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Nigerian VP Osinbajo: “Banning Fossil Fuel Investments Would Crush Africa”

November 10, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, Environmentalism updates, Finance, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Nigeria, Nigeria

Nigerian VP Osinbajo: “Banning Fossil Fuel Investments Would Crush Africa”–

Nov 8 (EIRNS)–Adding another voice to the African chorus denouncing the Green Reset– Mark Carney’s drive to “red-line” the developing world, by refusing credit for projects and even proffering pay-offs to never develop your nation– is Nigeria’s Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo. He wrote an article this Summer, that was re-posted last week during the COP26 Summit. He states that “wealthy nations” cutting investment avenues for carbon-based energy sources in Africa– especially after having profited from them for decades– “will do little to limit carbon emissions globally but much to hurt the continent’s economic prospects.”

Nigeria, a country rich in petroleum and natural gas, is being forced to deny itself the benefit of {its own} resources, Osinbajo says, because the only investments which can be financed are for (interruptible) solar and wind. “For countries such as my own, Nigeria, which is rich in natural resources but still energy poor, {the transition must not come at the expense of affordable and reliable energy} for people, cities, and industry. To the contrary, it must be inclusive, equitable, and just – which means preserving the right to sustainable development and poverty eradication, as enshrined in global treaties such as the 2015 Paris climate accord.”

The Vice President writes, “Africa’s progress could be undone by the rich world’s efforts to curb investments in all fossil fuels,” pointing out with bitter irony that, “Institutions such as the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation and the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation {were specifically created to help spur high-impact projects},” the very kind of which they are now refusing to let go forward. [emphasis added]

The fact that Osinbajo wrote this piece, titled, “The divestment delusion: Why banning fossil fuel investments would crush Africa,” over two months ago –about the time that the multinationals were beating a retreat from one of the world’s largest natural gas developments, in Mozambique– should not reduce the power of his statement, in fact just the opposite. Originally published in the August 31 issue of the Foreign Affairs, the magazine of the imperial Council on Foreign Relations, Osinbajo’s piece was republished last week by the Habari Network a publication focusing on Africa and the Caribbean. While the post therefore may not reflect the latest developments in Glasgow, the sentiment and the validity of the charges made against the “climate mafia” in the U.K., the U.S. and Western Europe continue to ring true. The Habari Network article appears here. The original article in Foreign Affairs is here.

China Labels U.S. Foreign Policy on Xinjiang “Weasel Diplomacy”

May 13, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in China, Color Revolutions, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Global Diplomacy, United States, World war danger updates

May 12 (EIRNS)—China very appropriately has labeled as “weasel policy” U.S. policy toward Xinjiang. Today at the United Nations, the permanent missions of the U.S., the U.K, Germany and an array of NGOs are holding an event on Xinjiang and “the repression of Uighur Muslims.” The spokesman for China’s UN mission issued a hard-hitting statement in response to this insult, while the semi-official Global Times titled its article on the subject: “U.S. `weasel diplomacy’ will not function in Xinjiang.” During the May 10 Foreign Ministry briefing, spokeswoman Hua Chunying also asserted that U.S. behavior on Xinjiang was “just like the weasel paying respect to the hen, without the best of intentions.” Global Times quotes professor Li Haidong, from the Institute of International Relations at the China Foreign Affairs University, who warned that the purpose of this “weasel diplomacy” is to turn Xinjiang into another Afghanistan. The proverb quoted by Hua, he said, is that a weasel may put on a friendly face, but will always find the opportunity to catch the hen and eat it.

Global Times adds that this weasel diplomacy has brought war to many countries, pointing to how the U.S. “ruthlessly and barbarically inflamed turmoil in Afghanistan for its own interests,” yet now pretends to care about Xinjiang’s Muslims. It won’t work in Xinjiang, GT admonishes, because Xinjiang “is neither Ukraine nor Afghanistan–China has strong national power, rich resources and powerful strategies.” Li pointedly warns, “If the U.S. tends to believe it could stir up internal chaos in China, it must have overestimated its own strength and underestimated China’s ability to resist external pressures.”

