The problem now is what happens when current monetary policy collides with a policy of “vast government borrowing” on a scale unknown since the 1940s.

“We have the fiscal policy of a world war without a war.”

Referring to the clash between inflation and deflation he added: “I don’t know who is going to win but we know that while the struggle goes on ordinary people will get trampled. There will be more economic volatility and ordinary people will pay.”

He has also warned that in Britain he expects “more riots in major cities this year” because of the economic situation and says the recent “drip feed” of the peccadilloes of British MPs and their expenses is “just the beginning of a crisis of political legitimacy that will be played out over the next 18 months”.

Ferguson, a native of Glasgow, specialises in financial and economic history as well as the history of the British empire.

Source/Full Story: The Independent

A home-made bomb exploded outside a Citibank branch in the Greek capital causing minor damage and no injuries, police said on Monday.

There has been an outbreak of violence since the fatal police shooting of a teenager in December, which sparked Greece’s worst riots in decades and rocked the fragile conservative government.

“The bomb exploded at the rear of the bank’s building breaking its windows and damaging two cars parked outside the bank,” a police official who declined to be named said.

Source: Reuters

Source: The Irish Times

ONE MILLION workers on the streets of France, wildcat strikes in Britain, rioting in Greece and the Baltic republics and sit-in protests by glass workers in Waterford: social unrest is spreading throughout Europe and no one knows where it is all going to end.

Last week the worst economic recession in at least 30 years claimed its first political victim in Europe when on Monday Iceland’s beleaguered prime minister Geir Haarde tendered his resignation following weeks of street protests. The collapse of the country’s banking system, which has shredded the value of the krona, driven interest rates to 18 per cent and unemployment to 8 per cent, put paid to his Conservative-led coalition.

By Thursday one million workers were protesting on the streets of Paris, angry that they are losing their jobs while bankers are being bailed out. “I’m tired and frozen after waiting half an hour on the platform,” commuter Sandrine Dermont said. “But I’m prepared to accept that when it’s a movement to defend our spending power and jobs. I’ll join the street protests during my lunch break.”

Workers at Waterford Crystal tapped into the continent-wide mood of defiance, staging a sit-in protest when a receiver announced an immediate halt to all manufacturing. Many must be asking why the Government is giving billions in taxpayers’ money to save Anglo Irish Bank while turning down a request for a State-backed loan for Waterford.

As more families in Europe face hardship the sense of injustice is growing. Words coined during the dark days of the 1930s such as “bankster”, which is a mix of banker and gangster, are suddenly back in vogue as a younger generation of Europeans used to more than a decade of consumerism gets its first taste of dole queues.

“There’s a big scandal . . . governments are now trying to save banks through injecting capital and save companies by giving credit guarantees, and this will translate into higher public deficits,” says Ronald Janssen, economist with the European Trade Union Confederation.

“This is not sustainable for public finances, so you have to cut social security, which will lead to an attack on social Europe,” he says, warning that the potential result is an “explosion of social unrest” and the de facto end of social Europe.

And it’s not just the trade unions that are warning of the danger of social unrest. The IMF, which has already helped bail out Iceland, Latvia and Hungary with emergency loans, warned back in December there was a dire need for governments to take action on the economy to stop trouble spilling on to the streets.

“If we are not able to do that, then social unrest may happen in many countries – including advanced economies,” said IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who warned that violence could break out if the global financial system was not remodelled to benefit everyone.

His warnings have turned out to be prescient. Widespread rioting broke out in Greece in December when a 15-year-old boy was shot dead by police. Students and young people went on the rampage for several days, citing lack jobs and opportunities for their anger. In January, riots broke out in Latvia and Lithuania, which have been hit hard by the economic slowdown. Later, a Bulgarian demonstration against corruption held in front of the parliament in Sofia descended into violence.

“Serious social unrest is probably more likely to occur in new member states in eastern Europe where political systems are less mature and there is often popular discontent due to corruption,” says Daniel Gros, director of the Centre for European Policy Studies, who also notes that some Europeans, such as the French, are quicker to protest than others.

