EU presidential candidate proposed “Green Tax” to fund “Welfare State” at secret Bilderberg meeting

In this Oct. 29 2009 file photo, Belgium’s Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy participates in a meeting prior to an EU summit in Brussels. Very soon, Europeans from Denmark to Bulgaria will wake up to the reality of having their very first president, one person world leaders can call when they want to talk to Europe. AP Photo

“New resources will be necessary for the financing of the welfare state. Green tax instruments are a possibility.”

Top candidate debates EU tax at elite dinner

EU Observer | Nov 16, 2009

by ANDREW RETTMAN

Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy, a top candidate for the new European Union president job, laid out his views on future EU financing at a dinner of the secretive Bilderberg group last week.

The event took place at Val Duchesse, a former priory on the outskirts of Brussels, on Thursday (12 November), with guests including Belgian industrialist and Bilderberg chairman Etienne Davignon, former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger and luminaries from the worlds of international politics and business, according to Belgian broadsheet De Tijd.

The Belgian leader is reported to have said in a speech that: “New resources will be necessary for the financing of the welfare state. Green tax instruments are a possibility, but they are ambiguous: This type of tax will eventually be extinguished. But the possibilities of financial levies at European level must be seriously examined and for the first time the large countries in the union are open to that.”

Mr Van Rompuy’s official spokesman later told the Belga news agency that: “The Prime Minister … indicated that it is necessary to carry on thinking about structural financing at the European level.”

The leak to De Tijd, coming just days before the EU aims to choose its first permanent president, could damage Mr Van Rompuy’s chances.

Proposals about imposing fees on environmentally-damaging behaviour or skimming small levies off financial transactions have been mooted before. But the suggestion that the new EU president might interfere in national taxation policy is anathema to anti-federalists in EU countries such as the UK or Denmark.

Mr Van Rompuy’s participation at the Bilderberg dinner will also give ammunition to critics of the EU top job selection process, which takes place via confidential consultations between EU leaders and informal social events.

The Bilderberg group is an elite club of aristocrats, politicians and businessmen dating back to 1954, which likes to meet away from the public eye and which is widely disliked by pro-transparency campaigners.

EU parliament chief shows his cards

Meanwhile in a related development, European Parliament President Jerzy Buzek over the weekend backed former Spanish leader Jose Maria Aznar to take the EU president post.

“As far as I know, Aznar is not currently interested in this kind of position. But I think it would be good for the EU if he changed his mind and submitted his candidature,” Mr Buzek told Spanish daily ABC in an interview published on Saturday.

Mr Buzek met Mr Aznar along with the current Spanish government on a trip to Madrid ahead of Spain taking up the rotating EU presidency in January.

The conservative Spanish politician is from the correct political family according to the prevailing wisdom that the centre-right will take the EU president job while the centre-left will take the EU foreign minister position. But he was a firm advocate of the Iraq war, which remains a highly-divisive topic in the EU.

The speculation is set to see an end on Thursday (19 November) when EU leaders gather in Brussels to decide the top appointments. Other names in line for the presidency post include Dutch leader Jan Peter Balkenende and his Luxembourg counterpart, Jean-Claude Juncker.

Favourite to be EU president backs European national anthem

The revelation of the extent of Mr Van Rompuy’s federalist agenda will increase the pressure on Gordon Brown to try to block his elevation on Thursday  Photo: REUTERS

The new front-runner to be the first EU President is committed to a European national anthem and the replacement of a range of nationalistic symbols.

Telegraph | Nov 16, 2009

By Andrew Pierce and Holly Watt

Herman Van Rompuy, 62, the Prime Minister of Belgium for 11 months, is expected to be installed as President of the European Council at a dinner in Brussels on Thursday of the 27 EU leaders.

The Daily Telegraph can disclose that the Flemish Christian Democrat was an architect of his party’s federalist manifesto which calls for a massive extension of the presence of the EU in town halls, schools and sporting events.

The manifesto says: “Apart from the euro, also other national symbols need to be replaced by European symbols (licence plates, identity cards, presence of more EU flags, one time EU sports events, …).”

Mr Van Rompuy suggested a compromise to placate any anger at the perceived dilution of national pride. The manifesto continued: “In order to preserve unity in diversity a national reference can be preserved (as on the national side of euro coins).”

The revelation of the extent of Mr Van Rompuy’s federalist agenda will increase the pressure on Gordon Brown to try to block his elevation on Thursday.

The government had claimed victory after references to Beethoven’s Ode To Joy adopted as the EU’s anthem in 1985 were removed from the revised European ‘constitution’ which was voted down in the Dutch and Irish referendums in 2005.

Mr Van Rompuy, in a speech to the Belgian Parliament after the No votes, said: “We go on with the ratification of the European Constitution in all our parliaments, but we need to admit that for the moment the project is over. However, this doesn’t mean that we cannot continue to work in a creative way in the direction which the Constitution points in.

“I don’t object if we break up the Constitution into smaller parts, as long as we continue to work in the same direction: in the direction of more Europe.“

Mr Van Rompuy, barely known outside Belgium, is the favoured candidate of Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, and Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor.

They want a figure who will not overshadow them on the world stage who will act a chairman rather than a Presidential figure with the stature of a world leader which was why Tony Blair’s chances faded.

