← From Our Own Correspondent
From Our Own Correspondent
Dec 17, 2011
00:28:00
The polar bear's back in the news - this time it's at the centre of controversy in a...
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- [00:00]
Kate Adie
Hello, this is the from our own
- [00:02]
Chris Morris
correspondent office in Bush House in London. We also make editions of the programme
- [00:06]
Kate Adie
for the BBC World Service, but you've
- [00:08]
Chris Morris
downloaded the latest Radio 4 programme.
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Kate Adie
It's presented by Kate Ady Today.
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Narrator/Presenter
Crisis? What crisis? In Germany, the problems of the eurozone are set aside as the festive season gets into full swing. The Indian authorities are being asked about thousands of unmarked graves in the mountains of Kashmir. Revolution gives a new look to Libya. But not everything, it seems, has changed. And why? It's a time of mourning in the Paris bookshop, where the authors don't just sell their books, they eat and sleep there too. There have been further grim warnings that the countries of Europe shouldn't fall out over plans to rescue the Eurozone. Don't argue over this, said Mario Monti, the new Italian prime Minister. We all need to work together. The head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde, says the debt crisis can't be solved by Europe alone. She maintains all countries have to cooperate to avoid a 1930s style depression. The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, told her parliament finding a solution would take years and there would be setbacks along the way. But the end result, she insisted, would be a stronger Europe. Chris Morris says the German people don't seem too concerned about their position within the eurozone.
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Chris Morris
Crisis? What crisis? There's no sense of the eurozone falling apart. At Frankfurt's Christmas market, the cobbled streets are full of people drinking Gluwein, apple wine, champagne and hot chocolate. There are sweetmeats, nuts, wooden toys and the biggest sausage stall I've ever seen, a veritable bratwurst bonanza. The stalls are decked out like mountain huts. There are decorations and lights everywhere, and solid prosperity seems to ooze from every pore. People don't feel the crisis here, says Berndt, who works in investment banking. He's standing in a queue to buy, inevitably, a sausage sandwich. Unemployment is at its lowest level in decades, he points out. We feel prosperous, and it's almost like the crisis is taking place elsewhere outside Germany. That may not be entirely true, he admits, but it often feels that way. The centrepiece of the market, alongside an enormous nativity scene, is a wonderful old carousel. People clamber on and simply go for a spin. Couples giggling like children, an elderly lady wearing an immaculate red coat and a man clutching a briefcase smiling to himself as he sits in a small carriage. They all look rather like they haven't got a care in the world. Tis truly the season of good cheer. Fast forward a few days and another Christmas market, this time in Brussels. And surprise, surprise, it's pouring with rain. Just off Place Catherine, famous for its fish restaurants. Next to a church covered in scaffolding, is the area reserved for the guest of honour. And in the best festive, Eurozone crisis solidarity style this year, the guest of honour is Greece. Bunting with blue and white Greek flags is draped rather limply between lamp posts. There's a solitary kebab man and billboard adverts for yellow sands and blue seas. Rain is dripping off the awnings of a few Greek food stalls. And here the carousel isn't actually moving. It is quite an impressive sight, though. Sort of Jules Verne Phantasmagoria meets Mad Max. Almost as terrifying as Greek debt. I think China was going to be the guest of honour originally, said Emmanuel, as we huddled under an umbrella. The mayor of Brussels changed it because I think he felt sorry for Greece. We were standing next to Emmanuel's stall, sipping racamello, a liqueur from Crete sweetened with honey and spices. It was all done at the last minute, he said, but we have to export something. We need all the help we can get that they do. 2012 will be a tough year for Greece and all the countries who've had to implement many years of painful austerity measures.
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Jill McGivering
But.
