DENMARK

DENMARK
Kristeligt Dagblad, Copenhagen, June 6: Considering that U.S. President George W. Bush seldom changes his political course, or even admits errors, the new American attitude toward the talks with Iran is remarkable.
If the Americans sit down at the same table as the Iranians, we're talking about the first high level contacts in a generation between the Islamic state and the world's sole remaining superpower, also called the "Great Satan" by the regime in Tehran.
For the United States, it will be a considerable U-turn as the clerical regime for many years has been seen an important supporter of international terrorism.
Clash of values
Part of the picture is that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wants Israel to be erased from the map moreover and uses any opportunity to demand a clash with the West and its values.
However, the American shift in connection with the talks is not the result of them looking at the regime in Iran and its plans to get the nuclear weapons more gently.
The change of course has been brought on by the solidarity between the great powers regarding the Iranian nuclear arms plans faltering and in danger of collapse.
The reality is that President Bush must see that the Iranians have exploited the disagreement about the course between the United States and Britain on one side and Russia and China on the other.
The attempts by the United States to get the matter on the table at the U.N. Security Council with the aim of sanctions against Iran has moved at a snail's pace.
BRITAIN
Financial Times, London, June 7: There can be little dispute with Ben Bernanke's observation on Monday that the U.S. economy is "entering a period of transition." Understandably, though, the markets alighted on the least ambivalent portion of the Fed chairman's remarks that inflation was "at, or above, the upper end" of what most economists view as consistent with price stability. As a result, the futures market is now forecasting another quarter-point rise at the Fed's next meeting in late June.
But things are not necessarily that simple. Recent U.S. data pose a particular challenge because they are pulling in opposite directions. As Mr. Bernanke observed, core inflation -- excluding food and energy -- has risen to 3.2 per cent in the past three months, up from a 2.8 per cent six-month average. Some of this can be attributed to the feed through of higher oil and other commodity prices into retail costs. But it could also signify inflationary pressures resulting from a rise in U.S. capacity utilisation.
Tepid numbers
Against this, there is clear evidence that overall U.S. economic growth is starting to slow as the Fed has long anticipated. Last Friday's non-farm employment numbers looked tepid, with a rise of just 75,000 compared to an average of 125,000 in the past few months. In addition, there are further signs of a weakening in the housing market, with a slowdown in sales and persuasive evidence -- in spite of the volatility in U.S. residential data -- of a tapering off in house price inflation. There are corresponding signs of a parallel slowdown in consumer buoyancy, which has been largely sustained by the housing market boom.
In previous remarks, Mr. Bernanke has hinted he would be prepared to tolerate a short-term rise in inflation as long as it did not affect the Fed's medium-term forecast. Most took this to mean the Fed was readying the markets for a pause in its two-year tightening cycle at its open market meeting in June. But Mr. Bernanke has now twice prompted a reappraisal of the market's benign interpretation of what he meant by a pause, the first time in unscripted comments to a broadcast journalist in April, the second on Monday.
In addition, the Fed chairman faces the problem of rising inflation expectations. The spread between inflation-linked Tips and 10-year Treasury bonds has widened by about 30 basis points in the past three months. This echoes rising inflation expectations from consumer surveys. Overlooking what may turn out to be a short-term blip in core inflation is one thing. It is quite another to ignore rising expectations. As Mr Bernanke argued, the best way to prevent higher energy prices from creating higher inflation is by "anchoring the public's long-term inflation expectations." On balance then, the market's interpretation of Mr. Bernanke's remarks seems reasonable. The Fed's benchmark rate looks likely to rise at least one more time.
JORDAN
Jordan Times, Amman, June 7: So far, public freedoms throughout the world have been the first victim of the so-called war on terror.
From the historic capitals of civil liberties in old Europe, all the way across the Atlantic in the U.S. the self-declared defender of freedom and promoter of democracy worldwide blatant human rights violations are being committed everyday in the name of the fight against terrorism.
Since Sept. 11, most Western democracies have adopted anti-terror legislation largely restrictive of basic freedoms.
If well-established democracies, if the very temples of personal, civil and political rights, have reneged on the principles of the inviolability of the human person, freedom of assembly, right to privacy and presumption of innocence, and have de facto legalized incommunicado detentions and other undemocratic practices, then why should less advanced and much more fragile countries, with political systems that are only close or not even close to real democracies, not do the same?
Draconian legislation
This is the question that conservatives in the Third World raise most often in defence of undemocratic or draconian legislation purportedly introduced in the wake of Sept. 11.
The answer is simple: Being less advanced does not authorize one to ignore the principles that constitute the pillars of the society to which human society governments and conservatives included says it aspires.
Less democracy exacerbates, and does not curb, terror. Renouncing the democratic march means giving in to the terrorists and helping them achieve exactly what they want.
The debate over the anti-terror draft that the government has recently readied should take into consideration all these reasons.