Bilderberg.org

[marektysis]

ROME—The oil and natural-gas facilities in Libya of Eni SpA are undamaged amid fighting between forces loyal to Col. Moammar Gadhafi and the rebels, said Chief Executive Paolo Scaroni Wednesday.

Paolo Scaroni is one of the Bilderberg Attendees who will certainly attend this year conference.

Marek tysis


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704101604576246900541863450.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

[marektysis]

(CNN) — Just a few years before becoming embroiled in fighting a rebellion, Moammar Gadhafi was spending millions of dollars a year to wage a secret PR campaign to burnish his global image as a statesman and a reformer, confidential documents show.

photo:daylife.com
The mercurial leader hired The Monitor Group, a Boston-based consulting firm, to execute a public relations strategy that included paying think-tank analysts and former government officials to take a free trip to Libya for lectures, discussions and even personal meetings with Gadhafi starting in 2006.

According to a 2007 memo from Monitor to Gadhafi’s intelligence chief, the campaign was to “enhance international understanding and appreciation of Libya… emphasize the emergence of the new Libya… (and) introduce (Moammar Gadhafi) as a thinker and intellectual.”

The price: $3 million a year, plus expenses, for work that included consulting, briefings, analyses and a steady stream of high-profile visitors to Libya — at least one a month.

The memos were posted online by the National Conference of the Libyan Opposition.

Eamonn Kelly, senior partner at Monitor Group, is heading an internal investigation at the company. He said the visitors program was only a small part of a wider campaign to help build civil society there.

The vast majority of the work, he says, was bringing leadership training and expertise to the country, aimed at “promoting reform, improving the economic prosperity of the country and the people, modernizing the government and helping to heal the very broken civic society.”

“We were not working for Gadhafi, we were working for Libya,” Kelly said.

After one year’s work, a 2007 memo from Monitor (PDF) touted the results, including a dozen high-profile visitors, ranging from interviewer David Frost to eminent professors such as Francis Fukuyama, fellow at Stanford University. Monitor also took credit for positive media coverage and also highlighted a half-dozen positive articles written by some of the participants they sponsored.

For example, Benjamin Barber wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post entitled, “Gaddafi’s Libya: An Ally for America?” and Andrew Moravcsik wrote a piece for Newsweek called, “A Rogue Reforms.”

Although the firm had vowed to “provide operational support for publication of positive articles on Libya,” there is no indication any of the pieces were written at Monitor’s behest.

Instead, participants in the program who were reached by CNN say they believed they were being paid for the lectures they gave and the coaching they offered. They said they agreed to go because they were curious about Libya at a time when the regime had taken several positive steps toward the West and appeared to be open to change.

Barber points out that, starting in 2003, Libya “came out of the cold, thanks to Bush administration overtures: rejoined the West, made war on al Qaeda, started imprisoning al Qaeda warriors, paid (Lockerbie) reparations of $1.3 billion, and yielded their weapons of mass destruction.”

Barber, an academic whose books on political theory include the best-seller “Jihad vs. McWorld,” says he now wants to see Gadhafi driven out. But at the time, Barber tells CNN, “we thought — and I think Monitor thought — it was an opportunity to work at internal reform.”

Another distinguished academic, Harvard’s Joseph Nye, said he accepted the paid trip because “Gadhafi appeared to be changing his policy — and introducing new ideas could further reform.”

After he met with Gadhafi, Nye wrote an op-ed for The New Republic that contained both praise and criticism of the dictator.

Several other program participants, including Fukuyama and Harvard’s Michael Porter, did not reply to inquiries.

Some of the visitors who met with Gadhafi later briefed American officials, according to Monitor’s memo, including “senior officials in the White House” and “senior government officials” at the State Department and the Department of Defense.

The Monitor Group claimed that after they sponsored two trips to the country by former Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle, “he briefed Vice President Dick Cheney on his visits to Libya.”

Cheney did not reply to an inquiry, but Perle told CNN he did not “brief” Cheney on Libya and that it was mistaken to suggest he had done any lobbying for Libya.

Still, the possibility that paid visitors later briefed government officials has Paul Blumberg at The Sunlight Foundation, a watchdog group that has reported on the subject, saying the firm should have registered as lobbyists for a foreign country.

“They really wanted these intellectuals to be able to influence policy on Libya,” says Blumberg, to talk to “people in the State Department and the Defense Department, and really convey the sense that Libya was this great new open place.”

