UN to review errors made by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Ben Webster, Environment Editor

The United Nations is to announce an independent review of errors made by its climate change advisory body in an attempt to restore its credibility.
A team of the world’s leading scientists will investigate the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and ask why its supposedly rigorous procedures failed to detect at least three serious overstatements of the risk from global warming.
The review will be overseen by the InterAcademy Council, whose members are drawn from the world’s leading national science academies, including Britain’s Royal Society, the United States National Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
The review will be led by Robbert Dijkgraaf, co-chairman of the Interacademy Council and president of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
He has been asked to investigate the internal processes of the IPCC and will not consider the overarching question of whether it was right to claim that human activities were very likely to be causing global warming.
The review, which will be announced in New York by Ban Ki Moon, the UN Secretary General, and Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, is expected to recommend stricter checking of sources and much more careful wording to reflect the uncertainties in many areas of climate science.
The IPCC’s most glaring error was a claim that all Himalayan glaciers would disappear by 2035. Most glaciologists believe it would take another 300 years for the glaciers to melt at the present rate.
It also claimed that global warming could cut rain-fed North African crop production by up to 50 per cent by 2020. A senior IPCC contributor has since admitted that there is no evidence to support this claim.
The Dutch Government has asked the IPCC to correct its claim that more than half the Netherlands is below sea level. The environment ministry said that only 26 per cent of the country was below sea level.
The allegations about climate scientists are believed to have contributed to a sharp rise in public scepticism about climate change. Last month an opinion poll found that the proportion of the population that believes climate change is an established fact and largely man-made has fallen from 41 per cent in November to 26 per cent.
The Met Office, which produces the global temperature record used by the IPCC in its reports, has proposed a separate review of its data after admitting that public confidence in its findings had been undermined.
The Met Office relies on analysis by the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, which is under investigation over allegations that its director manipulated raw data and tried to hide it from critics.

The ‘waterless’ washing machine that could save you money

New machine by Xeros cleans clothes with beads and a tiny amount of water and may cut household bills by 30%

Alok Jha, green technology correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 9 March 2010 16.16 GMT

“Dry” cleaning is set to become a domestic activity with a washing machine that uses 90% less water than a normal laundry cycle and could be available by the end of 2011. The device, developed by Leeds-based Xeros Ltd, replaces water with tiny plastic beads that suck up stains and its producers claim it will shift stubborn pounds from household energy bills as well.
The Xeros process uses 3mm-long nylon beads that can get into all the crevices and folds of clothing and can also be re-used hundreds of times. The beads flood the machine’s drum once the clothes are wet and the humidity is at the right level. After the washing cycle is complete, the beads drain away in the same way as water in a conventional machine.
The chief executive of Xeros, Bill Westwater, said: “The net saving in water, detergent and electricity and including the cost of the beads, we calculate, is about a 30% cost saving for the user.” He claims the machine has been tested successfully on a range of fabrics stained with everything from mud, red wine and curry stains to ink from ballpoint pens.
According to the Energy Saving Trust, just under one-third of household energy is used to heat water. Laundry washing also accounts for 15% of all household water consumption; meaning if everyone in the UK converted from normal washing to the Xeros system, the carbon emissions saved would be the equivalent of taking 1.4 m cars off the roads. Another perk of the device is that it should allow many delicates to be “dry” cleaned at home.
Xeros has already received research and development funding from Yorkshire Forward and has just returned from a government-sponsored “Clean and Cool” trade mission to the United States, aimed at securing investment from venture capitalists in Silicon Valley in California.
The idea for polymer-based cleaning came from Stephen Burkinshaw, a polymer chemist at Leeds University who spent 30 years working out how to improve the dyeing of plastics used in fabrics. A few years ago he realised that the stains on clothes acted in a similar way to dyes, and he wondered if he could use plastics to attract away the stains.
After experimenting with a range of plastics, he settled on nylon. Thanks to a natural property of the material, nylon beads attract stains to their surface and, in 100% humidity, the molecular structure of the plastic becomes amorphous, so the stains diffuse into the centre of the beads. “Not only are you able to suck the stain off the clothes, you’re also able to ensure there’s no deposition back onto the clothes,” said Westwater.
When the beads are at the end of their life, saturated with dirt and stains, they can be collected and recycled into, for example, dashboards for cars. Eventually Westwater wants to design a closed-loop recycling system for his washing machines, where saturated beads can be refreshed and re-used in Xeros machines.
Westwater has already built a prototype washing machine and aims to have a product ready for the commercial laundry market by the end of next year, with a consumer version coming to market shortly afterwards. “There is more of a technical challenge [in development] as you compact the system. But it’s not just about that - there’s also consumer inertia. For millenia, people have been washing their clothes with water and a bit of detergent and suddenly we’re coming along and saying that most of that water can be replaced by these beads. That’s a big leap in the consumers’ minds.”
Claire Cunningham, a spokesperson for the government-backed Technology Strategy Board, said Xeros had an “interesting and innovative product” and the environmental and financial savings were of particular interest when it was selected to take part, along with the 18 other British clean technology companies, in the Clean and Cool trade mission.

