Look at landscape continues. After yesterday's examination of the situation in Egypt and Tunisia, I will now turn to the situation and prospects for a number of other countries.
Libya: uncertainty and blackmail. There is something rather absurd and rash about the attempt to formulate general considerations about this country, when the situation is dramatically unfolding on an hourly basis and when news reports oscillate between the tyrant having fled, the town of Benghazi being under rebel control or the rebels having been put down by bloody repression (this is actually painfully true). Readers are obviously following this constant evolution themselves. I have already expressed my personal opinion about Colonel Gaddafi and he is the worst tyrant of all in this region. But he does have a number of arguments with which to blackmail the EU in three different areas: I protect you from the threat of Islamic fundamentalism, I preserve you from mass illegal immigration from Africa, and I provide you with quality oil. The EU cannot ignore the last of these three arguments, and the other two are also very serious - especially for Italy. According to one source, which is possibly exaggerated but does give an indication, without an agreement with Gaddafi, illegal immigrants intending to go to Italy very soon would not be just a few thousand (which is currently the case), but half a million!
In her interview quoted yesterday, the European commissioner responsible for this field, Ms Malmström would only say that “it is a special case: with the other countries of this zone, the EU is committed to a good neighbourhood process; it is very difficult to collaborate with Libya”. Ms Ashton's response was just as terse and she called on the Libyan authorities to show both restraint and calm, whilst abstaining from any further use of violence against peaceful demonstrators. These cautious words will not manage to restrain the Libyan tyrant. Certain political forces, including the European Parliament, are calling for a total and immediate break in ties with Libya. It is not so simple for Italy and a number of other member states, unless the dictator is killed by the rebels who, given the level of violence and repression, would then truly become heroes of freedom.
If the Gaddafi regime collapses, very abundant oil resources would enable Libya to continue to survive on the basis of a good understanding with the EU, whilst taking into account Italian concerns. Is this just an illusion?
Algeria: no eruption possible. Discontent is unconcealed. Part of the population would undoubtedly like total regime change because the situation is ridiculous. One observer described it saying: “One cannot understand how there can be such poor people in such a rich country like Algeria.” State coffers are full: $155 billion, almost the same level as gross national product. The economy, however, is totally disorganised: oil and gas account for 98% of total budget revenue; food dependency stands at 75%; industry only accounts for 5% of national product, although in the past it played a much more important role; there is mass unemployment, widespread job insecurity or moonlighting and where the only escape is drugs trafficking or in a few cases, football. The cause? It is mainly due to corruption in the army and the ruling class, which abuses and takes advantage of the situation but which at the same time denies the possibility of concessions that would partly meet the demands of protesters. This is even more the case because the latter do not represent a mass movement like elsewhere (the Front des Forces socialistes has been dissolved) and cannot forget (either directly amongst the older protesters or indirectly among the others) the 20-year-old civil war, which left 200,000 people dead.
The prime minister has promised to end the state of emergency (in force for almost 20 years) and introduce a few social reforms. The authorities themselves have denounced and arrested those responsible for certain scandalous examples of corruption. The EU is not seeking the overthrow of the current regime with which it will soon be signing important agreements for joint oil transporting network projects. In addition to these factors, there is also the fact that those who lost the civil war (namely the Islamic fundamentalist who won the first round of the last free elections held) have in some instances become dangerous terrorists who are even active in Europe.
Bahrain, Yemen and other countries in the Arab Peninsula. I am not going to say anything about these countries which have been involved in different degrees of violent uprisings because I do not have the information available to enable me to take a position in this connection.
I am also going to leave Morocco aside, where demonstrators are restricting their demands to political reforms and are not seeking any regime change. With regard to Iran, I will not add anything further to the hope expressed last Saturday.
Other questions that have not been asked. Tomorrow, in order to conclude this analysis, I will pose a number of significant questions that have not, to my knowledge, been raised by anybody else. (F.R./transl.fl)