Former Spy Chief On Britain's 'Libya Mistake'

Πηγή: skyNews
By Alistair Bunkall, Defence Correspondent
March 30 2016

A former Israeli spy chief tells Sky News the actions of the UK and France in 2011 are to blame for the country's current turmoil.

David Cameron has again been criticised for Britain's 2011 intervention in Libya, this time by a former Israeli intelligence chief.

Ephraim Halevy has warned that Libya will be the "biggest problem for Europe in the months to come".

The former head of the Mossad gave a forthright assessment of the situation in an exclusive interview with Sky News.

David Cameron has been criticised over UK involvement in Libya

He said: "I believe the trouble coming from Libya is going to be immense.

"I think the operation originally launched by Britain and France turned out to be the biggest mistake committed by western Europe in recent years.

"I think the result we are now seeing in Libya is a direct result of the policies that were initiated by Paris and London at the start of this campaign."

Mr Cameron was singled out by Barack Obama a few weeks ago in rare criticism from a serving US President.

The Prime Minister was "distracted by a range of other things" after the 2011 invasion, Obama said, and Libya had been left in "a mess".

So far, action against Islamic State in Libya has been confined to a small number of US airstrikes.

Britain, and other European nations, are waiting on a formal request by a Libyan administration before intervening in the country.

If that is forthcoming around 1,000 UK troops are expected to deploy in a training capacity, supporting a larger Italian mission. An air campaign is also being considered.

Mr Halevy also said Britain was more secure as a member of the EU and should not leave.

"I have no doubt that the continued membership of Britain in Europe is vital and essential…to make Britain more secure.

"In order to craft a credible reply, a credible remedy to the Muslim communities' problems as traditional Europe faces them, there must be a common policy.

"A common policy can only be obtained if all the countries who are involved in this actually work together in unison in a very, very profound way.

"Otherwise, each country will go its separate way and it will take much, much longer and the end result will be in doubt."

Merkel set to face down France and Italy over pleas for action in eurozone crisis as world leaders meet for summit

Give us some slack: German Chancellor Angela Merkel said even Europe's strongest economy must not be overburdened

Πηγή: MailOnline

By MATT BLAKE
June 28 2012

• The German Chancellor spoke on the eve of EU summit
• Fears that leaders have never been more divided
• Italy and Spain want rapid action to lower their soaring borrowing costs
• France wants eurozone countries to share joint liability for each other's debts.
• It comes as Britain plans to pump another £1billion into propping up the eurozone’s stricken economy

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is preparing to square up to France and Italy over their pleas for emergency action in the eurozone crisis.

Instead she will demand that they roll up their sleeves and join in with the effort to clean up Europe's existing financial mess.

Her put down comes on the eve of the EU's 20th summit since the crisis began and as Britain unveiled plans to pump another £1billion into propping up the eurozone’s stricken economy – a move critics have called a ‘backdoor bailout’.

Italy, along with Spain, have begged Germany for rapid action to lower their soaring borrowing costs, while France wants eurozone countries to share joint liability for each other's debts.

But on the eve of the EU summit, which is due to start at 2pm British time, Merkel brushed aside their demands, accusing top EU officials of getting their priorities wrong.

'I fear that at the summit we will talk too much about all these ideas for joint liability and too little about improved controls and structural measures [on national budgets and economic policies],' she told parliament in Berlin today.


Friends or foes: Mrs Merkel talks to (right to left) Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti, French President Francois Hollande and Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy at a meeting in Rome last week

French President Francois Hollande is championing joint 'eurobonds' to bring down borrowing costs for the weaker euro zone countries as the pool of guarantors would include the strongest - meaning Germany.

But before the summit - the EU's 20th since the crisis began - Merkel repeated her objections to the plan, saying even Europe's strongest economy must not be overburdened.

The German chancellor said she did not expect to see the introduction of debt-sharing measures ‘as long as I live’.

But as Spain’s borrowing costs approached the 7 per cent danger zone yesterday, its prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, warned: ‘We can’t continue for a long time to finance ourselves with these prices.’

The EU’s 27 leaders first met to discuss the crisis formally at a summit in February 2010, when they agreed to ‘stand behind’ failing Greece.

David Cameron is expected to announce today that the UK will hand over £1.3billion to the European Investment Bank as part of an EU-wide growth plan.

