Does 'the root of Haiti's misery' date back to France's 19th-century extortion?

 (Part 1)

 France 24 

Modified: 27/05/2022 

Video by:  Delano D'SOUZA

A newspaper exposé has reignited debate over the ongoing legacy of debts that Haiti was forced to pay to former colonial ruler France in the 19th century -- but the country's elites are surprisingly keen to bury the issue. After months of poring over archives, The New York Times estimated that debt payments starting in 1825 cost poverty-stricken Haiti between $21 billion and $115 billion -- or as much as eight times its GDP in 2020. One of the New York Times journalists who worked on this in-depth historical report, Constant Méheut, joins FRANCE 24 to recount exactly what ensued following Haiti's resounding victory against France and Napoleon's forces in 1803. When it declared independence in 1804, Haiti became the world's first Black-ruled republic and an outcast in an era dominated by countries that engaged in slavery. But, as Mr. Méheut explains, Haiti's new-found freedom came at a heavy price. In 1825, more than two decades after Haiti's victorious revolt over their former colonial power, "the French came back with a fleet of warships and told Haiti you have to pay us an astounding amount of money in reparations to the former French slaveholders or we will [wage] war again." For more than half a century, Haiti would be forced to pay exorbitant "reparations" to their former enslavers, all the while taking out loans from French banks to cover the forced reparations and thereby suffering from a "double debt" phenomenon. By the 1880's, with the extortion payments nearly paid off, Haiti was ready to break free from the French financial shackles, open a new central bank and ring in an exciting new era of freedom and prosperity. They had big dreams of investing in the nascent country's future: infrastructure, public works, schools, hospitals, etc. But Haitian hopes were quickly dashed. Haiti's new national bank was set up by French bank Crédit Industriel et Commercial (CIC) which functioned more as a Trojan horse. As The New York Times describes it, "The National Bank of Haiti, on which so many hopes were pinned [...] was national in name only. Far from an instrument of Haiti’s salvation, the central bank was, from its very inception, an instrument of French financiers and a way to keep a suffocating grip on a former colony into the next century."

 (Part 2)

Cancer patients forced to testify anonymously in Fukushima nuclear disaster case

The plaintiffs are facing a backlash as they argue that the 2011 disaster is the cause of their ill health.

ByJulian Ryall 

TOKYO29 May 2022 • 

Screening of local children has revealed unusually high levels of thyroid cancer

LIKE AFTER CHERNOBYL

 CREDIT: REUTERS/Toru Hanai

A court in Japan this week began hearings against the operator of a Fukushima power plant over cases of thyroid cancer in children allegedly linked to the 2011 nuclear disaster.

Six people are seeking Y616 million (£3.8 million) in damages from Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), claiming they were exposed to radiation after a massive tsunami destroyed the plant's cooling systems and caused three of the six reactors to suffer meltdowns.

The people - all aged between 6 and 16 at the time - have been living with the effects of that day ever since.

Four had their thyroid removed entirely and will need to take hormone medication for the rest of their lives. The other two had portions of their thyroids removed. One of the plaintiffs said the cancer has spread to their lungs.

"Because of the treatments, I could not attend university, or continue my studies for my future job, or go to a concert. I had to give up everything", testified one woman who is now in her 20s. "I want to regain my healthy body, but that's impossible no matter how hard I wish."
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Their stories are compelling, but the four women and two men are having to testify anonymously in the landmark case - in part because many people simply do not believe them.

Doctors in Fukushima have screened hundreds of thousands of people for thyroid cancer in the years since the disaster 

CREDIT: Simon Townsley

A culture of discrimination and misunderstanding around cancer in Japan that dates back to the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings of 1945 has meant they have become the target of insidious online abuse.

Some have suggested they are exaggerating or making their illnesses up. Others have accused them of damaging the reputation of Fukushima, which has tried hard to rehabilitate its image since the disaster.

One message posted on the site of a local Fukushima website said the plaintiffs’ parents were to blame because they failed to evacuate the children immediately after the disaster.

Another message said the people “appear to be annoyed that they cannot live perfect lives”.

A third person said the case was being encouraged “by an anti-Japanese, leftist group”.

The plaintiffs involved hope that this case will finally put all that to bed.

Their lawyers will argue that screening of 380,000 local children since 2011 has identified around 300 cases of thyroid cancer. That incidence rate of 77 cases per 100,000 people is significantly higher than the typical one or two cases per million and can only be linked to radiation from the accident, they say. A similar pattern was seen among children following the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine.

Japanese police wear suits to protect them from radiation as they search for victims after the disaster 

CREDIT: AP Photo/David Guttenfelder


“The doctor told my father that the cancer was highly malignant and had spread widely. He said it appeared to be less than five years old,” one man told local media before the hearing.

