SAITM As Model For Expanding Medical Education?

By Sumathy Sivamohan, Harini Amarasuriya, A. Karunatileke, Athula Samarakoon, Upul Wickramasinghe, Waradas Thiyagarajah, Chinthaka Rajapakse, Shamila Ratnasuriya, S.Thanujan, M.Mauran, Amali Wedegedera, Niyanthini Kadirgamar and Sylvester Jayakody –AUGUST 5, 2017

A Response to the Subcommittee on Higher Education of the Parliamentary Sectoral Oversight Committee

On the 1st of August, concerned Academics and Activists gathered at the Honourable Speaker, Karu Jayasuriya’s office in the parliament and handed over a response to the report on SAITM made by a sub-committee of the Oversight Committee on Education and Human Resources.  Copies of the report to be given all the members of the Oversight Committee, Prime Minister, Leader of the Opposition, Government Whip, Opposition Whip and the Minister of Higher Education and Highways were also handed over to the Hon. Speaker. 

SAITM: An ill-conceived response to the question of health and education in Sri Lanka

The government appears ill prepared to address the unravelling situation around SAITM. Its current actions are mired in violence, bombastic rhetoric and unrealistic projections of great economic advances to be made in the business of education and health. The policy paper of the Subcommittee on Higher Education of the Parliamentary Sectoral Oversight Committee,  Expansion of Medical Education in Sri Lanka With the Participation of the Private Sector:  Adopting the South Asian Institute of Technology and Medicine (SAITM) as a Model published on 23 November, 2016 is a justification and conceptualisation of  SAITM as an educational institution, offering it as a panacea for the supposed ills dogging the heels of the two sectors. It is an illustration of the nature of the government’s approach to some very serious issues, undertaken in an ad hoc, unprofessional and unethical manner. The ill-conceived nature of the report unequivocally demonstrates the fact that SAITM is itself a poorly planned programme that barely addresses the problems that exist in the areas of health and education and creates new ones that will be insurmountable in years to come.

Both health and education have been the cornerstone of the democratic structure of the Sri Lankan state.  A policy shift on either of these sectors demands careful thought, public engagement, and the highest degree of integrity on the part of all the policy makers. Yet on both counts, the policy paper demonstrates abjectly poor thinking and a clear lack of vision for the country.

SAITM: Is it numbers?

Regarding Health, the paper says that SAITM will address the lacunae in the system presented by the inadequate number of doctors in the country. In other words, SAITM will be able to add to the number of doctors in the country. Such a claim, if stated with any sincerity, demonstrates that the policy makers have absolutely no understanding of the existing system of health care delivery. The problems besetting the health sector are not a mere matter of numbers. They are an integral part of the structure of health care provision, namely distribution and specialization. As medical professionals, researchers and those who actually care about the state of affairs in Sri Lanka will tell you:

a) The inadequate number of medical professionals lies in the areas of distribution of doctors across the country. In 2015, Colombo District had 182.3 doctors per 100,000 population (employed by the Ministry of Health) compared with 37 doctors per 100,000 population in Nuwara Eliya District (Vallipuranathan 2017). That same year, Colombo District recorded the highest number of medical officers (5344), while the lowest number was recorded in Mullaitivu District (Health Information Unit, Ministry of Health 2015).

b) Doctors on completing their internship are posted to peripheral areas, but can leave those stations before they are eligible for transfer if they pass a screening exam for a course of specialization. There is no mechanism in place to retain non-specialist doctors in such areas, resulting in a large number of cadre positions remaining vacant.

Read More

Drought plays havoc

By Madhuri Peiris-2017-08-06

All nine provinces in the country are suffering from a severe drought due to insufficient rainfall. The government requests the residents in these areas to use water with much care and minimize wastage, especially due to the despite the little rainfall received in the past few weeks. The country's drinking water crisis continues as storage levels of many tanks have dropped drastically. What is worse is that according to the Meteorological Department there will be no rain in these areas until October.

The latest data on electricity generation for 2016 and up to March 2017 released by the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) shows the sharp impact of the drought on hydro electricity generation. By Q4 2016 and Q1 2017 reservoir levels were at their lowest in five years, and this has had a major impact on the cost of electricity generation as the CEB had to switch to thermal generation. At a higher cost. CEB hydropower generation in Q1 of this year (2017) was the lowest compared to Q1 of the past three years.

Since June/July, 2016 through to March 2017, electricity generation in all hydropower stations was halved (or more) due to the drought. On average every month, the top 6 largest hydropower plants were operating at a fraction of their full capacity.

Irrigation

Irrigation mainly for agriculture purpose has been highly affected by the drought and many agriculture farmers are finding it difficult to maintain their cultivations. Due to low production, vegetable prices have been rising over the time. According to Wasantha Bandara Palugaswewa, Director Irrigation, Water Management, and Training, Department of Irrigation, out of major tanks 73 have got only 15 per cent of overall capacity.

"We have completely cut down the water supply to paddy fields in drought affected areas at the moment," Palugaswewa said. "We carefully manage water with the help of Sri Lanka Police and I hope we can save the crops," he added.
Cultivations and farms

The prevailing dry weather conditions are severely damaging the crop production as well as the livestock industry in the country. The drought that lasted for nearly eight months has turned into a crisis situation for many cultivators as well as the farmers in affected areas.

For most of the farmers, it is the worst condition they have seen in decades. Survival has become their only goal as there is no sign of rain for months. Namal Karunarathne, National Organizer, All Ceylon Peasants' Federation said, " 118 District Secretariats have been affected by the drought. Areas like Vilachchiya in the North Central Province, which I have visited personally many cultivators are suffering without water even for their consumption like drinking, washing, and cooking. The situation in Ampara remains the same.

