← From Our Own Correspondent
From Our Own Correspondent
Talking About Fish
00:28:09
Insight, colour and analysis from reporters around the world. Mark Lowen's in Cyprus...
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Transcript16 lines
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This is a download from the BBC. It's the latest edition of From Our Own correspondent, broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and introduced by Kate Ady.
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Have you lost your mind? A mother questions our correspondent's decision to move to troubled Pakistan. We meet a man who's unlocked a treasure chest of gold and silver. He's quite possibly the most influential Mongolian since Genghis Khan. And as politicians in Yemen gather for discussions about the future, we arrive in a town where all the talks about. But first. The Cypriot president, along with a group of his senior MPs, is on his way to Brussels for talks aimed at preventing the island slipping into bankruptcy. Last night, their parliament approved nine bills, including one to restructure the country's main banks. It had been considering the conditions set by the European Union for securing an international bailout. Eurozone finance ministers are expected to meet in Brussels tomorrow to discuss this. It's now more than a week since the banks were open in Cyprus, and Mark Loewen, who's there, says people have been finding it increasingly hard to go about their daily business.
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Dotted across the Cypriot capital, they snake around street corners. They begin early and are slowly growing lines of people outside bank machines, stuffing wads of cash into bags and pockets. It is the surest sign yet of what is happening to this nation. Fear is gaining ground and nobody seems able to stop it. At one queue in the center of the city, a pensioner, Andreas, had withdrawn his latest €200, unsure if the cash might dry up. Last week, Cypriots were rich, he said. Now we're poor. Why is this happening? He had summed up the feeling of many here that in the space of a week, a tiny Mediterranean holiday island has become Europe's problem child. The Cypriot economy has been in free fall for some time. Everyone knew a bailout was coming. But something sensational occurred this week, a defining moment in the eurozone saga. When the bosses in Brussels gave their demand for a tax on all savers. Cyprus said no. Protesters in Greece and Spain may have thrown petrol bombs, but their governments swallowed the bitter bailout pill. This time, Cyprus. Cyprus calmly spat it out. A minute economy thumbing its nose at the powerful. That independence has come at a cost. Almost a decade ago, Cyprus cheered as it proudly entered the European Union. But now, within a week, a feeling of betrayal by Europe has set in. Posters have appeared of the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel with a Hitler moustache.
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What is Europe?
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Asked Marilena Nicolaou, a protester outside parliament. Is it a union of those who have money and want to control Those in need. We don't want to be in that Europe. Perhaps it is this country's relationship with the other side that gives it the confidence to push back at the eu. Russia is an old Orthodox friend, though plenty of its nationals are thought to have rather unorthodox money here. Moscow has been courted for the rescue, so far without success. But that could lock Cyprus into a messy game of geopolitics, one arm pulled by Europe and the other by Russia. It would be easy for the country to lose its balance. Cyprus is not just the playground of wealthy Russians. It is a place where foreigners from all corners abound. I've struggled to practice my pidgin Greek. So many people with whom I stopped to chat turn out to be Bulgarian or Polish. There are thousands of Brits, many here since before independence from the UK in 1960. At the weekend, foreign workers on their days off flock into Nicosia and the capital becomes a lively mix of Filipinos and Bangladeshis. Even cars are brought from abroad, shipped in second hand from Japan because both countries drive on the left. That mix of nationalities has created a cosmopolitan feel to this little island. But it's also complicated the financial rescue, with Cyprus keen to protect various foreign interests. That's what helped create the mess in the first place, that a country of barely a million people has become an international tax haven with an overgrown banking system. And now the party's over and the hangover is beginning to hurt. With the bank still closed, cash is prized. I met Argilis Zambakidis at the petrol station he's managed for 16 years. He was turning away credit cards since his suppliers wanted payment in cash only. It's the first time this has happened, he said. I can't believe it. My wife works in a bank that might be closed down and my customers are staying away. So I may have to shut too. What now? The hordes of journalists who have descended on Cyprus have found a country longing to be out of the media glare. People tell you it's the worst thing to have happened since 1974, when Turkey invaded following a Greek backed coup. Today, Greek and Turkish Cypriots live in peace, but are divided by bitter memories. The border between the two communities cuts Nicosia in half. I wandered across, given a visa by a territory only recognized by Turkey. Its picturesque old bazaars nestle beside beautiful mosques. Beyond the cheap jewelry shops and casinos, Hava Shenal sells scarves. We feel sorry for what they're going through, she says, gesturing to the south. Because we're all Cypriots, we should be one family. And we're hit as well because they don't spend here like they used to. But when I ask her if she thinks the current crisis might spur reconciliation, she shakes her head. We've always been poor and they never cared. So why would we help them now that they've got problems? On Cypriot television, a live show discussed how to solve the worsening crisis. And then the camera panned to a villager who had arrived on set. He was carrying two and a half thousand euros in cash which he said he wanted to hand to the state to save Cyprus and sabotage Germany's bailout plan. He was thanked by the presenter and moved on. Cypriots fought for a country that now seems poised on the edge. This week has dented their pride, but not their resolve.