TEPCO has always maintained that there is no link between the leak of radiation from the plant and the spike in cancer cases, adding that tests of 1,080 children from three cities around the plant showed no one received more than 50 millisieverts of radiation, the annual limit for nuclear workers.

Their lawyers are set to argue that the high rate of thyroid cancers in Fukushima is the result of overtesting.

The company’s attempts to discredit them has added fuel to widespread hostility towards the plaintiffs.

“The people of Hiroshima were shunned by the rest of Japan after the atomic bombing of the city in 1945 because they did not understand about radiation and they feared they could catch it as a disease,” Chisato Kitanaka, an associate professor of sociology at Hiroshima University told The Telegraph.

“We cannot say that people do not lack information on the Fukushima case, but these people are still being singled out. They attack because they prefer to believe TEPCO or because they support the government’s plan to restart the nation’s nuclear reactors.”

In a separate case, earlier this year Japan's Supreme Court upheld an order for TEPCO to pay damages of 1.4 billion yen (£9.5 million) to about 3,700 people whose lives were devastated by the Fukushima nuclear disaster, in the first decision of its kind.

GENTRIFICATION KILLS

Do wood burners add to air pollution in cities? Yes, say citizen scientists

Pioneering Bristol study blames the solid-fuel burners in people’s homes for breaches of World Health Organisation guidelines

Rapidly gentrifying Bristol, where many residents have installed wood burners. 

Photograph: Shahid Khan/Alamy


Tom Wall
Sun 29 May 2022 

Like many parts of the country, Bristol has experienced a huge rise in the number of houses installing wood burners over the past decade. But as they have proliferated, mainly in the wealthier parts of the city where many Victorian and Georgian houses have been renovated, so too have fears that they cause pollution.

And now a group of citizen scientists taking part in the first community-led project targeting toxic smoke from wood burners has discovered new evidence about their dangers.

Ten volunteers based in a rapidly gentrifying Bristol inner-city neighbourhood with one of the highest concentrations of solid fuel-burning appliances in the city, recorded 11 breaches of World Health Organization daily guidelines for ultra-fine particulate pollution over a period of six months.

The project is thought to be the first where volunteers have been given newly affordable monitoring technology to gauge pollution partly caused by domestic combustion.

Sensors were placed throughout Ashley ward, which encompasses deprived parts of St Pauls and better-off Bristol neighbourhoods such as Montpelier. Oluwatosin Shittu, 40, who lives in St Pauls, found his sensor picked up more pollution during the weekend when some residents were burning wood and during rush hours when cars queued on local roads.

“At the weekend [pollution] was high because obviously up the hill [in Montpelier] people were burning wood,” he said.

Steve Crawshaw, who manages the project for the council, said domestic wood burning was a serious and growing problem. He added that the number of days exceeding WHO pollution guidelines in the ward were broadly in line with the city average, but still a cause of concern.

Wood burning and traffic produces tiny airborne particles – so called PM 2.5, or fine particulate matter of 2.5 micrometres or less in diameter – that can pass through the lungs and into the bloodstream, causing cardiovascular problems, respiratory disease, and cancers.

“The evidence is that virtually any level of PM 2.5 is harmful – there is no threshold below which you don’t see health effects,” Crawshaw said. “There are around 300 deaths a year in Bristol due to poor air quality and at least half of those deaths – 150 – are down to PM 2.5.”

The number of solid fuel appliances such as log burners installed in Bristol increased sevenfold in the decade after 2007, with just over 900 installations recorded in 2017.

“We’ve forgotten the journey we’ve been on with clean air. In the 1950s at least 4,000 people died in the smog in London in five days,” said Crawshaw. “That led to the clean air act, then natural gas started to get piped into homes in the 1960s. Most people stopped burning wood because it was dirty and inconvenient. Now it’s become a fashionable lifestyle choice.”

The council hopes the project will raise awareness of the health impact of wood smoke and encourage residents to turn on their central heating instead of loading up their log burners in the colder months. Crawshaw added: “We want citizen scientists to become community ambassadors for improving air quality and help change behaviour in the city.”

From the start of this year all new wood burners sold must be so-called “ecodesign”, but Crawshaw said: “Even if people burn clean, dry wood, those stoves are still grossly polluting compared with gas and electric.”

The smoke in the ward is not just coming from middle-class homes. There is a van-dwelling community in the area, with some burning wood to stay warm. Soaring energy costs are also driving some struggling families to use open fires again.


