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China Confidential

Tuesday, May 05, 2009

 

Hitlerian Hamas Hailed by Islamist Sympathizers for Offering Israel 'Truce' in Return for Total Surrender

IRAN'S TERRORIST PROXY AIMS FOR FINAL SOLUTION TO JEWISH STATE PROBLEM

The exiled, supreme leader of Iran's Palestinian proxy, Hamas, a Foreign Terrorist Organization (so designated by the U.S. State Department) that rules over the Gaza Strip with an iron fist, killing, torturing, and intimidating political opponents and critics, is being hailed by Western Islamist sympathizers and appeasers for suggesting that it would agree to a 10-year "truce" with Israel--whose existence it vows never to recognize or accept--provided Israel withdraws from the disputed and strategically situated West Bank territories, the eastern part of Jerusalem, including the Old City, which is home to Judaism's most sacred site, the Western Wall, and the Golan Heights, from which Syria shelled Israeli communal farms before losing the land to Israel in the Six-Day War of June 1967, and also agrees to allow all Palestinian refugees and their descendants to return to Israel--with compensation, of course.

Stressing Hamas had stopped firing rockets into Israel, Khaled Meshaal told a reporter for The New York Times in Damascus: "I promise the American administration and the international community that we will be part of the solution, period. 

"We are with a state on the 1967 borders, based on a long-term truce.

"This includes East Jerusalem, the dismantling of settlements and the right of return of the Palestinian refugees."

Unofficially, Hamas representatives continue to call for a different kind of solution--a Nazi-style, final solution. Click below for a sample Hamas hate speech--by an imam, ironically, who once participated in an international conference of Muslim and Jewish clergy. He calls for a new Holocaust and makes a point of urging Muslims to exterminate Jewish children. 

# posted by Confidential Reporter @ 1:51 PM links to this post 

 

Rights Group Calls London Protest in Memory of 23-Year-Old Woman Hanged in Iran After Unfair Trial

Delara Darabi was executed in the Islamic Republic of Iran on May 1 after spending almost six years in prison for an alleged offence committed at age 17. The 23-year-old maintained her innocence up until the very end. Her trial was a sham.

Amnesty International is inviting people to join the organization on Wednesday, May 6, from 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM, outside the Iranian Embassy in London to lay flowers in memory of Delara and as a protest against child execution. 

The Embassy is located at Princes Gate, Kensington. The nearest underground station is Kensington High Street.

Click here for Claire Soares' chilling coverage of the secret hanging. An excerpt follows:

'Oh, Mother, I see the Hangman's Noose' 

It was 7am when Delara Darabi phoned home. "Oh mother, I see the hangman's noose in front of me," she garbled. "They are going to execute me. Please save me." Moments later a prison official snatched the handset away. "We will easily execute your daughter and there's nothing you can do about it," he barked at the parents. Then, with a chilling click, the line went dead.

# posted by Confidential Reporter @ 8:27 AM links to this post 

 

For Students of International Law and Political Science: a Great Legal Opinion and a Case that Reminds Us that World Politics is About Power

EDITOR'S NOTE: Some of the most interesting and informative writing in the United States is in the public domain--specifically, in the written opinions of great American judges. The "article" below--abridged with apologies in advance to United States Court of Appeals Judge Janice Rogers Brown--is but one example of the genre. The actual opinion can be found here.

Here's the background: China regards Taiwan, a thriving, self-ruled democracy, as a renegade province and is committed to reunifying with the island, even through the use of force. In fact, China has adopted a law that authorizes use of force if Taiwan makes any moves toward formalizing its de facto independence.

It turns out, however, that Taiwan's sovereignty is in question in terms of international law. Moreover, an argument can be made (click here, here, and here) that the United States is the legal sovereign. At the end of World War II, the Japanese forces on Taiwan surrendered to the U.S. military, and in the 1954 San Francisco Peace Treaty, Japan renounced all claims to Taiwan. However, the treaty did not otherwise specify Taiwan's status. Seeing an opportunity, some Taiwanese filed a court case in which they asked the U.S. State Department to be ordered to issue them U.S. passports and to be recognized as "U.S. nationals."

On April 7, the District of Columbia Circuit Court ruled that the Political Question Doctrineprevented the Court from deciding the issue. Judge Brown wrote the opinion, which, as stated above, appears below in abridged form. China Confidential readers are encouraged to read the entire opinion. 

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge BROWN. 


America and China’s tumultuous relationship over the past sixty years has trapped the inhabitants of Taiwan in political purgatory. During this time the people on Taiwan have lived without any uniformly recognized government. In practical terms, this means they have uncertain status in the world community which infects the population’s day-to-day lives....