‘Gribble’ marine pest may be key to biofuel breakthrough, say scientists

Home staff

A marine pest could be the key to a biofuel breakthrough, say scientists. Gribble, which resemble pink woodlice, plagued seafarers for centuries by boring through the planks of ships and destroying wooden piers.
But now environmental scientists are taking a keen interest in the crustaceans.
A team of British researchers has learnt that gribble have a gift for digesting wood not seen in any other animal.
Enzymes produced by the tiny creatures are able to break down woody cellulose and turn it into energy-rich sugars meaning that gribble could convert wood and straw into liquid biofuel.

A gribble-like processing plant could make sugars from woody raw material that can be fermented into alcohol-based fuels for vehicle engines.
Researchers at the universities of York and Portsmouth made the discovery after carrying out an extensive study of digestive genes from the gribble species Limnoria quadripunctata.
They found the crustacean’s long digestive tract is dominated by enzymes that attack cellulose and lignin, the normally indigestible material in woody plant tissue.
The results of the study were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The research was made possible by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) Sustainable Bioenergy Centre, a £26 million network of expert groups looking at bioenergy.
Duncan Eggar, the BBSRC’s Bioenergy Champion, said: “The world needs to quickly reduce its dependence on fossil fuels and sustainably produced bioenergy offers the potential to rapidly introduce liquid transport fuels into our current energy mix.”

Financially Pinched, Young Adults Lose Faith in American Economic System

March 9, 2010

Poll: Financially Pinched, Young Adults Lose Faith

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 5:15 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) — Young adults are financially anxious, worried that they can’t meet their educational, housing and health care needs, according to a new poll that exposes a growing pessimism about achieving the American Dream.

The poll by Harvard’s Institute of Politics found that six out of 10 of those surveyed worry they may not meet their current bills and obligations. Nearly half of those attending college wonder whether they will be able to afford to stay in school. And more than eight out of 10 said they expect difficulty finding a job after graduation.

Fewer than half said they believe they will be better off than their parents when they reach their parents’ age.

With the country in the midst of a slow economic recovery with nearly 10 percent unemployment, the data finds a deep sense of gloom among 18-29 year olds. The grim mood could have immediate political consequences, and it could also shape that generation’s long-term faith in government and in its ability to improve their daily lives.

”We have a generation that is committed to their community, but unless they can restore their levels of trust in some of the big American institutions, we will have lost a great opportunity to engage some of the best and brightest,” Institute of Politics polling director John Della Volpe said.

Four out of 10 respondents described themselves as politically independent, 36 percent affiliated themselves with Democrats and 23 percent said they considered themselves Republican. But young Republicans displayed more enthusiasm for the 2010 midterm elections, with those who said they disapproved of President Barack Obama’s job performance saying they were more likely to vote than those who said they approved of his performance.

Still, Obama enjoys a 56 percent approval rating among young adults, even though majorities of 51 to 56 percent disapprove of how he has handled high-profile issues during his first year in office, including health care, the economy, the federal deficit, Iran and Afghanistan.

The distinction that these voters make between the president and the issues worries Democratic politicians who fear they will not benefit from Obama’s appeal.

Nearly four out of 10 of those surveyed said the country was on the wrong track. About as many said they were unsure about the country’s direction. Only 23 percent said the country was headed in the right direction.

The economy dwarfed health care and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as the issue that concerned young adults the most. Forty-five percent cited the economy as their top worry, while only 17 percent mentioned health care and 6 percent cited the wars.

Despite their immediate financial concerns, 51 percent of these young adults said the president and Congress should seek to keep the budget deficit down, ”even though it may mean it will take longer for the economy to recover.”