The sight of typically more restrained British workers taking part in wildcat strikes is another sign that this is no mere economic downturn. Contractors brandishing placards with the message “British jobs 4 British workers” in protests against the use of foreign workers at an oil refinery in Lincolnshire showed that an upsurge in anti-immigrant feeling could take hold.

EU governments are getting increasingly nervous at the rise in social tensions and in Brussels there are fears the European elections in June will see a large anti-establishment vote that could see xenophobic and extreme MEPs elected. Employment commissioner Vladimir Spidla said last week he is investigating how the EU budget could be used to alleviate the crisis. One way could be to expand the scope of the EU globalisation fund, which provides funds to help retrain workers; another, to allow faster access to EU social funding.

But most of the policy levers to deal with the crisis and provide a social security safety net lie in the hands of national politicians. The €2 trillion question (the IMF’s latest estimate of the bad debts held by banks) is whether policymakers can find a plan that steers a course towards economic recovery while restoring a sense of fairness to life. If they fail Iceland’s Geir Haarde will certainly not be the last political victim of this economic recession.

Technorati Tags: riots, civil unrest

Source:  Times Online

Icelanders all but stormed their Parliament last night. It was the first session of the chamber after what might appear to be an unusually long Christmas break.

Ordinary islanders were determined to vent their fury at the way that the political class had allowed the country to slip towards bankruptcy. The building was splattered with paint and yoghurt, the crowd yelled and banged pans, fired rockets at the windows and lit a bonfire in front of the main door. Riot police moved in.

Now in the grand sweep of the current crisis, a riot on a piece of volcanic rock in the north Atlantic may not seem to add up to much. But it is a sign of things to come: a new age of rebellion.

The financial meltdown has become part of the real economy and is now beginning to shape real politics. More and more citizens on the edge of the global crisis are taking to the streets. Bulgaria has been gripped this month by its worst riots since 1997 when street power helped to topple a Socialist government. Now Socialists are at the helm again and are having to fend off popular protests about government incompetence and corruption.

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Technorati Tags: riots, civil unrest, depression

Source:  Reuters

China faces surging protests and riots in 2009 as rising unemployment stokes discontent, a state-run magazine said in a blunt warning of the hazards to Communist Party control from a sharp economic downturn.

The unusually stark report in this week’s Outlook (Liaowang) Magazine, issued by the official Xinhua news agency, said faltering growth could spark anger among millions of migrant workers and university graduates left jobless.

“Without doubt, now we’re entering a peak period for mass incidents,” a senior Xinhua reporter, Huang Huo, told the magazine, using the official euphemism for riots and protests.

“In 2009, Chinese society may face even more conflicts and clashes that will test even more the governing abilities of all levels of the Party and government.”

President Hu Jintao has vowed to make China a “harmonious society,” but his promise is being tested by rising tension over shrinking jobs and incomes, as well as long-standing anger over corruption and land seizures.

China also faces a year of politically tense anniversaries, especially the 20th year since the June 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square. That date has already galvanised the “Charter 08″ campaign by dissidents and advocates demanding deep democratic reforms.

While foreign commentary about risks to China’s recipe of fast economic growth and one-party control are common, the nation’s leaders are usually reticent about such threats.

This report and other recent open warnings may be intended to help snap officials to attention, said one Chinese expert.

“The candor about these problems reflects the severity of the unemployment problem. It’s meant to attract the attention of all levels of government,” said Mao Shoulong, a professor of public policy at Renmin University in Beijing.

“The government wants to show that stability is at the top of its agenda.”

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Technorati Tags: China, protests, riots, civil unrest

Source: NYTimes.com

Gunmen sprayed Athens riot police with automatic weapons fire early Monday, seriously wounding a policeman in an escalation of violence that erupted last month when a teenager was killed in a police shooting.

The teenager’s death on Dec. 6 sparked Greece’s worst riots in decades, with masked protesters frequently attacking police with gasoline bombs and rocks. But none had caused serious injury.

