Neo colonialism in the South China Sea

When the Europeans embarked on their conquest of the world, to colonise the world, the rule of the game was that might was right. They went about with their gunboats and cannons to rob, loot, rape and seize countries occupied by the natives they claimed to be savages, and they were given God’s power and blessing to take their lands and everything, including their lives.
 
The European practically seized every corner of the earth regardless of the objections and protests of their owners. Being newly industrialized countries, with new technologies and weapons, they just ran down the natives as sub humans. The natives have no rights to their land and possessions. The Europeans were there to take them away and to rule them.
 
There is a new kind of colonialism raising its ugly heads in the South China Sea. The difference, the colonialists were new nations that were once colonized, new states given independence by their former colonial masters. Now they are out to seize islands in the South China Sea. They did not know that these islands were there since time immemorial. They just knew, as they did not have the skills and technology to discover the existence and where about of these islands till they were given independence and starting to acquire some wealth and technology to discover the existence of such islands. They did not know that the islands were claimed by China centuries ago, centuries before they became independent nations of today.
 
Their ignorance of history, of the ownership of the islands are good enough reasons to claim these islands as theirs, and like the Europeans, totally ignored the rights of their owners. They are claiming their rights based on a new law set by a new organizations called UNCLOS. They demanded that the new laws take precedent over historical rights of ownership.
 
Another big difference is that the new countries were not the invincible Europeans running roughshod over the poorly equipped and armed natives. These little countries are trying to seize the islands of China, a super power with enough power to colonise them if needed to. What an irony? Little countries trying to colonise the territories of a bigger nation and power and think they could get away with it. Even the mighty Europeans had to return most of their colonized land except those that owned by smaller and weaker countries that they could over powered.
 
Would this new colonization of China’s islands in the South China Sea ended in the favour of the new little colonial powers?

Taiwan – The first victim of the Hague kangaroo court

The Taiwan govt thought by being a good boy, stayed out of the fray while the Americans and Japanese conspired with some Asean states to wrestle Chinese islands and the interest of Taiwan would be protected. Afterall Taiwan is being courted by both the Americans and Japanese and is considered to be one of them. Surely they will not do anything to harm the interest of Taiwan in the South China Sea. Taiwan also owned several islands there with the biggest Taiping Island or  Itu Aba, big enough to have an airfield and home to a few hundred Taiwanese.

What the Taiwanese did not bargain for and could not believe their collaborator friends would do them in, is the ruling that the Taiping Island is a reef. What a joke and what a shocking awakening. The Taiwanese have been sacrificed as a dispensable pawn. In the minds of the Americans and Japanese, Taiwan would return to China some day and it is better to cut Taiwan off the deal, that the Taiping Island pronounced by the kangaroo court is a reef and would not be entitled to a 200nm EEZ.

Now what are the Taiwanese going to do? Pay a visit to Washington to beg for a new ruling? Forget it, it is a done deal. Taiwan is enemy in the long run and its interests in the South China Sea would not be worthy to be protected. Protecting Taiwanese interests in the Taiping Island is as good as protecting China’s interests. The Americans and the Japanese have it all worked out.  Taiwanese is useful only in the short term to be used to pressure China but nothing more.

Thank you for being a good boy.  Taiping Island is a reef. Want to buy more mediocre American weapons to shoot at China? Taiwan would not be allowed to be turned into a Trojan Horse to undermine the strategic interests of the USA and Japan in the South China Sea. Period.

The kangaroo court rules in favour of the Philippines

The rulings of the Permanent Court of Arbitration came as expected. The rulings were as good as a done deal from the day the case was filed by the Philippines with the connivance of the Americans and the Japanese as the President of the PCA. What can China or Taiwan expect from the rulings of a kangaroo court that predetermined and prejudged the case, decided who are the judges, what they want to judge, how they want to judge and how they want to interpret the laws to achieve what they want to achieve? Does anyone in his right mind really believe that this was a fair trial based on legal principles?

No international body shall be given so much power and authority to decide on the issue of sovereignty of any country without the consent of that country.  This carnal principle cannot be violated at the peril of small states. Only a kangaroo court would have the arrogance to rule on sovereignty issues and declare that its decision is final and binding. When an international institution has abused its authority and power, it loses its right of existence, the very reason for its creation. China and Taiwan and other sovereign states that feared being bulldozed by such arbitrary rulings against their national interests without their consent, should walk out and quit the organization. China should rally its allies like Russia, North Korea, Iran and the central Asian states to leave the UNCLOS and close the door behind them. Let UNCLOS and the Permanent Court of Arbitration continue with their mischief, to rule against other hapless small countries.