The poll surveyed 3,117 U.S. citizens between the ages of 18 and 29. It was conducted between Jan. 29 and Feb. 22, and it has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.3 percentage points.

The survey was conducted by Knowledge Networks, which initially contacted people using traditional telephone and mail polling methods and followed up with online interviews. Those chosen who had no Internet access were given it for free.
——
On the Net:

Harvard Institute of Politics: http://www.iop.harvard.edu/

David Cameron’s environmentalism will succeed where Labour’s failed

Big Government environmentalism hasn’t worked. But David Cameron’s market-driven solutions will be effective in saving the planet, write Ben Caldecott and Gavin Dick.

By Ben Caldecott and Gavin DickPublished: 6:07AM GMT 10 Mar 2010

Left-wingers have colonised green politics for decades. Despite having the best of intentions, their policies failed and the environmental threats we now face are too serious to be left to them. That’s why David Cameron’s greening of the Conservative Party is so welcome.
Some claim that the party’s focus on the environment is a recent conversion. In fact, it is a homecoming. The Tories have a long and proud history of environmental preservation. Benjamin Disraeli, just like Mr Cameron, reasoned that Conservatives were natural stewards of the environment, keen to conserve its vitality and pass its benefits and beauty on to future generations. He faced grumbles from some and protest from others, but pressed on, confident that prioritising the environment was not just good for his party, but good for Britain.

It was Disraeli’s government that put the River Pollution Prevention Act into law in 1876, to prevent the dumping of raw sewage into Britain’s rivers. It proved seminal, influencing environmental legislation well into the 20th century. Likewise, it was a Conservative government that rid London of pea-soup smog with the Clean Air Act. It was the Tories who introduced the green belt across England to preserve our countryside in the 1950s. And it was Margaret Thatcher who was the first international leader to speak to the UN General Assembly on the dangers of climate change. She argued that we are “the trustees of this planet, charged today with preserving life itself – preserving life with all its mystery and all its wonder”.
Conservatives understand why it is important to conserve, to live within our means and not run up a vast debt – be it financial or ecological, to pass on to future generations. They have also always understood the importance of security. Today, climate instability, the break-down of ecosystems, population movement and resource conflict all pose serious threats to the safety of Britain’s people, our Armed Forces and our economy.
That is why the Conservative Environment Network, which launches today, has been formed. We are determined to support the current environmental leadership the Conservative Party is showing and to make the case to other Conservatives who may not recognise our Party’s proud environmental heritage.
The public has had enough of Left’s preference for tax, regulation, government interference and penalties. But there is the positive agenda – of socially empowering and market-driven solutions – that Mr Cameron’s 21st-century green conservatism can advocate. In a world of emptying oceans, disappearing forests, depleting aquifers, eroding soils, a warming atmosphere and an ever-increasing human population, the stakes are too high to ignore.
Ben Caldecott and Gavin Dick are among the founders of the Conservative Environment Network

New generation of nuclear in doubt

Ambitious plans to build a new generation of nuclear power stations across Britain will fail because of a lack of skills and funding, engineers have warned.

By Louise GrayPublished: 7:30AM GMT 10 Mar 2010

The Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMech) said the UK needs to have the first new nuclear power stations up and running by the end of this decade to avoid the lights going out.
However a lack of skilled engineers, delays in the planning process and a shortage in funds mean the building programme is in danger of stalling.
IMech called on ministers to invest in training programmes for nuclear engineers and speed up planning by identifying areas where power stations could be built.
Taxpayers will have to effectively provide a subsidy for the industry by either guaranteeing loans to the nuclear industry or setting a minimum price for carbon.
However a seminar of environment and industry experts meeting in Westminster will question whether the new generation of nuclear should go ahead.
Ministers want up to 11 new nuclear power stations to be built in Britain over the next 15 years in order to provide energy and cut carbon emissions.
But each power stations will cost up to £5 billion and need up a workforce of up to 10,000. In the past the planning process has dragged on for years.
The IMech report calls for a “floor price” for the carbon permit that coal and gas generators have to buy to cover their emissions, this would make nuclear more competitive but ultimately the extra cost for fossil fuels over the short term will be passed onto energy bills. Alternatively a loan guarantee would encourage investment in nuclear but would mean the taxpayers pay if Government has to bail the industry out.
Dr Tim Fox, Head of Energy and Environment at IMech, said energy bills will need to rise to pay for new energy sources over the next decade and nuclear is among the cheaper options.
“For the nuclear energy sector to have the confidence to invest tens of billions in new plants or technologies, it will need strong and binding commitment, delivered in actions that will last,” he said.
However Dr Paul Dorfman, an expert on nuclear at Warwick University and former government adviser, said nuclear will provide only four per cent of total energy – and could cost billions to clear up.
“The key problem is locking in vast amounts of money at a time when the public purse is running short of cash into one particular essentially high risk technology at the risk of endangering other more sustainable technologies.”

