“U.S. President Splits Europe,” Says Russia’s Rossiyskaya Gazeta

By Lucy Jones

Under the headline “Europe and America must stand united,” the London Times on Jan. 30 carried a declaration signed by eight European leaders—the prime ministers of the UK, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Hungary and Poland, and the Czech Republic’s outgoing President Vaclav Havel.

“The transatlantic relationship must not become a casualty of the current Iraqi regime’s persistent attempts to threaten world security,” the declaration said. “We in Europe have a relationship with the United States which has stood the test of time…We are confident that the [United Nations] Security Council will face up to its responsibilities,” it continued.

The following day the French and German press criticized their European partners’ support for Washington’s Iraq policy. In an editorial titled, “Bush and his eight mercenaries,” France’s Liberation on Jan. 31 described the statement as a “smart missile” aimed at “France’s pretension to lead a revolt at the United Nations to deflect, or even counter, Bush’s desire to finish off Saddam Hussain.” Concluded the paper: “The leaders in Washington dream of preventing the emergence of a strong Europe capable of challenging America.”

On the same day Le Figaro said the declaration had caused “diplomatic pandemonium in Europe,” adding that “the notion of a European ‘common front’ has vanished into thin air.” Le Monde of Jan. 31 said many European leaders viewed what it called “the gang of eight” as “raising grave problems for the European Union.”

In Germany, Die Welt on Jan. 31 said the statement has “sounded the death knell” for a common European foreign and security policy even before it has become a reality. According to that day’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung, it now will be easier for the U.S. to ignore European opposition to a war on Iraq. “Europe’s disgrace lies in the symbolism of the gesture itself,” the newspaper commented.

The joint statement also was criticized elsewhere. Austria’s Die Presse of Jan. 31 said the eight signatories “have let it be unmistakably understood that Washington can count on them even when it embarks on dubious adventures.” Spain’s El Periodico of the same day urged that Madrid “must not help Bush,” as that would “discredit the United Nations and weaken the EU.” Russia’s Rossiyskaya Gazeta of Jan. 31 published the statement with a headline “U.S. president splits Europe.”

“Blix Forces Bush to Wait,” Notes Le Figaro

Chief weapons inspector Hans Blix’s Jan. 27 report to the U.N. was considered by Sweden’s Sydsvenska Dagbladet the following day to be “hot enough.” Britain’s tabloid The Sun on Jan. 28 described Saddam “as deadly as a tank of piranhas.” Arguing that “The search for these weapons cannot go on much longer,” the newspaper recommended that “A few more weeks are all Saddam should be given. If it drags on too long, the U.N. will make itself a laughing stock.”

“The notion of a European ‘common front’ has vanished into thin air.”

The same day, however, Britain’s Mirror said: “The highly critical report by United Nations weapons inspectors confirmed what everyone already knew about this thoroughly nasty piece of work. But what it didn’t do is confirm what George Bush and Tony Blair want us to believe: that Saddam has weapons of mass destruction and intends to use them. And that is the crux of this dangerous situation.”

In France, “Blix forces Bush to wait” was the verdict of France’s Le Figaro of Jan. 28. Liberation on the same day said Blix had “refused to take sides with the supporters or the opponents of military action against Saddam Hussain,” and went on to say that the “extension of the U.N. mission…was not a foregone conclusion.” By agreeing to the extension, the newspaper suggested, Bush and Blair “have shown they are not indifferent” to the views of the U.N.

Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of Jan. 28 detected ulterior motives behind the emerging consensus that the inspectors should be granted more time. It suggested that Americans are warming to the idea “because the deployment of troops takes time and perhaps because there is dwindling domestic support.”

Concluded Switzerland’s Le Temps on the same day: “Iraq is not only a country and a population, it is a factor of financial instability,” noting that “As each day passes war becomes more likely because the markets don’t like uncertainty and are making it known.”

The view of many Russian commentators was that Blix’s report fell short of Washington’s expectations but that it will not halt the march to war. “The more obvious it becomes that Iraq does not possess weapons of mass destruction, the more categorical and intransigent becomes the tone of pronouncements by U.S. officials,” said Rossiyskaya Gazeta on Jan. 28. “Washington does not know how to back down and does not like doing it,” the newspaper added. Nezavisimaya Gazeta on the same day accused the U.S. and Britain of “performing a shameful farce before the eyes of the entire world, which could be caught up in large loss of completely innocent life.”

“Bush’s Washington is Fundamentalist,” says UK’s Guardian

Discussing Bush’s Jan. 28 State of the Union address, in which the U.S. president addressed Iraq and terrorism as well as domestic issues, London’s Independent the following day said Bush “added little to the existing charge-sheet against Saddam.” The newspaper also noted that Bush dedicated just 18 words to the situation in Israel, “the crisis that many believe fuels terrorism more than any other.”

According to the Jan. 29 Guardian, “To European ears, much of what Bush says sounds archaic. There are constant references to good and evil. There’s biblical language…Old Europe, as Donald Rumsfeld calls us, doesn’t take religion too seriously these days: Bush’s Washington is fundamentalist.” The paper also said the most significant sentence was “the stark assertion that ‘the course of the nation does not depend on the decisions of others.’ That was a direct slap in the face for United Nations prevarication.”