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Mark Lohan in Nicosir, Pakistan is never far from the headlines this week. Amid reports of bombing, shootings and corruption, the date of the next election emerged May 11. Today, cricketer turned opposition politician Imran Khan's at a huge rally in Lahore tomorrow. The cameras and microphones will be lined up as former military leader General Pervez Musharraf is due to return from his self imposed exile in Dubai. Also returning to his homeland is the BBC's Shahzeb Jilani, who spent the last 12 years in our newsroom in London. He's made the decision to go back to his old home city of Karachi to work as a correspondent there. Given the turmoil in Pakistan generally and Karachi in particular, his decision's not gone down very well with some members of his family.
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Have you absolutely lost your mind? That was my mother's predictable response. People are trying to get out of this godforsaken city and you are planning to come back. Her fears aren't entirely exaggerated. Facts speak for themselves. Last year was the bloodiest year for Karachi in nearly two decades with about 2,000 people killed in drive by shootings, bombings and revenge attacks. That's based on reported figures. A lot of threats, intimidation and day to day crime in this city of 18 million people go unreported. But in Karachi, you can't help but hear about them in every other conversation. Visiting the city recently, I caught up with mates from school over dinner at a seaside restaurant. Sitting above the splashing waves on a moonlit night, I could feel the cool breeze of the Arabian Sea on my face. We were served with a large spicy sea fish with a pile of hot naan bread. Over the next couple of hours, my friends narrated incident after incident about the extent of lawlessness in Karachi. A story about a multinational executive receiving an envelope with a bullet inside and a note saying, pay now or we know which school to pick up your son from. A story about a relative who arrived at Karachi airport on a late night international flight only to be abducted and robbed of his baggage while on his way home. A story about a teenage boy shot dead along with his brother and father while he was being dropped off at school in the morning because the family happened to be Shia Muslims. The mood became predictably grim. My friends tried to change the subject, joking about the stuff we indulged in as teenagers. Our picnics at the beach, our failed romances, the Bollywood songs of our generation. We talked about our cheerful friend Moin, who was the first amongst us to die after losing his battle with a brain tumor a few years ago. We recalled the tears, the laughter, the embarrassments, the heated arguments, recalling the details just as we have done during previous but rare reunions. But it wasn't long before the reality of today's Karachi pulled us back into the present. A text alert informed me there had been a killing not far from where we were. A young graduate of one of Pakistan's top management schools had been killed in a drive by shooting along with his father. In that week alone, dozens more people in Karachi lost their lives in seemingly senseless attacks. And yet the chief minister of the province had the audacity to insist that not only the law and order situation wasn't that bad, but it was actually improving. For most people, it sounded like little more than a bad joke. But such is the disconnect between Pakistan's rich and powerful ruling class and millions of its insecure subjects. And so Karachi continues to bleed. These days it's considered a good day in the city when only five to six people die in shootings. Eight to 10 is considered the new normal. No wonder then, Pakistanis have lost track of the fact that far more people have died on the streets of Karachi at the hands of gun totting militants and criminals than by the much detested American drone strikes in Pakistan's tribal areas. And this when the city's technically not even at war. At least not yet. So what does the future hold for Pakistan's economic capital? This place is home to the country's biggest number of educated middle class people. Some of the best universities and hospitals are located there. Nearly 60% of Pakistan's tax revenue comes from Karachi. But if this megacity represents the best of Pakistan, it also presents a nightmare scenario. Many believe with its multi layered conflicts and state weakness, it is already out of control and ungovernable heavily armed extremists, Al Qaeda linked groups and criminal gangs operate with impunity here. Hence the fear that the slow burning turf war for the city's wealth, resources and votes is threatening to spiral out of control. The optimistic view is that Karachi has seen worse periods of violence, only to bounce back and even to thrive. But whatever happens in the future, I will be there reporting as the story of Pakistan's biggest city continues to unfold.