Monday’s pre-dawn shooting targeted a police unit guarding the Culture Ministry in downtown Athens, police spokesman Panagiotis Stathis said. It was the second such attack against police. On Dec. 23, gunmen fired two automatic rifles at a riot police bus passing a university campus outside the city center, but none of the 20 or so officers on board were injured.

Anti-terrorist police are investigating both shootings.

The wounded policeman, 21-year-old Diamandis Matzounis, was hospitalized in critical but stable condition after six hours of surgery, Health Minister Dimitris Avramopoulos said. He suffered two bullet wounds, one to the thigh and the other near the shoulder, hitting several vital organs, the hospital said in a statement.

Interior Minister Prokopis Pavlopoulos described the attack an attempt to undermine democracy.

”Those who attacked Diamandis Matzounis targeted democracy and order,” Pavlopoulos said after visiting the wounded man.

”They will soon realize that democracy is strong and our society is safeguarded,” he said, adding that ”no bullet and no murderer” could undermine the police force’s morale and sense of duty.

A police official said two men, one with a Kalashnikov-type automatic rifle, had sprayed bullets at the police unit in Exarchia — a downtown area of bars and restaurants that is considered an area favored by radicals.

”They wanted to kill someone in uniform. They sprayed our colleagues with gunfire,” said Stratos Mavroidakos, the head of a police officers’ association.

”People were instigated into taking this action by the prevailing climate,” Mavroidakos said, referring to the near daily violent demonstrations in which youths chanting ”cops, pigs, murderers” have clashed with riot police, set up burning street barricades and torched banks and stores.

”This is what happens when you have 12-year-old children at demonstrations calling police ‘murders’ … These events have set us back 20 years,” he said.

After Monday’s 3:05 a.m. (0105 GMT) attack, patrol cars and riot police buses blocked access to much of Exarchia well into the morning, and forensic investigators in white coveralls collected evidence from the site of the shooting.

A police statement said authorities detained 72 people during the initial search for suspects.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the shooting.

After the Dec. 23 attack against the riot police bus, an anonymous caller had claimed responsibility on behalf of a previously unknown group. It was unclear whether the claim of responsibility was reliable.

At least six serious attacks have been carried out by little-known domestic radical groups in the past five years, including two bombings and the fatal shooting of a policeman by gunmen who stole his automatic weapon.

Most of these attacks were claimed by a group called Revolutionary Struggle.

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Technorati Tags: Greece, riots

Source: The Associated Press

A nationally televised meeting between Iceland’s prime minister and other political leaders was forced off the air Wednesday night when angry protesters disrupted the broadcast.

For more than two decades, the leaders of Iceland’s political parties have met every New Year’s Eve over champagne and spiced herring to talk about the year ahead on Iceland’s Channel 2 television.

But this year’s show with Prime Minister Geir Haarde was cut short 45 minutes into the program when a torch-wielding crowd stormed Reykjavik’s Hotel Borg in an attempt to get to the studio.

Protesters inside and outside the hotel clashed with police, who fired pepper spray to disperse the 500-strong crowd. Some demonstrators threw water balloons, while others tossed firecrackers.

At one point, the broadcaster’s television cables caught fire, interrupting the live broadcast. The program cut to commercials, followed by an announcement that Channel 2’s equipment had been damaged and the show would be suspended.

Outside the hotel, a policeman hit on the head with a brick had to be hospitalized. Three protesters were arrested.

The disruption was the latest in a series of demonstrations that have rocked Iceland since the country’s economy imploded this fall under a mammoth load of bad debt. Unemployment has increased and inflation has soared.

Demonstrations have been largely peaceful — some protesters were reportedly invited in for coffee when they showed up at President Olafur Grimsson’s home earlier this month.

But other events have been violent. Icelandic authorities used tear gas for the first time since 1949 when a huge crowd tried to storm a police station in Reykjavik in November, and on Dec. 18, protesters smashed the windows of the country’s financial watchdog agency.

