Quote Of The Day - Sham Of Middle East Civil Rights Forum

The people's will - coming soon to Qatar

" 'The Arab foreign ministers,' as one prominent figure in the democracy-promotion world said to me, 'have learned from these meetings exactly how to thwart democracy, not how to help it.' The sessions have taught local leaders the dangers of Western-supported and genuinely autonomous NGOs, and regimes across the Arab world have cracked down on them. Many human rights groups have been hounded out of existence; only the most reliably docile ones are permitted inside the forum’s doors."

James Traub writing in Foreign Policy Magazine on last week's Forum for the Future in Doha. The Forum was the initiative of George W Bush and the G-8 nations, and was founded in 2004 with the aim of promoting democracy and civil rights in the Middle East and North Africa, but Traub now says it achieves the exact opposite. He calls for the Forum's abolition and for the United States to align itself "more clearly and convincingly on the side of those who clamour for change".

Quote of the Day - Russia going totalitarian

Those dictatorship days ain't over

"It's becoming clear we are on the way back to the 1940s and a totalitarian state. How can one sit and watch quietly as it happens?" Marina Rozumovskaya, a Russian school teacher, quoted in The Washington Post while demonstrating in Moscow to prove her legal right to protest, and holding a sign that read "Freedom to political prisoners". 

Rozumovskaya was taking part in one of three simultaneous protests following the arrest of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, who was arrested Sunday upon leaving a legal demonstration in support of the right to assemble. He was sentenced to 15 days in prison, allegedly for disobeying police officers.

The school teacher avoided arrest, but 19 fellow protestors were not so lucky. "I am not a politician, just a teacher," she added, "I want my pupils to live in a civilized country. I don't want them turning into people without honor and conscience."

World Cup nostalgists will remember that the 1978 competition in Argentina also took place in a totalitarian state. Presumably FIFA is as unruffled about that possibility in 2018 as it was for the tournament  33 years ago.

FIFA Quote of the Day - No Soul, No Sellout

"The problem with FIFA was that it had no interest in extracting human-rights concessions from its hosts. Qatar had monstrous amounts of cash to offer, and FIFA could pretend that its choice had an ambassadorial quality, taking the great fellowship of soccer into the Middle East, where the Olympic Committee still fears to tread. It would, however, be unfair to accuse [FIFA President Sepp] Blatter and his crew of a sellout, since FIFA has never had a soul to barter." From Gwen Knapp, writing in the San Francisco Chronicle on FIFA's award of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar.

Quote Of The Day - Slapping Blatter Down

“We are talking about a very basic human right that is being violated. This is not a joke, this is a matter of life and death to people. Qatar and more than 70 other countries in the world still criminalize individuals for homosexual relationships, and some countries even punish them by death sentence.

“It’s disappointing to see that an organization [FIFA] that is promoting the game, which in its statutes condemns discrimination of any kind, is coming out with comments like this.” 

Juris Lavrikovs, communications director for the European branch of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association, condemns FIFA President Sepp Blatter for his comments that gay fans visiting the 2022 World Cup in Qatar should "refrain from sexual activities". Full Associated Press report here.