PoliticsTunisia: New cabinet: Defence, finance, foreign, interior ministers kicked out, Ounais new foreign minister

AFP via Yahoo! News (Jan29,2k11)
by Ines Bel Alba

Clashes in Tunisia 

as new cabinet sworn in

Tunisia's new cabinet line-up culled key figures associated with Ben Ali's ousted regime including the defence, finance, foreign and interior ministers.

Ghannouchi has promised to hold democratic elections within six months.

The reshuffle was received positively by the influential UGTT trade union -- which played a vital role in the anti-Ben Ali movement and had led opposition to the interim government, with the union saying it approved of Ghannouchi.

EU officials said the new foreign minister, Ahmed Abderraouf Ounais, a Paris-educated career diplomat, was set to visit Brussels on Tuesday.

A statement from European Union chief diplomat Catherine Ashton congratulated Ounais on his appointment.

She stressed the EU's "solidarity with the Tunisian people in their efforts to build a stable and pluralistic democracy with full respect for the rule of law and fundamental rights and freedoms."

The EU said it would send experts next week to help prepare elections.

France, which has come under fire for backing Ben Ali and failing to support protests against him early on, said it wished the new government "success".

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Tunisia has a chance for a cooled-down peaceful transition, with a time-horizon for new elections under a care-taker govt under Ghannouchi but representing diverse social demographics instead of the present residues of the totalitarian regime further phasing out of power.  May God have mercy on the emerging new Tunisia.  And may its Muslim majority show mercy upon its Christian minority, both Protestants and Catholics.

-- Politicarp

PoliticsEU: UK Tories: France says Conserv leader Cameron "autistic," some EastGermans pine for old days of Communism

Pierre Lellouche, considered pro-Brit in Sarkozy-era cabinet (France), blasts UK's Tory leader, David Cameron, "France: autistic Tories have castrated UK in Europe" (by Nicolas Watt, Patrick Wintour, and Allegra Stratton, Guardian, Nov4,2k4). The piece reports the furious response of European leaders to yesterday's letter of Cameron to the President of the EU, acknowledging the very recent full adoption of the EU's Lisbon Treaty. And therefore the appropriate but reluctant dropping of Cameron's previously proposed referendum for lessened UK involvement with Europe, altogther. Cameron, then -- in his mentioned letter to CzechRep's Klaus (presently head of European Parliament) -- went on to build a new moat, closer to the castle, so to speak, that woud set impregnable barriers, thus containing European sway over Britain.

On the man initiating all these wordy reverberations, see: David Cameron, for a profile and a survey of recent event's involving this newmaker.

Meanwhile, Germany is undergoing a longterm reappraisal of the "split over the past" that divides the former West Germany from its soulmate the former East Germany which was Communist-dominated for some decades -- until precisely the fall of the Berlin Wall. This page in Washington Post, "In unified Germany, split over the past" carries a photo gallery feature "Tearing down the Wall in 1989."

Recall the USA's President, Ronald Reagan's appeal, "Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall." And the wall came tumblin down.

Apparently some regions and movements in Europe are feeling claustrophobic just now, around the time of the closing of the mechanisms that allowed meandering from the Eurofold, closing down around the Treaty of Lisbon which had been held in abeyance for a number of years, until Klaus affixed his signature the other day, Cameron wrote his letter accepting the basis for his promised UK referendum on European relations, shoud he be elected Britain, UK, England's new Prime Minister.

-- Politicarp

Politics: Fiji: Is Russia keen on establishing foothold in SouthWest Pacific?

Radio Australia's website reports that Europe has taken quite seriously the renegade military coup d'etat, tho the ruinous militarism was far off in the SouthWest Pacific.

The European Union has told the military authorities in Fiji that it will stop development aid if it doesn't see enough progress on a return to democracy, human rights and media freedom.

Lee Duffield reports from Brussels the European Commission has put conditions on Fiji, that it needs to get back to democratic government and fully restore human rights.

Its spokesperson Amadeu Altafaj said that was a condition, for Fiji to receive assistance.

"If the responses are not satisfactory of course we will have to take measures in terms of suspending partially or totally our aid," Amadeu Altafaj says.

Strictly humanitarian aid is not affected.

Meanwhile, serendipity itself is reconsidering its role in the Pacific, where Fiji has become the most pressing problem of New Zealand's foreign relations.

SouthWest Pacific > Republic of Fiji

Other foreign sources, as well, have indicated Fiji's development aid may be cut-off if the failed Republic doesn't check its military (which means the military itself must backtrack, as there's no other internal force that can oust it). That is, Fiji's military must backtrack to its barracks -- unless it wants to exacerbate to the level of a major disaster the already-weakened economic situation that has descended on Fijians since the coup.

And, while the military's interim Foreign Minister is off to India, guess who's showed up for the financial presentation of the military's interim Economics Minister? None other than Russia! Perhaps it wants to buy an island, perhaps establish its own offshore Crimean Paradise, a series of beachfront skyscraper hotels for all those big spenders from Moscow, Saint Petersburg, and Stalingrad.

More Info:

Special Feature on Military Coup in Fiji Today (Mar4,2k7)

Politics: Military coup: More on the troubles of the Republic of Fiji in the southwest Pacific (Feb21,2k7)

Politics: Coup: SouthWest Pacific island-state of Fiji undergoes coup, dismissing constitutional government (Dec6,2k6)