Foreign Policy Blogs

It has been a full year since a quartet of Arab countries – the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt – tried to silence Al Jazeera as part of their subsequent 13 arbitrary demands: demands that specifically included shutting down our news network, Al Jazeera.

This particular demand is absurd, given that Al Jazeera has endured as one of the only beacons for free press in the region, maintaining a level of award-winning journalism unattainable by the region’s state-controlled media outlets.

If you want to understand the eagerness these Arab leaders have for shutting down Al Jazeera, you need only to understand how most of media works in the Middle East. Truth drowns beneath the preservation of these crowns. While many Arab leaders parade a vision of modernization in the West, they brutally crack down on dissenters in their country and those they claim are in their “backyards.” They shut down news media outlets seeking to curtail any hint of criticism or opposition, seeking a return to the pre-Al Jazeera period of sycophantic parroting of the party line.

When Al Jazeera first came on the scene over two decades ago, our network broke the stranglehold on state propaganda and gave a platform for independent news, opposing views and untold stories in the region, following what true journalism teaches – to bring all points of view to a story and let audiences decide for themselves. Our uncompromising pursuit of the truth and raw reality on the ground has made Al Jazeera loved by its audiences, but hated by many governments.

Al Jazeera has refused to be silenced, not only continuing to deliver breaking news across the globe but also standing with our media brothers and sisters across the globe in demanding press freedom for all, using the #DemandPressFreedom to sustain global momentum on these efforts. In collaboration with press freedom organizations and initiatives, we continue to demand the release of Reuters journalists in Myanmar as well as those incarcerated in Egypt, Mexico, Afghanistan among others, including our very own Mahmoud Hussein, who has been held in solitary confinement in an Egyptian prison for 534 days. He has yet to be formally charged.

While Al Jazeera remains blocked in the quartet countries, with heavy fines and possible imprisonment for those accessing the channel through VPN, other governments and interest groups seek to impose regulations to curtail press freedom. However, this has been the case since we first broke the status quo back in 1996. Since then, our journalists have been threatened, imprisoned, tortured, and killed, our offices have been bombed, our signals have been blocked, our websites hacked, and our social media accounts taken down. But we have endured and will continue to endure.

In the midst of the call to close us down, a 2017 report by US News and World Report, in partnership with the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School noted that Al Jazeera operates in one of the most media free environments in the region and “…has gone on to become one of the most popular channels in the Middle East.” This year alone, Al Jazeera journalists have won Peabody awards and accolades at the New York International Television and Film Festival and the United Nations, among other institutions. In the past the network has won several hundred journalism awards including an International Emmy.

Shutting down independent free media because it does not tow the government line is uncivilized, backwards, and oppressive. At a time when more dialogue is so desperately needed across the world, to be voiceless is to be powerless. But that is what some of the most powerful leaders in the world are attempting to do right now; silence the media, silence the people.

If we’ve learned anything in all our triumphs and tribulations, it is that you cannot silence the people for long. You cannot take away their experiences, dreams, stories and opinions. They will be heard and we will continue to be a messenger for them.

As we mark a year since the Arab quartet demanded we be shut down and silenced, we celebrate another year of courageous journalism and a steadfast commitment to press freedom in the region and across the globe.

Abdulla Al Najjar is the Executive Director of Global Brand and Communications at Al Jazeera Media Network.

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U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un take a stroll during their June 12th Singapore summit. Photo courtesy of Kevin Lim/The Strait Times/Handout/Getty Images

As Washington is currently full of armchair quarterbacking in the wake of the historic Trump-Kim summit in Singapore, perhaps a more unorthodox and pragmatic, less idealogical quarterback was what was needed to finally move the ball (back) up the field of U.S.-DPRK relations.

Despite the warm smiles and gestures proffered during the recent, historic Singapore summit between the U.S. and the DPRK, there remains an air of continuing mistrust between the two states. This is because both states have been at this very same juncture before, only to have progress stymied because of mistrust and deception on both sides. A key component of previous difficulties had been the hesitancy of previous U.S. presidents in granting a diplomatic audience to the DPRK in the first place in the belief that solely being able to meet with the U.S. president is a concession in and of itself and that the DPRK should be grateful that its stature would be raised accordingly.

Another key component of previous difficulties has been the notion of reciprocity, or more accurately, the perceived lack thereof. Previous U.S. administrations have held firm to the belief that the DPRK must agree to a complete, verifiable, irreversable denuclearization (CVID) of the Korean Peninsula first before any true negotiations with the U.S. could start. Or, to re-phrase it, “Surrender first, then we’ll talk.”

Because of domestic backlash, even this stance has been walked back post-summit to that of the U.S. demanding that CVID of only the DPRK (as opposed to the entire Korean Peninsula, which would include U.S. nuclear weaponry) must be done before sanctions are totally lifted and U.S.-ROK military exercises are totally halted. Despite the previous U.S. insistence that withdrawal of U.S. troops from the Korean peninsula is not a negotiating point and would be a matter of joint discussion with the ROK, some media pundits and politicians are trying to use the fear of even this remote possibility, in the wake of President Trump’s surprise statement regarding U.S.-ROK military exercises, as further ammunition in their quest to discredit the president, and thereby sabotage negotiations.

What’s still not clear is the extent to which the president is proposing halting U.S.-ROK joint military exercises. What is clear, however, is that previous negotiating tactics with the DPRK clearly were not working and a drastic change in approach was necessary. The extent to which the president’s method was influenced by China’s “double freeze” proposal or his own instincts will be a subject of further debate. What’s also clear is that serious diplomacy is much more preferable than simply walking up to the DMZ in a cute bomber jacket and looking through binoculars at the very adversary you should be talking to. Also, ignoring your adversary’s sister at the Winter Olympics doesn’t win you any points with anyone…anywhere.

To cut to the chase, no one actually knows Trump’s strategy, or if he even has one or not. This is not only confined to the DPRK issue, but also encompasses U.S.-China trade, U.S.-EU relations, Syria, and much, much more! Anyone in Washington (or elsewhere) claiming they have a bead on the president because they’ve read Trump: The Art of the Deal is disengenous. As many times as Trump has shifted his thinking over the course of a week (or day), surely perhaps his thinking has shifted slightly over the course of the last generation, as the book was originally published over 30 years ago. The year 1987 can not even hold a candle to today’s increasingly frenetic multipolar world. This is one of the reasons why the DPRK held talks with China, the ROK, and Russia, before deciding to “raise its stature” by then holding direct talks with the U.S..

In Ronan Farrow’s War on Peace: The End of Diplomacy and the Decline of American Influence, the author decries the steady atrophying of the U.S.’ diplomatic game over the course of several U.S. administrations. The reasons are multiple, ranging from still-unfilled vacancies of the upper management echelons at the State Department, to the gradual assumption by the military and intelligence community of roles formerly performed by State. The book posits that this is by presidential design, but if so, still lacks concrete answers as to exactly why. 

Whether it’s an attempt by Trump to further marginalize professional expertise in favor of asserting a more dominant role for himself in U.S. foreign policy formulation is anybody’s guess. Perhaps it’s an attempt to clean out schlerotic, Cold War thinking (“The Blob”) in favor of a new approach. If so, then this new dynamic, out-of-the-box thinking is desperately needed on other issues as well. The possible upcoming summit with Russian President Putin comes to mind, especially in the wake of Trump’s recent comments regarding Crimea. Let’s hope that “The Blob” heeds the advice of one analyst who recently stated, “A summit is not a wrestling match”. Very wise. Very wise indeed.

The post More Bold, Risk-Assuming, Presidential Pragmatism on DPRK Needed appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

“Oh Charlie Brownnnnn…” Year after year, Lucy tricks Charlie Brown to kick a football she inevitably pulls away. Each time it’s a new creative argument. Lucy promises the world and the temptation is so great that Charlie Brown overlooks history and everything else except kicking that ball. Drawn in, surely this time Lucy will hold the ball as promised and Charlie Brown will kick it to the moon. Unlikely.

Allured by the objectively noble prospect of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula, America is paying less attention to the real threat in the Western Pacific. While nuclear weapons are an existential threat, North Korea is neither going to denuclearize nor use their warheads. To do either would be disastrous for them. As talks with North Korea commenced this week, America must resist being distracted by the dream of a nuclear-free Korea and remember the preeminent security threat of the next century is Chinese supremacy in the South China Sea.

North Korea is what economists call a rational actor: they act in their own self-interest. Their foremost goal is to perpetuate the Kim regime and North Korea will always act based on that objective. If Mr. Kim launched a nuclear attack, the response would be cataclysmic and would surely end his rule. Conversely, if he denuclearized, he would give up all the international leverage he has to stay in power. Mr. Kim is therefore very unlikely to give up his nuclear deterrent, but by engaging in talks with America he earns legitimacy and propaganda without concession. We’ve been here before.

However, the far greater threat is China’s imminent dominance of the South China Sea (SCS). China is challenging the international system built by America and its allies. For the first time in decades, a new economically viable alternative to the liberal world order is spreading. From thieving American commercial and military secrets to recruiting scientists, China is rapidly closing the technological gap with America and energizing its military and economy. With its One-Belt-One-Road initiative, China is investing in dual-use foreign infrastructure across a third of the world’s GDP at a rate up to 2-3 trillion dollars per year – 12 times the size of America’s Marshall Plan. Using unprecedented cash that the United States simply can’t match, China is luring nations into their sphere of influence.

Furthermore, Chinese investment comes without rules and lectures on human rights or democratic ideals, attracting authoritarian-leaning governments. China’s goal is to surpass the United States economy and become the world’s dominant military power by 2050, starting in the SCS. Carrying 60 percent of the world’s seaborne trade and the link between the Pacific and the Indian Oceans, the SCS is a global choke point and the economic lifeline for many of the world’s nations. By establishing control there, China is using economic and military force to intimidate and coerce regional nations into obedience. If America doesn’t address China’s growing power over the SCS, it risks sacrificing the current international order for one much less favorable to freedom and democracy.