With China and Russia joining the USA as non members of UNCLOS, the organization will become a meaningless lame duck. There is now no reason or benefits for China and its allies to be a member of an organization that has undone the goodwill and respect that it deserved, as a neutral, fair and just international body.

China must behave like a super power and stop being bullied by farcical institutions pretending to be world bodies and have power over countries without respecting their national sovereignty and territorial integrity. It is good that the PCA rulings came to expose the hypocrisy of what it is instead of what it was supposed to be.

China should leave these theatrical rulings behind and move on. The immediate task is to strengthen its military deployments in its islands, reinforce the weapons system in anticipation of a military assault by an American led joint military force.

The PCA rulings would also be an opportunity for China to see through the façade of hypocrisy of some Asean states, to know who they really are. Some Asean states would be compelled by these rulings and by the Americans to make a stand. China too should take a clear stand, to review all its agreements with the Americans done under the policy of appeasement, believing that the Americans would reciprocate goodwill with generosity. The truth is that the Americans have never been sincere in wanting to work and cooperate with China and have been treating China as their arch foe.

This is a wake up call for China, to identify friends or foes. China should no longer deceive itself that appeasing the Americans, trying to work with the Americans would be appreciated. It is a moment to be firm and resolute, to take a stand against this international conspiracy to violate China’s sovereignty and to contain China from expanding and developing its own islands in the South China Sea.

China must close ranks with its allies, especially with Russia, North Korea and Iran and the central Asia and African nation states. There is clear and present danger and unity is strength. The Americans and their allies have declared war on China. The days of trying to sleep with the devil are over. The devil will never change its evil ways.

The kangaroo court’s decision is the clearest sign of what’s more to come and China either stands and fights or would lose everything it has built for the last 40 years. The smaller states and those fence sitters would be watching how China stood up to this international bullying. Any weakness shown by China would only drive them quickly to the camps of the Americans. China must pick up the gauntlet and stare at the enemies with the nerve of steel, that it is not going to be pushed over.

Yes, D Day is here for China. This day would change the course of history and how the world would be going forward. The moment has come for China to take its place as a super power in the world stage and rebuild a New World Order that is fair to all countries big and small.

What is the Permanent Court of Arbitration?

By Chua Chin Leng (chinadaily.com.cn) 2016-07-14 16:04

Wikipedia has this to say about the PCA.‘The PCA is not a “court" in the conventional understanding of that term but an administrative organization with the object of having permanent and readily available means to serve as the registry for purposes of international arbitration and other related procedures, including commissions of enquiry and conciliation. The judges or arbitrators that hear cases are officially called "Members" of the Court.


The public at large is usually more familiar with the International Court of Justice than with the Permanent Court of Arbitration, partly because of the closed nature of cases handled by the PCA and also the small number of cases dealt with between 1946 and 1990. Sometimes even the decision itself is kept confidential at the request of the parties.’


To simplify, this is a private entity established to facilitate arbitration by member states on a willing buyer willing seller basis. It is quite like a commercial establishment, any member state can come to seek help to arbitrate their disputes. It is not a court! It is not a world body like the UN or sanctioned by the UN. Its jurisdiction and ruling are as good as the disputing parties want it to be. It has no authority and no legal status if a disputing party is not willing to subject itself to its arbitration. The closest example of such a court is the international court in Tanjong Pagar in Singapore, a convenient store for customers to avail themselves of its facilities.


I hope this is clear and no one should go on to believe that it is akin to the International Court of Justice, a UN organization. This South China Sea dispute that the PCA was hearing has no credibility and legal standing as the other party did not oblige or agree to the arbitration. What China said, that it is piece of waste paper is as good as it could be.


The Americans and its allies have tried to deceive the world that the PCA’s rulings on the Philippines submission are binding and legal. This is hogwash. How could it be when it is not a court of law? How could it be when it is a tribunal for willing parties to seek arbitration when there is an unwilling party (China) that refused to participate and did not even make any representation on the case?


Having established the basis and nature of the PCA, it would be interesting if the Philippines would to file another case to claim the state of Sabah as part of the Philippines. And it is expected that Malaysia would object and would decline to participate in such a trial settlement. But given the support of the Americans, the PCA could go ahead to appoint a panel of judges without the consent of Malaysia and come out with a judgment in favor of the Philippines. And the PCA could then declare that its ‘judgment’ is final and binding on Malaysia.


Would Malaysia agree to the judgment, would it be legal and binding on Malaysia? Many similar cases and judgments could be brought to and decided by the PCA which the Americans would like the world to believe is a world body with the authority to impose its judgment on unwilling nation states and expect them to abide by it.


