Michelle Obama wants 'honest conversation' on girls' education

Yahoo – AFP, David Harding, 5 Nov 2015

US first lady Michelle Obama speaks at the World Innovation Summit for 

Education (WISE) in Doha on November 4, 2015 (AFP Photo/Faisal Al-Tamimi)

Doha (AFP) - Michelle Obama called for an end to "outdated laws and traditions" preventing millions of girls around the world from completing their education, in an impassioned speech Wednesday in Qatar.

The US first lady, on a seven-day trip to the Middle East, told an education conference in Doha that an "honest conversation" was needed around the globe about how women were treated and how this prevented millions of girls from finishing school.

"If we truly want to get girls into our classrooms then we need to have an honest conversation about how we view and treat women in our societies and this conversation needs to happen in every country on this planet, including my own," she told delegates at the World Innovation Summit for Education.

US first lady Michelle Obama (C) speaks with

 schoolchildren at the World Innovation Summit

 for Education (WISE) in Doha, on November 4, 

2015 (AFP Photo/Faisal Al-Tamimi)

"When girls are young they are often seen simply as children but when they hit adolescence and start to develop into women they are suddenly subject to all of their society's bias around gender. That is precisely when they start to fall behind in their education," she said.

"It's also about attitude and beliefs. It's about whether parents think their daughters are worthy of an education as their son.

"It's about whether our societies cling to outdated laws and traditions that oppress and exclude women."

Obama spoke for almost 25 minutes at the Qatar National Convention Centre to a packed audience which included political and education leaders from around the world and dignitaries including Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, mother of Qatar's emir.

The US first lady's speech was also highly personal, claiming that her education opened up opportunities she "never could have dreamed of as a young black girl from a working class family".

"My university degrees transported me to places I never could have imagined -- to boardrooms and courtrooms, to the White House -- where my mother now lives with my family, and we're raising our daughters just steps from the Oval Office," she said.

'Men, we need you'

Obama also said the constraints put on women "limit men too".

To loud applause she told the audience: "Today, to all of the men here, I want to be very clear -- we need you. We need you as fathers, as husbands and simply as human beings. This is your struggle too. We need you to speak out against laws and beliefs that harm women."

Obama's speech was part of the "Let Girls Learn" initiative, a programme to find ways to provide education for the 62 million girls worldwide, according to the first lady, who do not go to school every day.

Afghanistan's Sakena Yacoobi (C) receives the WISE prize for education

 from Sheikha Moza (L), chairperson of the Qatar Foundation, and US first 

lady Michelle Obama in Doha on November 4, 2015 (AFP Photo/Faisal Al-Tamini)

Opening the conference, Sheikha Moza warned that the challenges faced by girls in the Middle East were worsening.

"In this region we are not only paralysed, but going backwards at the speed of light," she said, adding that "education was under attack".

Obama is also visiting Jordan during her trip but bad weather forced the postponement of her flight to Amman, scheduled for Wednesday afternoon.

An official travelling with the first lady told AFP that Obama was still in Qatar on Wednesday night because of a "weather call".

"Unfortunately due to a weather call in Amman, the departure of the first lady from Doha has been postponed," said the official.

She is now expected to fly to Jordan on Thursday.

Related Article:

Low oil prices force rethink on reforms in Gulf states

Japan district issues first gay union certificate

Yahoo – AFP,  5 Nov 2015

Japanese gay couple Hiroko Masuhara (R) and Koyuki Higashi display a certificate 

of 'partnership', issued by the Shibuya ward office in Tokyo, on November 5, 2015

(Photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno / AFP)

A major Tokyo municipality started Thursday issuing "partnership" certificates to same-sex couples, as Japan takes gradual steps towards greater tolerance for sexual minority groups.

Hiroko Masuhara, 37, and Koyuki Higashi, 30, registered their "partnership" with Shibuya ward, a major Tokyo district that is home to embassies, international businesses and trendy fashion houses.

"As a first step, I hope this will spread across Japan," said Higashi, a stage actress by profession, amid intense media coverage in front of the Shibuya ward office.

The certificates are not legally binding and carry only symbolic significance since the Japanese constitution identifies marriage as a union based on mutual consent of the parties from "both sexes".

