Muslim Brotherhood the main opposition party has vowed to ‘respect the will of the people’ if Mubarak’s regime falls Egypt’s Islamist opposition has vowed to “respect the will of the Egyptian people” if Hosni Mubarak’s regime falls, amid concern from western leaders that religious extremism might proliferate following the anti-government uprising. Tony Blair, the Middle East peace envoy, warned that Egypt might take a backward step “into a very reactionary form of religious autocracy”. But his words carried limited resonance in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood – the country’s largest opposition force – has played little more than a walk-on role in the unprecedented protests that have shaken one of the Middle East’s oldest and most entrenched dictatorships. “There is widespread exaggeration about the role of the Brotherhood in Egyptian society, and I think these demonstrations have exposed that,” said Khalil al-Anani, an expert on Egypt’s political Islamists at Durham University. “At first the movement showed little interest in the protests and announced they weren’t going to participate; later they were overtaken by events and forced to get involved or risk losing all credibility.” Egypt’s ongoing intifada or uprising has been largely leaderless, planned initially by secular online activist groups and quickly gathering a momentum of its own, as protesters managed to beat riot police off the streets and inspire belief that Mubarak’s security forces could be overcome. Even on Friday, when the Brotherhood finally threw its weight behind efforts to bring down the government – a stance its leadership initially held back from – Islamist slogans were noticeable by their absence, and the formal contribution of the movement remained limited. “Like many others, I participated in these protests not as a Brotherhood member but as an Egyptian, even though both labels apply to me,” said Mohamed al-Assas, a 35-year-old media production worker in Cairo. “Many of the older political leaders, not just of the Brotherhood, but of other formal parties as well, were not so enthusiastic about the demonstrations. But that doesn’t matter because this is a youth revolution – we don’t need leaders to tell us what to do.” The group was formed in 1928 and is still officially outlawed. Hundreds of Brotherhood members have been jailed in periodic crackdowns, yet it is from the existence of the Brotherhood, and the regime’s perceived ability to suppress its influence, that Mubarak has derived much of his legitimacy in international circles. This, combined with the fact that the Brotherhood’s current leadership has often devoted more of its energies to “dawa”, or social evangelism, than overtly political projects, has led many analysts to accuse it of a symbiotic relationship with the government it claims to resist. At crucial moments of popular public tension with the Mubarak regime in recent years, such as the killing of three people in the Delta town of El Mahalla El Kubra in April 2008, and during an attempted general strike one year later, the Brotherhood has opted to take a relatively non-combative stand towards the authorities. “The Mubarak regime was adept at inflating the influence of the Brotherhood and painting them as a threat to Egyptian society and to the west,” said Anani. “It was the pretext for Mubarak’s rule, and it was a lie. I think that if Egypt held free and fair elections tomorrow the Brotherhood would not get a majority; it would enjoy a significant presence in parliament, but the overall makeup of seats would be pluralistic.” Mindful of the limitations of their popular support, and the danger of their involvement in protests being used as an excuse for the west to maintain support for Mubarak, the leadership of the Brotherhood therefore stood back as the past week’s revolt unfolded. Only in the past two days have senior figures begun publicly taking part in the jockeying for position in a post-Mubarak Egypt, and they have done so as unobtrusively as possible, mandating the non-Islamist Nobel peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei to help lead any transitional government and promising a “populist stance” in the future. “The Brotherhood realises the sensitivities, especially in the west, towards the Islamists, and we’re not keen to be at the forefront,” announced Mohamed el-Beltagui, a senior Brotherhood leader, on Monday. “We’re trying to build a democratic arena before we start playing in it,” said Essam El Arian, a reformist leader, and one of dozens of Brotherhood members who have escaped from jail in recent days following the disappearance of the country’s police force. “The Brotherhood does not take decisions on its own,” he insisted. The Brotherhood’s leadership continues to claim it does not aim to take control. “We are not for governing, we have no ambitions in this area,” media