He also backs proposals for the EU to be directly funded from a ring-fenced swathe of green taxes such as fuel duty or aviation levies. It could mean all shopping and petrol station receipts in Britain could in future include the amount of VAT or fuel duty that goes directly to Brussels as an “EU tax”. The idea, championed by the federalists, is fiercely resisted by Britain.

William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, said: “Any attempt to move the EU further towards a federal state would be unacceptable. The British people never had a chance to give their view on whether the job of president of the Council should exist at all.”

Pieter Van Clippe, of Open Europe think tank, said: “Van Rompuy is your typical EU federalist – he isn’t going to step on anyone’s toes or try to dominate the world like Tony Blair or President Sarkozy might have – but he can be relied upon to quietly make sure that the EU gets more and more powers, with less and less say for voters.”

The Taxpayers Alliance is setting up the “Great EU debate” at http://www.greateudebate.com/ where people are invited to register and express their view of Britain’s EU membership. The TPA is funding cinema adverts and publishing a book “Ten Years On: Britain without the European Union”, which paints a positive picture of Britain in 2020 outside the EU.

Jesuit University professor cheerleads “evolution of international governance”

“People are deeply suspicious of what they perceive as faceless bureaucrats and elites.”

Law Professor Trains Eye on Evolution of International Governance

Fordam Jesuit University | Nov 9, 2009

By Patrick Verel

Gráinne de Búrca’s worldview expanded when she moved from Ireland to mainland Europe, and then to the United States. So, too, has her interest in issues of governance expanded, such that de Búrca, a professor of law, now writes increasingly about international and transnational governance.

It is a timely subject, because as the development of the European Union (EU) and recent events in the global economy have shown, the era of independent states that can act purely in their own self-interest and regardless of the impact on others is over.

International institutions such as the United Nations, World Bank and World Trade Organization (WTO); more recent transgovernmental networks such as the Group of 20 (G20); and the growing number of regional organizations such as the EU, Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the African Union are more important than ever, according to de Búrca.

“The phenomenon of governance escaping the state is really what interests me,” she said. “Although the growing interdependence of states requires transnational governance solutions, there are problems of legitimacy and effectiveness. People are deeply suspicious of what they perceive as faceless bureaucrats and elites.”

De Búrca came from the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, to the Fordham School of Law in 2006. She is currently working out of an office on Washington Square Park in Manhattan as part of a yearlong fellowship with the Straus Institute for the Advanced Study of Law and Justice at New York University. The institute’s research theme this year is “the turn to governance in international law,” which de Búrca said may seem obscure, but is a phenomenon with many practical consequences.

“International law is a traditional and old-fashioned discipline in some ways, and has not fully adjusted to the rapidly changing global environment,” she said. “But the discipline has begun to change, and to reflect some of the major changes that have taken place in the international environment over the last half-century or so, with even greater intensity in recent decades.

“There has been a turn away from traditional international legal mechanisms and diplomacy, and a rise in novel forms of ‘global governance.’ This term includes all kinds of patterns of transnational policy-making and lawmaking involving different groupings and networks of actors, both public and private,” she said. “The picture is much more fuzzy, complex and opaque than the traditional realm of international law, which was composed primarily of sovereign states interacting amongst themselves.”

Having spent the last few years examining how the 27-member European Union works to address issues such as trade, social policy, anti-discrimination and anti-terrorism issues in her papers, including “The European Court of Justice and the International Legal Order after Kadi” (Harvard International Law Journal, 2009), de Búrca is now examining how the EU is influencing the international legal realm as an emerging global actor.

For example, she cited the fact that the EU had, for the first time, participated in the negotiation and signing of an international human rights treaty, the U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which was recently adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. Unlike previous U.N. human rights treaties, this one was negotiated with the strong participation of organizations representing people with disabilities, and other non-governmental organizations, and contained several novel features that make it a promising instrument for delivering the social change that is needed.

Some of these features—including the strong participation of key “stakeholders” in many aspects of policy-making—are a familiar part of how the European Union operates in its internal domain.

“Because the EU has to coordinate the different interests of so many states and actors, and has created new institutions to shape policy for 27 member states, much of its policy-making is quite strongly participatory in interesting ways, and is not exclusively confined to formal state representatives, parliamentarians or foreign office officials,” she said. “The EU frequently relies on and works through networks of stakeholders, involving the actors who are likely to be most affected by the policies in question.”

Another example of an arena in which de Búrca said the EU has recently been making its voice heard is the meetings of the G20. At its September summit in Pittsburgh, the group—which represents finance ministers and central bank governors from the world’s 20 largest economies—in an attempt to respond to the growing economic interdependence of states in the global economy, agreed to establish a system of “peer review” of each other’s economic policies. While new to the international realm, such a system of economic peer review is a familiar tool of internal EU policy.

“It’s a potentially radical idea if you take seriously the notion that states, which conceive of themselves as sovereign entities, have agreed to open up their economic polices to one another for scrutiny and comment,” she said.

It’s a tricky proposition that involves balancing states’ concerns about their sovereignty with their need to cooperate. But the trade, environmental and economic interdependence of states is increasingly evident and conflicts are inevitable.

