Arizona Daily WildcatBy Erik Flesch Friday March 28, 2003

What do the UA Young Socialists, Students Against Sweatshops, the Alliance for Peace and Justice in the Middle East, Refuse and Resist, Beyond Tolerance, Heatwave and a motley group of campus pacifists all have in common? Contempt for the absolutism of reason, the inalienable morality of individual happiness, and the defense of intellectual and political liberty — in short, contempt for the founding principles of America’s capitalist social system.

Though the style and particular emphasis of these UA organizations vary — for example, on whether armed revolution is the means to dismantle the U.S. capitalist establishment (Heatwave), or if rallying the public around “labor rights” is sufficient (SAS) — their hatred for the war has brought these squadrons together in a united “24-hour anti-war Infoshop,” an anti-war sit-in of sorts disguised as an “information center,” here at the UA.

Members of these groups mobilized Monday and moved in to occupy three study rooms on the fourth floor of the Main Library, where they vow to squat until further notice. Security guards who intended to toss them out threw up their hands when the members threatened to call the media. (They would prefer, but have thus far been prohibited from, holding this continuous occupation on the UA Mall. Rachel Wilson of SAS revealed to me yesterday, however, that their ACLU lawyer may be able to score the location for them later this week.)

They also have received extraordinarily over-generous special permission by Vita Kowalski, our dean of students, to protest outside Speaker’s Corner — the area in the center of the Mall set aside for such public forums — with an imposingly amplified open mic right on the steps of the Administration building every day from noon to 1 p.m.

They are protesting the U.S.- and British-led campaign to topple the totalitarian regime of Saddam Hussein, a butcher who ordered munitions be concealed in heavily populated areas to deter Western forces — who Saddam knows are loath to put civilians in harm’s way — from disarming his regime and ending its reign of terror. The Arizona Daily Wildcat reported Wednesday that, according to one protester, “The original goal (of the demonstration) was to show solidarity with the people who are dying in Iraq.” But since Greg Knehans of Refuse and Resist stressed that “everyone is actively against Saddam Hussein,” I think it is fair to ask: Just exactly who, then, are these Iraqis being targeted by coalition troops with whom these protesters stand in solidarity? Erik Flesch

By default, they stand in solidarity with the Saddam Fedayeen — Iraq’s paramilitary “secret police” who torture Iraqi citizens who dare to criticize their dictator, and who dress in U.S. military uniforms only to slaughter any fellow countrymen who attempt to surrender to them or try to flee their city. Reports Thursday indicate these Fedayeen thugs are kidnapping children from their homes and holding them hostage to force their parents to fight for Saddam.

They stand in solidarity with Saddam’s Republican Guard, who are lining up women and children ahead of their units as human shields, who shoot at coalition troops while waving the white flag, and who film and release to state-owned propaganda television for broadcast throughout Arabic nations the execution and humiliation of prisoners of war.

They stand in solidarity with militant Islamic radicals whom Iraq calls brothers, and who demand the destruction of the state of Israel and the extermination of Jewish people — which they call Palestinian liberation.

They stand in solidarity with Saddam’s role model, Josef Stalin — the Soviet dictator who forced the collectivization of agriculture and industry, attempted to eradicate by force the separate identities of his nation’s minorities, invaded neighboring countries, and maintained absolute power through a powerful secret police, informers, mass deportations and executions.

They stand in solidarity against the United States with Saddam and his political allies in Iran, Cuba, North Korea, Russia, Venezuela, Syria and other socialist nations who advocate and orchestrate the nationalization of private property — starting with foreign-owned businesses and any other money-making ventures created by productive, rational men and women — and the forced labor of its citizens according to the orders of its ruling party.

Consistent with the collective-rallying tactics of the regimes they are defending, this union of UA anti-war activists has chosen to coerce students into listening to them via a pseudo-blockade of library study rooms and the entrance to the Administration building and the brute physical intimidation of mob gatherings.

By such means, these so-called peace protesters show their contempt for the individual rational mind, which requires the freedom to weigh the evidence without such obnoxious intimidation.

And Dean Kowalski et al. have not defended the interests of students by closing their eyes to such violations of campus rules.

Erik Flesch is a geosciences junior. He can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu

By JUAN FORERO

LA PAZ, Bolivia, March 21 — Ed Miller had high hopes in the late 1990's when, as manager for British Gas in this landlocked country, he and another geologist came up with a sure-fire plan to develop and market Bolivia's immense reserves of natural gas.

With an eye on California and its insatiable appetite for energy, three multinationals, including British Gas, soon formed a consortium to build a 400-mile pipeline to the Pacific coast. The idea was to liquefy the gas and ship it to California, with projected sales of $21 billion over 20 years.

