Browse content similar to 20/10/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Hello and welcome to Dateline London. This week, we are looking | :00:33. | :00:37. | |
at riots in Greece, budget in Portugal, and we will be asking if | :00:37. | :00:41. | |
President Obama has done enough to stay President. We will also be | :00:41. | :00:48. | |
looking at the latest bombing by Syrian jets of civilian populations. | :00:48. | :00:53. | |
My guests today are Yasmine Allah by Brown, Unesco has, the | :00:53. | :01:03. | |
:01:03. | :01:05. | ||
Let's go first to Europe, because another leaders' summit this week | :01:05. | :01:09. | |
on the euro crisis didn't seem to get very far. Meanwhile, there have | :01:09. | :01:13. | |
been strikes in Greece over their austerity measures, and the | :01:13. | :01:15. | |
Portuguese have introduced what some commentators say is a | :01:15. | :01:21. | |
draconian budget. Maria, let's start in Greece. Did the strike | :01:21. | :01:30. | |
achieve anything? I wouldn't call it a riot. By Greek standards, this | :01:30. | :01:36. | |
was a small demonstration, not a riot. People are continuing to go | :01:36. | :01:41. | |
on these demonstrations because not to go would be to rollover and play | :01:41. | :01:44. | |
dead, not because they hope the demonstrations themselves will | :01:44. | :01:52. | |
achieve anything. There is a real feeling of despair in Greece now. I | :01:53. | :01:56. | |
have said this again and again, and I always say, we have reached the | :01:56. | :02:02. | |
bottom, and we never do reach the bottom. What is more worrying is | :02:02. | :02:09. | |
that they have a deep political crisis. The Rise Of Golden Dawn, | :02:09. | :02:17. | |
the fascist party, it has now come third in political polls, it is | :02:17. | :02:25. | |
committing assaults, it is opening offices. It is against mostly | :02:25. | :02:33. | |
immigrants, but also gay people, leftists. Being in Parliament has | :02:33. | :02:37. | |
given it a kind of legitimacy. It has given it access to the media, | :02:37. | :02:45. | |
and it has given his money. Its MPs are talking about a new kind of | :02:45. | :02:51. | |
civil war. And what is the public reaction to that? There is more | :02:51. | :02:55. | |
sympathy for the right than they used to be, even among people who | :02:55. | :03:00. | |
used to vote left. I have been trying to understand what this is | :03:00. | :03:05. | |
about. It comes from a sense that the old political parties which | :03:05. | :03:10. | |
drove the country to this state are hopelessly corrupt, and they have | :03:10. | :03:16. | |
basically failed. In June, people said they were voting for golden | :03:16. | :03:19. | |
dawn because they wanted them in Parliament to beat the others up, | :03:19. | :03:29. | |
:03:29. | :03:29. | ||
literally. But they are also handing out food - for Greeks only | :03:29. | :03:35. | |
- and they have a project for jobs for Greeks only. They have | :03:35. | :03:41. | |
vigilante forces in large towns, and they are very successful at | :03:41. | :03:44. | |
infiltrating parts of the police so that the police don't do anything | :03:44. | :03:51. | |
about right-wing violence. If you say in Athens that your apartment | :03:51. | :03:57. | |
has been squatted by Athens -- immigrants, but the police will | :03:57. | :04:03. | |
give people the phone number of Golden Dawn and say, we can't do | :04:03. | :04:08. | |
anything, but these people will help you. The crippled state that | :04:08. | :04:13. | |
we are seeing in many countries in Europe. Is the rise of the right | :04:13. | :04:19. | |
the threat now? Is really scary to hear what you are saying. Something | :04:19. | :04:24. | |
similar has happened here, but not to that extreme degree. You do find | :04:24. | :04:29. | |
extreme right-wing parties have gone into communities and provided | :04:29. | :04:37. | |
support and so on. What I find unforgivable are two things. Europe | :04:37. | :04:43. | |
has had this history, and I think it just is a sham when they keep | :04:43. | :04:47. | |
saying, never again, because we have seen what happened in Bosnia, | :04:47. | :04:53. | |
we have seen how they capitulate. And when the left, and it does so | :04:53. | :04:59. | |
even more shamefully here, it is confronting the right and the | :04:59. | :05:05. | |
extreme right, it rolls over, and then what you have is a shift. It | :05:05. | :05:09. | |