But the official recognition of the same-sex unions is aimed at encouraging hospitals and landlords to accept the certificate to try to ensure couples receive similar treatment to people who are legally married.

The mayor of nearby Setagaya district said it would also start issuing similar certificates later Thursday.

While Japan is largely tolerant of homosexuality there is no specific legal protection for gay people, who complain that they may be prevented from visiting loved ones in hospitals or may be refused tenancy because their relationship is not regarded as in line with social norms.

Japanese lesbian couple Hiroko Masuhara (C) and Koyuki Higashi are congratulated

 by Ken Hasebe, head of the Shibuya ward after they received a certificate of

 'partnership', in Tokyo, on November 5. (Photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno / AFP)

"Heterosexual couples and same-sex couples are really very much the same. It is unfortunate that there are many things that cannot be done and cannot be recognised because the number (of gay couples) is small," Higashi said.

"I hope the day will come soon when there will be equality in society," she added.

The certificate issuance came amid other signs of a gradual acceptance of the rights of same-sex couples by Japanese businesses.

Lifenet Insurance said Wednesday it had expanded its services to recognise same-sex partners as beneficiaries of life insurance contracts.

Mobile phone carriers NTT DoCoMo and KDDI have also said in recent months that they would expand family discount services to cover gay partners.

SoftBank, another major mobile carrier, has offered family discounts to those who shared addresses, regardless of their genders.

Maldives declares state of emergency ahead of rally

Yahoo – AFP, Mohamed Visham, 4 Nov 2015

Maldives police patrol the streets of the capital Male on October 24,

2015 (AFP Photo/Haveeru)

Maldives President Abdulla Yameen Wednesday invoked draconian emergency laws for the first time in 11 years, heightening a crackdown on dissent after alleged attempts on his life.

Foreign Minister Dunya Maumoon said the declaration of a state of emergency meant that a rally planned by the main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) for Friday was unlikely to be allowed.

"Obviously there is every likelihood that it might not go ahead given the situation," Maumoon told AFP by telephone. "Because of the security (in the congested capital island Male)."

The Maldives is a tropical nation made 

up of 26 coral atolls (AFP Photo)

There was no immediate word from the MDP on whether the party would defy the emergency.

However, Maumoon, who is the niece of Yameen and the daughter of former president Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, said the emergency, which gives security forces and police sweeping powers to arrest suspects, was a "precautionary action."

It was necessary because of threats to the president's life, she said, denying that the move was to suppress Friday's planned protest by the opposition.

"President Yameen has declared state of emergency to ensure the safety and security of every citizen," his spokesman Muaz Ali tweeted.

The last time the Maldives imposed a state of emergency was in August 2004 under president Gayoom, the half brother of Yameen, to crack down on pro-democracy protests by the MDP.

Official sources said the latest declaration, initially for a period of 30 days, would lead to the automatic suspension of several constitutional provisions including the right of association and the right of assembly.

Tensions are high in the honeymoon island nation following an explosion aboard the president's speedboat on September 28 and this week's alleged discovery of a remote-controlled bomb near his official residence.

Yameen was unharmed in the boat explosion, although his wife and two others were slightly injured, and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation has said there was no evidence it was caused by a bomb.

But authorities in the Maldives have called it an attempt on his life. On October 24 Yameen arrested his deputy Ahmed Adeeb, accusing him of "high treason" and linking him to the blast.

Maldives President Abdulla Yameen declared

a state of emergency to to "ensure the 

safety and security of every citizen", his

spokesman said (AFP Photo)

The state of emergency order fast-tracked the impeachment of Adeeb, who could be sacked within days.

Several ministers, a police chief and key security personnel have also been sacked following the explosion.

The MDP said the emergency order was aimed at cracking down on anti-government activists.

"The discovery of a 'bomb' (on Monday) was the lead up to today's emergency," MDP spokesman Hamid Abdul Ghafoor told AFP.

"Yameen has jailed or threatened every opposition leader, placed criminal charges against 1,700 opposition activists, and is now turning on his own by jailing the vice president.

"For the good of the nation, it is time for Yameen to resign."

