Flat Earth News: An Award-winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media

Books at Random, by Nick Davies

A genuinely important book, one which is likely to change, permanently, the way anyone reads it looks at the British newspaper industry LRB

'Finally I was forced to admit that I work in a corrupted profession.' When award-winning journalist Nick Davies decided to break Fleet Street's unwritten rule by investigating his own colleagues, he found that the business of reporting the truth had been slowly subverted by the mass production of ignorance.

Working with a network of off-the-record sources, Davies uncovered the story of the prestigious Sunday newspaper which allowed the CIA and MI6 to plant fiction in its columns; the newsroom which routinely rejects stories about black people; the respected paper that hired a professional fraudster to set up a front company to entrap senior political figures; the newspapers which support law and order while paying cash bribes to bent detectives.

Davies names names and exposes the national stories which turn out to be pseudo events manufactured by the PR industry, and the global news stories which prove to be fiction generated by a new machinery of international propaganda. He shows the impact of this on a world where consumers believe a mass of stories which, in truth, are as false as the idea that the Earth is flat - from the millennium bug to the WMD in Iraq - tainting government policy, perverting popular belief. He presents a new model for understanding news. With the help of researchers from Cardiff University, who ran a ground-breaking analysis of our daily news, Davies found most reporters, most of the time, are not allowed to dig up stories or check their facts - a profession corrupted at the core.

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The Thinker: A Call to Action Over China’s Rights Abuses

Jakarta Globe, Geng He, February 04, 2010

One year ago today, China kidnapped my husband.

I don’t know where he is. I don’t know what is being done to him. The only thing I know is why he disappeared: My husband, Gao Zhisheng, defied Beijing by representing people the government finds threatening. As a leading human rights lawyer in China, he fought for those who had been abused by police, those who had their land stolen by the government and those who were persecuted for their religious beliefs.

And now my husband is one of those persecuted people he so vigorously defended. Chinese authorities abducted Zhisheng on Feb. 4, 2009. But they did not officially arrest him and won’t tell anyone where they’ve taken him.

My children and I feared the worst. After nearly a year, a Foreign Ministry official said on Jan. 22 that my husband is “where he should be.” I focused on the only thing I could glean with certainty from those ominous words: the indication that the government has my husband in custody. That Zhisheng was alive! At first, this was cause for our family to celebrate. Then we started thinking about what “alive” meant.

The last time my husband was arrested, the government tortured him. After he sent a letter to the US Congress in 2007 denouncing human rights abuses in China, the government held him for more than 50 days. His captors electrocuted him. They burned his eyes with lit cigarettes. They stuck toothpicks in his genitals.

My children and I escaped China last year shortly before my husband was abducted. The United States granted us shelter. I fear that the Beijing government took my husband in retaliation for our escape. We knew that if Zhisheng had tried to leave with us, we would never have made it out of China. Now I wait, helpless, certain that my husband is being tortured and wondering whether I should actually hope that he has already been killed.

Over the past several years Zhisheng and I watched the government regularly disbar lawyers and shutter their firms for taking politically sensitive cases. We saw friends and their families beaten, harassed and in some cases imprisoned. We knew it was only a matter of time before the government did the same to us.

That time came in 2006. I cannot adequately explain the panic and intimidation that come with 24-hour government surveillance. That come from knowing that the police could take Zhisheng at any time. Or worrying what government threats were doing to my children. But Zhisheng and I knew he couldn’t give in.

I must ask my new country to help my husband; the father of my two children. China won’t listen to me. If our relatives who remain in China press the government too hard, they will be arrested. But China will listen to the United States.

Some people here talk of a political hardening in Beijing since the 2008 Olympics. They cite the kidnapping of my husband, or the sentencing of Liu Xiaobo for his role in Charter 08 or of Chen Guangcheng, the blind lawyer, and say that China no longer listens to the United States. It’s true that Beijing is silencing more political dissidents than ever. But this is a call to action, not a reason to stand idly by.