The same day’s Times of London said Bush had left “the hard bit” to Secretary of State Colin Powell, at his special presentation to the U.N. Security Council the following week. Spain’s La Vanguardia of Jan. 29 speculated that Powell would show photos of Iraqi troops removing large quantities of material from sites before they were inspected.

At the U.N., Powell Convinces The “Already Convinced”

The day after Secretary of State Powell’s Feb. 5 presentation to the Security Council of Washington’s case against Iraq, the European press was divided on whether the evidence was credible.

“Mr. Powell’s keenly anticipated presentation of U.S. evidence of Iraqi non-compliance with U.N. disarmament contained no ‘killer facts’ or definitive proof of the kind that would render continued inspections or further diplomacy redundant,” said a Feb. 6 editorial in Britain’s Guardian. “This was not the dread moment that war became inevitable,” it concluded.

France’s Le Figaro said little had been learned from the presentation. “Colin Powell’s task was to win over public opinion, which is broadly hostile to war,” it noted. “He may have convinced the Minnesota rancher but the European farmer will certainly continue to have doubts.”

Also in France, Libération said Powell’s presentation had “convinced only those who were already convinced.” It continued: “In other words, political opportunity not conscience will be the criterion upon which the speech is judged.”

Germany’s Die Welt compared Powell’s evidence to that of then-Secretary of State Adlai Stevenson, who presented photographs to the U.N. that showed the Russians had put nuclear missiles on Cuba. “Colin Powell was unable to produce such conclusive facts,” the paper said. “His evidence did not have the power of an all-exposing document.”

Munich’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung said that although Powell’s speech was “intelligently constructed,” he was unable to present anything that could count as “irrefutable proof of operational weapons of mass destruction.”

Russia’s Pravda called the satellite photographs “risible.” “This presentation of ‘hard evidence’ is a tissue of lies, gossip, misinterpretation, cynical maneuvering and possibly even misrepresentation, aimed at providing a case for a war against Iraq,” the newspaper said.

The Question of Oil

Asked London’s Financial Times on Jan. 6, “Is the U.S. really after Iraq’s oil rather than Saddam Hussain’s weapons?” The newspaper described the accusation as “fanciful,” if only because America’s “extravagant lifestyle” means that Iraq couldn’t solve its oil dependency anyway. A post-Saddam Iraq couldn’t quit OPEC, the paper argued: if it did, the new government “would appear as a puppet in the eyes of its own citizens as well as its neighbors.”

Britain’s Mirror of Jan. 6 asked the same question, and concluded that Bush “is out to protect and control the planet’s oil supplies, because without them America would grind to a halt.” It added: “Many wars have been fought for the flimsiest and falsest of reasons. But that is no reason for the United Kingdom to attach itself to the coattails of the most right-wing and dangerous U.S. administration in history.”

Mecca-Cola on Sale in Mideast, Reports Agence France-Presse

According to a Jan. 19 report by Agence France-Presse (AFP) published in several European newspapers, Franco-Tunisian journalist Tawfik Mathlouthi has established Mecca-Cola, a “politicized soft drink,” which he is beginning to market in the Middle East, with a portion of the revenues going to help Palestinians. Mathlouthi said he admires the U.S., but sees his new drink as “a means of fighting American hegemony.”

Libyan Appointment Scorned By France’s Le Monde

The U.N.’s election of a Libyan on Jan. 20 to head its human rights commission, France’s Le Monde said the following day, would be “clownesque” if it were not also serious and full of implications for the current situation. “Here is a nomination that affects the United Nations’ credibility at a time when the organization must play a major role in the Iraq crisis,” said the newspaper.

According to the BBC’s Martin Asser the same day, in its successful campaign to be elected to the committee the Qaddafi government “has gone to great lengths to reverse its reputation as one of the world’s worst violators of its citizens’ human rights.” He went on, however, to quote organizations which oppose the appointment, including Human Rights Watch, which said Libya should have been forced to put such measures into practice before it was allowed to chair the session. “That way the international community would have been able to exert some leverage on Tripoli, a chance that has now passed,” Asser reported.

Hungary Worries About U.S. Training of Iraqis on its Soil

Hungarian newspapers have expressed alarm at the U.S. training of thousands of Iraqi opposition members at Taszar military base in southern Hungary. On Jan. 20 under the headline “International curriculum for teaching genocide,” the Budapest daily Nepszabadsag asked what exactly the Iraqis would be taught at Taszar. The paper described the stated aim of training interpreters at the strictly guarded base as “so ridiculous” it cannot be believed. “The usual lack of publicity on the real nature of the Taszar mission forces journalists to use their imagination,” the paper said. It cited the “infamous” and now renamed School of the Americas (SOA) in the U.S., alleged to have trained 63,000 South Americans, including a dozen dictators and hundreds of suspected mass murderers and torturers.

Lucy Jones is a free-lance journalist based in London.