China uses Foley murder, Ferguson riots as propaganda

Chinese media has capitalised on the murder of kidnapped journalist James Foley and the riots in Ferguson, Missouri as a propaganda tool.

Certain sections of the press in China have exploited the incidents to criticise US foreign policy and point a finger at the disquiet and ethnic divisions that exist in some parts of the United States.

On August 20th, soon after video  emerged showing Foley's execution by Islamic extremists in Iraq, Beijing-based finance magazine Caijing and Hong Kong-based Phoenix Media both published posts on their official Weibo accounts about the US journalist.

Half truths

"The American reporter beheaded by ISIS blamed the US government for the tragedy," Caijing's Weibo post began. It then quotes Foley as saying, "I call on my friends, family, and loved ones to rise up against my real killers: the US government," who ordered recent air strikes targeting ISIS.

Whilst Foley did utter these words, Caijing crucially neglected to point out that ISIS militants had forced him to read them aloud in front of the camera.

Phoenix Media's Weibo post followed in a similar vein and posted several photos of the execution including a partly censored photograph of Foley's body lying in the desert.

"US negligence"

The state-run Global Times, known for its nationalist editorials, took another tack, intimating on its Weibo account that Foley's death resulted from US government negligence towards its own citizens. The Global Times asked rhetorically on its official Weibo account, "No matter where you are, can you always rely on the U.S. military?" and followed with a nose-picking emoticon.

Public screenings

Meanwhile in Beijing a large TV was used to display footage of the execution interspersed with riots in America that followed the shooting dead of black teenager Michael Brown by a police officer. Edited into the video loop were clips of "happy families skipping in front of various Beijing landmarks" and "photographs of local school children holding handicrafts and helping old people."

"This type of juxtaposition is fairly common in China," says George of That's Beijing, adding that images of peace and prosperity in China are typically contrasted with clips of violence around the world, promoting the narrative that "chaos looms beyond our pleasant and safe borders."

According to another online source, the video was unlikely to be mandated by the state. Dr. Xu Wu, an associate professor at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism, told Quartz that if the government had the intention to use foreign violence as propaganda, it wouldn't just be in Dongzhimen in Beijing. "You'd see it across China…everywhere," he said.

However, the screen in question often shows broadcasts from the state run channel CCTV. Furthermore there was an official looking logo shown on the bottom right of the screen, which we've as yet been unable to identify.

Anger from citizens

Whilst the state media may be trying to exploit troubles abroad, Chinese citizens were outraged both by the murder of Foley and some of the media reportage.

"Global Times, how despicable," wrote one user. "All day you use a magnifying glass to look for dirt on other people." Another user asked sarcastically, "I wonder what the Chinese government would do if you, Little Editor, were kidnapped."

Across Chinese social networks there were  expressions of horror at Foley's death and anger at the extremists who killed him. Many called his killers "monsters" or asked for a moment of silence for war correspondents. Some users posted pictures of lit candles on Weibo as others wished for peace in the Middle East.

Reports: Foreign Policy / IBT / YouTube

tvnewswatch, London, UK

War on Terror is far from over...

Four people have been arrested in connection to what US authorities believe was a serious plan to launch a terror campaign in and around New York. Three of the persons have been named as James Cromitie (also known as Abdul Rahman), David Williams (aka Daoud and DL), and Onta Williams (aka Hamza). They were brought to court on Thursday and were ordered to be detained until the 5th June for a preliminary hearing. The three and a fourth man, Laguerre Payen (aka Amin and Almondo), have been accused attempts to bomb a synagogue and planning to target military jets at an airfield [BBC / Sky News / CNN].

The threat is being taken extremely seriously by authorities despite the group being infiltrated early on in their planning the attacks and supplied with fake explosives. According to reports the group attempted to detonate the explosives outside two synagogues in New York.

The foiling of the alleged terror plot comes as the US senate rejected an appeal by Obama for money to close Guantanamo Bay and will serve to reinforce the argument that the terror threat remains strong enough to maintain the camp. On Thursday it was also announced that the first trial for a former Guantanamo Bay detainee will take place in New York in the coming weeks. Ahmed Ghailani, who is suspected of taking part in al-Qaeda plots to bomb US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, will be the first former detainee to face trial in the United States [CNN].

Meanwhile terror attacks have continued in Iraq today. Scores have been killed in Baghdad and Kirkuk in an upsurge of violence that has swept the country in recent weeks. April was the bloodiest month since September, and despite reassuring statements from both the Iraqi government and the US military that things were getting better, most ordinary citizens are increasingly concerned [BBC / CNN].

In Kirkuk at least five were killed and 3 US soldiers were amongst 12 killed in a blast that struck in central Baghdad. Today’s attacks which left at least 23 dead came a day after 40 were killed in north-west Baghdad. More than 250 died in a series of attacks in April leading many to believe that insurgents may be regrouping as US troops prepare to downsize their operations [BBC].