The centerpiece of America’s strategy to counter China’s weight in the Western Pacific was the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The TPP wasn’t just a free trade agreement, but an alliance, an evolution of NATO, designed for the region. Without it, Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPS) are an important stop-gap, but they will not roll-back Chinese fortification of the SCS. Similarly, military exercises and trade sanctions only have limited use. An effective strategy must draw the regional nations into American geopolitical orbit based on free and open political and economic governance. Being the global leader requires America to be a reliable partner and advocate for the democratic institutions its worked so hard to create. By living up to its principles, America can unite the regional and democratic nations through political and economic alliances, like the G7, to resist the spread of the illiberal order.

Each year that I flew missions in the SCS I saw the threat rings in my jet, drawn around Chinese claims and fortifications, expand and multiply. Soon, the US military won’t be able to operate there at all without being targeted by Chinese defenses. The allure of a historic political achievement—the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula—is powerful precisely because it makes the world safer. But sadly, it’s an illusion and a distraction that is taking our attention away from what China is doing right now.

LT Peter Devine is a Navy F/A-18 pilot, he recently returned from the Western Pacific and teaches economics at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis. He is a member of Truman National Security Project’s Defense Council. The views expressed are his own and not representative of the Navy, the Naval Academy, or Truman National Security Project.

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Heads of state attend the G7 summit in La Malbaie, Canada( Leon Neal/Getty Images)

The leaders of the 7-largest global economies gathered on the beautiful bank of Quebec’s St. Lawrence river to acknowledge their commitment to resolve dire global issues according to “our shared values of freedom, democracy, (and) the rule of law.” The world has turned more or less into a shooting venue for a Spaghetti Western film as both leftist and rightist anarchists have fed the trolls of the Trumpian unilateralism. In response, the militia of the Free World under Canada’s leadership, the new “good cop”, fights to bring our global community together.

The product of the summit, the Charlevoix Communique, which was signed by the G7 leaders on June 9th (but allegedly rejected by the ugly cop a few days later) lays out the group’s governance plans to collaboratively remedy major global problems through a number of documented consensuses. The Charlevoix Commitment on Equality and Economic Growth endorses enabling marginalized individuals, especially women, to fully participate in the global economy by removing the barriers of inequality and poverty, and taking a more holistic view of measuring economic progress alternatively to GDP to reflect today’s complex economic landscape. Reflecting the group’s thematic emphasis on gender equality, the Charlevoix Declaration on Quality Education for Girls, Adolescent Girls and Women in Developing Countries further prioritizes the group’s investment plans to improve the quality education that women and girls in developing countries deserve. A meaningful consensus has also been reached to address governance issues in Artificial Intelligence (AI), climate change, and collective security. The Charlevoix Common Vision for the Future of Artificial Intelligence commits the group to create a suitable policy environment for the development of a human-centric AI that “fosters economic growth, societal trust, gender equality and inclusion.” The G7 Ocean Plastics Charter recognizes the importance of managing plastics in a sustainable way to protect the environment. Lastly, in the aim of building a more peaceful world, the Charlevoix Commitment on Defending Democracy from Foreign Threats agrees to be resolute in fixing the recent malfunctions of our democratic institutions caused by authoritarian chicaneries.

Unfortunately, the 44th G7 summit – which could have been highlighted for its maternalistic institutional visions for the future if it hadn’t been disconcerted by the pre-summit clash in Whistler between the six finance ministers and the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Steven Mnuchin – ended up revealing the deepening schisms between order-defying transactionalism and globally shared values. President Trump’s decision to impose tariffs of 10% on aluminum and 25% on steel on Canada, EU, and Mexico under the phony national security rationale (which came into effect on June 1st) forced the allies to choose the most natural strategic response in an uncertain transactional climate – tit-for-tat. They retaliated with punitive measures on U.S. exports to fight against what President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, labelled as “protectionism, pure and simple.” The new trade war remained a hot issue during the summit. The six frustrated leaders admonished President Trump to reconsider the importance of preserving shared global values during the meeting, but the president was too preoccupied with his upcoming historic meeting with Kim Jong-un that is ought to be perceived by the public as “a scene from a sci-fi movie.” It is expected that the started trade war will escalate; the allies impacted by the trade war might increase the intensity of punitive retaliation by strategically targeting the economy of the president’s electoral base.

President Trump is getting more and more familiar with his new authoritarian friends, embellishing America’s national façade with the morally nonchalant Trumpian unilateralism; it is now easy to think of the U.S. as a greedy profit-maximizer who would conduct business even with rogue countries as long as it guarantees its leader’s political survival. Some argue in defense of such transactional tribalism that nostalgia towards the pre-Trump liberal order is harmfully ahistorical and even mythical; therefore, the world should rather adapt to the new reality. However, such defense ignores many costly effects of the (Trumpian) unilateralism-induced anarchic global order on the U.S., especially in the upcoming multipolar world. After all, the world will soon enter a new era of systems competition and the U.S., with its debilitating soft-powered value network, will nevertheless need to get prepared to compete efficiently against other superpowers, especially the neoliberal China. On the one hand, the anarchic order will let the Spaghetti Bowl Effect prevail; the weakened legitimacy of the WTO will foster regionalization over globalization, increasing weak states’ politico-economic dependency on the regional hegemon. On the other hand, the U.S.’s Trumpian mis-abuse of its politico-economic power which emanates from its global hub position might in turn weaken the brokerage capacity of its middle-power allies. In sum, the anarchic order is rather harmful to the U.S.’ national interests since the U.S. will lose the positive externalities generating from the network of the post-war system that once helped the good cop to successfully compete against Soviet Union, the most pivotal one of which was the internalized functioning of the consumer-sovereignty-based “invisible hands” of America’s allies’ brokerage power.

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Not long ago the international community was celebrating the end of the Sochi Olympics in Russia. This was before Russia’s involvement in the Middle East, before the conflict in Crimea as well as before the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight over a contested part of the Ukraine. The beginning of Russia’s added military involvement started soon after Sochi, and there has been little analysis of Russia beyond tying it to the last Presidential elections, in the United States.

International sporting events seem to have a different perspective inside Russia as opposed to that of the rest of Europe. While the FIFA World Cup is often a time to set aside differences and promote fair play on the pitch, Russian based international events also seem to focus Russians in on themselves in addition to providing the world with a positive image of the host nation as well. Sochi was a successful games, but also set a very different tone outside of Russia as opposed to inside of Russia. Negative perspectives on Russian society during the last Winter Games outside of Russia allowed nationalist movements to set Russians apart from the rest of Europe, playing on historical divisions between Russia and the West. Since then, divisions have been amplified by actions by Russian politicians as well as European policy that drove a wedge further between neighbours. What must be understood is that international events can be used as a tool of self-promotion by the government, but can also be focused on in a way that pushes moderates in Russia closer to their government if international media uses such events to criticize Russian culture.

A post Sochi approach to Russian policy during international events should have made it clear that any conflict with Russia should be addressed by an absence in international activities where Russia is hosting the event. A severe fault by Russia’s government should likely be met with a clear response to their government, even if it costs a spot for a national team in the World Cup. If all teams accept to participate in the tournament, policy is best left to when the event ends. An appreciation for the hosts during the event should reflect an appreciation of their people, not necessarily their government, until the games conclude and relations can return to one focusing on government policies. A positive games is good policy, as politics should always be left off the pitch.

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The new Malaysian Prime Minister, Dr. Mahathir, has indicated that he will reverse significant gains made by China under the outgoing Prime Minister, Najib Razak. In response, China has called on Dr. Mahathir to honour bilateral agreements and investments. How might the change in government impact these agreements, Chinese investments, and bilateral ties between China and Malaysia?

A political earthquake shook Malaysia after the general elections earlier this month when over 60 years of Barisan Nasional (BN) – the longest ruling political coalition in history – rule finally came to an end. Galvanised by the presence and support of Dr. Mahathir, the erstwhile leader of BN and former mentor to the incumbent Prime Minister Najib Razak, Malaysia’s opposition coalition Pakatan Harapan (PH) stormed to a resounding victory in the national elections.

The election results also served as an indictment of BN’s stewardship under Najib Razak’s tenure. The 1Malaysia Development Board (1MBD) scandal was particularly harmful to BN, and revealed that Najib Razak and his wife had embezzled over USD1 billion from an economic development fund. Likewise, BN did a poor job allaying public concerns over unusually high levels of Chinese investment in the country.

These concerns included fears that the government would not be able to repay Chinese loans that it had been guaranteed by the Malaysian government. Malaysians were well aware that Sri Lanka had to surrender control of a major port to Chinese state-owned enterprises after the island nation was unable to repay the debts incurred in the port’s construction. With China similarly involved in important national infrastructure projects such as the East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) and several other ports to the tune of USD100 billion, Dr. Mahathir spoke for the average Malaysian when he remarked that the country was being “sold” piecemeal to China.

Additionally, the average Malaysian has been sidelined by China in such projects. China has opted to export its own resources and labour instead of subcontracting out such requirements to local companies. With China having already acquired a reputation in places as far afield as the Philippines and Ghana for such behaviour, Malaysian companies justifiably fear that it would presage future competition with the Chinese – and that they will not be competing on an equal footing, as the Chinese complete projects better and faster than them.

The East Coast Rail Line. When complete, this rail infrastructure would allow a large amount of freight to bypass Singapore and the Straights of Malacca (Map source: Malaysia’s Land Public Transport Comission).

While Dr. Mahathir was able to play on such fears in order to win the elections, it would be incorrect to say that Chinese involvement has entirely been to Malaysia’s detriment. Chinese investments in these projects have indisputably contributed to Malaysia’s national development, and helped shore up a flagging economy that would have otherwise taken a battering from falling oil prices and the 1MDB scandal.

As such, these infrastructure projects may be necessary in order to future-proof Malaysia’s economy. Malaysia is touted as an invaluable link in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) – at the expense of Malaysia’s long-time neighbour, Singapore. While Singapore’s diplomatic run-ins with China have been speculated to underpin this decision, the fact remains that critical shipping routes bound for China have to pass by Singapore, located at the tip of the West Malaysian peninsula. Through infrastructure projects such as the ECRL, the Kuantan port and the Kuala Linggi port, China therefore aims to shorten and secure shipping routes headed its way.