The Chinese UN mission’s statement points to the “sheer lies and political bias” of today’s UN event, and particularly attacks the fact that in the middle of a global pandemic, and when nations should be acting in solidarity to face the challenge of defeating the pandemic, the co-sponsors of this event are obsessed with undermining the unity and collaboration of Member States–violating the purposes and principles of the UN Charter. The spokesman slams the U.S.’s sanctimonious claims of defending Uighur Muslims, when its perpetual wars have slaughtered Muslims in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria–killing civilians and displacing tens of millions. The U.S. doesn’t care about the deaths of almost one million Muslims in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria but is “very keen” on Uighur Muslims in China, he says. Today’s event, he intones, is “outright political farce.” The full Global Times article is here.

`… Soaring Food Prices and Conflict’ Increases Hunger by a Third in West Africa

April 20, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Agriculture, COVID-19, Economic development updates, General, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Healthcare, Healthcare, The Committee for the Coincidence of Opposites

`Explosive Mix of Soaring Food Prices and Conflict’ Increases Hunger by a Third in West Africa

April 19 (EIRNS) — The hunger situation in Africa continues to deteriorate, as relief efforts continue to be overwhelmed with new crises, and receive little help in response to their calls. In an April 16 release under the above title, the World Food Program warned that “more than 31 million people in [western Africa] are expected to [become] food insecure and unable to feed themselves during the coming June-August lean season – the period when food is scarce before the next harvest. That number is more than 30 percent higher than last year and is the highest level in the best part of a decade.

“Food prices have increased dramatically across the region. Local staples are up by nearly 40 percent over the 5-year average, and in some areas, prices are up by more than 200 percent. This is caused in part by the economic impact of measures put in place to contain the spread of the coronavirus over the past year. People’s incomes have plummeted due to reductions in trade, tourism, informal activities and remittances.”

Chris Nikoi, WFP’s Regional Director for West Africa, explained that, “In West Africa, conflict is already driving hunger and misery. The relentless rise in prices acts as a misery multiplier, driving millions deeper into hunger and desperation. Even when food is available, families simply cannot afford it – and soaring prices are pushing a basic meal beyond the reach of millions of poor families who were already struggling to get by. The needs are immense, and unless we can raise the funds we need we simply won’t be able to keep up. We cannot let 2021 become the year of the ration cut,” he warned. [emphasis added]

This year, almost 10 million children under 5 are acutely malnourished across the region,” the WFP says, “with the Sahel alone accounting for half of that number. This number could rise significantly alongside the projected 30 percent increase in hunger, and the high prices of nutritious foods.”

Schiller Institute Urges Funds for Afghan Health Platform; British Urge Billions to Fight Mythical `Global Warming’

November 2, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Afghanistan, Agriculture, Economic development updates, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Healthcare, Helga Zepp-LaRouche

Oct. 31 (EIRNS)–Schiller Institute Chair Helga Zepp-LaRouche in her weekly webcast yesterday reported that more than 2,000 hospitals in Afghanistan had closed during the fighting in that nation. Even more shocking, only 100 hospitals, most lacking medical supplies and adequate personnel, remain for 38 million people.

Mrs. LaRouche called on her audience to mobilize immediate emergency aid to be sent from the United States, Europe and the whole world; China has already done so. She called the needed supply action, “Operation Ibn Sina,” after the famous Persian doctor born in today’s Afghanistan, considered one of the greatest scientists of the Islamic Golden Age, and the father of modern medicine. Of the 250 books Ibn Sina is estimated to have written, 40 deal with medicine, including The Book of Healing, and the Canon of Medicine (which became a standard medical text at medieval universities until about 1650).

