Well the crude Europeans in the name of GOD sacked its holy places in Jerusalem, stole Islam’s science, its mathematics, its art to bring about their Renaissance, rose to dominate most of the rest of the globe, and then scooped up the majority of Muslims into their European empires.
September 11 committed by a tiny minority of extremist misfits that killed over 300 people resulted in the Taliban been turfed out of power in Afghanistan with Saddam Hudson somehow replacing bin Laden as the most evil man of history.
Causing a pre- emotive war to get rid of him and his alleged weapons of mass destruction in Iraq occurred with no weapons of mass destruction only a pathetic man with a beard hiding in a hole.
Since then it seems the world has changed into isolation with Russia trying to take advantage of its disunity to grab the Ukraine back by force into is empire.
The more one reflects on what really matters in human existence the more you become alienated from a culture that is obsessed with materialism.
These days we barely have time to absorb one event before ten others replace it.
Society is now governed by Social Media which is incapable of expressing any critical thinking to tackle the real problems facing all of us in a world that needs to unite to have any hope against CLIMATE CHANGE or ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE.
It’s now or never that we need to come together, not isolation, not Donald Dump, nor Mr Putin, nor most of the Islam I am all right Jack world, while we watch inequality expand across the globe.
Insh’ Allah might descend a religious philosophy in one word however ever I prefer the word bolloxed.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.
≈ Comments Off on THE BEADY EYE ASK’S: WITH SO MANY WARS IN THE WORLD WHY IS ENGLAND TURNING ITS BACK ON THE ASPIRATION OF A UNITED PEACEFUL EUROPE. DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY CURRENT WARS WE HAVE IN THE WORLD.
As you read this, there are more than 40 conflicts unfolding in countries around the world. You could not be blamed for thinking that most of the world is in conflict.
They all seem to overflow into one great swam of human misery that occupy our News on a daily basis.
These days wars are more to do with identity based in historical, geographical, political, social, cultural and economic realities.
The EU endeavors to appease these differences, however the European Community needs to stop worry about protecting yesterday’s accomplishments rather than facing tomorrow’s challenges.
THIS IS HIGHLIGHTED BY ENGLAND PENDING DEPARTURE LEADING TO THE QUESTION:
DOES A DEFINABLE, IF NASCENT EUROPEAN IDENTITY EXIST OR IS IT LIKE ALL OTHERS.
It should come as no great surprise that most EU citizens regard themselves as belonging within a number of culturally defined groups and do not normally feel that these overlapping identities are incompatible.
As we are now witnessing with England’s departure and the divide between northern Europe and the Southern Europe.
The critical moments that lead to war are those when one or more identities take precedence over the others. So the objective of the EU must be to reach a stage at which regional, national, European and other identities are regarded as compatible rather than competitive.
This stage has not yet been reached and it may be argued that reaching this plateau is the major challenge which the Union faces in the next century.
It is extremely difficult to construct a European cultural project which embraces both the differences in European cultures and their common roots but in a world now driven more and more by technology that must be the objective, not isolation.
Europe is by far the most peaceful region in the world. Yet the continent is not immune to war – Britain, France, Belgium and others are heavily involved in external conflict in the Middle East, and face a growing threat to peace from international terrorism.
It is not inevitable that the logic of unity and interdependence will prevail and there is a consequent danger of a return to a dangerously fragmented Europe with potentially devastating consequences.
So given all the dire warnings from either side about the security of Europe if Britain leaves the EU, does the IEP foresee a change in the region’s fortunes in the event of Brexit?
In the short-term it’s unlikely to have an effect.
The longer-term ramifications, more for Britain than for [the rest of] Europe, would probably depend on what the economic outcome of a British exit would be. If there’s a further deterioration in the economy in England we may well witness an increase in violence.
This is a country that is full of places of worship that are thronged with glorification of war, saturated with historical blood, building two new aircraft carriers, while its people are on trolleys in hospitals.
