March 2011

Gaddafi and Western powers

Frei Betto
The

Western powers led by the United States, are made of thick mouth in defense of human rights in Libya. What about the genocidal occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan? Whom the Bell Tolls "by a million dead in Iraq? Who does the International Court of Justice to the UN in Afghanistan confessed murderers and those responsible for crimes against humanity? Why the Security Council the UN did not say a word against the massacres carried out against the Iraqi, Afghan and Palestinian?
The U.S. interest and the European Union is not the defense of human rights in Libya. Is to ensure the control of a territory that produces 1.7 million barrels of oil per day, which depends on energy from countries such as Italy, Portugal, Austria and Ireland.
Iraq's case is exemplary: the United States invented the never found "weapons of mass destruction" of Saddam Hussein to exercise control over a country that is the second largest world oil producer -2.11 million barrels, just overtaken by Saudi Arabia. And it has a reserve estimated at 115 billion barrels. At that wealth is compounded by the fact occupy a strategic geographical position, it has borders with Saudi Arabia, Iran, Jordan, Kuwait, Syria and Turkey.
The March 20 marks eight years that the U.S. and his cohorts invaded Iraq on the pretext of 'establishing democracy. " The Maliki government is far from being considered a democracy. Last February, thousands of Iraqis took to the streets to demand work, bread, electricity and drinking water. The army brutally suppressed, having killed, wounded, arbitrary detention and kidnapping of activists. No world power called for human rights and suggested to Maliki to respond to international tribunals.
The UN is today, unfortunately, a discredited institution. U.S. use it to pass resolutions to justify its role as global policeman in the service of an unjust and exclusive. When the UN adopted decisions that are contrary to the White House as the condemnation of the blockade against Cuba and the oppression of the Palestinians, she simply turns a deaf ear.
Gaddafi has been in power since 1969. Are 42 years of dictatorship. Why U.S. and the European Union never talked about removing it? Because, despite their terrorist attacks, there was desirable to maintain a despot that attracted foreign investment and prevented arrived illegal immigrants to Europe from Africa, or all the countries south of the Sahara desert.
Now that the Libyan people crying for freedom, the U.S. strategic positions in the Mediterranean. Amphibious ships, planes and helicopters carried by U.S. warships and U.S. Ponce Kearsarge. The European Union, in turn, is not concerned about democracy in Libya, but to prevent thousands of refugees landing in their countries damaged by the financial crisis.
also worried that the libertarian wave plaguing the Arab countries, oil producers rise the price of the product, charging most Western powers, struggling with difficulty to overcome the crisis of the capitalist system.
is talk of establishing a "no-fly zone 'in Libya. That means bombing the country's airports and all aircraft stationed there. And it requires sending aircraft carriers to the African coast. In addition, a new war front.
The fact is that the White House was surprised by the libertarian movement in the Arab world, and now does not know how to proceed. Was easier to remain complicit authoritarian regimes in exchange for energy sources such as gas and oil. But how to resist the clamor for democracy and avoid the danger that the government of these countries might fall into the hands of extremists?
Gaddafi came to power with wide popular support to overthrow the tyrannical regime of King Idris in 1969. Bitten by the blowfly, eventually forgot all the promises he had made libertarian. In 1974, using the global recession expelled Western companies expropriated properties and promoted a series of progressive reforms that were made to improve the quality of life of the Libyan people. Associated
the Soviet Union from 1993 Gaddafi welcomed foreign investment. After the fall of Saddam, fear of being next on the list, signed agreements to eliminate weapons of mass destruction and compensation to the victims of terrorist attacks. It was erected in a fierce persecutor of Osama Bin Laden. Asked to join the IMF, created special areas of free trade, opened the country to the oil companies and eliminated subsidies for staple food products. Started the privatization of the economy, which increased unemployment to about 30% and worsening social inequality. Gaddafi
earned praise from Tony Blair, Berlusconi, Sarkozy and Zapatero. Like the West, disliked the expulsion of the tyrannical governments of Tunisia and Egypt. Now shoot at an unarmed people who hopes to oust him from power.
Gaddafi to the Western powers became a Rebel card from the deck. The problem now is how to remove him from power without opening a new front in war and to turn Libya into a 'protectorate' under the control of the White House. If Gaddafi is resisting, Bin Laden can make more of an ally or at least have one more in regarding terrorist threats.
West's speech is democracy. The interest, oil. And only that interested capitalism: privatize the sources of wealth. As for the logic of capital predominates on freedom, the West will never know true democracies, those in which the majority of people decide the destiny of the nation.

Frei Betto is a writer, author of "Diary of Fernando. In the prisons of Brazil's military dictatorship," among other books.
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WHO IS FREI BETTO

Brazilian writer Frei Betto is a Dominican friar. known internationally as a liberation theologian. Author of 53 books of various literary genres-novels, essays, crime, memoir, children and youth, and religious themes in two-acasiones in 1985 and in 2005 was awarded the Jabuti, the most important literary award in the country. In 1986 he was elected Intellectual of the Year by the Brazilian Union of Writers. Advisory

social movements, camo Base Ecclesial Communities and the Movement of Landless Rural Workers, participates actively in the political life of Brazil in the last 45 years. In 2003 and 2004 was special counsel to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Social Mobilization Coordinator of the Zero Hunger. Translation
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