In a cynical juxtaposition to this heroic effort to save the nation of Afghanistan, police estimated last summer that the current “Climate Summit” in Glasgow could cost “several hundred million pounds,” nearly half a billion U.S. dollars. COP 26 will be the largest summit the U.K. has ever held, with up to 200 leaders expected. Better they stay home and focus on Operation Ibn Sina instead.

Beethoven: Sparks of Joy!

May 7, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Cultural renaissance updates, Daily Beethoven — Sparks of Joy, General updates, Music updates

Beethoven: Spark of Joy – HIs Mass in C, God’s Grace Comes to Those Who Act for Posterity

Prince Nikolaus Esterházy II, the long-time patron of Franz Josef Haydn, commissioned a new mass setting each year for his wife’s name-day. In 1807, the commission fell to Beethoven, who, in his own words, “treated the text in a manner in which it has rarely been treated”. The great masses of Bach and Mozart are structured somewhat like operas, whereas Beethoven’s mass is powerfully symphonic, with the soloists treated as a unified quartet, inextricably interwoven with the choir. Esterhazy was not pleased, but the next performance, at Prince Lichnowsky’s residence, received a more positive response. After its publication in 1813, one commentator wrote that the mass conveyed “a childlike optimism that in its very purity devoutly trusts in God’s grace, and appeals to him as a father who desires the best for his children and hears their prayers”.
On November 18, 2018, the Schiller Institute NYC Chorus performed Beethoven’s Mass in C at the beautiful St. Bartholomew’s Church in New York City. [Notes by Margaret Scialdone.]

Experts Speak Out Against Suicide in the Name of Climate

November 2, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, Environmentalism updates, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Green New Deal

Experts Speak Out Against Suicide in the Name of Climate –

Oct. 31 (EIRNS) – Quite a number of seasoned experts on power, carbon, and weather are challenging the premises of the Suicide on the Clyde in Glasgow. Among those who have not yet participated in Schiller Institute and LaRouche Organization events, are Bjorn Lomborg, Robert Bryce, and Richard Lindzen.

Swedish economist Lomborg was quoted in Manila Times: “You’ve probably seen the latest alarming headlines: Rising sea levels from climate change could flood 187 million people out of their homes. Don’t believe it. That figure is unrealistic — and it isn’t even new. It appears in a new scholarly paper, whose authors plucked it from a paper published in 2011. And what the earlier paper actually found was that 187 million could be forced to move in the unlikely event that no one does anything, in the next 80 years, to adapt to dramatic rises in sea level.

“In real life, the 2011 paper explained, humans ‘adapt proactively,’ and ‘such adaptation can greatly reduce the possible impacts.’ That means ‘the problem of environmental refugees almost disappears.’ Realistic assumptions reduce the number to between 41,000 and 305,000 — at most, less than 1/600th of the figure in those headlines.

“Sober scientific findings get less attention than alarming and far-fetched scenarios…. We have more knowhow and technology than ever to build dikes, surge barriers and dams, expand beaches and construct dunes, make ecosystem-based barriers like mangrove buffers, improve building codes and construction techniques, and use land planning and hazard mapping to minimize flooding….”

Bryce, a regular Forbes contributor on energy and power, spent two days with no power in Texas in February. He testified Oct. 27 at the House Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee on the American power grid. Whereas from 2000-2007 there were fewer than 100 blackouts in any year around the country, in the past three years there have been 220, 278, and 383 blackouts as interruptible sources have been pushed out and onto the grid. “These policies are not just wrongheaded, they are deeply dangerous,” Bryce told the Committee. “Banning the use of liquid and gaseous fuels will reduce America’s energy security because it will concentrate our energy risks on a single energy network, the electric grid. Furthermore, they would require an electric grid with more than two times the capacity of today’s grid. That’s a largely fanciful notion given that the electric grid is faltering under existing demand.” His Forbes piece is here.