The Monitor Group has received an inquiry about their work from the Justice Department, according to Kelly.

Monitor also offered, in a letter to Gadhafi’s intelligence chief, a 22-page proposal for a book about Gadhafi, to be produced for $2.9 million in fees and expenses. The book would cover Gadhafi’s “ideas on democracy,” the outline said, “so that the West gains a more accurate and balanced understanding of his actions and ideas.”

The book project never reached fruition, and Monitor said in a statement the proposal was “a poor decision” that the firm seriously regrets.

But overall, said Kelly, Monitor stands by its main body of work. “We were working in a very different period, a period of promise, and we are heartbroken that that period clearly has ended.”

Monitor wasn’t the only U.S. firm that Gadhafi’s regime engaged. In 2008, as Monitor’s work was coming to a close, Libya retained a more traditional lobbying firm, The Livingston Group, led by former U.S. Rep. Bob Livingston, R-Louisiana.

The firm lobbied State Department officials and members of Congress for Libya in 2008 and 2009, introducing Libya’s U.S. ambassador to dozens of members of Congress. Libya initially paid the firm $200,000 a month, but after a year, the billings had dwindled to just $30,000 a month.

Livingston declined an interview with CNN, but he told CNN affiliate WVUE that he ended the contract shortly after Gadhafi gave a hero’s welcome to Lockerbie conspirator Abdelbeset al Megrahi upon his release from prison in Scotland. “That was just a bridge too far, and we had to fire the client,” he said.

And before Livingston and Monitor, starting in 2004, Gadhafi’s government engaged lobbyist Randa Fahmy Hudome during its effort to get Libya accepted in the international community and taken off the State Department’s list of nations who sponsor terrorism. Libya paid her firm more than $3 million over the course of three years, she said.

“It certainly was not about money,” Hudome said. “It was about national security principles at the time.”

http://news.maars.net/blog/2011/04/07/gadhafi-paid-millions-to-u-s-firms-to-polish-his-global-image/

Perle, at my eyes has merits to be there as well...he has a long
carreer of Prince of Darkness

Marek Tysis

[marektysis]

Now you guess easily who i am speaking of. To be short ( if as a programmer i was programming as he is speaking i should be fired since long) our brave hart is solliciting again and when he is speaking about philantropist, he is speaking about bankers etc... he has to ask the money to the Bilderberg clique !

Marek
http://www.raleighinternational.org/news-centre/news/423-bill-gates-mdg-deadline-likely-to-be-missed

[marektysis]

Ok, that is my understanding of following 'exclusive interview' of Mr
War Build -oops- i meaned Carl Bildt.
He was opening the Swedish ambassy in Tbilisi-Geogia ( i was used to pronounce it tifliss but people of today-including journalists are saying tibilissi, ok do as them).
The wrong thing is when mr War Build-oops-errare humanum est-
is speaking about Bakou in the Caspian region which following me is included in the russian sphere of influence.
As we know them, the people of the elite it goes without saying it that what they think is what they think is acquired. In two or three years from now, but it is already in their possession in their planification.
If i were something in the Kremlin i should see immediatly the danger and make the immediate answer to break this insensed dream connected with the Nabucco network of gas and oil.

Marek tysis

http://www.tabula.ge/en/article-3625.html

[marektysis]

Joseph Jimenez, CEO, and Daniel Vasella, Chairman of Swiss pharmaceutical group Novartis, right, attend the extraordinary general assembly in Basel, Switzerland, Friday, April 8, 2011. Shareholders vote Friday on a US dollar 51 billion deal to buy Alcon eye care company.

MT

[marektysis]

OTTAWA—A $139-million project to fight HIV-AIDS, launched by Prime Minister Stephen Harper in a glitzy photo-op with Microsoft’s Bill Gates, began to flounder within months, says an internal report.

Red tape and turf wars choked off the flow of money, and a vaunted plan to build a vaccine plant in Canada was effectively sidelined within a year, suggests the newly released analysis.

“Very significant delays ... have put into question the extent to which the initiative can achieve the expected results within the remaining time frame,” says the report, completed last August for the Public Health Agency of Canada.

The $62,000 study, commissioned from Goss Gilroy Inc. consultants, examined the effectiveness of the Canadian HIV Vaccine Initiative, created with great fanfare four years ago.

A copy of the document was obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act, after a five-month delay.

The prime minister won headlines across Canada when he announced the project on Feb. 20, 2007, a smiling Bill Gates at his side.