coordinator Waleed Shalabi told the Guardian today. “What the Brotherhood really want to get out of this revolution is official recognition, the end of legal prohibition,” said Anani. “That’s its minimum demand, but beyond that, if a post-Mubarak Egypt offers genuine avenues of political participation and a fair electoral system, then the movement will be happy.” But amid all the discussion about the impact the Muslim Brotherhood is having on Egypt’s uprising, another story of these remarkable few days might be about the impact the uprising is having on the Brotherhood. Anani believes the protests have shifted the balance of power within the organisation, boosting the influence of younger reformists and weakening the more conservative old guard. “Egypt is witnessing the creation of a new regime, and is reconfiguring all its internal political structures – obviously the Muslim Brotherhood will not be immune to that process,” Anani said. “The revolution has brought us into much closer contact with other secular protest groups with whom we’re working now on a regular basis. The elder leadership respects those new links, because they have to,” confirmed Assas, the 35 year olde Brotherhood member. Indeed many believe the triumphant surge of youth activism seen in Egypt this past week could have as significant effecti on the Brotherhood as on Mubarak’s beleaguered National Democratic Party. “Ongoing internal debate within the MB leadership oddly mirrors claims of an old-guard/new-guard clash within the ruling NDP,” observed the US ambassador to Cairo, Margaret Scobey, in a secret cable in 2009. “The concern expressed by the current leadership of both the NDP and the MB about the impact of rapid or aggressive reform is a common thread. “All of Egypt is changing, and of course the Brotherhood is part of that,” said Assas. “The youth is leading the way, and leaders are heeding our call.” Egypt Middle East Islam Religion Jack Shenker guardian.co.uk
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Demonstrators in Cairo’s main plaza suffused with optimism about end of Hosni Mubarak’s regime Some brought paint and brushes to express themselves, some prayed, some yelled political slogans, some picnicked on eggs and bread, underneath the clattering helicopters. But all came to demand the end of the Mubarak regime – and on the seventh straight day of protests, many believed they were on the home stretch. “We have spoken. When the citizens speak, we cannot go back,” said Ahmed Mustafa. “I came here to fight the fear inside me. Now people have lost their fear.” “For the first time I am proud to be an Egyptian,” said Susanne Saleh, a 38-year-old mother of three. “People are exploding. Mubarak is facing the pressure of his people and there is no way he can stay.” “This is the end,” said Ala’adin al Sahabi simply, a view echoed in many of the handwritten signs. “Game over, Mubarak,” said one. About 10,000 people streamed into Tahrir Square, paying no heed to the curfew which was today brought forward to 3pm. Indeed at two minutes to the hour, a large contingent of chanting protesters appeared, to cheers, from a side street in a bold demonstration of defiance. In contrast to the violence meted out in Friday’s protest, there was no sign of the police or army inside the square although it was ringed a block back by tanks and armed soldiers. They did not attempt to prevent access to the square but were instead polite and helpful. “The army will take the people’s side,” predicted Adel, one of the protesters. “The lower ranks all hate Mubarak too.” The mood among protesters was heady; most feel victory is within their grasp. A call for a million Egyptians to join the Cairo protest tomorrow will be easily surpassed, many said. “If people leave this square the regime will survive and Mubarak will have his revenge,” said Ahmed Muhammad. “Tomorrow we will be stronger, there will be millions.” They were scathing about the new government announced by the president. “This is all nonsense,” said protester Omar el-Demerdash, 24, a research executive. “The demand is clear: We want Mubarak and his men to get out. Anything other than that is just not enough.” Israa Abdel-Fattah, a founder of the 6 April Group, a movement of young people pushing for democratic reform, added: “We don’t want life to go back to normal until Mubarak leaves.” Demonstrators climbed lampposts to hang Egyptian flags and signs proclaiming “Leave, Mubarak!” One poster featured Mubarak’s face plastered with a Hitler moustache. Few had a clear idea of what might happen following the departure of Mubarak, other than talking in passionate, if ill-defined, terms about democracy and freedom. The crowd included both supporters and critics of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist organisation which the west fears will step into any vacuum left by the fall of Mubarak. “Ninety-five