"Sri Lanka has enough rivers but we don't utilize these rivers in a proper manner," he added. "Many major rivers have been blocked to generate electricity, but what I suggest is generating electricity has many options but agriculture does not. So we should utilize our river water mainly for agriculture and find out alternatives to generate electricity," Karunarathne said.

Dairy farmers

Not only cultivators but also dairy farmers have equally been affected, he further stated. Especially in areas like Trincomalee, Seruvila and Vilachchiya cattle do not have enough water to drink and some farmers have started selling their herd for meat since they do not have a way of providing food and water. "Dry weather has eliminated many grazing areas and also the government has restricted cattle from entering forest reserves which I think is not fair," he said. These innocent dairy farmers and their cattle do not harm the forest. I think the government should call an emergency situation for this drought and seek international assistance and aid to stop people suffering.

However, a senior official from a leading dairy company, one of the country's leading milk-based product manufacturer said they have not seen any decline in their milk supply. "Some of the small scale private milk collectors have stopped purchasing milk from dairy farmers and I do not know whether that is the reason for our supply to remain the same even in areas like Batticaloa,

Anuradhapura and Ampara which are severely affected by the drought," he added. "I think nowadays most of the dairy farmers do not send their cows to the jungle for grazing, but they provide food and water by themselves. So these cattle are not affected by the drought, he further stated.

Disaster management measures

We see a drastic change in the world's climate and many forest covers having been cut down for various development purposes which lead to the long lasting droughts as well as the drop in ground water levels. According to the National Disaster Management Centre (NDMC) data, more than one million people are suffering for nearly eight months in all the nine provinces in the country due to the ongoing dry weather. The government has already sanctioned more than Rs 40 million to District Secretaries mainly to address the drinking water issue. More than 6,000 tanks have been allocated in many different locations to provide clean drinking water to the affected communities.

Pradeep Kodippili, Assistant Director, NDMC said still some of the areas are not getting sufficient amount of drinking water. Within the 2-3 months we have provided 200 water bowsers and we have been providing them for some time, he added. The Northern Province is the worst affected and even most of the areas in the Eastern Province have not received rain.

Answering a question on whether there were any funds distributed among the affected residents he said funds had been distributed to farmers for their damaged crops for the eight months of drought.

The Ministry of Disaster Management has established Disaster Management Units to coordinate ground level conditions. The drought has affected the whole economic situation in these areas Kodippili added. "I should say that the areas like Kalutara and Moneragala which were also affected by the drought have come out of danger as these areas have started experiencing sufficient rainfalls.
"And we are continuing our funding to provide drinking water to drought affected areas," he said. We have enough funds allocated. We have provided a 24-hour service to the residents so that they can call us if they are in need of drinking water.

Drought mitigation projects

As a long-term measure the NDMC carries out drought mitigation projects which include rainwater harvesting projects and constructing irrigation wells. "We hope to expand our drought mitigation measures with more funds in the future," Kodippili said. "The government is working on a project with the Arthur C. Clarke Centre for monitoring droughts and predicting them in the future." he added.

Kodippili also said, "The people need to save water especially and they should properly utilize rain water. There should be a proper mechanism to protect the existing water bodies without getting contaminated.

The country also needs new policies or revise the existing ones in order to face disasters such as droughts."

Global climate is changing rapidly resulting in many natural disasters in various parts of the world.
As a country with a proud history of being the number one rice producer in the region Sri Lankans had the best practice of using tanks and other water bodies. Both traditional knowledge and discipline were around the use of water.

Many of these practices have disappeared over time. Traditional crop patterns have not been followed by many farmers while encroachments and dumping of waste have increased rapidly. Rapid development has led to the clearance of many natural forest covers.

As a result, we are dealing with more natural disasters such as floods, droughts, cyclones and even landslides causing many deaths and damage to residents. Drought conditions are getting worse day by day in several provinces, and the extremely hot weather has led to stress in daily life and damage to crops and livestock. Preparedness, awareness and proper management of forests and water bodies can only minimize the effects of these harsh weather conditions and no government can alone work towards them.

South Africa marks 12 years of BDS successes


South Africans march in Cape Town against Israel’s attack on Gaza in August 2014. The movement for Palestinian rights continues to gain strength in South Africa and around the world.Mike HutchingsReuters

Kwara Kekana and Muhammed Desai- 4 August 2017

South Africa has been described by Israeli media as the “mothership” of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement. While we as a country have made remarkable strides, we are only but one partner in this growing international human rights movement, a movement that proudly turned 12 this year.

In 2005, Palestinians called on the international community to support a campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions against the government of Israel until it abides by international law.

The BDS movement, as it has come to be known, is inspired by the successful boycott of apartheid South Africa and has grown to include millions of allies globally. It has wide-reaching support in South Africa. The largest protest in South African history, after all, was the National Coalition 4 Palestine’s 2014 #SAMarch4Gaza in support of the Palestinian struggle.

BDS successes, which are registered on a monthly basis across the country and globe, motivate peace-loving peoples around the world. They are a practical form of solidarity that sends a clear and concrete message to Israel that there is a price to pay for its crimes. These victories and activities also bolster the spirit of resistance of Palestinians and their progressive Jewish Israeli allies fighting for an end to Israeli apartheid.

Electrifying pace

The BDS movement is indeed moving at an encouraging, inspiring and electrifying pace. Israel and its lobby groups are trying to respond (rather than ending Israel’s apartheid) but they are failing.

In July, in a decision with far reaching impact, the General Council of the World Communion of Reformed Churches, representing over 80 million Christians, called on its members to take action in support of the Palestinians. Among other measures, the body has urged its more than 225 member churches worldwide to examine their investment relationships.