“Through today’s initiative, Canada, in partnership with the Gates Foundation, will provide the resources needed to help realize an HIV-AIDS vaccine, which could one day spare millions of people from this horrific disease,” Harper said.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation pledged $28 million to the five-year project to pay for its keystone: a pilot manufacturing facility for trial batches of HIV vaccine.

The federal government pledged $85 million in new money, plus $26 million reallocated from another HIV-AIDS program, for a $111-million commitment. Of that total, $60 million was earmarked for the manufacturing facility.

But the Goss Gilroy report says the grand plans quickly became entangled in a cat’s cradle of red tape. Among the many problems:

•There was “little evidence of collaboration” among the five federal departments and agencies running the project.

•It took eight months to move the reallocated $26 million from one HIV program at the Public Health Agency of Canada to another.

•Money drawn from the Canadian International Development Agency was caught in interdepartmental limbo, helping to delay a grant program by more than two years.

•A secretariat created to oversee the project was soon “overstaffed” with bureaucrats, according to observers, but lacked anyone with technical expertise in HIV vaccines.

•By March 2009 — two years into the project — only $2 million of a planned $16-million annual budget had been spent. And a year later, just $5 million of a $34-million budget had been spent.

The most high-profile failure was a decision not to proceed with the pilot facility to produce HIV vaccine in Canada.

The Goss Gilroy report suggests stakeholder support for the facility seriously eroded in September 2007 when an international trial of a promising HIV vaccine was cancelled. The plug was pulled on the so-called STEP trial, with some 3,000 participants, when the vaccine was found to be ineffective.

Program officials and others told Goss Gilroy that the unexpected cancellation immediately raised red flags about the proposed Canadian facility — but few had the appetite to question it so soon after Harper’s photo-op.

“Given the high-profile announcement ... with the particular focus on the pilot scale manufacturing component and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s support for it, it did not seem appropriate to open the question of the rationale for this component at that time,” says the report.

“The majority of respondents felt that the need for this facility should have been reassessed after the failure of a promising HIV vaccine candidate in the fall of 2007.”

Meanwhile, four groups applied in mid-2008 to establish the pilot facility — only to be told on Jan. 22 last year that none of them had made the grade. Weeks later, Ottawa announced it was cancelling plans for any such facility.

“A great deal of time, effort and money were wasted on a giant photo-op for the prime minister,” says Terry Duguid, who headed a Winnipeg-based consortium that spent $750,000 applying to operate the pilot facility. “It was just incompetence of the highest order.”

Duguid now is campaigning as the Liberal candidate in Winnipeg South, a Tory riding in the last Parliament.

The House of Commons health committee held hearings on the cancellation in April last year, where another applicant was critical of the process.

“There was a fairly frequent shifting of timelines and delays for reasons that were not explained clearly,” testified Ted Hewitt, vice-president of research at the University of Western Ontario in London.

Hewitt declined to comment on the Goss Gilroy report, the findings of which were not available to the health committee.

The committee reported last fall that witnesses questioned why the government did not review the need for a vaccine facility sometime before April 2008, when it issued the formal invitation for applications, given the collapse of the STEP trials.

“I think Canada’s reputation has taken a big hit,” said Duguid.

Last July, Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq extended the initiative by four years, to March 2017, in recognition of the lengthy delays, though with no additional funding.

About half the money saved from cancelling the vaccine facility will go to a program to reduce the transmission of HIV from mothers to their children in developing countries.

The “overstaffed” secretariat is also being dismantled, replaced with a coordinating office expected to be set up this spring, said Charlene Wiles of the Public Health Agency of Canada, noting the Goss Gilroy report’s other findings have also been dealt with.

“All of the recommendations of the report have been addressed,” she said.

About 2,500 new cases of HIV are confirmed each year in Canada, and about 58,000 Canadians are living with HIV/AIDS.
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/972488--hiv-project-harper-signed-with-bill-gates-fizzled-soon-after-report

[marektysis]

I know that Jim has found it, but i am the lawyer of the devil, controlling every strange facts.

Here is one:

Queen Bea is going in official visit in Germany from april 12 up to 15
and Bildt will be on the 14 thursday in Berlin.
Barroso is going to Danemark (European university of Aarhus, annual conference 2011) on friday 15.

I am just reporting what is perhaps a coincidence....
Marek

[marektysis]

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will meet with leaders in Germany, South Korea and Japan. AP Photo
Close Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is going to Germany, South Korea and Japan in the coming days, the State Department announced Monday.