percent of the people do not support any party,” said al-Sahabi. On the battered and increasingly sparse grass in the centre of the square, someone had pitched a tent with a sign saying, in Arabic and English, “Freedom Motel”. A few metres away, Ramy Hussein, 26, had already set his sights beyond the end of the Mubarak regime. “Without what happened in Tunis, this wouldn’t have happened here,” he said. “I think it will happen in Syria as well because Assad is also a dictator. And maybe Jordan, too.” Egypt Protest Middle East Harriet Sherwood guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Egypt’s internet cutoff has failed in its central aim, but there may yet be further harms As recently as a week ago, Egypt ‘s internet was extraordinary in the Arab world for its freedom. For more than a decade, the regime has adhered to a hands-off policy, leaving unblocked everything from rumours about President Hosni Mubarak’s health to videos of police beatings. Unlike most of its regional neighbours and other authoritarian regimes, Egypt’s government never built or required sophisticated technical infrastructures of censorship. (Of course, the country has hardly been a paradise of free expression: the state security forces have vigorously suppressed dissent through surveillance, arbitrary detentions and relentless intimidation of writers and editors.) Partly as a result of its liberal policies, Egypt became a hub for internet and mobile network investment, home to a thriving and competitive communications sector that pioneered free dial-up services, achieved impressive rates of access and use, and offered speedy wireless and broadband networks at relatively low prices. Indeed, Egypt is today one of the major crossing points for the underwater fibre-optic cables that interconnect the regions of the globe. But last Thursday, the Mubarak regime shattered a decade’s worth of accomplishment by issuing the order to shut down the mobile networks and internet links. Since the internet age dawned in the early 90s, no widely connected country had disconnected itself entirely. The starkness and suddenness of Egypt’s reversal – from unrestricted to unreachable – marks one of the many tragedies of the Mubarak regime’s brutal and hamfisted response to last week’s emergence of citizen protests. The internet cutoff shows how the details of infrastructure matter. Despite having no large-scale or centralised censorship apparatus, Egypt was still able to shut down its communications in a matter of minutes. This was possible because Egypt permitted only three wireless carriers to operate, and required all internet service providers (ISPs) to funnel their traffic through a handful of international links. Confronted with mass demonstrations and fearful about a populace able to organise itself, the government had to order fewer than a dozen companies to shut down their networks and disconnect their routers from the global internet. The blackout has proved increasingly ineffective. A handful of networks have remained connected, including one independent ISP, the country’s academic and research network, and a few major banks, businesses and government institutions. Whether these reflect deliberate defiance, privileged connections, or tactical exceptions –one might imagine, for example, that members of Mubarak’s family and inner circle would want to have Internet access to move money, buy tickets, or make hotel reservations abroad — is as yet unknown. Moreover, innovative Egyptians are finding ways to overcome the block. They are relaying information by voice, exploiting small and unnoticed openings in the digital firewall, and dusting off old modems to tap foreign dial-up services. For democracies, one lesson here is clear: diversity and complexity in our network architectures is a very good thing. Likewise, enforcement of public policies such as network neutrality – the
Continue reading …The challenge for the US this week is to raise the temperature delicately, rather than seeking to call the global shots On an emotional level, everyone wants Barack Obama to thunder that Hosni Mubarak must go. And there are bad reasons why the US