The United States cannot allow China to continue to act with impunity, particularly with respect to imprisoning lawyers. China’s lawyers are the country’s only hope for becoming a one-party state where the rule of law prevails, let alone a true democracy. If China continues to imprison its lawyers, there will be never be change.

I worry about the next generation of Chinese lawyers. Will disappearances like my husband’s deter them from becoming rights defenders? I imagine so. But if the United States were to speak out on my husband’s behalf, perhaps this would change.

My 8-year old son, Peter, was surprised to discover last week that President Barack Obama is a lawyer. To him, lawyers are people the government throws into prison, not leaders of the government itself. He asked me whether this meant that President Obama could help free his father. I told him that I hoped so. We are waiting to see.

The Washington Post

Geng He is the wife of Gao Zhisheng, a human rights lawyer and Nobel Peace Prize nominee who has been held incommunicado by the Chinese government since Feb. 4, 2009.

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N. Koreans Revolt as Chaos, Starvation Increase

Jakarta Globe, February 02, 2010

North Korean border guards march in the truce village of Panmunjom. (AFP Photo)

Seoul. Angry North Koreans have attacked security agents as hunger woes mount following a crackdown on free-market trade, according to reports on Tuesday by groups in Seoul with contacts in the communist state.

Riots have flared since a shock currency revaluation by Pyongyang in November worsened shortages of food and other goods for an increasingly desperate population, they said.

“Traders and residents have lost their property due to the revaluation,” according to a North resident quoted in Daily NK, an online newspaper hostile to the reclusive regime.

“People are taking revenge on agents, since they feel so desperate that regardless of their actions, they will die,” the source in North Hamkyung province said. “As a result, social unrest is becoming more serious.”

In one violent incident, Daily NK said “a number of people” assaulted a group of security agents on patrol on Monday in markets in Pyongsung, South Pyongan province. There were no details of any casualties.

The paper, citing a group of defectors, said a fight had broken out recently between residents and security agents monitoring the crackdown in Hyesan in Yanggang province. As the fight turned nasty, it said, one resident snatched a gun from an agent and fired at random — leaving one security official in critical condition.

The North told its citizens on Nov. 30 to swap old banknotes for new at a rate of 100 to one. But it capped the amount which could be exchanged, reportedly wiping out some people’s savings and causing widespread anger.

The revaluation was widely seen as an attempt by the regime to reassert control over the economy and clamp down on growing free-market activities in the country of about 24 million people. But the move has reportedly fueled inflation and created chaos in North Korean shops and markets, with some people forced to barter goods to survive.

The North has suffered severe food shortages since a famine in the 1990s killed hundreds of thousands. The United Nations tightened sanctions last year in response to its nuclear test and missile launches.

JoongAng Daily newspaper quoted South Korea’s National Intelligence Service chief Won Sei-hoon telling lawmakers last week the revaluation had caused riots.

“The move late last year led to riots in some places,” Won was quoted as telling the lawmakers in a closed session. “But the North Korean government appears to have them now under control.”

The Yonhap agency, quoting traders near the Chinese border with the North, said the number of people dying of hunger was rising. That view was echoed in a newsletter by Good Friends, an aid group with contacts in the North. It said residents, including war veterans in their 70s and 80s, protested last month outside a city hall in Danchon, North Hamkyong province and that authorities rushed to release 1,000 tons of rice to placate them.

Agence France-Presse

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5-day Davos forum ends on note of humility

The Jakarta Post, Edith M. Lederer, The Associated Press, Davos | Sun, 01/31/2010 9:51 PM

The world's foremost gathering of business and government leaders wrapped up a five-day meeting Sunday with widespread agreement that a fragile recovery is under way but no consensus on what's going to spur job growth and prevent another global economic meltdown.

In a group of big egos and many power players attending the annual World Economic Forum, there was even some humility and a realization that overcoming the first global financial crisis is uncharted territory.

