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Bungling US Bully shoots itself in the foot
Editorial Comment: Financial Times. UK
07/04/03: (Financial Times) Bullying is reprehensible in any circumstances. But simultaneously shooting oneself in the foot looks like incompetence. Regrettably, ham-fisted tactics by George W. Bush's administration have in the past few days achieved that feat in two separate areas of foreign relations. The first is suspension this week of US military aid to some 50 countries that refuse to exempt American forces from possible prosecution by the International Criminal Court. Washington has opposed the body from the start: the Clinton administration voted against its creation in 1998, even though it would pursue war criminals only if national courts did not act. Under Mr Bush, hostility has reached new heights. Not content with obtaining safeguards for US participants in United Nations peacekeeping operations, the US is pressing individual countries to agree not to hand over American citizens to the ICC or risk losing US military aid. European Union members and a few other countries have won special dispensation after standing firm against that threat. So now Washington is picking on other, mostly weaker and poorer, states. One is Colombia, the third largest recipient of US aid. Although most US funding for combating the country's drug barons will continue, Colombia stands to lose as much as $100m (£60m) annually in military aid. But the main casualty is set to be American commercial interests: most of the aid is used to train a Colombian army unit to protect a pipeline operated by Occidental Petroleum, a US company, that has been repeatedly blown up by terrorists. The second US own goal is its slap in the face last week to Egypt. After vaunting the country as the linchpin of US plans for a Middle East free trade area, intended to mend fences in the region, Washington dashed its hopes of an early bilateral free trade agreement. The official reason was Egypt's flagging economic reforms. But the decisive one was its refusal to back the US case in the World Trade Organisation against the European Union's moratorium on genetically modified foods. Washington has made clear from the start that it will do free trade deals only with countries that support its broad foreign policy goals. That pre-condition is already dubious. But forcing Egypt to take sides in a completely unrelated dispute between the world's biggest trade powers is shameful. It suggests the "freedom" that other countries gain from trade deals with the US is to do whatever Washington demands - even when it cannot make up its mind what it wants to achieve. That is a dangerous message from a country that is badly in need of friends - above all in the Middle East - after the Iraq war. It can only undermine trust in the US. If Washington is to repair the damage done by its behaviour towards the ICC and Egypt, it needs to ditch strong-arm tactics, get some coherent policies and start engaging in constructive diplomacy. |
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