These churches are joining a long list of Christian congregations taking similar positions and resolutions. These include the Quakers, United Methodists, the Mennonite Church of the USA, Presbyterians, the United Church of Christ, Unitarian Universalists, the Catholic Conference of Major Superiors of Men, the Alliance of Baptists, the Evangelical Lutheran Church and the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa (UCCSA).

Last year, when the UCCSA, with over 1,000 local South African churches, adopted the BDS boycott of Israel, the church, importantly, drew attention to the deceptive conflation between “Biblical Israel” and the “Modern State of Israel” and between the Israelites of the Bible and Israelis.

Beyond the churches, South Africa is also scoring major wins on the cultural, academic, sports, consumer, political and government front. One of our first major wins was in 2011 when the University of Johannesburg ended its relations with Israel’s Ben-Gurion University. This set the context for further academic boycott successes including South Africa’s largest student formation, SASCO, adopting BDS, followed by the South African Union of Students also endorsing a similar resolution.

Last year, after engagement by the local BDS South Africa chapter, several academics pulled out of a conference on genocide taking place in Israel. Among those who withdrew, much to the Israeli organizers’ irritation, was the vice president of the International Network of Genocide Scholars, who hails from South Africa.

The BDS campaign is also active within the South African cultural sector with some of the country’s biggest artists, comedians and film stars coming out to back the movement, our activities and events.
This year, award-winning South African film director, John Trengove withdrew from an Israeli film festival hosted in Tel Aviv. The South African withdrawal led to several other international filmmakers also canceling their participation.

Politics and labor

Within the trade union movement, COSATU, one of the first labor federations in the world to adopt BDS, has not only incorporated BDS within its local organizing and among affiliates but has also been championing its promotion at an international level.

COSATU and its affiliates, for example, were some of the main drivers of the Public Services International adopting BDS as a strategy at the global trade union federation’s congress in Durban a few years back. PSI is one of the largest federations in the world, representing more than 20 million workers.

On the political front, South African President Jacob Zuma, for two years in a row now, has included in his 8 January speech marking the founding of the African National Congress a reminder to all employees in government that they are to boycott travel to Israel.

Furthermore, the recent recommendation by South Africa’s governing party to downgrade its embassy in Tel Aviv has been welcomed by Palestinians across the political spectrum – including the Palestinian Authority, Fatah and Hamas – and is a major signal to Israel that its violations of international law are unacceptable, that it cannot be business as usual.

Importantly, the recommendation to downgrade has also been welcomed by South African Jews for a Free Palestine, an organization representing a growing number of Jews in this country in support of BDS. The South African Communist Party, COSATU and various other organizations also came out in support of a downgrade or shutting down of the embassy.

At a government level there have been various successes. The Israeli ambassador has tried in the last few years to sign contracts between our two countries in the water sector – selling a similar colonial line that was sold to African countries by apartheid South Africa during the 1980s, that without our technology you will not progress. Likewise, Israel and its lobbyists are trying to suggest that we, as African countries, cannot do without their technology.

To Israel’s embarrassment, several events that the Israeli ambassador tried to host with the South African government were canceled. Furthermore, water minister Nomvula Mokonyane warned against Israel’s so-called water technology, saying Israel has been using water as a “tool to control the Palestinian state.”

“Israel,” she added, “is the world’s leading practitioner in water apartheid.”

Note of caution

However, some officials at South Africa’s department of international relations do not always respect the country’s policies on this issue.

Last year, for example, at the very time Speaker of Parliament Baleka Mbete was celebrating the BDS movement in her address to the annual Israeli Apartheid Week campaign, Jerry Matjila, then director general of the department of international relations, was at a photo shoot with Dore Gold, his counterpart from the Israeli foreign ministry.

Matjila claimed in contradiction with government policy, that he wanted to investigate ways in which he could improve relations with Israel.

How to hold such individuals accountable needs to be investigated especially at a time when the Israeli government has made public the huge amount of resources that are being invested in trying to thwart the BDS movement.

In some ways, the collective magnitude of our joint successes is reflected in the fact that Israel is investing time, energy and money to counter BDS. As Palestinian BDS leader Omar Barghouti put it, while activists are unnerved by the Israeli government’s attempt to attack this nonviolent movement, we are definitely not deterred.

Eyes on the prize

Palestinian academic Nada Elia, in an article celebrating 12 years of BDS, has noted how the wide array of successes, victories and campaigns over the last 12 years reveals the extent to which multiple segments of society – students, church members, unions, athletes and superstars – are now aware of and actively opposed to Israel’s abuses.

However, she cautions, no matter how much we have gained from these years of organizing, the biggest victory is still to come. And that is the day Palestinians (like us South Africans, the indigenous people of the land) are free in their homeland.

“Each victory we score – and we continue to score victories big and small almost daily – is proof that we, the people, are stronger than the most militarized powers that are intent on suppressing us,” Elia writes. “We must keep our eyes on the prize, as this is one case where the final destination, not just the empowering journey, is what matters.”

That day is coming sooner rather than later because of the Palestinian spirit of perseverance together with the advances of the BDS movement – a movement that gains its strength not from military power or financial resources but from the people.

The BDS victories, successes and wins of the last decade, both in South Africa and beyond, are not that of one organization or group of activists: they belong to the various communities who come out to protests, who stay away from certain stores, who make donations, attend rallies and events.
The ordinary person gives this extraordinary movement its internationalist muscle.


Kwara Kekana is the national spokesperson and Muhammed Desai is the national coordinator of BDS South Africa, a local South African partner of the international BDS movement which is led by the Palestinian BDS National Committee based in Ramallah. A version of this article was originally published by South Africa’sWeekend Argus newspaper.