The gathering of some 2,500 VIPs in this Swiss alpine resort saw much spirited debate on whether more regulation is needed for the financial industry, how to boost sagging global unemployment, and finding ways to ensure the nascent recovery is kept on course through 2010.

The atmosphere of doom and gloom that pervaded last year's forum, which took place at the height of the economic crisis, was replaced this year by a feeling of some satisfaction that a modest recovery is under way but uncertainty about the way forward and how banks should respond.

Deutsche Bank chief Executive Josef Ackermann told an AP-sponsored closing panel that the worst of the financial and economic crisis had been managed "quite successfully" but decision-makers now had a tough choice: "Should we take more risk, be a creative force for growth, or should we focus on security?"

Peter Sands, the CEO of Britain's Standard Chartered Bank, said at the panel that the right balance must be struck "between making a safer banking system and a financial system that can support the sort of dynamism and growth in job creation."

"Get it wrong one way and we risk a new crisis; get it wrong the other way and we'll take the steam out of the recovery and reduce the chances of creating new jobs," he said.

At the same time, Sands said, everyone must have "a degree of humility about what we actually know, and how confident we can be, that the ideas we're going to put in place are going to have the consequences that we thought they were going to have."

At Davos, the pendulum swings between a focus on the economy and other global issues.

The spotlight at past forums has been on celebrity guests like Angelina Jolie and Bono, but this year it fell on the big bankers and government financial regulators.

"It was all economics - and they were all lost," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch.

In the keynote speech, French President Nicolas Sarkozy called for a return to ethics and morality in business and gave a broad riposte to free-market capitalism.

Klaus Schwab, the forum's founder, ended the meeting with a call to the business and government leaders to reflect "on values" and social responsibility.

Sarkozy told international bankers and CEOs just what they didn't want to hear: Brace for bonus curbs, tighter banking regulations and new bookkeeping rules. He echoed rallying cries of workers from the United States to Europe and Asia, and hours later, President Barack Obama also called for reforms to Wall Street.

Perhaps the most important meeting was unscheduled. It came Saturday on the sidelines of the forum when government regulators, finance ministers and central bankers from the U.S. and Europe laid out their financial reform plans during a two-hour meeting with bank executives.

Sands called the discussions at this and other meetings "very constructive" but said: "They haven't in a sense solved the issues, but they certainly, I think, pushed them forward."

Ackerman praised the major economic players for expanding their Group of Eight to the Group of 20. He said there should be a Business group of 20 to work alongside them and focus on business issues.

With China and India spurring the global economy, Azim Premji, chairman of Wipro Limited, India, a global communications company, predicted that the difference between growth rates between the developing and developed worlds "are increasingly going to become larger."

The result, he told the AP-sponsored panel, is that richer countries will "more aggressively" invest in emerging markets in order to maintain their own growth, which will be "good for the emerging world."

Muhammad Yunus, managing director of the Grameen Bank, which pioneered microcredit, said in an AP interview that "this is a good time to redesign the entire financial system."

"Big guys are not the big sufferers," he said. "Big sufferers are the small guys who lost their jobs, who lost their food, who lost their livelihood."

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Rwanda becomes African model state

Radio Netherlands Worldwide, 31 January 2010 - 10:14am, by Sebastiaan Gottlieb

Fifteen years after it plunged into genocide, Rwanda has emerged as a safe and stable country. The economy of this small African nation is the fastest growing on the entire continent. Political order has come under the leadership of President Paul Kagame.

Almost all of those involved in the Rwandan genocide have now stood trial at the Gacaca community justice courts. Nearly 800,000 people have been convicted. A number of them are serving their sentences in Mpanga prison, which was partly funded by the Netherlands.

Many people outside of Rwanda still base their view of the country on the terrible massacres and atrocities which took place during the genocide of 1994. But that image is now outdated. Rwanda is rapidly developing into a model state for Africa.

The ethnic tensions between Hutus and Tutsis appear to be under control. A law has been passed which forbids making reference to different population groups. Everyone in the country is Rwandan and no more distinctions are made along ethnic lines.