For Malaysia, the combined effect of the three projects would provide a portage route for nearly 53 million tonnes of cargo instead of taking the long way around the West Malaysian peninsula via ship. 80,000 jobs from the ECRL alone would be created for Malaysians. Further – and contrary to what voters may have thought – local firms are expected to play a part in the ECRL’s construction as well. The icing on the cake is an industrial training programme for Malaysian students that is designed to tie in with the ongoing construction work.

Dr. Mahathir’s election rhetoric may therefore prove to be nothing more than the ordinary course of business in politics, as he recently promised to uphold Malaysia’s end of its various bargains with China. With that said, however, ties are unlikely to be affected even as Dr. Mahathir attempts to “renegotiate” their terms. Under Najib Razak’s tenure, bilateral ties with China reached an all-time high. The sheer volume of Chinese investment in Malaysia appears to have secured ties for the time being.

With political and economic ties with China locked in for the foreseeable future, it is up to Dr. Mahathir to do better than Najib Razak by going back on his words – and convincing an uneasy Malaysia that it will be to their benefit.

This article was first published on Global Risk Insights and was written by Nicholas Leong.

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The lebanese flag floating over the palace of Beiteddine.

Having postponed elections twice, Lebanon now has a new parliament after nine years. The results of the elections raise questions about the internal and external issues that threaten Lebanon’s stability and prosperity.  

News headlines announced the victory of Hezbollah in the Lebanese elections. They warned of Iran’s enhanced presence in the country since its Lebanese proxy had won big. Although the winners were not the West’s preferred parties, the extent of Hezbollah’s win was exaggerated by foreign media.

These claims are based on the 2009 election groupings which pitted the March 14 and the March 8 coalitions against one another. March 14 was a Western, especially U.S.-backed, grouping of parties, while March 8 was backed by Iran and included Hezbollah. In the previous elections, March 14 took a majority of seats in parliament which alleviated Western fears of Iranian interference. However, these groupings are no longer part of the Lebanese political scene today and the past couple of years marked a shift in political alliances. Civil war enemies and parties that belonged to the two coalitions banded together to elect President Michel Aoun in 2016.

In the May elections Hezbollah won 13 of 128 seats, one more than in 2009, but the group of parties that used to belong to the March 8 coalition took a majority in parliament this time around. Notably, the biggest “win” for the Shia party was taking away Sunni seats from its rival, PM Saad Hariri’s Future Movement, which lost almost a third of its seats in parliament. Its losses in Beirut especially to pro-Hezbollah Sunni candidates, fueled the victorious calls of the Hezbollah leadership.

The new electoral law introduced proportional representation, which prompted parties to form alliances. Some were along the lines of the March 8 and March 14 divide, but there were new alignments that mirrored alliances that had formed in recent years, and some that were purely tactical in certain regions. One such alliance is the Free Patriotic Movement’s alliance with the Future Movement in support of PM Saad Hariri, which manifested itself in electoral lists in some constituencies. However, FPM is considered to be an ally of Hezbollah’s and their 22 seats in parliament count towards the latter “winning more than half the seats.” Therefore, these elections have shown how convoluted political alliances can be in Lebanon and that it is too simplistic to draw lines between party groupings in the same manner as in 2009.

Painting the elections as a Hezbollah victory has deep repercussions on the image of Lebanon abroad. It feeds into a campaign of fear mongering regarding Iran’s geopolitical influence. This affects tensions in the region, especially with Israel. In fact, it created an opening for Israel’s education minister to announce that Lebanon was equivalent to Hezbollah, which justifies its policy to hold the entire country responsible for Hezbollah’s actions. In the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel, the latter targeted Hezbollah strongholds and did not focus on other Lebanese regions. Thus, these words signal the willingness of Israel to target the entire country indiscriminately in case of renewed conflict.

These elections, in addition to inflaming foreign public opinion, brought to the surface Lebanon’s glaring problems. The results exhibited the strength of patronage networks and nepotism in the country. The fair nature of the voting process was questionable at best since the Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections recorded more than 7,000 violations.  Despite the presence of alternatives this time around, very few changes were made to the standing of deeply-rooted parties and families in parliament.

Various civil society-backed individuals and new parties joined together to form electoral lists under the name Koullouna Watani, in addition, independent candidates banded with more established parties to join lists. However, only one Koullouna Watani candidate made it through, while another who was announced as winner had her seat revoked, which caused activist protests in Beirut. Voter turnout was about 49 percent with cynicism running through the community about the possibility of change, which materialized as a self-fulfilling prophecy due to the lack of support for new faces that set themselves apart from established parties.

The dangers of the static nature of politicians’ presence in Lebanon are the depth of corruption and patronage that are bleeding the country dry. Debt is already at a staggering $90 billion, or 150% of GDP, while basic infrastructure is suffering. To promote macroeconomic stability, a recent IMF mission statement stressed the importance of stabilizing debt, managing public investment, and enhancing the anti-corruption regulatory framework.

This election had the potential to add some new groupings to a parliament that is already ten years old, but aside from some shuffling and seat exchanges between parties, nothing much has changed. Furthermore, Nabih Berri got re-elected as Speaker of Parliament, a position he has held since 1992, and Saad Hariri returned as PM for a third term and is tasked with forming a new government. Despite the hopes that these elections might shake up the Lebanese political scene, the established political elite have further strengthened their grip over the country.

The coming government must address the dire economic situation, especially since Lebanon is looking at a new era with the discovery of oil and gas near its shore. In February, the government made a deal with an international consortium made up of French Total, Russian Novatek, and Italian Eni to start exploratory offshore drilling. This new industry has the potential to boost the Lebanese economy and send it into a path of faster development.

Nonetheless, this newfound wealth of natural resources comes with its own complications. Israel has escalated its threats amid the talks leading to the contract claiming that the drilling would be in areas owned by the state. But despite the provocations, the deal went through. It will be interesting to see whether the wealth will trickle down to the popular level through projects for sustainable economic growth, or whether it will get tangled up in the nets of power struggles and patronage networks.

This article first ran on Global Risk Insights and was written by Myriam Maalouf.

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Chinese President Xi Jinping welcomes U.S. President Donald Trump to Beijing. Photo courtesy of Reuters.

Any kind of security or economic paradigm in Asia which does not include China is doomed to failure. Structures which have failed to take into account the interests of a region’s dominant, or near-dominant, power have failed both in the recent, and not-so-recent past.

From the German perspective, World War II was practically preordained based on its treatment at Versailles post-World War I.  The excessive reparations demanded of it further depressed its postwar economy, which was itself a contributing factor to the rise of fascism and eventual rearmament of Germany in relatively short order. It wasn’t until Germany was defeated again (and partitioned) that it received economic assistance through the Marshall Plan.

In more modern times, the failure to include Russia and its interests in any post-Cold War security architecture on the European continent has led directly to today’s Ukraine Crisis. This idea of a more inclusive arrangement, acknowledging Russia’s legitimate security interests in Europe was voiced most recently by Russian President Putin, but actually goes back further to former Russian President Yeltsin’s original hope for Russian membership within NATO itself. Additionally, for acknowledging “losing” the Cold War, an economically devastated Russia, circa the 1990s, expected massive financial assistance from the West, akin to the above-mentioned Marshall Plan.

Disappointingly, this assistance never materialized. However, economics was just as important a factor as security concerns in the Ukraine Crisis as one of the causes was Ukraine’s economic alignment. Disagreement over whether the EU or the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) offered the best path forward for Ukraine led Ukraine’s leaders to play both sides off against one another. A Russian solution for Ukraine to potentially be part of both blocks was jettisoned by the EU due to the exclusive nature of its own proposition, leading to Ukraine’s refusal of the EU solution, the Euromaidan Revolution, and thus the current crisis.

The TPP was originally designed to exclude China, the leading trading partner of most states in its region. In its modified form even after the U.S.’ departure, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), or “TPP-11”, still follows this model, to its own detriment. Currently, China has argued for keeping its own economy open to the world even as the U.S. becomes more protectionist in nature. The case can not even be made by the U.S. that the CPTPP is a community of states based on shared liberal values, like democracy, therefore China’s exclusion is logical, as Vietnam is still a CPTPP member. The current G-7 meeting in Canada deftly illustrates how trading groups based on shared values, and not reality, can quickly become anachronistic.

India is currently being wooed by the U.S. in its efforts to balance China in Asia. However, the U.S.’ current use of the term “Indo-Pacific” over “Asia-Pacific” is not enough to make India forget its own historically non-aligned stance and overriding desire for strategic autonomy. Of course, India has its own issues with China, ranging from the Doklam Crisis last year, to continuing concerns over the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Apparently, however, India has decided that any kind of Indo-Pacific paradigm must not exclude or target states like (but especially) China, which may or may not share similar democratic values with India or the U.S.. India has referred to the “Indo-Pacific” as a geographic concept, not a strategic one.

This Indian standpoint complicates U.S. wishes to enlist it, Japan, and Australia into a “Diamond of Democracies” (Japan’s original term) targeting China. This renamed “Quad” forms the core of the U.S.’ Indo-Pacific strategy to address regional issues, such as securing freedom of navigation rights in the South China Sea. Some have even called for Taiwan to be included in this grouping. Further complications arise from India’s desire to import energy from Iran and weaponry from Russia as both states are currently under U.S. sanctions. The U.S. strategy to further marginalize China within its own region by recruiting the U.K. and France as potential FONOP partners reeks of historial amnesia as these states are still lumped together by Asian nations with others such as Spain, Portugal, and The Netherlands as former colonial powers. Lastly, the move is highly risky as it might invite even further Russian naval maneuvers in the region as a show of support for China.

Lastly, depite both Indian and U.S. reassurances at the recent IISS Shangri-La Dialogue of ASEAN centrality in any Indo-Pacific paradigm, ASEAN is still hesitant to sign up to anything which would excessively marginalize China, the largest trading partner for many of its members. Yes, many Southeast Asian states still desire security from the U.S., while simultaneously continuing trading linkages with China. While, like Ukraine, ASEAN is leveraging its geographic position to gain maximum dividends from all outside parties (Japan, Russia, and India, too), it draws the line at membership in any structure or paradigm where it would explicitly be asked to choose between China and the U.S.. Therefore, as the linkages between trade and security become ever more complex in the future, more inclusive groupings such as China’s RCEP and India’s SAGAR, though not perfect, may offer a better chance of success in the long-term.

