Barbarians at the gate

“Behead all those who insult the prophet” is a curiously worded slogan. It says Mohammed is a figure so holy that even the mildest rebuke should be greeted by severing that person’s arteries at the throat.  It is a common punishment for trivial matters in hard-line Wahhabist regimes such as Saudi Arabia.  One such trivial matter lies behind the latest calls for such barbarism, a "clumsily overdubbed and haphazardly-edited” low budget film with no production values.  Its US-Egyptian maker Nakoula Bassely Nakoula could well be the Ed Wood of the 21^st century. But because his film contains “insults to the prophet”,  it is capable of causing world-wide riots, multiple deaths including a US ambassador  and the banning of youtube in Afghanistan. 

Yesterday's protest in Sydney was the first Australian attempt to normalise such an extreme response. It was a deliberate affront to the norms of western culture and the live and let live philosophy of multiculturalism. Saturday shoppers on Pitt Street would have been bewildered to reads signs that told them  "Our dead are in paradise, your dead are in hell''.  It was so far outside their life experience as to be surreal. But they would have noticed the anger was real enough.

It was worse in other parts of the world where protesters were taking active steps to behead the insulters. Urged on by opportunist Salafi political leaders they lashed out at whatever target was convenient. But it was contrived.  In Libya and Egypt, it was Al Qaeda-affiliated groups preaching to the disaffecting. In Yemen, it was former president Salah undermining the current administration. And behind the scenes across the region it was Iran flexing its muscles.  There is no god but God and Muhammad is his prophet, but it was politicians pulling the strings.

As usual, the West had no idea how to react. The protests were cloaked in wrath so righteous, it dared not be criticised. Far easier to criticise the target of the wrath, as western countries did in the past, blaming Salman Rushdie or the Danish cartoons for antagonising Muslims, not the protesters themselves for their over-the-top response or their leaders for their cynical manipulations. It is easier to retreat into pious homilies that attack the proximate rather than political causes. Then-US president George HW Bush refused to condemn the fatwa on Salman Rushdie with a non-committal “no American interests are involved” while the British deplored his fight with a great religion.

Now the American can’t look away any longer when a work of no artistic value causes international murder and mayhem. Nakoula had every right to make a film that took Mohammed’s life to pieces and portrayed him as a flawed man, not as a flawless “prophet”.  If that was humiliating and offensive to some, then so be it. That is their problem and they could have dealt with it by ignoring it. But the Innocence of Muslims is not only a rubbish film, it is not even honest rubbish. Nakoula lied to his cast and crew about its intentions .   

Under an assumed name of Sam Bacile, Nakoula pretended he was making a “historical desert drama” called Desert Warriors.  His lead character was Master George, a philanderer and husband of multiple wives, one as young as seven. The references to Mohammed and Islam were thrown in later in the absurdly bad editing process. When one of the cast rang Bacile/Nakoula to talk about his deception, he replied, “I'm tired of radical Islamists killing each other. Let other actors know it's not their fault.”

Nakoula may have wanted to light a flame but it was up to others to burn the house down with it. Former Iranian Hezbollah leader Massoud Dehnamaki gives a clue as to how others would use the spark. Dehnamaki told the Daily Beast it was up to the US to “prove” it was not involved  The US government had to prosecute the filmmakers, he said. “Westerners see their own freedom in the ability to insult others,” Dehnamaki said. “They see freedom as a one-way freeway that moves in the direction of their demands. They don’t respect other people’s beliefs.”  

And indeed there were pictures in the news today of Nakoula being arrested. Though it was not well explained by media, his crime was not blasphemy or even deception but simply a breach of probation conditions. When he was done for a fraud crime in 2010, Nakoula was not allowed a computer or the Internet without permission for five years.  

But there is no crime in his film, except against taste. It was not as the White House said  “reprehensible and disgusting”, but the response was. Bad films don’t kill people, people kill people. No one wants to take the side of a convicted fraudster who deceived his crew and set out to deliberately offend with a ham-fisted film.  But that is what we must do.

Freedom is not a one-way freeway as Dehnamaki calls it. It is an 18^th century enlightenment value that understands complex societies need a certain tolerance of difference to survive.  No longer tied to the dictatorial value-system of any one church, some leeway of live and let live is needed to ensure a peaceful life.  It is why blasphemy was mostly wiped off the books in the west in the 20^th century but it is also why it is creeping back in the 21^st in the form of legislated race hate crimes.  

 

It makes it harder to get criticism into the public domain while doing nothing to address the root cause of the hatred.  And it is the thin edge of the wedge. There are more serious works than Nakoula's at stake. Only this week, British television canned a serious historical program that casts doubt on the authenticity of Muslim traditions. Filmmaker Tom Holland said his "Islam: The Untold Story" was a “a legitimate subject of historical inquiry”. But it was cancelled on “security advice”. British audiences should slam Channel Four’s cowardice and demand they show it. This is not war of civilisations, it is test of strength.  We must stand up for free speech. Unless we are happy for western countries to imitate the Saudis, those who demand beheading need to be disarmed. 