6th anniversary of Iraq war passes silently

How the war began six years ago today

Today is the sixth anniversary marking the beginning of the Iraq war. It is a war that has left an estimated 90,000 Iraqis dead and countless others maimed or injured. More than 4,500 coalition troops have died and tens of thousand have been wounded. But according to several reports Iraq is “on the mend”. CNN’s Nic Robertson says that although the situation is getting better, Security is still a concern for many Iraqis. The International Correspondent for the global new channel said today that many Iraqis “have the sense that people have forgotten about them.” Although the numbers of attacks have decreased, they still occur. However, many go unreported unless there is a significantly high death toll. In the second week of March, nearly 70 people were killed in two suicide bomb attacks in Baghdad, but such incidents barely get a mention on news channels or in national newspapers. Thirty nine coalition troops have been killed so far this year, amongst them one Briton. Although it shows a decline, the numbers are still significant, and for the families who have lost their sons or daughters it is devastating.
Troops may be pulling out but there are some doubts as to what vacuum they will leave behind. “Iraqis have still got to live with what’s going on,” Robertson told viewers. And viewers were asked whether, after six years, the war was “worth it”? According to Jim Clancy, who hosts Your World Today, the majority of respondents thought the war was not worth it. “Surely you jest?” one viewer wrote, as she listed her reasons why. Views cited the millions of dollars wasted, the WMDs [Weapons of Mass Destruction] that were never found, the thousands of lives lost and others injured as well as the damage to infrastructure and the continuing fraught security situation.

It is a war that, while having removed a despotic leader and moved the country towards a form of democracy, has left the region in chaos. It has also affected reputations. Former Prime Minister Tony Blair will be more remembered as ‘Bush’s poodle’ and for his sanctioning what many have called an ‘illegal war’. George Bush has been lambasted by critics for his decision to invade, and America’s standing in the world has also been affected.

It may also be argued that the War on Terror took the politicians’ eyes off the economy and let the seeds of recession develop unhindered. The war has also added to the significant debts of both the US and the UK, money that will never be recovered.

Even before the war was waged there were warning that the conflict could plunge the world into a deep recession. In an article published in the Independent newspaper in Britain one academic expressed his view the economic effects could be devastating. William Nordhaus, a Sterling professor of Economics at Yale University, speaking several months before hostilities began, said that a war against Iraq could cost the US hundreds of billions of dollars, play havoc with an already depressed domestic economy and tip the world into recession because of the adverse effect on oil prices, inflation and interest rates. Some of the professor’s predictions such as the destruction of oilfields and use of chemical and biological weapons never happened. But his belief that a protracted conflict involving urban guerrilla fighting did manifest itself. "The Bush administration has not prepared the public for the cost or the financing of what could prove to be an expensive venture,'' Professor Nordhaus said in November 2002. "Perhaps the administration is fearful that a candid discussion of wartime economics will give ammunition to sceptics of the war; perhaps it worries acknowledging the costs will endanger the large future tax cuts, which are the centrepiece of its domestic policy. Nonetheless, the price must be paid, by raising taxes, by cutting expenditures, or by forcing the Federal Reserve do the job by raising interest rates. One way or another, Americans will pay for the war,'' the professor warned.
The report also highlighted the risk to oil supplies and a rise in fuel prices. George Perry, an analyst with the Brookings Institute in Washington, drew up three scenarios, one of which suggested a tripling of prices to $75 a barrel. That, he suggested, would almost certainly push the world into recession. Little could he have foreseen the oil price breaking beyond the $100 mark [link].

The financial cost of the war is still disputed. Last year estimates were running as high as $200 billion [CNN]. Even Norhaus was conservative with his estimated cost put at around $120 billion. It may look small now compared to the $750 billion bail-outs seen in recent months, but the critics would argue that none of it needed to happen. In fact the cost of the Iraq war is now judged to exceed more than $800 billion. However, most of those critics of the war were shouted down or ignored. Vince Cable, a leading British politician in the Liberal Democratic Party, echoed the views of Nordhaus. Writing in the Guardian a little over a month before the war began, Cable also suggested that military action could bring about a create global recession. Oil price hikes would in turn affect the GDP of industrialised countries, Cable suggested. The former Chief economist of the Shell said that funding of a costly and prolonged war could very easily precipitate a collapse of external and internal confidence in the US economy. Not all these predictions have come to pass. But the long war is adding to the financial woes of the US and the world.

CNN was the only channel to look back on the six year conflict today. The BBC and Sky were more fixated with the conviction of Josef Fritzl, an Austrian who held his daughter captive for 21 years. Even the release of a new audio tape purported to be that of Osama bin Laden went virtually unnoticed [CNN].

Dick Cheney speaking on CNN insisted that the war was worth it. Violence levels were down 90% he said and he added that it was the first proper democracy in the Middle East something he regarded as a “big deal”. But according to a CNN poll, around 70% of Americans are supportive of Barack Obama’s plan to pullout troops. Support for a long campaign is dwindling as the cost rises ever higher. That cost is now estimated as being in excess of $800 billion

Bush attacked with shoes in Iraq

George W Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq on Sunday, but not all went well after someone threw a pair of shoes at him. President Bush shrugged off the incident saying, “so what if a guy threw a shoe at me, it is one way to get attention. It’s like going to a political rally and having someone yell at you. It’s like driving down the street and have people not gesturing with all five fingers”. He dismissed the ‘attack’ as a way of getting attention but said he did not know what the man’s cause was. He added that he “didn’t feel the least bit threatened by it” and went on to say that other journalists in the room had apologized for the reporter’s actions.

During the press conference a journalist had stood up shouting in Arabic, "this is a goodbye kiss from the Iraqi people, dog" before throwing a pair of size 10 shoes towards the President. Both shoes missed the President one only missed him by inches and security seemed slow to restrain the man who was eventually pulled to the ground [BBC / CNN / Sky News / al Jazeera].

The shoe throwing incident detracted from the main reason President Bush visited the country. He and Iraqi PM Nouri Maliki had arranged the meeting to sign a new security agreement between the two countries. However footage of the American leader ducking the flying footwear dominated headlines. The throwing of shoes is an Arab insult and after the fall of Saddam Hussein many Iraqis were seen to throw shoes at Saddam’s portraits and statues. Only recently protesters in Baghdad were seen to throw shoes at an effigy of George Bush.