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ECONOMY OVERVIEW
Global
output rose by 3.8% in 2008, down from 5.2% in 2007. Among major
economies, growth was led by China (9.8%), Russia (7.4%), and India
(7.3%). Worldwide, nations varied widely in their growth results, with
Macau (15%), Azerbaijan (13.2%), and Angola (11.6%), registering the
highest. Growth rates slowed in all the major industrial countries and
most developing countries, because of uncertainties in the financial
markets and lowered consumer confidence. Externally, the nation-state, as
a bedrock economic-political institution, is steadily losing control over
international flows of people, goods, funds, and technology. Internally,
the central government often finds its control over resources slipping as
separatist regional movements - typically based on ethnicity - gain
momentum, e.g., in many of the successor states of the former Soviet
Union, in the former Yugoslavia, in India, in Iraq, in Indonesia, and in
Canada. Externally, the central government is losing decisionmaking powers
to international bodies, notably the EU. In Western Europe, governments
face the difficult political problem of channeling resources away from
welfare programs in order to increase investment and strengthen incentives
to seek employment. The addition of 80 million people each year to an
already overcrowded globe is exacerbating the problems of pollution,
desertification, underemployment, epidemics, and famine. Because of their
own internal problems and priorities, the industrialized countries devote
insufficient resources to deal effectively with the poorer areas of the
world, which, at least from an economic point of view, are becoming
further marginalized. The introduction of the euro as the common currency
of much of Western Europe in January 1999, while paving the way for an
integrated economic powerhouse, poses economic risks because of varying
levels of income and cultural and political differences among the
participating nations. The terrorist attacks on the US on 11 September
2001 accentuated a growing risk to global prosperity, illustrated, for
example, by the reallocation of resources away from investment to
anti-terrorist programs. The opening of war in March 2003 between a US-led
coalition and Iraq added new uncertainties to global economic prospects.
The complex political difficulties and the high economic cost of
establishing domestic order in Iraq became major global problems that
continued through 2008.
DISPUTES -
INTERNATIONAL
Stretching over 250,000 km, the world's 322
international land boundaries separate 194 independent states and 71
dependencies, areas of special sovereignty, and other miscellaneous
entities; ethnicity, culture, race, religion, and language have divided
states into separate political entities as much as history, physical
terrain, political fiat, or conquest, resulting in sometimes arbitrary and
imposed boundaries; most maritime states have claimed limits that include
territorial seas and exclusive economic zones; overlapping limits due to
adjacent or opposite coasts create the potential for 430 bilateral
maritime boundaries of which 209 have agreements that include contiguous
and non-contiguous segments; boundary, borderland/resource, and
territorial disputes vary in intensity from managed or dormant to violent
or militarized; undemarcated, indefinite, porous, and unmanaged boundaries
tend to encourage illegal cross-border activities, uncontrolled migration,
and confrontation; territorial disputes may evolve from historical and/or
cultural claims, or they may be brought on by resource competition; ethnic
and cultural clashes continue to be responsible for much of the
territorial fragmentation and internal displacement of the estimated 6.6
million people and cross-border displacements of 8.6 million refugees
around the world as of early 2006; just over one million refugees were
repatriated in the same period; other sources of contention include access
to water and mineral (especially hydrocarbon) resources, fisheries, and
arable land; armed conflict prevails not so much between the uniformed
armed forces of independent states as between stateless armed entities
that detract from the sustenance and welfare of local populations, leaving
the community of nations to cope with resultant refugees, hunger, disease,
impoverishment, and environmental degradation.
Refugees and
internally displaced persons:
The United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) estimated that in December 2006 there was a global
population of 8.8 million registered refugees and as many as 24.5 million
IDPs in more than 50 countries; the actual global population of refugees
is probably closer to 10 million given the estimated 1.5 million Iraqi
refugees displaced throughout the Middle East (2007).