Leaving the EU for all the wrong reasons, expecting to retain all the advantages of being in the EU but none of the responsibilities and costs.
A self-inflicted position.
At the moment they have the best trade deal possible – the best one imaginable – which is a customs union and access to the European Single Market and the European Economic Area.
We are now further away from world peace than at any time in the past 10 years – and it’s creating a global ‘peace inequality’ gap.
There are now just 10 countries which can be considered truly at peace – in other words, not engaged in any conflicts either internally or externally, completely free from conflict.
The lack of a solution to the refugee crisis and an increase in deaths from major terrorist incidents have all contributed to the world being less peaceful in 2016.
Many of the conflicts don’t get the media or policy attention of the wars in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan or Ukraine, and they may not have the same geopolitical or economic importance.
All wars need arms so who is supplying the arms:
Fueling the deadly conflicts for profit.
War kills. And war sells.
Where do nations from every corner of the planet look when they want to increase their arsenals?
Ten countries are responsible for the vast majority of all major arms exports, accounting for 90 percent of global sales with the United States, the world’s largest arms dealers.
The world’s top six major arms exporters are the United States, Britain, Russia, Germany, France and China. Together, they account for 74 percent of the total volume of exports.
Sales are in the region of $31.bn
If you don’t believe me here below is a link to interactive map.
The map is part of a series of articles from IRIN around the concept of forgotten wars.is an interactive map of the current conflicts in the world.
It examines the root causes, human cost and potential for peace of conflicts in Myanmar, Casamance, South Kordofan, southern Thailand, and Mindanao in the Philippines.
The map marks each conflict with a red dot.
It is sized to represent how long the battle has been going on, with the
larger dots representing those that have lasted the longest.
To see more about each conflict, click on the dot.
This brings up a fact box explaining the nature of the conflict, when it began and how many deaths have resulted from it.
Syria has been embroiled in civil war, that is also the biggest and most complex proxy war the world has witnessed.
Mexico’s drug war, fueled by 54 ruthless cartels lust for territory, cash, power and violence has slaughtered as many as 85,000 people since 2006.
Mali, AL-Qaeda took root in the country’s north. Around 4,000 people have been killed in Mali since 2012.
Afghanistan, Taliban and IS.
Iraq, the 2003 US-led Iraq war killed up to a million Iraqis, gave birth to Islamic State.
The conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq have been going for well over a decade, then it spilled into Syria in 2011, and afterwards into Libya and Yemen.
Yemen, AL-Qaeda and IS have fighters in Yemen, over 7,600 people have been killed in the past two years.
Pakistan, since the 9/11 outrage in 2001, war has been raging between the Taliban, IS.
Lebanon, Nearly a quarter of Lebanon’s population is made up of Syrian refugees and sectarian division has risen as IS battles with the Shia militant group Hezbollah.
Libya, 35,000 people have been killed since the Arab Spring uprising.
Democratic Republic Of Congo, more than 70 groups are fighting despite the presence of 20,000 UN troops.
Somalia, Al-Shabaab had 9,000 fighters in Somalia. IS has a foothold in Somalia and is trying to recruit Al-Shabaab fighters.
India,a fragile ceasefire since 2003 with Kashmir, but still exchange fire across the contested border.
South Sudan, over 50,000 people have been killed and more than 1.6 million displaced since war broke out in 2013. It has raged for more than 60 years.
Egypt, at war against Islamist militants in the Sinai.
Central African Republic, 6,000 people have been killed in the Central African Republic, with 25 per cent of the 4.6 million population displaced.
Ukraine, Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.
Nigeria, 50,000 people have died in the war between regime forces and Islamic State-affiliates Boko Haram.
Israel -Palestine, has forced tens of thousands of Arabs from homes in land grabs.
Turkey, fighting the Kurdish Workers Party the PKK, is hostile to the Kurdish Democratic Unity Party’s armed wing, the YPG, but has good relations with the Kurdish Peshmerga of Northern Iraq. The Turkish and Syrian Kurds are fighting IS and others in Syria but are against the Turkish government.