Richard Lindzen is emeritus Professor of Meteorology at MIT. He is quoted, also in Manila Times by author Yen Makabenta. After explaining that the demanded “climate mitigation” measures will have no effect on climate, Lindzen says: “Consider what the climate system actually is. This system consists in two turbulent fluids interacting with each other. They are on a rotating planet that is differentially heated by the sun. A vital constituent of the atmospheric component is water in the liquid, solid, and vapor phases, and the changes in phase have vast energetic ramifications. The energy budget of this system involves the absorption and re-emission of about 200 watts per square meter. Doubling CO2 involves a 2 percent perturbation to this budget. So do minor changes in clouds, ocean circulations, and other features, and such changes are common. In this complex multi-factor system, what is the likelihood that the climate (which itself consists of many variables and not just globally averaged temperature anomalies) is controlled by a 2 percent perturbation in the energy budget due to just one of the numerous variables, namely CO2?

“Believing this is pretty close to believing in magic…. After all, science is a mode of inquiry rather than a belief structure.”

Schlanger on Caesar Sanctions Posted by Russian International Affairs Council

April 20, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Color Revolutions, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Media coverage of our activity, Our initiatives (petitions, etc), Stop the Sanctions, World war danger updates

Schlanger on Caesar Sanctions Posted by Russian International Affairs Council

April 19: An article by Harley Schlanger, just written for LaRouche publications on Helga’ Zepp-LaRouche’s call to revoke the Caesar Sanctions, and how the U.S. Congress was incited to pass them, has been posted on the RIAC (Russia International Affairs Council) site. In addition, the RIAC tweeted the article to its 9,500 Twitter followers. RIAC is a institution of the Russian Foreign Minister, and is directed by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Here is a link to the Tweet.

Syria Times Reports Dr. Shaaban Attacking British at Schiller Event

May 11, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Activity of the Schiller Institute, Color Revolutions, General, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Global Diplomacy, Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Media coverage of our activity, Our conferences, Syria, Syria, World war danger updates

May 10 (EIRNS) – Schiller Institute Southwest Asia representative Hussein Askary reported to EIR that Syrian media is publishing a news item today in which it is made obvious that Syrian government spokesperson Dr. Bouthaina Shaaban used the Schiller Institute conference as a platform to single out the British as instrumental in the propaganda and psychological war against Syria. Dr. Shaaban usually directs her criticism for the military and economy devastation visited upon Syria, at the United States and Saudi Arabia; seldom at Britain. This link is for the English version of the circulating story in Syria Times. The Arabic version was published in several Arabic newspapers and websites, Askary reports.

Hyperinflationary Monetary Policy Starting to Have Serious Results

May 11, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Agriculture, Economic development updates, Finance, General updates, New financial order updates

May 10 (EIRNS) – The central bankers’ “regime change” plotted at the August 2019 annual bankers’ summit – senior partner central bank and junior partner government Treasury teaming up to print vast amounts of currency and direct its spending – has been carried out since that time, and now has triggered the start of a hyperinflation.

Bloomberg’s Commodity Price Index is up 62% from April 2020 to April 2021. These are spot market prices, which means not every buyer is paying them. But, nothing like this has been seen since January 1980, at the end of the 1970s “stagflation” and when Paul Volcker as Federal Reserve chair was already crushing the economy to stop it – 10-year Treasury interest rates were then 13%, not 1.5% as now.

Wall Street and the City are very happy, so far, about this rapid inflation in various forms of producer prices, which their corporate clients are passing on to households across the world whose wage income – at best – is stagnant. At “regime change” leader BlackRock, Inc., its global head of thematic investing Evy Hambro enthused on Bloomberg Television May 8, “There’s still quite a lot of room to go. What we’re really doing is we’re testing the upper ranges of commodity markets to work out what the new price range is going to be.”
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s global food price index rose in April to 120.9, which represents a 30.7% increase in one year. Food inflation last reached this level in 2011. Corn wholesale prices have surged the most, averaging 142% in the past year. Otherwise, sugars and oils are rising in price most quickly. Economists will “explain” that food prices both to the farmer and at the supermarket have been deflating during most of the 21st Century. But that is not the point: A hyperinflationary policy of printing currency and avoiding productive investment has triggered a sudden and rising inflation, as EIR forecast it would last in the Fall and the EIR Alert in late Summer. This inflation is getting started, and it will not be “transitory” unless the policy is changed radically.

