CiKEAS Tiga Saksi Kasus Soeharto Sudah Dipastikan Benarkan Dokumen
Tiga Saksi Kasus Soeharto Sudah Dipastikan Benarkan Dokumen * Tiga Saksi Kasus Soeharto Sudah Dipastikan Kompas, Sabtu, 02 Juni 2007 Jakarta, Kompas - Kejaksaan Agung mulai memastikan keterangan sejumlah saksi yang pernah memberikan keterangan dalam penyidikan perkara dugaan korupsi mantan Presiden Soeharto. Keterangan saksi itu digunakan untuk menguatkan barang bukti berupa fotokopi dokumen- dokumen, yang akan digunakan dalam menggugat perdata Soeharto dan Yayasan Supersemar. Direktur Perdata pada Bagian Perdata dan Tata Usaha Negara Kejaksaan Agung Yoseph Suardi Sabda, Kamis (31/5), menyampaikan, tiga saksi sudah didatangi dan dipastikan keterangannya. Namun, Yoseph menolak menyebutkan siapa saja saksi yang dimintai keterangan itu. Keterangan mereka menguatkan barang bukti dokumen yang kami miliki, kata Yoseph. Dengan demikian, meskipun bukti berupa fotokopi dokumen, diyakini hal itu dapat mendukung gugatan perdata atas perbuatan melawan hukum Soeharto dan Yayasan Supersemar. Rencananya, dalam gugatan tersebut, Kejaksaan selaku jaksa pengacara negara akan mengajukan ganti rugi materiil Rp 1,5 triliun dan imateriil Rp 10 triliun. Secara terpisah, Kepala Pusat Penerangan Hukum Kejaksaan Agung Salman Maryadi mengatakan, Bagian Perdata dan Tata Usaha Negara Kejaksaan Agung akan berkoordinasi dengan Kejaksaan Agung dalam mencari saksi-saksi kasus Soeharto. Yoseph Suardi Sabda pernah menyampaikan, sebanyak 43 saksi yang pernah bersaksi saat pemeriksaan perkara Soeharto akan disortir lagi. Dicari, siapa yang relevan untuk perkara perdata. Harus dipastikan juga mereka mau bersaksi dalam gugatan perdata, ujar Yoseph. Kasus PT Timor disidik Dugaan kerugian negara, sesuai informasi tim penyidik, masih dihitung dengan meminta bantuan Badan Pengawasan Keuangan dan Pembangunan, kata Salman Maryadi pada Kamis siang. Dihubungi Kamis malam, Elza Syarief, salah seorang pengacara Hutomo Mandala Putra atau Tommy Soeharto—pemilik PT TPN—mengaku sudah mendengar perihal penyidikan jaksa itu. Begitu pula kliennya. Namun, Elza menolak menanggapi dimulainya penyidikan perkara yang diduga melibatkan kliennya di PT TPN, yang tak lama dilakukan setelah penyidikan dugaan korupsi di Badan Penyangga dan Pemasaran Cengkeh. Kita lihat saja nanti, kata Elza. (idr) http://jawapos.com/index.php?act=detail_cid=288049 Sabtu, 02 Juni 2007, * Tiga Saksi Bank Benarkan Dokumen Rencana Gugatan Perdata Mantan Presiden Soeharto JAKARTA - Kejaksaan Agung (Kejagung) mulai memeriksa para saksi fakta atas rencana gugatan terhadap mantan Presiden Soeharto. Tiga saksi dari perbankan, misalnya, sudah memberikan keterangan yang menguatkan pernah mengetahui dokumen asli berisi aliran dana dari Yayasan Supersemar ke beberapa perusahaan kroni Soeharto, termasuk milik Tommy Soeharto. Saya sudah memeriksa tiga saksi. Mereka menyatakan confirm atas dokumen fotokopi yang saya tunjukkan. Artinya, mereka menyatakan fotokopian itu benar asli adanya, kata Dachmer Munthe, ketua tim jaksa pengacara negara (JPN) gugatan Soeharto, kepada Jawa Pos kemarin. Ditanya soal siapa dan dari mana tiga saksi tersebut, dia menolak menjelaskan. Saya nggak bisa menyebutkan. Itu terkait dengan strategi kami, ujar direktur Pemulihan dan Perlindungan HAM di JAM Datun tersebut. Yang pasti, kata dia, tiga saksi dari perbankan tersebut sangat kooperatif selama memberikan keterangan di gedung JAM Perdata dan Tata Usaha (Datun), kompleks Kejagung, Kamis lalu. Menurut Dachmer, tiga saksi itu akan dihadirkan dalam persidangan gugatan Soeharto. Keterangan mereka nanti dikuatkan dengan alat bukti lain, termasuk saksi-saksi lain. Fotokopian itu juga menjadi alat bukti, ungkap jaksa senior tersebut. Dia menambahkan, selain tiga saksi itu, tim jaksa melanjutkan memanggil dan memeriksa beberapa pihak yang mengetahui aliran dana dari Yayasan Supersemar ke perusahaan kroni Soeharto, termasuk dari pengurus yayasan tersebut.