Draft Surat Underground Water Impact Report - part 3: Bubbling gas issues

In the last couple of days, the Lock the Gate Alliance which represents a coalition of landholders opposed to coal seam gas in the Surat Basin released a video called Condamine River Gas Leak. It shows footage from an organisation called Gasileaks taken along the River at an “undisclosed location”. There was bubbling activity at the surface of the river and some kind of meter that went berserk when placed near the bubbles.

Frackman in Roma July 2010

The footage was filmed by local landholder Dayne Pratzsky who has been a long-term vocal critic of the industry. I remember Pratzsky as “frackman” for his wonderful attention-grabbing outfit he wore  when he heckled the State Government Community Cabinet in June 2010.  When we published the Lock the Gate footage on our Facebook page today (without comment),  a local man named Andrew Thomas pointed out this phenomenon was not uncommon in the gasfields region. “I grew up at a location near Orallo and all the bores would light up if you wanted them to - the gas comes out of most bore holes,” Andrew said. “It has been happening for well over 150 years around Roma and Surat and lots of other places - get a life and move on.”

It might be difficult for Pratzky and other blockies in the Lock the Gate Alliance to do exactly that. This is their life and they don’t want to move on. Yet I fear they – and others who want a moratorium of the industry – are placing themselves too far outside the conversation about how the industry should evolve. Origin Energy, the petroleum tenure holder in the location where Pretsky filmed (a fishing spot south west of Chinchilla known as the "coal hole") confirmed what Thomas told the Western Star on Facebook “According to local knowledge it goes back at least 30 years and naturally occurring gas has been a phenomenon in the Queensland Western Downs region for more than 100 years,” Origin said.

The public face of Lock the Gate Alliance is its media-savvy president Drew Hutton. He was the one who publicly announced  the Chinchilla leak.  Hutton, a prominent member of Queensland Greens, said he was unconvinced by Origin’s response and challenged them to prove it. Hutton said Origin should “release its seismic and other data...to establish whether or not the leak is linked to the company's coal seam gas operations.” Hutton said he consulted “several highly competent hydrogeologists” who told him there was a good chance the leaks were “linked to the de-watering of the coal seam aquifers and possibly fracking opening up pathways for the methane.” 

With neither Origin nor Hutton willing to offer their sources, it is difficult to know who is right. And water quality remains one of the great unknowns of this massive new industry. Yet this problem can be solved just as land access and now water depletion. The 2010 Queensland land access laws redressed the power imbalance between gas companies and landholders and the new Draft Surat Basin Underground Water Impact Report  which I reported about on Monday (Part 1) and Tuesday (part 2) deals with the water depletion issue. The report specifically ruled out a role for monitoring water quality. That prompted an anonymous respondent to my Tuesday piece to ask the legitimate question: if "It will not monitor water quality (eg for contamination from fracking)", who WILL monitor water quality?  

The answer to that question is the same as the answer to who will monitor water depletion: a mix of the Queensland Government Department of Natural Resources and Mining and the petroleum tenure holders themselves. Many in the Roma forum on the report I attended asked if this was not leaving the fox in the charge of the henhouse. The Queensland Water Commission’s response to that was to say, if they did something wrong, they’d be found out. There would be anomalies in the results that would stand out.

If this is correct then we need to maintain trust. Trust of the companies to do the right thing and trust of the regulator to pick up the anomalies if the companies don’t do the right thing. The gas majors all have the profit imperative but are bound by a number of strict rules and environment conditions they have to satisfy to get the green light for their enterprises. With the pressure to meet their export commitments once the gas comes online in 2014, those companies will need to ensure they are squeaky clean so the regulator does not have a reason to hold them up.

What does need to be looked at is the quick gobbling up of Australia’s natural resources.  According to mining critic Paul Cleary, Australia has the 12^th largest reserve of gas but is the world’s second largest exporter and heading towards number one. Gladstone Port in Queensland is the home of four of the eight big LNG plants and Incentives by the Bligh Government drove gas consumption for the local market. Now the high price of oil is driving this massive investment in coal seam methane for LNG. The problem is the price of natural gas on the New York-based Henry Hub has been declining for over a year and will mean the companies will have to reforecast earnings or else dig for more gas.  

With governments greedy for the royalties, knowing when that saturation point comes will be critical for the success of the industry and the regions they serve. As the Surat DWIR proves, having good legislation supported by science will be critical in keeping an even keel.

Bahrain's Formula 1 for failure

Activist Ala’a al-Shehabi is the latest victim of Bahrain’s dictatorship arrested after a series of articles critical of the repressive regime. Al-Shehabi was arrested last week while taking journalists on a trip around the country during the Grand Prix weekend. She was possible arrested while travelling with the Channel 4 News crew led by Jonathan Miller which was filming illegally in hot spot areas before they were arrested and deported.  Al-Shehabi announced her own arrest on Twitter saying “Under arrest. Surrounded by.”  She was unable to complete the sentence because she was surrounded by 11 police vehicles.  There has been no word of any charges laid since the arrest.

