

Ing. Salih CAVKIC
Editor in Chief
by ORBUS.BE
info@orbus.be
www.orbus.be

No more
Paris nor Brussels!
Stop
terrorism!
We want to live in peace with all
our neighbors.
regardless of their religion, color and origin.
Therefore, we condemn any
kind of terrorism!
*****
Ne više Pariz ni Brisel!
Stop terorizam!
Mi želimo živjeti u miru sa svim našim
komšijama,
bez obzira koje su vjere, boje kože i porijekla.
Zato mi osuđujemo svaku vrstu terorizma!


Prof. dr. Murray Hunter
University Malaysia Perlis


Eva MAURINA
20
Years to Trade Economic Independence for Political Sovereignty -
Eva MAURINA


Aleš Debeljak +
In
Defense of Cross-Fertilization: Europe and Its Identity
Contradictions - Aleš Debeljak
ALEŠ
DEBELJAK - ABECEDA DJETINJSTVA
ALEŠ DEBEJAK
- INTERVJU; PROSVJEDI, POEZIJA, DRŽAVA


Rattana Lao
Rattana Lao holds a doctorate in Comparative and International
Education from Teachers College, Columbia University and is
currently teaching in Bangkok.


Bakhtyar Aljaf
Director of Middle-East and Balkan Studies (IFIMES) in Ljubljana,
Slovenia


Rakesh Krishnan Simha
Géométrie variable of a love triangle – India, Russia and the US


Amna Whiston
Amna Whiston is a London-based writer specialising in moral philosophy. As a
PhD candidate at Reading University, UK, her main research interests
are in ethics, rationality, and moral psychology.


Eirini Patsea
Eirini Patsea is a Guest Editor in Modern Diplomacy, and
specialist in Cultural Diplomacy and Faith-based Mediation.


Belmir Selimovic
Can we trust the government to do the right thing, are they really
care about essential things such as environmental conditions and
education in our life?


Dubravko Lovrenović+
Univ. prof. Dubravko Lovrenović is one of the leading
European Medievalist specialized in the Balkans, pre-modern and
modern political history.


Manal Saadi
Postgraduate researcher in International Relations and Diplomacy at
the Geneva-based UMEF University


doc.dr.Jasna Cosabic
professor of IT law
and EU law at Banja Luka College,
Bosnia and Herzegovina


Aleksandra Krstic
Studied in Belgrade (Political Science) and in Moscow
(Plekhanov’s IBS). Currently, a post-doctoral researcher at the Kent
University in Brussels (Intl. Relations). Specialist for the
MENA-Balkans frozen and controlled conflicts.
Contact: alex-alex@gmail.com


Dr.Swaleha Sindhi is
Assistant Professor in the Department
of Educational Administration, the Maharaja Sayajirao University of
Baroda, India. Decorated educational practitioner Dr. Sindhi is a
frequent columnist on related topics, too. She is the Vice President
of Indian Ocean Comparative Education Society (IOCES). Contact:
swalehasindhi@gmail.com


Barçın Yinanç
It is an Ankara-based
journalist and notable author.
She is engaged with the leading Turkish dailies and weeklies for
nearly three decades as a columnist, intervieweer and editor.
Her words are prolifically published and quoted in Turkish,
French an English.


By İLNUR ÇEVIK
Modified from the original: They killed 1
Saddam and created 1,000 others (Daily Sabah)


Aine O’Mahony
Aine O'Mahony has a bachelor in Law and Political Science at
the Catholic Institute of Paris and is currently a master's student
of Leiden University in the International Studies programme.Contact:
aine-claire.nini@hotmail.fr


Elodie Pichon
Elodie Pichon has a
bachelor in Law and Political Science at the Catholic Institute of
Paris and is currently doing a MA in Geopolitics, territory and
Security at King's College London. Contact :
elodie.pichon@gmail.com

Qi Lin
Qi Lin,
a MA candidate of the George
Washington University, Elliott School of International Affairs. Her
research focus is on cross-Pacific security and Asian studies,
particularly on the Sino-U.S. relations and on the foreign policy
and politics of these two.


ALESSANDRO CIPRI
Born in Chile and raised in Rome, Alessandro
Cipri has just finished his postgraduate studies at the department
of War Studies of King's College London, graduating with distinction
from the Master's Degree in "Intelligence and International
Security". Having served in the Italian Army's "Alpini" mountain
troops, he has a keen interest in national security, military
strategy, insurgency theory, and terrorism studies. His Master's
dissertation was on the impact of drug trafficking on the evolution
of the Colombian FARC.


Ms. Lingbo ZHAO
is a candidate of the Hong Kong Baptist
University, Department of Government and International Studies. Her
research interest includes Sino-world, Asia and cross-Pacific.
Contact:
harryzhaolin@gmail.com


Hannes Grassegger
Hannes Grassegger and Mikael Krogerus are investigative
journalists attached to the Swiss-based Das Magazin specialized
journal.

Mikael Krogerus
Hannes Grassegger and Mikael Krogerus are investigative
journalists attached to the Swiss-based Das Magazin
specialized journal.


Michal Kosinski
Scientific analysis


Elodie Pichon,
Ms. Elodie Pichon, Research Fellow of the IFIMES Institute, DeSSA
Department. This native Parisian is a Master in Geopolitics,
Territory and Security from the King’s College, London, UK.


Djoeke Altena


Muhamed Sacirbey
Ambassador Muhamed Sacirbey currently lectures on Digital-Diplomacy. "Mo"
has benefited from a diverse career in investment banking & diplomacy, but
his passion has been the new avenues of communication. He was Bosnia &
Herzegovina's first Ambassador to the United Nations, Agent to the
International Court of Justice, Foreign Minister & Signatory of the Rome
Statute establishing the International Criminal Court. He also played
American football opting for a scholarship to Tulane University in New
Orleans after being admitted to Harvard, oh well!!

