Tunisian President Flees Country Amid Unrest

[gilliam]

Al Jazeera Breaking: Tunisian Army exchanges fire with Presidential Guards as the latter was trying to storm into Carthage Int’l Airport

Troops battle ex-ruler’s bodyguards in Tunisia & retake the presidential palace [seesmic.com/web/spacer.png](javascript:bit.ly/…

 

[Kadaveri]

Meanwhile, the full horror of repression over four weeks of demonstrations is beginning to emerge. Human rights groups estimate at least 150-200 deaths since 17 December. In random roundups in poor, rural areas youths were shot in the head and dumped far from home so bodies could not be identified. Police also raped women in their houses in poor neighbourhoods in and around Kasserine in the rural interior.

guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/16/tunisia-gun-battle-army-tunis

 

[kingal86]

May all the Arab regimes fall. Every single one of them.

Fingers crossed they’re not replaced with something more-or-less the same or worse (esp. for womens’ rights) if they do fall though… (a non-Arab example: the 1979 Iranian Revolution).

 

[kingal86]

The United States appreciates the tireless efforts of President Ben Ali of Tunisia. The United States just gave Tunisia $282 million worth of military equipment for free. Yeah sure just a minor ally.

Honestly, do you see no other alternatives for US-Tunisian relations other than 1. The US strongly supporting, arming, and being good friends with a vicious Tunisian dictatorship/police state that tortures and massacres its own citizens and 2. invading Tunisia and making it a colony? Do you have such contempt for democracy that the thought of allowing it doesn’t even occur to you?

I see your point on US funding and arming of Arab dictatorships - generally justified as backing secular dictatorships for “stability” to contain Islamism. I found it strange how the West went from bombing Tripoli (and killing Gaddafi’s daughter) for Gaddafi sponsoring Islamic terrorism & the IRA, to embracing Gaddafi as an ally against Al Qaeda, inviting him to Europe as an honoured statements and sending asylum seekers caught on the Med to camps in Libyia. Surely there was a medium between these two extremes in our relations with that repressive dictatorship?

However America (and other Western democracies) do have to have some kind of diplomatic relations and, often co-operation, with authoritarian regimes that there isn’t much chance of being overthrown/falling anytime soon.

 

[kingal86]

They may resent us, but they fear a world without us more.

As a left-leaning Brit, but with some idea of the realities of world politics and power, I agree with that. No matter the wrongs done by the United States, Europe would be much more vulnerable if America was less powerful.

And without US involvement in WWII either the Nazis would run most likely run Europe. And without the US defence of Western Europe, the Soviets might have taken us over or at least Finlandised us.

 

[gilliam]

We will have to see how things go. Ben Ali supporters still have key posts in the new government.

 

[gilliam]

As a left-leaning Brit, but with some idea of the realities of world politics and power, I agree with that. No matter the wrongs done by the United States, Europe would be much more vulnerable if America was less powerful.

And without US involvement in WWII either the Nazis would run most likely run Europe. And without the US defence of Western Europe, the Soviets might have taken us over or at least Finlandised us.

That is true. Another fact is that since 4th Century AD (the fall of Rome in the West) the countries of Europe have been fighting each other. That only stopped after WWII with American military in Europe to keep the peace.

 

[gilliam]

Why Tunisia Isn’t a Tipping Point for the Arab World

The Tunisian revolt fits Huntington’s model to a T. Looking at the third wave of democratization between 1974 and 1989, he found that rising wealth spells falling tyrants. How much money did it take? A per-capita income between $1,000 and $3,000, which would now be adjusted for inflation. Of the non-democracies which moved into that range in the 1970s and 1980s, three-quarters got rid of their overlords. To illustrate the point, Huntington recalls how the Spanish finance minister predicted in 1960 that his country would tumble into the democratic column once it had reached $2,000. Huntington’s terse comment: “It did”—in 1975…

But, if at all, this miracle will unfold in Tunisia. And why are the other Arab and Maghreb African countries—police states all—proving so immune to regime change (unless there is a little help from the U.S. military, as in Iraq)? Because they don’t make Huntington’s cut.

Not counting the petro-potentates (more about them later) and strife-torn Lebanon, Tunisia is the richest of them all. Its per-capita income is almost twice as high as neighboring Morocco, and it is ahead of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria by similar margins. The country is more urbanized (67 percent of the populace) than either Morocco (56 percent) or Egypt, (43 percent). Tunisia is also more educated: Its literacy is a bit higher than Egypt’s and a lot higher than Morocco’s, and it spends much more on education—7.2 percent of GDP, while Egypt devotes about half as much, and Morocco comes in at just 5.7 percent.

tnr.com/article/politics/81658/tunisia-revolution-riot-economy-democracy?page=0,1

 

[gilliam]

Tunisia minister: all political prisoners freed

(Reuters) - Tunisia freed all its remaining political prisoners on Wednesday, including members of a banned Islamist movement, government minister Najib Chebbi told Reuters.

“All the political prisoners have been released today,” said Chebbi, an opposition party leader who is now regional development minister in a coalition government. Asked if that included members of the banned Islamist Ennahda movement, he said: “There are no more Ennahda prisoners in jail.”

reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70I4RC20110119

 

[gilliam]

Tunisia to legalise banned polical parties
Tunisia’s new government says it will recognise all banned political groups, including Islamists, and grant an amnesty to all political prisoners…

We are not going back. We will recognise all the political movements."

The government said the amnesty would also cover the banned Islamist Ennahda movement.

bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12246030