After renewing sanctions, EU seeks face-time with junta – The Irrawaddy

April 27th, 2010

http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=18327

European Union (EU) foreign ministers have renewed the bloc’s “Common Position” on Burma, extending existing sanctions until April 2011.

In a statement released on Monday, the European Council expressed “serious concerns” that the recently published election laws “do not provide for free and fair elections.” and restated its call “for the release of the political prisoners and detainees, including Aung San Suu Kyi.”

However, the EU said that it “stands ready to respond positively to genuine progress in Burma/Myanmar.” In keeping with the Western trend toward dialogue with the Burmese military junta, the EU says it hopes to maintain its dialogue with Naypidaw.

The EU had previously pledged to tighten or expand sanctions if the junta did not respond to requests for reform. However, despite what the European Burma Network listed as a number of factors in what it deemed to be “a continued decline in the human rights and political situation in Burma,” since the common position was last discussed in April 2009, the bloc has not amended its existing sanctions. (more…)

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No EUdaimonia after Lisbon – The Casual Truth/Eurasia Review

March 8th, 2010

http://www.thecasualtruth.com/story/europe-country

http://www.eurasiareview.com/2010/03/32232-no-eu-daimonia-after-lisbon.html

Lacking a democratic mandate and acting by stealth, the EU elites – namely senior Brussels-based bureaucrats and fellow traveler politicians at national level – have sought to make the Union a state in its own right, and a world power to boot. But have they gotten ahead of themselves?

What we know as the EU started off in 1950 as the European Coal and Steel Community, when six countries centered on France and West Germany began sharing economic resources in the years after World War II. While aiming to prevent a repeat of Europe’s 20th Century wars, thinkers behind the project hoped that such links would in time lead to a European state.

Jean Monnet was the intellectual driving force. In 1957, a year before the ECSC became the European Economic Community, he wrote to a Dutch politician saying “the current communities should …lead us to European economic unity. Only then would the commitments make it fairly easy to produce the political union which is the goal.” (more…)

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Northern Ireland still troubled – ISN

January 14th, 2010

http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Current-Affairs/Security-Watch/Detail/?lng=en&id=111287

As the Irish and UK prime ministers meet to discuss the impasse over control of police and justice in Northern Ireland, the long-running dispute is overshadowed by sex and corruption scandals, and IRA splinter groups are keeping police busy by attempting to undermine the political process and capitalize on a vacuum should the policing powers dispute not be settled.

By Simon Roughneen for ISN Security Watch

The dictum that truth is stranger than fiction was given renewed impetus by the outing of MP Iris Robinson’s affair with Kirk McCambley, now 21. She announced last month that she would be stepping down from politics as she seeks treatment for depression, and says that she attempted suicide in March 2008 after the liaison ended.

Robinson, 60, is the wife of Peter Robinson, first minister in Northern Ireland’s regional government and the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), the largest pro-British political party in Northern Ireland.

The couple are to be investigated by Northern Ireland’s committee on standards and privileges after Iris Robinson admitted she secured £50,000 ($81,400) from two developers to help McCambley set up a restaurant business in Belfast. (more…)

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The worst crime – National Catholic Register

January 11th, 2010

http://www.ncregister.com/site/article%20/the_worst_crime/

KNOCK, Ireland — In 1979, Ireland was enthralled as a visit by Pope John Paul II brought out millions at locations across the land. Out of a population of just over 3 million at the time, this massive turnout was seen as a triumphal indicator of the strength of Irish Catholicism.

When Hilaire Belloc wrote “Europe is the faith, and the faith Europe,” he may have had Ireland in mind. Catholicism has been integral to Irish national identity for hundreds of years, and to an extent unequalled in any other European country, save perhaps for Poland.

But all was far from well in the Irish Church. The Pope was welcomed onstage in Galway by Bishop Éamon Casey and Father Michael Cleary, two of Ireland’s best-known Churchmen. Years later, it was revealed that both had fathered children. Soon after the Casey scandal emerged in the early 1990s, stories began to break that some priests had sexually abused children, and as the years went on, the number of allegations rose.

Thirty years after the Pope’s visit, 2009 saw the publication of two reports that have shocked Irish people, led to the resignation of four bishops, and prompted speculation that Pope Benedict XVI will instigate a reorganization of the Irish Church in a pastoral letter scheduled for early 2010 (see related story on page 4). (more…)

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Karen Refugees Have a White Christmas in Ireland – The Irrawaddy

January 4th, 2010

http://www.irrawaddy.org/highlight.php?art_id=17519

CASTLEBAR, Ireland — After fleeing an army campaign of human rights abuses in eastern Burma, a group of Karen refugees celebrated a white Christmas this year in the snowbound west of Ireland.

“Every now and then, the military comes through our village and asks my mother, ‘Where is your son?’” said Po Hta. His mother tells them that he is in Thailand.

But that’s no longer true.