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Chris Morris
But will Germany sail on regardless? If there's one thing that has struck me time and again during my year of covering the crisis surrounding the Eurozone, it's that the solution lies in Germany. But no one seems to have been entirely honest with German voters yet. I do have quite a bit of sympathy with the argument in Berlin that countries which have spent beyond their means now need to make the greatest efforts to put things right. But there is another side to the story, because the mirror image of massive debts in Greece or Italy are the huge trade surpluses which have fueled German success. So the Club Med Southern countries need to export more, a lot more, than a few Greek food stalls at a Belgian Christmas market. And they need to become more competitive compared to the Germanic north. A few years ago, they could have done that by devaluing their currency, but now, of course, they all use the same one. So how else to dig their way out of the debt hole? Well, massive wage deflation seems to be the preferred option at the moment, but it will have to last for years and it may well prove to be politically unsustainable. Would you vote to make yourself poorer and poorer and poorer? Which leaves option three. Alongside austerity and strict budget discipline in the south, it seems to me that Germany will have to accept that its economy will change too, either by taking on more guarantees for the debts of other countries, or by consuming more of the products those countries produce. Prices may have to rise a little. Whisper it softly. But slightly higher. Inflation may have to be part of the solution. Either that or the eurozone may have to break apart, losing a couple of countries along the way with unpredictable consequences for all. Will the good people of Frankfurt or Hamburg or Berlin heed this rather uncomfortable Christmas message? I'm not sure what the German for bar humbug is, but I think it might sum up their response, and that's
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Narrator/Presenter
Chris Morris in Brussels. Thousands of unmarked graves have been discovered in Indian Kashmir, a legacy of decades of conflict in the region. A government human rights organisation is calling on the Indian authorities to identify those buried there and find out who killed them. Jill McGivering says some believe many of the dead were innocent civilians. The security forces maintain they were foreign militants killed in fighting with their troops.
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Jill McGivering
Bilkis is a sweet faced young woman in her early 20s, with a shy smile and warm brown eyes. We sit cross legged on the floor against Kashmiri cushions as she serves me sweet milky tea and biscuits. Large photographs of her father dominate the room. Bilkis doesn't strike me as someone who cries easily, but at times as she tells her story, she fingers the hem of her green headscarf nervously and blinks away tears. She was a schoolgirl of just 13 when she says the army raided their house one night and took away her father. That was almost 10 years ago. Since then, she's been battling through the courts, trying to force the army to explain why he was arrested and and what's happened to him since. Her father is one of thousands of people who simply disappeared. In more than 20 years of conflict, I've met mothers searching for sons, wives left without husbands, children without fathers. The government says these missing people probably crossed over to Pakistani Kashmir to become militants, joining the long running insurgency against India. But some local people have a more sinister explanation. They say the empty spaces in their families represent innocent victims abducted, perhaps killed, either by militants or by India's security forces themselves. It's a long, winding drive up to Bimyar, a village high in Kashmir's mountains, which are rocky and sharp with shadow. The wind whips across scrub. I meet Ata Mohammed, an elderly man with a short grey beard and eyes which seem haunted by sights no one should see. He shows me low mounds of disturbed earth by the roadside, an undulating patch of stony ground studded with fresh grass. In the last two decades, he's buried 235 unidentified bodies here. He tells me they were brought by the police, sometimes at night. Most were young men killed by bullet wounds. Some were mutilated or bore the marks of torture. One was a six month old baby girl. It's just one of many places where silent, anonymous burials were carried out by men who until recently, have been too afraid to speak. India's security forces say these dead men are foreign militants who crossed over from Pakistan and died in clashes with border troops. Human rights groups say they could be missing civilians, the victims of abductions and unlawful killings by the security forces. I have been coming to Indian Kashmir for more than a decade. In the summer capital, Srinagar, I met the same separatist leaders as before in the same neat gardens. As I sipped tea with them, I felt the echo of my previous visits through the years and time seemed oddly suspended. Mist still hangs low over Dar Lake and its array of mostly deserted houseboats. Most houses, crowded and crooked along narrow streets, still look dilapidated. But this time, one change has struck me. The presence of India's security forces feels much less oppressive than before. Fewer roadblocks, fewer body searches, a fractional easing of tension. It's a fragile and superficial peace. Just last year, more than a hundred people died in street protests. But today everyone agrees that there's less militancy now. And a narrow space has opened up in which the horrors of the past 20 years are, however haltingly being discussed. For India, this is a front line in the broader battle against Pakistan. Both giant neighbours claim the Kashmir region. I travel high into the mountains to the very limit of India's presence. Here, on a bleak summit, Indian soldiers, fresh faced and far from their families, stand behind sandbag walls and train their binoculars on similar Pakistani positions. In the gorge between, mountain eagles ride currents of air. A newly erected barbed wire fence unrolls across the scenery. It's hard to imagine these personable young soldiers as villains, especially while they're serving me Kashmiri tea and snacks and chatting about the hardships on the mountaintop once winter sets in. Their duty is to protect India from incursions. As for allegations of human rights abuses, their commander dismisses these as nonsense. Some families say these things for money, he told me. So who are the unknown dead in these unmarked graves? Everyone has an opinion. No one really knows. For Bilkes, still searching for her father, the uncertainty is painful. She's willing to have a DNA test in case that helps to identify her father's remains. If he is buried there, she says. At least we could pray for his soul. But it's also clear that she doesn't yet accept that her father may be dead. She told me quietly, I live my life in the hope that one day he'll come home.