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What is the likelihood of the current unrest in Egypt spreading to other countries in the region? Syria Syria’s small private media sector has featured the story prominently. State media have found it too big a deal to ignore. Surprising many, Bouthaina Shaaban, an adviser to President Bashar al-Assad, dedicated her newspaper column to the streets of Cairo, Tunis, Amman and Sana’a, saying the west did not know how to respond to collective Arab anger. Syria seems as perplexed. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Assad said circumstances in his country would not stir the rage of the masses. However, he did pledge reform. Over the past week, government ministers have announced subsidies and aid for the poor. Today teachers were granted interest-free loans for laptops, and some public officials were charged with corruption in the city of Aleppo. Syria last faced serious unrest in 1982 in the city of Hama, when many thousands were killed in an abortive revolt by the Muslim Brotherhood. Jordan A prime candidate for catching the Egyptian contagion. Protests over poverty, inflation, unemployment, corruption and a lack of democracy have been going on for weeks. King Abdullah II is less popular than his late father, King Hussein, and Queen Rania’s global fame is not matched by enthusiasm in the country itself. Samir al-Rifa’i, the prime minister, has become a lightning rod for discontent, though he recently found $550m in subsidies for fuel and staples such as sugar, rice and gas. The package included pay rises for civil servants and security personnel. An active opposition role is now being played by the country’s Islamic Action Front, which is calling for political reform, but still treading carefully. “There is no comparison between Egypt and Jordan,” IAF leader Hamzeh Mansur said on Monday. “The people there demand a regime change, but here we ask for political reforms and an elected government.” Abdullah has promised reforms, particularly on an election law. But it is unlikely that he will surrender his right to appoint the prime minister and cabinet officials. Unemployment is officially around 14% in the country of six million people, 70% of them under 30. The minimum wage is $211 a month. Poverty levels are 25%, while the capital, Amman, is the most expensive city in the Arab world. Like Egypt, Jordan is a close ally of the US, and is the only other Arab country (apart from distant Mauritania) to have a peace treaty with Israel. But it has efficient security forces, the Mukhabarat secret service, and a tame media. Libya Sandwiched between momentous events in Egypt and Tunisia, Libya has so far escaped any large-scale unrest. Muammar Gaddafi, whose 41 years in power outstrips Hosni Mubarak’s 29, presides over a tightly controlled regime that is changing very slowly and is wealthy enough to do it in a way that relieves rather than worsens tensions. The still-tribal nature of Libyan society means Gaddafi controls not only the army and security forces, which would almost certainly step in if there was serious political upheaval, but also other key constituencies. Recent protests in Benghazi and Derna over housing shortages were seized upon as evidence of spreading trouble, but local grievances have not coalesced into opposition at the national level, Libyan opposition figures admit. Like Egypt and Tunisia, Libya has a young population and high unemployment but its oil resources mean it is far wealthier. The Gulf If all eyes in the Arab world are on Egypt, nowhere in the region seems less likely to see similar events than Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states. Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah rushed to telephone Hosni Mubarak to express his support, after welcoming Tunisia’s exiled leader Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali to a gilded exile in Jeddah. Impoverished Yemen apart, all the Gulf states are hereditary monarchies with either no political parties or little in the way of representative government. Expectations are correspondingly low. Saudi municipal elections in 2005 were a limited exercise that has not been repeated. The Saudis control the world’s largest known reserves of oil and are a strategic US ally. Tiny Qatar, the richest of them all, leads the region in using wealth to provide subsidised education and food to buy the acquiescence if not the loyalty of their people – who in several countries are outnumbered by expatriate foreigners. Algeria Algeria has banned all marches “for security reasons” amid fears that the wave of unrest spreading through north Africa could destabilise the country. But a senior ally of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika said Algeria would escape an uprising because protesters were not demanding political reform. Abdelaziz Belkhadem, head of the ruling FLN party and a cabinet minster, said the government could be doing more but added: “Protesters in Algeria want better social and economic conditions. They have not made political demands as is the case in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Jordan.” Street protests have been banned in Algeria since 2001 when one descended into a riot, leaving eight people dead and hundreds injured. Security forces in Algiers have been reinforced to combat a feared attack by Islamist extremists after a series of suicide attacks in 2007. A march to demand the “departure of the regime” is planned for Saturday 12 February in Algiers by the newly-formed National Co-ordination for Change and Democracy