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05 Dec 2011 NPWJ News Digest on Middle East and North Africa Democracy
Articles
Political Islam set to dominate the Middle East
The Daily Star, 05 Dec 2011
Welcome to the age of "political Islam", this may prove to be one of the most lasting legacies of the Arab spring. It is not only in Egypt that an unprecedented Islamist political moment is playing out. In the recent Tunisian elections the moderate Islamist Ennahda party was the biggest winner, while Morocco has elected its first Islamist prime minister, Abdelilah Benkirane.
In Yemen and Libya, too, it seems likely that political Islam will define the shape of the new landscape.
Islamists led by the Muslim Brotherhood and radical Salafists appear to have taken a majority of seats in the first round of Egypt's first parliamentary vote since the ousting of Mubarak.
Hamid Karzai makes plea at Afghanistan summit in Bonn
BBC, 05 Dec 2011
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said international support after foreign forces withdraw in 2014 is crucial if Afghanistan is to remain stable.
His comments opened a major global conference on Afghanistan's future in the German city of Bonn.
Syria unrest: Arab league issues new Sunday deadline
BBC, 04 Dec 2011
Syria is facing a new Arab League deadline to accept proposals to allow observers into the strife-torn country.
Arab foreign ministers said Damascus had until Sunday to agree to the league's plan. Further sanctions have been threatened.
The fate of Saif Gaddafi
By Benjamin Barber, The Guardian, 04 Dec 2011
The Libyan may deserve prison for his recent acts, but previously his heart was on the side of reform
Fair trials rarely emerge from the fog of war. The victors not only tell the tale but render judgment on it. That is why I would prefer a truth and reconciliation commission to Libyan trials of Saif Gaddafi; or for Lord Woolf, whose report on Gaddafi's relationship with the London School of Economics was released last week, to preside over a trial.
Although Gaddafi has so far avoided the terminal vengeance visited on his father, a trial by Zintan militiamen or Transitional National Council members who are themselves in permanent transition is hardly likely to be very clarifying, let alone fair. The international criminal court is probably the best bet for justice (though one worries about Nato's influence), but also the least likely venue.
Is Saudi Arabia Next?
By Robert M. Danin, The Atlantic, 04 Dec 2011
Recent demonstrations and violence in Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province that left four people dead and nine others wounded raise the question: Is Saudi Arabia the next country that will encounter the wave of popular unrest sweeping the Arab world?
Already the Arab uprisings' effects have been felt in Saudi Arabia. In February and March, soon after Mubarak's overthrow in Egypt, Saudi Facebook activists began calling for a revolution and declared a "Day of Rage" for March 11, emulating the youth activists in Egypt and Tunisia. However, the "Day of Rage" fizzled out, and demonstrations were held only in the Eastern Province, home to Saudi's restive Shia minority.
The Arab Spring: For women, some achievements, many disappointments
By Nadya Khalife, Human Rights Watch, 30 Nov 2011
Back in March, when I visited Tunisia and Egypt, I met some remarkable women, who told me that for the first time, they really felt Tunisian or Egyptian, and that they were so proud of what women and men had achieved together.
(…) The upheavals were not instigated by men alone, but included women who were equally fed up with decades of authoritarian rule, and who wished to live freely. There are many striking pictures from Egypt, Tunisia, Bahrain, Syria, Yemen and most recently Libya, of women demonstrating alongside men for basic human rights.
Disappearing Dissent: How Bahrain Buried Its Revolution
By Aryn Baker, Global Spin - CNN, 29 Nov 2011
Every dictator worth his epaulets knows that the best way to nip a revolution in the bud is to have his opponents “disappear.” No body to mourn, no martyrs raised, and of course the ever-useful plausible deniability. But in Bahrain, with its tightly packed population of more than 1,200,000 living on a small sandy archipelago in the Persian Gulf, it is difficult to bury the bodies. People notice. So what's an authoritarian government to do when the people rise up and protest the regime? Bury the evidence and pretend it never happened.
Deadly shootings in Saudi Arabia, but Arab media look the other way
By Hayder al-Khoei, The Guardian, 28 Nov 2011
Even Al-Jazeera English, which does better than its Arabic sister station, did not follow up its coverage of deaths at Qatif protests
Arab broadcasting has never been renowned for neutrality but the events of the past week in Saudi Arabia have revealed some interesting – if not surprising – bias. On 20 November, 19-year-old Nasser al-Mheishi was shot dead in Qatif, Saudi Arabia. When the authorities refused to hand over his body to his family, protests ensued the next day and security forces shot another young man, Ali al-Felfel. In the demonstration that followed on Wednesday, two more protesters, Munib al-Adnan and Ali al-Qarayrees, were killed.