In the United States, the price of the median home purchase is 18% higher than one year ago. While rental inflation had fallen quite low during the pandemic (though the lowest-income renters faced the most inflation!), it is now ready to take off. Two very large rental owners, Invitation Homes and American Homes 4 Rent, are raising rents by 8-11% on all new leases and re-leases.

The April Consumer Price Index, defanged of inflation in every way Federal Reserve and Labor Department economists have been able to devise in 35 years of effort, will be published May 12. It tends to shape Americans’ “expectations” of inflation. That survey by the New York Federal Reserve Bank showed today, for example, that Americans expect home price inflation to be 5.5% in the coming year – when it is already 18% for the median home!

NYT Opinion Writer: Biden’s Taiwan Policy “Reckless,” Threatens “Catastrophic War”

May 6, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in China, General, General updates, Geopolitics updates, Global Diplomacy, United States, World war danger updates

May 6 (EIRNS)–Under the title: “Biden’s Taiwan Policy Is Truly, Deeply Reckless,” the New York Times Opinion writer Peter Beinart warned on May 5 that the Administration’s policy is bringing us very close to war, and quotes experts that the war would become nuclear. He also quotes military experts that the U.S. could not win such a war — simply driving home that such a war would likely become nuclear by a desperate and crazy U.S. leadership.

Beinart writes: “Like the Trump administration before it, the Biden team is now progressively chipping away” at the One China policy, which has prevented war over these past decades. 

He notes: “Last summer, Democrats removed the phrase `one China’ from their platform. In January, Mr. Biden became the first American president since 1978 to host Taiwan’s envoy at his inauguration. In April, his administration announced it was easing decades-old limitations on official U.S. contacts with the Taiwanese government. These policies are increasing the odds of a catastrophic war. The more the United States and Taiwan formally close the door on reunification, the more likely Beijing is to seek reunification by force.”

Beinart quotes Harvard’s Graham Allison: “No Chinese national security official I have ever met, and no U.S. official who has examined the situation, doubts that China would choose war over losing territory it considers vital to its national interest.” He quotes Fareed Zakaria: “The Pentagon has reportedly enacted 18 war games against China over Taiwan, and China has prevailed in every one.” He notes: “Within 500 miles of the island, mainland China boasts 39 air bases. The United States possesses two. To come to Taiwan’s aid, U.S. forces would need to cover huge distances, and China has built an arsenal of advanced anti-ship missiles, sometimes called “carrier-killers,” which are designed to make such a rescue mission hideously costly.” 

In other words, the U.S. can not win such a conventional war. Beinart notes: “Some of America’s most experienced China experts — including former ambassador to Beijing J. Stapleton Roy and Chas Freeman, who served as Richard Nixon’s interpreter on his 1972 trip to China — believe such a conflict would risk nuclear war. He adds that, according to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, 85 percent of Republican leaders support defending Taiwan militarily, but “only 43 percent of Republicans among the public agree.”

 He concludes: “What’s crucial is that the Taiwanese people preserve their individual freedom and the planet does not endure a third world war. The best way for the United States to pursue those goals is by maintaining America’s military support for Taiwan while also maintaining the “one China” framework that for more than four decades has helped keep the peace in one of the most dangerous places on earth. Hawks will call this appeasement. So be it. Ask them how many American lives they’re willing to risk so the United States can have official diplomatic relations with Taiwan.”

Beinart is a professor of journalism and political science at The Newmark School of Journalism at The City University of New York, and is editor-at-large of the “progressive” Jewish Currents..

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