(agm) == * Kejaksaan Yakini Bukti Dokumen Soal Soeharto Cukup Kuat Sinar Harapan, 1 Juni 2007 Jakarta- Kejaksaan Agung (Kejagung) menegaskan legalisasi fotokopi dokumen untuk berkas gugatan perdata terhadap Yayasan Supersemar bisa dikuatkan dengan pengesahan penyidik, notaris, atau pejabat yang berwenang. Dengan demikian, langkah gugatan terhadap Soeharto diyakini tak akan bermasalah dari barang bukti dokumen yang dimiliki Kejaksaan. Jika dokumennya (asli) tidak ada, maka legalisasinya bisa dikuatkan dengan pengesahan penyidik, notaris, maupun pejabat yang berwenang, kata Direktur Perdata Kejaksaan Agung (Kejagung) Yoseph Suardi Sabda kepada SH , Kamis (31/5). Yoseph menambahkan, hingga saat ini Kejagung memang masih berusaha mencari dokumen asli guna melengkapi berkas gugatan perdata dalam kasus kosupsi pada Yayasan Supersemar yang pernah dipimpin mantan Presiden Soeharto.
CiKEAS Putin: US imperialists start new round of arms race
http://english.pravda.ru/russia/kremlin/01-06-2007/92585-putin_imperialist-0 01.06.2007 Putin: US imperialists start new round of arms race Russia's recent tests of new ballistic missiles can be interpreted as a direct response to the deployment of the US missile system in Europe, and the development of new military bases on the continent, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday. At a news conference after meeting with the Greek president in Kremlin, Putin spoke about the cooperation between the two countries and condemned US missile defense systems in Europe. We are not the initiators of this new round of the arms race , Putin told a joint Kremlin news conference. There is no need to fear Russia's actions, they are not aggressive... They are aimed at maintaining balance in the world order, and are extremely important for maintaining peace and security globally, Putin said. The president suggested recently that Moscow might suspend its obligations under the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty if talks with NATO countries on its implementation show no visible progress. No NATO members have yet ratified the re-drafted CFE pact, demanding that Russia first withdraw from Soviet-era bases in Georgia and Moldova under previous agreements. Russia, concerned over Europe's refusal to ratify the re-drafted version of the accord, and acceptance by certain EU states of US missile shield plans on the continent, proposed on Monday holding an emergency CFE conference in Vienna on June 12-15. We are fully observing the provisions of the (CFE) treaty and have pulled out all heavy weaponry from the European part of Russia. We have reduced our armed forces by 300,000 personnel in the past few years, but what about our partners? Putin said. They are inundating Eastern Europe with new weapons - a new base in Bulgaria, another base in Romania, a (missile interceptor) site in Poland , a radar in the Czech Republic, the president said. What are we supposed to do? We cannot just observe all this and continue to keep our obligations under the treaty. There is a clear desire by some international players to dictate their will to everyone without adhering to international law, Putin said. International law has been replaced by political reasons. In our opinion it is nothing different from diktat, nothing different from imperialism , he added. Putin stressed that the US unilaterally withdrew from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, paving the way to the deployment of its missile shield in Europe. Source: agencies Translated by Alexander Timoshik Pravda.ru Discuss this article on Pravda.ru English Forum [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
CiKEAS KaMpanye NasionAL : Jangan Bugil di depan Kamera - 15-17Juni 07 Semarang!!