From Wednesday to Friday, Clinton will travel to Berlin, where she will meet with foreign ministers to discuss Libya and Afghanistan, and attend Amb. Richard Holbrooke’s memorial service at the American Academy. She also will get the Walther Rathenau Prize “for outstanding contributions to international understanding and cooperation,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in a statement.

Over the weekend, Clinton will be in Seoul, where she’ll meet with President Lee Myung-bak “as part of our ongoing efforts to strengthen the alliance and to discuss cooperation on regional issues.”
http://www.politico.com/politico44/perm/0411/around_the_world_ec3e6f23-a8f5-43f6-8ccb-06eb44c3da5c.html

Marek Tysis

Amazingly, remember that Rathenau was the man assassinated after having said that '300 families are dominating the world'

[marektysis]

ShareThisPrint E-mail .The Associated Press

BERLIN — Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands has met German Chancellor Angela Merkel as she starts her first state visit to Germany in nearly three decades.

Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, 2nd from left, holds her hat as she is welcomed by German President Christian Wulff, right, at a stormy and rainy day at Bellevue Palace in Berlin Tuesday, April 12, 2011. Queen Beatrix arrived for a four days official visit in Germany. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, right, welcomes Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, left, in front of the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Tuesday, April 12, 2011. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn)

German President Christian Wulff, second right, and his wife Bettina Wulff, second left, welcome Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, center, Crown Prince Willem-Alexander, left, and his wife Maxima, right, in front of the Bellevue Palace in Berlin, Germany, Tuesday, April 12, 2011. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn)

German President Christian Wulff welcomed the 73-year-old Beatrix to his Bellevue palace with military honors on a wet, blustery Tuesday. She was accompanied by the heir to the throne, Crown Prince Willem-Alexander, and his wife, Princess Maxima.

Merkel later received Beatrix at the chancellery.

The monarch's four-day visit to Germany also features trips to the eastern state of Saxony and to western North Rhine-Westphalia, which borders the Netherlands.

It's the first state visit to the country since 1982 by Beatrix, whose late husband Prince Claus...
http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/dutch-queen-beatrix-starts-906289.html
[media is forgetting private meeting in Munchen Bilderberg caucus a few years ago]
MT

[marektysis]

At the opposite of affirmed information i've given,
the journalism prize Davignon is only reserved for belgian
members in this slave profession.
I am SOOO sorry for globalist contesters which could have had a chance
to lick the hand of the powerful Bilderbergers.
Here the sorrowfully new:


The Representation of the European Commission in Belgium and the Belgian section of the Association of European Journalists organise for the third time the Karel Van Miert/Etienne Davignon prizes.

These prizes reward Belgian journalists who deal with European matters. The Etienne Davignon prize targets news items in French and the Karel Van Miert prize news items in Dutch. This year, there are two categories for each prize: one for students in journalism (bachelor students) and one for professional journalists (and master students).

News items can be articles (written or online press), radio or video pieces and can be an individual or a group work. This year's subject: the EU impact of Belgian citizens'life. The first prize for students (bachelor) amounts to 1000 euros and the first prize for professional journalists (and master students) 1500 euros.

Inscriptions: www.aej.org (Media Prizes à Belgium)

Workers of all countries be united ! the fight is going on against
Universal greedness !!!

Marek Tysis

[marektysis]

Who is behind Middle East revolutions?
Tags: World, Commentary, Interview, Middle East crisis, Politics
Kudashkina Ekaterina Apr 12, 2011 12:27 Moscow Time


Interview with Vyacheslav Matuzov, one of the leading Russian experts in Middle East affairs, and former councilor, head of group for bilateral Arab-Israeli negotiations, Soviet Embassy in Washington, DC.

First of all, Mr. Matuzov, thank you very much for joining us, I am very happy to have you as our guest speaker. Just for the start of our interview let me quote a book by two conservatives, I remember you were telling me about it, and I just feel that this piece is a good start for an interview. So David Frum and Richard Perle said that people all over the world want the benefits of American democracy but they do not always possess the skills to launch a representative government by only their strength, and they said we can help as we helped in Western Europe and Japan. I have been following your interviews lately, so do I get you right that perhaps what we are witnessing now in the Middle East, starting from January 2011, or just to be more precise perhaps from the end of 2010, that it might be regarded as a continuation of this effort?

