| Kenyan vp says there will be more dictatorships Original Source Link: (May no longer be active) http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/election2004/10091671.htm"We are going to see more dictatorship on an international scale," said Kenyan vice president Moody Awori. "We are going to see more extremism come out of there. We are going to see even more isolationism where America will not bother about the United Nations. To me that is a very sad affair."
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/election2004/10091671.htm
Posted on Wed, Nov. 03, 2004 World reaction to Bush's victory muted
BY KEN DILANIAN, MATTHEW SCHOFIELD AND SORAYA SARHADDI NELSON
Knight Ridder Newspapers
PARIS - (KRT) - At Au Bistro on Wednesday, it was clear that nearly all the sleek, pin-striped lunchers were talking about the U.S. election, debating whether the Bush victory was an earth-shaking disaster, or simply a spot of unsurprising bad news.
"Shame on America," said a distraught Patrick D'Albertlake, who runs a Paris paper company with a factory in Charlotte, N.C. "It's a disgrace. ... It's a very dangerous situation for the world."
In a world generally thought to have favored John Kerry's campaign for the presidency, reaction to Bush's re-election was generally restrained, however.
Many in Europe and the Middle East expressed hope that a second Bush term would find him more open to cooperating with them. But Arab analysts said they expected another four years of antipathy and antagonism, and there was no expression from Europe of greater cooperation on issues such as Iraq.
Russian President Vladimir Putin welcomed the result as showing that Americans won't back down on the war on terrorism, and a spokesman for the Interior Ministry in Afghanistan, Lutfullah Mashal, said in a phone interview that the government there was pleased.
"The determination and the commitment of the U.S. forces in Afghanistan will increase now that Bush has been re-elected," he said.
Tuesday's election was followed closely - and warily - in foreign capitals. In a September poll sponsored by 10 major foreign newspapers, overwhelming majorities in eight of 10 countries - France, Spain, Canada, Britain, Japan, Australia, Mexico and South Korea - favored Kerry over Bush.
"Today," the French newspaper Le Monde said in an article written for Thursday's editions, "they find themselves in the camp of losers."
"If this doesn't add up to a mandate, it is hard to know what the word means," wrote Martin Kettle, a columnist for the left-leaning British newspaper, The Guardian. "Increased turnout. Narrow but decisive wins on all fronts. What more can you ask for from a single campaign ... It's time for the Democrats to get back to the drawing board."
Karsten Voigt, Germany's coordinator of German-American Relations, said the decisiveness of Bush's victory might free the president to be more open to the ideas of others.
"You can use a mandate to emphasize your convictions," he said. "Or you can use it to express wisdom ... without abandoning your own convictions, to listen to and consider other points of view."
In the Middle East, some Israelis and Palestinians suggested a second-term president, free from re-election worries, might exert real pressure to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Israeli daily Ma'ariv wrote that an Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs report recently concluded that Bush would try to improve his image in the Arab world by adopting a less supportive policy toward Israel.
Palestinian leaders made similar comments. "Now that the president is not under this (election) pressure maybe he'll be more forthcoming in terms of a more balanced approach to this conflict," Palestinian Labor Minister Ghassan Khatib said.
Others were not optimistic. "I don't see any Clinton-like brokering of a peace deal," said Amr Shalakany, an Egyptian American law professor at the American University in Cairo and former legal advisor to Palestinian peace negotiators. "There's a perfect fit between the neo-cons in Washington and the ruling elite in Israel in terms of perspective."
Nevertheless, Arab governments in the region are eager for rapprochement with the Bush Administration and to heal the wounds of the past four years. Even before the elections, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak gave the American president a badly needed boost by agreeing to host an international conference on war-torn Iraq on Nov. 22 in the Egyptian Red Sea resort city of Sharm el Sheikh.
The hope for better relations was also evident in Latin America's two largest countries, Mexico and Brazil.
Mexican President Vicente Fox, sent Bush a hand-written, congratulatory fax, then phoned him to invite him to Mexico. Fox said he hoped the two nations would reopen immigration talks.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said that despite Brazil's intense criticism of the war in Iraq, he expected good relations during a second term and hailed the election's result. "What's important is that the election be a manifestation of the American people's will," he said.
But not all comments were upbeat.
"We are going to see more dictatorship on an international scale," said Kenyan vice president Moody Awori. "We are going to see more extremism come out of there. We are going to see even more isolationism where America will not bother about the United Nations. To me that is a very sad affair."
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(Dilanian reported from Paris, Schofield from Berlin and Nelson from Tel Aviv, Israel. Knight Ridder correspondents Susana Hayward in Mexico City, Sudarsan Raghavan in Nairobi, Kenya, and Kevin G. Hall in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, contributed to this report.)
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© 2004, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
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