INDEX 2017
INDEX 2016
English
Important News
Dutch - Nederlands
Belangrijke nieuws
French - Français
Nouvelles importantes
German - Deutsch
Wichtige News
Bosnian-Bosanski
Važne vijesti
|
JUNE 2017
“We win, they lose” –
Wonderful world of Binary categorisations
(Refeudalisation of Europe – III Part)
Anis H. Bajrektarevic
The new Cold War knocks on our doors, suddenly.
Why so? How did it previously end?
The end of the Cold War came abruptly, overnight. Many in the West dreamt about it, but nobody really saw it coming.
The Warsaw Pact, Red Army in DDR, Berlin Wall, DDR itself, Soviet
Union – one after the other, vanished rapidly, unexpectedly. There
was no ceasefire, no peace conference, no formal treaty and
guaranties, no expression of interests and settlement. Only the
gazing face expression of that time Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard
Shevardnadze who circles around and unconvincingly repeats: “we now
better understand each other”.
On contrary, Bush (the 41st
US President) calmly diagnosed: “We win, they lose!” His
administration immediately declared that the policies, including all
military capabilities, will remain unchanged but with a different
pretexts – to respond to the ‘technological sophistication of the
III world powers’ and to a ‘radical nationalism’ (meaning; any
indigenous emancipation). The so-called normative revolution from
Atlantic followed shortly, in which the extensive (assertive) rights
were self-prescribed to that theater. Thus, the might-makes-right
interventions were justified through the new (de facto
imperial) doctrines: humanitarian intervention, R2P (incl.
Kouchner-Lévy bombing for a noble cause), doctrine of
preemption, uninhabited access to or beyond grand area, as
well as the so-called Afroasia forward deployment, as a sort
of the enlarged Brezhnev and Monroe doctrines combined both
together, etc.
Simultaneously, that time Washington darling
Fukuyama published his famous article
The
End of History?
and the book which came soon
after. To underline how sure he was about this claim he even dropped
the question mark into the title of the book.
Was this sudden meltdown of
the Soviet colossus and the day after intrinsic or by design?
Brutality respected ?
Generous support, lavish and
lasting funds that Atlantic-Central Europe extensively enjoyed in a
form of Marshall Aid has never reached the principal victim of WWII
– Eastern Europe. Despite being set on a weak ethical grounds, it
was due to ideological constrains in the post-WWII period. Total
WWII devastation of the East and their demographic loss of 36
million people (versus only 1,2 million of the West), was of no
help.
Moreover, only 8 years after
the end of WWII, West brokered the so-called London Agreement on
German External Debts (also known as the London Debt Agreement or Londoner Schuldenabkommen). By the letter of this accord over
60% of German reparations for the colossal atrocities committed in
both WW were forgiven (or generously reprogramed) by their former
European victims, including – quite unwillingly – several Eastern
European states. The contemporary world wonder and the economic
wunderkind, Germany that dragged world into the two devastating
world wars, is in fact a serial defaulter which received debt relief
like no one else on the globe – four times in the 20th
century (1924, 1929, 1932 and 1953).
Despite all the subsidies
given to the West, East recovered remarkable fast. By 1950s and
1960s, many influential western economists seriously considered
communism as better suited for economic advancements, along with a
Soviet planned economy as the superior socio-economic model and
winsome ideological matrix.
Indeed, impressive Soviet
results were a living example to it; Backward, semi-feudal, rural
country in 1920s, has won the WWII and in parallel it evolved into a
highly industrialized and urbanized superpower – all that in just 30
year-time. Spain needed two centuries (and never completed), Holland
130 years, the UK 110, Germany 90, Japan 70 years to revolve from a
backword agricultural cultivator into an industrial giant. Moscow
achieved that in only 30-35 years, all alone. Hence, by mid 1950s –
besides becoming a nuclear power – the Soviet Union grew up into a
pioneer and pivot in deep space exploration, moving the final
frontier of mankind deep into the outer space. Sending woman to
space while many in the West still struggled with elementary gender
equality was an ethical and technological blaster. Morality of
communism narrative as well as its socio-economic advancements
appealed globally.
Master-blaster
If all the above so, why did
than the Soviet Union collapse? Was it really a bankruptcy caused by
the Afghan intervention and costly Space program (orbital station
Mir)? And finally, if the US collapsed earlier, with the so-called
Nixon shock, why did America became stronger afterwards, while after
the Gorbachev-era bankruptcy of the SU, Russian historical empire
has melted away so rapidly?
There are many views on it.
Still, there is nothing conclusive yet - neither popular no
scientific consensus is here.
Some years ago, I’ve had an
honour to teach at the famous Plekhanov University of Economics of
Moscow. It was a block-week with the students of the Plekhanov’s
elite program IBS. 12 days in Moscow proved to be an excellent
opportunity to ask these questions some of the most relevant economy
authorities among academia colleagues.
The line of answers was quite
different to anything I’ve usually heard or read in the West.
Muscovites claimed that right after Nixon shock the Soviet
Politbureau (top Communist party executive) and Gosplan (the
Soviet Central Planning Economic Body – overseeing the entire
economic performance of the SU and de facto its satellites)
have sit jointly in an extensive closed session, as to debate two
items only.
1. Could we prevent chaos and global instability by
filling the gap after the collapse of the United States (and it
eventual partition on 4 to 6 entities), by putting the allied
countries – previously under the US sphere of influence – under
our effective control;
2. Could we viably deter Chinese economic (and
overall Asia’s socio-demographic and politico-military)
advancement alone, without a help of the US and its western
satellites.
After much debating, answer
to both questions was unanimously NO.
Consequently, the logical
conclusion was: The Soviets need to save the US as to preserve
balance of power. Without equilibrium in the world affairs, there is
no peace, stability and security on a long run – a clear
geostrategic imperative.
Indeed, right upon the Nixon
shock, an era of détente has started, which led to the Helsinki
process and its Decalogue (that remains the largest and most
comprehensive security treaty ever brokered on our planet). The US
was left to re-approach China. Soon after, it recognised the Beijing
China and closed the Vietnam chapter. Simultaneously, it (re-)gain a
strategic balance elsewhere, like in Latina America and (horn of and
western) Africa, with a brief superpowers’ face-off in the Middle
East (Yom Kippur War) which – though bloody and intensive – did not
damage the earlier set balances.
Why goodbye?
Why, then, instability
in today’s world?
Apparently, Americans did not
really consider these two questions when it was their turn.
Gorbachev altruism was ridiculed and misused. As a consequence, the
edges of the former Soviet zone – from Algeria to Korea and from
Finland to the Balkans – are enveloped into instabilities. On top of
it, Chinese powerhouse is unstoppable: Neither of the Western powers
alone nor a combination of them is able to match Sino-giant
economically. Asia, although largest continent, is extremely
bilateral. It fragile security structures were anyway built on a
soft centre precondition.
* * * * Bear of permafrost
worried about planetary balance and was finally betrayed, while a fish of warm seas unleashed its (corporate) greed and turned the
world into what it is today: a dangerous place full of widening
asymmetries and unbalances. Climate, health, income, access to food
and water, safety and security – each regionally and globally
disturbed. Exaggerated statement?
For the sake of empirical
test, let us apply the method of sustainability on this short story
of geopolitics of the second part of XX century. As per tentative
definition, Sustainable Development is any development which aims at
the so-called 3Ms: the maximum good for maximum species, over
maximum time-space span. (The beauty of the 3M principle is that it
makes SD matrix very easily quantifiable.)
How did our superpowers
behave? Was our 3M better off before or after 1991?
The UN High Commissioner for
Refugees Filippo Grandi (in his just released Global Trends Report)
notifies unprecedented asymmetries of today’s world: “Every 113th
person on this planet is the displaced. Of the 65.6 million people
forcibly displaced globally, 10.3 million became displaced in 2016…
This equates to one person becoming displaced every 3 seconds – less
than the time it takes to read this sentence.”
“You are either with us or
against us” is a famous binary platform of Bush (the 43rd
US President). Indeed, our planetary choice is binary but a bit
broader.
End of history in re-feudalisation
or a dialectic enhancement of civilisation. Cosmos (of order) or
chaos (of predatory asymmetries) – simple choice.
Anis H. Bajrektarevic
Vienna, 22 JUN 2017
anis@corpsdiplomatique.cd
Author is chairperson and
professor in international law and global political studies, Vienna,
Austria. He authors four books: FB – Geopolitics of
Technology (Addleton Academic Publishers, NY); Geopolitics –
Europe 100 years later (DB,
Europe), Geopolitics – Energy – Technology (Germany, LAP).
Europe and Africa – Security structures
(Nova, NY) is his latest, just released book.
June 20, 2017

