All these wars are similar in the way ideology is being used. It's the ideology of so-called humanitarian intervention. We don't want to do this, but we're doing this for the sake of the people who live there. This is, of course, a terrible sleight of hand because all sorts of people live there, and, by and large, they do it to help one faction and not the other.
Tariq AliI think the United States and its British attack dog are not taken seriously anywhere in the world and can play no role in helping a political solution.
Tariq AliThe current Eurozone is obviously dysfunctional. And serious people within Germany and elsewhere know this to be the case and know things cannot function this way forever.
Tariq AliAt the moment we have a critical situation in Greece. Even as we speak, where there is an open attempt by the EU to destroy Syriza by splitting it. There is a German obstinacy and utter refusal to seriously consider an alternative. The reason isn't even a lack of money, because money swims around the EU coffers endlessly, and they could write off the debt tomorrow if they wanted. But they don't want to do so, because of the election of a left-wing government. They want to punish Syriza in public, to humiliate it so that this model doesn't go any further than Greece.
Tariq AliWe have populations now in the West with a very short memory span. One reason for this short memory span is that television over the last fifteen years has seen a big decline in the coverage of the rest of the world.
Tariq AliThe European Union is effectively a union dominated by the German political and economic elite. Its main function is to serve as a nucleus for financial capitalism and to ease the road for that capitalism. The other functions just irritate everyone: it's undemocratic; decisions are not made by parliament; the European Parliament is not sovereign.
Tariq Ali