ANCYL Leader Malema Responds to Charges of Excessive Wealth

Malema Responds to Charges of Excessive Wealth

African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) president Julius Malema says if anyone can prove any wrongdoing against him, they should arrest him.

“I’m not above the law. If there is any crime I have committed, I’m asking to be arrested,” he told students at the University of Johannesburg on Tuesday.

Malema reiterated previous statements that he has never stolen from the poor, and said he would give the R140-million reportedly in his bank account to the less fortunate.

“If I have got R140-million, take that money and nationalise it,” he said, in an echo of his calls to nationalise the country’s mines.

“I’m giving you the permission to take everything else you find in that account and give it to the poor.”

Malema said the perceived “onslaught” against the youth league was not “an ordinary attack”. He said he would “never be ambushed” and never be “looted by anybody”.

Malema also said lifestyle audits were not a concept thought up by Congress of South African Trade Unions general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. It was a practice carried out by the Scorpions and currently by the South African Revenue Service.

“Why should we be subjected to a factional lifestyle audit?”

Malema again charged he was the victim of forces out to get rid of the youth league. “It you want to kill a snake … hit it hard on the head, that’s what they want to do to me.”

‘Nobody will remove Zuma’

Meanwhile, Malema on Tuesday expressed support for President Jacob Zuma leading the ANC for a second term.

“Nobody will remove Zuma. If you want to serve in the ANC, support Zuma,” said.

“That [Zuma] is the only man guaranteed in 2012 for a second term.”

Malema also alluded to the youth league not wanting ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe to be part of the party’s leadership in 2012, wanting him to replaced by Fikile Mbalula.

“But in that top six there is one man who will not be coming back … who has isolated himself from the ANC,” Malema said.

He, however, dismissed reports of plans to oust Mantashe at the ANC’s September national general council, saying all current leaders would complete their five-year term.

Malema claimed that whatever the youth league pronounced on would be the outcome of the 2012 leadership race.

He condemned accusations against some ANC leaders made by Cosatu, as well as criticism by the union federation of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and Zuma.

Malema expressed concern over the “apartheid regime of the Western Cape” under the premiership of Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille.

He accused her of demolishing churches in Khayelitsha and dragging the elderly out of their places of worship.

“Helen Zille, who is suffering from Satanism, has gone all out to demolish the churches in the Western Cape. She is exposing herself … people there will know they voted for a monster.” — Sapa

Two new sites for eco-towns

Two more councils are planning to build eco-towns under Government plans to roll out the controversial project.

By Louise GrayPublished: 7:30AM GMT 10 Mar 2010
John Healey, the housing minister, has already given the go-ahead for four local authorities to build environmentally friendly settlements and a further nine locations are developing plans.
Now two more councils in South Hampshire and East Devon are developing proposals.

To qualify as an eco-town, a development must have 5,000 homes – at least 30 per cent of which are affordable to those on low incomes – and contain low-carbon services and energy supplies.
The Government’s aim is to build 10 eco-towns by 2020.
Mr Healey has already granted £10 million to help councils develop their plans for eco-towns.
He also announced a further £10 million to help councils develop renewable sources of energy like wind and solar, install electric car charging points and update planning procedures to protect the environment
.“We know we need greener, renewable energy if we are to meet our ambitious low carbon targets. We also know that the ways and means for people to access this energy needs to be quicker and easier.
“The tougher, better guidelines for planning give councils a new blueprint, reflecting the latest targets and ensuring councils put combating climate change at the heart of future development – ultimately saving people money on their bills and reducing emissions,” he said.

AFL-CIO Passes Resolution Against Obama’s Endorsement of Mass Firing ofRhode Island Teachers

Unions Plan Political Work Despite Strained Relations With Obama

By David Moberg
In These Times
March 2010

After Obama earlier this week supported the
mass firing of 93 teachers and other staff at the
troubled Central Falls High School in Rhode Island, the
AFL-CIO executive council, already meeting in Orlando,
fired off an unusually harsh resolution.