is almost worse to hear a mainstream politician saying it is | :05:09. | :05:12. | |
all the fault of immigrants, which happens and all of our countries, | :05:12. | :05:15. | |
then to hear a member of the BNP say that, because they would say | :05:15. | :05:19. | |
that, wouldn't they? But when those clothes are worn by mainstream | :05:19. | :05:23. | |
politicians, the game is lost. Her Mostafa, would you agree that the | :05:23. | :05:30. | |
game is lost? And there is certainly a danger of that, but let | :05:30. | :05:35. | |
us remember that this is always the case in every country, every | :05:35. | :05:40. | |
society. In a dire economic situation, a high rate of | :05:40. | :05:48. | |
unemployment, high rate of immigrants, the extreme right | :05:49. | :05:55. | |
always rises to the top. We have seen that in every culture. Look at | :05:55. | :05:59. | |
the Muslim world as well, why you have the extremist Taliban in | :05:59. | :06:05. | |
Afghanistan. They have taken advantage of poverty, literacy, a | :06:05. | :06:10. | |
political vacuum. With the question of the rise of the right, we need | :06:10. | :06:19. | |
to touch on this subject, but we need to be careful, because not all | :06:19. | :06:24. | |
European countries have this threat. In the countries that have facing | :06:24. | :06:29. | |
austerity, the greatest danger is not only the rise of the right, it | :06:29. | :06:34. | |
is the failure of the state. What is happening in Spain, the collapse | :06:34. | :06:38. | |
of the state, we have independent movements in Catalonia becoming | :06:38. | :06:44. | |
very strong. The failure of the state to provide, to comply with | :06:44. | :06:47. | |
its responsibility towards its citizens, is very serious, because | :06:47. | :06:53. | |
it is not just the threat of the right. It is many other threats. It | :06:53. | :07:00. | |
is total anarchy, social unrest, that we need to look into. Give us | :07:00. | :07:04. | |
a sense of what it is like in Portugal with the introduction of | :07:04. | :07:08. | |
draconian budgets. The Portuguese seemed until this point to be | :07:08. | :07:16. | |
resigned to what was happening, but that has changed. It has. It has | :07:16. | :07:23. | |
been three years of austerity. Since 2009, the Government has | :07:23. | :07:31. | |
introduced several austerity packages. And when the government | :07:31. | :07:37. | |
announced new austerity measures to be introduced in the Budget in 10 | :07:37. | :07:43. | |
days, to be voted in Parliament, people said, enough. It reached a | :07:43. | :07:48. | |
threshold of economic pain that people can't accept. The economic | :07:48. | :07:52. | |
pain, to give you an idea, is what they wrote originally proposing to | :07:52. | :07:57. | |
do is to increase national insurance contributions by 8% for | :07:57. | :08:02. | |
all workers. For somebody on a minimal wage, which is not even 500 | :08:02. | :08:09. | |
euros per month, 8% as a lot. The government was forced to backpack | :08:09. | :08:17. | |
on -- backtrack on their proposals. So they will increase income tax, | :08:17. | :08:22. | |
and reduce the different bands so it is less regressive. And what | :08:22. | :08:27. | |
happens is that people earning up to 1,000 euros per month will pay | :08:27. | :08:33. | |
23% of income tax plus 8% of national insurance, so 30% of their | :08:33. | :08:39. | |
income stays in taxes. On top of that there are new other taxes, on | :08:39. | :08:46. | |
property. They are paying more for energy, more for transport, health | :08:46. | :08:53. | |
care now is costly. It used to be free, almost free at the cost of | :08:53. | :08:57. | |
delivery. Now if you go to the doctor you have to pay, and then | :08:57. | :09:02. | |
you pay more and more for all the medical procedures that you need. | :09:02. | :09:09. | |
Given that list, can the government survive? I don't think so. The | :09:09. | :09:14. | |
coalition is going through a very fragile period. The smaller party | :09:14. | :09:18. | |
in the coalition is starting to show some disquiet. Even the main | :09:18. | :09:25. | |
party, there is a lot of dissension within its ranks. Very senior | :09:25. | :09:32. | |
people are complaining. So we are really talking about early | :09:32. | :09:37. | |
elections as soon as next year, as soon as September 2013, when | :09:37. | :09:46. | |
Germany will have its own elections. We will leave that there, because I | :09:46. | :09:53. | |