At the end of the Sino-Japanese War, in 1895, China relinquished the island of Taiwan (then Formosa) to Japan. Treaty of Shimonoseki, China-Japan, art. 2(b), April 17, 1895, 181 Consol. TS 217. After its defeat in World War II, Japan surrendered sovereignty over Taiwan to the Allied forces in 1945. See 91 CONG. REC. S8348–49 (1945) (Text of Japanese Order). Specifically, General Douglas MacArthur ordered the Japanese commanders within China and Taiwan to surrender to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, leader of the Chinese Nationalist Party, The Chinese Revolution of 1949, In 1949, China’s civil war—a battle between Chinese nationalists and communists—ended; mainland China fell to the communists and became the People’s Republic of China (“P.R.C.”), forcing Chiang Kai-shek to flee to Taiwan and re-establish the Republic of China (“R.O.C.”) in exile. 

On September 8, 1951, Japan signed the San Francisco Peace Treaty (“SFPT”) and officially renounced “all right, title and claim to Formosa and the Pescadores.” Treaty of Peace with Japan, art. 2(b), Sept. 8, 1951, 3 U.S.T. 3169, 136 U.N.T.S. 45. The SFPT does not declare which government exercises sovereignty over Taiwan. It does generally identify the United States as “the principal occupying Power,” but does not indicate over what. 

In 1954, the United States recognized the R.O.C. as the government of China, acknowledged its control over Taiwan, and promised support in the event of a large-scale conflict with the P.R.C. Mutual Defense Treaty Between the United States of America and the Republic of China, U.S.-R.O.C., Dec. 2, 1954, 6 U.S.T. 433; The Taiwan Strait Crises: 1954–55 and 1958. The ensuing decades, however, brought improved diplomatic relations with the P.R.C. and the United States’ posture on Taiwan’s sovereign changed. Starting in 1972, the United States recognized that the P.R.C. considered Taiwan a part of China and specifically declined to challenge that position. See DEP’T ST. BULL., Mar. 20, 1972, at 435, 437– 38 (setting forth the text of Joint Communiqué by U.S. and P.R.C., the “Shanghai Communiqué,” issued on February 27, 1972). In 1979, President Carter recognized the P.R.C. as the sole government of China and simultaneously withdrew recognition from the R.O.C. See DEP’T ST. BULL., January 1, 1979 (setting forth the text of Joint Communiqué on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations Between the U.S. and P.R.C., issued on December 15, 1978); see also Goldwater v. Carter, 617 F.2d 697, 700 (D.C. Cir.), vacated, 444 U.S. 996 (1979). 

This change in policy prompted Congress to pass the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979 (“TRA”), 22 U.S.C. § 3301 et seq., in order to spell out the United States’ new, unofficial relationship with “the people on Taiwan.” See id. § 3301 (“[T]he Congress finds that the enactment of this Act is necessary to help maintain peace, security, and stability in the Western Pacific; and . . . authoriz[e] the continuation of commercial, cultural, and other relations between the people of the United States and the people on Taiwan.”). The TRA established the American Institute in Taiwan (“AIT”) as the unofficial U.S. representative for relations with Taiwan. Id. § 3305. The AIT, inter alia, “processes visa applications from foreign nationals and provides travel-related services for Americans.” United States ex rel. Wood v. Am. Inst. in Taiwan, 286 F.3d 526, 529 (D.C. Cir. 2002). There is no indication the Congress or the Executive gave the AIT any responsibility for processing passport applications for the people on Taiwan. 

The TRA also outlined the United States’ “expectation that the future of Taiwan will be determined by peaceful means” and its intention “to provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character.” Id. § 3301(b); see also id. § 3302 (describing the provision of defense articles and services to Taiwan). Despite the executive renunciation of ties with the R.O.C., Congress pledged to maintain relations with the people on Taiwan and supply the government with weapons. Id. Thus began decades of “strategic ambiguity” with respect to sovereignty over Taiwan....

Identifying Taiwan’s sovereign is an antecedent question to Appellants’ claims. This leaves the Court with few options. We could jettison the United States’ long-standing foreign policy regarding Taiwan—that of strategic ambiguity—in favor of declaring a sovereign. But that seems imprudent. Since no war powers have been delegated to the judiciary, judicial modesty as well as doctrine cautions us to abjure so provocative a course....

We will never know [who is Taiwan's sovereign], because the political question doctrine forbids us from commencing that analysis. We do not dictate to the Executive what governments serve as the supreme political authorities of foreign lands, Jones, 137 U.S. at 212; this rule applies a fortiori to determinations of U.S. sovereignty....

Even if we concluded (which we do not) that Boumediene abrogated sub silentio the political question doctrine as it relates to de facto sovereignty, no valid argument can be made that it did so in relation to determining de jure sovereignty, which is at issue here....

Addressing Appellants’ claims would require identification of Taiwan’s sovereign. The Executive Branch has deliberately remained silent on this issue and we cannot intrude on its decision....