Technorati Tags: Iceland, riots, protests, demonstrations, inflation

By way of remembrance, on the eve of the New Year…

Source: El Paso Times

A U.S. Army War College report warns an economic crisis in the United States could lead to massive civil unrest and the need to call on the military to restore order.

Retired Army Lt. Col. Nathan Freir wrote the report “Known Unknowns: Unconventional Strategic Shocks in Defense Strategy Development,” which the Army think tank in Carlisle, Pa., recently released.

“Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities … to defend basic domestic order and human security,” the report said, in case of “unforeseen economic collapse,” “pervasive public health emergencies,” and “catastrophic natural and human disasters,” among other possible crises.

The report also suggests the new (Barack Obama) administration could face a “strategic shock” within the first eight months in office.

Fort Bliss spokeswoman Jean Offutt said the Army post is not involved in any recent talks about a potential military response to civil unrest.

The report become a hot Internet item after Phoenix police told the Phoenix Business Journal they’re prepared to deal with such an event, and the International Monetary Fund’s managing director, Dominique Strauss-Khan, said social unrest could spread to advanced countries if the global economic crisis worsens.

Javier Sambrano, spokesman for the El Paso Police Department, said city police have trained for years so they can address any contingency, but not with the military.

“The police (department) trains on an ongoing basis as part of its Mobile Field Force Training,” Sambrano said. “As a result, the police will be able to respond to emergency situations, such as looting or a big civil unrest. The police (department) does not train with soldiers.”

Earlier this year, Pentagon officials said as many as 20,000 soldiers under the U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) will be trained within the next three years to work with civilian law enforcement in homeland security.

Joint Task Force-North, a joint command at Biggs Army Airfield, which conducts surveillance and intelligence along the border, comes under NORTHCOM. No one was available at JTF-North to comment on the Army War College’s report. NORTHCOM was created after the 9-11 attacks to coordinate homeland security efforts.

Soldiers under the former Joint Task Force-6 (now JTF-North) supported the Border Patrol in El Paso with its drug-interdiction operations.

In case civilian authorities request help or become overwhelmed, El Paso has several National Guard and military reserve units that can be called on. In 1992, National Guard and active Marine and Army units were deployed to help police control riots and looting in Los Angeles.

Charles Boehmer, political science professor at the University of Texas at El Paso, was skeptical about the Army War College report.

“The military was not called out during the Great Depression, and I don’t think our economic problems are as bad as they were then,” he said. “The military always has contingency plans. It’s a think tank’s job to come up with scenarios, but that doesn’t mean it represents an active interest on the part of the (Pentagon).”

Diana Washington Valdez may be reached at dvaldez@elpasotimes.com; 546-6140.

Technorati Tags: Nathan Freir, Known Unknowns: Unconventional Strategic Shocks in Defense Strategy Development, riots, civil unrest, martial law

Literally, the bottom line:  “ The last great era of globalisation peaked just before 1914. You know the rest of the story. “

Source: Telegraph

Greece has been in turmoil for 11 days. The mood seems to have turned “pre-insurrectionary” in parts of Athens – to borrow from the Marxist handbook.

This is a foretaste of what the world may face as the “crisis of capitalism” – another Marxist phase making a comeback – starts to turn two hundred million lives upside down.

We are advancing to the political stage of this global train wreck. Regimes are being tested. Those relying on perma-boom to mask a lack of democratic or ancestral legitimacy may try to gain time by the usual methods: trade barriers, sabre-rattling, and barbed wire.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the head of the International Monetary Fund, is worried enough to ditch a half-century of IMF orthodoxy, calling for a fiscal boost worth 2pc of world GDP to “prevent global depression”.

“If we are not able to do that, then social unrest may happen in many countries, including advanced economies. We are facing an unprecedented decline in output. All around the planet, the people have reacted with feelings going from surprise to anger, and from anger to fear,” he said.

Russia has begun to shut down trade as it adjusts to the shock of Urals oil below $40 a barrel. It has imposed import tariffs of 30pc on cars, 15pc on farm kit, and 95pc on poultry (above quota levels). “It is possible during the financial crisis to support domestic producers by raising customs duties,” said Premier Vladimir Putin.

