German President Resigns, Successor To Be Elected on 30 June

Following President Horst Koehler's unexpected resignation on 31 May over fierce criticism of comments he made on Bundeswehr missions during a visit to Afghanistan on 22 May. The Federal Convention will elect his successor on 30 June.

Resignation Statement
Announing his resignation, Koehler said: 'I regret that my comments led to misunderstandings in a question so important and difficult for our nation. But the criticism has gone as far as to accuse me of supporting Bundeswehr missions that are not covered by the constitution. This criticism is devoid of any justification. It lacks the necessary respect for my office,' Koehler said in his resignation statement.

According to the German Constitution, the selects Federal Convention the federal president. The Federal Convention is Germany's largest parliamentary body, where all of the members of the lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, are entitled to vote, as well as a corresponding number of representatives from the federal states. The federal president is elected by secret ballot, without a prior debate, and requires an absolute majority.

The ruling coalition, the Christian Democratic Union and the Free Democratic Party, will have 22 votes more than the required absolute majority. The exact number is not yet known as the diet of North Rhine-Westphalia has not yet been formed following the 9 May election there.

Election of New President
It has been that announced that the Federal Convention will meet on 30 June to elect a new president. As German Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition is expected to hold the majority in the Convention, the opposition will have no way of opposing the government's choice. But Merkel has indicated they would try to find someone who would be accepted by government and opposition alike.

Bundesrat president Jens Boehrnsen from Bremen will be the acting president until the election of a new president.

China's Guangdong Selects ASEAN as First Step To Go Overseas

In order to fully implement China Central Government authority's major strategy to speed up economic development transformation process, the Guangdong Provincial Government has come out with a full deployment measure to speed out its economic development transformation plan. These measures have included the response to China's 'Go Overseas' policy. For Guangdong, Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries have become Guangdong Provincial Government's first gateway to 'go overseas.'

Wang Yang, China Central Committee Political Bureau's Party Secretary for Guangdong, pointed out that ASEAN countries are China's neighboring countries. He said that in addition to the geographical proximity, the cultural characteristics of China and ASEAN countries are also quite close to one another. Although there are differences in one another's national systems, over the years, China and ASEAN nations have developed more understand with one another.

Wang Yang cited Singapore as an example. He said that among the ASEAN countries, Singapore was a knowledge and technology-intensive country, but China was still a labor-intensive country. Moreover, the political and economic systems of Singapore and China are also different. However, Malaysia is a moderately developing country. But Malaysia's electronic technology development is what China can use for reference.

Economic Development Implementation Plan
Wang Yang said that except Singapore, other ASEAN countries are developing countries. This is the reason why the Guangdong Provincial Government would want to choose ASEAN countries as its first step 'to go out to overseas.' By choosing ASEAN countries as its first gateway to go out, Wang Yang said this could mean that the overall cost of Guangdong government's economic development implementation plan would also be reduced.

Wang Yang said this on behalf of the Guangdong Provincial Government and as the representative of the Guangdong Provincial Communist Party of China (CPC) Party Committee when he received the World Chinese Media Group media delegation from Malaysia when the media group paid official visit to Guangdong Province.

Guangdong's Trade Volume With Malaysia on Increase
Wang Yang said he was happy to note of the continual increase of trade volume between Guangdong Province and Malaysia. He hoped that the trade volume between Guangdong and ASEAN countries, including Malaysia could further be strengthened.

Wang Yang said one of the major economic reform implementation strategies for Guangdong province to speed its economic development model is to increase domestic demand in order to change the old trade model that had to rely heavily on external trade demand.

He said that the Guangdong province has carried out reform and has opened up to foreign trade for 30 years. All along, the province has put strong emphasis to develop foreign trade demand. The result was that when global financial storm landed on Guangdong, the economy of the province could not avoid affecting by it. As such, the goal of the Guangdong Provincial Government would now be speeding up its domestic demand. Although such a change might take a long time to achieve, it was necessary.