KaMpanye NasionAL : Jangan Bugil di depan Kamera - 15-17 Juni Semarang!! Rekan, tanggal 15,16,17 juni besok, TV Lab Communications akan berada di Semarang dalam rangka Kampanye nasional : Anak Muda Indonesia, Jangan bugil di depan Kamera!!! Apa aja yang mau dilakukan? tanggal 15 juni, saya dan teman-teman semarang akan turun ke jalan dan membagikan stiker ke pelajar dan mahasiswa di sekitar simpang lima dan daerah kota. Kita mau nyebarin virus untuk menolak segala bentuk kegiatan pembuatan film porno dan penyalahgunaan handphone. selain itu, rencananya sambil workshop skenario TV Program dengan STIE BPD, kita mau ambil sesi 1 jam untuk ngobrolin soal kampanye jangan bugil di tanggal 16-17 juni 07. tempatnya di Lt.5 STIE Bank BPD Jateng Jl.Pemuda 4A (Johar) Semarang. Jam 10-17.00 Bayangin deh, udah 500 lebih film porno yang dibuat dengan handphone dan semua itu asli produk lokal. kalo nggak dilawan , jumlah itu akan meledak. Kemarin tanggal 25 Juni, saya diwawancara di radio Delta FM Jakarta, bareng Shanaz Haque dan Gilang Pambudhi Delta FM Bandung. Wawancara ini disebarluaskan di 22 stasiun radio di seluruh indonesia dalam acara Indonesia Siesta, jam 11-12.00. Kita dapat respon yang menarik, dari teman2 penelpon dan pendengar acara ini. Dari Makasar, medan, bandung, jogja dan semuanya yang nggak bisa masuk disaluran komunikasi tanya jawab via telepon. Tapi kampanye ini dapat dukungan dari mana-mana, kebanyakan merasa khawatir atas data dan fakta yang kami beberkan pada hari itu. nah, nggak hanya berhenti di kampanye radio, saya dan teman2 akan bergerak turun ke jalan besok 15 - 17 juni 2007 di Semarang. Ada yang mau ikut atau sekedar sumbang saran? Ayo dukung kampanye ini. Jangan bugil di depan kamera, selamatkan Anak muda Kita. Oh iya, sekalian mau info, kalau sekarang, kami dapat support dari penerbit liliput - www.indonesiakreatif.com dan mas Peri Umar Farouk yang udah membuatkan situs www.janganbugildepankamera.org sebagai situs resmi gerakan ini. Jadi silahkan klik di situs tersebut, semoga kami masih bisa bergerak, berkampanye dan berbuat baik 10 tahun lagi dari sekarang, atau 100 tahun lagi. Semoga..semoga. salam sony set http://tvlab.blogspot.com 0813 929 820 71 0274 - 7017358 ( Kapan ya bisa kampanye turun langsung ke sekolah2 di jogja? ) Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
CiKEAS Qur'an Is the Main Source of Inspiration'
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1section=0article=96978d=3m=6y=2007 Sunday, 3, June, 2007 (17, Jumada al-Ula, 1428) Qur'an Is the Main Source of Inspiration' P.K. Abdul Ghafour, Arab News Dr. Abdullah Basfar JEDDAH, 3 June 2007 - Throughout history, the Holy Qur'an has been the main source of inspiration for non-Muslims to embrace Islam, said Dr. Abdullah Basfar, secretary-general of the International Organization for the Memorization of the Holy Qur'an and professor of Islamic studies at the King Abdul Aziz University. Basfar, who was addressing a meeting of Qur'an Study Center students in Jeddah, emphasized the importance of practicing the teachings of the Qur'an. The companions of the Prophet (peace be upon him) had tried to practice whatever they learned from the Qur'an without delay, he said. Basfar, who is imam and khateeb of the Shuaibi Mosque in Jeddah, said many scientific factors mentioned in the Qur'an were only discovered by modern science very recently. Prof. Keith Moore, a former anatomist at the University of Toronto, had expressed his astonishment at the accuracy of statements in the Qur'an on the development of human embryo inside the womb 1,400 years before the science of embryology was established. The Qur'an is the main reason for people embracing Islam, Basfar said. He further cited the growing demand for the translation of the meaning of the Qur'an in the West. The second Caliph, Omar ibn Khattab was attracted to Islam after hearing the verses of the Qur'an. Most companions of the Prophet came to the fold of Islam after hearing its verses, he added. Dr. Basfar called upon Muslims to read the Qur'an and think about its meaning. It is better to read the chapter Al-Baqara and to understand its meaning than reading the chapters of Al-Baqara and Al-Imran together without understanding their meaning, he said quoting a Hadith of the Prophet. Jamal Mohammed, a Qur'anic researcher, spoke about how Muslims should approach the Holy Book to gain maximum benefit. We have to read the Qur'an as if Allah is talking to us, he said. The Qur'an has challenged the world to bring a chapter similar to it but nobody has accepted this challenge and this proves that it's the word of Allah. One orientalist said that if the Qur'an is not the word of God we have to say that Mohammed himself is God. He added that the enemies had utterly failed to disprove its divinity and that using Qur'anic verses as a ring tone was disrespectful to the holy book. In his thought-provoking lecture, Jamal Muhiyuddin, supervisor of the center, spoke about the great social and cultural revolution brought about by the Qur'an. The Qur'an is not a book to decorate our homes and libraries. It's a divine message to follow in all walks of our lives, he said. We should know how the Qur'an transformed the people of Arabia into leaders world civilization. The empire of Islam expanded covering a large part of the world. The faith in the hereafter life was another important teaching of the Qur'an. This belief made Muslims more active and inspired them to confront troubles, tribulations and challenges without fear. He added that the Qur'an encouraged Muslims to stop drinking alcohol with a single verse. When Muslims in Madinah heard about the prohibition, they threw alcohol bottles the same day without waiting. Muslim women also proved their commitment by wearing hijab when the verses about Islamic dress were first revealed in the holy book. If Muslims follow the Qur'an in the right manner it would definitely change their present pathetic situation and bring back their lost glory, Muhiyuddin said. K.K. Nissar, coordinator of the center, explained his organization's efforts to teach the Keralite Muslim community in Jeddah the meaning and message of the Qur'an and how to recite it properly. More than 300 men and women benefit from these classes. The meeting was held at WAMY auditorium. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