Russia is not alone. India and Vietnam have imposed steel tariffs. Indonesia is resorting to special “licences” to choke off imports.

The Kremlin is alarmed by a 13pc fall in industrial output over the last five months. There have been street protests in Moscow, St Petersburg, Kaliningrad, Vladivostok and Barnaul. Police crushed “Dissent Marchers” holding copies of Russia’s constitution above their heads in Moscow’s Triumfalnaya Square.

“Russia has not seen anything like these nationwide protests before,” said Boris Kagarlitsky from Moscow’s Globalization Institute.

The Duma is widening the treason law to catch most forms of political dissent, and unwelcome forms of journalism. Jury trials for state crimes are to be abolished.

Yevgeny Kiseloyov at the Moscow Times said it feels eerily like December 1 1934 when Stalin unveiled his “Enemies of the People” law, kicking off the Great Terror.

The omens are not good in China either. Taxis are being bugged by state police. The great unknown is how Beijing will respond as its state-directed export strategy hits a brick wall, leaving exposed a vast eyesore of concrete and excess plant.

Exports fell 2.2pc in November. Toy, textile, footwear, and furniture plants are being closed across Guangdong, now the riot hub of South China. Some 40m Chinese workers are expected to lose their jobs. Party officials have warned of “mass-scale social turmoil”.

The Politburo is giving mixed signals. We don’t yet know how much of the country’s plan to boost domestic demand through a $586bn stimulus package is real, and how much is a wish-list sent to party bosses in the hinterland without funding.

Shortly after President Hu Jintao said China is “losing competitive edge in the world market”, we saw a move towards export subsidies for the steel industry and a dip in the yuan peg – even though China already has the world’s biggest reserves ($2 trillion) and the biggest trade surplus ($40bn a month).

So is the Communist Party mulling a 1930s “beggar-thy-neighbour” strategy of devaluation to export its way out of trouble? Such raw mercantilism can only draw a sharp retort from Washington and Brussels in this climate.

“During a global slowdown, you can’t have countries trying to take advantage of others by manipulating their currencies,” said Frank Vargo from the US National Association of Manufacturers.

It is a view shared entirely by President-elect Barack Obama. “China must change its currency practices. Because it pegs its currency at an artificially low rate, China is running massive current account surpluses. This is not good for American firms and workers, not good for the world,” he said in October. The new intake of radical Democrats on Capitol Hill will hold him to it.

There has been much talk lately of America’s Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which set off the protectionist dominoes in 1930. It is usually invoked by free traders to make the wrong point. The relevant message of Smoot-Hawley is that America was then the big exporter, playing the China role. By resorting to tariffs, it set off retaliation, and was the biggest victim of its own folly.

Britain and the Dominions retreated into Imperial Preference. Other countries joined. This became the “growth bloc” of the 1930s, free from the deflation constraints of the Gold Standard. High tariffs stopped the stimulus leaking out.

It was a successful strategy – given the awful alternatives – and was the key reason why Britain’s economy contracted by just 5pc during the Depression, against 15pc for France, and 30pc for the US.

Could we see such a closed “growth bloc” emerging now, this time led by the US, entailing a massive rupture of world’s trading system? Perhaps.

This crisis has already brought us a monetary revolution as interest rates approach zero across the G10. It may overturn the “New World Order” as well, unless we move with great care in grim months ahead. This is where events turn dangerous.

The last great era of globalisation peaked just before 1914. You know the rest of the story.

Technorati Tags: riots, insurrection

Source: Phoenix Business Journal

A new report by the U.S. Army War College talks about the possibility of Pentagon resources and troops being used should the economic crisis lead to civil unrest, such as protests against businesses and government or runs on beleaguered banks.

“Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security,” said the War College report.

The study says economic collapse, terrorism and loss of legal order are among possible domestic shocks that might require military action within the U.S.

International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn warned Wednesday of economy-related riots and unrest in various global markets if the financial crisis is not addressed and lower-income households are hurt by credit constraints and rising unemployment.