want to move to the United States. Most pundits think that President | :09:53. | :09:56. | |
Obama won at the second debate, but has the President done enough to | :09:56. | :10:04. | |
stay in the White House? I don't know. They are really so close, | :10:04. | :10:08. | |
that I think anything that is going to make a difference, though I am | :10:08. | :10:14. | |
not an American, and didn't know how you change your vote on this | :10:14. | :10:17. | |
basis of a single debate, I cannot think like that, but it seems to me | :10:17. | :10:25. | |
that to lose the vote of women as rapidly as President Obama has done, | :10:25. | :10:33. | |
it's quite extraordinary. Her wide using he has? I don't know. I found | :10:33. | :10:39. | |
him very disappointing. I would think he was the least worst | :10:39. | :10:46. | |
candidate if I was voting. I think some of his foreign policies, | :10:46. | :10:55. | |
Guantanamo still being open, all of that is problematic. But what is | :10:56. | :10:58. | |
interesting years people think that what will now make the difference | :10:59. | :11:03. | |
is everyone going from home to home, using them a offence, which is what | :11:03. | :11:09. | |
his camp is good at. So it will be very interesting. But I can't even | :11:09. | :11:15. | |
imagine what the world will be like if Mitt Romney wins. From a | :11:15. | :11:18. | |
European point of view, Maria, what will the world be like if Mitt | :11:18. | :11:25. | |
Romney wins? What I would like to say is I think Obama had a real | :11:25. | :11:28. | |
chance at one point to put forward an alternative to austerity | :11:28. | :11:33. | |
economics. He began to do it at the beginning of his term. He did run a | :11:33. | :11:37. | |
similar programme. And then they came a point where he caved and | :11:37. | :11:44. | |
gave in to Wall Street and the 1%. That has been disastrous for Europe | :11:44. | :11:53. | |
as well, because if we don't have an alternative to this feeling, | :11:53. | :11:59. | |
Europe is in trouble. The Left has caved in on every single issue, and | :11:59. | :12:04. | |
nobody is thinking about the alternative models. Let's face it, | :12:04. | :12:09. | |
this model has filed the world. When the IMF was punishing for | :12:09. | :12:12. | |
current -- poor countries for decades that now the Europeans are | :12:12. | :12:18. | |
being punished, we didn't care. It is a bust model, and they are | :12:18. | :12:28. | |
:12:28. | :12:29. | ||
clinging to it. Merkel, Obama, the lot of them. What would a change of | :12:29. | :12:35. | |
President or President Obama remaining in the White House mean? | :12:35. | :12:39. | |
The campaign in the United States all the time is on internal issues, | :12:40. | :12:45. | |
basically the economy. On foreign policy, nothing at all. Regardless | :12:46. | :12:48. | |
of the point of view of each presidential candidate on, let's | :12:48. | :12:55. | |
say, the Middle-East or Israel or any issue overseas. So it is really | :12:55. | :13:01. | |
the economy at the end of the day. And why it Obama in the second | :13:02. | :13:05. | |
debate has made progress is because he dealt with that issue much | :13:05. | :13:15. | |
:13:15. | :13:16. | ||
better than Ronnie. -- Mitt Romney. I think Obama is right when he says | :13:16. | :13:19. | |
that Mitt Romney's plan on the economy has one point only, which | :13:19. | :13:26. | |
is helping the rich, which is basically the case. I think he now | :13:26. | :13:34. | |
by saying that and being aggressive, has regained, he managed to regain | :13:34. | :13:42. | |
some of his popularity. He is not only attracting more women, he has | :13:42. | :13:51. | |
to recapture the vote of the people who voted him into 1008. -- in the | :13:51. | :14:01. | |
:14:01. | :14:05. | ||
2008. Who created the mess? The Bush administration. The the | :14:05. | :14:07. | |
Republican-controlled Congress have voted against so many of the | :14:07. | :14:16. | |
measures. His coolness has been a very much praise as a great asset | :14:17. | :14:20. | |
in politics, but sometimes we have the impression that he doesn't care, | :14:20. | :14:24. | |
that he feels no passion, and he has to come across as somebody who | :14:24. | :14:33. | |
He has a slight difficulty in that he raised such difficult hopes with | :14:33. | :14:39. | |
his first election, which he to quite a large extent let down - on | :14:39. | :14:42. | |