Dr. Ala’a al-Shehabi is an economics lecturer, a founding member of Bahrain Watch and an outspoken democracy advocate. Her arrest came a week after she published a piece for Foreign Policy called Hunger, heroism and hope in Bahrain where she wrote about another prominent Bahraini activist Abdulhadi al-Khawaja. Al-Khawaja was then into his 64^th day of a hunger strike. Al-Shehabi said if he died it could end the regime's efforts to rehabilitate itself. The regime was obviously paying attention. Not only did it arrest her, it also forcibly ended the hunger strike after 77 days by force feeding al-Khawaja who now plans to resume it.

His survival removed another potential embarrassing moment for Bahrain as it dealt with the fall-out from the Formula 1 Grand Prix. Leaving aside the disgrace of Bernie Ecclestone and the sport’s governing body heaped upon motor racing by agreeing for the event to go ahead (exposing once again the oft-repeated lie that sport and politics do not mix), the event did bring some good to Bahrain – it shone a light on the nation’s grievous problems. These problems have only got worse since the regime crushed the Shiite protests in March 2011 with Saudi help and US acquiescence.

A new briefing from the Project on Middle East Political Science called Breaking Bahrain surveys Bahrain’s political stalemate, how it got to this point, and what the future might hold. The briefing said the crackdown torpedoed a political compromise and had wider implications to the region blunting the momentum for change (a strong motivation for Saudi intervention). It also hardened sectarian attitudes between Sunnis and Shiites and exposes US hypocrisy at the same time as it intervened in Libya.

Bahrain’s own Independent Commission of Inquiry report found the Bahraini regime committed wide scale human rights violations during the crackdown. The report documented 35 deaths and found  13 of them were caused by security forces, five more dying of torture and eight more “not attributable to a perpetrator”.  Torture included extremely tight handcuffing, forced standing, severe beatings, electric shocks, burning with cigarettes, beating of the soles of the feet, verbal abuse, sleep deprivation, threats of rape and sexual abuse.

A year on, the Bahraini regime has refused to implement the recommendations of the report. They show no sign of admitting there is a problem and are unwilling to countenance any power sharing. When protests started again on 13 February to mark the one year anniversary, the response was swift and brutal. Police fired teargas and stun grenades at protesters who tried to occupy the old Pearl Square, the demolished rallying point of the 2011 protests.  The Government blamed outsiders for the riots. Field Marshall Shaikh Khalifa bin Ahmad Al Khalifa, the Bahrain Defence Forces commander in chief told local press a vast array of countries had “mobilised their media, embassies, agents and fifth columns in the Gulf” against Bahrain’s government.

The Grand Prix gave the regime only brief respite. Bahrain’s Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa claimed cancelling the race would have empowered the extremists. But the security blanket Bahrain put on to ensure its “success” fooled no-one inside or outside the kingdom.  The protester Salah Abbas Habib was beaten to death by riot police on the eve of the race while there were more journalists in the country more interested in race issues rather than the race. Formula One is a loss leader for Bahrain costing $40 million to run but supposedly stimulating knock-on effect to other business.  But with the country on the front pages and first five minutes of international news, tourism remains on the nose and investment is seen as too risky. Bahrain’s problems will continue indefinitely in the absence of any serious attempts at political compromise.

Assad's moment of truth or dare

The Syrian city of Hama remains defiant despite a week-long assault by President Bashar al-Assad’s troops. On Thursday Syrian forces took Turkish journalists around the city to show them they were back in control. While the government claimed it was ridding Hama of “terrorists”, residents had a different story. They told of told of indiscriminate shelling by the army, snipers aiming at civilians and corpses piling up in the streets. Human rights groups say 1,700 people have died so far in the crackdown with casualties highest in Hama. (photo of Hama July protest:Wikipedia)

It is little surprise Hama should be at the heart of the revolution as it has long been a hotbed of anti-Ba’athist activity. Shortly after the Ba’athists first seized power in Syria in 1963, Islamic groups in Hama rose against the new secular regime. That rebellion was crushed as was another in 1982. Tens of thousands were killed in what became known as the Hama Massacre and parts of the city were flattened. There were echoes of that in July when 136 people were killed in Hama in the “Ramadan Massacre”. Syrian forces attacked demonstrators using tanks, artillery, and snipers.

Hama and Homs were among the earliest city to join this year’s Arab Spring but the two biggest cities Damascus and Aleppo (home to half the country’s population) have been mostly quiet. But that may be about to change. Reports just in from Al Jazeera north east Damascus is the focus of a major government offensive. As one protester puts it, the regime is feeling time is against it after strong Arab and international reaction against the crackdown. The security forces want to end anti-Assad protests within one or two weeks.

Assad belongs to the minority Alawite sect which has ties to Shia Islam. Alawites are 12 percent of Syria’s 22 million people but hold a vastly outsized portion of the high-ranking positions in the government and the military. Sunnis consider them heretics. When the French ruled in the early 20th century, they granted the Alawites their own state and they were autonomous Syrian independence in 1946. In the 1930s, the French rejected calls from Sulayman Al Assad against union with Syria. Since then, the Assad family has built its power in the Alawite political movement in Syria. When Hafez Al Assad seized power in an intra-party coup in 1970, most of the Alawite community lined up behind him. Hafez was a hardline ruler and it was he who authorised the 1982 Hama massacre. Bashar al Assad absorbed the lessons well after becoming president in 2000 on his father’s death.