Avoid using wood burning stoves if possible, warn health experts

“Increasingly people are keeping warm by having an open fire in one room and turning off the central heating,” he said. “We recognise some people living in poverty don’t have an alternative. We’re not saying ‘you must freeze’ – we are taking a socially just approach.”

The latest analysis from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) reveals that wood burners and open fires are now responsible for 17% of the country’s total PM 2.5 pollution – more than the pollution caused by road traffic. Nationally, emissions from domestic wood burning increased by 35% between 2010 and 2020.


Wood burners emit more particle pollution than traffic, UK data shows

The government is consulting on introducing a new target for small particulates of 10 micrograms per cubic metre for England by 2040. However, this is close to existing levels in cities such as Bristol and double safe concentrations set by the WHO.

A Defra spokesperson said PM 2.5 pollution had fallen by 18% since 2010 but more needed to be done: “We have legislated the phasing-out of the sale of the most polluting solid fuels in domestic combustion, and have committed to driving down emissions across all modes of transport.”

A look at the moon

May 29, 2022
By Giancarlo Elia Valori
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

The statements made recently by Dr. Mohamed Ebrahim AI-Aseeri, chief executive officer of the National Scientific Space Agency of the Kingdom of Bahrain, give pause for thought, as more than five decades have elapsed since the first astronauts walked on the Moon. Since then, only one fleet of probes has visited the Moon, and they have done an extraordinary job in providing research centres with a huge amount of information about the lunar environment. Such research efforts have contributed to a deeper understanding of the Moon and paved the way for an afterthought, but this time for different purposes than before.

Over the past two decades, with the growing role played by the private sector in the space industry, investors have begun to think seriously about exploiting space in a way that can ensure a return on their investment. The idea emerged about mining on the surface of the Moon and expanding the implementation of scientific research, as well as promoting space tourism, including visits to the Moon.

In recent years there has been a positive shift toward returning to the Moon, as such an initiative has been announced by the United States of America, the European Union, Russia, the People’s Republic of China, Japan, India, the United Arab Emirates, Israel and the Republic of Korea (South Korea). It is their ambition to explore the Moon through huge investment in major projects.

The most important of all has been the 100 billion dollar Artemis programme devised by NASA (Artemis, the Greek goddess of the moon, was equated by the Romans with the goddess Diana).

The Artemis programme includes scenarios to stay on the Moon and its orbit for long periods of time, and establish a space base that would be used as a launch station for deep space missions since the Moon has lower gravity than Earth’s, thus enabling rockets to take off with ease. This also makes the venture more economically feasible, besides providing the possibility of mining, based on the scientific research results that have confirmed the presence of precious metals on the lunar surface.

One of the significant goals of the Artemis mission is to land men and the first woman on the surface of the Moon in 2025. The final Artemis programme will include 37 launches and establish a permanent base on the Moon. Traveling to the Moon, however, will still be expensive. Nevertheless the programme planners are very confident that benefits will outweigh costs. More importantly, the U.S. government expects a good return on investment. Comparing future Moon missions with Apollo missions will lead us to recognize the fact that Apollo‘s initial investment in technology, climate satellite systems, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), and advanced communication devices created to support Moon missions, are now part of everyday life on Earth.

As previously happened, the new technologies developed to support future missions to the Moon will surely find their way into world economies, thus stimulating a good return on investment.

The People’s Republic of China and Japan are investing heavily in space missions and are looking quite seriously at sending missions to the Moon. China and Russia have announced a collaborative effort to build a lunar base before 2030. China has been very clear about its intentions and has good capabilities to carry out a long-term Moon mission. It is planning a crewed mission landing on the Moon and developing new spacecraft for such missions.

The People’s Republic of China is also planning to build a scientific research station on the Moon’s south pole within the next ten years. Efforts by other countries to reach the Moon and study it from its orbit, or to land on its surface, vary considerably.

Only a few States have so far succeeded in reaching the surface of the Moon as part of successful or semi-successful missions. Current scientific advances and technologies being developed for Moon missions will enable scientists to conduct more detailed studies of the lunar surface and subsoil. Scientists will also seek answers to the big questions about how the solar system was formed, as well as the formation of the Moon and its geology. Moon exploration missions will stimulate large-scale scientific research and innovation.

Much investment, research efforts and innovation are required to overcome the problem of Moon’s hostile environment and enable humans to establish colonies on the surface of the closest celestial body to Earth. Scientific evidence corroborates the abundance of a range of worthy natural resources with high industrial value that can be extracted through mechanical processes. This is one of the most important returns on investment in current Moon missions.

Studies based on the analysis of lunar soil and rocks collected during the six missions that landed humans on the Moon surface between 1969 and 1972 indicate the presence of valuable resources that can be used in other space missions. For example, NASA believes that liquid oxygen can be easily extracted from the Moon and stored for use in other space missions, particularly missions to explore Mars, since the aforementioned oxygen is an important component of the fuel needed for space missions.