Potential Wars:
North Korea, technically, it has never stopped being at war with the South since 1953.
East China sea, South China Sea.
Will any end soon. Not likely.
This autocracy must stop.
The shelf-life of weapons is often longer than the governments and situations they were sold to.
Britain – is now the world’s second largest arms exporter after America – around 120,000 people are employed in weapons dealing.
Two-thirds of UK weapons have been sold to Middle Eastern countries.
If Europe is to escape the cauldron of fragmentation and national strife our shared bonds of European identity must be more broadly defined, given concrete expression and have the flexibility necessary to create an outward-looking and self-confident union of people’s.
The logic of global socio-economic interdependence that spells integration and the logic of ethnicity and nationality that demands separation both apply.
If England leaves the EU without a satisfactory solution to the Irish Border it could reignite one of the longest conflicts in the world going back 700 years.
To make the Irish less Irish backfired once and it will again.
With the coming Climate Change, doubts about the science are being replaced by doubts about the motives of scientists and their political supporters.
Once this kind of cynicism takes hold, is there any hope for the truth?
Climate change deniers argue they are only trying to discover the truth.
We should all be sceptical about that.
No Technology, No Artificial Intelligence, No inequality adjustment, No Frontiers, No Nuclear weapons, No alliances, not anything is going to stop migration.
Where will the next War be?
It will be between the countries relying on the Nile for power and water.
The toll of decades-long conflicts – from Colombia to the Ogaden, from Kashmir to Western Sahara – will be just as devastating for the people who do not live there.
All of the above presupposes that the development of Europe’s cultural identity is a worthy and attainable goal.
Europe, when you think about it, is a pretty small place. Jump on a plane in London and you can be all the way across the continent, in big old Russia, within just a few hours.
Europe stresses the importance of a continuing dialogue between the present and the past.
All human comments appreciated. All like clicks chucked in the bin.
From the beginning of capitalism the drive for profits has been the major force in dispossession peasant and small-scale farmers from the land and water.
While we are all consumed by our daily lives the armies of our greatest enemy Greed in the form of money never sleeps.
Now there are many ways to acquire land as Mr Putin see it and you might think that he is the greatest current threat with nuclear power.
You would be wrong in my opinion.
In more stressful times, expect these land deals to lead to unrest and lay the groundwork for wars and national boundary or ownership changes. Any nation faced with civil disobedience or unrest, for whatever reason, might be subject to regime changes which might quickly change foreign land ownership policy. Moreover, political instability elsewhere in the region is pushing oil prices up, thereby increasing and guaranteeing the main source of income of the oil-rich Persian Gulf states.
The greatest threat is the Privatization of our world resources for the sake of profit which is in the not so distant future is going to come back to haunt us all.
It is an existential struggle for the future of humanity.
Unless the resources of the earth can be utilized in an equitable and sustainable way, then civilization itself is under threat.
The main threat are called Sovereign Wealth Funds that are currently plundering the world. There are about 52 sovereign investors who collectively manage $5.7 trillion in assets
( I have addressed the problem in past posted if your are interested.)
Here I want to highlight two aspects of their current activities that we should all be made aware of.
The first is Land and water.
Land grabbing is directly intertwined with the growing scarcity of fresh water resources around the world.
More than 463 projects covering 116 million acres, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa were acquired in eight months during 2008-9.
Perhaps the most famous example of such privatization of water was the infamous purchase of Bolivia’s water supply by Bechtel and the Abengoa Corporation of Spain in the late 1990s
If one needed more evidence that financial and political elites were consolidating their ownership of global water resources, one needs look no further than the Guarani Aquifer in Paraguay.
