Diplomacy & Crisis News

China has been the world’s worst environmental offender for years. That could change a lot sooner than expected.

It’s time for Aung San Suu Kyi to stand up for her country’s persecuted Rohingya minority.

President Barack Obama said the United States and its allies must accelerate the training of the Iraqi security forces whose recent setbacks at the hands of Islamic State militants have raised questions about the broader U.S.-led effort to beat back the Sunni extremist group.

To keep up with Democracy Lab in real time, follow us on Twitter and Facebook.  Ilya Lozovsky interviews Tunisian activist Amira Yahyaoui, who delivers a sharp critique of the professional human rights community. Thomas Carothers asks six experts on political change to debate why new technologies have not led to democratic advances around the world. ...

President Obama waded into the eurozone crisis. But a Greek official made clear Athens was no closer to giving in to European demands.

Photograph from the International Space Station of the South China Sea which includes the Eldad Reef and Itu Aba Island features. Photo Credit: Image Science and Analysis Laboratory, NASA-Johnson Space Center

The advent of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) appears to be a sign of U.S. geopolitical decline, or at least of China’s geopolitical ambitions. France, the U.K., Australia and South Korea are among our allies who have signed up; the U.S. and Japan have been holding back. At the same time, the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact, which does not include China and appears to be an attempt to check Chinese power, seems to be on track.

Should the U.S. allow geopolitical rivalry to subsume economic matters? Economically, our interdependence with China is deep and mutually beneficial; disrupting it will damage both sides, and both governments know this. While U.S. influence remains dominant, China’s is growing. Using economic policy to reinforce our position puts the economic benefits at risk and exacerbates tensions. As China grows in international economic clout, extending the rivalry could even drag our economy into the relative decline of our overall power. If we let geopolitics alienate us from a global source of economic strength, we also cast ourselves as more interested in our power than others’ economic growth.

To be sure, we must follow up on commitments made to date and implement TPP and its Atlantic counterpart, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Principles pact (TTIP). Both liberalize trade, a good in itself, even if they are tied to geopolitical allegiances. Shoring up the latter is necessary right now, and dropping the ball on either pact would undermine U.S. credibility, both to our partners and to our commitment to liberalization.

The time has come to contemplate diplomatic foundations for a new global posture. The purpose of our geopolitics is to defend freedom, as we know it in our liberal democracy, and as understood by our closest allies. Our nationhood makes freedom our deepest strategic interest. Whether of containing Russia or China or Iran; of cementing economic power in trade or finance; or of enforcing human rights; policies must fit each other, and current realities, in a long-term orientation to that fundamental end.

Geopolitics and military security can be re-oriented, away from “containing X” (fill in Russia, China, Iran, ISIS, North Korea, or anyone else we dislike but prefer not to attack) toward “defending free society.” Established democracies, with a liberal ethos, largely comprise the memberships of our primary alliances, NATO, U.S.-Japan, and ANZUS. Knitting these into an integrated community, dedicated to protect precisely this vision of freedom, we can keep attacks of violence, malicious disruption, or external coercion, off the table as they are now. Our focus would be non-directional, responsive to any threat, and would hold not only our territories but our communications channels sacrosanct.

This group of nations has the technical capacity to deter any threat. The U.S. military is already orienting itself in that direction, toward a focus on the global commons. Diplomatic re-orientation of our alliances will align our military and geo-political strength with moral principle. Freedom will have a clear diplomatic base, on which we can orient further diplomacy to our best ends.

We should treat economic development as an influence for freedom. Those places where well-ordered democracy has taken root, or where rights are spreading, have seen freedom progress after economic growth. We should not condition our support of growth on such progress, but if a nation secures liberal values in its institutional practices, we should consider inviting it into our security alliance. Such a stance creates a mutual interest in developing nations’ intertwined growth and freedom.

Here, U.S. policy would assess other nations less as “friend or foe,” than as more or less compatible with our ends of freedom. The U.S. and China may well be inevitable rivals, as Robert Blackwill and Ashley Tellis assert in a recent Council of Foreign Relations report.  But China might become a “three (or four or two) out of ten” rather than a “frenemy.” With a single criterion to guide us, we will be better able to avoid schizophrenia such as dissident Chen Guangcheng felt when his refuge in the U.S. Embassy collided with Hillary Clinton’s economics-oriented visit. In this stance, questions over China’s islands in the South China Sea can be viewed in terms of how they “move the needle” of compatibility rather than who wins or loses a zero sum confrontation. A security policy emphasis “for freedom” more than “against China” also maintains an overriding defense commitment to Japan while allowing us to treat an AIIB on purely economic grounds.

