From one election to another

This week has seen an election in a country that likes to be perceived as the world's foremost democracy, now on to another election in a country that is commonly perceived as one of the least democratic countries. Burma is ruled by an undemocratic military regime, that has used violence and undemocratic measures to suppress and imprison the opposition. The most famous examples would be Aung San Suu Kyi who has been place in house arrest since 1989 and the recent (2007) protests of the monks. Many monks where shot or imprisoned, and today their democratic movement is living a life outside the spotlight in one of the world's most closed countries. The military regime is backed by China, Burma's most important trade partner, that is blocking UN resolutions against Burma. 

On Sunday an election will be held, however the party that won the last election will not participate. National League for Democracy won 392 out of 485 chairs in the parliament in 1990, but the parliament was never assembled and the military regime took the power instead. Participating in the election would mean they have to accept the constitution that is giving all power to the military and it would also entail kicking Aung San Suu Kyi out of the party.

The outcome of the election is quite clear, very little will change and the need for outside intervention seems obvious...

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The Sphinx and the Egyptians

The mythical sphinx of Giza was constructed around 2500 BC by the Egyptian Pharao Khafra. Some theories is giving credit for building the Sphinx to Khafra's father, Khufu, or his half brother, Djedefre. It has now lost its nose and beard; especially the beard is quite characteristic for Egyptian Pharao depictions. Later on walls were constructed around the Sphinx to protect it from flying sand that would erode the statue.

New theories claim that the Sphinx was not originally constructed with a human head, but rather that of a lion or of the Jackal-Dog Anubis, God of the Necropolis.This is partly based on the proportions of the statue; the body is long and the head is quite small. Thus it is believe that the head used to be larger and has carved out of the original head.

One controversy based partly on the appearance of the Sphinx is about the race of the ancient Egyptians, some archaeologists/historians claim that the head has typical characteristics of a black African. This is obviously hard to determine after thousands of years of erosion. Also many paintings show black Egyptians from this time, and it has been proposed that the view of the Egyptians as rather light-skinned is a result of European racism during the earlier days of egyptology. Many however believe that the people of the ancient Egyptian civilization were not homogeneous, but rather mix with influences from several cultural and geographical areas. This make this controversy rather pointless, if not to discover the origins of the first inhabitants of the Egyptian Nile area and founders of the ancient civilization. Egypt is located in the crossroads between the African continent and the Middle East, and it is not unlikely that the population then, as it is now, was quite diverse.

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The result

In the end it seems the Democrats keep their majority in the Senate (counting two independents who caucus with the Democrats), however in the House of Representatives the Republican party will get a quite clear majority. This leaves us in a position where the Republicans have gained influence, and the Democrats have seen their room to maneuver decreased. Thus increased regulations on the financial markets may be hard to push through, at least as the Democrats has envisioned it. 

As for the Tea party candidates results are mixed, as expected you win some and loose some. Exact numbers should be available should be available soon.

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Pyongyang Bob strikes again

North Korea has now released an official statement concerning the torpedo that sunk a South Korean ship in March and killed 46 soldiers. As suspected the North Korean official standpoint is that it was not their torpedo, since it was supposedly made out of aluminum and all North Korean torpedoes are made from steel. They have even offered to send a torpedo to South Korea as "proof". As always, it is hard to trust Kim Jong-Il on this issue.

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Midterm Elections

Today Americans are voting in the midterm elections. The Republican party is expected to increase their influence, and the Tea Party movement is expected to gain influence as well. Elections for the congress is every two years; the Congress is the legislative body of the US government.The Congress is made up of two chambers: the Senate, to which members are elected for six-year terms; and the House of Representatives, whose members are elected for two-year terms. Meaning that all the 435 House seats will be filled by the will of the people now in November. Also around one one-third of the Senate is also elected, this year 37 senators will be elected or re-elected.

It is expected that the Republicans will get a majority of the chairs in the House of Representatives, the Senate seem to harder to predict and more uncertain. What is quite clear however is that this election will force president Obama to negotiate more with the Republicans and compromises will have to be made. The most pressing issue is obviously the strained economy, an area where compromises will be hard since the parties are quite far apart.

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Disputed land

Tension is building up between Japan and Russia after president Medvedev's visit to the Kuril islands. The Kuril islands are around 50 islands outside the eastern coast of Russia and north of Japan. After the Japanese surrender in World War II the Soviet Union annexed the four southernmost islands that previously belonged to Japan. Because of this issue there has been no official peace between Russia/Soviet Union and Japan following WWII. This is however disputed by Japan. In this context Medvedev's visit was a clear sign from Moscow that these islands are to be considered Russian ground and it not up for negotiation. This stop was made on his trip to the meeting of Southeast Asian nations the coming weekend.

Whether or not this should be seen as a sign of a Russian expansionistic and nationalistic movement is still unclear. The San Francisco Peace Treaty between the Allied Powers and Japan from 1951 states that Japan must give up all claims to the Kuril islands, but it also does not recognize the Soviet Union's sovereignty over the Kuril Islands.

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Biological diversity

Friday evening in Nagoya, Japan, a new treaty on biological diversity was signed by almost 200 nations. Finally some positive signals in international environmental work can be seen, even though the treaty is a compromise. The overall purpose is to reduce the loss of biodiversity over the coming 10 years.

The treaty contains an agreement on how to compensate nations for use of domestic "genetic resources", for example if a new pharmaceutical is developed from a medicinal plant. This is significant since many of these potential medinical plants exist in developing countries, whereas the companies using them are mainly from industrialised countries. 

Furthermore, it contains an agreement about protection of 17% of the land area and 10% of the ocean area on a national level. This was reduced from the proposed 20% and 15%.

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