Way To Carry Out Guangdong's Style Economic Development
Wang Yang said what Guangdong province should do was to develop the Guangdong style economic development model and not the Singapore style or the US style economic development model. He said the Guangdong Provincial Government is currently seeking a consensus, common understanding with the people so that both the provincial government and the people could walk the same path and that given time, the Guangdong style of economic development model could be achieved.

Referring to the coming Asian Games to be held in Guangdong province, Wang Yang said the Guangdong province would be the first province besides capital Beijing to hold such a large scale Asian Games international sport event. He said the ability of Guangdong to hold the Asian Games reflected the strength of the Guangdong Provincial Government. He said the basic infrastructure of the Guangdong Provincial Government was in no way inferior to Qatar, the host of the last Asian Games.

Wang Yang also emphasized that ever since the Guangdong province opened up for economic reform in the past 30 years, the province has focused so much on economic development it had ignored the cultural construction. As such, under the target to speed up its economic development goal, the Guangdong Provincial Party Committee and the Guangdong Provincial Government would also further strengthen the cultural construction to ensure that the soft power and hard power infrastructure of the province could be combined and strengthened as one.

The following is the conversation with Wang Yang:

Question: Transformation of economic development is the top priority in China. This is also the general world trend. Since Guangdong Provincial Government is a pioneer and forerunner of China's economic development transformation policy, how does the Guangdong Provincial Government change the mindset and thinking of the government workers at all levels? Can all government officials discard the traditional economic development mindset and embrace the new economic development model without carrying with them the historical burden?

Answer: We used almost a year to come out with different stage of development to change the mindset of our government officials at different levels. After we had done that, we also carried out large scale work training programs including the introduction to government officials the understanding of modern financial industry and to allow them to grasp basic financial knowledge. Recently the Development Center of the Central Department of State had sent personnel to Guangdong providence to carry out site inspection. The conclusion of the site inspection was that all the Guangdong provincial officials from top to bottom level did understand our economic development transformation strategy.

Question: You attach great importance to the development of web media, and dialogue with users. You had also held dialogues with the web community. During these dialogues you had also encouraged the 'go out to overseas' economic strategy adopted by the Guangdong Provincial Government. Is it possible for the Guangdong Province Government to carry out the promotion of trade cooperation with overseas businesses through the media portal with friendly ties with China? This would allow the overseas businesses especially the overseas ethnic Chinese to understand the characteristics and special features of Guangdong province's development plan.

Answer: The Internet is without borders. On my part, personally I am willing to cooperate and exchange my view with the network media. As regards to carrying out publicity on the promotion of Guangdong's economic transformation plans I feel it is still not fit to do at this very moment.

Question: Whether it was to study flood control or environmental restoration projects, you have put special attention to gauge the opinions of the masses. You would also carry out public opinion surveys as and when needed. Through public forum, you also proposed the implementation of the 'Pearl River Delta Development Point Plan.' When you carried out this kind of public forums for the evaluation and implementation of polices, will you often encounter differences in opinions between the masses and the provincial government's position in these situations? How does the Guangdong Provincial Government manage to resolve this kind of confrontational opinions between the government officials and the general public?

Answer: The different views will make our decisions more perfect. The processes of major changes will inevitable goes through the cursing process from the masses. However as the masses curse, they also play a supervisory and monitoring role for the government. If the future society turns better, the masses will turn their curses into praises. Different voices will make us improve. This is the practical application of democracy.

UK Faced With Limited Options in Afghanistan

In the name of war on terror, the United Kingdom's mania to occupy Muslim world in alliance with the United States has finally led the United Kigdom to financial bankruptcy. It has been admitted in the British Government's produced statistics that the United Kingdom had to bear an expenditure of £7.34 billion ($10.6 billion) in war on Iraq and has to bear an expenditure of £12 billion ($17.29 billion) in Afghanistan annually. Consequently, the country is running in a debt of £156 billion ($224.8 billion) and the fiscal deficit is mounting with every passing day. Moreover, the life loss of the British soldiers is never less than this deficit. In Afghanistan, 287 British soldiers have been killed during the past nine years; whereas, in Iraq, the death toll hikes to 179.