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May was a tough month for Taiwan’s international presence. The troubles began on 1 May when the Dominican Republic ended its alliance with Taipei in favor of Beijing, then doubled on 26 May as Burkina Faso followed suit. Despite its successful self-governance, the Chinese-claimed territory struggles to maintain international support and acknowledgement as an independent country. Beijing’s ‘dollar diplomacy’ will continue to chip away at Taipei’s legitimacy, leveraging smaller impoverished nations in an effort to solidify and justify its influence over the Taiwan Strait.

China’s charm offensive highlights a growing mistrust of the changing political climate in Taiwan. Tsai Ing-wen made local history in 2016 when she and her Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won the Taiwanese presidential election, ousting the Kuomintang majority for the first time since 1950. Her pro-independence tendencies worried Beijing. Tsai’s unwillingness to affirm the 1992 Consensus—an agreement that there is one China, but along two different interpretations— threatens a long-held status quo and an already-shaky bilateral relationship. When she directly called Donald Trump to congratulate him on his US election victory later that year, Beijing grew even more concerned that she was shoring up international support and preparing for a push for Taiwanese sovereignty. As the Tsai administration continues to build its relations with the US, its mainland counterpart grows suspicious.

Beijing consistently sends belligerent warnings in the form of increased air force drills and naval exercises in the Taiwan Strait, but has also taken more subtle efforts to maintain the status quo in the region. The government has cracked down on foreign firms operating in China such as Delta Airlines, Zara, and Marriot that refer to Taiwan as a separate country. Companies that list Taiwan separately on online surveys or exclude the island from Chinese maps have faced strong criticism, heavy fines, and even temporary suspension of the offending website. Tensions ramped up again when China opened four new flight routes near Taiwanese airspace without any consultation or approval from the Tsai administration, which responded by refusing to acknowledge the almost 200 flights and forcing their cancellation before the Lunar New Year, the region’s highest travel season.

Beijing’s soft power offensive against Taiwanese legitimacy includes buying support from impoverished nations. Countries allied to Taiwan are enticed with soft loans (meaning that they pay below market-rate interest or even no interest at all), multimillion-dollar donations, and long-term investment projects that bring much-needed development. Offers have included a scholarship program for Caribbean students to study in China, a USD 250 million children’s hospital to Trinidad and Tobago, a USD 600 million highway to connect the Jamaican islands, and even a USD 60 million cricket stadium in Antigua and Barbuda. Most importantly, the cash comes with no strings attached—China provides exorbitant financial support in exchange for simply switching diplomatic alliances.

Impoverished nations willingly play along because they have no other choice. Countries receive notoriously flawed aid packages from typical lenders such as the US, which re-instated the “Global Gag Rule” that prevents the use of foreign aid to inform about or provide abortions, and the World Bank, whose austerity measures have continued to cripple the Greek economy. China’s simple request to recognize its sovereignty over Taiwan offers a far more bearable solution, and countries openly acknowledge and accept the help.

Grenada’s nutmeg crisis clearly highlights the power and convenience of dollar diplomacy. In 2004, Hurricane Ivan caused over USD 900 million in damages and leveled the country’s nutmeg crops—a main export that needed approximately five years to fully recover. When then-ally Taiwan offered a disappointing USD 4.7 million in emergency funds, Prime Minister Keith Mitchell flew to Beijing to strike a better deal in aid and development and, in return,renounce Grenada’s ties to Taipei in favor of the mainland. Chinese foreign direct investment in Grenada has since leapt from USD 4 million in 2006 to USD 14.5 million in 2013. China successfully flexed its philanthropic muscles while simultaneously leading another diplomatic ally away from Taiwan.

In a more recent case, the Dominican Republic openly admitted that its decision to switch alliances was financially driven. Legal advisor to the president Flavio Dario Espinal acknowledged the valuable relationship between Taiwan and the Dominican Republic, but also admitted that “the socioeconomic reality” forced his country to reconsider its allegiances. Taiwan’s recent accusations shed more light on Espinal’s vague explanation: according to an official from the Taiwan Foreign Ministry, China offered a package of up to USD 3.1 billion that included low-interest loans, financial aid, and investments for a freeway, infrastructural projects, and a natural gas power plant. While details of Burkina Faso’s impending aid remain undisclosed, Foreign Minister Alpha Barry confirmed that a Chinese delegation would soon travel to the country to plan development packages.

Tsai struggles to compete with China’s massive spending power. Although she openlycriticized China for buying her diplomatic allies out from under her, she has few options. When Haiti threatened to end its bilateral relationship in early June, Tsai quickly caved and offered USD 150 million in loans to help the Caribbean nation recover from the 2010 earthquake. With only 18 countries left supporting Taiwan, including only one in Europe and one on the African continent, the Tsai administration may find itself forced to dole out larger, unaffordable aid packages. Furthermore, as the Tsai administration and its pro-independence narrative directly caused China’s increased diplomatic push, the DPP could lose voter confidence and suffer defeat in the next Taiwanese elections in favor of yet another pro-status quo party and president.

Taiwan is highly likely to more closely ally itself with the US, but the Trump administration’s dedication is questionable. Washington has indeed pushed for increased communication between high level officials with the Taiwan Travel Act and called for improved military capabilities to counter China with the US National Defense Authorization Act. However, the US’ relationship with China is too crucial for the Trump administration to take any truly aggressive action in the name of the small island nation. While the Taiwan Strait may see increased military presence in the form of China’s so-called “routine” exercises, Taiwanese jets monitoring the situation, or the US’ Freedom of Navigation missions, escalated encounters are still highly unlikely.

China is likely to continue an aggressive philanthropic campaign, whittling away at Taiwan’s allies, and a few countries already seem receptive. The Vatican, the sole diplomatic ally to Taiwan in Europe, has seen an unsteady but potentially pivotal shift in relations with the notoriously atheist Chinese Communist Party. eSwatini, formerly Swaziland, recentlyreaffirmed its decades-long bilateral relationship with Taiwan and declared no interest in switching allegiances to China despite heavy courting. However, as the sole remaining country on the African continent that supports Taiwan, eSwatini could face new pressure not only from China, but from its own neighbors as well. If the push for a Pan-African association gains more momentum and the union forges formal ties with China, the continent’s number one trading partner, eSwatini could find itself pushed into—or out of an alliance. As China doles out more generous aid packages and outshines Taiwan’s diplomatic efforts, the Tsai administration will have to find new ways to establish itself on the international stage.

This article was first published on Global Risk Insights, and was written by Kiana Mendoza .

The post Buying friends through dollar diplomacy appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

Bryan Lanza (CNN via Media Matters).

Sanctioned Chinese telecommunications company ZTE has hired former Donald Trump campaign aide Bryan Lanza and his firm, Mercury Public Affairs, to lobby the U.S. government on its behalf. ZTE is paying Mercury $75,000 per month for its services through Washington DC law firm Hogan Lovells, according to a filing with the U.S. Justice Department under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). Lanza is a managing director with Mercuty’s DC office and “a leading Republican strategist with extensive experience in political campaigns, policy and media relations.”

The hire suspiciously coincides with Trump’s unexpected “flip-flop” on a U.S. components ban against the Chinese telecommunications giant for violating sanctions against Iran and North Korea. News of the hire further fuels suspicions that Trump may be making such decisions on the basis of his own and his associates’ business interests rather than on the basis of U.S. national security interests.

Shenzhen-based ZTE (Zhongxing Telecommunication Equipment Corporation, 中兴通讯股份有限公司 or 中兴通讯) has been noted for its close ties to the Chinese government and for the possibility that its smartphones and other devices might be used for surveillance or espionage. In 2016, Chinese-authored spyware was found on Chinese-made smartphones including phones manufactured by ZTE. Trump’s concessions to ZTE prompted “bipartisan rebuke” and accusations of “putting China first and letting sanction-breakers off the hook.”

ZTE’s Shenzhen headquarters (ZTE)

“Obviously the Chinese government and ZTE want something from the U.S. government,” Brendan Fischer, director of federal reform programs at the Campaign Legal Center, told Lachlan Markay at the Daily Beast. “One way of getting what they want is hiring well-connected former staffers [like Bryan Lanza] as lobbyists.” Fisher continued: “Foreign entities hiring politically-connected lobbyists who have just come through the revolving door is fairly standard practice…, but this administration presents all sorts of new opportunities for influence-peddling.”

“The hiring of Bryan Lanza, a former campaign consultant for Donald Trump shows how companies seek – and obtain – influence with the fickle U.S. president,” observes Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post. “The contract is for three months, but it already seems to have borne fruit, possibly thanks to Lanza’s reported close relationship with the White House.”

“The deal signed with Lanza echoes recent disclosures of influence-peddling associated with Trump’s lawyer and personal fixer Michael Cohen,” writes Oliver Willis at Shareblue. “What would have been a departure from the norm, even for Washington, is simply how things work under Trump and his cronies. And the sudden reversal on sanctions for ZTE shows they aren’t even trying to be subtle about it.”

Mercury Public Affairs has an extensive history of registered foreign lobbying work, as indicated by its numerous filings with the Justice Department as required under FARA. This includes current registered lobbying work by Bryan Lanza on behalf of Russian energy company EN+ Group, controlled by sanctioned oligarch Oleg Deripaska, a close associate of both Russian president Vladimir Putin and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort. Lanza’s work for EN+ Group is aimed at gaining relief from U.S. sanctions, and appears to be within the law if not particularly respectable.

In October 2017, however, Mercury was identified as one of two unnamed firms (with Podesta Group) that performed unregistered lobbying work for pro-Russian interests in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s grand jury indictment of Paul Manafort and his deputy Rick Gates. Mercury’s failure to register this work as required under FARA could place the firm in significant legal jeopardy.