Bashar was an accidental president. When his father died in June 2000, it only took hours for the Syrian parliament to vote to amend the country's constitution to allow al-Assad to become president lowering the age of eligibility of the president from 40 to 34. It had been elder brother Basil who was originally groomed as Hafez’s successor, and was chief of security. Meanwhile Bashar studied medicine in Britain, receiving a degree in ophthalmology, and headed the Syrian Computer Society. But in 1994 Basil was driving his Mercedes to the airport at high speed during a fog. He slammed into a roundabout and died instantly. Bashar was rushed home from London to rejoin the army.

The army remains Bashar’s greatest ally today. Like the president, most of the top brass are Alawite. Assad's brother Maher controls key military units packed with Alawite soldiers. One security expert told Reuters the regime had been careful about placing Alawite loyalists in all key positions. Some Sunni officers have risen to high ranks but have very little power to command troops. It is unlikely the army will switch sides any time soon.

If pressure has to be brought to bear, it must come from outside. The US added to its sanctions on Syria on 10 August to blacklist telco Syriatel and the Commercial Bank of Syria, a Syrian state-owned institution and its Lebanon-based subsidiary, Syrian Lebanese Commercial Bank. They add to existing sanctions including freezing assets and bans on business dealings, personal sanctions on Assad, as well as Syria's vice president, prime minister, interior and defence ministers, the head of military intelligence and director of the political security branch. Internally, the protests have reached a point of no return. As the Economist puts it, the savagery of the regime’s response has convinced protesters that the movement has to continue or face revenge of unimaginable proportions.

Bahrain government continues brutal crackdown

The main Shiite opposition party in Bahrain has said it will boycott the proposed “national dialogue” next month and will also sit out the planned September elections. Al Wefaq leader Shaikh Ali Salman said it was a protest against the government for not doing enough to address Shiite concerns. "There has to be real dialogue that results in political reforms,” Salman said. “We believe the dialogue was a step forward for the country but setting conditions before the process is not acceptable.” Salman told Chinese news agency Xinhua they would not take part in the 24 September elections because the “issues faced by people are more important and are still ignored”. He also said government needed to address the sacking of workers, arrest of doctors and nurses, as well as politicians and other citizens before entering any dialogue. (photo of Shaikh Ali Salman by Hasan Jamali)

The national dialogue forum Salman is referring to starts on Saturday. It is aiming to attract 300 participants bringing together the full spectrum of Bahrain's political, social, economic and rights groups. According to Dubai’s Gulf News (which is distributed in Bahrain), the participation rate of invitees is 94 percent. But Al Wefaq was the big undecided group and suspicious that the too wide variety of issues on the table would diminish the chances of agreeing on real democratisation. Despite being almost ha;f of parliament, it was invited to choose only five representatives to the 300-person conference.

Al Wefaq is Bahrain’s largest party winning 18 of the 40 seats in last year’s parliamentary election. However they are regularly outvoted by a bloc of Sunni parties and independents. In February, all 18 Al Wefaq MPs resigned after police killed seven people in the battle for Pearl Roundabout (now razed and known as Al Farooq junction). The Government crushed the rebellion in March with the aid of troops from Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

On 1 June, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa announced the lifting of a "state of national safety" he had decreed and offered talks. Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Khalifa went to the Oval Office a week later to meet President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton to seek support for the national dialogue. Bahrain is home to the US Fifth Fleet so the US has been cautious about overtly attacking the regime despite condemning the security crackdown. The State Department formally welcomed the talks on 15 June. However Assistant Secretary Michael Posner told his Bahraini hosts meaningful dialogue could only take place “in a climate of respect for the freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly.”

This was a veiled reference to the many trials and military court proceedings initiated by the government to deal with 500 people arrested since the February protest. On Monday Bahrain launched a mass trial of 28 doctors and nurses accused of joining the protests and spreading “false information” which means talking to foreign media. Another 20 doctors and nurses are accused of an "anti-state plot". On 22 June, a special security court in Bahrain sentenced eight activists and opposition leaders to life in prison on charges of “plotting to overthrow the government”.

Meanwhile a special military court called the Court of National Safety came into being on 12 June to hold the trials of politically motivated cases against opposition members of parliament and a prominent defence lawyer. According to Amnesty International, the courts were put in place to respond to the protests and are presided by one military and two civilian judges. The court sentenced a young activist to a year in prison for charges related to her public recital of a poem critical of Bahrain’s King.

Two Al Wefaq MPs are among those arrested and kept in secret solitary confinement. They have no access to legal representation or family present. Human Rights Watch has called on Bahrain to end the proceedings. “Most defendants hauled before Bahrain's special military court are facing blatantly political charges, and trials are unfair," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "The Crown Prince may be sincere in his efforts to promote dialogue, but what good is that while back home the government is crushing peaceful dissent and locking up people who should be part of the dialogue."