Föderation
für Weltfrieden – UPF Austria - Infoservice,
 www.weltfriede.at
NGO in Special Consultative Status with the Economic and
Social Council of
the United Nations

Partner NGO to the UN Sustainable Development Knowledge Platform
The Universal Peace
Federation Austria (UPF) in cooperation with the Association of Bosnian Academics in Austria (GBAA)
and the International Institute
for Middle-East and Balkan Studies (IFIMES)
is inviting you to a special lecture on the topic
 Sarajevo, Jerusalem of Europe
The Bosnian experience of Islam – Building bridges between the Orient and Europe Friday June
16th 2017, 18:00 (6:00 pm) Föderation für
Weltfrieden, Seidengasse
28, 1070 Vienna
Speaker:
Honourable
Mirnes ef. Kovac
Lecturer at the eldest
Islamic theological school in Europe, Faculty for Islamic Studies of Sarajevo.
Graduate of the same faculty, and MA in International Relations from the Sussex
University in the UK,
he is editor of PREPOROD (Official Journal of the Islamic
Community of Bosnia). Honourable ef. Kovac is theologian, journalist and
political analyst from Sarajevo – author of hundreds
of texts, essays and
commentaries. Editor and author of numerous books. His latest book is "The Siege
of Islam". He is a regular columnist and commentator on the Middle East and
Balkan issues for prestigious media houses. For further Information
please contact: Peter Haider 0650 2588846
Or:
contact@bhakademiker.org

www.bhakademiker.org ____________________________________________________________
IFIMES Permanent Representation to Austria and Vienna-based IOs
Executive Assistant to HoM Anis H. Bajrektarevic, Head of Mission
Cell: +43 (0) 676 739 71 75
Email: vienna(at)@ifmes.org www(dot)ifimes.org http:// www(dot)youtube.com/watch?v=645V9eryieI
|
June 20, 2017
Memorandum of Understanding
between the
International Institute for Middle-East and Balkan
Studies (IFIMES), Ljubljana, Slovenia
and the
Gesellschaft Bosnischer Akademiker in Österreich (GBAA),
Vienna, Austria
on Scientific and Socio-cultural Research and
Cooperation
Reaffirming
excellent relations between the two countries,
Recalling the need for a horizontal
cooperation on all (non-governmental) levels, and Noting that
such cooperation between institutions as well as the
people-to-people exchanges are the best way to strengthen and
further excel cordial relations, but
Regretting that the wider theater of
Southeastern Europe, and its National minorities and Diaspora in
Central Europe are very little known to each other, and therefore
Wishing to reverse this negative trend, thus
Determined to promote and enhance scientific
and socio-cultural research and cooperation of the two and their
wider regional interest, including that of the national minorities
(already established and those in making), all that
Based on the exchange of letter of intent and
statement of purpose, and
Embedded in the mutually expressed accord of
wills, consequently
Gesellschaft Bosnischer Akademiker in Österreich
(hereinafter referred to as "GBAA"), and the International
Institute for Middle-East and Balkan Studies (hereinafter
referred to as "IFIMES") are
Concluding the Memorandum of Understanding,
substantiating it as follows.
The signatories undisputedly agree that their
respective scientific and socio-cultural research and cooperation
shall be carried out through:
● Joint research projects in areas mutually agreed
upon as priorities;
● Exchange of experts, researchers, senior
practitioners, young talents (and the so-called ‘hidden champions’ –
less-known excellence);
● Exchange of views, standpoints and information
(social, economic, political, cultural, educational) of relevance
for the collaborative activities of the signatories (including the
best-practice exchange and transfer of research and event management
know-how);
● Joint conferences, round-table, symposia,
workshops, and other (public or targeted-audience) events;
● Other forms of scientific cooperation, including
joint publications, research studies, on-demand expertise and
feasibility studies for the governmental and private sector within
and beyond the two countries;
● By a prior notification either party can revoke,
terminate or suspend, or invite for an alternation or amendment (in
full or in parts) this Memorandum at any time without any further
due;
● The above stated cooperation will be pursued in
accordance with the positive legislation in force in the signatory
countries, Republic of Slovenia and Republic of Austria, all in
conformity with the standard EU rules and regulations.
Well-determined, the signatories will jointly
support, promote and enhance scientific and socio-cultural research
and cooperation between them as well as among the similar research
organizations within their respective countries and regions.
To this end, this Memoranda shall provide a framework
basis for any further arrangements between signatories, defining and
annotating future aspects of collaboration and eventual joint
undertakings.
Honorable but humble, authorized representatives of
the IFIMES and of the GBAA agree that a favorable atmosphere to
develop and excel cooperation in science and research has been
established for the lasting benefit of the two nations, their
respective institutions and wider regions, by today’s signature.
Ljubljana/Vienna, 16 February 2017
for IFIMES:
|
for GBAA: |