Abbas pledges to ramp up sanctions against Gaza

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has been seeking to weaken rival Hamas by cutting payments for power supplies to Gaza

 

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the internationally recognised Palestinian government based in the occupied West Bank (AFP)

Sunday 6 August 2017

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has pledged to increase sanctions on the Gaza Strip, drawing a fresh attack from its Hamas rulers.

Abbas, the leader of the internationally recognised Palestinian government based in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, has been seeking to weaken Hamas by cutting payments for electricity supplied by Israel to crowded Gaza.

On Saturday, he said he would continue with sanctions on the coastal strip, despite UN concerns that this amounts to collective punishment of its two million residents.

"We will continue the gradual stopping of financial allocations to the Gaza Strip until Hamas commits to reconciliation" with the Abbas administration, the president said.

"Since the coup, we have paid a billion and a half dollars to the Gaza Strip," Abbas said, referring to the 2007 overthrow of his Fatah movement by Hamas in Gaza.

"We will not allow this to continue," the WAFA official Palestinian news agency reported him as saying in Arabic.

"Either things will go as they are meant to be, or we will continue to reduce these funds," he said, accusing Hamas of stealing some of the funds.

The Islamist group responded late Saturday in a statement, saying: "Attacking Hamas and threatening the people of Gaza with more sanctions is a blow to reconciliation efforts."

It accused Abbas's Palestinian Authority of working with Israel to isolate Gaza and bring suffering to its people.

Both sides have previously committed to reconciliation, but repeated attempts have failed.

The Palestinian Authority had been paying for some electricity to be delivered to Gaza since 2007, but in recent months has reduced the amount of money it pays.

Gazans now receive only a couple of hours of electricity a day, delivered from the territory's own power station and others in Israel and Egypt.

The Palestinian Authority has also cut stipends to its former Gaza staff forced out of office by Hamas, in a move analysts see as seeking to sow discontent in the enclave.

Why Has Rex Tillerson Belly-Flopped as Secretary of State?

BY DEREK CHOLLET-AUGUST 4, 2017 

I ask the question with regret. Before this year, Tillerson had a long and distinguished career as chief executive of one of the world’s most complex companies. At ExxonMobil, he led a global workforce of thousands, and was no stranger to tricky politics, earning praise for navigating his company’s position on climate change and helping to end the discriminatory, homophobic policies of the Boy Scouts of America.

Like Tillerson himself, I was surprised when President Donald Trump asked him to lead the State Department. He was not part of the Republican national security establishment or a major political figure, and aside from serving on a few think-tank boards, barely registered in the foreign-policy community. Nor, thankfully, was he a Trump zealot or Fox News regular like Rudy Giuliani or John Bolton. As I learned more about Tillerson’s private-sector record, I came to believe he had the tools for success at the State Department. In fact, from a management perspective, his experience surpassed that of most of his predecessors.

Although new to public policy, Tillerson was no stranger to global politics, having rubbed shoulders and brokered deals with many world leaders. Such respected mandarins as James Baker, Robert Gates, and Condoleezza Rice vouched for him. So I was ready to do more than just give Tillerson a chance — I actually expected good things.

After six months on the job, the secretary of state entered August enduring one of Washington’s hallowed rituals, the career deathwatch, as leaks about his frustrations grew and rumors spread that he might walk. A few months ago it seemed reasonable to bet that he would not survive much past the 2018 midterms, and be replaced by Nikki Haley, the current U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Now it would be surprising if he even made it that far. Things are so bad that when the State Department press spokeswoman recently said Tillerson would be taking a few days off, many immediately guessed he was on the brink of resigning. The chatter has even produced a new word in the Washington vernacular: “Rexit.”

Other secretaries of state have gotten off to rough starts — think Alexander Haig and Warren Christopher. But Tillerson’s beginning is by far the worst of the modern era. This week, he made his first visit to the State Department pressroom, explaining how busy he’s been and giving shout-outs to a lot of officials he’s working closely with. But one appearance can’t compensate for the fact that, as an analysis by the New York Times illustrated, this is the lowest-profile State Department in at least half a century.

Tillerson is easily the most invisible top diplomat since Christian Herter. But as a devastating report by Foreign Policy and many smart observers have pointed out, the institutional damage is far greater and more lasting.

How could someone with such an accomplished private-sector career have turned out to be such a disappointment? Consider four possible reasons.

First, there’s the excuse one hears most often from Tillerson’s defenders: This is a short-term hiccup and in fact he’s playing a long game. Tillerson’s slow start is therefore by design — he’s purposely taking it slow and steady, learning the issues, building his relationship with the president, solidifying his alliance with the “axis of adults,” and once he’s ready, things will turn around.

This spin worked for the first few months, but its shelf life has long expired. Tillerson’s most prominent validators have gone quiet — has anyone heard from Baker, Gates, or Rice lately? We used to read a lot about Tillerson and Trump dining together, and how Tillerson talked to Secretary of Defense James Mattis all the time. Now we hear more about Tillerson fighting with the White House over personnel, see him get out-hustled by the Pentagon, and witness the public spectacle of he and Trump differing on policy issues like the fight between Saudi Arabia and Qatar or the fate of the Iran nuclear deal. The president regularly brags about his generals, but never says very much about his Rex.

To be effective, the secretary of state must have a strong relationship with the president. So I don’t fault Tillerson for trying. The problem is he doesn’t have much to show for it, and a lot of what he’s done to appease the White House (such as alienating the career Foreign Service officers, who have made their suspicions of Trump widely known) has only compounded the problems in his department.