group, which includes opposition movements and other civil organisations. Yemen The opposition coalition, the Joint Meeting Parties (JMP), has called for nationwide protests on Thursday after talks with President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s ruling party failed to materialise. Opposition members were in discussions with EU officials yesterday in Sana’a to try and find a way of resuming a dialogue with Saleh’s ruling GPC. The biggest obstacle is a proposed constitutional change that would abolish presidential term limits and the timing of the upcoming parliamentary election. A JMP spokesman said: “These protests will be bigger than last week’s; tens of thousands will be demonstrating across Yemen calling for Saleh to leave.” Saleh has taken steps to defuse tensions, raising salaries for the army and civil servants and rebutting claims that he plans to install his son, Ahmed, as his successor. Yesterday he announced plans to expand Yemen’s limited social security system Egypt Middle East Jordan Syria Saudi Arabia Algeria Yemen Ian Black guardian.co.uk
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Factories are closed, cash machines running dry, and food and petrol shortages feared, but some say it is a price worth paying The industrial city of Abu Rawash sits in the desert beyond the pyramids. You reach it down a dusty road that seems to lead to nowhere. Then the factories and warehouses begin: Toyota, Hyundai, Mazda and Jeep deserted save for a handful of security guards sitting in front of a vacant parking lot for absent staff. Outside the gates of the Toyota warehouse Ayman Ibrahim is talking to the gatekeeper. The factories are closed, the man tells Ibrahim, who owns a window business on the same site. They won’t reopen until at least mid-week. Perhaps even Friday. No one really knows. The closures in places such as Abu Rawash have been accompanied by calls from unions for an indefinite general strike. “I’m losing £10,000 pounds a week,” says Ibrahim. “But it’s worth it, I’ve been to the protest in Tahrir Square for the past three days with my kids. Mubarak is costing me money, but he has been costing Egypt money for 30 years.” It is not only Ibrahim whose business is being hurt financially by the crisis. All of Egypt is hurting. On the main road close to the factories the large Carrefour-Dandy mall is as deserted as the car plants. Egypt’s stock market, the bourse, is closed after losing 16% in value last week. Moody’s and Fitch – the debt rating companies – have revised their outlook for the country’s bonds to negative. The country’s banks have been closed for the past two days in fear of a run on the county’s bank system. It is damaging Egypt at all levels. Already some bank machines have run out of money. Some petrol stations have begun running out of fuel. Economists are warning of the risks of shortages of staples, such as bread and water. Elsewhere shops are shuttered. Those not shut, like some in the paved streets in the financial district close to the epicenter of Egypt’s uprising in Tahrir Square, are empty. The owners sit on plastic chairs. “This is very, very bad,” says Ah Mahmoud, who owns a clothes shop called Polo. “The problems between the people and president Hosni Mubarak are bad for business. Bad for work. With no money coming in how will we eat?” The increasingly idle factories in industrial cities like Abu Rawash, 6th October and Sadat City are Hosni Mubarak’s achilles heel in a country where unemployment is running at 25%. At the ports – like Alexandria – that depend heavily on the internet to distribute cargo, shipping containers are piling up on the dockside since last Friday’s Day of Fury, when the government shut the country off from the world. All of which has a growing political significance in Cairo’s deepening crisis. For while Mubarak may believe he is able to ignore the massive swelling of public sentiment against him, bolstered by his formidable armed forces and police, what he cannot survive in the long run is an Egypt closed for business. Not least in a country where under his rule the centre of political power and economic interest have become so intertwined. It is Mubarak, say an increasing number of the country’s business community, not the people who is costing them money. Among those who appear to be distancing themselves from Mubarak is Naguib Sawiris, head of the Orascom international telecoms empire and one of Egypt’s most high-profile business figures, who said that he supported the ambitions of the protest movement, adding that a transition to democracy would be good for the Egyptian economy. Foreign investors, on whom the economy depends, are also quick to retreat and, according to assessment by Credit Suisse, are not likely to return, at least until the crisis ends, which it believes is now most likely to happen with the departure of