We should not overlook the fact that, over the past two decades, NASA has deployed a series of probes to the surface of the Moon to measure the amount of water inside or under the rocks. What they found was surprising. There was much more water than previously thought. There is evidence of water ice at the lunar poles, hidden in craters not reached by sunlight. NASA plans to use this water to support the colonization of the lunar surface and for upcoming deep space missions.

Returning to the Moon is an important move in planning future missions to Mars that have been attracting increased attention in recent years. The hope is that humans can learn from their stay on the Moon how to live in a hostile environment before setting foot on more distant places like Mars. The experience gained and the solutions developed will therefore pave the way for missions beyond the asteroid belt as well.

The Moon is a treasure chest, which is the reason why several countries are investing many of their resources to visit the Moon as soon as possible in an undeclared space race. Scientists from different fields firmly believe that man’s expected return to the lunar surface in the coming years could help life on Earth and bring about a huge all-round change.

Besides the above mentioned benefits of returning to the Moon, here are some main examples summarized in the following points:

1) the Moon could be a source of unlimited solar energy for Earth, by collecting that energy through very low-cost panels and then transmitting it to Earth in the form of a microwave beam;

2) the Moon is rich in helium-3 that is used for clean and safe nuclear fusion energy, medical applications, etc.;

3) the dark side of the Moon could be used to build radio and optical telescopes to advance human knowledge of the Cosmos and search for signals from extraterrestrial civilizations without any interference from Earth’s radio transmissions and frequencies;

4) the Moon could be an alternative place to store Earth’s hazardous industrial materials, waste and pollutants without worrying about their side effects on the environment;

5) the establishment of laboratories in lunar orbit will contribute to the implementation of numerous scientific tests and experiments that will have a direct impact on world progress and welfare. Such laboratories will also sustain human presence on the Moon surface for long periods of time and may help in the design of future similar laboratories in orbit around Mars;

6) colonization of the Moon surface cannot be done and sustained by a single State, and hence different countries sharing the same interests must work together; this will strengthen international collaboration for the benefit of all mankind, and joint efforts could lend significant support to peace on Earth.

The relationship between Earth and the Moon is fundamental to the existence of life on our planet. The Moon has been decisive in sustaining human existence on Earth for billions of years. A team of scientists from the University of Cologne analysed chemical signatures of rare elements in lunar rocks collected by the Apollo missions, dating their formation to about 4.51 billion years ago.

Today the Moon’s role is becoming increasingly important and will support human development and growth for many decades to come. With a view to achieving this goal, we need to return to the Moon, study it in situ, understand it well and make fair use of it to preserve its environment and ensure the sustainability of its natural resources.

While using the natural resources of the Moon, humans should avoid repeating the previous mistakes made on Earth. Future generations will be connected in an unprecedented way to the Moon, and this could be the source of great human achievements beyond our imagination.

IPAC New Zealand Co-Chairs Urge Pacific Neighbours To Exercise Sovereignty Over Police Presence

Sunday, 29 May 2022, 5:43 pm
Press Release: IPAC

The announcement in the last 24 hours by two Pacific Island countries that China will build police infrastructure there shows how quickly China is intending to militarise the Pacific. Plans to provide fingerprinting facilities in Samoa and the Solomon Islands, and possible arms to police in the Solomons, are the first step in militarisation by stealth.

We are deeply cynical about the timing of these announcements, and the deals being done with individual nations, ahead of two looming Pacific Islands Forum meetings — including the leaders’ meeting in July.

The whirlwind tour by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi ahead of the July PIF reveals that China is wanting to get ink on paper before the leaders have time to come together and think through the regional implications of their decisions.

It’s a classic case of divide and conquer.

While climate change is undoubtedly the priority long term issue, the immediate focus must be on the scale, speed and breadth of China’s intentions to expand into our region. This is evidenced by security deals done already in Samoa and the Solomon Islands, and the leaked draft regional pact which would see China have cooperation deals with 10 Pacific nations.

'We urge our Pacific neighbours to exercise their sovereignty and self-determination by holding their own strategic talks first before coming together at the behest of foreign actors — whether East or West.'

China will meet with the Foreign Ministers of 10 Pacific nations in Fiji tomorrow (Monday).

George W Bush, Freudian Confessions And Foiled Assassinations

Sunday, 29 May 2022, 5:37 pm
Opinion: Binoy Kampmark

Death, remarked Gore Vidal about Truman Capote’s passing, was a good career move. The novelist Saki also considered the good qualities of shuffling off the mortal coil. “Waldo,” he writes in “The Feast of Nemesis”, “is one of those people who would be enormously improved by death.” But what of those instances when death is foiled, the Grim Reaper cheated?