Practical examples of the way international trade rules, for instance, have affected domestic policy in the United States can be seen in the famous “tuna/dolphin” and “shrimp/ turtle” controversies, which affected the extent to which the United States could limit the import of tuna that was fished in a way that was harmful to dolphins, or shrimp that was harvested in a way that was harmful to sea turtles.

“These international trade rules are set through the WTO, which is another organization whose legitimacy is regularly called into question,” de Búrca said. “Theoretically, every state that is a member of the WTO has an equal voice, but in practice this is not at all the case. Proceedings are very much dominated by a small group of economically powerful states; many developing countries struggle to send negotiators and to be able to participate in meetings.”

De Búrca sees her role as a cheerleader for democratic and other reforms within transnational governance, which are gradually becoming more open to such reform in part because their very legitimacy depends on it. The kinds of public protests that now regularly accompany the meetings of political and economic leaders such as the G8, G20, WTO and World Economic Forum illustrate why such changes are necessary, she said.

Even in Europe, the Lisbon Treaty, which would have made significant amendments to the European Union’s founding treaties, was initially rejected by a popular referendum in Ireland in 2008, before being accepted last month in a second referendum held at the urging of the EU’s political leaders. The intense public interest in that process and the lively debate which the two referendums generated is part of what makes de Búrca optimistic that more democratic mechanisms of governing will gradually be embraced.

“The process of opening borders and states to one another, and reducing the barriers between them, is a positive development. It’s, of course, in some respects a frightening one for many people, since globalization brings with it all sorts of perceived threats and fears and anxieties, but it’s also a cause for optimism and hope,” she said.

“If you want to see the simplest example of this lesson in Europe, it’s that it is almost impossible now to imagine any one of the 27 member states being at war with one another again. And as the EU ambassador to the U.S., John Bruton, recently noted, not a single person has died in the creation of the European Union, something that cannot be said of the process of coming into being of many nation states. That, in and of itself, is a significant achievement.”

Inside the shadowy (and very lucrative) world of Blair Inc

Inside the shadowy (and very lucrative) world of Blair Inc: How the ex-PM has become a one-man multinational money-making machine.

Daily Mail | Oct 31, 2009

By Edward Heathcoat-amory

So, as the job of European President apparently recedes from Tony Blair’s grasp, should we feel sorry for our former prime minister, sitting at home watching his dreams of returning to the world stage turn to ashes?

Perhaps not. In fact, there is every reason to believe that Mr Blair might be rather relieved if he doesn’t have to go to Brussels, because taking the job would have meant renouncing his current role as a one-man multinational money-making machine.

If you were to take Mr Blair’s activities at his own evaluation, you would believe he divides his time between trying to save the world in the Middle East as the representative to that troubled region from the UN, the U.S., Europe and Russia; running his own faith and sports foundations in London; and organising various other charitable endeavours.

But the truth is a lot more complicated – and vastly more lucrative – than that.

At a conservative estimate, he has made £15million from his commercial activities since stepping down as prime minister in 2007, and there is every sign that his earning capacity is increasing.

He remains in demand as a £100,000-a-time international speaker, he has contracts to provide advice with several banking institutions, he is writing his memoirs, and he has established Tony Blair Associates (TBA) to provide advice to foreign governments for money.

There is nothing wrong with all this – except that he is pursuing his commercial interests so closely in tandem with his charitable work and job as an envoy to the Middle East that it is hard to see where the not-for-profit element ends and his own personal bank account begins.

As a friend told the Financial Times, ‘if Mr Blair emerged from a meeting with an Arab emir having won a donation to the Palestinians, a donation to the Tony Blair faith foundation, and a consultancy fee, that would be a “good trip”.’

And so far this year, he’s been to more than 20 countries.

All of this activity is masterminded by an astonishing 80 staff, all working from a splendid suite in Grosvenor Square, Mayfair, conveniently located near to the American embassy.

This seems appropriate because it is Mr Blair’s close connection with America, stemming from his support for them in invading Iraq and Afghanistan, that underpins much of his earning ability, not only as a lucrative speechmaker in the U.S., but because he is known to have the ear of those who run the world’s most powerful nation.

At the heart of his web of overlapping and conflicting interests is Tony Blair Associates, a consultancy, modelled on a foundation set up by Henry Kissinger, the former U.S. Secretary of State, which has made Kissinger very wealthy.

A friend told a Sunday newspaper recently: ‘TBA has been set up to make money from foreign governments and companies. There’s a focus on the Middle East, because that is where the money is.’

And Mr Blair is in the Middle East regularly, in his peace envoy role, with all expenses picked up by taxpayers around the world and instant access to any foreign potentate he cares to see. Which is, as it turns out, very helpful for his business interests.

On January 17 this year, he went to hold talks with King Adbullah of Saudi Arabia on the situation in the Gaza strip. With him on the trip was his old chief of staff from No 10, Jonathan Powell, who has no formal role in connection with his official activities, but just happens to have joined the staff of Tony Blair Associates.

And after meeting the king, Powell and his boss both went to see Prince Alwaleed, the richest businessman in the Middle East, worth at least £15billion. The prince is also chairman of the Kingdom Holding Company.