ZTE’s DC legal representative, Hogan Lovells, also has an extensive “China Desk,” a special “area of focus” for foreign clients dealing with inconvenient U.S. sanctions, and an eye on “the Chinese market” as a target for “robust growth” in 2018. Former Donald Trump lawyer Ty Cobb was a partner at Hogan Lovells until he left the firm to join the Trump legal team in July 2017. Perhaps Beijing and Donald Trump’s Washington aren’t so far apart after all.

Trump’s campaign promise to “drain the swamp” in Washington doesn’t seem to be panning out, as Sarah Westwood and Sara Murray observe at CNN regarding Bryan Lanza’s lobbying work for big-spending foreign interests that may be at odds with the national interests of the United States: “In fact, Trump has presided over the expansion of a new generation of influence peddlers who have used their actual or perceived proximity to the President to line their pockets.”

Trump’s concessions to ZTE suspiciously coincide also with recent news that the Chinese government will provide $500 million in financing for a Trump-branded resort in Indonesia and has granted Ivanka Trump new Chinese trademarks potentially worth millions of dollars. Under the Trump administration, even America’s national security seems to be for sale to the highest bidder.

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According to research conducted by Professor Abdul Barakat of Dhaka University, who recently published a book titled “The Political Economy of Reforming Agriculture: Land Water Bodies in Bangladesh,” there will be no Hindus left within Bangladesh within 30 years. He told the Dhaka Tribune: “The rate of the exodus over the past 49 years points to that direction.” From 1964 to 2013, around 11.3 million Hindus were compelled to flee Bangladesh due to religious persecution.

Before the Liberation War, the daily rate of migration was 705 while it was 512 during 1971-1981 and 438 during 1981-1991, the report noted. However, it added that the number increased to 767 persons each day during 1991-2001 while around 774 persons left the country during 2001-2012.

Barakat’s study found that most of the Hindus fled Bangladesh during the Pakistani occupation of the country. According to Shipan Kumer Basu, the President of the World Hindu Struggle Committee, “Pakistan’s feudal and military rulers were born anti Bengali language and anti-Bengali. In any way, if the vast majority of Hindus are displaced, it would be easy to rule by dividing the non-communal Bengali nation. From this point of view, the Pakistani military issued the Enemy Property Act in 1965, using the Pakistan-India war as an excuse.”

“Following that, 2.6 million acres of the original ownership of the Hindu community has been occupied or evicted,” Basu added. “Of the 2.6 million acres, about 82 percent is agricultural land, 29 percent is homestead, 4 percent is gardens, 3 percent are waterfalls, 1 percent are ponds and 19 percent of other lands were occupied. Abul Barakat mentioned in his study that the financial loss of the land and water and transferable assets under the Arms Vested Property Act amounted to Tk 650 million.”

Even though Barakat’s study found that most of the Hindus fled Bangladesh during the Pakistani occupation of the country, Dhaka University Professor Ajoy Roy told the Dhaka Tribune that due to the Vested Property Act, which led to the present government taking over the Hindu properties that the Pakistani regime seized as enemy property, 60% of the Hindus were left landless and this is one of the reasons that prompted their mass migration from the country.

Basu noted that aside from the Vested Property Law, there are also cases of Hindus falling victim to false accusations by the legal authorities in Bangladesh so that the authorities can seize their land with greater ease: “Due to a land dispute, Hindu senior lawyer Samar Chowdhury was falsely accused of crimes. The police attempted to portray him as a drug and arms dealer but in reality, he was framed. We demand that the authorities will release him as soon as possible without any conditions. Otherwise, ordinary people will lose their trust in you.”

Bangladeshi writer Sushanto Das Gupta added that under the Awami League government, the very lives of Hindus are also threatened as there are numerous cases of Hindus getting murdered, raped and physically assaulted: “Youth League President Ataur Rahman Selim threatened to murder a number of Hindu families in Habiganj’s Sunaru village. The only purpose is to grab our land without us being in the area. He is threatening us in so many ways, so that we will leave the area and go to India. If we do not leave this country, we will be forced to become Muslim. If we do not comply, then we will be burned in the fire.” According to Basu, this horrible reality is the fate of many Hindus such as a poor egg trader from the village of Dahor Chaluduri, who was critically injured after being attacked with a number of sharp objects merely so that his land could be seized.

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Illustration by Tim O’Brien for TIME

The U.S.’ current tempestuous, or stormy, reversals of several recent agreements bode quite ill for its role as the major stakeholder in the current international system. While an argument can be made that these moves are part of a high-risk, possible high-return negotiating strategy, it’s still an unproven strategy at best, with China as the primary opponent in many of the scenarios.

Recently, the U.S. has indicated a possible willingness to reschedule its historic summit meeting with the DPRK, originally slated for June 12th in Singapore, after abruptly cancelling it. Actions by both sides have been blamed for the cancellation, ranging from the DPRK’s “unfriendly” tone towards senior U.S. officials, to alleged Chinese influence on the DPRK’s negotiating posture, to the continued U.S.-ROK military exercises (Max Thunder), to the conflation (deliberate or otherwise) of the 2003 and 2011 “Libya models” and their applicability to the current DPRK situation.

With some haling the DPRK’s apparent willingness to still meet with the U.S. at a later date as a victory, it’s a Pyrrhic victory at best, at least in the short-term. This is because the U.S. cancellation of the summit plays into two narratives, one bad and the other much worse. The first situates the DPRK summit cancellation within the context of the U.S.’s previous withdrawals from agreements addressing longer-term issues, such as trade (TPP) and the environment (The Paris Agreement). The second places it in the arc of security issues which could have been addressed in the short-term, but for U.S. capriciousness and schizophrenia. The U.S. violation of the Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA) is the prime example in this line of argument.

The U.S.-DPRK summit had (has?) the potential to lead to a possible renewed Six-Party Talks format, which would address underlying Chinese security interests as well, as the Korean Peninsula is but one of several theaters of increasing great power competition between the U.S. and China currently. Related to this is the U.S. “disinvitation” to China to participate in the biennial RIMPAC exercises, after the original invitation was issued. While Chinese militarization of South China Sea islands was cited, the fact remains that more, not less mil-mil cooperation between the U.S. and China is sorely needed.

The U.S. is in a new (really old) game with China as its revisionist behavior has been cited in the U.S.’ latest National Security Strategy. As a consequence, the U.S. is a lot less hesitant to conflate trade issues with security ones as well. After tariffs, countertariffs, and various other trade actions were announced between the U.S. and China earlier in the year, seeming progress in trade relations was made recently, with ZTE being an example. However, inexplicably, the U.S. earlier this very week announced a list of Chinese items totalling $50 billion in U.S. imports to be subjected to 25% tariffs, with the list to be finalized by June 15th.

As has been noted elsewhere, U.S.-China trade is the primary ballast keeping U.S.-China security competition from truly spiralling out of control. Lastly, this apparent loss of face suffered by the ROK and China in negotiating with the U.S. to solve the DPRK and U.S.-China trade dispute issues, respectively, is not something that’s going to go unnoticed by the global community at large.

U.S. recalcitrance on trade issues was, in part, a factor in the recent summit meeting between China, Japan, and the ROK to resolve outstanding trade and economic issues. U.S. tariffs, threatened against its own allies (Japan and ROK), whom it’s looking toward to help contain an adversary (China) through its Indo-Pacific Strategy, whom, in turn, it’s ostensibly looking toward to help it contain yet another adversary (DPRK) is a strategy quite worthy of the most scathing, unrelenting derision. This doesn’t even factor in initial U.S. efforts to also recruit Russia (yet another sanctionee) to help with the DPRK, as well as recent U.S. tarifffs against the EU, Canada, and Mexico.

U.S. frenetic uncertainty is going to have further consequences in the long-term as it finds itself shut out of various diplomatic venues convened to address yet more pressing security issues. Partners and allies aren’t going to fall on their swords and subordinate their own respective national interests to U.S. “resolve” forever.

Whether it’s the Astana talks regarding the Syrian peace process, or the Minsk Protocols (I and II) set to resolve the Ukraine Crisis, U.S. participation is going to have to rise above arming this faction or another, brush off some suits, and get back in the diplomacy game, double-quick. Although it’s not currently sexy, after the Iraq War, and the 2008 Financial Crisis, the Ukraine Crisis is actually the third and final straw which broke the unipolar camel’s back. If the U.S. is going to consistently explain any kind of strategy at all at fora like this week’s IISS Shangri-La Dialogue, also in Singapore, it’s going to have to let the stormy winds die down for a bit.

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A fragmented society and a varied field make Colombia’s 2018 elections difficult to disentangle (Carlos Reusser Monsalvez, CC BY 2.0)

It can be disheartening when looking back on compromises in the past that gave way to peace when justice for victims is ignored for what was seen at the time as the greater good. The US Civil War itself is seen as a fight between good and evil in most American textbooks today, but the strength of both armies and a hard fought victory still lead to memorials to the Confederate army that still stand today. At the time it was known that pressuring past enemies after the official end of the war may have led to increased conflict. Poking a defeated southern bear was avoided as the cost of continued war impressed humility on the victors.

Colombians have lived far too long under the threat of terror from the FARC. The government of their outgoing president spent his last two years producing a compromise that would remove the FARC from the battlefield while integrating them into the mainstream government. Many in Colombia felt this deal ignored the rights of the victims of the FARC, and for having forty years of terror laid upon the country, a passive handshake lacks true justice in its application. The perception may be that the government was too willing to make a deal with old “revolutionaries” that could have been simply eliminated by the military, or that justice could have been applied via a truth and reconciliation commission to produce some healing in those communities most affected by the FARC. After an initial failure and eventual success on the policy, the deal with the FARC may now be in jeopardy as a run-off election in Colombia places an anti-FARC deal candidate against a left of centre ex-revolutionary.

