The West backs the wrong systems

The West 's trustworthiness has once again suffered with the fall of Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali Far too often it flatters rulers of his ilk, writes the liberal daily Mladá fronta Dnes in dismay: "The West regularly faces a dilemma: should it support autocrats in the interest of stability? Ben Ali was a good example. A man with a suit and tie, no turban or fundamentalist beard. We liked him because he didn't make waves. Things stayed quiet in the mosques because all the radicals were locked away. ... Our hypocritical pragmatism is dangerous because we're dealing with medieval ruling systems, even if they are sometimes fronted by 'modern' statesmen sporting ties. We help to cement these systems. A look at the Middle East is enough to see that we procede everywhere in the same way."

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