President of New Oil Producing Nation Makes First Official Visit to U.S.

[Omaha Steve]

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=72291

President of New Oil Producing Nation Makes First Official Visit to U.S.

9/13/2006 8:53:00 AM

To: National Desk

Contact: Sally Kader of the United States Federation for Middle East Peace, 973-568-8384

NEW YORK, Sept. 13 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The first official visit of the new President of Mauritania will take place this Monday, Sept. 18 in New York City. A reception hosted by the U.S. Federation for Middle East Peace (USFMEP) will be held at the Waldorf Astoria for President Ely Ould Mohammed Vall.

The USFMEP will be honoring President Vall for his progressive democratic agenda. Among them are his pledges to "fight corruption, guarantee freedom of the media, eliminate poverty, alleviate unemployment, and promote the role of women and young people in public life."

He has also supported limiting a serving President to two consecutive terms and cut the Presidential term from six to five years. President Vall came to power in a popular bloodless coup on Aug. 3, 2005. In June 2006, a transitional referendum was held which was well received by the international community. The referendum established the term limits he proposed as well as a variety of other progressive initiatives.

"We are pleased to see the reforms President Vall has implemented," says Sally Kader, president of USFMEP, "and we look forward to his leadership for the future of Mauritania."

FULL story at link above.

[Turbineguy]

1. It would be nice

if George W. Bush, who came to power in a bloodless coup in 2000 embraced such philosophies.

[whistle]

2. Want to know where Mauritania is?

Mauritania — Location: Northern Africa, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean, between Senegal and Western Sahara

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/country_profiles/791083.stm

[rman]

3. So, they're going after the left-overs now -

previously unattractive low-yield, low-volume oil deposits.

[denverbill]

4. Hmm. Coup, then oil. Coup, then oil. Odd how that keeps happening.

[Jack Rabbit]

5. When the neocons talk about a democratic agenda, worry

Their idea of democracy is rigged elections and the torture of dissidents.

Their idea of a free press is one where private businesses that own the news outlets and support politicians who support them do the censoring, not the government.

Their idea of alleviating unemployment is to pay workers below subsistence so that businesses can afford to hire everybody and their idea of eliminating poverty is to blame the poor and tweak the stats.

I don't know if that's fair to Mr. Vall or not, but that's the neoconservative idea of a democratic agenda. Mr. Vall should be aware that praise from them makes me suspicious of him, rightly or wrongly.

[Kozmik]

6. Where do get neocons out of that article???

JACK RABBIT: I agree with your take on Neocons. Though, the Neocons have nothing to do with the organization that is hosting the event for his visit. They're too busy with the bigger fish. Plus Mauritania is too far into dark skin people land for any Neocons to deal with.

And DENVER BILL: Oil had nothing to do with this recent non-violent coup. The oil was discovered in 2001. Read up on the country of Mauritania on the net: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mauritania