GREECE

GREECE

Kathimerini, Athens, Feb. 24: We must not look at Greece’s financial crisis as a black cloud, because it also presents the country with a new opportunity.

Prime Minister George Papandreou is in a position where he can make important decisions that go beyond fiscal measures and influence more than the economy: Greece needs to be pushed forward, to embrace change, but what it needs to do first is erase the backward mentalities and remove the obstacles that have kept the private sector and entrepreneurship from flourishing.

Significant changes

Papandreou needs to make what significant changes he can now, while he still enjoys the support of the majority of the country’s population and a large section of the opposition.

Opening up closed-shop professions, trimming the red tape that keeps so many good and profitable initiatives from moving ahead, and making work regulations more flexible so that they reflect contemporary reality are some of the measures that he must implement very soon. If he waits, he will be making a big mistake, much like his predecessor Costas Karamanlis did.

HONG KONG

South China Morning Post, Feb. 24: A world worried about climate change needs a strong signal from a powerful leader to take the next step in tackling the problem. U.S. President Barack Obama’s announcement of loan guarantees to build his country’s first nuclear reactors for three decades is such a beacon. Safety concerns have kept many democratic states from ending bans on the technology. His giving the go-ahead proclaims in the clearest possible way that it is time to set aside reticence.

Fossil fuels

Debate rages over the best alternatives to the fossil fuels blamed for causing rising temperatures. Heavy investments have been made in hydro, wind and solar plants. Billions more dollars are being poured into experimental technologies. But for all the talk of alternatives to fossil fuels, only one — nuclear — can reliably generate electricity to satisfy the energy intensive lifestyles that virtually all communities desire.

Obama well knows this. With half of the U.S.’ electricity coming from the most polluting fuel, coal, he has made weaning citizens onto alternatives a priority. Emissions from the combustion of oil, gas and biofuels cause pollution and have been blamed for global warming. And, the U.S. relies heavily on imports of oil. Hydroelectricity is of use only where there is an abundance of flowing water; no way has yet been found to store power from wind and solar, which are dependent on weather conditions. The 104 U.S. nuclear stations in operation produce 20 per cent of the nation’s power with minimal climatic consequences. ...

Obama has sent a signal the world needs to hear. His government, investors and electricity companies need to put their energies into ensuring plants are funded and built. Other nations have to follow suit. Better alternatives may yet be found, but until they are, nuclear is the most viable option to produce electricity.

BRITAIN

London Evening Standard, Feb. 18: The genteel language of the Foreign Office’s “invitation” to Israel’s ambassador to “share information” in the case of fake British passports used in the Dubai killing should not obscure the seriousness of the case. Relations with Israel are already strained after efforts by pro-Palestinian groups to issue an arrest warrant here for Israeli opposition leader and former foreign minister Tzipi Livni.

Israeli secret service

Yet whatever the evasive language of the Israeli government over the murder of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, there is little doubt that it was the Israeli secret service, Mossad, which was responsible. This was an operation demanding a high level of organization, impossible for rival Palestinian factions, and no other Middle Eastern intelligence service has either the European operatives or the motive to have carried it out. Israel has a long record of such killings — which, of course, remain illegal, whatever the doubtless unsavory record of men like al-Mabhouh.

Gordon Brown ordered an investigation into how the identities of six British citizens with dual Israeli nationality were apparently stolen. It seems unlikely that he will receive much co-operation from Israel. But we must try to find out what happened, not least because the British citizens concerned are liable to experience considerable difficulties traveling abroad in future. Whether Israel is prepared to come clean about its role or not, no foreign government should be able to mistreat Britons living abroad with such impunity.

AUSTRALIA

Sydney Morning Herald, Feb. 24: Heavy jail terms for five Muslim men, most of them raised in Sydney, will have given many people what they think is a clear idea where the threat of terrorism lies. The federal government’s new white paper on counterterrorism, identifying a strand of homegrown violent jihadism, will undoubtedly reinforce this impression.

New threat

Yet without becoming complacent, we should remind ourselves that, so far, our intelligence and police agencies have been remarkably effective in detecting and preventing acts of terrorism in the planning and preparation stages, and intervening to protect the public. Given the limits on linguistic and interpretive resources in the intelligence agencies, as they have turned from Cold War concerns to this new threat, this result could not have been achieved without widespread and timely cooperation from Muslim communities across Australia.

This spirit is something that governments and their agencies will have to nurture carefully, it is clear from the white paper, as we move through a period of ideological turmoil in Islam as its societies are exposed to a rapidly changing global culture dominated by the West and East Asia. Those marginalized and alienated in the middle of that culture can fall for the millenarian, violent script of unscrupulous radicals. Those at risk must be noticed and watched. But radical thought is not a crime, nor is it always or even often a lifelong attitude. Support for the security agencies would drop away quickly if they were to intervene before thought turns to active planning. It will always be a tricky game, in which success is measured in negative outcomes.

The foreign threat is always much easier to address, and the public will not begrudge the extra $69 million the government will spend on new biometric identification systems, airport scans and a new anti-terrorism control room to connect the dots — a persistent problem in intelligence, as the alleged bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound aircraft on Christmas Day showed. ...

The instigators of terrorism will always be looking for fresh faces to outflank the technology.