Rwanda has not only raised its economic and political profile but it is also making significant strides on the environment, with a strong focus on renewable energy and combating pollution. Increasing numbers of people are hooked up to eco-friendly power. And once a month, everyone in Rwanda helps keep the streets and doorsteps clean.

Rwanda is by far the least polluted country in Africa. There is even a ban on plastic bags, which have been entirely replaced by paper. In many ways, Rwanda can serve as an example, not only to other African countries but also to the wealthy countries of the West.

Chinese vice premier proposes way forward for world economy at Davos

English.news.cn, 2010-01-29 21:37:18

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan. 28 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang on Thursday outlined China's response to the economic crisis and its follow-up policies and put forward proposals for global recovery.

In a keynote speech delivered at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in the eastern Swiss ski resort of Davos, Li said the theme of the meeting, "Rethink, Redesign, Rebuild", embodied the spirit of cooperation and innovation in discussing world economic development in the post-crisis era.

Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang delivers a speech in the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, Jan. 28, 2010. (Xinhua/Xie Huanchi)

Detailing China's response to the crisis, Li said it was resolute decisions and timely measures taken by the central government that helped China post an overall growth of 8.7 percent last year during the global economic crisis.

"With an increase of 380 billion dollars in gross domestic product (GDP), China's contribution to world economic recovery is obvious," he said. "To effectively cope with the crisis, we increased public spending by a large margin and carried out structural tax cuts."

In the fourth quarter of 2009, China's central government revenue, household income and profits of businesses all increased in tandem with GDP growth, Li said.

The vice-premier said it should be stressed that, despite the international financial crisis, the fundamentals and long-term positive trend of China's economic development remained unchanged.

"As we stand at a new historical juncture, we must change the old way of inefficient growth and transform the current development model that is excessively reliant on investment and exports," Li said.

China would transform its current growth pattern and explore a new development model in the post-crisis era, he said.

The vice-premier said China's future direction had three aspects: a focus on boosting domestic demand to drive economic growth; reliance on technological innovation, energy conservation and emissions reductions to promote industrial restructuring and upgrading; deeper reforms and more opening up to the world.

To promote world economic recovery and sustained development in the post-crisis era, Li laid out a five-point proposal.

• "First, we should continue to work together and prevail over the crisis. The policies of one country can well impact those of others. Only when global economic recovery is achieved can the recovery of national economies be secured," he said.
  
  
• "Second, we should promote a more open market," Li said, adding that this was the only way forward in the continued response to the crisis. Opening-up could be both bilateral and multilateral. Trade protectionist practices would only exacerbate the economic crisis, slow down the recovery process and ultimately harm the interests of the very countries who applied such measures.
  
  
• "Third, we should promote balanced development of the world," said the Chinese vice premier. Only by helping developing countries out of economic backwardness could the world ensure enough food and clothing for their people and poverty was reduced. And only by tapping the potential demand of developing countries could the global market be expanded and unemployment around the world reduced.
  
  
• "Fourth, we should jointly tackle major challenges," he said. This was an urgent task to ensure sound recovery and sustained development of the world economy. The international community ought to coordinate actions to meet the challenges.
  
  
• "Fifth, we should improve the structure of global governance," Li said. The world needed not only more consensus and actions but reliable institutional guarantees, i it was to overcome the crisis, open up markets, promote balanced development and address major challenges.
  
  

Li said he was confident that, as long as the international community pursued development in a spirit of cooperation and built a common future with inclusiveness, the world economy would embark on a path of sound recovery and sustained development.

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Out of Aceh's experience, hope for rebuilding Haiti

The Washington Post, by Joachim von Amsberg, Friday, January 29, 2010

Haiti’s damaged National Palace.