The most dangerous implications arising from this precedent, if it can be called a precedent, would be on countries agreeing to the Trans Pacific Pact (TPP) that the Americans are proposing. The members of this TPP would come under the jurisdiction of the PCA for obvious reasons and they have no rights to be excluded from its judgment, and its decision would be final and binding.


This could be a test case and a precedent that the Americans are trying to set to impose on the members of the TPP with the PCA doing its bidding like in this South China Sea case. Can members of the TPP and members of the PCA expect a fair hearing when they can be put on trial against their objections? Would any country be willing to be ruled by an organization like the PCA to determine the fate of their disputes, even their sovereignty without their consent?


The PCA cannot be seen to be an authority or a court to rule over nation states. It is a miscarriage of justice and an attempt to usurp the rights of a nation state in matters of the state and sovereignty if the PCA, a commercial organization, is deemed to have such authority.
 
Can a commercial tribunal rule over nation states and its judgment be binding against the objection of nation states?


The author is a political observer from Singapore.


PS. There have been many comments and discussions and opinions on this PCA rulings by all and sundry, including academics and the untrustworthy politicians. Even in a Channel News Asia programme the presenter was saying that the PCA was a UN backed arbitration court which is furthest from the truth.


In brief, the discussions and comments can be summarised like people arguing why 1 + 1 = 4 and not 3. To some it should be 3 and to others it should be 4. They forgot to go back to first base to question why 1 + 1 is 3 in the first place. This boils down to a lack of understanding of what this PCA is all about. It is like a private school or university, uncredited, unrated commercial setup unlike a govt or established and recognised public university.  The private school would take in any candidate who is willing to pay the tuition fee and may even freely award first class honours to the highest bidder to increase its revenue.


The PCA has nothing to do with the UN or approved by the UN. It is NOT a court but a tribunal for willing parties to seek an arbitration ruling applicable and binding only to the consenting parties. How on earth would academics forget this critical distinction, and for politicians to call a non participating litigant to respect its ruling, that its ruling is binding?  They totally forgot to dispute that fact that 1 +1 is not equal to 3 but 2.  They start to argue from a wrong basis, that a private school has so much credibility that its degrees must be recognised at all cost.


Get my point?

USA cheats Third World countries of trillions of dollars through World Bank / IMF and other financial institutions it controls

                               John Perkins a former World Bank economist reveals how USA through World Bank, IMF and other financial institutions it controls cheat countries around the world of trillions of dollars.

John Perkins worked directly with the heads of the World Bank, IMF and other global financial institutions USA controls. He quit this job in 1980s because he felt it was morally and ethically wrong for him to play a part to help creating USA into a bloatedly rich world empire at the expense of the poor disadvantaged third world countries.

His job as an "Economic Hit Man" was to convince countries that are strategically important to USA to accept enormous loans for infrastructure development and to make sure that the lucrative projects were contracted to US corporations . He created economic projections for countries to accept billions of dollars in loans they surely couldn't afford. His conscience was pricked when he realised how these wicked American practices have directly resulted in terrorist attacks and animosity towards the United States.

Perkins defines economic hit men as "highly paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. They funnel money from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development

(US AID), and other foreign 'aid' organizations into the coffers of huge corporations and the pockets of a few wealthy families who control the planet's natural resources.
Their tools include fraudulent financial reports, rigged elections, payoffs, extortion, sex, and murder. They play a game as old as empire, but one that has taken on new and terrifying dimensions during this time of

globalization."
 Perkins' was hired as an economist for the international consulting firm of Chas. T. Main, Inc. (MAIN). He was told in confidential meetings with "special consultant" to the company Claudine Martin that he had

two primary objectives:

    He was supposed to justify huge loans for countries. These loans would be for major engineering and construction projects, which were to be carried out by MAIN and other U.S. companies such as Bechtel,

Halliburton, Stone & Webster and Brown & Root.
    He was supposed to help bankrupt the countries that received these loans after the U.S. companies involved had been paid. This would make sure that these countries would remain in debt to their creditors and would

then be easy targets when the U.S. needed favors such as military bases, UN votes and access to natural resources like oil.