One of the world’s largest fresh water aquifers, Guarani is estimated as being larger than the US states of Texas and California combined. Researchers have calculated that Guarani could provide fresh water for the world’s population for at least 200 years. It is precisely atop this aquifer that George Bush and the Bush family have purchased more than 100,000 acres, though many believe the purchase to in fact be much larger.
If ownership of water and the farmland of a nation doesn’t define a nation tell me what does.
It is difficult to obtain accurate figures for the amount of land in the global South that is under the control of foreign and local private capital as well as foreign sovereign wealth funds.
Sovereign wealth funds–charged with preserving the accumulated fortunes of their home nations–are well known for their opaque, tightly guarded investment decisions.
Sovereign wealth funds hold about $5 trillion in assets globally, and many, are food challenged, such as Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi, Qatar, South Korea, and China.
With Climate change the rush for agricultural and water gold is in fully flight. Water “the petroleum for the next century” Future agricultural production will be stressed by climate change and competition for remaining oil and water supplies while population numbers grow will become more intensive.
A disturbing trend in the water sector is accelerating worldwide. The new “water barons” — are buying up water all over the world at unprecedented pace. Not only are the mega-banks investing heavily in water, the multimillionaire tycoons are also buying water.
Unfortunately, the global water and infrastructure-privatization fever is unstoppable:
Here are a few facts that might make you think twice.
There is currently a consolidation of land and resources in ever fewer hands, while the mass of workers and peasants are made dependent on corporations and governments.
Hedge funds, big banks, sovereign wealth funds, are gobbling up the most fertile land around the world, leading many to wonder what the future of food production and land distribution will look like.
By 2020 more that 50 million people will be pushed into poverty because of high food prices, and this speculation will be if not already one of the main causes.
”Today’s emerging new farm owners are private equity fund managers, specialized farmland fund operators, hedge funds, pension funds,big banks and Sovereignty Wealth Funds.”
In Australia more than 800,000ha of prime and fertile land, from Moree in the north to Deniliquin in the south, is foreign owned, with Korea’s Ho Myoung Farm company the largest stakeholder with 500,000ha. Hassad Australian, a company wholly owned by the Arab state of Qatar, has acquired 730,000ha of farm land in Australia, including 25,245ha in NSW.
There has been more than $1.5 billion in direct investment in Australian agricultural land over the last three years by GLOBAL fund managers and some of the world’s largest pension funds and of course Sovereign Wealth Funds.
The sovereign state of Qatari are on track to acquire a larger area more than the entire Arab state with plans to spend over $350 million on acquisitions. The Qatari government has leased large amounts of land in Kenya. They also have or are working on deals in Brazil, Argentina, Australia, Sudan, and the Ukraine.
They include: Two Swedish pension funds, Första AP-fonden and the Second Swedish National Pension Fund/AP2; the Dutch pension fund Algemene Pensioen Groep; Danish pension fund Danske; Swiss fund Adveq Real Assets Harvested Resources; Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund; and several from Canada including the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation, BNY Mellon, the Ontario Municipal Employee Retirement System, and Quebec’s CDPQ fund, Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec.
As of May 2012, it was estimated that between 32 and 82 million hectares (between approximately 80 and 200 million acres) of global farmland had been brought under foreign control, with the amount constantly increasing.
Top Ten Land Grab Targets and Investor Countries
Target Countries
(millions of hectares)
Investor Countries
(millions of hectares)
South Sudan
4.1
United States
8.0
Papua New Guinea
3.9
Malaysia
3.5
Indonesia
3.5
Arab Emirates
2.8
DRC
2.7
UK
2.1
Mozambique
2.2
Singapore
1.9
Sudan
2.0
China
1.6
Liberia
1.4
Saudi Arabia
1.5
Argentina
1.3
South Sudan
1.4
Sierra Leone
1.2
China, Hong Kong
1.3
Madagascar
1.1
India
1.3
It is estimated that the amount of global farmland that has been acquired by foreign entities equals about 198 million acres.