Travel warning

Yameen faces international censure over his jailing of MDP leader Mohamed Nasheed, the country's first democratically elected leader who was forced to step down in February 2012 following a police mutiny.

Colombo-based Western diplomats, who are also accredited to the Maldives, had decided to tell their nationals to exercise caution when visiting the capital island Male, a diplomatic source in Colombo said.

Australia had already asked its citizens to exercise "a high degree" of caution when travelling to Male, warning of the possibility of terror attacks.

Every year more than one million tourists visit the Maldives, a nation of 1,192 small 

coral islands dotted around the equator (AFP Photo/Lakruwan Wanniarachchi)

Dunya said the government assured the safety of tourists, a key source of revenue for the Indian Ocean atoll nation.

Despite the political unrest, tourism -- the archipelago's mainstay -- is booming with more than one million visitors a year.

Holidaymakers who pay top dollar to relax on one of the atolls are usually whisked away by seaplane or boat, bypassing the restive capital Male where extra police have been deployed in recent months.

US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke in May of "troubling signs" for democracy in the Maldives, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi this year shelved plans to visit the islands, a move seen as a rebuke to Yameen.

Maldives declares state of emergency https://t.co/mamFQ9igM2 pic.twitter.com/2gnPnLiTBh

— Agence France-Presse (@AFP) November 4, 2015

'Secret wife' of late Saudi king wins payout worth more than £20m

High court judge rules Saudi royal family must honour promise that Janan Harb would be looked after for the rest of her life

The Guardian, Tuesday 3 November 2015

Janan Harb told the court she married King Fahd in 1968, when she
was 19. Photograph: REX Shutterstock

A woman who claims to be the secret wife of the late King Fahd of Saudi Arabia has won a payout worth more than £20m to honour a promise that she would be looked after for the rest of her life.

Palestinian-born Janan Harb, 68, claimed she had lived a cosseted life in the embrace of one of the world’s richest and most secretive families for more than 20 years and had married Fahd in 1968.

The Saudi royal family has fought her claims through the high court for more than a decade, insisting that no official marriage took place and that she was owed nothing.

On Monday, however, a judge ruled in Harb’s favour, saying she was entitled to more than £15m plus the value of two expensive west London properties.

Mr Justice Peter Smith also ordered Fahd’s son, Prince Abdul Aziz, to pay legal costs estimated at more than £1m.

The prince, who did not attend the court hearings to counter Harb’s claims, must pay damages of £12m with interest of £3.25m for leaving her without her money for years.

Smith also ordered the prince to transfer two luxury flats in Chelsea worth around £5m to her name, making a total award of £20.25m.

As she left court, Harb said: “I am very very happy. This has been 12 years of misery for me. I am very happy with British justice, otherwise they wanted me to go to Saudi Arabia where they could have stoned me.

“I am very relieved and only wish the prince could have honoured what his father wanted and stopped delaying things. He is just being very mean.”

Harb told the court she had secretly married Fahd in 1968, when she was 19 and he was still a prince and his country’s interior minister.

Born to Christian hoteliers in Ramallah, she said she had met her future husband the year before in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where she was working as a translator at the Venezuelan embassy.

She said she had accompanied him on trips to Europe and the US, and that she had been introduced to world leaders and wealthy businessmen.

Harb said she was banished from Saudi Arabia by the king’s immediate family in 1970 after they “wrongly” blamed her for his addiction to methadone. She thought then that banishment had led to a divorce.

She has also said that although Fahd had other wives, he continued to keep in touch with her after she married a second man, a Lebanese lawyer, in 1974.

By the late 1970s, Harb also had a home in London and two daughters and had set up an aerobics franchise, opening branches in Europe and the Middle East.

Fahd would occasionally fly to London in his private jet to visit her, but their marriage was dictated by his schedule, friends said.

Harb has said she continued a relationship with Fahd until he suffered a stroke in 1995, and that his advisers were enraged when it emerged that she had abandoned Islam to become a Scientologist.

Monday’s court case rested upon her claim that Abdul Aziz, the son of another of Fahd’s wives, had met her at the Dorchester hotel in London on 20 June 2003 when the king was seriously ill.