U.S. Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and U.S. Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Calif., both said U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson brought up a worst-case scenario as he pushed for the Wall Street bailout in September. Paulson, former Goldman Sachs CEO, said that might even require a declaration of martial law, the two noted.

State and local police in Arizona say they have broad plans to deal with social unrest, including trouble resulting from economic distress. The security and police agencies declined to give specifics, but said they would employ existing and generalized emergency responses to civil unrest that arises for any reason.

“The Phoenix Police Department is not expecting any civil unrest at this time, but we always train to prepare for any civil unrest issue. We have a Tactical Response Unit that trains continually and has deployed on many occasions for any potential civil unrest issue,” said Phoenix Police spokesman Andy Hill.

“We have well established plans in place for such civil unrest,” said Scottsdale Police spokesman Mark Clark.

Clark, Hill and other local police officials said the region did plenty of planning and emergency management training for the Super Bowl in February in Glendale.

“We’re prepared,” said Maricopa County Sheriff Deputy Chief Dave Trombi citing his office’s past dealings with immigration marches and major events.

Super Bowl security efforts included personnel and resources from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. military’s Northern Command, which coordinated with Arizona officials. The Northern Command was created after 9/11 to have troops and Defense Department resources ready to respond to security problems, terrorism and natural disasters.

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Technorati Tags: civil unrest, riots, martial law

Source: Prison Planet

Celente reiterated his prediction of a revolution and riots in America, and said that the first signs of it could even emerge before the end of the year.

Celente said that the troops now being brought back to America for “domestic security” would be used to suppress the riots.

“There’s talk of opening all these detention centers and hiring the goon squads, the Blackwaters to run them, so these are realities going on as we speak,” said Celente, adding that the Halliburton subsidiary KBR had been awarded a half a billion dollar contract to build “national emergency” internment camps in the name of detaining illegal immigrants but that they would be used to hold rioting Americans.

“We’re really in a period of ‘off with their heads’ and its going to be the people against the politicians,” said Celente.

Celente said that a breakup of the United States was possible and that the secessionist movement was strong.

“The government owns and runs the largest mortgage company, owns the largest insurance company, they’re going to be owning a piece of the oil industry, so it’s a fight against a totalitarian government…so there’s going to be rebellions and things will change for the better if we break up these criminal governments that are in place now,” said Celente.

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Technorati Tags: Celente, riots, detention centers, Blackwater

Source: SPIEGEL ONLINE

As Greece entered its sixth day of unrest sparked by the police shooting of a 15-year-old boy, violence spread to other parts of Europe on Thursday. Solidarity protests in cities including Rome, Madrid and Copenhagen turned into skirmishes between demonstrators and police.

The unrest that has gripped Greece for days has started to spill over into other European capitals, with arrests made in Rome, Copenhagen and Madrid on Wednesday night after solidarity demonstrations descended into violence.

The situation in Greece itself had calmed somewhat by mid-morning Thursday following pre-dawn violence which saw students clash with police. Youth threw stones and fire bombs at police in the early hours of the morning in the sixth day of protests since the fatal shooting of 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos ingited anger over police brutality. The events have also stoked public anger with the government — resentment that was already widespread following a series of financial scandals and unpopular reforms.

In Madrid nine people were arrested when things turned violent and another two were detained in Barcelona, after police broke up a demonstration attended by around 300 young people. A protest in the Danish capital Copenhagen also turned nasty with 32 people arrested after run-ins with the police.

In Greece a new student protest has been called for later on Thursday and school and university students and teachers have called a rally in Athens for Friday.

Many people have voiced anger at the lack of remorse shown by the police officer charged with murdering the teenager on Saturday night. On Wednesday a prosecutor sent Epaminondas Korkoneas and his partner, who is charged with being an accomplice, to jail pending their trial. Their defense lawyer Alexis Cougias said that a ballistics examination had shown that Grigoropoulos had been killed by a ricocheting bullet and not a direct shot. Under questioning Korkoneas indicated that he had acted out of self defense when a group of 30 youths in the volatile Exarchia district began throwing firebombs and other object and shouting that they “were going to kill them.”