The initiative – to be unveiled at a summit in Brussels, the 19th since the euro crisis began – came after demands by France’s new Socialist president, Francois Hollande.

Mr Cameron is expected to argue that kickstarting growth in Europe could have knock-on benefits for Britain.The EIB has also directly funded a number of projects in the UK.

In return, the Prime Minister is demanding that EU leaders sign up to reforms to boost competitiveness in their own economies.

The deal is designed to distract attention from continued infighting over radical measures to save the euro.

However, the decision is likely to anger many Conservatives and taxpayers. Britain is already liable for £12billion as a result of the bailouts of Ireland, Portugal and Greece.

Mr Cameron is also likely to come under pressure to hand over more cash to the European Commission after it warned yesterday that it was running £3.5billion over budget.

Eurosceptic Tory MP Douglas Carswell said: ‘It is just more money wasted. What part of “stop giving them more money” does the Government not understand?


Bailout: Prime Minister David Cameron is expected to announce that the UK will give £1.3billion to help the EU economy

‘They know they can’t get more money voted through Parliament and this seems like a way of achieving the same result by the backdoor.

‘If there is £1billion going spare I would much rather it was spent here delaying the fuel duty rise for another year or fixing potholes in my constituency.’

Christopher Howarth, of the think- tank Open Europe, added: ‘This feels an awful lot like spending for the sake of spending without doing anything to solve the eurozone crisis. We fear this won’t be good use of taxpayers’ cash.’


EUROPEAN LEADERS NEVER MORE DIVIDED

The summit is the 20th between leaders of the 27 EU states since the crisis erupted in early 2010.

The many meetings has given them a reputation for failing to match their talk with decisive action.

But EU leaders go into a Brussels meeting today more openly divided than at any time since the euro crisis began.

Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel shows no sign of relenting in her refusal to back other countries' debts.

But French President Francois Hollande is championing joint 'eurobonds' to bring down borrowing costs for the weaker euro zone countries as the pool of guarantors would include the strongest - meaning Germany.

Meanwhile Spain is desperate for support for its ailing banks.

But Germany does not want to use its credit rating to support other members unless they first agree to share control of taxing and spending powers.

She is being urged at home to stay tough and reject all efforts to make Germany underwrite European partners' debts or banks, while her EU partners say that may be the only way to save the single currency.

'Nein! No! Non!' shouted a headline splashed across the front page of the normally sober German business daily Handelsblatt, with a commentary by its editor-in-chief saying Merkel must remain firm at the two-day summit.

The moral decay of our society is as bad at the top as the bottom

Tottenham ablaze: the riots began early on Sunday (Photo: AP)

Πηγή: The Telegraph
By Peter Oborne
August 11th, 2011


David Cameron, Ed Miliband and the entire British political class came together yesterday to denounce the rioters. They were of course right to say that the actions of these looters, arsonists and muggers were abhorrent and criminal, and that the police should be given more support.

But there was also something very phony and hypocritical about all the shock and outrage expressed in parliament. MPs spoke about the week’s dreadful events as if they were nothing to do with them.

I cannot accept that this is the case. Indeed, I believe that the criminality in our streets cannot be dissociated from the moral disintegration in the highest ranks of modern British society. The last two decades have seen a terrifying decline in standards among the British governing elite. It has become acceptable for our politicians to lie and to cheat. An almost universal culture of selfishness and greed has grown up.

It is not just the feral youth of Tottenham who have forgotten they have duties as well as rights. So have the feral rich of Chelsea and Kensington. A few years ago, my wife and I went to a dinner party in a large house in west London. A security guard prowled along the street outside, and there was much talk of the “north-south divide”, which I took literally for a while until I realised that my hosts were facetiously referring to the difference between those who lived north and south of Kensington High Street.

Most of the people in this very expensive street were every bit as deracinated and cut off from the rest of Britain as the young, unemployed men and women who have caused such terrible damage over the last few days. For them, the repellent Financial Times magazine How to Spend It is a bible. I’d guess that few of them bother to pay British tax if they can avoid it, and that fewer still feel the sense of obligation to society that only a few decades ago came naturally to the wealthy and better off.

Yet we celebrate people who live empty lives like this. A few weeks ago, I noticed an item in a newspaper saying that the business tycoon Sir Richard Branson was thinking of moving his headquarters to Switzerland. This move was represented as a potential blow to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, because it meant less tax revenue.