|
 |
Dr. Zijad Bećirović
Director |
Siradj Duhan
President |
June 18, 2017
Paris and Pittsburgh, pesticides in
Indonesia: When none is best
Julia Suryakusuma
Jakarta
| Wed, June 14 2017 | 01:22 am - Donald Trump famously said, “I was elected
to represent the people of Pittsburgh, not Paris,” when he announced the
withdrawal by the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement (PCA).
Pittsburgh is a city in the Rust Belt, which suffered from economic decline
due to deindustrialization. It was purportedly the Rust Belt that paved
Trump’s path to the presidency.
But what was the Pittsburgh mayor’s reaction? “We’re actually
with Paris on this.” In fact, the majority of Rust Belt states are also. It
just goes to show, climate change and global warming goes beyond politics
(although pssst! For your information, Pittsburgh did vote for
Clinton!).
Well, that’s the way it should be. If there’s one thing that
people have in common, it is that we all live on this one fragile, precious
planet. Another thing we have in common is that we all eat. In the
past 50 years, the number of people in the world has doubled, and so
obviously, so has food production. Modern agriculture has relied even more
on pesticides to get rid of pests and vermin which damage crops, but like
anything, too much of a “good thing” can be bad.
Pesticides are for crops like chemotherapy is for cancer: in
the same way that chemo kills the good cells in addition to the bad ones,
pesticides tend to kill organisms that weren’t intended to be killed.
Pesticides also affect the whole ecological system, leeching into the soil
and water, and poisoning birds, fish and other small animals.
And the effect of pesticides on humans? An entry in Toxipedia
says it has “neurological health effects
such as memory loss, loss of coordination, reduced speed of response to
stimuli, reduced visual ability, altered or uncontrollable mood and general
behavior, and reduced motor skills.” Thanks, but no thanks!
Recently I came
across a book called Krisis
Pangan dan ‘Sesat Pikir’: Mengapa Masih Berlanjut?
(Food Crisis and ‘Misguided Thinking”: Why does it still continue?”)
published last year, which addresses a very important issue: food production
in Indonesia.
Edited by Yunita T.
Winarto, professor of anthropology at the University of Indonesia (U.I.),
the anthology has eight chapters by six experts on topics ranging from
climate, insects, marginalized farmers and, yes, pesticides.
There were two
chapters on pesticides, one of them written by James J. Fox, professor
emeritus from the Australian National University (ANU) and Professor Yunita
from UI.
Jim, as he is
usually called, is an old friend of mine from the 1980s. When I knew him
then he was working among others to get rid of pesticides. He was lucky. He
got help from none other than President Soeharto himself.
Pak
Harto issued a presidential decree (Inpres No. 3/1986) on Nov. 5, 1985
banning the use of 57 varieties of pesticides in response to a serious
outbreak of brown planthopper infestation. At the time Indonesia had just
achieved rice self-sufficiency – a source of great national pride.
According to Jim in
his chapter, the Inpres had the immediate effect of reducing the brown
critters and more. The reduction of pesticides for rice cultivation resulted
in annual rice increases for 17 years from 1987 to 2002. Impressive!
As the lowest user
of pesticides in any developing country, Indonesia was a shining example of
effective biological control of pests for other countries. In any typical
sawah
(paddy field) there are 100 natural predators of threatening pests,
especially of brown planthoppers who breed like rabbits.
Unfortunately, all
good things come to an end. In 2002, there was a dramatic change in the
pesticide industry. Hundreds of local companies were established relying
heavily on supplies from China. Pesticides were promoted as
obat
(medicine) for growing crops, distributed by local agents to village kiosks
throughout Java.
Stunningly, in one
decade, from being one of the world’s lowest users of pesticides, Indonesia
became one of the highest. Brown grasshopper infestation became endemic on
Java. According to Jim and Yunita, “Twice in five years (2011 and 2014)
national rice production declined because of significant crop losses on
Java.”
What? Aren’t
pesticides supposed to get rid of the brown planthoppers? Here’s the irony:
The overuse of pesticides actually induces the population increase of
planthoppers by killing their natural predators. Oh no! Then there’s also
resistance: With each generation of pesticide, the planthoppers become more
resistant to the pesticides.
There were also rice
varieties that were resistant to brown planthoppers, but by 2011, Indonesia
had none. Shifting infestations became endemic.
Jim and Yunita did a
UI-ANU pesticide survey in the village of Indramayu in West Java to obtain
comprehensive data on farmers’ utilization of a range of pesticides. The
study is replete with scientific names of various types of pesticides,
fungicides and herbicides, which the farmers can’t distinguish. Given the
lack of control in the form of government licensing systems, for example,
the farmers are like kids in a candy shop, choosing between striking labels
and the existence of “new products,” which could actually be old products
with new labels. Does this sound like a familiar marketing ploy?
Other problems that
the UI-ANU study identifies are spraying intensity and pesticide cocktails.
The farmers believe that the more, the better, and just to be on the “safe
side,” why not mix all the different products into a cocktail? Sounds yummy
right? In a disastrous way.
What’s the politics
behind it all? Political reformation in 1998, which led to regional
autonomy. Inpres No. 3/1986 still exists and could be invoked, but it isn’t.
The existence of a variety of incentive schemes from the pesticide companies
certainly helped, in the same way that the 22 senators who urged Trump to
withdraw from the PCA over the past five years collectively received US$10
million in campaign contributions from oil, gas and coal industries.
Rice is a “political
commodity” and governments’ ability to guarantee rice production and supply
earns them the people’s trust. In fact, raising the target of rice
production is a main program of the Jokowi administration in 2014-2019. But
the reality is that the sawah
ecosystem on Java has now
become very vulnerable. This trend cannot be reversed until the “misguided
thinking” of the farmers and various interested parties is also reversed.
Given the recognized
global dangers of pesticides, two United Nations experts have called for a
comprehensive global treaty to regulate and phase out toxic pesticides. The
movement for organic sustainable farming is in fact growing.
Could this be an
opportunity for Indonesia to reclaim the Queen Bee status it once had for 17
years to lead this movement?