She said he agreed in the early hours of the morning to pay her £12m and transfer two flats in Cheyne Walk to her name, to honour his father’s promise of lifelong financial support.

The prince made written statements to the court denying her claim, but Smith ruled that there had been an agreement.

He said Harb has received £5m from the Saudis in the past, but that she has used £3m of it to pay off debts, including an £85,000 gambling debt, before spending the balance within two years on what he described as her lavish lifestyle.

He said: “It is fair to say that she maintained a high maintenance lifestyle as she says, to which she had become accustomed whilst being supported by the late king.”

Smith added that the £5m “was plainly payment to buy her silence in respect of her relationship with the late king”.

He also said that while her evidence was unsure and at times bizarre, he believed she was telling the truth about the 2003 agreement with Abdul Aziz.

Harb intially launched a much larger claim against the Saudi royal family in 2004. Fahd, however, died the following year aged 82, and the high court ruled that her previous £400m maintenance claim died with him.

Nine Chilean 'miracle miners' sue lawyers

Yahoo – AFP, 3 Nov 2015

Miners from "the 33", (L-R) Victor Zamora, Jorge Galleguillos, Luis Urzua and
Mario Gomez arrive at the courthouse in Santiago, on November 2, 2015 (AFP
Photo/Martin Bernetti)

Santiago (AFP) - Nine Chilean miners trapped underground in 2010 in an ordeal that captured world attention sued their lawyers Monday, accusing them of cheating them out of the rights to their story.

The nine men, part of a group of 33 that spent 69 days trapped underground after a collapse at the San Jose mine in northern Chile, accused lawyers Remberto Rodrigo Valdes and Fernando Garcia of defrauding them with a dodgy deal to create a company to manage their rights.

"Today we're being rescued for the second time," said plaintiff Luis Urzua, the foreman who acted as the leader of the trapped miners and was the last to return to the surface when they were saved.

"We've been fighting for four years to show that our rights were violated."

The nine plaintiffs said Valdes and Garcia "misled the 33, making them believe they would manage their own company, only to harm them and appropriate monies that rightfully belonged to them."

The miners say the lawyers convinced all 33 men to set up a company to manage the rights to their story, and that they agreed to give up their rights for about $5,700 each.

The lawsuit deepens a fissure that has emerged in the rescued group in recent years, accentuated last August by the release of "The 33," a movie based on their misadventure and starring Antonio Banderas as miner Mario Sepulveda.

The real-life Sepulveda, the most charismatic of the group, took issue with his comrades' lawsuit.

"It's a shame they're being so ignorant and letting themselves be led astray by people who haven't read the contracts properly," he said.

But one of the plaintiffs, Victor Zamora, insisted the dispute was not between the nine miners and the rest of the group.

"It's not about fighting the (other) miners, because we're a very united group," he said.

"The division we have within the group is because of what the lawyers have done to us."

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33, the magic number

The BBC’s James Read says the number 33 has taken on a special significance for the miners, who are known to be superstitious: there are 33 miners, it took 33 days for the drill to complete the rescue shaft and Roman Catholic Chileans believe Jesus Christ was 33 when he died. Even President Sebastian Pinera mentioned the “magic number” in his triumphant speech after the first miner emerged from the shaft. The date of the rescue 13/10/10, adds up to - you guessed it - 33.


"Atacama Desert, Chile 33-Miners" – Nov 5, 2013 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll)

"The 33 Miners" – Oct 24, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll)

"The N in Kundalini" – Oct 20, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll)

"The Human Design" – Oct 18, 2010 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) - (Text version)

"... So finally, I give you an answer to a question that has not been asked, but is still on the minds of many. What happened last week in Chile was not an accident [the saving of 33 miners]. Everyone was amazed at how smooth it could be. So, look at the numerology around it! Even the mainstream media noticed - 33, 33, 33. But the media did not tell you the meaning of it, because they didn't know. To them, it was just coincidental, so many 33s!

Let me tell you what it means. Let us take a look at the numerology attributes of 33 from the ancients to modern day. The number 33 is called a master number. It is not to be broken apart numerologically, but you could still look at the attributes of the three alone if you wish. The three in numerological terms is a catalyst energy. A catalytic energy changes things around it. When you put two threes together, they represent one of the highest energies on the planet. It's so high that it's the last master number that is definable by humanity.