Deceleration of Economic Recovery
The biggest agenda during the last electoral campaign was how to get rid of this debt. Tory Party (TP) was of the opinion that public expenditures be cut down by £6 billion ($86,47 billion). However, the Labor Party (LP) was against such a massive cut down in public expenditure. Their rationale was that a massive cut down in public expenditure would result in deceleration of economic recovery, and there is a threat that the economic crisis may turn even graver. However, new Finance Minister George Osborne in the incumbent coalition government, in accordance with the manifesto of TP, has declared a cut down of £6.20 billion ($8.9 billion) in public expenditure, whose biggest sword would fall on the head of civil service.

Budget in this area would be cut down by £120 million ($172 million) because of which thousands of government employees would be laid off. Budget of the municipality departments would be economized by £331million ($477 million) which would hit hard on the provision of public services and largely add to unemployment. Cut down in education budget would lead to a reduction of 10,000 in the number of university students. Moreover, it is feared that taxes would be massively increased in the emergency budget that would be announced after two months.

Process of Deficit Reduction
However, it is being emphasized at this time that the process of deficit reduction would not have any effect on the defense budget. However, financial experts say that a saving of £60,00,000,000 ($8647200,000) in the running year is just the beginning and much more would have to be saved next year in order to get rid of the heavy burden of debts and it is highly probable that expenditure on defense, health and education have to be largely cut down. This is the reason why the new British Foreign Minister William Hague, rushed to Washington just two days after assuming charge of his office and held talks with US secretary of state on ways to get rid of war in Afghanistan.

Anyhow, Democrats in the coalition government hold the stance that the United Kingdom should immediately withdraw from war in Afghanistan and 9000 British troops, who are fighting in Afghanistan, should be called back into the country. Influential circles in the government are of the opinion that it is very difficult (for coalition forces) to win the war in Afghanistan and solution to the prevailing situation lies in a political arrangement. However, under military expediency and due to ego reasons, the United States is bent upon continuing war in Afghanistan.

From the time the new coalition government has come to power in the United Kingdom, pressure from the United States is increasing pressure on the United Kingdom that its forces should withdraw from Helmand to assume positions in Kandahar, where the US forces plan to launch a massive operation in June, and in the same connection, the United States is pressurizing Pakistan to launch an operation in North Waziristan.

This is the reason why the new British Defense Secretary Liam Fox and Andrew Mitchell, secretary of state for international development, joined new Foreign Minister William Hague to pay an emergency visit to Helmand where British forces are based. The visit had two objectives. One was to boost the morale of British troops and second was to make the United States realize that Britain is equally participating in the war with the same.

The United Kingdom is faced with a dilemma in case of war in Afghanistan. It has the feeling that it would have to make attempts to declare a lost war as a won war in order to preserve its ego. A joint military operation was launched with full strength and clamor in Marjah, South Afghanistan, in recent March and an attempt was made to prove that the coalition and Afghan forces are liberating this area from the Taliban. A lot of publicity continued for this operation for some time but gradually reports stopped coming about the same. Now, there are again reports of the Taliban regrouping in this area and offering stiff resistance to the US troops.

Continuing US Pressure
Thus, for the United Kingdom, on one hand, there is the problem of special relations with the United States and with it is the US pressure to continue war in Afghanistan. However, there is the problem of mounting war expenditures, and on the other, it has the problem of eliminating the fiscal deficit. In this situation, the gravest and biggest challenge before new British Prime Minister David Cameron is the war in Afghanistan.

Given its financial interests, Britain cannot afford to dismiss US pressure in relation to Afghanistan and assume a different stance (on this issue). However, persistently mounting war expenditures of the British forces is dragging the United Kingdom toward a point of no return. The United Kingdom has the realization that in order to rescue the country out of the financial crisis, it is necessary to eliminate this mountain like fiscal deficit. Thus, United Kingdom faces a dilemma in rescuing itself from the fiscal deficit and war in Afghanistan.