Whither Bahrain?

Libya is not the only Arabic revolution where outside forces have intervened; there are also foreign troops on the streets of Bahrain. But unlike Libya, the foreigners in Bahrain have come in on the side of the discredited regime. Occupying forces from Saudi Arabia and the UAE are helping the monarchy put down a rebellion with only a few hypocritical murmurs from the West and no sign of any UN-sponsored intervention in the rebels’ favour. With martial law in place after almost two months of protests, Bahrain has today brushed off a Kuwaiti offer to mediate with the rebels saying it wasn’t necessary. The detested al-Khalifa regime is set on a path of destroying the opposition while hoping the rest of the world is too distracted by events in Libya to do anything about it. (photo:AFP)

The Sunni Al Khalifa tribe has ruled Bahrain for almost 200 years, a rule cemented by British overlords and trade-based wealth in the 1800s. The majority Shia did not share in the general prosperity and remained second class citizens despite the implicit and sometimes explicit support of Iran. The discovery of oil ensured British meddling would continue for much of the 20th century. The struggle for supremacy in Bahraini affairs by both Britain and Iran continued until the country gained full independence in 1971. A 1973 constitution promised free elections (though for men only) but this was thrown out two years later by the then-emir Salman al Khalifa.

In the 1990s opposition forces came together to demand reforms from the ageing emir and a return to the 1973 constitution. For six years the streets were plagued with riots which were met by suppression by the regime The intifada did not end until the death of Salman in March 1999. Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa succeeded his father and immediately promised to carry out political reforms. On 14 February 2001 a referendum to carry out the National Action Charter to return the country to constitutional rule was overwhelming supported by 98.4 percent of the voters. The 2000s saw important progress including the enfranchisement of women and parliamentary elections in 2006 and 2010. But key problems remain including discrimination against the Shia and the all pervasive power of the al Khalifa caste.

Problems of powersharing were thrown firmly into the spotlight after pro-democracy demonstrations in Tunisia and Egypt hit the headlines in January. In Bahrain opposition was mobilised to demonstrate on the 10th anniversary of the signing of the National Action Charter on 14 February. Pearl Square in the capital Manama became the epicentre of resistance with protesters calling for political reform and equalisation of the economic benefits of Bahrain’s oil-rich economy. The reaction from the alarmed administration was swift. On 17 February a pre-dawn tank raid on the square killed 5 and injured 230 others. Soldiers placed roadblocks and barbed wire around the centre of town and leaders banned public gatherings.

The effect was to harden resistance. Talk of reform was replaced by talk of overthrow of the al Khalifas. The funerals of the dead turned into shrines of martyrdom with talk of 100,000 on the streets – about one eighth of the country’s population. Unity of opposition forces was marred by sectarian clashes between Sunni and Shia. Meanwhile panicky leadership cadres made some concessions by sacking extremist ministers while still authorising a shoot to kill policy on the streets.

On 14 March, the Emir had enough and called for support from his Sunni allies. Led by Saudi Arabia they answered the call. A thousand Saudi troops and 500 UAE police officers crossed the bridge to Manama. The invaders were part of a deployment by the Gulf Co-operation Council, a six-nation regional grouping of Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and UAE. The force immediately set about protecting the oil and gas plants and financial institutions. According to al Khalifa, the troops were there “to look at ways to help them to defuse the tension in Bahrain.” But no one in the country was under any illusion this was anything but an occupation force to crush the revolution.

There was the inevitable bleating from the West but no sign of action to back it up. Hillary Clinton said Bahrain and its GCC allies were "on the wrong track” but mentioned nothing about the 5th fleet that remains in its Bahrain base protecting US oil wealth in the greater region. The Khalifas may not be loved by their subjects but the White House know a Shia government in Manama would not be accommodating to 4,500 US military personnel in the city. The Americans have nailed their colours to the mast. The Fifth Fleet is not there to create disorder but to preserve it. When the regime does fall, as it inevitably will, the Americans can have no complaints when they are kicked out.

Saleh becomining increasingly desperate in Yemen

Embattled Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh has sacked one of his ministers as the month-long protests against his 32-year rule shows no sign of ending. Hamoud al-Hattar is the scapegoat for failing to find a way to deal with opponents who are demanding Saleh step down. Protesters in the capital Sana’a are fed up with a lack of democratic reform, widespread corruption and human rights abuses by Saleh, his family and allies. Saleh refuses to step down until his term of office expires in 2013. (photo:STR/ AFP/ Getty Images)

Yemeni authorities have deported four western journalists over their coverage of the protests. Security forces raided an apartment and arrested two British and two American journalists and kicked them out of the country. They follow the deporting of an American journalist and Italian photographer a day earlier. Briton Oliver Holmes said that said that one of the agents told him they were all being kicked out because of their coverage of the protests. “We have all been reporting on the use of violence by the police,” Holmes told Al Jazeera.