It may be difficult for those outside of Colombia to understand how Colombians feel about the FARC deal and on how they should vote in their election. Many Colombians across the country have been affected by narco-terrorism in their own communities, and still face threats from ELN and other organisations linked to the same values and profits that motivated FARC actions for generations. The concept of natural justice also propels people to seek justice for those who have lost their rights, their limbs and their family members. While many western governments are trying to legitimize the peaceful return of their own citizens who fought in Syria and Iraq, there is little consideration to those in the region that suffered under the actions of their citizens in those countries. Justice is not applied in many western countries for those who most likely committed human rights atrocities against foreign communities. Someone who is living peacefully after committing the most brutal of crimes, healthy and well in a peaceful city reflects poorly on those countries who ignore someone that tortured and killed foreign nations. A peaceful ignorance in one place would be a major trial in Syria or Iraq, likely leading to a death sentence. Colombians need a compromise that places justice first, and it is hopeful that the application of justice would not propel a conflict further. In reality, we all need such a process and to remember and honour those who were brutalized by people who might be coming out of our own communities. Natural justice demands it.

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Amid doubts over whether Theresa May can deliver a Brexit deal that avoids a hard Irish border, Winthrop Rodgers assesses whether the result will be a renewed push for a united Ireland.

The imposition of a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic by a seemingly callous Tory government would risk angering the youth and business classes of the North – but would it be enough to provide momentum towards a border poll? Democratic Union Party (DUP) leader Arlene Foster recently said that Irish unity was “not going to happen.” Meanwhile, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn delivered a speech in Northern Ireland which stressed the popularity of a potential unification of Ireland within the context of Brexit.

Fundamentally, unification is very unlikely, for two simple reasons: first, London recognizes the immense political dangers surrounding the discussion and will likely work to minimize them and, second, there is not the popular support for doing so among the people of Northern Ireland or the Republic.

Perhaps no issue within the complex constellation of the Brexit negotiations is more fraught than how to deal with the UK’s land border with the Republic of Ireland. If this year’s celebrations of the 20th anniversary of the Belfast Agreement have taught us anything, it is that the first steps toward peace and prosperity in Northern Ireland were a close-run thing.

Indeed, the very nature of the transition away from violence and towards institution building makes a united Ireland unlikely as a consequence of Brexit. The 1998 Belfast Agreement, or the Good Friday Agreement as it is popularly known, binds the various parties together along a set of overlapping and mutually reinforcing axes that govern sovereign interplay. Leaders in both London and Dublin are loath to wade into the morass of Northern Irish politics or each other’s affairs without a very serious reason.

The danger for Prime Minister Theresa May is that she treads too far in one direction or the other. For instance, if she imposes measures that pander too much to the Eurosceptic wing of her Conservative party and imposes a hard border that impedes the free movement of goods, capital, and people to such a degree that it makes a majority of people in Northern Ireland rethink their relationship with the Union, then she risks a border poll or, at the very least, a drubbing at the next election.

If, instead, she opts for the softest of Brexits and creates special rules for Northern Ireland, on one side, she risks angering the hardline Eurosceptic Democratic Unionist Party, which props up her government after her disastrous decision to call a snap election in June 2017, On the other hand, she would enrage the Europhile Scottish National Party for not giving them the same deal and ignite a renewed push for independence.

Therefore, it is likely that May will attempt to find a middle path that does not unduly privilege or punish one constituency or another, which would be true to her own personal instincts as a politician. (Anecdotally, during the last election, when asked for the “naughtiest” thing she had ever done, she said that as a child she and a friend used to “run through fields of wheat.”Who knows how Foreign Minister Boris Johnson would have replied?) She will likely chart a course that pleases no one and is vaguely technocratic enough to sound plausible, but does not risk bringing down her government or force a border poll.

Moreover, any kind of action that would harm the Irish Republic would bring European negotiators to its defense. The EU has made it quite clear that it fully stands behind Ireland and that it would take its side over Britain’s if push came to shove. If she imposes an overly harsh border policy, European Chief Negotiator Michel Barnier may retaliate against Britain in some other area, such as finance or the rights of British citizens in Europe and in a targeted manner designed to upset May’s domestic constituents.

Nevertheless, there are some among the Irish nationalist camp who see Brexit as their best opportunity in the short term to force the issue of a United Ireland.

This misreads the situation in two ways. First, there is simply no appetite for a border poll in Northern Ireland and, in the unlikely event that one was held, it would fail. Poll after poll shows only a small minority who favor of a united Ireland; in fact, a recent Ipsos MORI pollfound only 21.1% total and only 42.6% of Catholics favor that option.

Second, there would have to be consent from the Republic as well, which would not be readily forthcoming. Ireland, at the moment, is still recovering from the disastrous financial crisis of 2008, which saw a catastrophic collapse of its economy. Northern Ireland is almost entirely dependent on an outsized block grant from London for its budget, and is struggling with increasing poverty, and is also burdened with a bloated civil service; Dublin would refuse to take on those responsibilities.

Moreover, the Irish in the south are fighting their own battles over social issues, most recently over abortion, and are casting off the old, clerically-mandated ways of thinking and acting and becoming a progressive, outward-looking society. To bring in a rump of angry, resentful, deeply conservative, religious fundamentalists from the DUP would work against this trend. There is likely to be significant resistance to adding a religious, nationalist angle to politics in the Republic.

A groundswell of support for a united Ireland is of course possible given the right trigger – but Brexit is not it. An all-island Republic is more likely to come about through the democratic acclaim of the Irish on both sides of the current border, rather than through violence or opportunistically because of poor relations between London and Brussels.

This article was first published on Global Risk Insights, and was written by Winthrop Rodgers.

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The US and North Korea are likely to attempt diplomacy for a few months, but impossible expectations and intentionally vague promises could frustrate both sides. If this causes the deal to fall through, bilateral tensions could boil over once again.

On 29 April 2018, the world watched as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in shook hands and crossed the border in an historic diplomatic moment. The next country on North Korea’s peace tour appears to be the United States, where President Donald Trump initially agreed to a summit to further his goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula – then withdrew the offer – then seemingly put it back on the table. However, Trump should prepare for the worst: there is ample evidence that both leaders are master showmen specializing in grand rhetoric with few tangible steps.

Trump and Kim are working towards very different goals. Trump presumably wants to become the president who denuclearized the Korean Peninsula, and all other concessions are trivial to him in comparison. In contrast, Kim seeks the lifting of economic sanctions and a removal of a threatening US presence in South Korea at the very least, indicated by his sudden focus on economic progress and pledge to denuclearize in exchange for guaranteed security. Furthermore, if he truly has achieved his intended progress with North Korea’s nuclear program, he would likely demand recognition as a nuclear state.

It therefore becomes clear why the negotiations are at risk of falling apart before they have even begun. The leaders’ respective expectations are all non-starters: Kim will not easily give up his biggest bargaining chip, the US and UN have no plans to lift sanctions or recognize Pyongyang’s nuclear legitimacy, and the US cannot pull troops fully out of South Korea because it would solidify China’s position as the dominant force in the Asia-Pacific region. If Trump and Kim are unable to reconcile their conflicting objectives, the lack of progress could frustrate them and drive them back to aggressive rhetoric and brinkmanship.

Kim’s alleged promise to shut down the nuclear weapons program in exchange for confirmation that the US will not invade instills hope, but remains vague enough to avoid actually having to follow through. It is still unclear what Kim will consider sufficient evidence that he is safe from a US attack: he could demand an end to the Foal Eagle and Key Reserve joint military drills, or use continued American military presence in South Korea as a reason to resume his own arms buildup. Even if Pyongyang were to give up its nuclear program, its cyberwarfare program — responsible for the “Wannacry” ransomware attack and multiple cryptocurrency thefts — could likely continue to wreak havoc.

The Trump administration is also able to revise standards at any time to press for North Korean compliance. Even as Pyongyang returned three US detainees and Trump praised Kim for his “honorable intentions,” the US State Department released scathing criticism of Pyongyang’s “egregious human rights violations” and condemned the Kim regime as “one of the most repressive and abusive governments in the world” in a possible readjustment of terms of cooperation. Just as one side makes any small concession, the other can adjust the dial and demand more.

If Trump and Kim meet, it will likely  involve a lot of Trump’s empty showboating — except this time he’s meeting his match. If the US fails to lift sanctions or remove its military presence and Kim strays away from his promises of denuclearization, the two frustrated leaders would likely have to return to their reliable practices in grandstanding and threats.

Not only could the proposed conference between US and North Korean figureheads end in disappointment for those hopeful of nuclear de-escalation, but the relationship between Moon and Trump may also be in danger. Kim has successfully centered the diplomatic narrative around “inter-Korean peace” and framed the US as an outsider. For now, Moon is scrambling to include the US in all Korean dialogue, going so far as to suggest that Trump deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to stabilize the region. However, as the Korea Research Center reports that 78% of South Koreans find Kim trustworthy after the Korean summit, Moon may now have two relationships to cautiously balance: one with Trump and one with Kim, both of which are notoriously volatile and urging him to support their interests. Tensions on the Korean Peninsula may spike once again, this time with new complexities as the three countries strive for their versions of stability.

Even if a US-North Korea summit fails to denuclearize the peninsula, Kim and Moon have gained new political advantages. After enduring criticism for appearing weak against Pyongyang, Moon’s dedication to peaceful negotiations has boosted his political clout.  The diplomatic triumph could secure his proposed extension to Seoul’s presidential term limits, instill much-needed confidence in his economic policies, and distract from his party’s sexual harassment accusations. If Seoul and Pyongyang successfully sign an end to the Korean War, Moon’s Democratic Party is almost guaranteed to secure the presidency for another term. Across the 38th parallel, Kim could gain a new ally to increase his legitimacy on the international stage, decrease his dependence on China, and more effectively further his own economic policies – potentially with Seoul’s help. Although the US-North Korean relationship is still uncertain, Moon and Kim have both emerged as winners from this diplomatic breakthrough.

This article was first published on Global Risk Insights, and was written by Kiana Mendoza.

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President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump pose for a photo with Chinese President Xi Jingping and his wife, Mrs. Peng Liyuan, Thursday, April 6, 2017, at the entrance of Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fl. (Official White Photo by D. Myles Cullen)

In the midst of trade war threats between the US and China, Trump’s latest trade tariffs emerge as the new American strategy to weaken Xi Jinping’s plans to transform China into a major high-tech player.

Trump’s recent multi-billion tariffs, allegedly designed to protect the American economy from trade deficit, made global headlines. If at the beginning such tariffs involved most of the United States’ international economic partners, now it is increasingly clear that Trump’s main target are the rising Chinese strategic sectors, which pose a threat to the American technological leadership.