In numerology, 44 has no definition. Even those in Tibet who helped originate the numerological system said that 44 was multidimensional and had no paradigm of definition. Neither did 55 or 66 or 77. Thus, 33 was the highest of all defined master numbers and remains so to this day.

Now, don't misunderstand what I'm going to tell you, for this definition is not about the Human Being; it's about an attribute. Thirty-three is defined as the passion of the Christ. Not the man, but the attribute [the noun, compassionate redeemer], the passion of the Christ. Is there anything higher than this? The number 33 is the highest compassion number of them all, and here it was right in Chile, where the heart center moves to. This compassion for the miners was a metaphor filled with energy and things to look at, but nothing will ever be the same here. And how does it make you feel? ...."

Australia ditches 'out of date' knights and dames

Yahoo – AFP, 2 Nov 2015

Australian High Commissioner Alexander Downer attends a ceremony where

 Queen Elizabeth II presents Prince Philip with the Insignia of a Knight of the

Order of Australia at Windsor Castle on April 22, 2015 (AFP Photo/John Stillwell)

Sydney (AFP) - Australia has removed knights and dames from the national honours system, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Monday, dismissing the ancient titles as "not appropriate" in the modern age.

Knights and dames were unexpectedly revived last year by then prime minister and ardent monarchist Tony Abbott -- prompting accusations he was in a "time warp" and out of touch with voters.

Turnbull, an outspoken republican, had been widely expected to dump the titles ever since he replaced Abbott in a conservative Liberal Party room coup in September.

"The cabinet recently considered the Order of Australia... and agreed that knights and dames are not appropriate in our modern honours system," Turnbull said in a statement.

The prime minister said Britain's Queen Elizabeth had agreed to the government's recommendation to remove knights and dames from the Order of Australia, which recognises achievement and service.

"This change will not affect existing knights and dames," he added.

Speaking later to reporters in Sydney, Turnbull said the matter was "a long way from being the most important issue in Australia today".

But he added: "This reflects modern Australia; knights and dames are titles that are really anachronistic, they're out of date, they're not appropriate in 2015 in Australia."

Abbott's reintroduction of knights and dames in 2014 was questioned, but it was his subsequent decision to knight Queen Elizabeth II's husband Prince Philip which was met with ridicule and disbelief.

Republicans, who favour cutting Australia's ties to the British monarchy, had already accused Abbott of turning the clock back to a colonial mindset, while the Labor opposition said the titles should never have been brought back.

"It was a farce, a joke, a national disgrace," Labor MP Chris Bowen told reporters in Sydney.

"It is not appropriate in modern day Australia ... that we are clinging onto imperial Britain through our honours system, and we shouldn't be celebrating the fact that knights and dames are gone, we should be lamenting the fact that they came back under this government."

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said November 2, 2015 that Britain's

 Queen Elizabeth had agreed to the government's recommendation to remove 

knights and dames from the Order of Australia (AFP Photo/Fiona Goodall)

Republic by stealth

Australia has long wrestled with the idea of cutting ties to the British monarchy, but a 1999 referendum on the issue kept the traditional model under which Britain's Elizabeth II is head of state.

Support for a republic has ebbed in the years since, with a Fairfax-Nielsen poll in 2014 finding that 51 percent of the 1,400 people surveyed favoured the status quo while only 42 percent supported a republic.

The Australian Monarchist League said it was disappointed and concerned by Monday's development, accusing Turnbull of "republicanism by stealth".

"Mr. Turnbull is trying to bring on a republic and this is a way of starting it all off," the league's national chair Philip Benwell told AFP.

"We don't forget that Mr. Turnbull led republicans into the last referendum."

But Australian Republican Movement chair Peter FitzSimons welcomed the demise of knights and dames, saying their reintroduction reflected "Australia of the past, not the diverse and multicultural nation that exists today".

The mis-step over Prince Philip's knighthood was seen as one of the catalysts for a leadership challenge against Abbott in February, adding to flagging opinion polls and an unpopular budget.

He survived the first challenge after awarding the honour to the non-resident duke, dubbed a "knightmare" by the media, but was removed by Turnbull's challenge seven months later.