Trafficking
in persons:
Current situation: approximately 800,000 people, mostly
women and children, are trafficked annually across national borders, not
including millions trafficked within their own countries; at least 80% of
the victims are female and up to 50% are minors; 75% of all victims are
trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation; almost two-thirds of the
global victims are trafficked intra-regionally within East Asia and the
Pacific (260,000 to 280,000 people) and Europe and Eurasia (170,000 to
210,000 people).
Tier 2 Watch List: Albania, Argentina, Armenia,
Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad,
China, Costa Rica, Cote d'Ivoire, Cyprus, Democratic Republic of the
Congo, Dominican Republic, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, The Gambia,
Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, India, Jordan, Libya, Malaysia,
Montenegro, Mozambique, Niger, Panama, Republic of the Congo, Russia,
South Africa, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Zambia,
Zimbabwe.
Tier 3: Algeria, Burma, Cuba, Fiji, Iran, Kuwait,
Moldova, North Korea, Oman, Papua New Guinea, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan,
Syria (2008).
ILLICIT DRUGS
Cocaine: worldwide coca leaf
cultivation in 2007 amounted to 232,500 hectares; Colombia produced
slightly more than two-thirds of the worldwide crop, followed by Peru and
Bolivia; potential pure cocaine production decreased 7% to 865 metric tons
in 2007; Colombia conducts an aggressive coca eradication campaign, but
both Peruvian and Bolivian Governments are hesitant to eradicate coca in
key growing areas; 551 metric tons of export-quality cocaine (85% pure) is
documented to have been seized or destroyed in 2005; US consumption of
export quality cocaine is estimated to have been in excess of 380 metric
tons.
Opiates: worldwide illicit opium poppy cultivation continued
to increase in 2007, with a potential opium production of 8,400 metric
tons, reaching the highest levels recorded since estimates began in
mid-1980s; Afghanistan is world's primary opium producer, accounting for
95% of the global supply; Southeast Asia - responsible for 9% of global
opium - saw marginal increases in production; Latin America produced 1% of
global opium, but most was refined into heroin destined for the US market;
if all potential opium was processed into pure heroin, the potential
global production would be 1,000 metric tons of heroin in 2007.
ELECTIONS AROUND THE WORLD
To follow this year's elections online as they unfold, visit the ELECTIONS AROUND THE WORLD
EUROPE WASTED 20 YEARS SINCE COLD WAR: GORBACHEV
Wednesday May 13,
2009
MOSCOW, Russia (Reuters) - Europe has squandered the
opportunity created by the fall of the Berlin Wall 20 years ago for a new
era of cooperation between East and West, former Soviet President Mikhail
Gorbachev said on Wednesday. Gorbachev, who presided over the collapse of
the Soviet Union, said he and other world leaders had hoped that the
Wall's fall in 1989 would allow Europe to become a model of security and
peace for the rest of the world, but this had not happened. "We have
wasted the last 20 years," Gorbachev, 78, told a news conference at his
charitable foundation in central Moscow. "We have not done everything we
should have done. It's a great pity." Gorbachev sharply criticized those
in the West who claimed to have won the Cold War by defeating the Soviet
Union, instead of viewing the end of East-West confrontation as a mutual
decision made for the benefit of all. Dressed in a dark blazer and
open-neck blue shirt, Gorbachev at times stumbled for words and paused for
thought as he took the mainly foreign audience of reporters on a long
amble through the history of the Cold War's final years. Russians remain
nostalgic for the superpower empire of the Soviet Union and polls show
they loathe Gorbachev for allowing its collapse -- an event Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin described once as the biggest geo-political tragedy of the
20th century. Gorbachev said it was unrealistic to hope for the Soviet
Union to be rebuilt but called for the four key states which formed its
economic heart to unite again to form a free trade area. "It is not yet
too late to look again at creating a free economic area between Russia,
Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan," he said, adding that this would
strengthen European security.