The official death toll of the recent earthquake in Haiti is more than 110,000. That tens of thousands more may have been killed puts this tragedy on par with that wrought by the tsunami that struck South Asia in December 2004, killing about 200,000 people and displacing more than half a million just in Indonesia's Aceh province. There are other parallels between these disasters. Haiti is a poor country long plagued by governance issues. Even though Indonesia is a well-functioning state, Aceh at that time had been ravaged by decades of conflict between the Indonesian government and Acehnese groups fighting for independence. Whatever government had existed in Aceh was severely diminished by the tsunami.

Yet Aceh today is a vibrant place where families live in houses and communities, children attend school and farmers tend to their fields. Its reconstruction is widely recognized as a success, and that work could offer a silver lining for Haiti.

In Aceh, about 140,000 houses have been rebuilt, 2,500 miles of roads have been constructed, and 200,000 small and medium-size businesses have been supported. Indonesia concluded an agreement seven months after the tsunami with the independence fighters that gave important autonomies to Aceh in return for a peace that has lasted. That pact laid the foundation for the investment and economic development that have taken place.

While the memories of the tragedy linger, what can be rebuilt has been rebuilt. In numerous trips to Aceh over the past 2 1/2 years, I have seen enough redevelopment and spoken to enough local people to know that Aceh has been built back better than it was before the tsunami. Today, Aceh has functioning local and provincial governments that work together with the national government to provide services for its people. There is a functioning state in Aceh. By no means is it flawless, but it holds promise for more social and economic progress and development.

Aceh's experience provides hope that at least the physical and economic damage from natural disasters can be overcome. Hope that out of the desperation of disaster can come the desire for reconciliation after conflict and for establishing an effective state or nation that can address the challenge of rebuilding. No two disasters are the same, but a few keys to success from the Aceh tsunami reconstruction experience should be kept in mind as international support is channeled to Haiti:

• First, local and national leadership count. While Aceh's local government was decimated, Indonesia's national government led the recovery and reconstruction efforts. The president appointed a personally trusted, experienced leader to manage the reconstruction and created an agency with overarching powers to coordinate billions of dollars of investments by 350 organizations in 12,500 projects. International partners may have to take the lead in Haiti during a transition period, but there is no substitute for national leadership in the long run.
  
  
• Second, empowering people is key. In Aceh, strong top-down leadership was complemented by the empowerment of the people and communities. Victims became development workers. Aid recipients and former combatants became community facilitators. Displaced families became workers who rebuilt their houses. By channeling a large share of reconstruction funds directly to communities, the people of Aceh's problems were transformed as they became part of the solution. Their hard work meant that houses were built faster, at a lower cost, and better met the needs of the people.
  
  
• Third, coordinating global aid is critical. International development partners supported reconstruction through coordinated approaches that were aligned behind government leadership and Aceh's priorities. Fifteen donor countries and donor organizations pooled $700 million in a multi-donor fund administered by the World Bank. Instead of 15 separate housing and road projects with different procedures and criteria, which would have overstretched the limited capacity of local institutions, one well-coordinated program was implemented by communities, government and U.N. agencies, and respected nongovernmental organizations.
  
  

There are, of course, many differences between Haiti today and Aceh five years ago. But as we found in Aceh, recovery is possible. The first priority, as it was after the tsunami, is the vast humanitarian task that is underway. But if the international community comes together, aligns its efforts and coordinates support that prioritizes the interests of the people affected by disaster and puts them in the driver's seat, Haiti's future can look much brighter than its past ever did.

Joachim von Amsberg, the World Bank's country director for Indonesia since 2007, oversees the bank's management of the Multi Donor Fund for Aceh and Nias.

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Haiti survivors facing disease outbreaks

Radio Netherlands Worldwide, 29 January 2010 - 9:07pm

Survivors of Haiti's earthquake are facing outbreaks of diarrhoea, measles and tetanus, according to the World Health Organisation.

