Author: mopress

Following the spaghetti trails of binational and international policy groups in the Americas, we find a “Declaration of San Carlos” adopted on March 24, 2006 by the Inter-American Committee against Terrorism (CICTE). Venezuela’s footnotes to the declaration suggest some discomfort with the emerging anti-terrorism category of “emerging threats.”
This is an international, rather than multinational initiative, since it falls under the Organization of American States (OAS).

Interesting to find are three objections in the form of footnotes from the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

The first objection concerns wording of a paragraph that connects terrorism to “illicit drug trafficking, illicit trafficking in arms, money laundering, and other forms of transnational organized crime.” Such wording, says Venezuela, “is geared toward pointing out a direct and permanent connection between terrorism and transnational organized crime, as that entails a repudiation of the norms of due process and the presumption of innocence—universally recognized principles in the area of human rights.”

The second objection concerns the category of “Emerging Threats.” Venezuela refuses to support the framework of this category, “because no common definition is given of emerging threats and because it introduces elements that are not consistent with the realities of the Hemisphere and that are disproportionate with regard to one another, by their nature and according to the provisions of the Declaration on Security in the Americas.”

Concerns embraced by the category of “emerging threats” do seem to be “disproportionate to one another” if you compare security for the 2007 Cricket World Cup alongside weapons of mass destruction. As for its reference to “elements that are not consistend with the realities of the Hemisphere” it is more difficult to see what Venezuela intends. Perhaps this is a reference to the category’s preoccupation with cyberterrorism. Perhaps it has more to do with the issues that surround nuclear materials (see below).

One interesting phrase under “emerging threats” defers to “each state” to define “emerging threats” according to its own laws. We read in this language the influence of the USA.

In objection three, Venezuela returns to the category of “emerging threats” in order to single out disapproval of the reference to UN Security Council Resolution 1540 (2004). The resolution pertains to “proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons”. This category rings familiar as a motivation (or pretext) most vigorously applied by the USA to Iraq and Iran. Does Venezuela worry that such powerful linkages between emerging threats, nuclear and chemical materials, and pre-emptive warfare may soon go South?

Instead of viewing nuclear issues in terms of “emerging threats”, Venezuela’s footnote encourages a framework established in 1967 by the nations of Latin America and the Caribbean in the form of the Treaty of Tlatelolco, a self-adopted prohibition of nuclear weapons from the region.

The first web report from today’s press conference at Camp Mabry, headquarters of the Texas National Guard, comes from Lee McGuire of Austin’s KVUE-TV (with video clip online).

“Yesterday, we just found out, was a deadline the President set to have 800 members of the National Guard on the border already, and today we learned that that deadline has been met,” says McGuire in his live report.
When and how did the President set that deadline? A review of online sources turns up an AP story of May 24 that references “a first wave of 800” that “will head to the US-Mexico border next week” (or by June 1).

Of the eventual force of 6,000 planned for the border, McGuire reports that half will be spending anywhere from two weeks to two years “making sure that folks do not cross illegally.”

“They will be armed, but they will be not allowed to shoot anybody. They will only be allowed to fire in self defense, if that is the case,” says McGuire, blinking into the camera.

“That is one concern that the Mexican government had had, that folks along the border would be armed and providing some kind of military presence along the border. Again, the National Guard will be armed, but they will not be ‘militarized’,” says the messenger, who we would prefer to have said “say officials” at that precise point.

Armed miltary will not be militarized, say officials.

“The rest of the folks there will kind of be watching cameras and also looking at what is happening along the border trying to learn about where folks are coming across, and supporting the border patrol in their existing mission along the border.”

Reuters splits the remaining half in two: with a quarter helping to gather intelligence, while the other quarter will build “roads and metal barriers.”

More coming at five and six. “We learned a lot of facts today.” Thanks Lee for being there. But let’s call militarization for the fact it is, pretty please. Just give us a little space to think clearly while we try to figure out why today we are learning for the first time about yesterday’s Presidential deadline.

“There’s still a lot of questions up in the air about how this whole business is going to go,” John Gipe, Army National Guard Sergeant Major speaking about the deployment of troops at the USA-Mexico border. (C-SPAN: Congressional hearing on Role of National Guard, 2:55 CDT, July 15.)

In May the Council of the Americas held its 36th Washington Conference on the Americas. In June the Organization of American States held its 36th General Assembly.

“Our annual Washington Conference is the premier event in the nation’s capital focusing on the
Americas and has consistently brought together senior corporate executives with the highest level of
speakers,” says the report from the Council of the Americas, a David Rockfeller organization.

“In [this year’s] final declaration [of the OAS general assembly], the delegations of 34 OAS member states called on the Secretary General . . . to promote the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to facilitate the participate of citizens in public life, thereby strengthening democratic governance.”

But remember, just because one event follows the other, we should never infer causality. Still, we like this paragraph from the Washington conference that has Wolfowitz and IBM collaborating on reasons to take poverty reduction seriously:

Working together with government, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz stressed the role of the
private sector as an important engine for development. IBM Americas General Manager Marc
Lautenbach provided first-hand examples of a
corporation that prioritizes investment in people. In an
increasingly globalized, technology-oriented world,
companies such as IBM recognize their obligation to
bridge the digital divide and help create opportunities for those that otherwise would have been excluded. But, not only does poverty reduction help people it also makes plain business sense. According to the World Bank a 10% drop in poverty levels increases economic growth by 1%, so “growth and poverty reduction should be seen as part of the same problem, and, therefore, as part of the same solution.”

Blogged by Steven Clift at DoWire.Org