The flashpoint has moved to the north eastern Marib province where the governor was stabbed, police have opened fire on protesters, and rebels have blown up an important oil pipeline. Marib is a predominantly tribal area implacably opposed to Saleh’s regime. Saleh’s man in the province Governor Naji al-Zaidi was caught up in a large demonstration outside the local government building yesterday. Security troops fired live ammunition and tear gas, injuring around 37 people. In the melee, a group of men stabbed al-Zaidi and four bodyguards with daggers before he was flown by helicopter to a military hospital in the capital.

Meanwhil tribal fighters sabotaged an oil pipeline this morning and cut the road between the Marib’s gas fields and the capital. Local police said the pipeline connecting Marib's oil fields to the Red Sea was ablaze and the main road between Sanaa and Safer was cut off disrupting tanker traffic and jeopardising gas supplies to the capital.
There have been grumblings in the Arab world’s poorest country for several years over Saleh’s autocratic regime and the likelihood of an eventual transfer of power to his son Ahmed Saleh. His troubles are compounded by an insurgency by Houthi rebels in the north, a separatist movement in the south and a large Al Qaeda threat. But it took January’s Tunisian revolution to galvanise the opposition into action. Large street protests flooded the capital and Saleh offered reforms including presidential term limits and voter registration. The opposition and protesters rejected the proposals saying the reforms did not ensure that Saleh could not run again.

Emboldened by success in Tunisia and the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, protesters held a “day of rage” in early February. Unlike events in Egypt, the 20,000 strong Yemeni protest ended peacefully, though Saleh did make efforts to stifle them and his forces shot dead protesters in Aden. Protests continued through the month, gradually increasing in size and scope. Yemeni soldiers fired artillery at anti-government protesters in the northern village of Semla in Amran, killing two and wounding seven.

After his offer to form a national unity government was rejected, Saleh imposed a tight security cordon around Sana’a. His objective now is to stop more protesters joining 150,000 in the main square. They include tribesmen from Hamdan tribe who were angered when police killed one of their kinsmen. The Hamdan are not Saleh’s only headache. Sheikh Ameen al-Okaimi, chieftain of northern largest powerful tribe Bakil, staged a sit-in in Sana’a with a sign emblazoned "Welcome to the Liberation Land."

Where the protests have been most successful is in bringing Yemen’s deeply fractured opposition movements together. In the last election in 2006, Saleh’s ruling General People’s Congress took 76 percent of the vote with the umbrella group Joint Meeting Parties taking 21 percent. Now the JMP has united with the tribal and Islamist Islah party bringing most of the anti-Saleh forces under one banner. But the Hashid tribal confederation and Houthi rebellion forces remain outside the tent and it would be unclear what role if any they would have in any post-Saleh government. Indeed it is likely secessionist movements will continue to agitate regardless of who reigns in Sana’a.

Algeria's disaffected find their voice

“Acts of violence don't win wars. Neither wars nor revolutions. Terrorism is useful as a start. But then, the people themselves must act. That's the rationale behind this strike: to mobilise all Algerians, to assess our strength,” Larbi Ben M’hidi The Battle of Algiers (1966)

To no one’s great surprise, the wave of people power revolutions that have shaken North Africa to the core has now washed over Algeria. There is something circular in this too, as Algeria was the scene of the first protests this year which spread to Tunisia and then to Egypt. Yesterday 2,000 protesters marched in the capital Algier’s May First Square where the overcame a security cordon to meet up with other protesters despite being vastly outnumbered by 30,000 riot police. Protesters want greater democratic freedoms, a change of government and more jobs. They are determined to remain peaceful and not react to police provocation as they march despite being banned by a nervous government.

The Algerian Government has much to be nervous about as it attempts to keep power it stole two decades ago. In December 1991, the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) stunned the FLN which had ruled Algeria since independence from France in 1962 by smashing them in an election with a slogan of “No Constitution and no laws. The only rule is the Koran and the law of God.” A month later the army declared a state of emergency, overturned the result and formed a collective presidency known as the High State Council. The FIS was stripped of its victory, declared illegal and its leaders jailed.

The move sparked a civil war which lasted ten years and cost 200,000 lives. The army cemented power as the standard of living slowly lifted with new oil finds. Algeria has estimated oil reserves of nearly 12 billion barrels, attracting strong interest from foreign oil firms. Although political violence in Algeria has declined in recent year, the country has been shaken by campaign of bombings carried out by a group calling itself Al-Qaeda in the Land of Islamic Maghreb. Poverty remains widespread and unemployment high, with 30 percent of Algeria's youth without work.

On 9 January, major protests broke out over food prices and unemployment, with three people being killed in clashes with security forces. The demonstrations started in the poor westerns suburbs of Algiers. They grew in intensity spreading to the country's second largest city, Oran. Then the unrest spread to the working-class district of Bab El Oued in central Algiers. One by one, the other working-class districts of the capital followed suit as well as the cities of Tipaza, Annaba, Tizi-Ouzou.

