FAO Quotables

"But being right, even morally right, isn't everything. It is also important to be competent, to be consistent, and to be knowledgeable. It's important for your soldiers and diplomats to speak the language of the people you want to influence. It's important to understand the ethnic and tribal divisions of the place you hope to assist."
-Anne Applebaum

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Obiang speaks out against torture...unfortunately Torture is the name of his imaginary pet

U.S. Engages With an Iron Leader in Equatorial Guinea by Adam Nossiter

Obiang speaks out against torture...unfortunately Torture is the name of his imaginary pet.  Or maybe the word 'torture' means something else in Obiang's native language. 

Look, as FUUO has examined in a past post Obiang is NOT a good dude.  He's done really bad things and most likely continues to do them.  But I do think that the US is doing as much and in some cases, astronomically more business with dictators and regimes that are WAY worse (this obviously doesn't make it right of course).

I think the unfortunate thing is that there's not an established threshold or level of transparency in how we deal with these countries with murderers in charge repressive regimes. 

Ultimately I am somewhat torn.  Obviously it sends the wrong message for us to be chummy with a perpetual human-rights violator.  However, Obiang the dictator does not equal the people of Equatorial Guinea or even necessarily the military of Equatorial Guinea.  If we cut off Eq. Guinea completely the people will continue to suffer, but perhaps we can make inroads in small steps that will eventually help the population at large through mil-mil and other avenues.  This is a question with which to struggle. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/31/world/africa/31guinea.html
http://fuuo.blogspot.com/2011/04/great-post-at-china-in-africa-real.html

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