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Shahzeb Jilani in Karachi, the latest round of talks aimed at securing a truce between the Colombian government and the leftist FARC rebels ended in the Cuban capital, Havana, on Thursday. Colombia's president, Juan Manuel Santos, says he hopes agreement can be reached by the end of the year. The optimistic mood's been reflected in the country's tourism statistics. More and more overseas visitors have been finding out for themselves that Colombia, with its historic cities, Andean peaks and Amazonian jungles, is a diverse, often stunning place. Charlotte Pritchard's just been to the borderlands between Colombia and Venezuela. This is the home of the Wayu, a tribe with a population of about 300 who speak their own language as well as Spanish and travel across the frontier without the need for passports. Not surprising, perhaps, that this is a territory well trodden by smugglers.
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I have 27 children, my guide, Carlos, declared. It seems slightly out of the blue. Over the past hour, our conversation had waned. All I'd been hearing was the sound of sand swirling against the windows, the bumping of our 4 by 4 over desert rocks, and then the occasional locust the size of a small bird buzzing into the windscreen. 27 children, Carlos repeated. With his fashionable clothes and sunglasses, he looked younger than his 64 years, but the lack of teeth on his bottom jaw perhaps revealed his true age. He told me he'd had five children with his wife, but the rest were what he called smuggler babies because their mothers concealed the fact Carlos was the father from their husbands. He flashed a cheeky smile and assured me his wife knew about the other women and their babies. We had been driving for about five hours through La Wahira Desert, the wilderness where the Colombian and Venezuelan borders meet. All around were endless tall, thin cacti and tiny trees bent into the sand like hunched old men sheltering from the desert wind. Then a sudden flash of the brightest red or yellow I'd ever seen, stunning desert birds darting in front of the weathered green of the cacti. Occasionally we passed small huts, their roofs made from Yotojuro cactus innards with sandy mud for the walls. Outside them were women dressed in long tunics, as brightly colored as the desert birds. As we passed, they'd look up from their looms, stare and wave for a few minutes before carrying on with their daily tasks. Around their huts were burnt conch shells, the leftovers of meals eaten by desert dwellers hundreds of years ago. We were on our way to Punta Gallinas, so called because the land forms the shape of a chicken's head. This is South America's most northerly point, where huge sand dunes of rich burnt ochre colour tumble into the milky green Caribbean Sea. Carlos described his head as like a sat nav, and he clearly did know this desert very well. He pointed to a long strip of flat sand. This, he said, is is a Runway for planes transporting Colombia's most infamous export cocaine. He told me he'd spent years smuggling Venezuelan gas, rice and sugar over the Colombian border. We left smuggling the big things to the police, he said, clearly referring to the drugs. But working for someone else, it seems, wasn't good business. Guiding tourists around this relatively unexplored part of Colombia is much more lucrative. On our way out of the desert, we hit a sandstorm. Like a thick yellow mist, our Jeep was engulfed with sand. We could just make out a small block of square concrete houses. Carlos told me the government had built them for the wau, but after a few weeks they had preferred their traditional homes and had all moved out. Now the grey houses were desolate, except for the plastic bags blowing in the wind attached to the thorns of the cacti. A young boy emerged from the sandstorm, ambling towards us. We'd seen a number of children like him trekking through the desert alone, but for this one, Carlos stopped and went down the window. A conversation in Wanaki ensued before Carlos handed the boy a 20,000 peso note, around 7 pounds. I always try to drive this way, he told me, because I know all but one of my 27 children and I'm trying to find him. I think he lives around here. He's around the same age as that boy. He lost touch with the mother, he said, because she went to work in Venezuela several years ago. Even if many of my children don't know I'm their father, he added, I still know them and visit occasionally. Our journey continued to a fishing village, a line of traditional WAU houses along a long, sandy beach. As we ate a welcome lunch of fried mojara fish and plantain pancakes, Carlos smiled and leant back in his chair. I was still curious. Could that boy have been Your son? I asked. He said he didn't know for sure, but he reckoned he'd find out soon. The boy's mother was finally coming home. He finished his last mouthful of the fried fish and said, all I have to do is wait. Then he added with a smile, 27 children. That's nothing. Anyway. My grandfather, who lived to be 202,
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he had a hundred sons, and that was Charlotte Pritchard. Now, if only we were a bit more like Mongolia. It's not a sentiment the Chancellor expressed during Wednesday's budget, but you can imagine George Osborne looking enviously at its economy. In recent times. It's been growing by at least 10% a year. 2013, some economists believe, could see a growth of 20%. The reason for the boom? The minerals. The country's a veritable treasure chest of mining riches. There's copper, gold, silver, coal, uranium and much else besides. And as fast as they dig it up, they're selling it, mostly to China. There's one particular mine not far from the Chinese border, which promises to be the biggest money spinner of them all. Justin Rolatt's been to take a look and to ask who exactly will benefit from all this wealth?
