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The Economist.04.19.2008 SEARCH RESEARCH TOOLS Economist.com Choose a research tool... advanced search » Subscribe Activate RSS Help Friday April 18th 2008 Welcome = requires subscription My Account » Manage my newsletters LOG OUT » » PRINT EDITION Print Edition April 19th 2008 On the cover Previous print editions Subscribe Why food is in crisis—and what Apr 12th 2008 Subscribe to the print edition to do about it: leader Apr 5th 2008 Or buy a Web subscription for Mar 29th 2008 full access online Mar 22nd 2008 Mar 15th 2008 RSS feeds Receive this page by RSS feed More print editions and covers » The world this week Politics this week Full contents Subscribe Business this week Enlarge current cover KAL's cartoon Past issues/regional covers Business Leaders NEWS ANALYSIS Disney Magic restored POLITICS THIS WEEK Food The silent tsunami General Electric BUSINESS THIS WEEK Immeltdown The return of Silvio Berlusconi OPINION Mamma mia Airline mergers Leaders Trouble in the air Letters to the editor McCainomics Blogs One cheer for the Arizona senator China's unhappy pilots Columns Trapped in the cockpit Kallery Zimbabwe Africa's shame European energy WORLD Power plays Brazil United States The Americas An economic superpower, and now oil too Coffee in Ethiopia Asia Direct from the source Middle East & Africa Derivatives Europe Taming the beast Technology start-ups Britain Chocolate.com International Letters Country Briefings Face value Jolly gold giant Cities Guide The World Bank, Macedonia, Silvio Berlusconi, Ian Paisley, Turkey, Heathrow SPECIAL REPORTS Briefing BUSINESS Briefing Brazil Management The delights of dullness Business Education Food and the poor The new face of hunger Oil FINANCE & ECONOMICS More bounty How countries cope Economics Focus Reviving the ration card Economics A-Z Finance & Economics SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY United States Macquarie Group Technology Quarterly For whom the tolls swell Inner-city crime BOOKS & ARTS Back from the brink Buttonwood Style Guide Still vulnerable Crime and exoneration Derivatives PEOPLE In the DNA Clearing the fog Obituary John McCain's economics The man with half a plan Canadian banks MARKETS & DATA Beware grannies on Facebook Weekly Indicators On the campaign trail Currencies Primary colour Oil prices Rankings Crude estimates Big Mac Index Climate change Chart Gallery Lukewarm African economies Lion cubs? DIVERSIONS The Virginia Tech massacre Curbing guns, but not too much Economics focus Correspondent’s Diary Krugman's conundrum Drinking RESEARCH TOOLS Too young to have fun Science & Technology AUDIO AND VIDEO University admissions DELIVERY OPTIONS Accepted Cancer therapy Stemming the tumorous tide E-mail Newsletters Lexington Audio edition A bitter pill Alzheimer's disease Mobile Edition To have and have not RSS Feeds Screensaver The Americas Nanotechnology CLASSIFIED ADS Silver tongues Colombia's president The Uribe temptation Financial endocrinology Bulls at work Economist Intelligence Unit Paraguay's elections Economist Conferences Liberation politics Correction: Palaeontology The World In Intelligent Life Canada's seal hunt CFO Books & Arts Roll Call Who's the pirate? European Voice EuroFinance Steel industry battles Economist Diaries and Asia Forging a new world Business Gifts Reprints and Permissions Nepal's election The British in Iraq The Maoists triumph Blood in Basra and beyond Bangladesh Men, women and work A different sort of emergency Vanilla is not the only flavour Advertisement Baluchistan New fiction Let them eat mud A tale of three women Western Australia Tony Judt Diggers for China Appraiser appraised China's grain supply Japanese contemporary art The ravening hoards Infantile capitalism The Thai police Correction: Crime fiction A law unto themselves India's Parsees Obituary Slow breeders Pedro Zaragoza Middle East & Africa Economic and Financial Indicators Zimbabwe Crisis? What crisis? Overview Kenya Output, prices and jobs More nice jobs for the boys The Economist commodity-price index Somalia A hint of hope for a broken country Global business barometer Iraq and the United Nations Trade, exchange rates, budget balances and interest A Kurdish conundrum rates Iran Markets Spinning out nuclear talks Regional income distribution The Palestinian territories On a wheel and a prayer Europe Italy's election Italy embraces Silvio, again and again Family policy in France Baby about-face Spanish economy In a slump Russia's leadership A double-headed eagle Bulgaria Dirty politics Charlemagne The other presidential race Britain The internet and politics Semi-connected Construction cartels Crooked builders BAE and its critics An inconvenient past The Gurkhas Trouble in the rear Schools strike Truanting teachers Alternative medicine Trust me, I've got a licence Crime and immigration Not guilty Bagehot