The Algerian cabinet responded by agreeing to lower the custom duties and taxes on sugar and other food stuffs by two-fifths as a temporary act to cut prices. President Abdelaziz Bouteflika also promised the imminent repeal of the hated 1992 state of emergency law. The decision was greeted with cautious optimism but rejuvenated opposition groups vowed to keep the pressure up on the government. The Rally for Culture and Democracy said they would proceed with a protest on 12 February as originally planned. In a statement last week they said authorities chose to resort to political manoeuvres and to sow discord rather than respond to “legitimate aspirations and demands for changing the political regime that destroyed the country and enslaved the people.”

RCD leader Said Sadi claim that Saturday’s demonstrations were spontaneous and not organised seems a bit far-fetched. However it is true the decision of Hosni Mubarak to flee Egypt on Friday has further galvanised the Algerian opposition movement. On Saturday demonstrators waved front pages of newspapers showing the Egyptian news and shouted "Bouteflika out!" Latest reports say 400 protesters including four MPs have been arrested. The government claimed it banned the march for public order reasons not to stifle dissent. But as other regional leaders have found to their cost, dissent has a strong mind of its own.

Yemenis throng to another Tahrir

The world has gotten used to hearing about democracy protests in Tahrir Square, Cairo in the last few weeks. But a square of the same name (Tahrir is Arabic for liberation) is also the focus of protests in the Yemeni capital Sanaa. But in this Tahrir Square the protesters are demonstrating in favour of the current government not against it. They were there to profess their support to President Ali Abdullah Saleh who announced last week he would not be seeking re-election in 2013. The protesters came from pro-Government parts of the country in a move the opposition has labelled political manoeuvring to make it appear as if pro-Saleh regime sentiment is still strong. (photo:EPA)

The pro-Government protests are a backlash to a major opposition demonstration widely known as the Day of Wrath. Inspired by events across the Red Sea in Egypt and Tunisia, 20,000 demonstrators came out last week to Sanaa University to protest Saleh’s regime which has ruled Yemen for over three decades. People of all ages chanted and held signs with messages against poverty and the government. Many expressed solidarity with the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt and demanded Saleh step down.

The regime insists it is not in trouble. Prime Minister Ali Mujawar defended the government yesterday saying there was no reason Egypt-style protests should take off in the country. Mujawar accused opposition parties trying to duplicate what happened in Tunisia and Egypt and acting “as if it should be imposed on the people here in Yemen." "Yemen is not Tunisia or Egypt," Mujawar said. "Yemen has its own different situation... Yemen is a democratic country. Through all the stages, elections took place. And therefore this is a democratic regime."

However one person’s democratic regime is another’s dictatorship. Army strongman Saleh took power in a coup in what was then North Yemen in 1978. When the North and South united in 1990 the South accepted Saleh as Head of State of the unified country. He first stood for presidential election in 1999 but the candidate list was whittled down from 31 to 2 by virtue of the strict approvals needed to run. Saleh won with 96.3 percent of the vote. Saleh initially said he would not run in the second election in 2006 but changed his mind. The EU declared the election valid though with “significant shortcomings”. Saleh was re-elected for seven years with 77.2 percent of the vote.

The next election is scheduled for 2013 and Saleh is barred under the Yemeni constitution from seeking a third term of office. However, discussions on prolonging his time in power started last year. Congress, which is dominated by Saleh’s General People's Congress party, is discussing a proposed constitutional amendment to cancel the limit of two consecutive terms for which a president can be elected. The proposed amendment will be submitted to a referendum which will be held simultaneously with parliamentary elections on 27 April.

But after the Day of Rage protest last Wednesday, Saleh apparently had second thoughts. He announced on state TV that April elections would be cancelled along with the constitutional amendment. "I will not extend my mandate and I am against hereditary rule," Saleh said. The hereditary rule comment was a response to suspicion he was grooming his eldest son, Ahmed Saleh, who commands an elite unit of the Yemeni army, to succeed him as president.

Given that Saleh made similar comments prior to the 2006 election, there is widespread doubt he is now serious. The current problems in Yemeni politics started when the mandate of the current parliament was extended by two years to April 2011 following the February 2009 agreement between the GPC and opposition parties to allow dialogue on political reform. There is also need for structural reform. Yemen is one of the poorest countries in the Arab region. Poverty is widespread with 45 per cent of its 21.1 million people living on less than $2 a day, according to the UN Development Programme.

Political analysts in Yemen feel that tension will only rise in the next 10 years, fearing that Saleh will never bow down from rule. One Opposition leader said Saleh will eventually be brushed aside. “For the same reason Yemenis revolted against the Imamate regime nearly 50 years ago,” he said. “Saleh will push Yemenis to the extent that they feel the only option left for them is a new revolution, therefore, forcing Yemen to start again from scratch.”