In July 2013 the Colombian ambassador to the United States resigned over his participation in a legally questionable effort to help the U.S. corporation Cargill use shell companies to amass 130,000 acres of land.
Sovereign funds loaded with new capital will continue to pour into real estate and are actively seeking out foreign farmland to purchase.
In this age of global uncertainty in the area of food-producing and wealth preservation, productive farmland around the world has been placed into the spotlight by “guru investors,” wealth management funds, growing mega agri-industries, wealthy sovereign wealth funds.
The Saudi Kingdom is behind a seven-year project of acquiring 1.7 million irrigated rice acres in Senegal and Mali, enough to produce 7 million tonnes of rice. Proposals would allow Saudi business groups to take control of 70% of the rice-growing area of Senegal.
Saudi Arabia has farming interests in Egypt, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Syria, Turkey and the Ukraine.
South Koreans want to produce rice, corn, sugar, fish, and livestock in the Philippines.
Japan is believed to hold three times the amount of its own farmable land outside of its borders.
Argentina and Brazil have acquired land in Uruguay.
South Korea and Russia agreed to create a $500 million joint fund with their sovereign wealth funds, aimed at increasing cross-border investments in various companies and projects.
Egypt leases land in Uganda to produce rice, wheat and beef.
Nigeria is appealing to the Gulf nations to utilize its land. It has 175 million acres and is only farming half of that. It desires investment in that land, it desires employment opportunities, and it claims that it could provide 100% of the Gulf’s food needs.
Chinese investment in Kazakhstan reached $5 billion by the end of last year, slightly less than 4 percent of the country’s total foreign direct investment. They are buying land in Brazil for soybean cultivation, as part of a $3.4 billion plan to build oilseed and rice production bases overseas including bases for rapeseed in Canada and Australia, palm oil in Malaysia and rice in Cambodia. China is by far the largest investor, buying or leasing twice as much as anyone else.
In January 2012, China Investment Corporation has bought 8.68% stakes in Thames Water, the largest water utility in England, which serves parts of the Greater London area, Thames Valley, and Surrey, among other areas.
Foreign firms have invested in dairies, meat processing, crops and others areas in Serbia and other non-European Union members of the Balkans.
67% of Mideast SWFs plan to allocate more funds to Latin America, while half will do the same to Africa and 60% to India.
In November 2012, One of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), also purchased 9.9% stake in Thames Water.
Food insecure nations such as the Gulf States, China, Japan, South Korea and Western Europe are all interested in increasing their farmland holdings.
Countries need to take control of their agriculture away from international and market forces and support the development of national food sovereignty based on family size farms.
And if all of that is not enough sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East expect to receive more funding this year, providing them with extra financial firepower to raise their investments into emerging markets and asset classes such as private equity and real estate. Slightly Ironically, with instability in the region, the oil prices go up and that gives the governments sometimes a little bit more room to maneuver,” 54% of Middle East SWFs expect an increase in new funding in 2014, higher than the 46% average for all funds.
As much as US$70 billion is up for grabs for global hedge funds looking to raise money in Asia over the next few years.
So the next time you walk into any Sainsbury’s across the UK, remember that Qatar is a major investor.
It owns 20 per cent of the London Stock Exchange and, at the other end of the scale, it owns 20 per cent of Camden market, the biggest grunge emporium in the country. Qatari LNG accounted for 85 per cent of Britain’s liquefied natural gas imports, providing power to homes across the land.
QATAR’S STAKE IN BRITAIN
The tiny Gulf state has snapped up a range of famous British assets, which include:
1. Harrods, the upmarket department store former owned by Mohamed al-Fayed.
2. The Shard, soon-to-be Europe’s tallest building.
3. No 1 Hyde Park, the world’s most expensive block of flats.
4. The London Stock Exchange, which they own a 20 per cent stake.
5. Camden Market, which they own a 20 per cent stake.
6. The Olympic Village, once the games are over.
7. Sainsbury’s and Barclays banks – major investors.
You would be ever so wrong to think that with all the present problems we have in the world that there could not be another in the melting pot.