health care and some things he did do well, but also areas a situation | :14:42. | :14:49. | |
where the Republicans are willing to go all the way out to the right. | :14:49. | :14:58. | |
The tea-party have been very effective at grass roots. And the | :14:58. | :15:02. | |
Wruck -- the Democrats have not wanted to go out to the left too | :15:02. | :15:07. | |
far. The demographics are going against them. They will not be able | :15:07. | :15:12. | |
to run in four years as the same Republican Party. America will be | :15:12. | :15:16. | |
much more a country of colour. you think these presidential | :15:16. | :15:22. | |
debates make any difference, at the end of the day? I am finding myself | :15:22. | :15:26. | |
really turning against these debates now. We saw what Nick Clegg | :15:26. | :15:35. | |
did with his moment of triumph. Anybody who is a good performer can | :15:35. | :15:40. | |
sway opinion, and actually, and a sense it is quite dangerous, | :15:40. | :15:44. | |
because a good performer can win people, and Nick Clegg could win | :15:44. | :15:49. | |
people, so I think these debates, although it is seen as a great | :15:49. | :15:53. | |
democratic advancement, I don't think they are. We need all of | :15:53. | :15:57. | |
these guys to go to town halls and talk to people without the | :15:57. | :16:07. | |
:16:07. | :16:16. | ||
mediators. Then we might see a The situation in Syria is not | :16:16. | :16:24. | |
getting any better. Is it going to get worse? It is already bad. It is | :16:24. | :16:30. | |
getting worse by the day. Unfortunately, what we do not see | :16:30. | :16:40. | |
:16:40. | :16:42. | ||
and do not hero of -- here off other stories of the people every | :16:42. | :16:47. | |
day you live in the countryside. The population there is suffering | :16:47. | :16:54. | |
every day people stop Mrs, unfortunately, not considered to be | :16:54. | :17:04. | |
:17:04. | :17:12. | ||
important. Governments do nothing. People in Syria are desperately | :17:12. | :17:21. | |
waiting for some action on this front to stop the murderous regime. | :17:21. | :17:31. | |
:17:31. | :17:44. | ||
He mentioned the bombing by Nicks. -- Nicks. They throw primitive | :17:44. | :17:50. | |
bombs from the top of a building and the building collapsed on the | :17:50. | :17:55. | |
population inside. The stories are not reported. It is happening on a | :17:55. | :18:00. | |
daily basis. It is very difficult for journalists to get in. I do not | :18:00. | :18:04. | |
agree with you that the media is not reporting. The British media | :18:04. | :18:12. | |
has done its best, I think. There was a wonderful programme about the | :18:12. | :18:15. | |
number of Syrians to have disappeared. What I cannot stand is | :18:16. | :18:23. | |
that the Arab countries, yet again, even after the Arab Spring, are | :18:23. | :18:29. | |
keeping so close to offer. As you know, I am very pro Palestinian, | :18:29. | :18:34. | |
but if Israel was doing this, the whole of the Arab world would be up | :18:34. | :18:40. | |
in arms about it. Why are Muslims and Arabs not standing up with the | :18:40. | :18:49. | |
same rage against Syria? It is a shame on our part. Absolutely. The | :18:49. | :18:53. | |
targets and the politics are totally different in Syria than | :18:54. | :19:01. | |
with Arab-Israel. The war in Syria is regional and international. | :19:01. | :19:09. | |
Syria is an international forum where regional powers are fighting | :19:09. | :19:18. | |
over their own interests. So does the rest of the world. Turkey has | :19:18. | :19:22. | |
been appealing for NATO to do something. Turkey is a very | :19:22. | :19:26. | |
important member of NATO. The appeals of the Turkish government | :19:26. | :19:31. | |
have fallen on deaf ears. No-one wants to hear about even creating a | :19:31. | :19:35. | |
buffer zone to do with the humanitarian crisis in Syria. | :19:35. | :19:42. | |
Complete silence. Was at this point can be done? You talked about it | :19:42. | :19:47. | |
being a battleground for foreign forces. We have had various | :19:47. | :19:51. | |
different kinds of intervention over the last 15 years. What would | :19:51. | :19:57. | |
work? What needs to happen? main reason for the survival of the | :19:57. | :20:03. | |
regime over what is left of its authority in the country is the | :20:03. | :20:09. | |
nature of the war taking place at the moment in Syria. When Russia | :20:09. | :20:17. | |