The WHO says medical teams have been reporting a growing number of cases of the diseases over the past few days. Cases have also been reported in the resettlement camps, where many of those who have lost their homes are now sheltering. UN agencies and the Haitian government are planning to launch a vaccination campaign next week. The authorities are also warning of soaring crime after 7,000 inmates escaped from prison on the day of the quake. The country's police chief, Mario Andresol, says there has been a growing number of violent assaults and rape cases.

Twitter Working on Ways to Evade Government Censorship

Jakarta Globe, January 28, 2010

Twitter helped get photos and information out of Iran during anti-government protests last year. (AFP Photo/Twitter)

Developers are coming up with new strategies to help Twitter evade censorship in countries like China and Iran, says the CEO of the popular micro-blogging service.

Evan Williams said programmers were working on "interesting hacks" to get around roadblocks erected by foreign governments.

“We are partially blocked in China and other places and we were in Iran as well,” he said as quoted by the Financial Times.

Instead of negotiating with governments that censor, "whose very being is against what we are about," Williams said he would rather find technological ways to get around such barriers.

He said he admired Google for standing up to China over its web censorship, but said Twitter was too small to adopt a similar strategy.

The company did not release details of the work, but said it was being done by third-party developers.

Williams said Twitter had an advantage over some other web-based media because it "is accessed in thousands of ways" through multiple internet and mobile applications.

Twitter played a key role in getting information out of Iran during anti-government protests there last year, while traditional media outlets were hobbled by government censorship.

JG

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Editorial: Don’t Underestimate SBY’s First 100 Days

I will listen to positive criticism: SBY

No laughing matter: College students participate in a rally denouncing President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's performance after the first 100 days of his second term in office in front of the Gadjah Mada University compound in Yogyakarta on Thursday. Similar rallies were being staged elsewhere across the country on Thursday. Antara/Wahyu Putro

Rights group slams treatment of Mideast minorities

The Jakarta Post, Paul Schemm, (AP), Cairo | Tue, 01/26/2010 10:33 PM

A New York-based human rights organization criticized the governments of five Middle Eastern countries Tuesday, including close U.S.-allies Jordan and Saudi Arabia, for their treatmen of women and minorities.

Human Rights Watch released the chapters of its 2010 World Report that deal with Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Yemen, accusing them of poor treatment of women, minorities and refugees.

"Middle Eastern governments need to recognize that the rights of minorities, refugees, and stateless persons need greater protections," the group's Middle East director, Sarah Leah Whitson, said in a statement.

The release of these latest chapters of the annual report follows Sunday's description of the post-election crackdown in Iran and the mistreatment of migrant workers in the United Arab Emirates.

The chapters described a pattern of discrimination against minorities in the region, including Saudi Arabia's treatment of its 2 million-strong Shiite population and Syria's repression of its Kurds.

In Lebanon, the report criticized the living conditions of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees, while asserting that the Yemeni government committed violations in its battle with Shiite rebels in the north.

Tensions with Shiites in Saudi Arabia reached new heights in 2009 when clashes between Shiite pilgrims and security guards in the city of Medina resulted in scores of arrests. At least one Shiite mosque was closed down in the kingdom.

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RI wins US praise for religious tolerance

Lilian Budianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Tue, 01/26/2010 9:54 AM

Indonesia’s religious tolerance has won praise from the US government and civil society groups despite concerns that the country may tilt toward more radical Islamic ideas, with several regions enacting sharia-based bylaws and hardliners reportedly trying to stifle pluralism.

Indonesia and the US kicked off a three-day interfaith dialogue Monday in Jakarta to deepen bilateral cooperation and cultural relations.

The 20-member US delegation is led by Pradeep Ramamurthy, senior director for global engagement of the White House National Security Council.

The Indonesian delegation comprises 30 people from religious organizations, including Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah, and is headed by Andri Hadi, the Foreign Ministry’s director general for information and public diplomacy.

A member of the US delegation, William F. Vendley, who is the secretary-general of Religions for Peace, said the American perception of Indonesia was positive, with people increasingly aware Indonesia was the country with the largest Muslim population in the world.