While there is no sign that Blair and Powell have so far been able to secure a consultancy contract with the Saudis, they were certainly more successful when, shortly afterwards, they visited Kuwait.

On January 26 they met the emir, Sheik al-Sabah, with Blair in his peace envoy role, and Powell in attendance. A few weeks later it was announced that TBA had been signed up to advise Kuwait on ‘good governance’ for a seven-figure sum.

It’s a similar story in Abu Dhabi, where Mr Blair has been numerous times since quitting as PM. Sheik Mohammed, the ruler, has signed up TBA to advise his state investment fund, Mubadala, as it goes round the world buying up assets.

Mr Blair’s advisers vigorously reject suggestions of any conflict of interest in these situations, but it’s hard to see how their master’s roles can be disentangled.

In addition to his TBA work, he is an adviser to U.S. investment bank JP Morgan, and Zurich Financial Services, on annual fees reported to be £2.5million. Incidentally, Jonathan Powell works for rival investment bank Morgan Stanley. No doubt they can compare notes.

This May, in his role as peace envoy, Blair met the education minister of the United Arab Emirates. On the same day, he met that luminary’s cabinet colleague, the finance minister, but this time wearing his JP Morgan commercial hat.

Another middle eastern state which he has visited on behalf of JP Morgan is Libya, a country whose international rehabilitation was one of Mr Blair’s obsessions as PM.

Oliver Miles, a former ambassador to Libya, told the Financial Times that Mr Blair had visited the country ‘a number of times’ since departing Downing Street, and ‘he certainly has a relationship with both the leader (Gaddafi) and the leader’s son’.

Some of Mr Blair’s former political opponents are concerned about the nature of that relationship, as Libya remains a controversial and potentially dangerous country. Tory MP Daniel Kawczynski, who chairs the all-party Commons committee on Libya, calls it ‘highly inappropriate given his unique position as a former prime minister and the fact that we don’t know what that business is’.

But it’s not only Mr Blair’s commercial interests that are surprisingly complicated – his charitable endeavours are equally hard to disentangle.

His work in Africa – a project to help the presidents of Sierra Leone and Rwanda – has yet to be given official charitable status, and for the moment is being largely funded by substantial grants from Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, and Lord Sainsbury, former science minister in Mr Blair’s government, who have given £1.5million each through their charitable foundations.

This money, however, has – according to a Financial Times investigation – been channelled through one of a large number of profit-making partnerships and private companies established by Mr Blair; this one is called Windrush No3. The funding process is arcane, adding to the air of mystery and secrecy that surrounds all of Mr Blair’s current activities.

His office insists that its activities in Africa are ‘entirely not for profit’, although these charitable funds may help fund Mr Blair’s offices.

And that won’t be cheap, as he hired his Grosvenor Square HQ at the very top of the property market and the cost of the eight years remaining on the lease is believed to be £4.4million, not to mention the salaries of his huge staff.

The final part of this jigsaw of interests is Mr Blair’s memoirs and speeches. He received an advance of £4.6million for the book, and is believed to be making steady progress on it.

As for the speechmaking, he is understood to have received a £600,000 ’signing-on fee’ from the Washington Speaker Bureau that organises his engagements, and each speech made for them generates another large fee.

His 36-hour, two-lecture tour of the Philippines this year netted him, according to the organiser, £240,000 plus expenses. And naturally, he met the Philippine president while he was there, and stayed with the British ambassador, mixing as always the different sides of his working life.

So why all this frenetic activity? Well, Mr Blair knows that his celebrity is a declining asset, so he needs to make as much money as quickly as possible.

And at home, his wife is busy spending the money, building up a £12million portfolio of properties, including large houses in London and the country and contributions towards smart homes for their sons, Nicky and Euan.

Of course, these homes have to be furnished; it was recently revealed that Cherie had spent £250,000 on Georgian and Regency furniture for their country residence.

He is making the money, and his wife is spending it. All of which would come to an abrupt end if he became President of Europe.

So despite the attractions of a job in which he would once more have had the ability to ’stop traffic’ in foreign capitals, there are good grounds for believing that he might prefer to keep things just the way they are.

He’s official enough to keep his credibility and his contacts, and commercial enough to be making a fortune. It’s the new Blairite Third Way.

Blair to be appointed president over all of Europe in November

Tony Blair ‘to be made EU president next month’

Daily Mail | Oct 22, 2009

By James Chapman

Tony Blair could be crowned first President of Europe at a special summit of EU leaders next month.

Diplomatic sources say French President Nicolas Sarkozy is pushing for an extraordinary meeting in Brussels to install the former prime minister in the new £275,000-a-year post.

Supporters of Mr Blair’s candidacy are racing to get a deal stitched up as doubts grow about whether the forthcoming inquiry into the Iraq war could prove a major stumbling block.

The Conservatives have told the French that making him EU president would be viewed by an incoming Tory government as a ‘declaration of war’.

They are warning other European leaders that if appointed, Mr Blair could find himself almost immediately at the centre of massive controversy as the formal inquiry into the Iraq war gets under way.

The former prime minister is expected to be the chief witness at the inquiry, being led by Whitehall mandarin Sir John Chilcot.