Yes, of course, I consider that all events that we are watching today in the Middle East are closely connected with the strategic line, strategic policy of the United States of America and of the NATO organization. Why do I consider so? Because it is a plan for re-changing, re-branding the Middle East at the origin of the world, it is known long time ago, days of George W Bush, when neoconservative forces in the United States articulated very clearly the goals of the whole globe, the policy that was very strongly criticized by Francis Fukuyama in his very well known article in Russia, it is “The neoconservative moment”. So I think that these events that we are watching today in the Middle East, all this revolutionary process in the Middle East is closely connected with the strategic goals of the United States’ policy.

What are these goals?

Goals are its dominating, dominating under the flag, under the slogan of fighting for democracy, fighting for people’s rights, then change it not as origin of the will of the people of this population of this region, but it is based as a company, as a political technology company, as some advertising of American foreign policy goals. It was changed in 2005 absolutely clearly and they established a special organization with very good financing, with very good political and informational color that it is called “Business for diplomatic action”. The main goal of this public organization, far from the White House, far from all official political organizations of the United States, they articulated very clearly all these goals: changing all Arab regimes.

Why? The Arab regimes are different, perhaps if we look at Egypt, that would seem to have been an American friendly regime, why do they need to change that?

The reason is absolutely clear, that this regime, even Hosni Mubarak’s regime, even King Abdullah II in Jordan – they are very close allies of the United States, but that doesn’t mean that they didn’t have their own stance towards American goals of domination in the Middle East, it is a geopolitical strategy, it is not a local, regional strategy, and the regional strategy is under the geopolitical goals of the American policy, because somebody considers how many dollars the Americans lost in this war, how many dollars Russia won while giving up prices for oil in the Middle East, it is not an economic approach, it is a geopolitical approach, and geopolitical goals of the United States are counted for tens of years, of decades, not today. I think this corresponds to the real situation that is developing in the Middle East, I can confess that this goal of changing corrupt and non-efficient regimes corresponds with the desire of these people, that is the main problem because people are very enthusiastic about these changes, and the United States policy is clearly on the streets of Amman, Damascus, Bahrain, Libya, maybe, and many other Arab countries, and Egypt of course. But I think these people on the streets do not understand that the real policy of the United States is not to satisfy their needs, their desires, their aspirations; the goal of the United States is to dominate, ruin the old regimes to construct a new big Middle East, and these new frontiers of the Middle East states will be on the ruins of the states existing today in the Middle East, this is the real danger, real danger.

Mr. Matuzov, but who are the so to say sherpas of the US policy in the region? I think that the image of the United States in the Arab streets has been rather unfavorable during the past years, so who are those who conduct the US policy in those countries, inside those countries?

That is the question, because the US understood very clearly in previous decades that its image in the world – not only in the Arab world, in the Islamic world, but also in Europe, in all other regions of the world – was going down dramatically and that is why they changed these goals of the American foreign policy against fighting terrorism, Islamic terrorism, proclamation that Islam is the main enemy of the United States in the world after ruining the world communism. All the slogans went on, and now they have a real new approach on foreign policy. They understand that when they put as a background of their foreign steps on the foreign arena that struggle not against but for democracy and people’s rights, they will win; now I think they are trying to change their image in the Islamic world, in the Arab streets, when they are positioning themselves in their roles of fighters against corruption for democracy, for political rights, but who are those who are supporting? In Egypt it is the Muslim Brotherhood, in Syria – the same, in Jordan – the same, so there is a question: who is the Muslim Brotherhood? In Russia they are registered as a terrorist organization, they were killing innocent people, in many cases, and it is listed as a terrorist organization, but in the United States they are trying to cover their activity in Jordan, in Egypt, in Syria, in other countries as right people, as people fighting for their political rights, but not as a terrorist organization. I think it reveals the real goals to undermine all these regimes and to bring into power in these countries those who are very reliable from the American point of view; I think it is a dangerous trend, I think it didn’t give any positive results even for the American society because ruining old regimes does not mean they are capable of creating new more progressive, more politically motivated regimes that can be accepted by the people, by the streets in Arab cities; I think one of the goals is to put the Arab Islamic world into a chaotic situation, but a chaotic situation controlled from the distance, by the United States, American military centers.

Do you remember there has been a map published by one of the American military analyst by the name of Peters?