Labor leaders said they were “appalled” by the
“unacceptable” and “disappointing” presidential
statements, especially since the local superintendent
fired the teachers rather than negotiate over how to
continue the recent academic improvement at the working-
class community’s school.

It was a mini-PATCO moment-echoing faintly President
Reagan’s decision to fire striking air traffic
controllers-in the increasingly frayed relations between
organized labor and a president who has at times seemed
distant from the labor movement, yet at other times
seemed more pro-union than any president in many
decades.

AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka said Obama’s comment
was “a bad call” based on “wrong facts,” but that it
happened at all caused him “concern, deep concern.”

Union reaction to the administration is increasingly
ambivalent. Partly it reflects frustration-mainly in not
getting adequate legislation passed to deal with the
multiple crises of working Americans (jobs, incomes,
health care, worker rights and more).

But that unease is tempered by satisfaction-mainly in
administrative actions.

This complex relationship was on display with two
speeches to the executive council-both somewhat
defensive, if not apologetic. Vice-president Joe Biden
was received lukewarmly with pointed questions about
broad administration policy afterwards. Labor Secretary

Hilda Solis received a much more enthusiastic reception,
partly as a result of her efforts to enforce existing
laws better and to develop more pro-worker regulations
(such as on occupational safety and health).

Labor leaders know their frustration primarily stems
from Republican obstruction, right-wing demagoguery, and
the anti-democratic rules of the Senate. (Asked if the
theoretically bipartisan labor movement would endorse
any Republicans this year, Trumka said, “We’re hoping.
None come to mind at this point.”)

But the unreliability of a significant bloc of
conservative Democrats slowed or stopped progress even
when the Democrats could claim the magic number-60-in
the Senate. In a plan first hatched by a group of big
unions from the AFL-CIO and Change to Win several weeks
ago, organized labor-from the state federation to the
AFL-CIO threw its support behind Arkansas Lt. Gov. Bill
Halter in a primary challenge against Sen. Blanche
Lincoln, a Democratic nemesis of unions. Communications
Workers, Service Employees (SEIU), AFSCME (public
workers), and the Steelworkers each pledged $1 million
for his campaign.

Lincoln, known as the Senator from Wal-Mart, rejected
labor law reform, opposed the public option in health
care reform, and refused to vote for cloture on the
appointment of labor lawyer Craig Becker to the National
Labor Relations Board. Halter is no labor tribune: he
says he doesn’t support the original labor law reform
involving majority sign-up, but leans to a compromise
that would hold NLRB representation elections more
quickly.

But “maybe something like this will send a message” to
other Democrats, says AFSCME president Gerald McEntee.
“I think it does represent a new strategy. We’re going
to take into consideration records on issues facing the
people. There’s always the danger [of losing a
Democratic seat]-we do want to support Democrats-but
when people are as recalcitrant as this, you have to do
something or you’re not a labor movement.”

There are other ways to deliver the same message.
McEntee says the AFL-CIO coordinated political program
will be even bigger this year than in the 2008
presidential election (partly because it will be
necessary to spend heavily in some normally blue states
like California and Illinois to erect a firewall
protecting vulnerable Democratic seats). But AFL-CIO
political director Karen Ackerman says that despite that
effort many Democrats may not get a labor endorsement or
get an endorsement with no money. “Those who’ve not
proven themselves will not get our support,” she says.

Union leaders-and likely many members and other workers-
are upset with a variety of Obama policy choices, such
as dropping the public option and imposing an excise tax
on high-cost health insurance policies (and were
disappointed even with the improvements Trumka and other
negotiated) or going easy on the big banks. (As blogger
Michael Whitney noted, there were no mass firings of
bankers.)

But people’s biggest frustration, especially among the
broader base of Obama voters, is that so little is
getting accomplished and that-even if Republicans and
blue dogs and filibusters are largely at fault-that
Obama doesn’t seem to be fighting hard enough. “People
get demoralized when they don’t have a vehicle to fight
back,” Ackerman says. Or when their representatives
don’t fight, adds UNITE HERE (hotel and restaurant
workers) president John Wilhelm . “There’s no fight
visible to the average worker,” he says.