But diplomats say that as well as M Sarkozy, Barack Obama would also be happy to see Mr Blair installed as EU President.

The White House will make no public statement on the post, but the President is said to favour a candidate such as Mr Blair, who is both pro-American and pro-European.

Mr Blair was the first European leader to meet Mr Obama after he became President, and was lavished with praise.

The ex-PM insists he is not campaigning for the job – even though he is the officially approved candidate of the British government. Gordon Brown is understood to have no objections to a special summit being convened next month.

Sweden, which holds the current ‘ rotating’ EU presidency, also wants a permanent president nominated within weeks, even though the successful candidate would not take up the position until all the EU’s 27 member states have ratified the Lisbon Treaty.

‘The French are pushing for an extraordinary summit next month to crown Tony Blair as President of the EU,’ said one diplomatic source. ‘Blair is looking like the clear favourite and Sarkozy wants to get it settled quickly.’

There is also growing speculation that Foreign Secretary David Miliband could be offered another job being created by the Lisbon Treaty.

The post of high representative for foreign affairs is seen as potentially more important job than the presidency itself. However, Mr Miliband would have to quit the Cabinet to take it up, risking accusations that he had abandoned hope of Labour winning the next election.

Last night a handful of members of the European Parliament started a campaign to stop Mr Blair winning the presidency.

A Luxembourg socialist and four senior German politicians from across the political spectrum launched a petition in the assembly calling for him to be ruled out of consideration because Britain is not one of the 16 countries which use the euro, is not in the Schengen border-free area and has an exemption from the bloc’s charter of fundamental rights.

If he lands the job, Mr Blair can expect 20 staff, a chauffeur and generous entertainment expenses. But he will almost certainly be forced to ditch outside interests said to have earned him £12million since leaving Downing Street.

Sarkozy demands ex-PM Blair’s ‘coronation’ as first President over all of Europe

The Sun | Oct 22, 2009

By GRAEME WILSON

FRENCH leader Nicolas Sarkozy is demanding a special EU summit next month to crown Tony Blair the first President of Europe.

Mr Sarkozy is urging other leaders to move quickly to give the former PM the powerful new role.

The news emerged as diplomatic sources revealed US President Barack Obama would be “happy” to see Mr Blair land the job.

Related

Berlusconi backs Tony Blair to be President of Europe

Plans to anoint him at an EU summit in Brussels next week have been scuppered by Czech president Vaclav Klaus, due to his refusal to sign the Lisbon Treaty. But EU leaders are confident Mr Klaus will finally approve it by early next month.

Mr Sarkozy says they should immediately organise a summit to unveil the new President – with Mr Blair the hot favourite to win the race.

One source said: “Sarkozy wants a quick decision on this and is demanding a one-off summit in the middle of next month to get the job done.”

Gordon Brown – who is backing Mr Blair’s bid – is understood to support the summit idea too.

The French fear if they wait until the next official EU meeting in December, the appointment will be overshadowed by the global climate change summit in Copenhagen.

The Tories warn the ex-PM could be hauled before the official Iraq War inquiry weeks after landing the role.

Berlusconi backs Tony Blair to be President of Europe

Silvio Berlusconi kisses Tony Blair (Thierry Chesnot/Reuters)

The former Prime Minister has enjoyed the Italian leader’s hospitality

London Times | Oct 15, 2009

by Lucy Bannerman in Rome

Tony Blair can count on the support of at least one old ally as he manoeuvres himself to become the first president of Europe.

Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian Prime Minister, found time out from his political battles to write a front-page letter in a right-wing newspaper, declaring his former holiday companion to be the best man for the job.

“Tony Blair has got everything it needs to become the first president of the European Council,” he wrote in Il Foglio. “He has everything it needs to be designated to that role, as soon as it will be judicially and politically possible . . . In agreement with many other heads of government, and heads of state, and in co-ordination with the powers of the European Parliament, my Government and I will work to ensure we do not lose a great political legacy, made with courage, equilibrium and prudence without uncertainty.”

Mr Blair’s appointment, he added, would renew the governance of the European Union.

The Italian leader has made no secret of his support for Mr Blair to win the historic role, created under the Lisbon treaty.

A summit in Brussels was due to name the new president, and also the foreign minister, at the end of the month but the path has since been blocked by President Klaus of the Czech Republic, who refuses to put the final signature to the document, which has been ratified by the rest of the EU member states.

Mr Berlusconi was one of Mr Blair’s key allies over the Iraq war, during the days of the Bush Administration. He also played a memorable role in their Italian holidays, treating the Blairs to his legendary hospitality during a visit to his villa in Sardinia in 2004.

Because he was recovering from a hair transplant at the time he also treated the world’s press to photographs of a world leader in a bandana. Cherie Blair later spoke of the impressive festivities held in her husband’s honour, including live music and a fireworks display that spelt out the words “Viva Tony”.

Mr Berlusconi also made a personal call to the head of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, to put in a good word for the former British Prime Minister, according to Il Foglio, a Milanese daily, whose largest stakeholder is Mr Berlusconi’s estranged wife, Veronica Lario, and whose editor is Giuliano Ferraro, a former spokesman in his first Government. Mr Barroso, a Portuguese conservative, is strongly supported by Britain and was appointed in 2004, thanks largely to Mr Blair.

