Biodun Iginla, BBC News

Biodun Iginla, BBC News
Showing posts with label George W. Bush. Show all posts
Showing posts with label George W. Bush. Show all posts

Monday, April 8, 2019

ANALYSIS: Forty years of US-Iran relations


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by Natalie de Vallieres and Biodun Iginla, France24 News Analysts
Key dates between the US and Iran since 1979 after their exchange Monday in which the US designated Tehran's elite military force a terrorist organization and Iran called the US a "state sponsor of terrorism".
- Rupture -
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On November 4, 1979 radical students demanding the extradition of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi take 52 diplomats and employees of the American embassy in Tehran hostage, seven months after the establishment of the Islamic Republic.
The hostages are held for 444 days in a crisis that results in the first US economic sanctions leveraged against the state.
On April 7, 1980 Washington breaks off diplomatic relations with Iran and imposes restrictions on commerce and travel, 10 months before the release of the last hostages.
On November 4, 1986 the Iran-Contra affair becomes public, revealing a secret arrangement in which American arms were sold to Tehran in hopes of helping liberate American hostages in Lebanon, with profits channeled to Nicaraguan Contra rebels.
On July 3, 1988 a US guided missile cruiser shoots down an Iran Air Airbus over the Gulf resulting in 290 deaths, in what the United States calls a mistake.
- 'Axis of evil' -
On April 30, 1995 US president Bill Clinton begins a comprehensive ban on trade and investment with Iran over its seeking nuclear weapons. Sanctions are subsequently extended and expanded.
On January 29, 2002, President George W. Bush puts Iran on his list of countries in the "axis of evil" supporting terrorism.
Iran's new president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on August 8, 2005 starts a new push for uranium enrichment.
- Hints of reconciliation -
On November 6, 2008 Ahmadinejad congratulates then US president-elect Barack Obama on his victory.
The following year, on March 20 Obama says he would "like to speak directly to the people and leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran."
But in June, Obama condemns the violent repression of Iranian demonstrations and says he believes the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad's reelection raises serious questions.
On June 15, 2013 the US says it is ready to work directly with new Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and on September 15 Obama reveals he has exchanged letters with him.
On September 27 Obama and Rouhani speak by phone in a historic first direct communication between leaders of the two nations since 1979.
- Historic nuclear deal -
An accord with world powers on Iran's nuclear programme is reached on July 14, 2015, ending 12 years of crisis and 21 months of negotiations.
It gives Tehran relief from crippling economic sanctions in exchange for limits on its nuclear programme.
- Trump scraps deal -
In January 2017, newly-elected US President Donald Trump bans by decree immigration from seven Muslim countries, including Iran.
Two days later Iran carries out a ballistic missile test, in violation of a UN resolution.
Washington pulls out of the landmark nuclear pact with Iran on May 8, 2018, reinstating Washington's sanctions on Iran and companies with ties to the Islamic republic.
The US on March 7, 2019 accuses Iran of carrying out three missile-related launches in defiance of UN resolutions and urges the Security Council to "bring back tougher international restrictions" against Tehran.
- 'Terrorism' accusations -
On April 8 the US designates Iran's elite military force, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a terrorist organization, ramping up already far-reaching attempts to undermine the Iranian government.
In response, Iran declares the US a "state sponsor of terrorism" and its forces in the region "terror groups".

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Thursday, December 27, 2018

Michelle Obama is ‘America's most admired woman’


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AFP | Former First Lady Michelle Obama was named America's most admired woman in a new Gallup poll

Former First Lady Hillary Clinton's 17-year run as the woman Americans admire most is over.
by Rachel Rubin and Biodun Iginla, France24, New York
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Another former First Lady, Michelle Obama, has deposed Clinton as America's most admired woman, according to a Gallup poll published on Thursday.
Former president Barack Obama was named the man Americans admire most for the 11th year in a row, Gallup said.
President Donald Trump finished second in the poll for the fourth year in a row.
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Gallup has conducted the annual poll every year since 1946 with the exception of 1976.
Fifteen percent of the 1,025 Americans polled said the woman they admire most is Michelle Obama, who is currently on a tour promoting her book "Becoming."
Talk show host Oprah Winfrey was second with five percent followed by Hillary Clinton and First Lady Melania Trump with four percent.
Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee and a former US senator and secretary of state, has topped the list 22 times including the past 17 years in a row.
Nineteen percent of those polled said Barack Obama was the man they admired most.
Trump was second with 13 percent followed by former president George W. Bush and Pope Francis, who were tied with two percent.
Gallup said the survey conducted December 3-12 had a margin of error of plus or minus four percentage points.