Launched in 2015, the plan “Made in China 2025” is to be considered Chinese President Xi Jinping’s economic pillar to grant the country a leading role in the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution, as well as to achieve self-sufficiency in terms of technology and development in strategic sectors. The disruptive technologies represented by artificial intelligence (AI), virtual reality and robotics, along with the concepts of data and connectivity, are now at the centre of a new global competition for power in which China is set to emerge as major player. With this blueprint, Xi aims at making China globally competitive in ten industries by 2025: next generation information technology, high-end numerical control tools and robotics, aerospace equipment, ocean engineering equipment and hi-tech ships, advanced railway equipment, power equipment, agricultural machinery, new materials (e.g. nano materials), biomedicine and high-performance medical devices.

Since China’s latest legislative amendment, which abolished the two-year mandate terms for Chinese leaders, Xi Jinping is now set to remain the leader of a country with a unique combination of elements powerful enough to dominate the high-tech race. The incredible amount of data available, the use of which is facilitated by the loosened privacy regulations and blurred lines between government and businesses in addition to the highly fragmented retail market, make of China a tremendous hub for technological innovation and development.

Starting from last January, Trump’s America First rapidly emerged as a pretext to impose new tariffs, part of a protectionist wave that rapidly involved most of the world economies. Relying on the urgency to reduce the US bilateral trade deficit, which amounted to $375 billions in 2017, Trump’s determination is threatening to spread into a dangerous and unpredictable war trade with China.

On one side, a number of economists focus on the short-term cost of an eventual trade war. For example, Wei Li, senior China economist at Standard Chartered in Shanghai, estimatesthat a broad-based trade war between the US and China would cost China 1.3 per cent to 3.2 per cent of GDP, with the latter estimate representing an extreme scenario in which the US bans all Chinese imports. The US, in comparison, would lose 0.2 per cent to 0.9 per cent, thus supporting the theory according to which deficit countries (US) hold an advantage over those with trade surpluses (China).

However, by paying closer attention to the specific sectors and companies hit by Trump’s tariffs, it emerges that what triggered the US strategy is not the bilateral trade deficit with China, but rather the long-term Chinese threat in terms of high-tech rapid development. In fact, the Chinese market went from being considered complementary to becoming more directly competitive to the United States thanks to companies like Huawei, Tencent and Baidu, to name a few. If it is true that Trump can rely on intensive capital control that could damage the Chinese leverage against the US, China is a huge domestic market that the US can’t do without, as well as being the leading Asian high-tech exporter since overtaking Japan in 2014.

Despite Beijing’s noteworthy technological development, the country still depends on foreign technology transfers to push forward its “Made in China 2025” agenda. Pressured by an aging population – with rising wages that are resulting in the relocation of low-tech factories to other countries – along with the goal of achieving 70% technological self-sufficiency by 2025 and of becoming a global leader in Artificial Intelligence research and development by 2030, Beijing is not sitting on its hands.

The Trump administration and the other European and Asian economies potentially involved in China’s high-tech rise (especially Germany and South Korea) are concerned by the unfair trade practices implemented by the Communist country, such as intellectual property theft, massive Chinese government subsidies and forced technology transfer agreements. China’s restrictive market practices have in fact often forced foreign companies to transfer valuable intellectual property to Chinese partners in exchange for market access, thus exploiting the asymmetries in market access between China and the rest of the world.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, in reaction to these international condemnations, used the platform offered by the Boao Forum for Asia last April to pledge further measures to protect the intellectual property of foreign companies and a further opening of China’s economy. In addition, in an attempt to address and de-escalate Trump’s trade war threats, Xi finally affirmed that China is not seeking trade surplus and that a “Cold War zero sum game” is increasingly obsolete.

“We encourage normal technological exchanges and cooperation between Chinese and foreign enterprises, and protect the lawful IPR owned by foreign enterprises in China.”

With over 730 million internet users (double the US population) and a clear plan that sees China rivalling the current high-tech strongholds, it is foreseeable that Beijing won’t stop the building up of its technological capabilities and resources. In the short-term, Xi Jinping is empowered by the lack of vision demonstrated by Trump, who has been incapable of seizing this opportunity to build around him a consensus based on international law. However, in the long-term, if China wants a prominent role recognized by the other international powers, new measures complying with fair trade practices, along with the further opening of its economy are non-negotiable.

This article first appeared on Global Risk Insights, and was written by Gaia Rizza.

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Cybercrime-as-a-Service opens up a realm of worrying new possibilities for opportunistic individuals and ideologically motivated groups, as well as a new front for law enforcement and security services to secure.

As early as 2013, cybersecurity experts noted that Cybercrime-as-a-Service (CaaS) was a burgeoning business. It is an industry as straightforward as it sounds – professional cybercriminals maintain and sell the means of committing cyberattacks to anyone with the motivation and money to do so.

In 2013, hiring a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack (a cyberattack that uses a network of subverted computers around the world to flood targets, such as websites and other infrastructure, with requests to impair or crash them) cost $535 for a month’s use. Today, a month’s rent for a DDoS can cost as little as $28.99. Falling prices are driven by competition in the CaaS market, enabled by the accessibility of the technologies.

Last week Europol and associates struck a blow against professional cybercriminals by taking down WebStresser – a website offering rental DDoS attacks, masquerading as a “stress tester.” The criminals behind the service were also arrested. Whilst it indicates the threat is being taken seriously and combated, it is little more than a proverbial drop in the ocean.

DDoS attacks are not the only service offered by professional cybercriminals. Ransomware is another, arguably more dangerous threat that is available. Ransomware is a type of software that stealthily makes its way onto PCs before encrypting the user’s files, or even the boot files for the machine itself, so when the computer is switched off, it refuses to start up again. In both cases, users are presented with a message demanding a ransom in order to de-crypt the files and restore ordinary usage.

These services are currently overwhelmingly used by opportunists seeking profits, and businesses seeking to disadvantage their competitors. However, with the increasing prominence and accessibility of these services, they will soon come to the attention of those with more nefarious intentions.

Britons in particular may be familiar with ransomware after it crippled the UK National Health Service in May 2017. The malware spread across NHS computers with outdated operating systems, locking out staff and directly leading to the cancellation of 6912 appointments, including operations. The attack has been attributed to the North Korean government, or state-sponsored groups in the country by senior figures across government and the tech industry.

Ransomware has also caused significant trouble across the Atlantic in the US city of Atlanta, where various IT systems used by the city administration were infected with ransomware in March 2018, costing the city millions of dollars in disruption.

However, the most prominent example of professional cybercrime must be the concerted Russian campaign against the United States in the build up to the 2016 Presidential election. The hacking of Clinton campaign emails, and the manipulation of individuals by professional cybercriminals via social media were just two of the prominent tactics employed by state-sponsored Russian groups.

The Russian attacks during the 2016 Presidential election are part of a wider Russian strategy of subverting US democracy. It is an ideologically motivated, targeted campaign against a predetermined enemy. At the other end of the spectrum, the more recent attacks against Atlanta city appear to be an opportunistic money-spinner by a group of professional cyber criminals.

The WannaCry attack highlights an interesting hybridization of ideological motivations and outright opportunism. Like the Russian campaign, the power of a nation-state is reflected in the virulence of the attack. However, it lacked the sophistication of previous state-sponsored attacks, as well as any sort of relevance to a longer-term plan. It was a cyberspace smash and grab, and it is in this niche, where ideology and opportunism intersect, that CaaS will come to find a great deal of traction in years to come.

CaaS provides ideologically motivated groups with a means of carrying out ambitious cyberattacks like WannaCry even if they lack the manpower or technical means of doing so. Undoubtedly, these groups will begin to see the opportunities offered by professional cybercrime services.

The global jihadist movement is one such movement that could take steps towards purchasing CaaS programs to launch attacks on their enemies. The movement already possesses a number of organisations operating in cyberspace, such as the Caliphate Cyber Army and Islamic Cyber Army, demonstrating they are conscious of the potential of cyber-terrorism. However, experts have ridiculed their capabilities, with the groups incapable of making simple chat apps for themselves, let alone develop expansive campaigns of cyber-terrorism.

The jihadist movement and other terrorist groups will develop cyber capabilities, but for the time being, they will turn to existing services as they have done with sites like Twitter and Facebook, and apps like Telegram and WhatsApp. This is where CaaS vendors stand to benefit from increasing awareness of their services and the havoc they can wreak.

It will be a mutually beneficial partnership that will overcome any aversion that the parties may have to working together. In many cases, professional cyber criminals hold the West in similar contempt to the jihadist movement, overcoming any moral dilemmas they may feel about working with terrorists. On the other side, jihadists curse the West and much of modernity, yet have no issue with adopting technology when it serves their needs, which CaaS undoubtedly will.

This presents a daunting picture of a future whereby terrorist groups extort funding from governments, businesses and civil society via ransomware, DDoS attacks and other capabilities that they have rented from professional cyber criminals. The precedent is clear in examples such as the WannaCry attack – disruption in cyberspace is increasingly felt in the offline world too, with severe financial and practical consequences. The good news is that with foresight and planning, Western nations can build up their deference before the threat reaches a critical mass.

This article was first posted on Global Risk Insights, and was written by Phin Roberts.

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In recent times, diplomatic relations between Israel and India have been stronger than ever. Israeli Druze diplomat Mendi Safadi, who is a strong advocate for Hindu human rights, is set to meet in the coming days with India’s Deputy President and other senior level Indian politicians. Given this, it is the hope of Bangladeshi Hindu human rights activist Shipan Kumer Basu that Safadi will use Israel’s influence with India in order to get them to stop supporting the present Bangladeshi government.

“We have a lot of documents in our hands that Bangladesh is now not safe for Hindus,” he proclaimed. “Just recently, a Hindu woman in Bangladesh was raped just because she is Hindu and for no other reason. This woman merely wanted to receive counseling to help her daughter’s marriage and she ended up being raped in addition to having her body parts bitten, her clothes torn and various organs burned with a gas lighter. However, her story has not made headlines around the world merely because she was born into the wrong faith.”

