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 China's African aid questioned（伦敦音，非常头疼） |
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哈哈，Jon Snow！花了我2个小时才写完，累死了 -- 错误 - (7590 Byte) 2007-6-06 周三, 22:59 (235 reads) |
司徒培德
头衔: 海归少校
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加入时间: 2005/12/02
文章: 207
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作者：司徒培德 在 海归酒吧 发贴, 来自【海归网】 http://www.haiguinet.com
俺借光又对了一遍:
Britain is concerned that China's drive to offer unconditional aid and cheap loans to African countries is undermining advances in dea**ly fund efforts to create more democratic administrations in the region.
The warning from International Development secretary Hilary Benn comes as the Chinese president travels across the continent - what is widely seen as an attempt to use economic muscle to secure relationships with key partners on the continent. Our economic correspondent Fayes Islam reports
The Chinese president 12-day tour takes in 8 nations including Sudan, the most controversial of the host countries where China's unconditional aid policy has angered western governments. Many of whom say Beijing should use its economic weight to end hostilities in Darfur.
Hu has already pledged 2.6 billion pounds of soft loans and grants, as well as hundreds of millions in aid, to countries like Zambia.
China’s also negotiating a billion pound loan to prop up the ailing economy of Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe next door. South African leader Thabo Mbeki had warned that Africa is slipping to some kind of colonial relationship with China.
The yesterday president Hu was keen to stress China shared experience of western colonialism. Western anti-corruption campaign is, however, in China’s law**gest could be disastrous.
Well there’s no doubt that Chinese companies represent some kind of threat in various parts of the world including Africa. TI issues from time to time a bribe payers index. As a matter of fact, China has the worst record in that index as a propensity to pay bribes.
Britain, meanwhile, has launched an evangelical campaign against bribery using Foreign Office funded videos like this. It’s a key part of Britain’s strategy to help developing world. But Britain itself has been under fire in Africa over corruption probes.
Mr. Mbeki last month attacks Britain for hypocrisy in stopping an investigation into an alleged bribery by BAE systems in Saudi Arabia, while continuing a similar probe in South Africa. The international policeman on bribery, the OECD, has also expressed serious concerns that Britain's citing the national security to hold investigation, said the president, that will render its international convention against bribery useless.
Fayes Islam, before we came on air, I talked to the International Development secretary Hilary Benn and asked him, whether the Chinese in Africa represented a new colonialism.
No I don’t see it in that way. I think we should warmly welcome China’s relationship with Africa as a trader, because trade between China and Africa is probably going to increase 10-fold in the first decade of this century. As an investor, China’s investing a lot of money in infrastructure, in roads, and also as a provider of development support to African countries. Actually giving them more choice about where they get their help from. And after all, investment and trade, and buying goods and buying up mineral rights and so on is in the interest of Africa’s economy development
Yeah. But at the same time the aid in the form particularly of loans, soft loans and the rest, surely is running counter to the ****efforts that the west is currently(?) engaged in
Well I think it’s an issue to be concerned about. I think we need to weigh up on the score card the advantages of China’s involvement and they are very considerable. But the thing’s we need to watch, and China should have an interest in this, in that the world having worked very hard to help relieve the debt burden of some of the poorest countries of the world. You don’t want them to get back into unsustainable levels of debt because of loans that they’ve taken on.
The second element of the concerns with the Chinese that is their attitude to bribery is rather different from what many others doing businesses in Africa see
Well I think whoever is doing business with other countries including in Africa should be setting high standards. One thing I’d like to see China do is to come in and support the stractive**** industry’s transparency initiative. Because a lot of contracts they’re signing in Africa are for minerals and oil. And EITI which Britain launched about 3 years ago, very simple principle, the companies that are getting these concessions will publish what they pay to the government so that the government will publish what they receive from the companies. And if China can come in and support that I think it would send a very powerful signal about upholding good standards in the fight against corruption.
While are you not worried that in talking to the Chinese we are ourselves now very weakened by the very fact that we abandoned the investigation into bribery allegation concerning Saudi Arabia for example. And we’re still having to investigate them in other parts of Africa.
The fact the investigations that are taking place in respect to other allegation shows, on the contrary, John, just how seriously we take our responsibility to fight corruption. There’re very specific reasons of national security in the Saudi Arabia case.
You’re never consulted about what the impact might be on your work. You’re the lead minister on anti-bribery. The attorney general doesn’t come knock on your door and say Hilary Benn, what impact is gonna have on your work. It’s devastating. I was in the African union summit the other day there were Presidents laughing up their sleeves about the Saudi deal.
No, the attorney general didn’t consult me. And it would be quite improper, Jon, had he done so. Because this was an operational decision taken by the director of the Serious Fraud Office having had representations made to him by the ministers who are concerned about the national security. And that doesn’t include me. And it would be wrong for me to be involved. But we have signed the UN Convention we’ve got more capacity now in the metropolitan police, the city of London police to investigate. And in two cases involving Africa, former state governors from Nigeria. In one case the money brought into this country in a suitcase has been returned. And in another, thanks to the legislation that we as a government passed, and a swift action that metropolitan police who seized the assets the court ruled just before Christmas, that a house can be sold and money can be given back to the people of Nigeria from whom it was stolen. That is kind of action.
But we actually have never had a successful prosecution of anybody for bribery.
Today, that is correct. We passed the legislation in 2001 and as you said yourself a moment ago, there’re numbers of investigations ongoing. And we should let those continue. And if the evidence is found and those who take decisions about prosecution think that is the case to be mounted, then they will come to the courts. But we’ve now got more capacity to investigate that we had in the past. We got legislation on the statute book, and we never have that in the past either. We’re very serious about fighting corruptions.
Let me bring it full circle then and simply ask you do you think that when you make the calls you’ve made as you have today to the Chinese, they have any reason to listen?
I’m sure China will come to see that it has exactly the same interest as the rest of the world has. In assuring that there is stability, the fight against corruption, sustainable levels of debt in Africa. Above all it’s the interest of the people of Africa that all of those things should come to pass.
作者：司徒培德 在 海归酒吧 发贴, 来自【海归网】 http://www.haiguinet.com
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