Julia
Suryakusuma is the outspoken Indonesian thinker, social-cause fighter and
trendsetter. She is the author of Julia’s Jihad.
(first published
by Jakarta Post)
June 16, 2017
COMMON
SENSE – A RELIC OF THE PAST?

By: Tomislav Jakic
Once upon a time, this is how fairy tales usually
begin. This is not a fairy tale, but once upon a time people used to talk
about common sense and to think based on common sense. It was never an ideal
time, but always when it seemed that the lack of common sense and the evil
in us would draw the world in the abyss of self-destruction, common sense
woke up and rebelled; most usually in combination with pragmatism. Mankind
paid dearly in the ensuing battle, it went through unbelievable horrors, but
eventually common sense would prevail. And so it went until the year 1990,
when the cold war ended. It was an extremely dangerous confrontation between
two, not only ideologically different blocks. The world peace was saved only
due to the fragile, but at the same time efficient balance of fear, namely
on the knowledge that an open armed confrontation would end without anybody
being victorious. But, as from the beginning of the last decade of the 20th
century, when East – West confrontation ended, due to the fact that the
Soviet block disintegrated, when the “dawn of democracy” begun shining on
countries, previously ruled with iron hand from one centre and by one and
only party and its repressive system, we are witnessing a constant and
steady downgrading in all sectors of life. Because of this and despite
democracy as a system, despite democratic forms and despite the multiparty
system, it is unavoidable that we put to ourselves the question: does common
sense belongs to the past, is t a relic of the past?
All indications point towards a positive
answer.
In international relations we are experiencing the
revival of the cold war, a new and with every day passing more dangerous
confrontation between the United States and the Russian Federation. In fact
it is nothing more than the almost desperate striving of neoliberal
capitalism to “rule the world”. In order to be able to achieve this goal, to
gain the support (of previously manipulated citizens, but – alas – in the
best democratic form) for the policy of expansionism, regardless of
anything, neoliberal capitalism needs an enemy. Because having an enemy is
the best way to homogenize one’s own flock. And the enemy was found, better
to say it was projected in the picture of Russia, although – and this is
ironic indeed – it is the democratic West that is today practicing the
policy of hegemony, once a trade mark of the Soviet Union. All basic
principles upon which the architecture of international relations was build,
are abandoned. Nobody even thinks of speaking about the principle of
equality, or the principle of not meddling in internal affairs of other
states, not to mention the right of every country and nation to develop as
they think it suits them best. In a globalised world, and we were made to
believe that only such a world could exist, everything must be “cooked
following the same recipe”. If this is not the case, with or without the
blessing of the UN and under the disguise of the war for democracy and for
human rights, bombers start their deadly missions, mercilessly killing those
whose human rights they are supposed to protect. Whole states are pushed
into chaos and internal fighting, whole regions are destabilized and heads
of states are killed (just remember Hillary Clinton and her words, when she
received the news that colonel Ghadafi was killed: “We came, we saw and he
is dead!”). At the same time for billions of dollars modern arms are being
sold to states whose record in the field of democracy and human rights is –
to put it mildly – very poor. But they are “ours”. With growing speed the
world is being divided between the ever smaller part of privileged and rich,
those who are governing not because they were democratically elected to do
so, but because they have the power to do so and the ever bigger part of
oppressed – in every sense – and poor, those who are being governed. While
thousands and thousands of people are dying from hunger in the undeveloped
countries, Europeans waste in one year so much food that every hungry human
being on this planet Earth could be fed. And the American President says
that climate changes and their evident results are just a hoax. Is there any
common sense in all this? No, there is none!
So, what can we expect, what is to be expected? Let
us put forward just two scenarios. The first is the armed confrontation
between East and West, be it direct, be it as a consequence of some action
of the unpredictable US President – amateur (for example a missile attack on
North Korea). In both cases the consequences would be disastrous, not to say
suicidal. The second scenario is slightly “milder”. It is based on the
presumption that the oppressed, the hungry and the poor would conclude that
they have nothing to lose, but their lives, and a tornado of revolution
would hit the whole world with a highly uncertain result. Indications that
are pointing towards this scenario we can detect in attacks whose
perpetrators are more and more often terrorizing the countries of the West.
While it is true that these attacks are – at least – disguised as being
religiously motivated, it is not less true that there is no religion that
could motivate suicide attackers, were it not for the basic and deeply
rooted feeling of being pushed to the margines of the society, of being
deprived of some basic rights, such as the right to be educated, the right
to be medically cared for, in short the right to live, as a human being, a
decent life.
There too we confront the results of a policy
without any common sense, a policy that recruited the oppressed, the poor,
but pathological killers too, trying to use them as an instrument for
achieving its goals, only to meet now the murderers it produced as its own
enemies. There can be no doubt about it – they, the terrorists, were
produced by the policy of the West, they were armed and supported thanks to
this policy – either directly, or through smaller countries, satellites of
the “big Brother” form the other side of the Atlantic. And now this same
policy is being confronted by them – globally. Still it will not, or cannot
accept the fact that the terrorists are the greatest danger for the world as
we knew it and that the fight against them should be the prime – and common
– target of our civilization. It will not, or cannot accept Russia as an
ally in this war; on the contrary it is continuing to present Russia as an
enemy (adversary), adding – if it seems to be suitable – Iran, North Korea
and sometimes China. Is there any common sense in all this? None whatsoever!
And is there some common sense in the policy of the
so called transition countries? Absolutely not! Former Soviet satellites
only changed their master, they became champions in the battle against the
(non existing) communism, because it suits the neoliberal capitalism for
which the very idea of communism is the worst imaginable enemy. At the same
time these countries are deeply engulfed in historic revisionism, “writing”
the new history of WW 2 and the Antifascists struggle, while “forgetting”
their collaboration with Nazi-fascism. Republic of Croatia, to name one
example, invented the formula about “all totalitarian regimes being equal
evil”, thus putting on the same level antifascism (labeled for this purpose
as communism) and fascism, while Republic of Serbia – just another example –
rehabilitates in court procedures the leaders of the Chetnik movement which
collaborated with the occupying forces during WW2 and fought against Marshal
Tito’s partisans.
The prevailing atmosphere in the world is one of
fear for the future, of growing intolerance, of hate not only towards those
who are in any way different, but towards those who dare to think
differently and to voice their opinion. In the creation of such an
atmosphere the once respected journalistic profession played a shameful
role. Not only the mainstream media, but social networks too are transformed
into a snake’s pit of intrigues, lies and disinformation servicing the
policy that forgot what common sense is.
The rest is silence.
June 8, 2017
The post-Christian West and post-Western
World
(Refeudalisation of
Europe – II Part)
Anis H. Bajrektarevic