CiKEAS ABG Expands Business in Indonesia
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=6section=0article=97006d=3m=6y=2007pix=business.jpgcategory=Business Sunday, 3, June, 2007 (17, Jumada al-Ula, 1428) ABG Expands Business in Indonesia Arab News MANAMA, 3 June 2007 - Al Baraka Banking Group BSC (ABG), a Bahrain-based Islamic banking group, intends to expand further its presence in international markets by setting up a representative office in Indonesia. The necessary regulatory approvals have been received recently from Bank Indonesia, the country's central bank, ABG said over the weekend. Indonesia has the largest Muslim population in the world, estimated at 220 million. It has a growing commercial and economic relationship with the Arab and Islamic worlds, while internally it has witnessed positive economic financial developments giving rise to an excellent investment environment. All these factors encourage major Islamic financial institutions to open offices in Indonesia to serve the Muslim community there and contribute toward facilitating trade flow between that country and the Arab world, ABG Chairman Saleh Kamel said. The successful IPO which increased the equity of ABG Group from $566 million to about $1 billion, has enabled the group to expand further into new international markets. The expansion plans include a number of new markets such as Malaysia, Indonesia, India, China and Syria, aside from certain Gulf states, he added. The ABG is firmly building up its regional and international presence according to a clear and well thought out strategic vision. The group is also expanding the range of the banking products and services that it offers to clients, capitalizing on increased financial resources, said ABG President and Chief Executive Adnan Ahmed Yousif. We look forward to continuing our achievements in 2007, as well as the work which we started since the inception of the group, namely building a strong banking group capable of maximizing the benefits from enhancing the business between the banking units affiliated to the group and from teaming up to form strategic alliances with a view to realizing our mission which is to make ABG a leading Islamic banking group at the international level, he added. The group's $31 million net income for the first quarter of 2007 is an indication of its success in this regard. This performance was the result of focusing our efforts on a unified business strategy for the group and is in line with a number of measures that we have taken to enhance the financial resources of the group, improve the operating environment in terms of human resources, technologies and control, as well as support from our subsidiary, he added. The investment grade rating obtained by ABG from Standard Poor's (SP) will further increase the confidence of investors and customers in the group's future business strategies, something that an international bank must possess. This rating will further confirm the soundness of ABG's capital adequacy ratio and financial position, Yousif said, adding that this rating will enable ABG to target the international market with greater ease and confidence and secure attractive pricing in its efforts to raise finance. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
CiKEAS A spot on Indonesian leader's clean hands
Reflection: Once tukang catut always tukang catut. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/IF01Ae02.html Jun 1, 2007 A spot on Indonesian leader's clean hands By Bill Guerin JAKARTA - Just when it seemed Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was making significant progress in tackling the country's endemic culture of corruption, he and Vice President Jusuf Kalla have been linked to allegations that they received illegal off-budget funds to finance their 2004 election campaign. Opposition politician Amien Rais, the onetime champion of the reform movement that helped bring about dictator Suharto's 1998 downfall, admitted he personally received about US$60,000 in illicit campaign funds through the Fisheries and Marine Resources Ministry, formerly headed by Rokhmin Dahuri. Rais dropped a potentially bigger bombshell when he claimed that Yudhoyono and Kalla also received illicit funds from Dahuri and that the General Elections Commission had evidence to substantiate his claims. Dahuri is currently on trial in a Jakarta court over alleged abuse of public funds, and on the stand he has owned up to channeling about Rp11.5 billion (US$1.2 million) from the ministry budget to at least four political parties between April 2002 and March 2005. Both politicians have denied the charges, with Yudhoyono referring to the allegations as slander. I and Jusuf Kalla clearly never received [funds] and clearly the claims are misleading and unhealthy, he said at a press conference last week. Yudhoyono and Rais later met on Sunday for 10 minutes and appeared to agree to leave