Mubarak. Instead, it warns, foreign and private investment risks collapsing even if Mubarak manages to cling on to power. Tourism, which along with remittances from Egyptians living abroad is the biggest source of foreign currency, looks most vulnerable of all. Not far from Cairo’s Central Bank Mohammed Rajaa, Ahmed Aggag and Amr Anwar – three young tour operators for NTS – were loading files into a car near their office. “It’s an absolute disaster,” says Rajaa. “We’ve had so many cancellations. Flights have not come and we’ve had to move people to safer locations. We are losing so much money.” But Aggag agrees with Ibrahim. Even though they are facing the prospect of ruin within a month, and the loss of their jobs – he believes the price is worth paying if they see Mubarak go. “We don’t care about the business. We care what happens to the Egyptian people.” “But we can’t last much longer if all of this continues” warns Rajaa. “Maybe a few weeks. Everything is going down …” “The price is worth it,” interrupts Aggag, “if we get change.” Egypt Middle East Peter Beaumont guardian.co.uk
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Opec secretary general expresses concern with tension throughout region and armed guards at Suez canal Fears that the turmoil in Egypt could disrupt oil shipments passing through the Suez canal and engulf the Middle East drove the price of Brent crude oil through the $100 barrier for the first time in over two years. The price of a barrel of the benchmark Brent crude soared by more than $1.50 to as high as $101.08 a barrel as the protests against President Hosni Mubarak’s regime intensified. Prices are now at their highest since September 2008, at the start of the financial crisis. Abdullah Al-Badri, secretary general of Opec, the cartel of oil producers, expressed concern about the situation in Egypt and added that Opec did “not want 2008 to be repeated”, referring to when oil prices hit a record $147. But he said the cartel would not increase production on the back of the surge in prices as he believed there was no shortage of oil. Since August, oil prices have been steadily increasing from around $70 on the back of higher demand as the global economy recovers from the downturn, fuelling inflation. The latest rise in oil prices will put further pressure on the British government to head off a rise in fuel duty planned for April. David Cameron gave the latest hint in an interview with the BBC this morning that the budget on 23 March could include a “fuel stabiliser” which would cut the level of fuel duty motorists have to pay when oil prices rise. Last week the price of diesel at the pump in the UK reached a new high, hitting 133.26p a litre on average . The price of fuel is a concern for the government as it was one of the reasons for the rise in inflation, measured by the consumer price index, in December. In turn, higher inflation could put pressure on policy makers to hike interest rates. Egypt is not a major oil producer but it controls the 120-mile Suez canal and the 200-mile Suez-Mediterranean pipeline which together carry about 2m barrels of oil each day, about 2.5% of demand globally. No major disruption to supplies has been reported after almost a week of violent protests although some ports’ operations have been slowed. Analysts said that oil prices were rising on concerns that the turmoil could spread into neighbouring countries or even major oil producers further afield, such as Saudi Arabia. The unrest in Egypt follows the recent overthrow of the regime in Tunisia, adding to the nervousness that more chaos could engulf the Middle East, which accounts for almost a third of the world’s oil production. The Egyptian authorities have said that the Suez canal is operating normally, with armed guards protecting the crucial waterway linking the Red Sea and the Mediterranean. Barclays Capital warned that some ships could be attacked if the situation deteriorates and that if a radical anti-western government seized power it could close the canal. If the canal was unavailable oil tankers would have to sail around Africa to transport oil from the Middle East to America – an extra 6,000 miles. “We cannot ignore the possibility that the chaos will spill over from Egypt into oil-producing nations,” said Kenji Sekiguchi of Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management. Badri said Opec ministers would discuss whether they needed to pump more oil to bring down prices at an energy conference in Saudi Arabia later this month but said a formal decision to increase production quotas was unlikely. Opec’s next formal meeting takes place in June. Oil Oil and gas companies Energy industry Egypt Middle East Tim Webb Graeme Wearden guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Two Weeks After Tucson Shootings, Phoenix Gun Show Dealers Still Illegally Selling Guns. What Have We Learned?