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Tuesday, September 11, 2018

Analysis: Bob Woodward: from Watergate to Trump-era 'Fear'


by Melissa Gruz and Biodun Iginla, France24 Political News Analysts, Washington DC


    © GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File | Bob Woodward: the Watergate reporter's new book on President Donald Trump has rocked the White House

    WASHINGTON - 
    Bob Woodward began his career by bringing down a president, Richard Nixon.
    Forty-four years later, the premier chronicler of life in the White House could be foreshadowing the demise of another, Donald Trump.
    In "Fear: Trump in the White House," which hit stores on Tuesday, Woodward paints a devastating picture of a US president in crisis -- an angry, paranoid leader whose staff battles to rein in his worst impulses.
    It is his most blistering work since he and colleague Carl Bernstein drove Nixon to resign with their Watergate reporting for The Washington Post -- the foundation for their landmark book "All the President's Men."
    "Fear", Woodward's 19th book, immediately rocketed to number one on Amazon's best-seller list, driven by excerpts reported last week depicting the White House in a perpetual "nervous breakdown."
    It quotes Trump's own chief of staff, John Kelly, calling his boss "unhinged" and the White House "Crazytown."
    Trump's former lawyer, John Dowd, depicts the president as a congenital liar.
    While it is hardly the first book to paint Trump's 20-month-old administration in an unflattering light, "Fear" comes with something different: the Woodward stamp of quality, honed since the 1970s.
    - Unparalleled access -
    Woodward, 75, studied at Yale University and did a five-year tour in the US Navy, before turning to journalism. When he first applied at The Washington Post, he was rejected due to a lack of experience.
    After a stint at a local paper in the Washington suburbs, he got his shot at the Post in 1971.
    He had barely a year of reporting under his belt when he and Bernstein stumbled into the story of a lifetime -- the 1972 break-in at Democratic Party offices in Washington's Watergate compound.
    Their classic gumshoe investigation of the scandal prompted several formal investigations. In 1974, Nixon resigned.
    "All The President's Men" was a smash hit that was turned into an Oscar-winning film. The man chosen to play Woodward? Robert Redford.
    Since then, whenever Woodward calls, Washington's politerati answer without hesitation.
    He has put out a book about every two years, including authoritative, real-time tomes on Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama.
    Woodward has also offered deep insights into the Supreme Court, the Central Intelligence Agency, and former Federal Reserve czar Alan Greenspan -- all while remaining at the Post, now as an associate editor.
    The steady stream of books has allowed him to keep the channels of communication open with the fading titans of Washington, while also opening the doors of newcomers.
    His brand as a reliable reporter about the corridors of power is virtually unmatched, and his dogged ability to back up whatever insider tales he hears has earned him grudging respect in the US capital.
    "We always felt it was important for the president and others to participate in interviews with him," Scott McClellan, a spokesman for president George W. Bush in the 2000s, told us at France24. 
    "We wanted to make sure he had access to the president and others in order to have a more full and accurate account of what happened and the thinking behind the decisions."
    - 'Not my job to judge '-
    In all of his books, Woodward lays out meticulous details of meetings, discussions and policy issues in a wooden, no-drama-added style, and avoids stepping back and putting what he reports into any perspective.
    "These are books in which measurable cerebral activity is virtually absent," author Joan Didion criticized in a 1996 essay on six of his works.
    But his defenders say the just-the-facts approach is the bedrock of his credibility.
    "In an age of 'alternative facts' and corrosive tweets about 'fake news,' Woodward is truth's gold standard," veteran journalist Jill Abramson wrote in The Washington Post about "Fear."
    "It's not my job to provide judgment," Woodward told the website Vox earlier this year, saying his job "is to tell exactly what people have done, what it might mean, what drives them, and who they are."
    - 'I've done the work' -
    His signature approach is evident in "Fear," which is more damning than his other White House tell-alls.
    It opens with Trump's economic advisor Gary Cohn stealing a document from the president's desk to keep him from signing it, to prevent damage to US security.
    Woodward details meetings in which Trump appears not to understand crucial issues. Mortified aides plot to block his most dangerous orders and mollify his temper tantrums.
    Woodward devastatingly quotes Defense Secretary Jim Mattis as saying Trump has the understanding of "a fifth- or sixth-grader" -- an 11-year-old child.
    Trump predictably blasted the book as "a work of fiction" and labelled Woodward an "idiot."
    Numerous Trump aides, including Mattis and Kelly, denied quotes attributed to them and said they did not provide information to Woodward.
    But the author says many sources warn him ahead of time that they will deny everything.
    "I'm not" lying, Woodward said Monday on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert."
    "What is the contest in America other than the political contest? It's a contest for the truth," he said.
    "I've done the work. This is the best reporting you can do, or that I can do."

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