While the Western world is increasingly post-Christian and cosmopolitan, its
Eastern sibling is trapped in a post-ideological bubble: strikingly
entrenched and enveloped in its neo-religionism. No wonder: Eastern European
communities on all their levels are using failed models of leadership. Too
many institutions are still mired in a narrative of past victimization, and
too many have no any mechanism for producing new leaders to serve true
national interests.
Currently, percentage of Eastern Europeans obtaining the foreign diplomas –
most notably those from the universities in Atlantic-Central Europe – that
are afterwards admitted to the higher echelons of their national
socio-economic, cultural and politico-military policy-making is higher than
even in sub-Saharan Africa (e.g. in the LDC, situated around Chad or
Victoria lakes or Horn of Africa). Their quantities and configurations
reveal us that the ‘elites’ in Eastern and Russophone Europe are among the
most unauthentic, least indigenous or less patriotically connected with its
electorate – probably a cleavage larger than anywhere else in the world.
That explains in detail why over the last two decades, the policies and
their protagonists in that region are so little responsive to a public
opinion.
Any research, which is not a pre-paid or guided by remote
control, is usually quickly denounced. E.g. debate about alarming de-industrialisation
and brain-drain is simply a no-go. Any independent
thinking must be condemned as a ‘radical nationalism’. As if the
emancipative democracy should be a lame talk-shop, not a pursuit of
happiness’ road-map.
Finally, East is sharply aged and depopulated –the worst of
its kind ever– which in return will make any future prospect of a full and
decisive generational interval simply impossible.
Is the Honduras-ization of Eastern Europe, in additional to
refeudalization, now taking place? This term refers to an operationalization
of XIX century Monroe Doctrine in Latin America, by which Washington ever
since allowed its strategic neighborhood to choose their own domestic
political and economic systems to an acceptable degree, while the US
maintained its final (hemispheric) say over their external orientation. The
so-called Brezhnev doctrine (of irreversibility of communist gains)
postulated the Soviet (Suslov-Stalin) equivalent to Honduras-ization – Finlandization. Hence, it is safe to say that the
Honduras-ization
of Eastern Europe nowadays is full and complete.
Thus, if the post-WWII Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe was overt and
brutal, this one is subtle but subversive and deeply corrosive?
The key (nonintentional) consequence of the post WWII Soviet occupation was
that the Eastern European states –as a sort of their tacit, firm but
low-tempered rebellion – preserved their sense of nationhood. However, they
had essential means at disposal to do so: the right to work was highly
illuminated in and protected by the national constitutions, so were other
socio-economic rights such as the right to culture, language, arts and
similar segments of collective nation’s memory. Today’s East, deprived and
deceived, silently witnesses the progressive metastasis of its national
tissue.
Terra nullius
Eastern Europe, the (under-)world of dramatic aging which, is additionally
demographically knocked down by the massive generational and brain drain.
Passed the dismantling of the communist order, these emerging economies,
countries in transition of the new Europe contain reactionary
forces (often glorifying the wrong side of history), predatory ‘elites’ and
masses of disillusioned (in a life without respect and dignity, humiliated
and ridiculed in the triviality of their lasting decline).
Even if the new jobs are created or old kept, they are in fact smoke
screens: Mostly a (foreign-loans financed) state-sponsored poverty programs
where armies of the underemployed and misemployed cry out miserable wages in
dead-end jobs. Clero-nationalism and ethno-chauvinism is therapeutically
offered as a replacement for a reasonable life-prospect.
Former Slovakian cabinet minister laments in private: “Our ‘liberated East’
lives on foreign loans, or in the best case as the industrial suburbia of
Western Europe, having these few ‘generously’ franchised factories like Renault,
VW or Hugo Boss. Actually, those are just automotive
assembly lines and tailor shops – something formally done only in the III
World countries. Apart from the Russian Energia-Soyuz (space-program
related) delivery system, what else do we have domestically created anywhere
from Bratislava to Pacific? Is there any indigenous high-end technical
product of past decades known? ... Our EU accession deals are worse than all
Capitulation agreements combined that the Ottomans and Imperial China
have ever signed in their history.”
His former Polish counterpart is even more forthcoming:
“Unexperienced and naďve as it was in 1990s, Eastern Europe – in shock of
sudden geopolitical change – foolishly embraced shock therapy
in lieu of a badly needed economic program… We failed to
understand that this destabilizing doctrine was simply a continuation of the
Milton Friedman’s experiment, which brought about one of the most notorious
dictatorships, of Pinochet in Chile, and then discharged its plague
elsewhere in Latin America, Middle East and Yeltsin’s obedient Russia. We
missed to make a comparative analysis and spot that this doctrine always
follows the same pattern in three stages: (i) the first impact of primary
destruction; (ii) ‘economic’ shock measures; (iii) their brutal enforcement,
along with an absence of any democratic debate… Implications are practically
irreversible reengineering that stretches far beyond our macroeconomic
fabrics. Consequences are socio-political, cultural, moral and demographic,
therefore existential…”
Ergo, euphemisms such as countries in transition or
new Europe cannot hide a disconsolate fact that Eastern Europe has been
treated for 25 years as defeated belligerent, as spoils of war which the
West won in its war against communist Russia.
It concludes that (self-)fragmented, deindustrialized and
re-feudalized, rapidly aged rarified and depopulated, (and de-Slavicized)
Eastern Europe is probably the least influential
region of the world – one of the very few underachievers. Obediently
submissive and therefore, rigid in dynamic environment of the promising 21st
century, Eastern Europeans are among last remaining passive
downloaders and slow-receivers on the otherwise blossoming stage of the
world’s creativity, politics and economy.
Persistent pauperization of the East is nothing else but a lasting
victimization of core sectors of the continent. That, in return, inevitable
leads to an accelerated (wealth, demographic and generational)
redistribution and hence a re-feudalization of the whole of Europe. Once the
black hole is formed, no star in proximity will ever prevail.
About the author:

Anis H. Bajrektarevic
Vienna, 01 MAY 2017
anis@corpsdiplomatique.cd
Author is chairperson and
professor in international law and global political studies, Vienna,
Austria. He authored three books: FB – Geopolitics of Technology
(published by the New York’s Addleton Academic Publishers); Geopolitics –
Europe 100 years later (DB, Europe), and
the just released Geopolitics – Energy – Technology by the
German publisher LAP. No Asian century is his forthcoming
book, scheduled for later this year.
June 6, 2017
2017
PUBLICATIONS
JULY, 2017:
REGIONAL SECURITY ARCHITECTURES: COMPARING ASIA AND EUROPE -
Insights from Anis Bajrektarevic
PUBLICATIONS
JUNE, 2017:
“We win, they lose” – Wonderful world of Binary categorisations - (Refeudalisation
of Europe – III Part) - Anis H. Bajrektarevic
Sarajevo, Jerusalem of Europe
Memorandum of Understanding between IFIMES and GBAA
Paris and Pittsburgh, pesticides in Indonesia: When none is best
- Julia Suryakusuma
COMMON SENSE – A RELIC OF THE PAST? - By: Tomislav Jakic
The
post-Christian West and post-Western World - (Refeudalisation of
Europe – II Part) - Anis H. Bajrektarevic
PUBLICATIONS
MAY, 2017:
Zbigniew Brzezinski & the Battle on Post Communism Fascism - By,
Ambassador Muhamed Sacirbey
Post-secular Europe and post-Soviet Russia - Anis H.
Bajrektarevic
The story of a Bosnian woman who lost her entire family to the
terror of the 1990s:“I feel like a cut tree. I am neither alive nor
dead … There is no justice and there will never be,” - Robert
Leonard Rope
'Schindler List' for Southeast Europe - Pakistanisation as the Final Solution for the Balkans? - Prof.
Zlatko Hadžidedić
Brazil in the short Strikes – the ultimate price
of welfare - By Luísa Monteiro
PUBLICATIONS
APRIL, 2017:
Pimp my s/ride - Ms. Elodie Pichon
SPIRITUALITY AND THE ECONOMY OF CLIMATE CHANGE - Anis H.
Bajrektarevic
Who Needs
Dysfunction in the Balkans? - Zlatko Hadžidedić
FATAL
SPIRALE OF SENSLESNESS - By: Tomislav Jakic
Neo-religionism
of the post ideological Russia (Refeudalisation of Europe – I Part)
- Anis Bajrektarevic
PUBLICATIONS
MARCH, 2017:
Saudi
king’s “Clash of Civilizations, convergence with Indonesia's
hypocrisy and opportunism - by Julia Suryakusuma
The World’s Last Colony: Morocco continues occupation of Western
Sahara, in defiance of UN - Nizar Visram
Culture as a binding factor in our society, interview with Camilla
Habsburg-Lothringen - By Djoeke Altena
ALL BREAKING BEDS OF OUR MOST FAVOURED AGGRESSOR - By Elodie Pichon
National
Congress of The Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina (NCR B&H) - March 2,
2017
Bosnian
precariat, militaristic world images and media cynicism - Senadin
Lavić
PUBLICATIONS
FEBRUARY, 2017:
SR15
Caspian Basin.pdf
THE
EMPIRE STRIKES BACK - By: Tomislav Jakić
Decriminalize
Victims, please - Sooyoung Hu
Big
data and the Future of Democracy - by Hannes Grassegger and Mikael
Krogerus
The
Malta Plan – a humane EU border and asylum policy is possible -
Gerald Knaus
PUBLICATIONS
JANUARY, 2017:
The
Diplomatic Insight JAN 2017.pdf
La-La-Land
of Central Asia Kazakhstan and its “Astana Code of Conduct” - By
Samantha Brletich
Donald
Trump, Nuclear Issue and Nuclear War -By: Markus Wauran
TRUMP’S
TURN - By Tomislav Jakić
Facing
the Trump Presidency – Will the Monroe doctrine finally die? -
Nicola Bilotta
Human
Misery monetized - By Aleksandra Krstic
Jakarta
Gubernatorial Election 2017: Who Will Be Eliminated? - By: Igor
Dirgantara
Battling
the Tiger: Combating corruption in the Sino-world - By Lingbo ZHAO
A
European swamp – corruption and human rights - Gerald Knaus
info@orbus.be
www.orbus.be

|












Maasmechelen Village

Maasmechelen Village


Adria


BALKAN AREA


prof. dr. Anis Bajrektarevic
Editor - Geopolitics, History, International Relations (GHIR) Addleton Academic
Publishers - New YorK
Senior Advisory board member, geopolitics of energy Canadian energy research
institute - ceri, Ottawa/Calgary
Advisory Board Chairman Modern Diplomacy & the md Tomorrow's people platform
originator
Head of mission and department head - strategic studies on Asia
Professor and Chairperson Intl. law & global pol. studies