He has since admitted the decision was a mistake, describing it as "an injudicious appointment, obviously".

Knights and dames were introduced into Australia's system of honours in 1976 by then-prime minister Malcolm Fraser, but abolished a decade later by Bob Hawke.

Previously, Australians had been honoured through British imperial awards.

Australia ditches 'out of date' knights and dames https://t.co/CNrevJxsKM pic.twitter.com/gL8mNBtTXb

— Agence France-Presse (@AFP) November 2, 2015

Related Article:

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Seoul hosts rare Asian summit

A rare Asian summit in Seoul has brought together the leaders of China, Japan and host South Korea, focused on regional security and trade. Also on their agenda is nuclear-armed North Korea.

Deutsche Welle, 1 Nov 2015

Breakthroughs were not expected at Sunday's meeting, but the commentators noted the inclusion of Japan's Prime Minister Shinze Abe whose country has long been ostracized over wartime atrocities .

Economically, however, the three Asian nations are closely linked. And, at a concluding press conference Park said the leaders had agreeed to work toward the conclusion of a 16-nation free trade area to be known as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).

Beijing has been a key proponent of RCEP, which would create the world's biggest trade bloc of 3.4 billion people.

Dialogue had become urgent

Seoul international policy expert Kim Soung-Chul said getting dialogue "going again" had become urgent because of "many common issues" andpressures at home and abroad in each country.

A mechanism for annual trilateral meetings last resulted in a meeting in 2012.

Pressure was on S. Korea's President
Park (R) for dialog

China was represented on Sunday by Premier Li Keqiang, rather than its president Xi Jinping.

Host South Korean President Park Geun-hye had told Li on Saturday that she hoped China as North Korea's only major ally would continue to restrain the reclusive state.

More patience, urges China

Li called for more patience amid efforts to create a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula ,according to Park's office.

Abe, noted for his reluctance to fully acknowledging early 20th century atrocities committed by former imperial Japan, said en route to Seoul that he expected a "frank exchange" of views.

Separate talks due on Monday between Park and Abe were only confirmed a few days ago amid reports of bickering over how Japan's former wartime sex slavery of Korean women might be rhetorically addressed.

Many South Koreans see his past remarks as falling short of a full apology.

Tokyo professor Hideshi Takesada said the so-called "comfort women" issue was unlikely to be resolved during the summit beyond agreeing to continue dialogue.

China has bitter memories stemming from past Japanese invasion and is also at odds with Tokyo over sovereignty of an East China Sea island chain.

Washington had also pushed South Korea and Japan to heal their rift.

About 80,000 US troops are hosted by Japan and South Korea, forming the core of America's military presence in the Asia-Pacific region.

Pentagon chief visits DMZ

US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter visited the Demilitarized Zone dividing the Korean Peninsula on Sunday and renewed calls for North Korea to cease "provocations" and to lower its nuclear activities to "ultimately zero.".

He later said that the US remain committed to six-party talks that seek the denuclearization of the peninsula.

ipj/ng (AP, AFP)

Related Article:

Abe promises S. Korea talks on 'comfort women'

Yudhoyono to Joko: Don’t Force Indonesia to Enter TPP

Jakarta Globe, Hayat Indriyatno, October 31, 2015

Yudhoyono, whose foreign policy mantra was 'A thousand friends, zero enemies,'
has cautioned Joko to look at the geopolitical consequences of signing up to the
 TPP, which conspicuously leaves out China but includes US ally Japan.
(Antara Photo/Prasetyo Utomo)

Jakarta. Former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has cautioned his successor against signing up to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, insisting the justifications he gave for refusing to join the trade pact while in office are still valid today.

In a series of tweets sent on Friday, Yudhoyono said President Joko Widodo had every right to commit Indonesia to the US-initiated pact, but warned that “If Indonesia is not ready and is forced to enter the TPP, then our nation will suffer. Such is the ‘law of globalization.’”

The essence of the TPP, he wrote, “is trade and investment liberalization.”

“The TPP is actually a good thing, if all the member states are ready, their interests are accommodated and there are real benefits all parties,” he said.