Former US President George W. Bush has had the good fortune of facing such a foiling, though the claims remain fresh. On May 24, Shihab Ahmed Shihab Shihab, an Iraqi national living in Columbus, Ohio, was arrested and charged with aiding and abetting the attempted murder of a former US official and charges of attempting to bring foreign nationals to the US. The nationals in question are said to be affiliated with the Islamic State group.

According to court documents, the FBI foiled the alleged plot through using informants. In November last year, Shihab is said to have told one of them that he “wished to kill former President Bush because they felt that he was responsible for killing many Iraqis and breaking apart the entire country of Iraq.”

In subsequent discussions with the informants, Shihab is alleged to have said how he “wanted to be involved in the actual attack and assassination of former President Bush and did not care if he died as he would be proud to have been involved in killing former President Bush.” One may fault the intended outcome, but the historical reasoning behind the motive is hard to rebut.

A statement from Bush’s chief of staff Freddy Ford had the former president expressing “all the confidence in the world in the United States Secret Service and our law enforcement and intelligence communities.”

This would have caused a gasp from those in the intelligence community so wilfully maligned in the lead-up to the Iraq War in 2003. The issue again surfaced in March 2019, when former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer took to Twitter to wash his hands while dumping on those who had supplied the intelligence. “There is a myth about the war that I have been meaning to set straight for years,” he began. “After no WMDs [weapons of mass destruction] were found, the left claimed ‘Bush lied. People died.’ This accusation is a lie. It’s time to put it to rest.”

Unconvincingly, Fleischer proceeded to shift and spread blame, claiming both he and Bush “faithfully and accurately reported to the public what the intelligence community concluded.” He implicated the CIA and other intelligence services, including those of Egypt, France and Israel. “We all turned out to be wrong. That is very different from lying.”

Bush’s role in the Iraq War was again appraised in his May 19 speech on election integrity, when he enlivened his gaffe-strewn legacy with a momentous Freudian slip or, as John Fugelsang described it, “a Freudian confession”. In referring to Vladimir Putin and Russia’s “absence of checks and balances”, Bush had something of a coming out moment: “the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq … I mean, of Ukraine.” On realising his error, and no doubt hoping to strike a note of levity, he suggested, “Iraq, too” and pointing to age as an excuse (“Anyway, 75!”).

Guffawing followed and could only come across as ghoulishly telling about the predations of power and cant. It was reminiscent of the light-hearted response to his cringeworthy performance at the 2004 White House Correspondents’ Dinner. While narrating a slideshow featuring a picture of himself peering under furniture in the Oval Office, Bush could not resist quipping: “Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be here somewhere.”

David Corn, writing at the time for The Nation, found little reason to be amused. “Before an audience of people who supposedly spend their days pursuing the truth, Bush joked about misstatements (if not lies) he had used to persuade (if not hornswoggle) the American people and the media.”

The same could be said about the Iraqi poet Sinan Antoon, who refused to partake in the merriment, however nervously expressed, by the audience gathered at the Southern Methodist University. “Freudian slip about past massacres (of other barbarians) amuses audience,” he tweeted gloomily. “All is well in the settler colony.”

All is certainly well for Bush, who, as absent-minded dauber, has undergone a rapid rehabilitation as elder statesman. Little is mentioned these days of his culpable role in leading an invasion of a sovereign state that saw the deaths and maiming of hundreds of thousands, displacements, poisonings, and the destabilisation of the Middle East. “When your guilty consciousness catch [sic] up with you and you end up confessing but no one cares to hold you to account,” observed Representative Ilhan Omar.

The Trump era aided the process of revision and cleansing, with traumatised Democrats and some notional progressives longing to return to the good times of the Bush imperium marked by illegal wars, warrantless surveillance and state sanctioned torture.

In 2019, Yale University, via a delegation of students who might have known better, bestowed upon Bush the Yale Undergraduate Lifetime Achievement Award. The decision to select the former president as the recipient was drawn from a vote by over 1,000 students, suggesting that collective amnesia is rife. In a statement, Bush acknowledged the role played by the university in shaping him, expressing pride in joining the ranks of Anderson Cooper, Maya Lin and Jodie Foster, concluding with the triumphant, “Boola Boola!”