the case in the hands of the Corruption Eradication Commission rather than sparring in the public domain. But the political controversy the allegations have already generated in the media have to some degree undermined public perceptions about the Yudhoyono government's corruption-busting credentials, crucially as the country enters a new election cycle with presidential polls scheduled for 2009. Significantly, Yudhoyono was elected on a clean-hands ticket in 2004, underlining the importance the Indonesian electorate then and likely now puts on corruption issues. While the business-minded Kalla has recently attracted media attention over possible conflicts of interest related to his family's non-competitive bidding and winning big-ticket government projects, the more bureaucratic Yudhoyono has until now remained above the fray. If public perceptions turn against his government, several opposition candidates, including from the main Islamic party, are poised to present themselves as graft-busters to voters. People's Consultative Assembly Speaker Hidayat Nurwahid said this week, The president and the vice president could be impeached if they are proven guilty of breaching the law. That seems unlikely, because Kalla's Golkar party dominates the legislative body, but the risk is that Yudhoyono and Kalla become in the popular imagination associated with the corrupt old ways they promised on election to reform. Of course, this would come as no surprise to Indonesia watchers who remember the furor in November 2004 when Election Supervision Committee head Kommarudin Hidayat went on record as saying investigations had revealed evidence of more than 1,000 serious administrative and criminal violations of election-campaign regulations allegedly involving all parties and presidential candidates. Bribes, kickbacks and phantom donors The most serious offenses - including fictitious donors, vote-buying and bribing officials - were attributed to both then-president Megawati Sukarnoputri's Indonesian Party of Struggle and the military-affiliated Golkar party, of which Kalla is chairman, according to Kommarudin Hidayat at the time. But Rais' allegations represent the first time both Yudhoyono and Kalla in particular have been directly accused of electoral fraud. Draining state funds for electoral purposes is nothing new for Indonesia. In 1999, Bank Bali paid local corporation PT Era Giat Prima (EGP) a commission of Rp546 billion (US$60 million) to help it collect Rp946 billion from the state foodstuffs monopoly, Bulog, which owned it money. Prosecutors later said the commission went into the Golkar party's coffers and helped finance president B J Habibie's 1999 election win. EGP was partly owned by Golkar's then-deputy treasurer, Setya Novanto. Golkar was later instrumental in pressing for a probe into the next election scandal, known as Bulogate I, which entailed the embezzlement of Rp35 billion from the company and eventually led to former president Abdurrahman Wahid's political downfall in July 2001. Bulogate II, disclosed by Wahid's National Awakening Party, surfaced when former Bulog chief Rahardi Ramelan told prosecutors he gave state funds for a food-relief program to former defense minister and military commander Wiranto, who was a presidential candidate in the 2004
CiKEAS Alarm sounds on cyber piracy as online banking rises
http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/alarm-sounds-on-cyber-piracy-as-online-banking-rises/2007/06/02/1180205572138.html Alarm sounds on cyber piracy as online banking rises June 3, 2007 THE rapidly expanding ranks of people banking online has raised questions over whether consumers can deal with the growing threat from cyber pirates. In the past year, the number of online bankers in Australia has swelled by 1.3 million to 8.2 million, according to a Commonwealth Bank survey, accounting for 52 per cent of the population. Commonwealth Bank of Australia acting head of retail banking Ross McEwan said ease of access to personal computers at work and at home meant more people were now doing more online, including their banking. This increase in online banking goes across the board, with more than 1.3 million customers joining the online banking revolution in the last year alone, Mr McEwan said. Security has become a major issue, with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) saying the threat of fraud through attacks against online accounts is increasing. In a submission to a current review of the Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) Code of Conduct, which sets out the responsibilities of banks and their online customers, the ACCC argued that customers who used electronic banking, such as internet banking, faced severe threats from tech-savvy criminals. The ACCC considers that widespread use of electronic facilities for banking and financial transactions will see continued growth in the number and complexity of related fraud which will target such transactions, it said. Attacks from cyber criminals can take many forms. Two of the biggest threats are phishing - used to gain personal information for the purpose of identity theft - and malware, software designed to infiltrate or harm a computer system. The Consumer's Telecommunications Network believes many consumers are not adequately prepared to deal with the threat of such online attacks. In a 2006 report, it said that although awareness of e-security threats might be reasonably high, consumers lacked understanding of how to protect themselves. AAP [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
CiKEAS Religion: prop or antidote to capitalism?