Now the knives are out for him, as some of the chatter about Tillerson’s ineffectiveness are coming not just from the State Department, but sources in the White House. He has very few admirers in Congress. And as for the big boss, Tillerson has yet to be on the receiving end of a disapproving Trump tweet, but the fate of Attorney General Jeff Sessions has to be foremost on his mind. No matter how much time one spends sucking up to this president, you are only a step away from being under the bus.

A second explanation is that since Tillerson genuinely believes the State Department needs to be better managed and reformed to be effective in the 21st century, he is taking the time to make that happen. That’s not entirely wrong. I don’t know anyone who believes the State Department is a bureaucratic Ferrari. Previous secretaries have undertaken major reform efforts that reshaped the organizational chart. Christopher had a “strategic management initiative,” Madeline Albright pursued a “war for talent,” Colin Powell oversaw a massive information technology upgrade, Rice launched “transformational diplomacy,” and Hillary Clinton instituted a “quadrennial diplomacy and development review,” which John Kerry continued. So Tillerson’s “redesign” follows in these footsteps.

But there are some big differences. All of these prior efforts were undertaken in the service of making the State Department stronger — to enhance America’s diplomatic power with greater resources and people. They were about investing in the institution. Tillerson, on the other hand, seems perfectly content with diminishing the department’s role.

Tillerson has some highly capable people around him — friends and former colleagues I greatly respect. But when it comes to building a State Department for the next generation, I am hard pressed to name a single thing Tillerson has said or done to attract the best talent. If anything, he’s driving people away by decapitating the Foreign Service and ending valuable entry-level programs like the Presidential Management Fellowship. He appears fine with all the senior level vacancies. He has told senators privately that he thinks that the State Department is way too big and has too much money — as evidenced by his shocking decision not to spend nearly $80 million allocated to the department to fight terrorist propaganda and Russian disinformation.

So despite all the earnest management consultant talk, few are really convinced Tillerson’s reform initiative is about making diplomacy more effective or actually driven by the “bottom-up.” The people running it are viewed with derision and suspicion, like the “Bobs” in Office Space. Instead of making the State Department stronger, under Tillerson it is becoming more like the foreign ministries in China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia — a bureaucracy with clerks but few policymakers, while the true power in government rests elsewhere, around the strongman leader and in the military and intelligence services.

Which leads to a third reason Tillerson is off to the worst start ever: because, management issues aside, he has embraced a policy framework that relegates the State Department to second-tier status, and America itself to being a back-row kid. Tillerson is the first secretary of state to preside over an “America First” policy. I don’t know if he really believes in it, or just parrots these lines to stay in Trump’s good graces. But unlike Mattis, he goes out if his way to defend the concept. It is telling that when the world wants reassurance that the U.S. will maintain its leadership and stand by its commitments, it looks to the Defense Secretary, not America’s top diplomat.

A fourth explanation for Tillerson’s flop is the simplest and most innocent: He never wanted the job, doesn’t really like it, and is just trying to stay afloat and counting the hours until he can make a graceful exit. No secretary of state has taken the job with as little enthusiasm. Tillerson has been very open about his doubts over leaving ExxonMobil and missing his old life. He recognizes the fact that the job of secretary of state is very different from that of a corporate CEO, and seems to feel out of place, like a major league outfielder being thrown into the game as a pitcher.

If he enjoys any part of his day right now, it isn’t evident. Instead, State Department officials complain that he spends his time cloistered in his office alone reading papers or huddled with a few aides, many foreign counterparts find him inaccessible, and interagency colleagues observe he is a grumpy presence in the Situation Room.

Watching Tillerson’s first six months, one wonders whether Trump picked him as a way to diminish the State Department, similar to how Richard Nixon chose William Rogers for the express purpose of ensuring that the department remained weak. As Henry Kissinger recalled of Rogers, “few secretaries of state can have been selected because of their president’s confidence in their ignorance of foreign policy.”

Trump is not that clever. Nor does he know history’s lessons well enough to follow them. But future secretaries of state and their staffs will study Tillerson’s opening months to learn what not to do — and have to spend a lot of time and valuable capital to fix what he’s breaking.

Photo credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images

 Black people aren’t keeping white Americans out of college. Rich people are.

The Trump administration is targeting affirmative action policies at universities under a new initiative in the Justice Department. (Claritza Jimenez/The Washington Post)

By Christine Emba August 4 at 7:06 PM

The 200th day of Donald Trump’s presidency draws near, and his legislative failures have become all too apparent. What better time to change the conversation and re-energize the base? And what better way than by raising the lightning rod that is affirmative action?

Justice Department officials are planning to investigate and sue universities over discrimination policies they determine discriminate against white applicants. The Supreme Court has ruled that colleges can use affirmative action designed to give minority applicants an edge. (Reuters)

According to a memo leaked to the New York Times, the Trump administration is planning to redirect Justice Department resources to investigate and potentially sue colleges that use “intentional race-based discrimination” in admissions. The project was quickly understood to be targeting affirmative action policies that many on the right see as “discriminating” against white applicants — in particular, ones that might give black and Latino students an edge. This move comes despite the Supreme Court upholding the use of affirmative action to diversify campuses just last year.
Justice Department officials attempted to play down the initiative after the story broke, stating that they planned to investigate a single complaint involving Asian American applicants, not whites. But it barely mattered. The message was sent.

Affirmative action is a consistent hobbyhorse on the right because it combines real anxieties with compelling falsehoods. College admission — especially to the elite institutions most often hit with affirmative action lawsuits — has become more selective and is an increasingly important factor in the creation and perpetuation of wealth and opportunity. Elite colleges serve as steppingstones into politics, finance, law and Silicon Valley; higher incomes tend to follow. Even so, 80 percent of top students who apply are accepted into at least one elite school, if not their No. 1 choice. But measures that help historically disadvantaged populations to take advantage of the same opportunity are nonetheless characterized as zero-sum.