“The US government is enormously impressed with both the Indonesian government’s and the people’s commitment to pluralism. Although the majority of the population is Muslim, they welcome diversity... They see Indonesia as a model for a religiously diverse society functioning in a harmonious and peaceful fashion.”

Vendley said the American community did not see the enactment of sharia-based bylaws and hardliners’ recent moves to ban Muslim pluralist activities as a looming threat to diverse religious life as “there is deep confidence that there is a profound [national] commitment to Pancasila”, the country’s ideology that defends freedom of religion.

“Educated Americans are alert to the shape of Islam globally actually look to Indonesia as a bridging country... well-positioned to understand pluralism, which is very characteristic of the US, and at the same time a country that is uniquely positioned to function as a faithful interlocutor and partner with other countries that have less pluralism,” he said.

Under the regional autonomy system, several local administrations in Indonesia have enacted sharia-based bylaws that require Muslim women to wear a hijab or put them under restrictions at night in relation to outdoor activities. Moderates have also been alarmed by hardliner groups attempting to impose harsh restrictions on the way women may dress and perform on television broadcast shows, especially under the pornography law, as well as recent attacks on minority places of worship.

“We haven’t focused so much on these issues and what we want to emphasize is that Indonesia is diverse and embraces diversity...” said Darcy Zotter, deputy political counselor of the US Embassy in Jakarta.

Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said the idea of the interfaith dialogue was floated by then foreign minister Hassan Wirajuda during a visit to the US to meet US Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton last June.

“Today, we convene to... implement the commitment to strengthen the voice of moderation and foster dialogue for cooperation as one way to address today’s critical challenge,” Marty said.

The interfaith dialogue is part of US-Indonesia cooperation covering a range of areas from education to counter terrorism to sanitation that have been established in the context of a comprehensive bilateral partnership.

Masjid Istiqlal Jakarta Indonesia

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Tibet envoys leave for fresh talks with China

Reuters, Krittivas Mukherjee, NEW DELHI, Mon Jan 25, 2010 8:13am EST

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Top envoys of the Dalai Lama will arrive in China for talks on Tuesday, the Tibetan government-in-exile said, the latest attempt to revive dialogue that has stalled since 2008.

The two sides have held eight rounds of talks since 2002, but little of substance has been achieved. The last round of discussions in July 2008 ended in acrimony.

The envoys, Lodi Gyaltsen Gyari and Kelsang Gyaltsen, will be accompanied by three other Tibetan officials, the Tibetan government-in-exile based in the northern Indian hill town of Dharamsala said in a statement on Monday.

China's Foreign Ministry referred questions relating to the Tibetan envoys to the United Front Work Department, which was not available for comment. The Religious Affairs Bureau was also unavailable.

The envoys' visit come days after Beijing held a top policy meeting on Tibet. The meeting pledged to "leap-frog" the development of Tibet by raising infrastructure quality and agricultural incomes to national levels by 2020, according to a Xinhua news agency report at the weekend.

Tibet's potential for social instability makes it a possible risk for investors in China and a key area for foreign governments interested in the country's peaceful development, analysts say.

But any significant progress at the talks on Tuesday was unlikely and the dialogue could be more a Chinese need to be seen as engaging the Tibetans to resolve the issue.

"Because the international community is beginning to perceive all these years of talks as a cynical Chinese exercise, there is a greater degree of accountability now devolving on Beijing," said Alka Acharya, professor of East Asia studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.

China accuses Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, who fled Tibet after a failed 1959 uprising against Communist rule, of manipulating opinion and governments in the West.

China has blamed the Dalai Lama's "clique" for the deadly unrest in Lhasa and other Tibetan areas in 2008.

The Dalai Lama says he is campaigning for meaningful autonomy for the strategic Himalayan border region. But China, which says it sent troops in 1950 to Tibet to liberate the country from feudal serfdom, says he is bent on independence.

(Additional reporting by Lucy Hornby in BEIJING; Editing by Matthias Williams and Sanjeev Miglani)

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