“But if we’re not ready for it, our market will be flooded with goods and services from other countries, while our exports will fail to be competitive abroad.”

Yudhoyono said his reasons for refusing to sign up to the TPP when he was in office included the fact that Indonesia was preparing for a similar agreement on a Southeast Asian scale: the Asean Economic Community, which comes into force at the end of this year.

He added that Indonesia also needed time to see the benefits from another trade pact, the Asean-China Free Trade Agreement, which saw Jakarta’s trade deficit with China doubling within a year of coming into full force in 2010.

Yudhoyono also pointed out that the three other Asean countries that had signed up to the TPP – Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam – had fundamentally different economic models from Indonesia. “The economies of Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam […] are ‘export-oriented.’ Indonesia is not. We have a large domestic market,” he tweeted.

He said that in order to protect its interests, Indonesia would have to be “tough” in its negotiations – but that the current TPP members had concluded their negotiations on Oct. 5.

Yudhoyono, whose foreign policy mantra was “A thousand friends, zero enemies,” also cautioned Joko to look at the geopolitical consequences of signing up to the TPP, which conspicuously leaves out China but includes US ally Japan.

“Let us ensure that we remain friendly with all our partners, including America, China and Japan,” he wrote. “Let us maintain a free and active foreign policy […] an all-directions foreign policy. Avoid allying with one country and distancing others.

“Let us also ensure that, whichever side we partner with, Indonesia’s national interests will be prioritized above all else.”

He then called on the Indonesian people to help Joko reach an “appropriate and clear decision for the interests of the people and the nation.”

Pastikan Indonesia mendapatkan keuntungan nyata ~ dlm pertumbuhan ekonomi, lapangan kerja & pengurangan kemiskinan. *SBY*

— S. B. Yudhoyono (@SBYudhoyono) October 30, 2015

Joko’s announcement, following a visit to the White House on Monday, that he was committed to signing Indonesia to the TPP has met with concern from the business community and the political establishment alike.

Yudhoyono’s own statements follow his Democratic Party’s warning that Indonesia is not yet ready to face the competition that joining the pact would entail, citing inadequate infrastructure and low public awareness about the TPP and its costs and benefits.

“Are Indonesians and the national economy really ready for this?” asked Edhie Baskoro Yudhoyono, the former president’s son and a senior member of the Democratic Party.

“How about our domestic infrastructure? Has the government asked for the public’s opinion, especially those involved in the national economy, about the possible impact of the TPP on Indonesia in the future?”

Wrong step

The Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), chaired by Joko’s rival in last year’s presidential election, Prabowo Subianto, has also criticized the president’s stance on the TPP.

Fadli Zon, a Gerindra deputy chairman and deputy speaker of the House of Representatives, said the TPP would only benefit Indonesia “if we had competitive businesses.”

Without adequate infrastructure and strong supporting education, welfare and legal systems, he warned, Indonesia would only be a “passive player” in the trade agreement.

“It would be a wrong step to join the TPP,” Fadli said on Wednesday.

Economist Lana Soelistianingsih of the University of Indonesia said separately that “Countries with manufacturing-based exports will be able to perform better in this partnership.”

“Our exports are mainly raw materials like oil and gas. If we can we get our commodities into a market like Chile” – which has signed up to the TPP – “can we compete with Brazil, which is much closer to Chile than Indonesia is? That’s the concern,” Lana said on Wednesday.

“How can we improve our manufacturing sector without electricity? It’s not that we should refrain from entering the partnership, but we need a clear blueprint on what products we want to sell, which raw materials we need to manufacture the products, and what kind of infrastructure we need,” she said.

The TPP, forged by the United States and other 11 countries around the Pacific Rim, including Australia and Canada, has a stated goal to “to promote economic growth; support the creation and retention of jobs; enhance innovation, productivity and competitiveness; raise living standards; reduce poverty in our countries; and promote transparency, good governance, and enhanced labor and environmental protections.”

In practice, the biggest impact will be the lowering of trade barriers, including tariffs.

The #TPP - a 12-nation free trade agreement pic.twitter.com/1h82wFRF68

— Agence France-Presse (@AFP) November 5, 2015

Related Article:

German frustration builds over TTIP secrecy from US