What is essential to understand is that it’s not a vast crowd of black or brown people keeping white Americans out of the colleges of their choice, especially not the working-class white Americans among whom Trump finds his base of support. In fact, income tips the scale much more than race: At 38 top collegesin the United States, more students come from the top 1 percent of income earners than from the bottom 60 percent. Really leveling the admissions playing field, assuming the Trump administration actually cares about doing so, would involve much broader efforts to redistribute wealth and power. A focus on fringe campaigns against affirmative action suggests it does not.

Addressing inequalities in K-12 education, for instance, could help at-risk students of all races increase their chances of attending a top college — or any college at all. Policies such as property-tax-based funding for schools and the curiously slanted allocation of talented teachers (in Louisiana, for instance, a student in the poorest quartile of schools is almost three times as likely to be taught by an ineffective teacher as a student in the wealthiest quartile is) give a tremendous boost in college admissions to children from high-income families, often at the expense of their lower-income peers.

And right up to the application-writing doorstep, the beneficiaries of the biggest extra edge in admissions are more often than not the children of alumni. At Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Georgetown and Stanford universities, the acceptance rate for legacy applicants is between two and three times higher than the general admissions rate. Pressing universities to drop legacy preferences, following the example of other elite schools such as the University of Oxford and University of Cambridge, could free up spots for those without that built-in advantage. Trump’s own wealthy-parent-sponsored education at the University of Pennsylvania, followed by the subsequent admission of three of his four adult children, makes that particular initiative seem unlikely.

In many ways, the Trump Justice Department’s proposed attack on affirmative action is a microcosm of how the president won the 2016 election and continues to maintain a base of support. First, Trump taps into a mainstream concern, one tied to how America’s economic system is changing and how some individuals are left at the margin: Employment? Immigration? College? Take your pick. Then, instead of addressing the issue in a way that embraces both its complexity and well-established research, officials opt for simplistic talking points known to inflame an already agitated base: Immigrants are sneaking into the country and stealing your jobs! Minorities are pushing you out of college!

The Trump administration assumes that picking race-focused fights is the most successful way to distract from its failures and to pander to a grievance-inspired base. The level of support for this latest attempt may prove it right.

Time to End The Lost Afghan War

The truth is, simply, that America blundered into the Afghan War under President George W. Bush who needed a target for revenge after the humiliating 9/11 attacks. Instead of blaming Saudi Arabia, a US protectorate which was clearly involved in the attacks, Bush went after remote but strategic Afghanistan and cooked up the Osama bin Laden bogeyman story.

by Eric S. Margolis-Aug 7, 2017

( August 7, 2017, New York City, Sri Lanka Guardian) Media reports claim President Donald Trump let loose on his generals behind closed doors, blasting them royally for their startling failures in Afghanistan, America’s longest war.

The president has many faults and is a lousy judge of character. But he was absolutely right to read the riot act to the military brass for daring to ask for a very large troop and budget increase for the stalemated Afghan War that has cost $1 trillion to date.

Of course, the unfortunate generals are not really to blame. They have been forced by the last three presidents to fight a pointless war at the top of the world that lacks any strategy, reason or purpose – and with limited forces. But they can’t admit defeat by lightly-armed Muslim tribesmen.

The truth is, simply, that America blundered into the Afghan War under President George W. Bush who needed a target for revenge after the humiliating 9/11 attacks. Instead of blaming Saudi Arabia, a US protectorate which was clearly involved in the attacks, Bush went after remote but strategic Afghanistan and cooked up the Osama bin Laden bogeyman story.

Sixteen years later, the US is still chasing shadows in the Hindu Kush Mountains, rightly known to history as ‘Graveyard of Empires.’

The US invasion of Afghanistan was based on the unproven claim that anti-communist fighter Osama bin Laden was responsible for the 9/11 attacks. We have yet to see conclusive proof. What we have seen are phony documents and faked videos put out by bin Laden’s foes, the Afghan communists and their Northern Alliance drug-dealing allies.

As I’ve written in my books on South Asia, the so-called ‘terrorist training camps’ in Afghanistan were mostly bases for training anti-Indian Kashmiri liberation groups run by Pakistani intelligence. Claims by the right-wing US media that Afghanistan would become a jihadist base if the 9,800 US troops there now withdrew are nonsense. The 9/11 attacks were planned and mounted from Germany, Spain and Florida, not Afghanistan. They could have come from anywhere.

After sixteen years, the US military and its Afghan mercenaries troops have failed to defeat the Afghan Pashtun tribal resistance forces, Taliban. In fact, the Taliban alliance now controls at least half of Afghanistan and keeps US and government forces pinned down. The US installed ‘president,’ Ashraf Ghani, barely clings to power.

What keeps the US in control of parts of Afghanistan is the US Air Force and naval air power. US warplanes from Afghanistan, Qatar, and aircraft carriers keep a 24/7 combat air patrol over distant Afghanistan and can reply in minutes to attacks on US or Afghan ground units. No other nation could do this – or afford the immense cost.

Gasoline trucked into Afghanistan over the Khyber Pass from Karachi costs $400 per gallon delivered. The authoritative ‘Aviation Week’ magazine reports that keeping US warplanes on station over Iraq and Syria costs an astounding $600,000 per mission. It’s even more over Afghanistan.

But without 24/7 US airpower, US forces in Afghanistan would be soon isolated, then driven out. This is just what happened to the British and Soviets, dooming their efforts to crush the independence-loving Pashtun, Afghanistan’s largest ethnic group.

Bereft of new ideas, the US keeps repeating its mistakes in Afghanistan: colluding with the worst, most corrupt elements of Afghan society; condoning torture and murder; relying on the big, drug dealing tribal chiefs.
The UN reports that opium (the base for heroin) exports doubled last year. The sputtering Afghan economy runs on opium and hashish.