The Irish bookmaker Paddy Power said this week that Mr Blair was the 4-6 favourite, followed by the Dutch Prime Minister, Jan Peter Balkenende (4-1); the Luxembourg Prime Minister, Jean-Claude Juncker (11-2); and the Danish Nato chief, Anders Fogh Rasmussen (6-1).

Mr Berlusconi, 73, who faces a series of criminal trials after a court stripped him of his immunity from prosecution last week, was removed from the running after his odds reached 100-1.

Secret meetings bring about demise of dollar for the New World Order

The demise of the dollar

In a graphic illustration of the new world order, Arab states have launched secret moves with China, Russia and France to stop using the US currency for oil trading.

Independent | Oct 6, 2009

By Robert Fisk

In the most profound financial change in recent Middle East history, Gulf Arabs are planning – along with China, Russia, Japan and France – to end dollar dealings for oil, moving instead to a basket of currencies including the Japanese yen and Chinese yuan, the euro, gold and a new, unified currency planned for nations in the Gulf Co-operation Council, including Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and Qatar.

Secret meetings have already been held by finance ministers and central bank governors in Russia, China, Japan and Brazil to work on the scheme, which will mean that oil will no longer be priced in dollars.

The plans, confirmed to The Independent by both Gulf Arab and Chinese banking sources in Hong Kong, may help to explain the sudden rise in gold prices, but it also augurs an extraordinary transition from dollar markets within nine years.

The Americans, who are aware the meetings have taken place – although they have not discovered the details – are sure to fight this international cabal which will include hitherto loyal allies Japan and the Gulf Arabs. Against the background to these currency meetings, Sun Bigan, China’s former special envoy to the Middle East, has warned there is a risk of deepening divisions between China and the US over influence and oil in the Middle East. “Bilateral quarrels and clashes are unavoidable,” he told the Asia and Africa Review. “We cannot lower vigilance against hostility in the Middle East over energy interests and security.”

This sounds like a dangerous prediction of a future economic war between the US and China over Middle East oil – yet again turning the region’s conflicts into a battle for great power supremacy. China uses more oil incrementally than the US because its growth is less energy efficient. The transitional currency in the move away from dollars, according to Chinese banking sources, may well be gold. An indication of the huge amounts involved can be gained from the wealth of Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar who together hold an estimated $2.1 trillion in dollar reserves.

The decline of American economic power linked to the current global recession was implicitly acknowledged by the World Bank president Robert Zoellick. “One of the legacies of this crisis may be a recognition of changed economic power relations,” he said in Istanbul ahead of meetings this week of the IMF and World Bank. But it is China’s extraordinary new financial power – along with past anger among oil-producing and oil-consuming nations at America’s power to interfere in the international financial system – which has prompted the latest discussions involving the Gulf states.

Brazil has shown interest in collaborating in non-dollar oil payments, along with India. Indeed, China appears to be the most enthusiastic of all the financial powers involved, not least because of its enormous trade with the Middle East.

China imports 60 per cent of its oil, much of it from the Middle East and Russia. The Chinese have oil production concessions in Iraq – blocked by the US until this year – and since 2008 have held an $8bn agreement with Iran to develop refining capacity and gas resources. China has oil deals in Sudan (where it has substituted for US interests) and has been negotiating for oil concessions with Libya, where all such contracts are joint ventures.

Furthermore, Chinese exports to the region now account for no fewer than 10 per cent of the imports of every country in the Middle East, including a huge range of products from cars to weapon systems, food, clothes, even dolls. In a clear sign of China’s growing financial muscle, the president of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, yesterday pleaded with Beijing to let the yuan appreciate against a sliding dollar and, by extension, loosen China’s reliance on US monetary policy, to help rebalance the world economy and ease upward pressure on the euro.

Ever since the Bretton Woods agreements – the accords after the Second World War which bequeathed the architecture for the modern international financial system – America’s trading partners have been left to cope with the impact of Washington’s control and, in more recent years, the hegemony of the dollar as the dominant global reserve currency.

The Chinese believe, for example, that the Americans persuaded Britain to stay out of the euro in order to prevent an earlier move away from the dollar. But Chinese banking sources say their discussions have gone too far to be blocked now. “The Russians will eventually bring in the rouble to the basket of currencies,” a prominent Hong Kong broker told The Independent. “The Brits are stuck in the middle and will come into the euro. They have no choice because they won’t be able to use the US dollar.”

Chinese financial sources believe President Barack Obama is too busy fixing the US economy to concentrate on the extraordinary implications of the transition from the dollar in nine years’ time. The current deadline for the currency transition is 2018.

The US discussed the trend briefly at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh; the Chinese Central Bank governor and other officials have been worrying aloud about the dollar for years. Their problem is that much of their national wealth is tied up in dollar assets.

“These plans will change the face of international financial transactions,” one Chinese banker said. “America and Britain must be very worried. You will know how worried by the thunder of denials this news will generate.”

Iran announced late last month that its foreign currency reserves would henceforth be held in euros rather than dollars. Bankers remember, of course, what happened to the last Middle East oil producer to sell its oil in euros rather than dollars. A few months after Saddam Hussein trumpeted his decision, the Americans and British invaded Iraq.