But with $350 million already invested, the project that was once heralded as Latin America's largest infrastructure development is now close to collapse, a casualty of roiling nationalism and political turbulence in Bolivia.

"The project is coming to the end of its opportunity window," said Mr. Miller, 47, an American who recently left the consortium and now runs a pipeline that transports gas to Brazil. "I would say the window was wide open a year ago, and now it's almost shut."

Indeed, the government of President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, buffeted by antigovernment protests that killed 30 people in February, has delayed plans to announce a decision on the project's next phase: whether to build a pipeline through Peru or through Bolivia's old enemy, Chile. Instead, the government is now talking about consulting with Bolivians, to let them to make the decision. But the companies of the Pacific LNG project, as the consortium is called — Repsol-YPF of Spain; British Gas; and Pan American Energy, a BP subsidiary — insist that Chile is the only viable option, because building through Peru would cost $600 million more. An American consulting firm working for the Bolivian government recently reached the same conclusion.

Aides to Mr. Sánchez de Lozada said the government was still carefully studying both options.

But people close to the project said the president was actually paralyzed, because deciding on Chile would lead to huge, destabilizing protests.

"The government does not have the political oxygen to decide," said Gonzalo Chávez, an economic analyst and former vice minister of energy.

Opposition to the project is intense and spreading, fueled by left-leaning indigenous leaders who strongly reject the Chilean option. Most Bolivians have never forgiven Chile for snatching Bolivia's coastal province in a 19th-century war, including the region around the present-day port of Patillos, where a liquefaction plant would be built.

The opposition also includes senior military officers who pronounced themselves against the project for reasons of "national dignity." Even the president's partner in the government coalition, former President Jaime Paz Zamora, has questioned the sale of natural gas, saying, "Bolivia must come first."

In one of Latin America's most nationalistic countries, some critics also oppose the very idea of selling gas to the United States, which is viewed as an imperialist aggressor.

"The gas stays here," explained Choque Huanca, a newly elected member of Congress, who represents a left-leaning indigenous political party. "We can consume it here."

Such talk, though, ignores the fact that Bolivia, with a gross domestic product of just $8 billion, could make use of only a tiny fraction of its gas reserves — now estimated at 52 trillion cubic feet, second in Latin America only to Venezuela's. Even supplying California for 20 years would consume only 13 percent of the gas.

Economic analysts say this desperately poor country could vastly improve its economic outlook by positioning itself as an important gas supplier to California before other countries do. Taxes and royalties on exported gas could bring in up to $7.7 billion in a generation.

But to become a great gas power, Bolivia needs foreign capital to finance the Pacific LNG project, whose total cost is estimated at $5 billion or more.

Changing minds in Bolivia will not be easy. Companies of all kinds have faced stiffening opposition to their investment plans as Bolivians have turned against the market reform model once championed by the president.

"There is a repudiation," said José Guillermo Justiniano, minister of the presidency, the executive's administrative arm. "That is why there is a conviction against the model. They see the model as the devil. Market economies are the devil."

The government of Mr. Sánchez de Lozada has been so battered by opponents that it lacks the political capital to undertake austerity measures or make unpopular economic decisions. In an interview, the president acknowledged the influence of his opponents.

"If I announced the second coming of Christ, they would vote against it," he said.

Bolivia's future, though, will remain grim unless it is open to foreign investment, political analysts say.

"The fact of the matter is, you cannot go back on globalization, and no country can afford to isolate itself from the international currents," said Eduardo Gamarra, a Bolivian-born expert on the country at Florida International University in Miami.

Mr. Miller, a Californian who first came to Bolivia in 1978, ran an Argentine company that in the late 1990's was among the first to find major gas deposits. After mapping out the pipeline plan on a barroom napkin, he assumed Bolivians would welcome a project that promised to inject billions of dollars into a moribund economy.

But now, the dream is all but dead — prompting him to abandon Pacific LNG. "I essentially became frustrated and burned out," he said.

www.vheadline.com Posted: Monday, March 24, 2003 By: Roy S. Carson

Leading economist and editor-publisher of the Caracas Daily Journal, Janet Kelly (56) has been found dead close to the Cota Mil highway above Caracas ... her Toyota Yaris automobile was parked at a tourist vantage point overlooking the upper Altamira suburb of Caracas close to a major exit from the highway and her body found over the edge, 150 meters below.

At this moment there are no indications as to how Janet's death occurred, but police detectives are at the scene which has been cordoned off while investigations proceed. Our highly-regarded colleague Janet Kelly had only just taken over the Daily Journal (March 10) and had great ambitions for the publication under her leadership. She was also part of an international negotiating committee between the Chavez Frias government and the opposition.