uses its veto, for example, which it has done three times during the | :20:17. | :20:23. | |
crisis in seven months, which is a record, practically, it is giving | :20:23. | :20:33. | |
:20:33. | :20:35. | ||
to the regime time to go on killing. But what about the opposition? He | :20:35. | :20:42. | |
was supporting the Free Syrian Army? Again, support is not enough. | :20:42. | :20:52. | |
:20:52. | :20:54. | ||
The material support, I mean, weapons, money and all that. The | :20:54. | :21:01. | |
safe havens own should have been introduced a long time ago. -- the | :21:01. | :21:09. | |
safe haven zone. If you want to support the opposition, the first | :21:09. | :21:15. | |
step is to recognise their position with physical means. Have we seen | :21:15. | :21:19. | |
any European or international figures visiting these so-called | :21:19. | :21:24. | |
liberated areas? We have not seen anybody. What about the danger of | :21:24. | :21:30. | |
this? What about the danger of it spreading, in the region, | :21:30. | :21:39. | |
especially to Lebanon? The danger of this conflict spreading is huge. | :21:39. | :21:45. | |
Turkey is very worried about the contagion effect with the Kurdish | :21:45. | :21:50. | |
zone. They're worried about the Syrian refugees and what they will | :21:50. | :21:55. | |
do to the Turkish Alawite groups. They are worried about the their | :21:55. | :22:03. | |
own national stability. The Turkish dimension is very important. | :22:03. | :22:13. | |
:22:13. | :22:14. | ||
Lebanon is a dangerous place now. Coming back to what Mustapha said, | :22:14. | :22:22. | |
I do not -- I disagree when he says it is a regional thing. We condemn | :22:22. | :22:30. | |
America when America supports Israel. Why is there not any severe | :22:30. | :22:37. | |
condemnation of Russia with the same loud voice? The UN has failed. | :22:37. | :22:42. | |
International condemnation has failed. When people are dying, it | :22:42. | :22:49. | |
does not matter what the inside argument suave -- 1/2. Arabs and | :22:49. | :22:53. | |
Muslims in particular need to stand up for those people. We are not | :22:53. | :22:59. | |
doing that. Maria, can I bring you in here with | :22:59. | :23:05. | |
the failure of Europe? Has Europe failed? Yes, Europe is looking | :23:05. | :23:09. | |
inwards to its own problems and is completely failing to be any sort | :23:09. | :23:13. | |
of international force, which was part of the idea in the first place | :23:14. | :23:23. | |
:23:24. | :23:25. | ||
for the you -- for the EU. It is failing. Some sort of ceasefire or | :23:25. | :23:28. | |
humanitarian help, he was going to impose that when the UN is | :23:28. | :23:35. | |
powerless? Who are the international forces representing | :23:35. | :23:40. | |
in the opposition? These details can be worked out if they agree on | :23:40. | :23:48. | |
the principle, first of all. This conflict is spreading out because | :23:48. | :23:53. | |
of the regional players who are within Syria. It is littered -- | :23:53. | :23:56. | |
logical to see this spreading out to other countries. What do you | :23:56. | :24:05. | |
mean by that? You have Turkey, Iran, the Gulf states, they are all | :24:06. | :24:13. | |
fighting their war of interest in Syria. Is that the difference | :24:13. | :24:18. | |
between Syria and the other countries we saw within the Arab | :24:18. | :24:28. | |
Spring? You have an uprising in Syria which starts at about 19 | :24:28. | :24:32. | |
months ago now. The first nine months was quite peaceful. People | :24:32. | :24:39. | |
did not even demand the collapse of the regime or getting rid of it. | :24:39. | :24:46. | |
Their demands were merely reform. The regime itself did not want to | :24:46. | :24:52. | |
respond positively to these demands and turned the game around. Bashar | :24:52. | :24:59. | |
al-Assad militarised the situation. That is his policy. He turned it to | :24:59. | :25:06. | |
his advantage. He has succeeded in that so far. Eunice, what about the | :25:06. | :25:10. | |
United States? I don't think they will do anything before the | :25:10. | :25:17. | |
election. Everyone is afraid after failure in Libya, Afghanistan and | :25:17. | :25:24. | |
Iraq, how can you persuade the American people that for an | :25:24. | :25:34. | |
American intervention in Syria? This is an important question. | :25:34. | :25:40. | |
European politicians need to think about how can the West to intervene | :25:40. | :25:43. |