Dances with democracy: Tunisia at the crossroads

Tunisia’s leaders resist change. It has had only two leaders in the 55 years since independence (though two more in the last 12 days). Colonial master France not only left its language and its culture but it also imparted the doggedness of its political elites. It was a lesson well absorbed by Habib Bourguiba. Bourguiba spent 11 years in French and Nazi custody for sedition where he picked up western ways with power. The Rassemblement Constitutionel Démocratique party was the vehicle for Bourguiba to seize power in 1956. The RCD became synonymous with Tunisian politics and The Supreme Warrior was voted the honour of president for life in 1975. He lasted another 12 years. (photo of Tunisian protests courtesy AP)

Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was Bourguiba’s Prime Minister and natural successor. Ben Ali had widespread experience in the military, politics and diplomatic service. With a sluggish economy and the support of the west he took control he used an 1987 medical report and Article 57 of the Tunisian constitution to show his boss should be removed on the grounds of “total incapacity”.

Ben Ali would prove just as tenacious in power as the man he replaced, with the added knowledge of knowing just how vulnerable life at the top could be. He kept Bourguiba under house arrest for the rest of his life and set about cementing his own reputation. He kept the ruling class of the RCD onside by keeping most of them in the powerful positions they had during the Bourguiba era. He won five elections, all of them rigged. After the Soviet era, the West was happy with Ben Ali because he was a strong and stable and secular ruler. Over time, Ben Ali was an elder statesman of the region. The US rewarded the Ben Ali’s regime with an estimated $350million in military aid between 1987 and 2009.

The Americans were not blind to Tunisia’s problems. As a Wikileaked cable said, Tunisia was a police state, with little freedom of expression or association, and serious human rights problems. “They tolerate no advice or criticism, whether domestic or international," the cable said. "Increasingly, they rely on the police for control and focus on preserving power. And, corruption in the inner circle is growing. Even average Tunisians are now keenly aware of it, and the chorus of complaints is rising.”

Despite knowing all this, the Obama administration continued to distribute largesse. As recently as last year the US sold Tunisia $282 million worth of 12 Sirkorsky military helicopters to Tunisia. Congress approved the deal on the grounds they would “enhance the modernisation of the Tunisian Air Force's overwater search and rescue capability and enable continued interoperability with US Armed Forces and other coalition partners in the region.” The sale would also improve “the security of a friendly country that has been and continues to be an important force for economic and military progress in North Africa.”

The sale of the helicopters showed the military progress. But it was harder to make the case for economic progress in Tunisia, particularly for the lower classes. There wasn't much progress in the life of 26-year-old Mohammed Bouazizi. Bouazizi had a computer science degree but sold fruit and vegetables without a licence in Sidi Bouzid because he could not find any other job. On 17 December, police confiscated his produce when he could not produce a permit. When he tried to snatch his apples back, the police officer slapped him in the face. Two other officers then beat him up. Bouazizi walked to the municipal building demanded his property, and was beaten again. Then he walked to the governor’s office, where he was refused an audience. In front of the governor’s gate he drenched himself in paint thinner and set himself alight. The burns covered 90 percent of his body. He died a painful death 18 days later in hospital.

Bouazizi had tapped into something in a repressed national psyche. People protested on the street in Sidi Bouzid where he was arrested. In a country where protesting is rare and the media is oppressed, the word was spread through amateur video which eventually made its way to Al Jazeera. A mass uprising was springing up from a groundswell of long-term grievances with the regime. Ben Ali knew the writing was on the wall and fled to Saudi Arabia on the 14th.

Within 24 hours his longtime ally and prime minister Mohamed Ghannouchi, assumed power. But the Constitutional Court ruled Fouad Mebazaa, the speaker, should be made president and given 60 days to organise new elections. Both men are heavily associated with the RCD and the protesters want the party removed from power, not just a new name at the top. Another Ghannouchi lies in the wings. Rachid Ghannouchi is the exiled head of Tunisia's Islamist party who plans to return to the country within weeks.

The likelihood of an Islamist Government if true democracy was restored is what scares the West the most. It also scares the other leaders in the Maghreb. The Algerian elite overturned the 1993 election when it seemed the Islamists were going to win at the ballot box and unleashed a civil war that killed 150,000 and goes on to this day. Other long-term leaders fear copycat immolation suicides such as the one in Mauretania. Egypt has also had copycat suicides and activists in Cairo using social networks are launching a "Day of Wrath" against Mubarak’s 30-year rule later today.

Next door in Libya Gaddafy is also worried. When he told Libyans in a broadcast “Tunisia lives in fear” he was really referring to himself. “Families could be raided and slaughtered in their bedrooms and the citizens in the street killed as if it was the Bolshevik or the American Revolution,” he railed. Gaddafy, in power for 40 years, has strong self interest at work but he does have a point. Nobody is sure what Tunisia’s troubles will lead to: a transition to multiparty democracy, an Islamist Government, a military coup or a prolonged period of turmoil.

Rachid Sfar, a former prime minister, outlined the problem in an editorial he wrote in La Presse yesterday. "We have to make the democratic process real and irreversible and at the same time guard against the violence and anarchy that threaten our country,” he said. Striking unionists have refused to recognise the new government because Mohamed Ghannouchi is there. A democratic vote will be held in six months but what if people suspicious of the West and the elites that serve it award it to the other Ghannouchi? The unions, and the left generally, should be careful about what they wish for.