With Shihab’s arrest, Bush can draw upon a well of sympathy by claiming that Freedom’s Land had, at the very least, a president worthy of being the target of an alleged assassination plot. But in prosecuting a man nursing a grievance over the role played by Bush in perpetrating the destruction of his homeland, another brutal invasion will receive some renewed attention, if only briefly.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. Email: bkampmark@gmail.com

Russia’s net debt position goes into deficit in 1Q22, but it still has healthy reserves despite sanctions and heavy spending
Russia had a net surplus of over $150bn before the war started if it had chosen to pay off all its external debt, but now that is a deficit of $177bn. / bne IntelliNews


By bne IntelliNews May 29, 2022

Russia’s external debt has been falling for years now to around 15% of GDP – one of the lowest levels in the world – and with the concurrent relentless rise in hard currency reserves, it created a net surplus position of some $153bn as of the end of the first quarter. Before the war started Russia could have paid off all its external debt and still had over $150bn left in cash.

After the sanctions on the Central Bank of Russia’s (CBR) gross international reserves (GIR) on February 27, now it can’t. Removing about $300bn from the spendable reserves and you are left with a deficit of just under $180bn. But even this is a low level of debt and the bulk of it is private, not public, leaving the government in a strong position.

In the shorter term, in the run-up to the war the external debt began to rise again modestly in the second and third quarter of 2021 to peak at $490bn in September before starting to fall again, as the chart shows, to the last reported figure of $453bn as of the end of the first quarter.

Of that debt, only $86bn was government debt and another $367.4bn was private debt, according to the CBR. Of the public debt some $40bn was in the form of Eurobonds.

With nominal GIR of $614bn at the end of the first quarter that meant Russia began the war in Ukraine with a net $528bn surplus in cash if you ignore the private debt. Even removing the circa $310bn of CBR reserves frozen by the West from this, that still leaves the government with a surplus of $218bn, of which circa $134bn is in the form of physical gold and a bit less than $100bn in cash.

Taking the more recent GIR total of $585.7bn as of May 13 as the total reserves and subtracting the $310bn of frozen CBR reserves as well as the sum total of public and private debt as of the end of the first quarter, that leaves a deficit of $177.3bn, or a net 12% of GDP, a very low level of indebtedness.

Looking at the same reserves in May and subtracting only the public part of the debt and there is a surplus of $187bn – more than twice as much as is needed to preserve the stability of the currency, leaving the government in a comfortable cash positive position.

Even taking into account an expected 15% contraction in the size of the Russian economy in 2022, that will still leave the Russian government with healthy surplus and a gross deficit – including public and private debt – of some 14% of GDP.

These calculations do not take into account the circa $100bn of revenues the government has earned as a windfall from the super-high commodity prices, and especial oil exports, in the first quarter. However, at the same time reserves have fallen by $43.8bn since the start of the war rather than this surplus accumulating as fresh reserves.

As the CBR has stopped reporting trade and reserves numbers since the start of the war, it is unclear what happened to this circa $150bn but it appears to have been spent on the war, used to prop up state-owned companies and banks or disappeared oversees as capital flight.

Iranian Agents Attack Peaceful Protestors, This Time in Brussels

Written by

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)
29th May 2022

Clerical Regime Agents Attack MEK Supporters’ Rally Brussels in Support of Abadan Uprising

In a desperate reaction to the solidarity protests in various cities of Iran in support of Abadan’s uprising, the ruling dictatorship sent its agents and functionaries to disrupt the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK/PMOI) supporters’ rally in Brussels in support of Abadan’s uprising. The frantic act was also prompted by the regime’s anger and concerns about the consequences of the conviction of Assadollah Assadi, its diplomat-terrorist, arrested and convicted by a Belgian court for attempting to bomb the opposition’s grand gathering in Paris in 2018.

Mistaking Brussels streets with Abadan, the regime agents attacked and injured several demonstrators who repelled their assault. Belgian police arrested the agents.

The agents’ attack on MEK supporters rally in Brussels is the flipside of the attempt to bomb the Iranian Resistance Annual gathering in 2018 by a regime diplomat-terrorist and his three accomplices holding Belgian passports.

The Iranian Resistance again demands the arrest, trial, and revocation of the passports of the regime’s agents, the Quds Force and Intelligence Ministry’s mercenaries, their expulsion from European countries, and the prevention of such agents from entering European soil. This is a necessary move to counter the clerical regime’s unbridled terrorism and ensure the security of Iranian refugees and asylum seekers.

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)

May 28, 2022

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)

Topic Summary

The NCRI is an umbrella organization of Iranian dissident groups that shared a common opposition to the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic Republic of Iran. It was founded in Paris in 1981 by Masoud Rajavi, the leader of the MeK/PMOI/MKO, and Abol-Hassan Banisadr. Since 1983, it has been exclusively controlled by the MeK... The NCRI's United States operation has also been listed as a foreign terrorist organization.

RAND CORP.

