There is little to celebrate. Friends were killed from Syria to Libya, while others remain in prison in Egypt. Great hopes have been set aside. Old cynicisms have returned, the cynicisms of arms deals and of energy deals, the cynicism of brutality. 19 Dec 2020
Ten years ago, a hawker in Tunisia set himself on fire, which spurred on people along the entire Mediterranean Sea from Morocco to Spain to rise up in revolt. They took to their squares indignant at the terrible conditions in which they had to make their lives.
Little of their agenda has been advanced in the past decade. Governments of the southern European states have one by one betrayed the aspirations of the people; the most dramatic such failure was of the Syriza government in Greece, which won a mandate against austerity and then surrendered before the troika (the European Central Bank, the European Commission, and the International Monetary Fund) in 2015.
Debunking the myths
Saturday 19 December 2020
THE EDITOR: The “victory” of the leadership and its cohorts in the UNC internal election is about done and dusted, as one cricket commentator is fond of saying, but I write to let them know that you can fool some of the people some of the time but not all the people all the time, that some of us in fact do know and are willing to acknowledge that, even as they clink their glasses in celebration, their so-called victory reverbs with hollowness, having fooled their grovelling faithfuls for yet another time.
Two myths in recent commentaries on the UNC victory tell the story of this continuing deception:
How long will Peru last? History weighs on today’s events
By Sergio Rodriguez Gelfenstein
The writer was the director of international relations in Venezuela’s presidential office and the country’s ambassador to Nicaragua. Currently, he is a guest professor at Shanghai University in China. This article was posted at sergioro07.blogspot.com on Nov. 13. Translation: Michael Otto.
Mariategui’s magazine, Amauta. Credit: Juan Fajardo, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
In his “Seven Essays on the Interpretation of Peruvian Reality,” José Carlos Mariátegui explains how the Spanish colonizers destroyed the “phenomenal production machine” of the Incas in Peru without being able to replace it. [The Inca empire created 25,000 miles of roads and stretched from the current borders of Colombia and Ecuador through Peru and Bolivia to northwest Argentina and Chile in the south.]
Tuesday, December 15, 2020
Soon after the January 2021 inauguration, President-elect Biden will announce his trade agenda. Many of the major trade issues which have been a focus of the Trump Administration, such as import tariffs, export restrictions, new and heightened economic sanctions, and inbound investment controls could shift in ways which impact U.S. and non-U.S. companies. The United States will continue to focus on China trade issues, investment by Chinese entities, protecting U.S. technology, and prohibiting imports made with forced labor. Importers, exporters, and manufacturers will need to be prepared to adjust operations. The incoming administration is expected to announce, if not implement, its priorities in its first months. This GT Alert discusses the expected trade and inbound foreign investment agenda, as well as the likely impact of such potential changes on U.S. companies.