What connects Japan and Costa Rica? Apart from the fact that Japan has been one of the most successful economies in the World, and that of Costa Rica one of the most successful in Latin America?
Here is a clue: excerpts from the Constitutions of these two countries:
Constitution of Japan.
ARTICLE 9. Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.
Constitution of Costa Rica
ARTICLE 12. The Army as a permanent institution is abolished. There shall be the necessary police forces for surveillance and the preservation of the public order.
Military forces may only be organized under a continental agreement or for the national defense; in either case, they shall always be subordinate to the civil power: they may not deliberate or make statements or representations individually or collectively.
So -these two successful states are essentially demilitarized. Now let us turn to Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt,who will take over the EU presidency in July. This representative of what is arguably one of the most anti-Semitic* and anti-Israel states in the EU, in a predictably hostile reaction to Netanyahu's proposal for a demilitarized Palestinian state [Bar-Ilan speech, 14 June 2009] said "The fact that he uttered the word state is a small step forward," but added "whether what he mentioned can be defined as a state is a subject of some debate."
Well, Mr. Bildt, do you have doubts that Japan and Costa Rica are "states"?
If not, then why does the absence of an army destroy the legitimacy of a putative Palestinian state in your eyes?
_________________________________________________________
*Zvi Mazel, who served in Sweden as Israel's ambassador in 2004, told a Swedish newspaper that "Sweden is among the most severely anti-Semitic places" with "daily agitations in the media to kill Jews."
Here is a clue: excerpts from the Constitutions of these two countries:
Constitution of Japan.
ARTICLE 9. Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.
Constitution of Costa Rica
ARTICLE 12. The Army as a permanent institution is abolished. There shall be the necessary police forces for surveillance and the preservation of the public order.
Military forces may only be organized under a continental agreement or for the national defense; in either case, they shall always be subordinate to the civil power: they may not deliberate or make statements or representations individually or collectively.
So -these two successful states are essentially demilitarized. Now let us turn to Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt,who will take over the EU presidency in July. This representative of what is arguably one of the most anti-Semitic* and anti-Israel states in the EU, in a predictably hostile reaction to Netanyahu's proposal for a demilitarized Palestinian state [Bar-Ilan speech, 14 June 2009] said "The fact that he uttered the word state is a small step forward," but added "whether what he mentioned can be defined as a state is a subject of some debate."
Well, Mr. Bildt, do you have doubts that Japan and Costa Rica are "states"?
If not, then why does the absence of an army destroy the legitimacy of a putative Palestinian state in your eyes?
_________________________________________________________
*Zvi Mazel, who served in Sweden as Israel's ambassador in 2004, told a Swedish newspaper that "Sweden is among the most severely anti-Semitic places" with "daily agitations in the media to kill Jews."
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