EU ‘homeland security’ lacks democratic oversight, says watchdog

EU Observer | Oct 2, 2009

by LEIGH PHILLIPS

Civil liberties monitors worry about the lack of participation of European and national parliaments in the development of the security sector (Photo: The Blackbird)

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – As European ‘homeland security’ sector stakeholders meet this week in Stockholm, a civil liberties watchdog is warning that decisions on the expansion of this lucrative new sector, hived off from public view and with minimal democratic scrutiny, are being made by the very companies that will ultimately profit from from them.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, security research stakeholders from across the continent met in Stockholm for the annual European Security Research Conference under the aegis of the EU presidency, currently held by Sweden.

The conference, the “major place to meet and discuss the creation of a security research area in Europe,” according to the Swedish EU presidency, takes place as a new report from UK-based civil liberties monitoring group Statewatch, brings to light how the very companies that will profit from the bloc’s €1.4 billion European Security Research Programme (ERSP) are the ones that are participating in its design and implementation.

The seven-year ERSP, launched in 2007, has the twin aim of delivering brand-new high-tech security technologies to Europe – from advanced profiling systems to unmanned aerial drones – and, explicitly, to foster a rapid growth in this lucrative sector in order to not let US companies steal a march on their European rivals.

While civil liberties campaigners say that there is nothing wrong in principle with genuine, civilian-led efforts to deal with crime and catastrophic events, the report says that at every step of the development of a European security research strategy, there has been no democratic oversight.

The group claims there is a clear conflict of interest as the design of the ERSP has been “outsourced to the very corporations that have the most to gain from its implementation,’ highlighting defence giants Thales, Finmeccanica, EADS, Saab and Sagem Défénsé Sécurité.

In the three different stages of the development of the ERSP, these multinational corporations have dominated the process while MEPs, national politicians and civil society have been all but excluded, the report shows.

‘Democratic sheen’

In 2003, a “Group of Personalities” (GoP) was convened as an advisory body essentially to conceive the first principles for European security research.

The GoP was composed of the EU commissioners for research and information society and as observers the commissioners for external relations and trade, along with the high representative for EU foreign and security policy, Nato representatives, the Western European Armaments Association and the EU Military Committee.

Also represented on the GoP were the CEOs or senior directors of eight multinational corporations, including Europe’s four largest arms manufacturers – EADS, BAE Systems, Thales and Finmeccanica – and IT firms – Ericsson, Indra, Siemens and Diehl.

Four MEPs were present, “adding a democratic sheen to the process,” according to the report, two Christian Democrats, a Socialist and a Liberal, but one, Karl Von Wogau was also an advisory board member with Security and Defence Agenda, an arms industry think-tank and lobby group.

The GoP’s 2004 report stated that there was a strong case for subsidising the development of a European security sector, as it was falling behind the United States, noting that the US Department of Homeland Security budget includes “around $1 billion dedicated to research.”

The report went on to say that as a result, Washington was “taking a lead,” which could be worrisome for the EU if the US was able to “impose normative and operational standards worldwide.”

But this is also problematic because “US industry will enjoy a very strong competitive position.”

Parallel to this first stage, the commission in 2004 established the €65 million Preparatory Action for Security Research, which funded 39 security research projects. Ahead of this, the commission issued no green paper on security research, which is the norm for setting out possible policy options, and no public debate.

20-year vision

After the GoP was wound up, the commission established the European Security Research Advisory Board (Esrab) in April, 2005, which moved on from first principles to setting the agenda for security research.

Similar to its predecessor, the Esrab included many of the same “stakeholder experts,” including seven of the eight corporations that had sat on the GoP – EADS, BAE Systems, Thales, Finmeccanica, Ericsson, Siemens and Diehl.

But there was no consultation of the European or national parliaments as to its make-up. The nominations instead came from EU ambassadors, the European Defence Agency and, again, unnamed “stakeholder groups”.

In March 2007, the commission set up the European Security Research and Innovation Forum (Esrif), with a wider remit than the Esrab, going beyond research to development needs and to produce a 20-year vision for the sector.

Here too, the 65 members of the Esrif plenary were selected in the same way as the Esrab without parliamentary input, no members of the European Parliament, and no representation from civil liberties or privacy organisations.

But while MEPs were shut out of the process, representatives from some non-EU member states were welcomed aboard, including from the Counter-terrorism Bureau of Israel’s National Security Council.

Moreover, Esrif was subdivided into 11 working groups with an additional 595 security research stakeholders, of the total 660 individuals participating, 66 percent came from defence and security contractors, again including EADS, Finmeccanica, Thales and the Aerospace and Defence Industries Association of Europe.

Three MEPs took part in the working groups and nine individuals from civil society, although again none from civil liberties groups.

Esrif’s report, a “roadmap” for security research until 2030 was to be presented at the European Security Research Conference in Stockholm this week, but the roadmap, a 300-page document, has been delayed for one to two months.

The report says that the failure to separate the development from the implementation of the ERSP and the appointment of industry-dominated stakeholder groups to develop the policy they will eventually get paid to carry out “represents an unlawful act of maladministration.”