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20070603a1.html Religion: prop or antidote to capitalism? By HAROLD JAMES PRINCETON, New Jersey - A provocative book written by a Japanese mathematician has reignited the debate about whether there are specifically Asian values. As yet untranslated into other languages, The Dignity of a State by Masahiko Fujiwara is an emotional plea for a Japanese special path. In particular, it argues that liberal democracy is a Western invention that does not fit well with the Japanese or Asian character. The reasoning is peculiar, and seems to revive a 19th-century critique, usually associated with Nietzsche, that Christianity (and Islam) produces an acquiescent or even subservient mentality, in contrast to the heroic virtues of classical antiquity or of warrior societies, such as the world of the Japanese samurai. Likewise, according to Fujiwara, democracy overemphasizes reason, another Western construct. But we Japanese, he writes, don't have a religion such as Christianity or Islam, so we need something else: deep emotion. Many non-Japanese Asians will dislike most or all of Fujiwara's message, for they will hear unpleasant historical echoes. After all, there is no reason to believe that Asians share a particular yearning for authoritarianism, or that, say, Chinese prodemocracy movements are insincere stooges for Western interests. But Fujiwara's book has also revived an old debate about capitalism and the values that are needed to sustain it. That debate stems from the fact that capitalism, or the market economy, cannot simply go on forever, driven by an internal momentum or dynamic. Any of the basic proclivities that drive capitalism, on their own, are destructive of long-term success. For example, while capitalism depends on investment and consumption, an excess of the former leads to production gluts, and too much of the latter causes economies to overheat. Similarly, capitalism depends on competition, but competition can be brutal and destructive. As a result, elaborate systems of laws are needed to ensure that competition is open and fair, that monopolies and trusts do not destroy competition itself. But even this may not be enough, because each legal reform is answered by entrepreneurial ingenuity on the part of those who want to circumvent the new restraints. Some thinkers, most notably Max Weber, floated the idea that capitalism must be sustained by a value system that could not initially be created from within. Almost every modern analyst, however, has come to the conclusion that Weber's attempt to link that capitalist spirit historically to a form of Christianity, namely Protestantism, is fatally flawed. To begin with, the founders of Protestantism, Martin Luther and John Calvin, were, as Weber recognized, more hostile to the dynamic capitalistic world of the Renaissance than was the Catholic Church. Indeed, pious Catholic Italian city-states were the cradle of early modern capitalism. But there are two crucial aspects of the debate on religious values that should not be overlooked: First, the core of Weber's argument was that religious values that emphasize restraint and a sense of duty may support dependability and reliability in business relations, which is especially vital in societies that are just opening up market relations. Where there is a legacy of violence and suspicion, it is hard for people to feel secure enough to enter into long-term contracts. They tend to look for short-term gains at the expense of others, reinforcing a generalized skepticism about the market. Second, religious values that emphasize social solidarity are an important corrective to the tendency of markets to polarize society by rewarding success. Periods of globalization have been eras of considerable economic advance; but they have also increased inequality within particular countries, as markets rewarded scarce factors of production, thus fueling powerful political backlashes that endangered the continuation of trade and financial integration. The debate about the contribution of religious values parallels the debate over the relationship of freedom to economic development - a central issue in the work of Nobel laureate economists Friedrich Hayek and Amartya Sen. It is clearly tempting for critics of authoritarian regimes to argue that freedom is good because it promotes economic growth. But a deeper view of freedom regards it as having intrinsic value. So, too, with religious values. Backed by evidence from large empirical studies, some claim that belief in religion is good because it boosts economic performance. That may be the case, and it may be a tempting argument to make in authoritarian societies that are unsympathetic to beliefs that challenge their own legitimacy. But is it possible to imagine the pope whispering such a message to the Chinese leadership? In the 18th century, Voltaire constructed