The United States is now the proud owner of the world’s leading producer of opium and morphine base. If the drug trade is ever cut off, the government in Kabul and its warlords will collapse. Ironically, when Taliban ruled Afghanistan before 9/11, the drug trade was almost wiped out. But you will never read this in the tame US media.

Now America’s imperial generals are asking Trump for 4,000 more troops. A basic law of military science is concentration of force. Penny packets of troops are a fool’s strategy. The main function of US troops in Afghanistan is to protect the strategic Bagram and Kandahar air bases and US installations in Kabul.

Now, hard right Republicans are pushing a daft proposal to contract the Afghan War to a US-paid mercenary army led by an imperial viceroy in Kabul. Shades of Queen Victoria. Break out the pith helmets.

Trump has proposed pressuring Pakistan, India and China to end the war. What an absurd idea. For Pakistan, Afghanistan is its blood brother and strategic hinterland. China plans to turn mineral-rich Afghanistan into a Tibet-style protectorate. India wants to outflank Pakistan by taking over Afghanistan. India and China are in a growing military confrontation in the Himalayas.

Trump had better come up with a better idea. My solution to the 17-year war: emulate the example of the courageous Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev. He pronounced his Afghan War unwinnable, told his angry generals to shut up, and ordered the Red Army out of the war in Afghanistan.

Copyright Eric S. Margolis 2017

Venezuela government claims control after 'terrorist' attack on military base

• Party chief Cabello says Paramacay base in Valencia is under control
• Video released showed group of armed men calling for rebellion

Diosdado Cabello speaks during a session of the National Constituent Assembly in Caracas on Saturday. Photograph: Cristian Hernandez/EPA

Sunday 6 August 2017 

The head of Venezuela’s ruling party, Diosdado Cabello, said on Sunday there had been a “terrorist” attack at a military base controlled by troops loyal to the government and several people had been arrested.

Cabello reported via Twitter that troops acted quickly to control the situation at the Paramacay base near the city of Valencia. One witness in the area, in the town of Naguanagua, reported hearing gunshots before dawn.

The defense ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Cabello’s announcement came after a small group of men dressed in military fatigues, some armed with assault rifles, released a video declaring themselves in rebellion against President Nicolás Maduro in Carabobo state, where Valencia is located.

In the video, a man identifying himself as Capt Juan Caguaripano said that any unit refusing to go along with its call for rebellion would be declared a military target.

“We demand the immediate formation of a transition government,” he said. “This is not a coup d’etat. This is a civic and military action to re-establish constitutional order. But more than that, it is to save the country from total destruction.”

Venezuela is wracked by tension and violence, as the unpopular Maduro government seeks to hold on to power. More than 100 people have been killed, nearly 2,000 wounded and more than 500 detained.

On Saturday chief prosecutor Luisa Ortega was removed and replaced after her office was surrounded by soldiers.

Delegates to the constitutional assembly later swore in as her replacement ombudsman Tarek William Saab, who was recently sanctioned by the Trump administration for failing to protect protesters from abuses in his role as the nation’s top human rights official.

The assembly was seated despite strong criticism from the US, other countries and the Venezuelan opposition, which fear that it will be a tool for imposing dictatorship.

Two prominent opposition leaders were taken from their homes by intelligence agents last week. On Saturday one, Leopoldo Lopez, was returned home to serve his sentence under house arrest.

Lopez was released from prison on 8 July and placed under house arrest after serving three years of a 13-year sentence on charges of inciting violence at opposition rallies. Many human rights groups considered him a political prisoner.

Kidnapping makes Vietnam persona non grata in Germany

Vietnam's abduction of one of its nationals in Berlin could upend a pending EU-Vietnam free trade pact and underlines pro-China versus pro-West factionalism in the ruling Communist Party

German Chancellor Angela Merkel greets Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc ahead of the G20 Summit in the Hotel Atlantic in Hamburg, Germany, 06 July 2017. Photo: Michael Kappeler/dpa via AFP-Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc (R) delivers a speech at the Vietnam-Japan Business meeting on January 17, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Hoang Dinh Nam/Pool

Former Vietnamese Nguyen Tan Dung was viewed as a strong advocate for stronger ties to the West. Photo: Reuters/Mike Blake-US President Donald Trump holds up an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership in January 2017. Photo: AFP/Saul Loeb

By DAVID HUTT, @davidhuttjourno -AUGUST 3, 2017 

A Vietnamese asylum-seeker who fled his country last year after allegedly causing a state-owned petroleum firm to lose almost US$150 million was kidnapped by Vietnam’s secret service on the streets of Berlin, the German foreign ministry said yesterday.

Earlier this week, Vietnam’s ministry of public security told local state-media that Trinh Xuan Thanh had voluntarily returned to Hanoi and turned himself in to the police. This was later contested by the German government, which asserted that he was abducted in Berlin and then forcibly taken back to Hanoi.

In a diplomatic rebuke, Germany ordered the expulsion of Vietnam’s intelligence chief. A Financial Times report said that Germany had also ordered the removal of Vietnam’s ambassador, but subsequent reports said the expulsion order was limited to the Vietnamese embassy’s spy chief.

“There is no serious doubt about the participation of the Vietnamese intelligence service and embassy in the kidnapping of a Vietnamese citizen on German soil,” a German foreign ministry spokesman told international media.

Thanh, who between 2007 and 2013 served as head of the state-owned PetroVietnam Construction Joint Stock Corporation, a subsidiary of energy giant PetroVietnam, is accused of mismanagement and losing the firm millions of dollars, a crime in Vietnam. An investigation into his activities began last year following his dismissal from the National Assembly, to which he was only elected one month before his sacking.