January 31, 2011 No CommentMayors Against Illegal Guns , a group of more than 550 U.S. mayors, is calling for a background check system that will keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people. (I know here in Philadelphia, mayors have been continuously stymied by the NRA-owned state legislature every time they try to put even small roadblocks in the way of gun purchase on demand.) To make a point, NYC for the second year sent undercover investigators to one of the largest Phoenix gun shows — two weeks after Rep. Gabby Giffords was shot — to illustrate how easy it is to use the gun show loophole to illegally buy weapons: On January 23, 2011, undercover investigators working for the City of New York attended the Crossroads of the World gun show in Phoenix. One investigator purchased a Glock 9 mm semiautomatic pistol without a background check. Because the gun dealer is a private seller and not a federally licensed firearms dealer , no background check was required and the transaction was apparently legal, assuming the seller was, in fact, an “occasional seller.” This gap in federal law that enables private sellers to sell guns without background checks is sometimes called the Gun Show Loophole because such sellers congregate at gun shows. The investigator also purchased 33-round extended magazines for the Glock from a separate seller – also legal because the 1994 law that banned such sales expired in 2004. Gun shows have been found to be major sources of guns used in crimes. According to the ATF, 30 percent of guns involved in federal illegal gun trafficking investigations are connected to gun shows. Because no records are kept, guns sold by private sellers at gun shows become virtually untraceable. Two private sellers failed integrity tests by illegally selling guns to an undercover investigator. Each seller sold a 9 mm semiautomatic pistol, one Sig Sauer and one Smith & Wesson, to an undercover investigator even after he declared that he “probably couldn’t pass” a background check . That statement should have immediately stopped the sale because even though occasional sellers are not required to run background checks using the FBI database, it is a federal felony for them to sell guns to people they have reason to believe are prohibited purchasers. In 2009, the City of New York conducted a similar investigation and documented problems at seven gun shows in three states. Investigators found private dealers who sold to those who said they could not pass a background check, including two sellers who failed at multiple shows. In total, 19 of the 30 private sellers approached in 2009 failed the test. Since the 2009 investigation, four of the seven gun shows documented on video have changed their practices. The operator of the Big Reno Show, and the owner of the venue, the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino, have each signed agreements with the City of New York agreeing to end no-background check gun sales. The Big Reno Show is one of the nation’s largest gun shows. It has 1,300 tables of exhibits, at the time of the investigation there were 120 private sellers at the show offering 1,700 guns for sale. The operator of the Big Reno Show has also prevented any seller caught breaking the law in the undercover investigation from returning to the show . The agreement stipulates that all sales by private party sellers will be processed through licensed gun dealers who will perform background checks. Bill Goodman’s Gun and Knife Shows promotes three of the seven shows visited by the City in 2009, they were held at the Hara Arena and Sharonville Convention Center in Ohio and at the Tennessee State Fairgrounds in Nashville. The promoter has ended no-background check sales at all 34 shows that he promotes. In 2009, the City turned over all of its investigative materials on illegal sales to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF). One of the sellers caught on tape at the Big Reno gun show, Robert Daly, was the subject of an ATF search warrant in July 2010. When the warrant was executed at Daly’s home in Mesa, Arizona, ATF agents seized 799 guns. The Justice Department has charged him with illegally selling these guns at gun shows. Yep. Even if you’re selling hundreds of guns at gun shows, you’re still considered to be a “private seller” and not a dealer. Isn’t that nice? In light of recent events, even politicians have to see that it’s time to keep guns out of the hands of high-risk buyers. You’d think that Arizona, whose far-right activists are always screaming about horrific crimes allegedly committed by Mexicans sneaking across the border, would catch on to the concept that loose gun sale practices put all of us at risk. From last week: In a case aimed at stemming the flow of U.S. weapons to the Mexican drug war, federal authorities indicted 20 men Tuesday on charges of buying an estimated 700 weapons in Arizona and conspiring to transfer them across the border, chiefly to the Sinaloa drug cartel. The arrests, carried out by at least 100 federal agents, began early Tuesday, the latest crackdown targeting an international trafficking network that authorities say has seen as many as 60,000 weapons seized in Mexico and traced to U.S. sources . Even if you don’t care about your loved ones getting blown away, Arizona, maybe you could cut the rest of us a break.
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The Bangles’ Walk Like an Egyptian is an unlikely choice of protest song So, the title of the Bangles’ 1987 hit Walk Like An Egyptian has been co-opted as a revolutionary slogan. Obviously, if this furthers the cause of democracy, all to the good, but given that the lyrics comprise every imaginable cliche about Egyptians strung together, it seems not unlike Mancunians taking to the streets in a revolutionary tumult wearing T-shirts that say MATCHSTALK MEN AND MATCHSTALK CATS AND DOGS. Whatever next in the world of pro-democracy demonstrations intersecting with 80s AOR tracks tenuously linked to the location of said uprising? Protesters on the streets of Beijing in T-shirts reading China In
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New pictures have emerged of Friday’s clashes between protestors and police on the a Nile bridge that connects to Cairo’s main square. Al Jazeera’s Hazim Sikka reports.
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