National Council of Resistance of Iran - Wikipedia

Iraqi farmers in distress as severe water shortages affect wheat harvest


Iraqi farmers work in their fields north of Mosul. (Reuters)

The Associated Press, Baghdad
Published: 29 May ,2022

Salah Chelab crushed a husk of wheat plucked from his sprawling farmland south of Baghdad and inspected its seeds in the palm of one hand. They were several grams lighter than he hoped.

“It’s because of the water shortages,” he said, the farm machine roaring behind him, cutting and gathering his year’s wheat harvest.

Chelab had planted most of his 10 acres (4 hectares) of land, but he was only able to irrigate a quarter of it after the Agriculture Ministry introduced strict water quotas during the growing season, he said. The produce he was growing on the rest of it, he fears, “will die without water.”

At a time when worldwide prices for wheat have soared due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Iraqi farmers say they are paying the price for a government decision to cut irrigation for agricultural areas by 50 percent.

The government took the step in the face of severe water shortages arising from high temperatures and drought — believed to be fueled by climate change — and ongoing water extraction by neighboring countries from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. All those factors have heavily strained wheat production.

Wrestling with the water shortage, Iraq’s government has been unable to tackle other long-neglected issues.

Desertification has been blamed as a factor behind this year’s relentless spate of sandstorms. At least 10 have hit the country in the past few months, covering cities with a thick blanket of orange dust, grounding flights, and sending thousands to hospitals.

“We need water to solve the problem of desertification, but we also need water to secure our food supplies,” said Essa Fayadh, a senior official at the Environment Ministry. “We don’t have enough for both.”

Iraq relies on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers for nearly all of itswater needs. Both flow into Iraq from Turkey and Iran. Those countries have constructed dams that have either blocked or diverted water, creating major shortages in Iraq.

Water Resources Minister Mahdi Rasheed told The Associated Press that river levels were down 60 percent compared to last year.

For Chelab, less water has meant a smaller grain size and lower crop yields.

In 2021, Chelab produced 30,000 tons of wheat, the year before that 32,000, receipts from Trade Ministry silos show. This year, he expects no more than 10,000.

His crops are both rain-fed and irrigated via a channel from the Euphrates. Due to low precipitation levels, he has had to rely on the river water during the growing season, he said.

Government officials say change is necessary.

The current system has been inefficient and unsustainable for decades. Water scarcity is leaving them no choice but to push to modernize antiquated and wasteful farming techniques.

“We have a strategic plan to face drought considering the lack of rain, global warming, and the lack of irrigation coming from neighboring countries as we did not get our share of water entitlements,” said Hamid al-Naif, spokesman at the Agriculture Ministry.

The ministry took measures to devise new types of drought-resistant wheat and introduce methods to increase crop yields.

“We are still dealing with irrigation systems of the 1950s. It has nothing to do with the farmers,” he said. “The state must make it efficient, we must force the farmer to accept it.”

Iraqi farmers have historically been heavily dependent on the state in the production of food, a reliance that policymakers and experts said drains government funds.

The Agriculture Ministry supports farmers by providing everything from harvesting tools, seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides at a subsidized rate or for free. Water diverted from rivers for irrigation is given at no cost. The Trade Ministry then stores or buys produce from farmers and distributes it to markets.

Wheat is a key strategic crop, accounting for 70 percent of total cereal production in the country.

Planting starts in October and harvest typically begins in April and extends to June in some areas. Last year, the Agriculture Ministry slashed subsidies for fertilizers, seeds, and pesticides, a move that has angered farmers.

Local demand for the staple is between 5-6 million tons a year. But local production is shrinking with each passing year. In 2021, Iraq produced 4.2 million tons of wheat, according to the Agriculture Ministry. In 2020, it was 6.2 million tons.

“Today we might get 2.5 million tons at best,” said al-Naif. That would require Iraq to drive up imports.

Most of the wheat harvest is usually sold to the Trade Ministry. In a sign of the low harvest, so far there are currently only 373,000 tons of wheat available in Trade Ministry storehouses, al-Naif said.

To meet demands amid the recent global crisis in the grain market, the government recently changed a policy to allow all Iraqi farmers to sell their produce to the Trade Ministry silos. Previously, this was limited to farmers who operated within the government plan.

Back in Chelab’s farm, the wheat is ready to be transported to the silo.

“It’s true we need to develop ourselves,” he said. “But the change should be gradual, not immediate.”

A combine harvester at the middle of a wheat field harvesting crops in Yousifiyah, Iraq Tuesday, May. 24, 2022. 