Philadelphia-born Janet had graduated in international studies at the John Hopkins University (USA) and had become a much-respected economics professor at the Institute for Higher Economic Studies (IESA) in Caracas and had gathered a group of investors to buy-out the DJ from the Neumann family in a deal that closed earlier this month. She was an associate professor at the Simon Bolivar University (USB) in Caracas and a leading light in the expat American comunity as well as a director at the Venezuelan American Chamber of Commerce (VenAmCham).

Chacao Mayor Leopoldo Lopez is at the scene and says that it is up to the experts to determine what happened ... suicide has apparently been ruled out and it is thought that she may otherwise have been the target of political assassination.

sg.biz.yahoo.com Friday March 21, 3:11 AM By Selina Williams OF DOW JONES N EWSWIRES

LONDON (Dow Jones)--As global oil markets keep a nervous eye on possible disruptions to Persian Gulf crude shipments amid a U.S. war in Iraq, ethnic unrest in oil-rich Nigeria could become as potentially damaging to supplies as the crisis in Venezuela.

Political and civil unrest in fellow Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries member Venezuela earlier this year cost the global oil market 125 million barrels, helped to drain U.S. commercially held petroleum stocks to critically low levels and combined with Iraq war jitters to push oil prices to well over $30 a barrel.

Although Nigerian output woes aren't critical yet, the situation could escalate and the timing of the crisis isn't great, says New York-based energy analyst Jay Saunders at Deutsche Bank.

"Nigeria won't be as bad as Venezuela, but the situation is volatile and it comes at a bad time," Saunders said.

The disruption of 156,000 b/d of Nigerian oil supplies due to clashes between rival tribes in the oil-rich Niger delta comes amid concerns that OPEC might not be able to compensate for the loss of crude oil supplies from more than one member.

As it is, OPEC has already pledged to cover a loss of some 1.7 million barrels a day of Iraqi crude exports due to the war. Thursday, legal exports of Iraqi oil through the U.N. oil-for-food program effectively halted following the departure of the last scheduled oil tanker from the Ceyhan oil terminal in Turkey.

However, OPEC Secretary General Alvaro Silva said Thursday that the group isn't currently worried about Nigeria.

"As Venezuela's production is normalizing, it wouldn't be a problem to fill in for a lack of production," he told reporters in Vienna Thursday.

But analysts say that it will be a while before Venezuelan output is back to its pre-strike level of around 3 million b/d as some of the oil fields and infrastructure were permanently damaged by the shut downs during the industrial action.

Nigeria Faces Unrest, Strikes, Elections

The clashes between rival tribes, that shut in oil produced by oil majors Royal Dutch Shell (RD) and ChevronTexaco, have left several people dead in one of the worst periods of violence in years. The skrimishes also follow in the wake of strikes over pay and conditions by the main oil workers unions in Nigeria.

And to top that all off, Nigeria's shaky democratic process will be tested by a round of presidential and parliamentary elections in April - the second since independence in 1960. Revenues from oil exports are one of the major issues in election campaigns.

It's not unusual for political upheavals in Nigeria to significantly impact output. A military coup in 1985 reduced the West African country's production by 10% and labor union strikes in 1994 cut output by 20%, a recent Deutsche Bank report said.

Oil traders on London's International Petroleum Exchange said the problems in Nigeria were "supportive" for the oil price Thursday and they were monitoring developments there.

But for the moment, traders were more focused on the escalation of U.S. airstrikes on Iraq, reports of fires near the southern Iraqi oil fields of Basrah and the Iraqi scud missile attacks aimed at Kuwait's northern Iraqi oil fields.

Physical crude traders said oil in storage facilities would plug the immediate shortfall of any missing Nigeria barrels and if the unrest escalates or the oil remains shut-in for a longer period, then delays to loading vessels would start to be felt.

For now the shut-in will mainly affect cargoes of oil that are scheduled to move in the next few days, the traders said.

Nigeria, which currently produces around 2 million b/d, is dependent on revenues from oil exports. It is one of the main oil exporters to the U.S.

• By Selina Williams, Dow Jones Newswires; +44 207 842 9262; selina.williams@dowjones.com

www.vheadline.com 1st Sunday in Lent 2003 sermon by The Very Reverend Roger Dawson Dean of St. Mary's Anglican Cathedral, Caracas Posted: Sunday, March 09, 2003 By: The Very Reverend Roger Dawson

Like much of the New Covenant writings in what we call the gospels, we should see today's reading as a psychological profile rather than as a physical happening in Jesus' life, though having said that, the temptations to abuse his position probably had much more effect on Jesus' life than any imaginary event conjured up by later writers.