The worlds present problems seem all but unsolvable until we learn to share wealth and remove inequalities that plague the earth. ( see previous posts)
For more than 800,000 years, ice reigns over the Arctic Ocean. Forming a layer of reflective protection, sea ice is one of the main earths regulators of our climate and our livelihoods.
Now the melting ice of the Arctic which has the potential to transform global climate and ecosystems as well as global shipping, energy markets, and other commercial interests is at this very moment shaping up to be the next hot spot for conflict.
Arctic permafrost is also melting, changing tundra to wetlands and shrub lands. All of these changes have profound effects on wildlife, and the human communities.
The benefits and pitfalls of the Arctic will have a global impact.
High Arctic sea belongs to no one and should remain the common property of mankind.
Fat chance of this happening.
With oil and gas companies consistently pressure politicians to open the Arctic Refuge to drilling. She is in the cross-hairs of the industrialists who covet her basement rich in oil, one of the dirtiest fuels.
Retreating sea ice is not only restructuring Arctic ecosystems, it is also permitting new industrial access for commercial fishing, offshore energy and commercial shipping on a scale never seen before.
Five countries are already seeking to annex territory that until now were under the authority of any state.
If tomorrow they come to an end, there would be only 9% of open water across the Arctic!
In addition, riparian countries are mobilizing their military capabilities on site, which could threaten peace in the region.
In preserving the Arctic, it is ourselves that we preserve.
In September 2012, the Arctic Ocean ice pack shrank to its lowest extent on record—49 percent below the average over the past 35 years.
The problems to come can only be addressed through a deep horizontal and vertical effort, in order to preserve the sustainability of the Arctic.
We should all be seeking an Arctic region that is stable and free of conflict.
Where all nations act responsibly in a spirit of trust and cooperation, and where economic and energy resources which are going to be developed are done so in a sustainable manner that also respects the fragile environment and the interests and cultures of indigenous people.
It’s rather remorse that Bill Gates is investing millions in the doomsday seed vault in Svalbard. A barren piece of rock claimed by Norway and ceded in 1925 by international treaty which is 1,100 kilometers from the North Pole in the Barents Sea near the Arctic Ocean.
Since early in 2007 Monsanto holds world patent rights together with the United States Government for plant so-called ‘Terminator’ or Genetic Use Restriction Technology (GURT).
Terminator is an ominous technology by which a patented commercial seed commits ‘suicide’ after one harvest. Control by private seed companies is total.
Such control and power over the food chain has never existed before in the history of mankind existed.
I diverse, back to the subject.
The EU’s primary interest in the region is economic, as 90% of its trade happens via maritime routes.
Green Peace is currently looking for 6 million signatures to lobby the United Nations to pass a resolution to Declare Arctic international waters “preserved natural area. ( See Their Web Site)
As they say ” the common and immutable commitment to preserving the planet we leave to our children. This desire transcends all boundaries and makes us stronger than all the armies or petrodollars.” “We will send a clear message to world peace and respect for the planet depend on the preservation of the Arctic.”
“We will resound loudly our appeal to political leaders around the world and when we are millions to stand together, we will ask the UN to adopt a global treaty to protect the Arctic Nations”
“We want to create a” natural preservation zone “around the North Pole, and banning destructive industries in the Arctic.
THE PETITION now has more than 5 million signatures!
BEFORE IT TOO LATE SIGN UP . I SUPPORT IT.
FOR IT TO WORK IT MUST BE ADOPTED ALONGSIDE A WORLD AID COMMISSION OF 0.05%. ON ALL FOREIGN EXCHANGE TRANSACTIONS OVER $20,000, ON ALL HIGH FREQUENCY STOCK EXCHANGE TRANSACTIONS AND ON ALL SOVEREIGN WEALTH FUNDS ACQUISITIONS. ( see previous posts)
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