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Narrator/Presenter
Jill McGivering and you can hear more about her investigation in Kashmir in next week's crossing continents on Radio 4 on Thursday morning, there have been demonstrations against Libya's new rulers. In the eastern city of Benghazi, the leader of the National Transitional Council, Abdel Jalil, was criticized for a lack of transparency and for going easy on supporters of the former dictator Colonel Gaddafi. The protests are further evidence that the Libyan revolution is still an unfinished one. With the country making its way through a period of transition, a new government is being formed and there's an ambitious timetable in place for democratic elections. Tariq Kafala, who was born in Libya and lived there until he was 10, has just been back for the first time in 30 years. There are signs of change all around, he says, but much that's familiar, too.
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Kate Adie
Wishwasha is one of those perfect Libyan words. It refers to people who inform on you to the secret police. The word is onomatopoeic. If you say it just right, with your hand shielding your mouth, it sounds like malicious whispering. The word has not always meant informer. For older Libyans, it still means mosquito. Fear of the wish washer is gone now. People come and go, meet and talk, criticise, complain and gossip with glee. By one count, In Tripoli alone, 500 civil society groups have been set up. Political parties, pressure groups, newspapers and magazines, environmental groups and even an animal welfare society. Everyone who is anyone is convening a conference to address some pressing ill. All this politics is exciting and chaotic. Two of the conferences I attended ended in techy disarray, as debate turned to argument and then boiled over into shouting. At times, Libyans seemed drunk on their new freedoms. Not everyone is thrilled with the makeup of the new government, but many people I spoke to are proud that they have a government and that the ministers can be seen nightly on TV answering hostile questions and being hassled into doing something about what matters to them. I anxiously watched the Libyan uprising at a distance from England. The protest turned almost immediately into a war, with terrible acts committed on both sides and eventually the bloody drama of Muammar Gaddafi's end. It took only nine months to undo four decades of rule by a family often referred to now as the mafia. But the fighting opened up existing fault lines in Libya and of Course, where some Libyans are triumphant, others have been left vanquished, destitute and scattered. And there are so many armed men everywhere you look. Guns. One of the most startling and immediate effects of the revolution is to sweep away all signs, on the surface at least, of Gaddafi himself. He was a vain man and his image and slogans were everywhere. The only place you see them now is in the gaudy graffiti he's often depicted suffering another gruesome death. Names are being changed, too. A huge tower in downtown Tripoli used to be known as Fatah Tower, in honour of the revolution that brought Gaddafi to power. Now it is Tripoli Tower. Green Square in the center of the city is now Martyrs Square. There seems to be a plan to change Algeria Place into Qatar Place. Algeria offered no backing during the uprising, as far as the revolutionaries were concerned, while Qatar was actively supportive. There's talk of a Nicolas Sarkozy Avenue. France was the first government to recognize the National Transitional Council in Benghazi. That's another key word for the new Libya. Everything is run by council these days. The old regime was very fond of committees. Then there are the inevitable ironies of revolutions. The current government is doing its work from the building that once held the General People's Committee, the body that ostensibly governed the country. While in Tripoli, I went on pilgrimages to some of the significant sites from my childhood. The golf club is now gone completely. It lost the golf course before I was born, but retained the name, the clubhouse and a wonderful stretch of beach where most of our summer holidays were spent. A few years ago, someone in power decided to level the clubhouse and dump the rubble on the beach, leaving a huge mess that scars the seafront. To this day, however, my school, then the American Oil Company school, was still there, barely changed, but a little shabby. It has the same rows of lockers, the same classrooms separated by little lawns, the same furniture, covered walkway, the gym exactly as they were, but for a few coats of paint. I visited Kafala Alley, a short, narrow street on the edge of Tripoli's ruined old city that once housed my father's extended family. As a boy, he lived in a classic Libyan home. Three floors with small windowless rooms opening out onto a central courtyard. And the home where I grew up in a newer part of Tripoli is still there, weathered and worn, lived in by some former army general who won't move out. I peered through the gate into the garden. The curtains in my old bedroom window were drawn closed. Now that my wife and family are finally going to get to visit Libya, I'M going to teach my kids some more essential Arabic. And that annoying thing that buzzes around your ear just as you're about to fall asleep will definitely be a wishwasha. We're going to reclaim the word.
