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Geopolitics

With Egypt On Edge, Tension Also Brews In Tunisia, Birthplace Of Arab Spring

ASSABAH (Tunisia), FRANCE 24-ARABE (France),

Worldcrunch

TUNIS – With protests mounting against the Islamist-led government, Tunisia's leading labor union called Friday for the first general strike since the fall of the Ben Ali regime nearly two years ago.

Slated for Dec. 13 in the capital of Tunis, Sfax and other major cities, the strike has been called by the General Union of Tunisian Workers as a response to the violence that was used against its members in front of the Union’s headquarters last Tuesday, France 24 Arabic reports.

As violence spreads in Egypt following President Mohammed Morsi's declaration of new powers, the tensions mounting in Tunisia, where the Arab Spring first ignited, show how fragile the pro-democracy revolution remains even after the downfall of the authoritarian leaders in early 2011.

Representatives of the Union blame these incidents on Islamist members of El Nahda ruling party. The Union also called for banning the “League for the protection of the revolution,” which it described as a militia that uses violence to serve the interest of the government.

As for the Nahda Party, it criticizes the interference of the General Union of Tunisian Workers in political affairs and compares it to a radical opposition party. The party characterized the call for strikes as a political and not a social act.

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Two years ago a popular revolt could not be held down (Habib M’henni)

In this context, Assabah newspaper wrote that these rising tensions could potentially plunge Tunisia into catastrophic upheaval. This strike is the first one the Union calls for after the downfall of the former president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, and the third in the history of Tunisia. The second strike was two days before Ben Ali fled the country.

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Geopolitics

Yes, Xi Jinping Is Now More Powerful Than Mao Zedong Ever Was

After being re-elected as head of the Communist Party last year, the Chinese leader has been unanimously re-elected to another five-year term as head of state. Now, wielding more power than any other past Chinese communist leader, he wants to accelerate the rise of Chinese influence around the world.

Photo of huge portrait of Xi Jinping

Huge portrait of Xi Jinping is displayed in the National Day mass pageantry celebrating the 70th founding anniversary of the People's Republic of China

Yann Rousseau

-Analysis-

BEIJING — Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping has been re-elected to a third five-year term at the head of the world's second largest economic power. Nobody was surprised.

The vote took place during a legislative assembly convened to rubber stamp decisions of the authoritarian power, during which 2,952 parliamentarians unanimously approved Xi's re-election before rising, in perfect choreography, to offer a prolonged standing ovation to their leader. As usual, Xi remained completely neutral in the face of the enthusiasm.

His victory was a mere formality after his re-election last fall as the head of the all-powerful party, which controls all of the country's political institutions, and after legislative amendments to erase term limits that would have forced him out.

Xi Jinping, who took over the presidency in 2013, "is now the most powerful leader in the history of the People's Republic, since its founding in 1949. Institutionally, he holds even more power than Mao Zedong," says Suisheng Zhao, a professor and Chinese foreign policy expert at the University of Denver.

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