On Wednesday, Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis pledged financial aid to those who have lost property in the riots. However, it is unlikely that this will placate the conservative government’s critics. In two separate opinion polls published on Wednesday, before the aid package was announced, 68 percent of Greeks said they disapproved of the government’s handling of the crisis and the opposition Socialists now enjoy a five-point lead in the polls.

Karamanlis, whose party only has a one-seat majority in the Greek parliament, has rejected calls for early elections. And despite the ongoing tensions at home, the prime minister is going ahead with plans to attend the European Union summit in Brussels on Thursday.

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Technorati Tags: riots

The political attention span of the average sheeple is about 2 weeks…

Source: washingtonpost.com

South Korea’s beef over U.S. beef is finally over.

So are the months of anti-beef rallies and riots that paralyzed downtown Seoul this year and cost South Korea an estimated $2.5 billion. So are the human chains of concerned housewives surrounding meat lockers containing U.S. beef. So are the beef-focused apologies of South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, whose dreadful poll numbers forced him to beg voters to forgive him for failure to “fathom the people’s mind.”

Now, in the winter of their consumerism, the people have changed their mind.

Low-priced U.S. beef has appeared in supermarkets here in recent days, after a decision by three major retailers to start selling it again, and the reaction has been brisk business and no political fuss. Fifty tons of U.S. beef disappeared from shelves the first day it was offered for sale.

“It is our national character to get upset easily and then to forget all about it,” said Park Eun-ah, 48, a romance novelist who lives in Seoul and Paris.

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Source: Bloomberg.com

Food Prices Rising

Food prices will rise next year, prompting a revival of protectionism from food-growing nations and risking a renewed bout of rioting, according to Jochen Hitzfeld, an analyst at UniCredit SpA in Munich.

“Agricultural commodities will outperform the broad commodity indices in 2009,” Hitzfeld wrote in a research note this week. “If key crop-producing countries then impose export bans again and speculators drive up prices via physical stockpiling and futures contracts, new food unrest is even conceivable in the second half of 2009.”

The CHART OF THE DAY shows food prices for the past 10 years as measured by an index compiled by UBS AG and Bloomberg that tracks at least 13 foodstuffs, including wheat, soybeans, sugar, cocoa and coffee. The index has declined 35 percent since peaking in July.

“The prices of many agricultural commodities are now clearly below their production costs,” Hitzfeld wrote. “We expect the coming year to bring a cutback in area under cultivation as well as a decline in the yield per hectare.”

Technorati Tags: Food prices

Source: Telegraph

Rioting in China

The move came just one day after the World Bank predicted that China would grow by 7.5pc next year. The level of growth may appear robust by Western standards, but it would represent the slowest economic expansion in China for the last two decades.

It is also perilously close to the 7pc minimum level of growth that Chinese economists believe is necessary in order to create enough jobs for the 6m university graduates who will enter the jobs market next year.

It is the fourth interest rate cut from the Chinese central bank in the last ten weeks as the government desperately battles an evident economic collapse. “China is out to save itself here,” said Patrick Bennett, an analyst with Societe Generale in Hong Kong.

The PBOC reduced its main borrowing rate by 1.08pc points to 5.58pc, the biggest one-off cut since the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997.

In recent weeks, a series of riots across central and southern China have flowered as disgruntled employees aired their grievances at the downturn.

Today, around 500 protesters rioted at the Kai Da toy factory in Dongguan in the Pearl River delta, flipping over a police car and trashing computers in a dispute over payoffs to 80 fired workers. Tens of thousands of factories across the region have already shut their gates.

Yin Weimin, China’s Social Security minister, has revealed that employment is the Communist Party’s number one concern in the downturn and said the “situation is critical”. Unemployment is expected to rise from 4pc to 4.5pc by the end of the year and anecdotal reports have suggested that 3m people have already been fired in the industrial province of Zhejiang alone.

Two major provinces, Shandong and Hubei, have already responded by banning companies from firing staff without permission from the government.

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