Probably the first account of the so-called temptations is to be found in Mark's gospel and that is what we have just heard. It comes right at the beginning of the gospel that is not lumbered like the others with unnecessary speculations as to Jesus' birth origins. Mark starts at the commencement of Jesus' ministry and sets the scene for us by telling us that John the Baptist is preaching repentance in the wilderness area as a preparation for entry into a new domain of God that will happen sometime in the near future.

Mark, or whoever is the author of this gospel account, points out to us that this is God's initiative of empowering Jesus to go into what we might call the enemy-occupied territory of Israel.

The author wants us to understand that all territory ... not just Israel ... belongs to God but has been usurped by a worldly and evil power. I personally hesitate to personalize evil into the form of Satan, or Beelzebub, Belial or the Evil One as has been commonly done, because it looks as though we have two gods, one of good and one of evil and the two are in battle to see who ever is the strongest. I know that this is a common understanding by many and Jesus himself may have understood the world in those terms. However I do not subscribe to a battle in heaven, with bad angels being thrown out, and the baddies making a new home for themselves on the earth till God says enough is enough and decrees the end of time, when he will finally take over the reins and rule in truth and righteousness for the rest of eternity.

That may be the view of the author of the Book of Jubilees, and may have been great when it was written some hundred or two hundred years before the birth of Jesus, and Jesus may have known this book and believed it and indeed, have endorsed it in his message of good news  ... but two thousand years later, I want a better explanation of how evil managed to come into the world.

The bottom line is that evil is here on the earth, and people do embrace it.

Some have tried to explain what happens by looking at light ... light is energy that enables our eyes to function so that we can clearly depict objects about us. If we remove that light so that we have total darkness, or blackness, we cannot see. The dark, therefore, is an absence of light rather than a force of its own. The question we are offered is whether evil is a force of its own, or simply an absence of good, following the example of light.

We are being told that God has sent Jesus to aid us defeat the power that evil has over us, and that Jesus has himself been tested. A bit like saying a professor is coming to teach us the rudiments of mathematics, and to prove that he is qualified to teach us, he has been taught and has been tested by examination at the University of such and such, and has a doctorate from the University of this and that, and here are his certificates. By this, we have his credentials that he is competent in his subject.

Mark details the examination paper that Jesus has to undergo by telling us it is for forty days, the biblical number that denotes the period of testing preceding a salvation assault against hostile forces. We can find others, and we might like to compare the testing procedures to Noah in Genesis, Moses in Exodus or Elijah in First Kings.

Marks account is very brief. This may be because his readers already knew the story so well it would not stand up to too much repetition. Luke and Matthew, having been written later, when perhaps the story was less well known, would need some further explanation or expansion.

Alternatively the account is deliberately brief to punch the story home. The Spirit leads Jesus to the desert, and Jesus is matched with Evil in order to underscore the truth that Jesus is the representative of heaven's power that has been unleashed against a hostile world, complete with wild and destructive forces ... here represented by the wild animals.

The author is assuring us, his readers, that Jesus is the victor against the worst that all these hostile forces of evil can throw at and against him. What is more, his note-worthy victory is at least as good and great as any of the pivotal Old Covenant figures who preceded him.

Thus Jesus is enabled to proclaim, with confidence, that a new time has broken into history. The person of Jesus is gathering workers ... soldiers some like to think of us, onward Christian soldiers marching as to war ... a war against evil in which evil itself, which, although not totally routed, is at least mortally wounded by the work of Christ and his followers.

I have seen it suggested that this is like D-Day and V-Day. The invasion of evil with Christ as the chief commander was on D-Day and the final defeat will be on V-Day.

Jesus thought it would be in his lifetime, or at least in his generation, but history has shown that it is longer than this time span. Everyone says that, ultimately, we will be the winners, there will be a V-Day, a victory and this assurance is given to us in the resurrection. There has been confusion as to when this might be, but most people like to think of it as being at the point at which we die to this earth.

That is understandable but wasn't Jesus' original message.

It is always nice to know that, in the end, we will prevail, but in the meantime things may be very uncomfortable. If the Holy Spirit can take over the will of Christ so convincingly in the story of the temptations, then perhaps he can do it in our lives as well why not?

We worship the same God, and live in the same world. If it works for Christ Jesus, then it will work for us also, is how the argument goes. There are times, certainly when we feel we are in the wilderness. There are also times when others prey on our vulnerability, and our inability to retaliate with any force. There are times when circumstances press in upon us.

What this passage of Mark's gospel shows us, is that we can in fact overcome these obstacles and win through.

Jesus, in his prayer formula, asks God that we should be delivered from the Evil One and not tempted beyond what we can cope with ... and Paul, writing to the Corinthians, reckons that we shall never be taken beyond our limits.

That is what we hope for and pray for, and is a worthy theme for Lent.