Above all, steering policy toward the protection of freedom and commitment to economic growth, and away from “anti-X” habits, will better orient our policy to our nature.

An visitor rejoices after catching a large fish during his trip to Truong Sa Islands. Photo: Mai Thanh Hai

Here in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), the local government last week ordered its travel and tourism departments to draw up a feasibility study for tours to the Truong Sa (Spratly) islands, which Vietnam currently occupies.

The first tour is scheduled for June 22 with over 200 Vietnamese reportedly signed up for the 7-10 day tour of two islands and two reefs which Vietnam controls. According to the promotion offer, “Traveling to Truong Sa…means the big trip of your life, reviving national pride and citizens’ awareness of the sacred maritime sovereignty of the country.”

Other islands in the Spratly island chain are either occupied or claimed by several nations, including Brunei, China, Malaysia and the Philippines. China, using a nine-dash line, lays claim to around 90 percent of the South China Sea.

The tour announcement in Vietnam follows last month’s confrontation between the U.S. and China in airspace over the South China Sea, which has sparked concern and triggered increased militarization among the claimant countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

The confrontation occurred on May 22 as a U.S. surveillance aircraft, with a CNN crew aboard, flew over Mischief Reef and Fiery Cross Reef — two artificial islands which China is constructing on submerged coral reefs it occupied in the mid-1990s and late 1980s, respectively. The aircraft was warned eight times to leave the airspace, over which Beijing has claimed the right to establish an air defense identification zone (ADIZ). Recently released satellite images reveal an airstrip, port facilities, cement factories and military barracks, and the U.S. has also received information China recently placed two mobile artillery vehicles on one of the islands.

China’s attempt to grasp the airspace follows last month’s grasp of the waters, as China’s municipality of Haikou, on Hainan island, issued its annual ban on all fishing vessels in the northern part of the South China Sea. The ban was first introduced in 1999 and typically lasts three months, ostensibly to protect marine resources. Haikou’s ban includes the waters of the Paracel island chain (known as Xisha in Chinese and Hoàng Sa in Vietnamese), which China grabbed from Vietnam in 1974, and the Scarborough Shoal in the Spratly island chain, taken from the Philippines in 2012. Last week, Vietnamese local media reported a Vietnamese search-and-rescue vessel from Da Nang was reportedly threatened and obstructed by a Chinese vessel while passing through the Paracel Islands en route to rescue a fisherman. (The fisherman was eventually rescued.)

These disputes over freedom of navigation in the air and waters are the latest in a series of spats China is having with the U.S., Vietnam and the Philippines in the South China Sea, which is leading to an increase in defense spending, defense coordination among Asian nations, and an increased military presence in the region.

The largest presence in the region will continue to be from the U.S., whose combat ship, the USS Fort Worth, just completed its patrol in May. Four more warships are expected to be deployed to the region.

The Philippines is also keen to beef up its military alliances to defend its territorial claims in the South China Sea. Last Friday, Philippine President Benigno Aquino announced his government is ready to start talks with the Japanese government on allowing Japanese military aircraft and naval vessels access to Philippines’ bases on a rotational basis for refueling purposes. With refueling capability, the Japanese military would be able to significantly extend their range of operation into the South China Sea.

On Saturday, Taiwan commissioned two 3,000-ton navy patrol vessels capable of docking at a new port being constructed on Taiping Island, the largest of the Spratly islands.

Back in Vietnam, Hanoi is also responding to a heightened activity by China in the waters it calls the East Sea, reportedly courting the foreign defense contractor divisions of such companies as Airbus, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Saab, and the European consortium Eurofighter to buy fighter jets, patrol boats and surveillance drones. Vietnam is believed to be interested in Saab’s Gripen E fourth-generation fighter jet and the Saab 340 or 2000 twin-engine patrol turboprops, and the latest P-8 Poseidon surveillance technology from Boeing placed on a business jet. Hanoi is also interested in Airbus helicopters, the Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jet, the Lockheed/Korea Aerospace F/A-50 light fighter jet, and the Lockheed Sea Hercules, a maritime patrol aircraft similar to its C-130.