Critical Similarities and Differences in SS of Asia and Europe - Prof.
Anis H. Bajrektarevic

MENA Saga and Lady Gaga - (Same dilemma from the MENA) - Anis H. Bajrektarevic

![Dr. Nguyen Anh Tuan, Assos. Prof.[1] Nguyen Linh[2]](images/Prof_Dr._Nguyen_Anh_Tuan_140.jpg)
HE ONGOING PUBLIC DEBT CRISIS IN THE EUROPEAN UNION: IMPACTS ON AND LESSONS
FOR VIETNAM - Dr. Nguyen Anh Tuan, Assos. Prof.[1] Nguyen Linh[2]


Carla BAUMER
Climate
Change and Re Insurance: The Human Security Issue SC-SEA Prof. Anis
Bajrektarevic & Carla Baumer

Igor Dirgantara
(Researcher and Lecturer at the Faculty of Social and Politics,
University of Jayabaya)


Peny Sotiropoulou
Is
the ‘crisis of secularism’ in Western Europe the result of multiculturalism?


Dr. Emanuel L. Paparella
A Modest “Australian” Proposal to Resolve our Geo-Political Problems
Were the Crusades Justified? A Revisiting - Dr. Emanuel L. Paparella


Alisa
Fazleeva
Earned an MA in International Relations from the University of East
Anglia in Norwich, United Kingdom in 2013. Her research interests include
foreign policy decision-making, realism and constructivism, and social
psychology and constructivism.


Corinna Metz
She
is an independent researcher specialized in International Politics and Peace
& Conflict Studies with a regional focus on the Balkans and the Middle East.

Patricia Galves
Derolle
Founder of Internacionalista
Săo Paulo, Brazil
Brazil – New Age


Dimitra Karantzeni
The
political character of Social Media: How do Greek Internet users perceive and
use social networks?


Michael Akerib
Vice-Rector
SWISS UMEF UNIVERSITY


Petra Posega
is a master`s degree student on the University for Criminal justice and Security
in Ljubljana. She obtained her bachelor`s degree in Political Science- Defense
studies.
Contact:
posegap@live.com


Samantha Brletich,
George Mason University School of Policy, Government, and
Intl. Relations She focuses on Russia and Central Asia. Ms. Brletich is an
employee of the US Department of Defense.

Interview on HRT-Radio
Prof. dr. Anis Bajrektarević


Dr Filippo ROMEO,


Julia Suryakusuma
is the outspoken Indonesian thinker,
social-cause fighter and trendsetter. She is the author of Julia’s Jihad.
Contact:
jsuryakusuma@gmail.com


Gerald Knaus


Mads Jacobsen
Mads is an intern at PCRC. Mads Jacobsen is from Denmark and is currently
pursuing his Master's degree in 'Development and International Relations' at
Aalborg University...


Dzalila Osmanovic-Muharemagic
University of Bihac, Faculty of Education,
Department of English Language and Literature - undergraduate
University of Banja Luka, Faculty of Philology, Department of English Language
and Literature - graduate study


Rakesh Krishnan Simha
New Zealand-based journalist and foreign affairs analyst. According to him, he
writes on stuff the media distorts, misses or ignores.
Rakesh started his career in 1995 with New Delhi-based Business World magazine,
and later worked in a string of positions at other leading media houses such as
India Today, Hindustan Times, Business Standard and the Financial Express, where
he was the news editor.
He is the Senior Advisory Board member of one of the fastest growing Europe’s
foreign policy platforms: Modern Diplomacy.


Damiel Scalea
Daniele Scalea, geopolitical
analyst, is Director-general of IsAG (Rome Institute of Geopolitics) and Ph.D.
Candidate in Political studies at the Sapienza University, Rome. Author of three
books, is frequent contributor and columnist to various Tv-channels and
newspapers. E-mail:
daniele.scalea@gmail.com


Alessio Stilo,
Research Associate at Institute of High
Studies in Geopolitics and Auxiliary Sciences (IsAG), Rome, Italy, and Ph.D.
researcher at University of Padova, is IMN Country Representative in Italy.


Tomislav Jakić
Foreign Policy Advisor to former Croatian
President Stjepan Mesić


Zlatko Hadžidedić
Graduate of the London School of Economics,
prof. Zlatko Hadžidedić is a prominent thinker,
prolific author of numerous books, and indispensable political figure of the
former Yugoslav socio-political space in 1990s, 2000s and 2010s.


Mr. Nicola Bilotta
Nicola Bilotta has a BA and a MA
in History from Universitŕ degli Studi di Milano and a MSc in Economic History
from the London School of Economics. He works as a Global Finance Research
Assistant at The Banker (Financial Times) and collaborates as an external
researcher at ISAG (Istituto di Alti Studi di Geopolitica e Scienze Ausiliari)
N_bilotta@lse.ac.uk


Markus Wauran
Date and Place of Birth: April 22, 1943 – Amurang,
North Sulawesi, IndonesiaEducation: Bachelor in Public
Administration.
Writer was a member of the House of Representatives
of Indonesia (DPR/MPR-RI) period of 1987-1999, and Chairman of
Committee X, cover Science and Technology, Environment and National
Development Planning (1988-1997).
Currently as Obsever of Nuclear for peace.


Sooyoung Hu
Attached to the US-based Berkeley University,
Sooyoung Hu is a scholar at its Political Science and Peace and Conflict
Studies Department. Miss Hu focuses on international relations, international
organizations and its instruments.


Senahid LAVIĆ


Nizar Visram
Nizar
Visram
is a Ottawa-based free-lance writer from Zanzibar, Tanzania.
Recently retired Senior lecturer on Development studies, he extensively
publishes in over 50 countries on 4 continents. He can be reached at
nizar1941(at)gmail.com
.


Robert Leonard Rope
He studied at the University of
Michigan,
He lives in: San Francisco, California: San Francisco, California, USA

|