In May, Dinh La Thang, a former general director of PetroVietnam, was dismissed from his post as the Communist Party leader of Ho Chi Minh City and from the Politburo on charges similar to the ones lodged against Thanh.

Thang’s case was rumored to be politically motivated due to his close ties to former Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, who lost a power struggle for the ruling Communist Party’s top secretary general position at a January 2016 congress. Thanh fled to Germany last summer to seek asylum and had been fighting extradition charges ever since.

According to reports, Thanh was likely kidnapped on July 23 by armed men while walking near Berlin’s Tiergarten, a central park. The day-light abduction was witnessed by several people who informed the police.

Then, when Thanh appeared back in Hanoi on July 31, the German foreign ministry gave the Vietnamese ambassador 48 hours to return him to Berlin. When the deadline lapsed, they went public with the story.

It is not known, however, how the Vietnamese secret service was able to transport Thanh out of the country and back to Vietnam. It is possible that he was flown directly out of Germany, but he could have also been moved to another country before leaving Europe.

In June, Vietnam’s president, Tran Dai Quang, made a state visit to Russia, where the two countries agreed to foster “coordination in ensuring national security and coping with non-traditional security challenges,” Vietnamese state-media reported.

Analysts now wonder why Hanoi would make such a bold and potentially costly move: Was it stupidity, arrogance or a calculated decision?

Germany’s foreign ministry spokesman said Thanh’s kidnapping was an “unprecedented and shocking” case. The spokesman added that the incident “has the potential to negatively affect relations massively.” Germany is Vietnam’s largest European trading partner, with bilateral trade worth almost US$9 billion last year.


Vietnam Communist Party (VCP) Secretary General Nguyen Phu Trong is closely aligned with China. Photo: AFP/Pool/Luong Thai Linh

What is perhaps most irksome for German officials is that they discussed Thanh’s case with Vietnamese prime minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc when he visited Germany in May to take part in the G-20 Summit, according to media reports.

At the time, it appeared Vietnamese-German relations were on the ascent. When Phuc met with Chancellor Angela Merkel in May they announced that the Vietnam-Germany Business Forum had just overseen the signing of US$1.7 billion worth of new trade deals.

The Vietnamese government has also placed a great deal of emphasis on pushing through a proposed free trade agreement with the European Union (EU), known as the EVFTA. It was agreed to last year but ratification, earlier expected for early 2018, has been delayed because of an EU ruling that each member nation has to agree to it.

The EVFTA is now the best free trade hope for Vietnam after US President Donald Trump withdrew America from the much larger Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which would have significantly boosted Vietnam’s economy and exports.

The EU is Vietnam’s second-largest trading partner, after China, and second-biggest export market, after the United States.

Human rights lobbyists are now pressuring the European Parliament, one of the EU’s legislative chambers, and individual nation members to delay ratification and amend the EVFTA to include more explicit requirements that Vietnam improves its human rights record.

Germany, one of the most influential countries in the EU, also has the ability to lobby its neighbors into aborting the EVFTA, a fact that must have been known by whichever Vietnamese official gave the order for Thanh’s kidnapping.

In a fractured Communist Party, however, this order could have come from any one of Vietnam’s power brokers and not necessarily from the highest-office, the Party’s General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong.

Still, Trong has made strong claims about fighting corruption in recent months and has been at the foreground during the arrests of various allegedly wayward state enterprise executives.

Thanh’s abduction also comes after the Vietnamese government arrested five prominent activists in the last two weeks, in what analysts are calling an alarming crackdown on critics of the one-party state.

Tran Quoc Thuan, a former member of Vietnam’s National Assembly, said he was “surprised” by Thanh’s return to Hanoi, the BBC reported this week. He added that while Thanh could have returned voluntarily, “the possibility of kidnapping is higher.”

Just as important as the economic fallout from this incident are the political upshots. The kidnapping was carried out in “blatant violation of…international law,” said the German foreign ministry.
How Merkel responds will be important. Some pundits claim Germany has now taken over the mantle of “leader of the free world” since the inauguration of US President Trump.


Vietnamese and Chinese communist youths wave flags to welcome Chinese President Xi Jinping and Vietnamese Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong at a meeting in Hanoi on November 6, 2015. Photo: AFP/Pool/ Na Son Nguyen

While Merkel has dismissed this, she has campaigned ahead of Germany’s federal elections in September on the promise to uphold a liberal international order. Merkel hopes to win her fourth term as chancellor.

It is unlikely that Berlin will push for formal sanctions against Hanoi, analysts say. Still, the incident will nonetheless dim the view of some of Vietnam’s allies who previously backed its South China Sea claims as being integral to an international law-based global order.

“[In July] Hanoi bent the knee to Beijing, humiliated in a contest over who controls the South China Sea, the most disputed waterway in the world,” Bill Hayton, author of The South China Sea: The Struggle for Power in Asia, wrote last week in a media report.

The Vietnamese ambassador in Beijing was apparently warned last month that military action would be taken by China unless Vietnam stopped exploration and drilling with a Spanish oil company in disputed waters. Hanoi acquiesced, reportedly on the orders of General Secretary Trong.

A Vietnamese dissident who requested anonymity speculated that after Hanoi’s recent capitulation to China, it might begin forming closer ties to Beijing, turning its back on the West and the international community in the process.

That may explain the Vietnamese government’s audacity in abducting one of its nationals in the heart of a European capital.

Editors Note: A previous version (Aug. 3) of this story cited reports saying that Germany had expelled Vietnam’s ambassador. Those reports have since been corrected to say only the Vietnamese intelligence attache faces expulsion. We apologize for the mistake.”