The commission says that the Esrif is in fact “neither a commission body nor a commission-driven exercise,” a statement Statewatch calls “astonishing” as it “suggests that the commission has effectively outsourced the strategic development of a €1.4 billion EU research programme to a wholly unaccountable, informal group.”

‘No legal basis’

But the report authors suggest that in fact the real reason the groups have been informal is due to the absence of a legal basis in the EU treaties for the commission to establish advisory bodies dealing with security and technology issues.

“Instead of seeking to legitimise the commission’s activities in this area, the EU and its member states have chosen instead to give a dubious mandate to an informal body.”

The report author says that as a result, the conclusions favour a high-tech blueprint for “a new kind of security”, one in which “peacekeeping and crisis management missions make no operational distinction between the suburbs of Basra and the banlieues,” a surveillance society where the type of aggressive systems used to make war are used domestically and along frontiers as well.

The ESRP is promoting the development of a range of technologies that could engender systematic violations of fundamental rights, according to the report, including militarised border controls, surveillance and profiling technologies, the widespread collection and analysis of personal data, automated targeting systems, satellite and space-based surveillance, and crisis management’ tools.

“It is not just a case of “sleepwalking into a surveillance society,” said the report’s author, Ben Hayes, “it feels more like turning a blind eye to the start of a new kind of arms race, one in which all the weapons are pointing inwards.”

MEPs integral

The European Commission, for its part, feels that the people behind the report are getting worked up over very little, as the Esrif is only an advisory body and not the organ that actually crafts policy.

“The Esrif cannot design a [security research] strategy, this is up to the commission,” the commission’s acting enterprise spokesperson, Jonathan Todd, told EUobserver.

“Esrif is a Cars 21-type process in a larger format – involving industry, research, users, MEPs, civil society,” he added, referring to the Competitive Automotive Regulatory System for the 21st Century, a high-level expert group that brought together all the main stakeholders in the car sector, including consumer and environmental organisations, to advise the commission on future policy.

Cars 21 was also criticised by lobbying transparency campaigners during its existence for its dominance of the European Car Manufacturers Association (ACEA).

The commission countered the suggested that the European Parliament was not getting a look in, with Mr Todd saying: “MEPs are an integral part of Esrif.”

“From the beginning we were conscious as regards civil liberties and believe that all what is happening has to happen transparently,” he said. “We are not in favour of a ’surveillance society’.”

EU mulls carbon tax to fight climate change

www.chinaview.cn | Oct 2, 2009

GOTHENBURG, Sweden, Oct. 2 (Xinhua) — European Union (EU) finance ministers on Friday discussed the idea of introducing a carbon tax across the 27-nation bloc as a way to help fight climate change.

“Today, there were few reactions, but all the reactions were positive,” Laszlo Kovacs, EU Commissioner for Taxation and Customs Union, told reporters after presenting the idea to EU finance ministers at an informal meeting in the Swedish port city of Gothenburg.

Swedish Finance Minister Anders Borg, whose country holds the EU rotating presidency, said there had been a constructive exchange of views and that the European Commission was encouraged to make a formal proposal, possibly next year.

He said a number of ministers welcomed the idea of introducing a carbon tax to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from sectors outside the EU Emission Trading Scheme.

The EU currently runs the world’s largest Emission Trading Scheme, which imposes emission caps on certain EU industries, including power generators and some heavy industrial plants, and requires them to buy extra permit if they want to emit more.

The new carbon tax is likely to be applied to transport, agriculture, forestry, households and others.

In fact, several EU member states have already introduced such tax on national basis.

Borg said Sweden’s carbon tax had proved “very successful” since it was introduced at the start of the 1990s.

Denmark, Finland and Slovenia also have taxes on household carbon emissions resulting from heating and electricity use. France is planning to introduce a carbon tax on gasoline or diesel fuel for cars next year, hoping it can bring more revenue for the government.

But Kovacs admitted it would not be easy to reach a deal since taxation is reserved for national sovereignty under EU rules and any change requires unanimity among 27 member states.

“Introducing a new tax in the EU has never been easy, and particularly it is not easy in the time of a financial and economic crisis,” he said.

“But it is evident that the climate change is an even more disastrous global challenge than the current financial and economic crisis. It’s a question of life or death for the population of the globe,” he added.

Kovacs said the tax would not only help reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the EU, but also its revenues could be used in financing the fight against climate change in the developing world.

The revenues “should be used for climate change purposes (and) to finance the climate change efforts of the developing countries, because they need some support and we need revenues to support them,” he said.

EU finance ministers also had an “active and constructive” discussion on the issue of climate financing today, according to the Swedish EU presidency.

World governments are expected to reach a new deal on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to replace the Kyoto Protocol after it expires in 2012 at a United Nations conference on climate change in Copenhagen this December, but current negotiations have been deadlocked, with climate financing proving to be a stumbling block.

Developing countries have called for generous financial support from rich countries to help them cut greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the impact of global warming, for which industrialized nations are historically responsible.

In early September, the European Commission unveiled a blueprint for scaling up international finance to help poor nations, proposing that the EU would contribute some 2 to 15 billion euros (2.9 to 22 billion U.S. dollars) a year by 2020, a sum criticized by developing countries as not enough.