[Media-watch] New U.S. Poll Shows Opinions Of America Increasingly Negative/ RFE

[Sigi D]

Hello, dear Media Watc friends,
this is from the website Radio Free Europe,
interesting poll. 
All the best,
s
http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2004/03/ad2a6e1c-fcb0-4680-acc5-0c17bdd0841c.html
Wednesday, 17 March 2004

World: New U.S. Poll Shows Opinions Of America
Increasingly Negative
By Jeffrey Donovan
Is America's war on terrorism a guise to control
Mideast oil and dominate the world? Did U.S. President
George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair
lie about the Iraqi threat? Is Osama bin Laden a hero?
According to a new survey of global opinions and
attitudes, much of the world answers "yes" to those
questions.
Washington, 17 March 2004 (RFE/RL) -- Former U.S.
Secretary of State Madeline Albright spoke yesterday
in Washington at a news conference marking the release
of a new global survey by the independent Pew Research
Center for the People and the Press. 
"What the poll shows is that the credibility of the
United States is sinking,” Albright said. “And the
numbers that reflect that the people believe that our
leaders lied to them is something that I think is
incredibly serious." 
The survey, which comes one year after the start of
the U.S.-led war in Iraq, polled people in nine
nations from Western Europe to the Middle East. And
the polls show discontent with America and its
policies intensifying over the last year. "The biggest
gap is on the question of whether or not America takes
into account the interests of other countries in
making its foreign policies. Americans say 'yes,' the
rest of the world says 'no.'"A majority of people in
Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan, and Turkey -- all
Muslim-majority countries with strong official ties to
Washington -- believe America is waging its war on
terror in a bid to control Middle Eastern oil and
dominate the world. While that might not be
surprising, majorities in France and Germany had
similar suspicions. Only Americans, Russians, and
Britons felt the war on terrorism was a sincere
effort. Of the countries surveyed, only people in the
United States believe the war in Iraq has achieved
progress in the fight against Islamic terrorism. 
Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Center, told the
news conference that the sweeping survey reveals a
deep-rooted mistrust of U.S. power and motives,
whether in Western Europe or the Middle East. "We were
expecting more positive attitudes than we found when
we conducted the previous survey, which was in May of
2003," he said. "Rather, what we see is that mistrust
of America in Europe is ever higher and that Muslim
anger persists, even though it's abated somewhat." 
Europeans are portrayed in the polls as ever more
cynical about the U.S. government. A majority in the
five European nations surveyed says it would be good
for the European Union to be more independent in
security affairs and become as powerful as the United
States. 
Kohut said Europeans want to check American power,
while Albright said the trans-Atlantic partnership has
reached the point of a psychological break. "The
trans-Atlantic breach that was opened by the original
choice to go to war in Iraq has, in fact, remained
wide. And I'm concerned that the psychology of
partnership that has prevailed for decades between
Europe and the United States is being replaced by a
psychology of dismissal on one side and a psychology
of competition on the other," Albright said. 
Meanwhile, people in the surveyed Muslim countries
remain angry about U.S. policies and sometimes have a
favorable view of Osama bin Laden, the Saudi-born
militant blamed for the 11 September terrorist attacks
on the United States. The United States is hunting for
bin Laden in the border area between Afghanistan and
Pakistan, a key U.S. ally in the war on terrorism. But
the survey shows about two-thirds of people in
Pakistan see bin Laden in a good light. A majority in
Jordan and almost half in Morocco had a positive view
of him, Kohut said. 
Osama bin Laden is viewed favorably by large
percentages in Pakistan and Morocco, but not in
Turkey. However, Kohut said, in Turkey, “we find as
much as 31 percent of the public saying that they
think of suicide attacks against Americans and other
Westerners in Iraq are justifiable." The survey also
shows that about half in Pakistan said suicide
bombings against Israelis in Israel and against U.S.
troops in Iraq can be justified. Two-thirds or more in
Jordan and Morocco say it can be justified in both
situations. 
Still, Kohut adds that though anger toward America in
these Muslim-majority countries is still very high, it
has dropped slightly since the previous survey in May.
Meanwhile, solid majorities in Germany, Russia,
France, Jordan, and Pakistan believe U.S. President
George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair
lied about the weapons of mass destruction they
claimed were in Iraq. 
Patrick Cronin is a former Bush administration
official who is now director of studies at
Washington's Center for Strategic and International
Studies. He says the survey points out disturbing
facts that will be hard to ignore in Washington.
"Really, power ultimately derives from the ability to
influence others toward a consensus," he said. "The
United States has not done a good job about that.
That's not a political statement, it's an empirical
fact." 
While support for the war on terror has dropped in
most countries, Cronin and others noted that European
attitudes could change in the wake of last week's
bombings in Madrid, which have possible links to
Islamic militants. The attacks, which killed 201
people, were followed by the surprise electoral defeat
of Spain's ruling conservative party -- the first
government that had backed Washington's war in Iraq to
be booted from office. 
In only one country did support for the war on
terrorism rise: Russia, where 73 percent approve,
nearly as many as in America. Albright, who now chairs
the Pew Global Attitudes Project, attributed this to
the close ties between Bush and Russian President
Vladimir Putin. She said those ties have given Putin
the freedom to clamp down on Russian civil liberties
and continue to abuse human rights in Chechnya without
worrying about U.S. censure. 
Finally, Kohut said the poll shows a disturbing chasm
in the way America sees its position in the world and
how the rest of the world views its role. "The biggest
gap is on the question of whether or not America takes
into account the interests of other countries in
making its foreign policies," he said. "Americans say
'yes,' the rest of the world says 'no.' There's no
narrowing of that gap. In fact, there's a widening of
that gap." 
(The full report by the Pew Research Center can be
found on the web at http://www.people-press.org.)




	
	
		
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