Demoralization will make it harder to mobilize the Obama
voters this fall, even though the union political
operation is much more effective than in 1994, when
union member and working class disillusionment with Bill
Clinton’s NAFTA deal and his health insurance reform
failure helped Republicans take control of the House.

Yet Wilhelm says, “It will be extremely tough. Our folks
are seriously disappointed not to see significant
changes since the Democrats took control. That was the
promise. Especially the response to the job problem has
been so anemic….Our members may not vote for
reactionaries, but they may not vote.”

“I think Rich Trumka is right,” Wilhelm continues. “The
conversation has to be about jobs.” And the plan this
year, far more than ever, McEntee says, is to lead into
the election battle with an issues fight over job
creation, including taxing the financial services
industry both to pay for reconstructing the jobs and
economy its executives destroyed and to discourage
speculation over investment in the future.

Winning that fight means pushing the president and many
Democratic lawmakers and officials beyond where they
want to go as well as defeating Republicans. At a time
when even many union members are disillusioned, and
right-wing scare tactics are powerful, the political
challenge for organized labor this year is extraordinary.

U.S. Imperialism and the War Against Zimbabwe

US declares war against Zim

By Tichaona Zindoga
Zimbabwe Herald

It is a war. Last week United States president Barack Obama announced he was extending US sanctions on Zimbabwe for another year as his country continued with the “national emergency” against Zimbabwe that, he repeated, posed a “continuing and extraordinary threat to US foreign policy.’’

“I am continuing for one year the national emergency with respect to the actions and policies of certain members of the Government of Zimbabwe and other persons to undermine Zimbabwe’s democratic processes or institutions,” Obama said in a statement.

“The crisis constituted by the actions and policies of certain members of the Government of Zimbabwe and other persons to undermine Zimbabwe’s democratic processes or institutions has not been resolved,” he added in an apparent reference to President Mugabe, his party and perceived sympathisers and supporters.

He declared: “These actions and policies continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the foreign policy of the United States.

“For these reasons, I have determined that it is necessary to continue this national emergency and to maintain in force the sanctions to respond to this threat.”

US sanctions, enabled by the sanctions law, the so-called Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act passed by George W Bush in 2002, bars US public and private citizens from doing business with Zimbabwe.

It instructs top US officers at multilateral lending institutions like IMF and World Bank to deny Zimbabwe access to funds or cancellation of indebtedness.

Sanctions also bar certain Zimbabweans from entering the US or having investments there.

This also applies to some journalists who have been questioning US’ unfair treatment of Zimbabwe.

On the other hand, US sponsors what it terms “pro-democracy” organisations and individuals, who loosely defined are overthrow activists and reactionaries against veteran President Mugabe and his nationalist liberation movement, Zanu-PF.

Obama’s latest move is his second in a space of a year, having renewed the sanctions last March.

It also follows hard on the heels of the 27-member EU bloc’s recent resolution to extend sanctions on Zimbabwe by a further year, nominally easing the restrictions by removing nine companies and certain persons — who passed on — from the list comprising of around 200 individuals and companies.

While there could be little surprise regarding the latest round of sanctions on Zimbabwe, there are a number of interesting points of Western involvement in Zimbabwe.

One of these is the contempt for, or perhaps impatience with, the inclusive Government of Zimbabwe, predicated on the Global Political Agreement.

The agreement, signed by Zanu-PF and the two MDC formations in September 2008, set the tone for political, economic and social reform in the country.

The country’s main political parties, Zanu-PF and the two MDC formations, have been implementing the reforms, albeit painstakingly, and still continue to do so.

Ironically, the West, which has been publicly proclaiming support for Zimbabwe in this reform agenda, has been subverting the same.

Sanctions, which the GPA says should go in all their forms, are not only undermining the economic recovery efforts but have also been a divisive element in the Government which has been trying and, largely successfully so, to eliminate polarisation in both society and the body politic.

The circumstances under which the US has renewed sanctions lately have an edge of keenness.

US’ recent extension of sanctions came at a time when Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai appeared to have finally found the voice to join President Mugabe and Deputy Prime Minister Professor Arthur Mutambara in calling for the immediate and unconditional lifting of sanctions on Zimbabwe.

Last week, Tsvangirai told visiting Danish Development Co-operation Minister Soren Pind that sanctions were affecting the full implementation of the GPA and should thus go.

Parliament has since unanimously agreed on an anti-sanctions motion.