At a time when worldwide prices for wheat have soared due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Iraqi farmers say they are paying the price for a government decision to cut irrigation for agricultural areas by 50% due to severe water shortages arising from high temperatures, drought, climate change and ongoing water extraction by neighboring countries from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers - all factors that have heavily strained wheat production. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)

Significantly lower water levels are seen on the Tigris River, in Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday, May 28, 2022. 

Planned Jewish nationalist “flag march” is a festival of hate

Tamara Nassar

Rights and Accountability 

29 May 2022

Israeli Jewish nationalists march through Jerusalem as part of the annual “March of the Flags” to celebrate Israel’s occupation and colonization of East Jerusalem on 15 June 2021. Baraah Abo RamouzAPA images

Thousands of Israeli Jewish nationalists intend on staging a major provocation in occupied East Jerusalem on 29 May, despite warnings from the Palestinian resistance in Gaza.

The Jewish extremists plan to hold their annual “March of the Flags” on what they call Jerusalem Day, an Israeli-invented holiday celebrating its occupation and colonization of the city in 1967.

In previous years, the event has been a festival of hate, with marchers, including children terrorizing Palestinian residents and chanting such genocidal slogans as “death to the Arabs,” Let Palestine be “wiped out” and “Muhammad is dead” – a denigrating reference to the prophet.

Fully knowing this, Israeli police have nonetheless approved a route for Sunday that would allow the Jewish extremists to march through the Muslim Quarter of the Old City, as they have done in previous years.

But occupation authorities have said they will “cap” the number of marchers to 16,000.

“Half the group will march through the Old City via the Damascus Gate, while the other half will go through Jaffa Gate, likely only skirting the Muslim Quarter,” according to The Times of Israel.

Israel will also deploy 3,000 officers to “secure the rally.”

But that will offer little comfort to Palestinians, who still face the prospects of thousands of anti-Palestinian extremists, backed by occupation forces, forcing their way through the Old City’s narrow streets.

The Jewish nationalists also know very well that Israeli police almost never subject them to the kind of brutality regularly used against Palestinians: tear gas, live fire and rubber-coated metal bullets. This means that if they decide to defy police orders, they will be able to do so with impunity.

Sunday’s march is set to take place despite stern warnings from the Palestinian resistance organization Hamas.

Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’ political bureau, said in a pre-recorded message on Monday that the group is prepared to defend the al-Aqsa mosque compound using “all capabilities.”

Haniyeh warned “the enemy not to commit such crimes,” adding, “Our decision is clear, no hesitation or faltering.”

Last year, Israeli attacks on Jerusalem and the al-Aqsa mosque compound led to a military confrontation between Palestinian resistance factions in Gaza and Israel that lasted 11 days and killed more than 250 Palestinians.

It was the first time Palestinian resistance groups launched a major military operation from Gaza specificially in response to Israeli aggression in Jerusalem. This denies Israel the assurance that it can carry on as it wishes in the city without risking a much broader confrontation it may want to avoid.

Israeli police chief Kobi Shabtai raised alert levels in Jerusalem ahead of the march. Israel is also reportedly contacting Hamas through mediators in Qatar and Egypt in a bid to keep violence from escalating.

“We’re coming to dismantle the Dome of the Rock”

Meanwhile, on Saturday, left-wing Israeli groups planned to raze a settlement outpost in the occupied West Bank. Israeli police clamped down on the protest and arrested activists.

Prior to the event, the groups had published a flyer on Facebook proclaiming, “We’re coming to dismantle the Homesh outpost.” It shows a bulldozer destroying a building.

The flyer also bears the logos of the liberal Zionist groups sponsoring the event, including Peace Now and Breaking the Silence.

The construction of all Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank is a war crime under international law.

But Homesh, an outpost near Nablus, is not authorized by Israel. It is one of the four tiny West Bank settlements removed in 2005, at the same time that Israel removed its occupation forces and settlers from the interior of the Gaza Strip.

But some settlers have maintained an unauthorized presence in Homesh with the tacit support of Israeli leaders.

Bentzi Gopstein, the head of the extremist Jewish nationalist group Lehava, posted a photoshopped version of the flyer on his Telegram channel.

The text was changed to read, “We’re coming to dismantle the Dome of the Rock.” An image of the Jerusalem shrine that is part of the al-Aqsa mosque compound was inserted under the teeth of the bulldozer.

Gopstein may have been trolling the liberal Zionist groups, but many Jewish nationalists like him are open about their intentions to destroy the Muslim holy sites.

The so-called Temple Movement, which enjoys support from many Israeli leaders, aims to take over the al-Aqsa mosque compound and build a Jewish temple there.

This apocalyptic plan, if implemented, could ignite a global religious war. It is why Palestinians insist on defending Jerusalem, particularly their holy sites, from any further settler encroachment.