I couldn’t help thinking that in a sane and decent world such a move would be a blow to Sir Richard, not the Chancellor. People would note that a prominent and wealthy businessman was avoiding British tax and think less of him. Instead, he has a knighthood and is widely feted. The same is true of the brilliant retailer Sir Philip Green. Sir Philip’s businesses could never survive but for Britain’s famous social and political stability, our transport system to shift his goods and our schools to educate his workers.

Yet Sir Philip, who a few years ago sent an extraordinary £1 billion dividend offshore, seems to have little intention of paying for much of this. Why does nobody get angry or hold him culpable? I know that he employs expensive tax lawyers and that everything he does is legal, but he surely faces ethical and moral questions just as much as does a young thug who breaks into one of Sir Philip’s shops and steals from it?

Our politicians – standing sanctimoniously on their hind legs in the Commons yesterday – are just as bad. They have shown themselves prepared to ignore common decency and, in some cases, to break the law. David Cameron is happy to have some of the worst offenders in his Cabinet. Take the example of Francis Maude, who is charged with tackling public sector waste – which trade unions say is a euphemism for waging war on low‑paid workers. Yet Mr Maude made tens of thousands of pounds by breaching the spirit, though not the law, surrounding MPs’ allowances.

A great deal has been made over the past few days of the greed of the rioters for consumer goods, not least by Rotherham MP Denis MacShane who accurately remarked, “What the looters wanted was for a few minutes to enter the world of Sloane Street consumption.” This from a man who notoriously claimed £5,900 for eight laptops. Of course, as an MP he obtained these laptops legally through his expenses.

Yesterday, the veteran Labour MP Gerald Kaufman asked the Prime Minister to consider how these rioters can be “reclaimed” by society. Yes, this is indeed the same Gerald Kaufman who submitted a claim for three months’ expenses totalling £14,301.60, which included £8,865 for a Bang & Olufsen television.

Or take the Salford MP Hazel Blears, who has been loudly calling for draconian action against the looters. I find it very hard to make any kind of ethical distinction between Blears’s expense cheating and tax avoidance, and the straight robbery carried out by the looters.

The Prime Minister showed no sign that he understood that something stank about yesterday’s Commons debate. He spoke of morality, but only as something which applies to the very poor: “We will restore a stronger sense of morality and responsibility – in every town, in every street and in every estate.” He appeared not to grasp that this should apply to the rich and powerful as well.

The tragic truth is that Mr Cameron is himself guilty of failing this test. It is scarcely six weeks since he jauntily turned up at the News International summer party, even though the media group was at the time subject to not one but two police investigations. Even more notoriously, he awarded a senior Downing Street job to the former News of the World editor Andy Coulson, even though he knew at the time that Coulson had resigned after criminal acts were committed under his editorship. The Prime Minister excused his wretched judgment by proclaiming that “everybody deserves a second chance”. It was very telling yesterday that he did not talk of second chances as he pledged exemplary punishment for the rioters and looters.

These double standards from Downing Street are symptomatic of widespread double standards at the very top of our society. It should be stressed that most people (including, I know, Telegraph readers) continue to believe in honesty, decency, hard work, and putting back into society at least as much as they take out.

But there are those who do not. Certainly, the so-called feral youth seem oblivious to decency and morality. But so are the venal rich and powerful – too many of our bankers, footballers, wealthy businessmen and politicians.

Of course, most of them are smart and wealthy enough to make sure that they obey the law. That cannot be said of the sad young men and women, without hope or aspiration, who have caused such mayhem and chaos over the past few days. But the rioters have this defence: they are just following the example set by senior and respected figures in society. Let’s bear in mind that many of the youths in our inner cities have never been trained in decent values. All they have ever known is barbarism. Our politicians and bankers, in sharp contrast, tend to have been to good schools and universities and to have been given every opportunity in life.

Something has gone horribly wrong in Britain. If we are ever to confront the problems which have been exposed in the past week, it is essential to bear in mind that they do not only exist in inner-city housing estates.

The culture of greed and impunity we are witnessing on our TV screens stretches right up into corporate boardrooms and the Cabinet. It embraces the police and large parts of our media. It is not just its damaged youth, but Britain itself that needs a moral reformation.