As a teenager, Po Hta fled Burma in 1994, spending a couple of years in Bangkok before the Thai authorities moved him to Ban Don Yang refugee camp in the north. He spent 10 years there, before being sent to Ireland in 2007 under a UN refugee resettlement program

Now he calls a friend in Bangkok every few weeks, who keeps in touch with his mother, mother and son pass information back and forth through the friend.

Po Hta, who asked that his real name not be used, is part of a group of 100 Karen refugees who resettled in Ireland two years ago. Estimated to number around 7 million of Burma’s 56 million population, with another 400,000 Karen native to Thailand, the Karen are both Christians and Buddhists. Of the six Karen who met with The Irrawaddy in Castlebar, Po Hta was the sole Buddhist. (more…)

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Linking Ireland and Asia – Irish Examiner

October 27th, 2009

- Simon Roughneen in Bangkok.

With over half the world’s population, Asia’s array of growing, dynamic economies will become an increasingly important place for Irish business going forward.

That was the key message delivered at the Asia Pacific Ireland Business Forum held in Bangkok recently.

Hosted by the Irish Thai Chamber of Commerce, the forum brought together over 400 Irish business leaders with operations across Asia. It follows up on the recent Global Ireland event held at Farmleigh. However, despite Asia’s potential and resistance to the current downturn, Liam O’Keefe – a Farmleigh attendee and leading Irish businessman in Asia – told the Bangkok gathering that that Asia was not originally on the Farmleigh agenda.

Jerome Kelly is President of the Chamber. He told the Irish Examiner that “we aim see how we can create opportunities for the Irish businesses looking to expand and invest in Asia.” (more…)

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Irish give go-ahead to EU – The Casual Truth

October 7th, 2009

http://thecasualtruth.com/node/187

Last Friday, Irish voters backed the European Union (EU) Lisbon Treaty by a 2 to 1 majority, 16 months after saying no to the document the first time around.

In the end, it was more about the Irish economy than the European Union (EU).

The result was a stunning 20% swing in favour of the Treaty, which is a replacement for the EU Constitution rejected by Dutch and French voters in 2005.

The Lisbon Treaty will create an EU President, Foreign Minister and diplomatic service, and transfer more areas of decision-making from national governments, like Ireland, to the EU level.Promoters of the Treaty argue it is necessary to ‘streamline’ decision-making in the 27-country union and enable it to act with a greater presence on the global scene.

Opponents regard this as a stealth power-grab enabling the European Commission – an unelected body – to acquire a greater say in how Europe is run.

One commonly-cited problem is Article 48, which opponents say will allow more ‘competencies’ (EU-speak for powers) to be transferred from national governments to EU level without additional treaties or public votes.

Ireland has been the only country to give its people a vote on the Treaty, which now awaits (expected) acceptance in the Czech Republic and Poland before acquiring legal force. The British Government could yet put the document to a popular vote. (more…)

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Ireland can learn from Asia – Sunday Business Post

September 13th, 2009

http://www.thepost.ie/news/world/ireland-must-learn-lessons-from-asia-44309.html

Two newly released reports  suggest that Ireland is slipping down global competitiveness rankings.

The World Bank Doing Business 2010 report came out last Wednesday, a day after the World Economic Forum (WEF) released a survey of economic competitiveness.

Ireland stays in the top ten in the bank’s report, which looked at ease of running a business in 183 countries, listing Singapore as the optimum location.

The Davos-based WEF does not have the World Bank’s standing, but its report takes a broader view of global economic competitiveness. It puts Ireland at number 25 of 133 countries surveyed, just below Malaysia. Switzerland displaced the US as the most competitive economy, with Singapore at number 3. (more…)

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Suu Kyi Verdict: Reaction Divided – The Irrawaddy

August 13th, 2009

http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=16554

As Aung San Suu Kyi returns to face another 18 months of house arrest, regional and global reactions have followed, highlighting a lack of international unity on her conviction and return to house arrest.

In somewhat of a surprise and perhaps indicating a difference in tone between US President Barack Obama’s foreign policy and that of his predecessor, the European Union (EU) reacted with the most vigor.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy specifically mentioned targeting Burma’s timber and gemstone exports for increased sanctions, while the European Parliamentary caucus on Burma said there should be a global arms embargo against the junta.

While President Obama and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton both denounced the verdict, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters in Washington that it was “premature” to consider UN sanctions against Burma, perhaps awaiting some consensus at the UN Security Council. However, the US had already renewed its sanctions against the junta some weeks ago, a hardball counter to Secretary Clinton’s offer to relax sanctions should Suu Kyi be released, as the UN Security Council originally requested in May. (more…)

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Northern Ireland: Fighting A Time Warp – ISN

March 14th, 2009

http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Current-Affairs/Security-Watch/Detail/?lng=en&id=97650

The murder of two UK soldiers and a Catholic policeman Northern Ireland by two IRA splinter groups threatens to set the country back decades, Simon Roughneen writes for ISN Security Watch.

When Irish Taoiseach (or Prime Minister) Brian Cowen joins political leaders from Northern Ireland in Washington for next week’s St Patrick’s Day jamboree, President Barack Obama will hopefully show them more courtesy than he did UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown last week. (more…)

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