“Unfortunately, we Hindus from Bangladesh are invisible to many in the international community,” Basu declared. “The abduction and rape of our women, the slaughter of our men, the desecration of our temples and the forceful seizure of our homes happens on a daily basis. However, the world does not care about us for we are brown skinned, are not from one of the three monotheistic faiths and do not come from an oil producing country. However, we are hoping that India will be different from the rest of the world since we share the same faith and have the same skin color. We hope and believe that India will take the necessary action and will stop supporting this government in Bangladesh especially if advised to do so by a strategic ally.”

“The Safadi Center, headed by Mendi Safadi, has always stood in the best interests of my people in our struggle against the terror implemented by the Bangladeshi government,” Basu added. “During Safadi’s meeting with Indian politicians, I would like to ask the Indian government to rethink their policy on Bangladesh as the current government is double faced. On the one hand, they say nice things in English and then they treat the Hindus horribly behind the backs of the international community.”

“Presently, the Bangladeshi government is misguiding the Indian government as they continue to brutally repress the minorities in the country,” Basu proclaimed. “As Hindus are being silently ethnically cleansed from the country with the seizure of minority properties under the Vested Property Law, India must recognize the true face of the Bangladeshi government and to stop supporting them.” Basu noted that it is still possible for India to reach out in friendship to the Bangladeshi people without supporting this present government which abuses the human rights of India’s Hindu brothers.

Bangladeshi dissident Aslam Chowdhury is a known advocate of Hindu human rights. He is presently being held by the Bangladeshi government due to the false charge that he is working with the Israeli Mossad in order to topple the Bangladeshi government. According to Basu, “this charge is false, baseless, and imaginary and such claims prove the incompetence of the accusers; Aslam Chowdhury is a real hero and is also highly educated, honest and has many merits as a leader.” Basu believes that if India intervened and supported him, it could be a sign of support for the Bangladeshi people against an oppressive regime and it could potentially help a wonderful dissident who worked on behalf of minority rights to obtain his freedom.

Basu emphasized that Chowdhury is innocent of the charges that the Bangladeshi government made against him: “They completely failed to prove his crime. So regarding the sedition case, he got bail. However, he was not released from prison due to various pretexts because the current so-called government has realized very well that since Aslam Chowdhury is with the people, the stability of the present ruling Awami League government could evaporate. Therefore, they decided to brutally repress him. For this reason, I call on India and other countries in the international community to intervene so that he can be free. “

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The end of the Second World War in Europe defined Soviet citizens and the Russian people in the 20th Century as those that saved the world from fascism. Despite the negative press during the Cold War in the West on Russia’s contribution to the end of Nazism, it is likely the case that every Russian family lost at least one close family member to save Russia, Eastern Europe and the world. Even today, the pride that Russians feel about their fight against Germany colours much of the dialogue on Russian foreign relations today. This goes beyond official state policy and reflects the sentiments of the people themselves.

Since the Sochi games and evidently into the World Cup taking place next month in Russia, negative press on Russia has pushed Russian public opinion towards a leader that claims its main goal is the defense of its people, but also spurns on popularity by claiming it is the sole entity that will give Russians due pride in themselves. While there are several reasons to target the Putin Administration, the actions taken against Russia often appear to focus not just on their government, but effects the people themselves. While the Vancouver Olympics were seen as successful, there was the death of one athlete during the 2010 games in Canada. Sochi was consistently shown in a negative light, despite it being an overall well done event. The expansionist policies of their government began soon after Sochi, with added support from a narrative coming from Western countries of a Russian failure.

Very recently, Russian claims that it was going to supply Syria with the S-300 anti-air system were altered, stopping the installation of the S-300 after a meeting between the Israeli PM and President Putin, notably during the days of the May Day/Victory Day Parade. While Russia had spent gold, weapons and blood fighting ISIS in support of Assad’s government in Syria, extended support after a US, UK, French and Israeli strike in Syria may not follow a simple foreign policy plan in the region. With Russia living rent free in the narrative of many media organisations from the US and the West, that negative press can be buoyed in a populist light in Russia by its government. Another victory over fascist elements in the Middle East brings added context to VE Day many years ago. Moves to counter terrorist attacks in Russia itself, regain pride from the war in Afghanistan and challenging negative media from abroad will extend Putin’s time in power as long as Russians themselves are also targeted in a negative light. Traditional pride defining the Russian people mixed with evident skepticism in Western media on Russians themselves pushes many to the side of the current government in Russia. Meeting Putin while respecting Russian history and its people now seems to be how the future of the Middle East will be determined. Respecting the Russian people while challenging its current government will also be how the future of Russian relations will develop as well.

The post Foreign Policy of the Russian People appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

Donald Trump meets with Indonesian partners, 2015 (South China Morning Post).

President Donald J. Trump’s overseas business dealings have once again come under scrutiny with reports that the Chinese government will provide financing to the tune of $500 million for construction of a theme park in Indonesia featuring a Trump-branded golf course and resort-hotel. This news comes on the heels of Trump’s surprise announcement that he will offer concessions to Chinese telecommunications company ZTE, recently hit with a U.S. components ban after violating sanctions against Iran and North Korea.

Trump’s concessions to ZTE prompted “bipartisan rebuke,” accusations of “putting China first and letting sanction-breakers off the hook,” and suspicions that the concessions might be linked to China’s financing of the Trump-branded Indonesian deal worth millions of dollars to Trump. The White House refused to answer questions from media on whether the deal might violate the U.S. Constitution’s foreign emoluments clause and Trump’s own pledge not to pursue new foreign business deals while serving as president.

As Agence France-Presse via the South China Morning Post and the National Review report, the billion-dollar theme park project featuring the Trump brand is part of MNC Lido City, an “integrated lifestyle resort” outside the Indonesian capital city of Jakarta. The project developer, MNC Land, features its “partnership with The Trump Hotel Collection” on its company website (archive), boasting that the “Trump International Resort” in Lido City is “the first Trump Collection Resort in Asia bearing the prestigious Trump brand name, known for unparalleled luxury and quality” (archive).

MNC Land CEO Hary Tanoesoedibjo (aka Hary Tanoe) and his wife Liliana, pictured above, visited Trump in New York in 2015 to finalize the deal for Trump resorts in Lido City and Bali. Tanoesoedibjo has boasted about his access to Trump and attended Trump’s presidential inauguration in January 2017. While in Washington for the inauguration, Tanoesoedibjo and his family stayed at the Trump International Hotel, a noted magnet for foreign emoluments concerns. Tanoesoedibjo has also suggested a possible run for president of Indonesia in 2019.

Hary and Liliana Tanoesoedibjo attend Trump inauguration (DetikNews).

Never far from their father’s conflicts of interest and foreign emoluments concerns, Donald Trump’s daughter and “senior adviser” Ivanka, and sons Eric and Donald Jr., also appear to be involved in the Indonesia project. “Each of them has different roles” says Tanoesoedibjo, “Don Jr. has responsibility for the overall project, Eric the design and golf, and Ivanka more of detail – the fit-out of the hotel.” Tanoesoedibjo posted photographs of a meeting with the Trump sons in New York on Twitter two days before their father’s inauguration.

Hary and Liliana Tanoesoedibjo meet with Trump sons (Twitter, archive).

In April 2017, The Intercept reported Tanoesoedibjo’s alleged involvement with an ISIS-backed militia in an effort to oust current Indonesian President Joko Widodo. Linked to this effort also was Indonesian politician Fadli Zon, “Trump’s main political booster in the country,” who made an unexpected appearance at a U.S. Trump campaign event in 2015. Then-speaker of the Indonesian parliament Setya Novanto, who appeared with Fadli Zon at the event and is also noted as “a Trump admirer,” has since been imprisoned for graft. The two politicians’ appearance at the event was reportedly arranged by Tanoesoedibjo and linked to Trump’s business interests in Indonesia.

China’s financing for half the cost of the project comes from Central Research Institute of Building and Construction Co., Ltd. (中冶建筑研究总院有限公司), a subsidiary of state-owned China Metallurgical Group Corporation (中国冶金科工集团有限公司 or 中国中冶集团), also known as Metallurgical Corporation of China (中国冶金科工股份有限公司, MCC) and managed by senior members of the Chinese Communist Party. According to the National Review, China’s involvement in the deal is “part of Beijing’s global influence-expanding ‘Belt and Road’ infrastructure initiative,” seen by many observers as part of a broader effort by China to “supplant the United States” as a leader in world affairs.

It is not certain that Trump’s “odd” and “stunning reversal” on ZTE was prompted by China’s agreement to provide financing for the Trump-Indonesia project. Trump is certain to profit from from the deal, however, and announced his concessions to ZTE a mere 72 hours after China agreed to finance the project. Former White House ethics counsels from both the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations commented that the move by Trump was suspicious at the very least and constituted a possible violation of the foreign emoluments clause.

In addition to its sanctions violations, ZTE is seen as a potential national security threat to the United States given its close ties to the Chinese government and the possibility that its smartphones and other devices might be used for surveillance or espionage. In 2016, Chinese-authored spyware was found on Chinese-made smartphones including phones manufactured by ZTE.

This is not the first time that the Trump family’s business dealings with China and Indonesia have come under scrutiny. Donald and Ivanka Trump have both been awarded valuable trademarks for their businesses by the Chinese government since the Trump inauguration, prompting constitutional concerns regarding foreign emoluments. Many of the products sold by Ivanka Trump’s fashion company are produced at factories in China and in Indonesia where horrifying sweatshop conditions have been reported.

The family of Trump son-in-law and “senior adviser” Jared Kushner has also come under fire for touting its presidential connections to lure Chinese investors for its New York-area real estate projects through the controversial EB-5 “visa-for-sale” scheme for wealthy foreign investors. China’s “courtship” of Jared Kusher and Ivanka Trump as conduits of influence on the Trump administration has been noted with alarm.

Concerns that the President of the United States and his “senior advisers” might be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of their business interests rather than U.S. national interests have become an everyday fact of life for Americans in the Trump era. Trump’s Indonesian resort deal, and the latest news of China’s financing for the deal, have only made the mountain of Trump-Kushner conflict-of-interest concerns a little bit higher.

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