Top stories from DAWNS Digest.
Hillary Clinton Takes Responsibility for Benghazi Security Lapses
The Secretary of State wades into a controversy that is increasingly becoming an election time political football. “‘I take responsibility’” for the protection of U.S. diplomats, Clinton said during a visit to Peru. But she said an investigation now under way will ultimately determine what happened in the attack that left four Americans dead. The attack on the night of September 11 killed Chris Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three other Americans at the American consulate in Benghazi. The Obama administration has been heavily criticized after Vice President Joe Biden said during last week’s vice presidential debate that the White House did not know of requests to enhance security at Benghazi, contradicting testimony by State Department employees that requests had been made and rejected. After the debate, the White House said the vice president did not know of the requests because they were handled, as is the practice, by the State Department. Clinton said President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are not involved in security decisions.” (CNN http://bit.ly/Wfo95i)
And the Winner of the 2012 Mo Ibrahim Prize is….Nobody
The Mo Ibrahim prize is supposed to be an annual $5 million award to former African leaders who did well in office and, crucially, left office when their terms constitutionally expired. Alas, no-one lived up to the criteria this year. “The prize committee said it reviewed several former leaders but decided that none met the award criteria. The group did not reveal who was considered. Any African leader who left office in the last three years was eligible. Africa on the whole is making political and economic progress but some of the more than 50 countries on the continent are still ruled by men who stay in office for decades. And some leaders who have stepped down from power over the past three years had blemished records. Mo Ibrahim, a British mobile phone magnate who was born in Sudan, insisted in an interview that he was not disappointed that no winner emerged. ‘Not at all. This is a prize for exceptional leadership, and we don’t need to go through the motions to just find anybody,” he told The Associated Press by telephone. ‘We have a wonderful prize committee which comprises some wonderful men and women, and they set really high standards.’ The cash prize has been awarded three times in its six-year history. Former Cape Verde President Pedro Verona Pires won last year. In 2008 Festus Mogae of Botswana won; In 2007 it was Joaquim Chissano of Mozambique. No award was given in 2009 and 2010.” (AP http://bit.ly/SWTFT7)
CGD Unveils Commitment to Development Index
The Center for Global Development’s of donor countries aid effectiveness is hot off the presses. “Each year since 2003, the CDI has ranked wealthy nations on how much their governments’ policies and actions support global prosperity. Nations are linked in many ways: through trade, aid, climate, technology, and more. The CDI assesses policies in all these areas in order to communicate that helping takes more than aid, and to organize a comprehensive agenda for development policy. Denmark has climbed atop the rankings for the first time since 2005, on the strength of ample aid-giving and high participation in international peacekeeping and military operations such as the intervention in Libya last year (more on that below). Japan and South Korea continue in the bottom two spots because of low contributions in aid and peacekeeping and high barriers to crops and migrants from developing countries. One thing that hasn’t changed is the finding that all countries have substantial room for improvement when it comes to helping the world’s poor.” (CGD http://bit.ly/SWTR4B)