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Narrator/Presenter
That's Tarek Kafala. The polar bear usually manages to get on with life without causing too much controversy. Not this year, though. Not only has the furry beast been at the centre of a BBC row involving the frozen planet programme, it's also causing heated debate on the other side of the Atlantic. That's about a suggestion that Canada ditch its national symbol, the beaver, and replace it with the far more imposing polar bear. Lorraine Malinder in Montreal says the debate shows many Canadians believe their country's become a tougher place. And it's time for an image makeover.
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Lorraine Mallinder
Beaver or polar bear. This is the stark choice Canadians face as they rethink how they want to present themselves to the rest of the world. It all started when a Conservative senator dissed the beaver. Canada's official emblem since the 70s. The dentally defective rat, as she called it, was deemed yesterday's animal. Cue lots of puns about gnawing fears and whether the nation should give a damn. The polar bear, she claimed, would better reflect the spirit of the nation. The debate could be summed up as the beaver, humble and industrious, represents Canada's colonial past, an era when hardy pioneers schlepped through the wilderness in search of fur for fashionable Europeans. It was the relentless pursuit of beaver fur that drove Canada's early expansion. A bygone era. Cried detractors. Besides, as one columnist put it, Canadians are tired of being perceived as a nation of apologetic fur trappers. The polar bear, on the other hand, is a majestic creature. In the words of Canada's national anthem, it's the defender of the true north, strong and free. Despite its cuddly appearance, it is no cutie. Rather a ruthless predator at the top of the food chain. One of life's winners. A bully. Cries Team Beaver. Though the earnest protests are drowned out by the roaring bears, the debate has set fur flying across the country. But beneath the comedy, there are some serious undertones. Canada, for so long seen as a country of moderate beaver types, has actually been undergoing an identity makeover for a few years now under the Conservative government of Stephen Harper. Many believe it's becoming a much harder place. Witness the government's increased military spending, the staunch defence of the highly polluting tar sands industry, the reduced funding for arts programs, the super prisons proposed under tough new crime laws, the steely determination to defend and exploit the country's Arctic territory. The polar bear poised to see off Russian interlopers. The change of tone is reflected in the media landscape. Three quarters of the country's newspapers endorsed the Conservatives in this year's federal election. This year also saw the launch of the Sun News Network, a tough talking television channel with the self professed aim of combating the political correctness of the so called lame stream media. Everyone knew they referred to the cbc, the nation's public broadcaster often derided as a hotbed of bleeding heart liberals. But even the CBC itself is shriller than it used to be. The network's leading hockey commentator was recently the subject of a national scandal when he called players a bunch of pukes for speaking out against violence in the game. And one pugnacious TV presenter raised eyebrows when he called a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist a left wing nut bar for his views on Occupy Wall Street. Not very Canadian, all this. But what does being Canadian mean? To find the answer, it might be worth going back to the era of Pierre Elliot Trudeau. First elected in the late 60s, the country's long serving prime minister led idealistic campaigns for world peace and nuclear disarmament, dropped in on John Lennon and Yoko Ono during their Montreal bed in and was friendly with Fidel Castro. Charismatic and unconventional, he was once photographed pirouetting in Buckingham palace as other guests greeted Queen Elizabeth. Trudeau may not have been a typical Canadian, yet people believe he represented the best of Canada. Perhaps more importantly, he was a free thinker whose policies were often at odds with those of Canada's southern neighbour. Ah, the US of A. It can't be easy having such a big, powerful country next door, particularly one represented by a bird of prey. Eagles eat beavers for breakfast. Little wonder so many Canadians are turning to the polar bear. They're fed up of being seen as a poor man's America, a nation of people who apologise when bumped into. It's enough to make you turn passive aggressive, which Canadians are often accused of being, by the way. But in retiring the beaver, would the country not risk losing the very qualities that make it unique? Canada may not be the most assertive of nations, but it's appreciated for its quiet virtues, its sense of fair play, its ability to compromise, its open mindedness and its generosity. In a world of eagles, bears, dragons and other fearsome beasts, surely we need more, not less, of the beaver.