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I'm sure he would blush at the suggestion, but Saman Sandoj is quite possibly the most influential Mongolian since Genghis Khan. Sanj, as he is known, is from a modest background. Like most Mongolians, he grew up in a gear, one of the round felt tents common in Central Asia. He's from a family of nomadic herders from the west of Mongolia, but he did well at school and managed to wangle himself a place on a geophysics course in a university in Russia. Now, you might imagine the work of a geophysicist would be a bit dull, but I challenge you not to be drawn in by Sanj's story. In the late 90s, an international mining company sent him deep into the Gobi Desert as part of a team investigating what he described as an interesting extrusion. To you and me, that's a great fist of rock punching out from the dusty desert scrubland. Sanj and his fellow geologists were by no means the first prospectors there. The local name for this extrusion is Oyu Tolgoi, or Turquoise Hill. The green stains that gave it its name, a clue to the minerals within. But first the Soviet teams, and then, more recently, those Western mining companies that examined it, dismissed the deposit as too small to warrant commercial exploitation. Sanj's work told a very different story. He said his results rapidly suggested a very unusual geological formation. Every day our data showed the potential ore body was bigger and bigger, he told me. I couldn't wait to get up the next day and explore further. We were pretty confident we'd found something important. They could hardly have imagined how important it would be. What Sanj and his colleagues had discovered is reckoned to be the greatest unexploited reserve of copper, gold and silver. Silver on the planet. A decade and a half later, and Sanj is showing me around the vast blue processing plant that rises up out of the sand where once he and his fellow geologists camped. The £4 billion the Anglo Australian mining giant Rio Tinto spent building this place was enough to help power Mongolia to the top of the list of the fastest growing economies on Earth. The company is predicting that the Oyu Tolgoi mine will generate more than 5 billion pounds every year for the next 40 or 50 years. An astonishing windfall for a country with fewer than 3 million people. And it comes at a time when other forces are also reshaping the nation. Mongolia has always suffered the occasional extreme winter. They're known as zuds here, but local people say they're becoming more frequent. In recent years, they've killed many millions of the double humped Bactrian camels, yaks, sheep, cashmere goats and cows on which the nation's herders depend. That's helped drive a great exodus of traditional nomads from the countryside and the growth of the most extraordinary shantytown I have ever seen. The herders have brought their gears, their tents to town and have set up home in the hills around the capital. Over the course of a single decade, the a quarter of the entire Mongolian population has given up the lifestyle that has sustained their families for millennia and has moved to this sprawling slum. And of course, everyone who lives here is well aware of Sanj's great discovery down in the Gobi. And naturally enough, they want a share of it. And that is where the problem is. The first ore was produced during the couple of days I was there earlier this year. A rather modest mound of black powder. In time, it should grow into a mountain. But the Mongolian government wants cash. Now. It's asking Rio Tinto for hundreds of millions of pounds more than was agreed for this year. The head of the mining company's operations in Mongolia hinted darkly to me that countries that change the rules like this risk killing the goose before it's laid any golden, or for that matter, copper eggs. Is that a threat?
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I asked.
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Oh, no, no, no, he replied. Yet the two parties have been locked in discussions for over a month now. Back at the mine in the Gobi, however, Sanj seems unperturbed by the dispute. One senses he's been in the business long enough to know that squabbles over how the Mongolian government and Rio Tinto divide the spoils may delay the project, but won't end it. He knows a prize this valuable will eventually be exploited. But that leaves the really big question unanswered. Can the government ensure that every Mongolian benefits from Sanj's extraordinary discovery?