Perkins' job was to produce economic growth projections that would make the case for a variety of major projects. If the U.S. decided to lend a country money, Perkins would compare the economic benefits of different

projects such as power plants or telecommunications systems. He would then produce reports that showed the economic growth the country would experience due to these projects. These economic growth projections

needed to be high enough to justify the loans. Otherwise, the loans would be denied.
The gross national product (GNP) was always the most important factor in these economic projections. The project expected to increase the GNP the most would be chosen. In the cases where there was only one project

under consideration, it needed to be shown that the project would greatly benefit the GNP. Luckily for the economic hit man, GNP figures can be quite deceptive. "For instance, the growth of GNP may result even when it

profits only one person, such as an individual who owns a utility company, while the majority of the population is burdened with debt."
All of these projects were meant to make huge profits for the contractors. The U.S. engineering and construction companies involved would be assured of great wealth. At the same time, a few wealthy families and

influential leaders in the receiving countries would become very happy and very rich thanks to these loans. The leaders of these countries would also have bolstered political power because they were credited with bringing

industrial parks, power plants and airports to their people.
The problem is that these countries simply cannot handle the debt of these loans and their poorest citizens are deprived of health, education and other social services for several decades as these countries struggle

economically to overcome their huge debts. Meanwhile, the huge American media conglomerates portray these projects as favors being provided by the United States. American citizens in general have no trouble believing

these messages, and in fact are led to perceive that these actions are unselfish acts of international goodwill.
Ultimately, due to the large debts, the U.S. is able to draw on these countries for political, economic and military favors whenever desired. And of course, the U.S. corporations involved with the expensive projects become

extremely wealthy.
The U.S. Government was clever in using economic hitman without directly implicating Washington. US empowered international corporations and mujltinatioinal organizations such as the World Bank and IMF. This allowed for US governments, corporations and multinational organizations to form mutually beneficial relationships . US intelligence agencies like CIA and FBI were able to use these relationships to their advantage.

Government organizations such as the National Security Agency (NSA) were now able to screen for potential economic hitmen (as they did with Perkins) and then have them hired by international corporations such as

MAIN.
"These economic hitmen would never be paid by the government; instead, they would draw their salaries from the private sector. As a result, their dirty work, if exposed, would be chalked up to corporate greed rather than

to government policy. In addition, the corporations that hired them, although paid by government agencies and their multinational banking counterparts (with taxpayer money), would be insulated from congressional

oversight and public scrutiny, shielded by a growing body of legal initiatives, including trademark, international trade, and Freedom of Information laws."

Southernglory1
Thursday,14th July, 2016

UN distancing itself from the kangaroo court

These are the comments from the UN on the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

‘The United Nations said on Wednesday it has nothing to do with the Permanent Court of Arbitration, which set up a tribunal that handled the South China Sea arbitration case the Philippines filed unilaterally in 2013.

In a post on its Sina Weibo micro blog, the UN said the PCA is a "tenant" of the Peace Palace in The Hague, "but has nothing to do with the UN".

The UN said the International Court of Justice, its principal judicial organ set up according to the Charter of the UN, is also located in the Peace Palace.

The construction of the palace was managed by the Carnegie Foundation, which is still the building's owner and manager, according to the Peace Palace website.

The UN said it makes an annual donation to the foundation for using the Peace Palace.

When asked about the Arbitral Tribunal's case's ruling on Tuesday, Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday "The UN doesn't have a position on the legal and procedural merits" of the South China Sea arbitration case.’ China Daily

The UN’s comments are a clear indication that the kangaroo court is a can of rotten fish and did not wan to have anything to do with it. The UN simply did not want to have anything to do with the PCA and did not want its good reputation to be tarnished by kangaroos running the circus.

The Permanent Court of Arbitration is not a court per se but a tribunal where willing parties brought their cases to be arbitrated, with each side choosing a judge and has the right to reject the judges appointed by the PCA. It was meant to be a tribunal that is neutral but not in this case. The judges were appointed by one party, paid by one party, to arbitrate on a territorial issue that it has no jurisdiction and with the other party not participating.

American Race Relations at a Crossroad

By MikoSpace aka Michael Heng

The police shootings of 2 Black men in the US cities of Louisiana and Minnesota are grim reminders of the consequences of losing the never-ending race against racism in the most developed and, arguably, most civilized modern human society. In a direct response, a black sniper-shooter killed 5 white police officers in another distant city of Dallas in Texas. 

In the weeks following Louisiana, Minnesota and Dallas, the US race against racism veered off its future destiny of true freedom and equality to run forward towards her bigoted Jim Crow past.

White American racism against Blacks in particular was thoroughly cooked and boiled in the living hells of her past institution of chattel slavery from 1619 to the 1865 Presidential Emancipation Proclamation that freed more than 3 million Black slaves, lasting about 246 years. Their freedom is followed by more than 150 years of systematic and continuous social discrimination and exclusion, as manifested lately by the Louisiana, Minnesota and Dallas killings.   