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Narrator/Presenter
Lorraine Mallender in Montreal. Hundreds of people are expected to gather on Thursday next week for the funeral in Paris of bookstore Owner George Whitman. His shop, Shakespeare Co. In the Latin Quarter, across the Seine from Notre Dame, doesn't just sell books. It's long been a literary hub, a writer's refuge, a tourist destination in its own right. He'll be buried at the Pere Lachaise cemetery in the company of other literati like Apollinaire Collette, Oscar Wilde and Balzac. And afterwards, it'll be back to the shop for champagne and chat. Christine Finn, who was working there a few weeks back, tells us there'll be no shortage of tales to tell.
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Christine Finn
George Whitman made his money selling books, but he never forgot what he owed to those authors. His bookstore was a refuge for them. Over the decades, thousands of writers have given him their time in exchange for a few hours or even longer, with kindred spirits at the bookshop. Whitman's dictum was, give what you can, take what you need. A few lines of W.B. yeats are painted on the wall. Be not inhospitable to strangers, they say, lest they be angels in disguise. Visiting authors and students were able to work here, sleep amidst its piles of books and soak up its unique literary atmosphere. A few weeks ago, before George Whitman's death, I talked to his daughter Sylvia about joining those ranks of writer volunteers. Not long after, I stepped into the warm glow of Shakespeare and Co. And this is a section to do with Paris. The Irish lilt of Linda at the counter starts my grand tour of the bookshelves. It's a grey Monday morning, not a time when you'd expect many people around, but already the store is buzzing with bibliophiles. It was named after one which used to stand not far away, also by the River Seine, a gathering place for the likes of James Joyce and Ernest Hemingway. That Shakespeare and Company was owned by a woman called Sylvia Beach. George Whitman named his own daughter Sylvia after her. Whitman, reputed to be the grand nephew of the American poet Walt Whitman, had his own radical friends in Paris. The work of these 1950s beat poets occupies not just a section, but a whole glass case in the shop. Sylvia took over the reins a few years ago, and as some wondered whether the E book would come to replace its paper and ink counterpart, she took Shakespeare and Company online to promote its events and history. The virtual book seemed not to matter. As ever, it was all about just being there. Linda guides me on past poetry and modern fiction sections and on through a series of tiny rooms which have the feel more of a library than a commercial enterprise. Whitman described them as being like the chapters of a novel I study walls papered with news cuttings and postcards, and walk up the stairs through plays and playwrights to the hallowed upper floor and where Sylvia Beecher's own library sits in a room now used for events. Amid the hush I hear a familiar tack tat tat dunk and a glimpse into a cosy writer's cave reveals someone sitting at an old portable typewriter at a desk and shelves laden with well thumbed books about how to get published. The only other sound, apart from the typing and the conversation, comes from a piano on which customers sometimes get carried away. Its nice, says Linda. The sound carries downstairs to the tills. She then gives me the science fiction and fantasy section to sort. Putting the books into some kind of order is a strangely comforting task. Conversations continue around me. A woman is flouting the Please no photography notice, directing a mobile phone photo shoot in the history section. No, she instructs, I want that shelf to be in it. Someone else is seeking advice on a good title for a book club reading, which results in a lively dialogue about international authors. I become fascinated by the role of the bookstore assistant. In my hands, sundry titles are unearthed from darker corners of the shop. Putting them into the few gaps I find in the shelves means I'm bringing them and their authors into the light. On the stairs, another volunteer is gamely trying to organise her section, precariously lunging with piles of books which, between people going up and down, we smile as a light bulb glows in the crime section, leaving it in mysterious darkness. The light restored, a so called mirror of love is revealed upstairs, its surface covered with notes and billets, doux, love poems and declarations. Here you can see not only a fascination with books, words and with Paris, but also the reflections of book lovers chatting over dusty tomes. Oh, that's my favourite. Oster too, says one. My session as a volunteer over, I go to collect my bag from a locker in the labyrinth upstairs. It turns out to be the lair of the writer in residence, 25 year old Jimmy Hargreaves. He's a published poet from Grimsby and with his long hair flopping over his chiselled face, he looks every inch the part, head bent over his paper notebook. I'm a dreamer, he tells me. This is a place where I can create.
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Narrator/Presenter
And with Christine Finn remembering the Paris bookshop which George Whitman created, we've reached the end of this program. We're back next Saturday. Do join us.
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Jill McGivering
Goodbye.