It will be recalled that July 2008, after the parties had just signed the Memorandum of Understanding, which begot the GPA, the Bush regime in Washington extended the embargo on Zimbabwe.

When Obama extended the sanctions on March 4 last year, the inclusive Government was just a couple of weeks old, with the euphoria of that momentous achievement having barely died down among people of all walks of life.

Sadc, the African Union and many countries across the world support the inclusive Government.

But perhaps the most critical point in US relations with Zimbabwe lies in the statement peddled since March 6, 2003’s Executive Order 13288, repeated by Obama on Monday that it was “necessary to continue this national emergency and to maintain in force the sanctions to respond” to Zimbabwe’s “unusual and extraordinary threat” to the foreign policy of the United States.

The extension is pursuant to its International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 USC 1701-17-06).

The 1977 Act allows freezing of assets, limiting of trade, and confiscation of property during a declared emergency.

The US is thus virtually in a war situation with Zimbabwe.

Authorities define a “state of emergency” as a governmental declaration that to suspend certain normal functions of government, alert citizens to alter their normal behaviour, or order government agencies to implement emergency preparedness plans.

Such declarations, renewable by the Executive, are usually common during times of natural disasters, civil disorder, or following a declaration of war.

The US has issued emergency declarations with respect to issues in the Middle East, Iran, September 11, among others.

Violators of emergency declarations face punishment, and in the case of Zimbabwe, American individuals and companies stand to pay thousands of dollars in fines if they engage Zimbabwe.

Apart from the overarching imperialist goal and the country’s characteristic importation of Britain’s bilateral wars, US policy towards Zimbabwe seems to border on something between lies, deception, hypocrisy and intrigue.

One of the basic questions is how little Zimbabwe can pose a continuous and extraordinary threat to the foreign policy of America.

If the US — just like the EU — predicate their re-engagement with Zimbabwe on the fulfilment of the GPA, it is to be wondered how Zimbabwe’s domestic situation, which the GPA largely is, stand to pose or not pose a threat to US foreign policy.

It is also to be wondered how the alleged “actions and policies of certain members of the Government of Zimbabwe and other persons to undermine Zimbabwe’s democratic processes or institutions” can amount to a threat to the foreign policy of America.

The wording and tone of Obama’s latest contribution to America’s blitz on Zimbabwe shows that part of America’s foreign policy has not changed, just as been seen elsewhere, from the regressive, aggressive and senseless Bush era.

This also shows Obama’s hypocritical side.

When the Obama administration got into office, it promised a new era of relations with those aggrieved by George W Bush’s style of government, but it has been largely Zimbabwe — whose doors have always been open to negotiations — that Obama has continuously shunned.

Despite the fact that the US has manifested itself to be a continuous and extraordinary threat to Zimbabwe through economic and political strangulation of the country, Washington has managed to lie to its people and the world that actions of certain Zimbabweans are a threat to America.

(This is of course besides the point that the actions of Zimbabwe in empowering its people that have suffered colonial injustice set the tone for empowerment initiatives by oppressed peoples of the globe.)

Propaganda is also very much a component of US war on Zimbabwe.

Apart from the American administrations’ misleading and oft hysterical language in justifying the war, they have created, funded and hosted individuals and organisations that while systematically sanitising US aggression towards Zimbabwe, they also say and do things that necessitate American self-serving interests.

The so-called independent media, analysts and pro-democracy groups have been part of the intricate propaganda machinery.

And in the cover of the big lie about wanting to see democratic institutions and processes, the US with the help of the aforementioned acolytes has maintained its stranglehold on Zimbabwe.

Yet if truth be told, the US has subverted and bastardised Zimbabwe’s institutions and processes for the whole existence of sanctions.

This is because sanctions, which by the US’ own admission were designed to “make the economy scream”, are by their very nature anti-people yet somehow the US and its partners have transferred their culpability to the “certain individuals” in Zanu-PF.

By funding political and media activities in and outside Zimbabwe, the US has also manipulated and suffocated Zimbabwe’s political space, institutions and processes.

The US just does not have the moral ground to play god or disciple in matters of democracy and democratic institutions.

Washington’s actions in Zimbabwe and elsewhere confirms such, and its economic war on Zimbabwe, which is known to stem from the desire to reverse indigenous ownership of natural resources, is as evident as it is evil, unjustifiable, and undesirable in any democratic and peace-loving society.