To be fair, American race relations have in fact improved significantly since the 1960s. Many Black Americans indeed have moved up the social mobility ladder through education and achieve prosperous careers as entertainers, doctors, lawyers, accountants, businessmen, politicians, professioals … etc.  A Black President in the White House for 2 terms should have convinced Black Americans of the abundance in life and social opportunities awaiting them that they have access to. For many Black Americans, these are simply not enough.

Black Americans at 13% is the largest racial minority, compared with 77% of racial majority Whites Americans. Hispanic and Latino Americans together amount to 17% of the population, making up the largest ethnic minority. Asian Americans at 5.6% are at a far distance, but more than the 1.2% Native Americans.

Many Black Americans believe that they are singled out for systematic discrimination by social institutions and by the law-and–order systems. Their proportion in prison far exceeds their proportion in over 20 states.  On the whole, they made up 35% of jail inmates and 37% of prison inmates.  Another study concluded that at the time of his birth, a Black American has a 33% chance of going to prison during his life-time.

Black Americans appeared to be trapped and languishing in their own self-perception of a persecuted people who were freed from plantation slavery just to be quickly enslaved by the larger White society. Poverty, unemployment and incarceration reinforced inherently low self-image and perceived lack of economic progress when compared with other better-off non-White Americans eg Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Hispanics and Latinos, many of whom were recent immigrants only in the last 30 years.

   

No wonder White Americans’ stereotypes of Black Americans are reinforced concerning the capability and suitability of the Black man to live and work in the civilized and modern American society of law. This sad state of mutual misunderstanding affects and retards any significant progress in their race relations, and can be attributed to the absence of visionary and courageous leadership in the President, both Houses of Congress, Community and Social Leaders, Black and White Influencers and Business Leaders. 

Leadership failure by both Black and White leaders is culpable and responsible for the American race against racism taking off on a momentum with racism in the lead far, far ahead.      

Know that American society was created with white racism. The earliest white God-fearing Christian settlers in the New World deployed racism as their weapon of choice, alongside firearms, to expropriate Native American Indians of their legacy ancestral lands as a matter of their self-assumed divine entitlement in order to create their own colonies. 

Early American colonies have a disdain for non-White immigrants who were not from countries like England, Ireland, France, Holland and Sweden.  That racism was nurtured and systematically developed by the early and subsequent colonies is baffling since they had migrated to the dangerous New World to escape religious persecution and social ostracism. 

The Chinese who first came to America in 1850s in search of gold and silver fortunes and who later helped built the Great American Railroads, like other non-White settlers, also encountered systemic White racism in the forms of legal and extralegal discrimination in daily living. Considered “the dregs of Asia”, they were prohibited from public schools, from voting, from citizenship and from testifying in courts or legal access. They were instead however legally liable to pay school, property, water, hospital taxes as well as a “permission tax” for gold and silver mining activities.        

The Chinese were only allowed US citizenship in 1943. It is not until the 1965 Voting Rights Act which banned discrimination against voters belonging to language minority groups and provided critically important protections to these and other minority Americans.

We should regard the USA as becoming a young modern democracy only in 1965 using the universal franchise measure for a modern democracy. 

Racism has neither a white or back face.  Racism is an evil that has neither colour nor face.  Racism is learnt.  We learn it from our parents. We teach it to our children.  The motivation to teach racism to our children arises out of our own fear.  We fear what we do not understand what or whom looks different from us.  Our natural reaction to the irritating uncomfortable fear is to retaliate, to defend, to eliminate and to remove the source of the discomfort by causing pain and possibly its death.  Racism counters such fears by concealing these fears.

Racism feeds on a dangerous diet of contaminant ideas and lies regarding race and racial superiority, and regarding the inferiority of other races along various dimensions.  Read for example, the Malaysian Myth of the lazy Malay and the divisive bogus notion of Chinese privilege in racially harmonious Singapore.  

The race against racism is long and never-ending.  We need to conquer the lingering racism in ourselves. Some may believe that we cannot live without racism; for sure, we cannot live within it.  To win the race against racism, we have to first conquer ourselves (quoting Chinese philosopher Lau Tzu).

Yes, it is OK to ignore the things we disagree and focus on those we do, especially that which unite us. Social harmony does not require consensus or standardisation or assimilation. Harmonious co-existence in race relations needs only the respectful tolerance of differences without discrimination or recrimination.  A strong united community can embrace diversities of practice and opinions to allow the innovations of thought and ideas to make for a better future society. 

After Dallas, can America run and stay increasingly way ahead in her race against racism? Only her readiness in truly acting out these responsibilities can begin the end of the long, long race against racism. Over these recent weeks, Americans know now that the mega-thon race against racism is far from slowing down … or over.

Read the Full Article:

The Never-Ending Race Against Racism: American Update