Send out the clowns Articles flagged with this icon are printed only in the British edition of The Economist International Missing persons What the dead have to say Muslim opinion Just what do they dislike, and why? Advertisement Classified ads Sponsors' feature About sponsorship » Jobs Business / Tenders Property Jobs Business / Associate, Middle Consumer Request for Business and Assets Dean Consumer East Build Green CEE 23- Expressions of of Mubuyu Farms College of Invites Internship International Peace 24 April Interest Limited Management of Applications for our Institute The 23-24 April 2008 Management The Joint Receivers Technology (CdM) Total Immersion International Peace Bucharest, Romania Sciences for Health, and Managers of Ecole polytechnique Program in Finance & Institute (IPI) Bringing together.... Inc. (MSH) is Mubuyu Farms fédérale de Laus.... Development (formerly Internati.... currently s.... Limited (.... (TIP/FD) 2008 About Economist.com | About The Economist | Media Directory | Staff Books | Advertising info | Career opportunities | Contact us Copyright © The Economist Newspaper Limited 2008. All rights reserved. Advertising Info | Legal disclaimer | Accessibility | Privacy policy | Terms & Conditions | Help Produced by =ECO PDF TEAM= Welcome to visit www.ecocn.org/forum Politics this week Apr 17th 2008 From The Economist print edition The World Bank introduced emergency measures to help countries cope with soaring food prices, which have caused rioting in some places. The organisation's president, Robert Zoellick, said that the demand for biofuels to help reduce energy pollution in the industrialised world was a “significant contributor” to rising grain prices. He had said earlier that 33 countries were at risk of social upheaval because of the crisis. See article Responding to violent protests over food prices, Haiti's president, René Préval, EPA cut the cost of rice by 15%. This was not enough to save his prime minister from being ousted in a Senate vote or to stop the rioting, during which a UN peacekeeper was shot dead. Five protesters were also killed. North Korea is facing a humanitarian crisis, according to the UN World Food Programme. It estimates that 6.5m out of a population of 23m do not have enough to eat. Chile's education minister was impeached by parliament and barred from office for five years for alleged corruption. She is accused of failing to account for the disappearance of $580m in school subsidies. Come the revolution Nepal's Maoists emerged as probable winners of an election to an assembly charged with drafting a constitution. They are almost certain to be the largest party. The Maoists, who had waged a ten-year insurgency against the royal government, joined mainstream politics in 2006. Election observers said that the election was held in a climate of intimidation. The Maoists want to abolish the monarchy; they said King Gyanendra should leave quietly. See article A meeting on China's Hainan island between China's president, Hu Jintao, and Taiwan's vice-president- elect, Vincent Siew, was hailed by China as a breakthrough in relations. But Taiwan's president-elect, Ma Ying-jeou, said it had “melted only a small chunk of the iceberg”. The Chinese press reported that nearly 4,000 “rioters” had been detained in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, and other Tibetan areas since anti-Chinese riots last month. More than half were said to have been released; 400 face formal criminal charges. Thousands of people attended a rally in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's capital, to mark the end of a ban that kept Anwar Ibrahim, an opposition leader, from holding office. Mr Anwar claimed the opposition could already form a government with defectors from the ruling coalition, but was biding its time. He's back Getty Images Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right coalition won a decisive victory in Italy's general election. Mr Berlusconi becomes prime minister for the third time. See article Georgia accused Russia of trying to annex Abkhazia and South Ossetia after the Russian foreign ministry said it would build closer ties with the breakaway regions. Vladimir Putin “agreed” to become chairman of the United Russia party, part of a power-sharing arrangement with Dmitry Medvedev, who takes over from Mr Putin as Russia's president in May. See article Fingers crossed Kenya's president, Mwai Kibaki, announced a government of national unity, ending a deadlock since disputed elections in December. The leader of the opposition, Raila Odinga, who says the poll was rigged against him, will be prime minister; other ministries have been shared out, though Mr Kibaki has held on to the most powerful ones. See article Zimbabwe's electoral commission had still not released the results of a presidential election,
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