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Justin Rolatt. And he'll have more of this extraordinary tale in next week's Crossing Continents. That's on Thursday morning at 11 o' clock here on Radio 4. They've been talking about the future in the troubled Arabian state of Yemen. This week, politicians, religious figures and social groups from across the political spectrum gathered in the capital Sanaa to take part in a so called national dialogue. The conference follows the year long uprising which ended the rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh. It's trying to deal with some of the thorniest questions facing this the Arab world's poorest nation, like demands for independence coming from the south, the role of Islamic law and how best to address terrorism and the presence in the north of the country of Al Qaed. The discussions have been welcomed by both the UN and in Washington, but Daniel Owen has been finding out that many Yemenis may be more concerned with the day to day business of earning a living.
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There is fish, says Ali with a relieved smile. Up until yesterday, a strong north wind in this corner of Yemen had been keeping the boats off the fishing grounds. But today the weather has been calmer and the fleet of open boats equipped with powerful outboard motors and has been out again with nets and lines. Ali is a fish merchant from a family of local fishermen. His trusty pick up truck is backed up to the small fish market at Half, where trading had been taking place just a little earlier. His mate Amar is loading their purchases into a big insulated tank on the back of the pickup. For Ali and Amr, the next part of their day will be a two hour drive west to the fish market located just outside the town of Al Raeda to sell on their produce. It's already early evening and the light is going. Do you want to come with us? Ali asks. Half and Alheda are located in the southeast of Yemen. Half is a small town at the end of the road. Drive any further east and you're soon into the neighbouring state of Oman in its setting beside the ocean, Half enjoys the best of both worlds. Look north and there's the escarpment, sheer limestone cliffs mixed up with wooded hills and valleys. Camels and goats are grazed there, and behind the highest cliffs are the mountains with their frankincense trees. Look south and there's the Arabian Sea, glinting in the sun and offering good fishing. It's easy to wax lyrical about half. Al Qaeda is a different matter. It's the region's capital, a noisy, sprawling shock to the system after small town life. But one of its attributes is the fish market on the edge of town. Ali had taken me to the Alreda market before. We'd spent two hours there early one morning. It had been a mass of activity, fishing boats speeding in from offshore and unloading their catch, which was then promptly auctioned and packed into waiting refrigerated lorries. Sharks, assorted other fish, prawns and lobsters all had been up for sale, with crowds of men huddled round to bid or just watch. The chance of going there again was too much to resist. For Ali And Amar, the 90 mile drive to Algheda was just part of the daily grind. Sometimes they'd even do the return trip twice in 24 hours. Eight hours on the road. As for me, I trusted Ali's judgment, so I had no qualms about jumping into the pickup and joining him and Amad for a nighttime drive down the coast. Two uneventful hours later, we were waved through the army checkpoint on the edge of Alreda and shortly afterwards arrived at the market. We were greeted by darkness. Electricity cannot be taken for granted in Yemen, and certainly there was none of it to be had at the market. At 8 o' clock that night, in the gloom, a handful of men dressed in shirt sleeves, sarongs and sandals were waiting around, the only light coming from their head torches. There was no clue that the Indian Ocean was less than 50 meters away, lapping quietly against the shore. Two refrigerated lorries were reversed up to the selling floor, their rear doors open, one bound for the Yemeni capital and the other for the coastal city of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia. In the muted atmosphere of this nighttime commerce, Ali's produce was weighed without fuss on scales illuminated by just a torch beam, and prices were agreed quickly, quietly loaded crates were dragged across the wet concrete floor and ice was dug out from stockpiles and shoveled over the fish. Whereas my previous visit to the market had been a bustling mass of sights and sounds, this occasion was an altogether more subtle experience, an understatement of subdued tones and torchlight. For me, our excursion to the market was an insight into the life of my friend Ali. I didn't envy him the long drives to and from Al Gheda, but for Ali and Ammar it was their way of making a living, and they were very good at it. We drove back at 10pm along the coast road to half kept awake by Arabic music from the cassette player going at full whack. We smelled now not of fish but of pungent cologne from a little vial that Ali kept in his pocket. Yemen undoubtedly has its problems and hasn't enjoyed the best press recently, but for me, this trip by night served as a comforting reminder that not all of this fascinating country is blighted by terrorism and criminality. In some quarters, it's still just the price of fish that really matters.
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And that's it. And now, quite fragrant Daniel Owen on the coast road in Yemen, bringing this edition to a close. There'll be more from our own correspondence next Saturday. Do join us. Goodbye.