The former Soviet leader complained that
Europe still failed to understand Russia properly. "It is complete
nonsense that Russia is aggressive or imperialist," he said. "Russia
doesn't want to go to war with anyone." Gorbachev has little political
influence in Russia today, but he reiterated plans to help form a new
party to challenge the overwhelming dominance of the Kremlin's main
political machine, United Russia. "People understand that something is
going wrong. And as for that monopoly of one party -- we know all about
that," he said. "As is well known, all monopolies are rotten." He said
more than 10,000 letters supporting the idea of a new party had been
received and that it would be set up soon, though he said he would not be
the leader. Gorbachev described United Russia, which enjoys a
constitutional majority in the lower house of parliament, the Duma, as "a
worse version of the Soviet Communist Party." Western-style liberal
opposition parties are mostly ignored by Russia's mainly state-controlled
media and struggle to fight elections against the huge political patronage
of United Russia. Polls put their support in the low single digits and
they have almost disappeared from elected legislatures around the country.
President Dmitry Medvedev has proposed some modest tinkering with the
country's electoral system to allow symbolic representation for the
liberal opposition in parliament and to make it slightly easier to
register new parties. Gorbachev said he wished Medvedev well but added
that he "still needs to gather strength" politically.
2009 WORLDWIDE ELECTION CALENDAR
January -
[18] El Salvador, Legislative; [25] Bolivia, Referendum; [ ] Gabon,
Parliamentary.
February - [10] Israel, Parliamentary; [ ] Denmark,
Parliamentary (Canceled).
March - [15] El Salvador, Presidential; [
] Congo (Brazzaville), Presidential; [ ] Fiji, Parliamentary; [ ] South
Africa, Parliamentary; [ ] Micronesia, Parliamentary; [ ] Moldova,
Parliamentary; [ ] Andorra, Parliamentary; [ ] Antigua and Barbuda,
Parliamentary.
April - [9] Indonesia, Legislative; [26] Ecuador,
Presidential; [26] Ecuador, Legislative; [27] Yemen, Legislative; [ ]
Algeria, Presidential; [ ] Slovakia, Presidential; [ ] Macedonia,
Presidential; [ ] India, Parliamentary; [ ] Comoros,
Legislative.
May - [3] Panama, Presidential; [3] Panama,
Legislative; [19] Malawi, Presidential; [19] Malawi,
Parliamentary.
June - [12] Iran, Presidential; [14] Lithuania,
Presidential; [14] Bulgaria, Parliamentary; [14] Bulgaria Parliamentary;
[14] Luxemburg, Parliamentary; [ ] Lebanon Parliamentary.
July -
[5] Mexico, Legislative; [ ] Albania, Parliamentary.
September -
[14] Norway, Parliamentary; [27] Germany, Parliamentary; [ ] Angola,
Presidential; [ ] Afganistan, Presidential; [ ] Saint Kitts and Nevis,
Parliamentary; [ ] Japan, Parliamentary.
October - [25 ] Uruguay,
Presidential; [25] Uruguay, Legislative; [ ] Ukrania, Presidential; [ ]
Tunisia, Presidential; [ ] Botswana, Parliamentary; [ ] Tunisia,
Parliamentary; [ ] Argentina, Legislative.
November - [28] Romania,
Presidential, First Round; [ ] Namibia, Presidential; [ ] Honduras,
Presidential; [ ] Niger, Presidential; [ ] Namibia, Parliamentary; [ ]
Niger, Parliamentary; [ ] Honduras, Legislative.
December - [11]
Chile, Presidential; [11] Chile, Legislative; [12] Romania, Presidential,
Second Round; [ ] Ecuatorial Guinea, Presidential; [ ] Uzbekistan,
Presidential; [ ] Mozambique, Presidencial; [ ] Algeria, Parliamentary; [
] Mozambique, Parliamentary.
2009 - [ ] Vanuatu, Presidential; [ ]
Iran, Presidential; [ ] Indonesia, Presidential; [ ] Sudan, Presidential;
[ ] Ivory Coast, Presidential; [ ] Chad, Parliamentary; [ ] Sudan,
Parliamentary; [ ] Portugal, Parliamentary.
RECIPES
(COOKING)
AUTHOR: INTERNET
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