Ah yes, of course, Ralph Peters, it is a cartographic experiment, source of a big scandal, from the Turkish government even, because he brought these materials as study materials for NATO military college in Rome, where the Turkish officers were trained, and there was a big scandal between the United States and the Turkish government, and I think that’s why they had problems, I watched Peter’s interview one month ago on Pops TV after the Egyptian revolution, and he said that he was considering the Egyptian events spreading to all over the world, and he was very proud of all these revolutions in the Arab world and considered it would spread to Central Asia and to Russia too. So I cannot say that neoconservative forces in the United States, and Pops news is one of the TV channels that reflect neoconservative views, and Ralph Peters is one of the hot heads of the neocons in the United States. I think that their goals all have the global substance, not regional only, a regional goal is permanent, it is only for today, for tomorrow there are other countries, the whole world, dominating on the global scene – that is the main target of the United States’ foreign policy according to the neoconservative thinking.

But if we look at Mr. Obama’s steps in regards to the Islamic world they would seem a bit inconsistent, because if you remember he started with his famous speech in Egypt in Cairo University, and then all of a sudden his administration is now engaged in a series of wars against Islam.

You are absolutely right, Ekaterina, because I can say that I see a collision between this policy that has produced all these revolutions in the Arab world and stand of the US government and Mr. Obama as President of the United States. I respect greatly the position of Mr. Obama as President of the United States when he was in Cairo University proclaiming the American position toward the world, toward the Islamic world. I am Russian, I was satisfied with the American approach to solve its relations with the Islamic world. You know, Russia has its own problems in the Caucasus, and it solves its own problems with the Islamic movements in some areas, but I think that Barack Obama chose the right way out of solving all these issues, and now I can conclude that his declarations contradicts with the real position of those forces who are dominating in the inside American apparatus, in American Pentagon, security organizations, intelligence organizations, and informational field. I think that Business for diplomatic actions revealed to the world how these contradictions between American administration and big American business that is dominating in the neoconservative forces are acting in the world and affecting the world policy.

Getting back to Business for democracy, there is a whole list of international corporations, not even American corporations, which means that business forces there are rather global than American, so but what can be their interest? Do I get it right that it is a global war on Islam that we are witnessing now?

I do not think that it is a war against Islam, on the contrary, some Islamic forces, especially terrorist forces are closely connected with the undercover activity of some forces in the United States, we know very well the origin of Bin Laden, how he appeared on the political scene, what money was paid to sustain him, we know very well how the Muslim Brotherhood is operating in the Arab world today, so the Islamic idea is exploited by the United States for many decades and I think they are not afraid of reaching power of those people in Egypt, in Jordan, in Syria and in many other countries, I think it is a chaotic situation in the Arab world, and it corresponds to the other main issue – the Middle East settlement. I will remind you maybe that the Quartet activity for solving Palestinian-Israeli problem, for pushing ahead the negotiations between Mahmud Abbas and Netanyahu was stopped by the American side, because the meeting !continued on)

http://english.ruvr.ru/2011/04/12/48812116.html

[marektysis]

(AGI) Roma - Telecom shareholders' meeting will be summoned tomorrow at Rozzano. Franco Lombardi, chairman of Asati small shareholders said that only in 1999 the shareholders had deposited over 51% of shares before the Meeting was called. It is ironical that Franco Bernabe will still chair the Assembly, as he did at the time of Colannino, ten years ago. Fortunately Bernabe "today is in a much stronger position," Mr. Lombardi remarked adding that such a mass participation in the Assembly will not lead to a change in leadership. . .
http://www.agi.it/english-version/business/elenco-notizie/201104112332-eco-ren1110-telecom_shareholders_meeting_over_51_shares_deposited

marek (between us, after ten years of Bilderberg meeting he had no chance to be a loser...)

[marektysis]

IMF clashes with Osborne over refusal to back eurozone bailoutHead of International Monetary Fund urges EU-wide support for new stability mechanism


Phillip Inman The Observer, Sunday 17 April 2011 Article history

International Monetary Fund managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn speaking at the fund's spring meeting. Photograph: Jacquelyn Martin/AP
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is on a collision course with chancellor George Osborne and Bank of England governor Mervyn King after the Washington-based agency voiced concern over Britain's refusal to support a funding package to tackle the eurozone crisis.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the head of the IMF, said Europe needed to come up with a more coherent plan to deal with government debt following the bailouts of Ireland and Greece. He criticised piecemeal attempts to resolve individual countries' debt problems, which critics believe leads to instability and undermines investor confidence in Europe.

The likelihood of prolonged negotiations over a Portuguese bailout deal was another instance of the need for an overarching mechanism to deal with all EU countries should they get into trouble, Strauss-Kahn told the IMF's spring conference.

However, Osborne has made it clear that he believes resolving the debt problems of eurozone countries is a matter for the eurozone and not for the broader EU, which includes nations with their own currencies.

The UK is expected to participate in raising €85bn-€90bn (£52bn-£55bn) to support Portugal, but Osborne has told France and Germany there will be no more cash from the UK for eurozone bailouts after the Portugal deal.

The chancellor would like to go further and repeal article 122 of the Treaty of Lisbon, which has been used to corral EU member states to bail out Ireland and Greece. The treaty says: "Where a member state is in difficulties or is seriously threatened with difficulties caused by natural disasters or exceptional occurrences beyond its control, the council, on a proposal from the commission, may grant, under certain conditions, union financial assistance to the member state concerned."

A move to amend the article is seen as essential if Britain is to avoid taking part in further bailouts.

It is understood the Bank of England also views the debt problems of eurozone members as a matter for countries within the euro area.

Strauss-Kahn said that a "European deal" needs to be in place because "the piecemeal approach is not working". And Olivier Blanchard, the IMF's chief economist, said the European debt crisis was one of the most crucial issues holding back the world economy and preventing the restoration of confidence: "How Europe is going to get out of a hole is a very big issue."

The IMF is understood to want Brussels to coordinate a long-term strategy with funding facilities that indebted countries can access without the need for further negotiations. Eurozone leaders have agreed to put in place a €500bn European Stability Mechanism (ESM), but the scheme will not be ready until 2013 and relies on France and Germany as lead underwriters of the fund.

IMF officials fear that without a speedier resolution and the participation of Britain and other richer EU nations outside the eurozone, in particular Sweden and Denmark, the investor spotlight will fall on other heavily indebted countries such as Italy, Belgium, Spain and Hungary.

Italy has a debt to GDP ratio of 110%, while Belgium's debts have reached 98% of GDP. Spain and Hungary have lower total debts, but remain in recession and investors are concerned these countries will find it difficult to grow and create jobs while implementing unprecedented spending cuts.

If any of these countries gets into trouble, several investor institutions have argued that the current funding mechanisms will be unable to cope, triggering another sovereign debt crisis.

Earlier this month EU finance ministers, including Osborne, met in Hungary to discuss the terms of Portugal's bailout package. Osborne ruled out offering direct bilateral loans to Lisbon, but is expected to participate in an EU-wide funding package and a large slice of funding via the IMF.

The IMF has part-funded the Greek and Irish bailouts. It has become increasingly frustrated at the hardline attitude of Berlin and London to the support, which has only been offered at high interest rates and with terms that demand dramatic cuts in spending and higher taxes. The IMF recently loosened the terms of Greece's IMF loans after attempts to recoup lost taxes from the country's wealthy businesspeople failed.

Strauss-Kahn said he was anxious that weakening growth and high youth unemployment would lead to social unrest.

The IMF cut its 2011 forecast for Irish GDP growth to 0.5% from 0.9% and said unemployment would hit 14.5%, from the 13.5% anticipated previously.

Despite the gloomy prognosis, he said he was confident Greece and Ireland would meet their debt obligations and begin to recover, but concern remained over the protection offered by the EU for future crises.

Ireland was downgraded last week by ratings agency Moody's, which said Dublin's recovery plans were still in doubt.

Moody's cited Ireland's weaker growth prospects when it cut the country's rating by two notches to the verge of junk status and kept its outlook on negative, meaning the next move could also be down.

Osborne said Spain showed that eurozone countries were capable of regaining investor trust without further support from EU countries. He praised the socialist government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero for restoring investor trust in the country after months of speculation that it would follow Portugal in needing a bailout.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/apr/17/imf-clashes-osborne-eurozone-bailout

Marek

PS;the same Strauss Khan is well placed in the future 2012 presidency election in France before Sarkozy ...a Bilderberger !!

[marektysis]

BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR QUEEN BEATRIX OF THE NETHERLANDS
The Leader Newspaper Online
On Saturday evening 30 April, the day after the marriage of Prince Harry and Kate, there will be a birthday party for the Dutch Queen Beatrix. In the Netherlands her birthday parties are very famous. The party is also for all those people who like....

So it is not on april 30....
A list of royals, celebrities and others attending Britain's April 29 royal ...
The Canadian Press
A brief look at guests attending the April 29 royal wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton at Westminster Abbey in London. FOREIGN ROYALS — Belgium's Crown Prince Philippe and his wife Princess Mathilde — Denmark's Queen Margrethe ...
...and neither on the 29...

Marek

[marektysis]

Beware of Asia's political shock, not Arab oil shock



Thierry de Montbrial speaks during Global Korea 2011 conference held in Seoul on Feb. 24.

/ Courtesy of Fleishman-Hillard
French economist warns clash of nationalism can shatter Asian growth

By Cho Jin-seo

The earthquake in the northeastern Japan continues to show that a regional crisis can affect a much wider economy. The electronics, auto and aviation industries in Asia and North America are still suffering production disruption as their Japanese suppliers have formed a critical link in their supply chain.

It is not surprising that from now on non-Japanese firms will think twice before building factories or depending solely on subcontractors on the east coast of the earthquake-ridden island country.

Are other Asian nations such as Taiwan, Korea, China and India safe from such risks? As for the earthquake they probably are. But the answer is definitely no for Thierry de Montbrial. The real danger to these Asian economies is not natural disasters, but rather man-made ones ?they cannot avoid political or economic shocks. "I reject the naive idea that the expansion of East Asia will continue for decades without any major accidents," he said.

Montbrial is the head of the Institut Francais des Relation Internationals, a major think tank in France. He talked to BusinessFocus during Global Korea 2011 conference.

In his view, despite China's remarkable yet stable economic growth in the recent years, the region is still more vulnerable to external and internal struggles ― whether one may call it a crisis, shock, or an internal upheaval.

"Of course, it will be ridiculous not to see the enormous investment opportunities that exist in East Asia," he says. "But the problem is inside Asia. The security situation within the region is very fragile."

Montbrial pointed to the clashes of national interests and nationalism between China and Japan, as well as the precarious power balance over the Taiwan Strait and between North and South Korea.

The situation in East Asia is like predicting an earthquake, he says. Geologists know that someday an earthquake will hit Tokyo. They know where the fault line lies. And they also know the tectonic plates will someday collide. What they do not know is exactly when this is going to happen and how much damage it will cause.

Koreas and bomb

Monbrial said that North Korea is "the most important spot of fragility," and it is more likely to have a sudden, eruptive regime change, not a gradual change as its neighbors hope.

But he ruled out any possibility of a U.S. attack on North Korea, as feared by the North Koreans since the U.S. invasion on Iraq.
"The situation is very different from Saddam Hussein. In the case of Saddam Hussein, the scenario of preventive attack was publicly discussed at major think thanks for months and for years. I've never seen any serious proposal comparable to that in the case of Korea."

Furthermore, in a debatable claim, Montbrial says that it is the North Korea's nuclear program that is deterring the threat of war from the U.S. side.

"Even if there is a very small probability for North Korea to have an operational nuclear weapon, nobody can take the risk. To bomb Seoul from North Korea, you don't need missiles. You don't even need modern planes. You can almost (throw)."

Eventually, this fragility of the Asian security will make businesses rediscover the stability of the old economies in Europe, he says.
"The West, despite differences and conflicts of interests, is quite united. This is a consequence of the two world wars. We have learned to develop a security alliance. War is no longer possible within Europe. The West is a very safe place, even if our growth rate is lower than Asia."

Peak oil a fragile theory

If East Asia is a fault line of a global political economy, another crack may lie underneath the Middle East. After all, more than a half of the world's oil reserves are concentrated in this desert region. Oil price has already risen to the degree that this year it alone is expected to push up this year's world inflation by 1.8 percentage points and dampen economic output by 1.4 percentage points, according to estimates by Samsung Economic Research Institute.

But Montbrial says that the revolutions have little to do with oil production and oil prices will not rise so much as to hurt the global economy seriously.

"As far as oil is concerned, I do not believe the 'peak oil theory' at all. It is the kind of theory that traces an extremely fragile hypothesis," he said. "In the first oil shock of the 1970s, all the pessimists were saying exactly what they are repeating now. Historically, we have observed the price of oil is extremely volatile. Each time the price goes up, we say that it is for some structural, long term reasons. But for most of them it is because of short term reasons, such as fear of short-term cuts and political difficulties."

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2011/04/328_85316.htm

Marek Tysis