Though a state secret, Vietnam’s military budget was believed to be around $3.4 billion in 2013, having doubled in size from a decade ago, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Vietnam’s military personnel are estimated at 480,000.

From Russia, Hanoi has already taken possession of three Russian Kilo-class attack submarines and has three more on order.  Hanoi currently owns more than 100 old Russian MiG-21 fighters, and has on order a dozen Russian Sukhoi Su-30 fighter jets.

From the U.S., following U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter’s visit last week, comes $18 million toward the purchase of U.S. patrol boats. The U.S. began easing its long-term embargo on sales of lethal weapons to Vietnam back in October.

Hanoi may have chosen to talk to defense contractors of many nations, so as not to anger Beijing by focusing on U.S. technology while also diversifying their equipment purchases. Nonetheless, Beijing cannot help but take notice of the rapid buildup in defense capabilities of not only Vietnam, but the Philippines, and the joint military exercises and promises of support among South China Sea claimants. Each Chinese action to assert its sovereignty over the South China Sea has a counter action, and while some of the counter actions have been relatively mild so far (Vietnam’s promotion of tourism on disputed islands), the potential for a more severe military confrontation is growing should these small actions grow in number and significance.

The world was made officially aware of corruption at FIFA when the U.S. Department of Justice set charges against several FIFA officials in an investigation going back several years. While there were ongoing suspicions of corrupt practices going on at FIFA linked to the World Cup in South Africa and Qatar, no actions had been taken until recently. What likely sparked off the push against FIFA was the national corruption debate in Brazil and its links to the last World Cup. Popular protests against the game that many in Brazil would have called a blessing were tarnished by corruption in the Brazilian government, not to mention FIFA itself. Two Brazilian nationals were charged this past week as well, which comes as no surprise to Brazilians, who are mired in a scandal that may even end in the removal of the president.

Since the global economic crisis of 2007–08, many governments have created new agencies to better regulate many private industries. In those cases where industry leaders have been seen committing severe acts of negligence, official and legally binding regulations have been applied and enforced.

In Brazil, the recent discovery of corrupt practices in their energy and construction industry and links to the ruling party has given the judicial community a great deal of power to enforce and enact new laws. In countries with a strong judiciary, strict guidelines and agencies work to streamline government regulations and their application. In those cases where the industry has been seen as a cooperative member in the policy making process, often voluntary regulations are expected by those companies in self-regulating their own actions and policies.

Legislation, policies and self-regulation will be applied differently in different situations. What has yet to be addressed are policies that are present but not followed by directors, officials or agents of those companies. Although FIFA always had well-scripted policies for self-regulation, when there is a culture of corruption in an already-regulated company or industry, there must also be a means of applying and enforcing the policy.

In many legal cases by individuals against large corporations there is often a trend of company officials bending their own policies in order to treat the victims harshly. The response to breaking their own rules often results in drafting more rules. However, without enforcement the policies are as good as the level of negligence being committed by the offending company officers. For companies to maintain self-regulation, they must actually create policies that are to be used.

Si le projet du ministre de l'économie apparaît comme un fourre-tout, il n'en possède pas moins une grande cohérence idéologique, que l'on peut résumer d'une formule : « Toujours moins ». Moins d'Etat, moins de protection sociale, moins de droits syndicaux, moins de règles pour les entreprises, moins (...) / France, Démocratie, Droit, Économie, Entreprise, Exclusion sociale, Idéologie, Inégalités, Justice, Politique, Protection sociale, Travail, Privatisation, Néolibéralisme - 2015/04

Après les « printemps arabes », la Turquie se trouve désormais en froid avec la Syrie, l'Arabie saoudite, l'Iran et l'Egypte. Alors que le régime connaît une dérive autoritaire, le choix de la « solitude dans la dignité » constitue-t-il une option ? / Égypte, Europe, Irak, Israël, Palestine, (...) / Égypte, Europe, Irak, Israël, Palestine, Proche-Orient, Syrie, Turquie, Censure, Islam, Kurdes, Médias, Parti politique, Politique, Relations internationales, Diplomatie, Autoritarisme, Réveil arabe 2011- - 2015/01

India Bonus: “Bangladesh and India finally give people a nation,” Syed Tashfeen Chowdhury (Al-Jazeera) India and Bangladesh sign agreement to swap border enclaves India and Bangladesh have signed an agreement to swap more than 150 land enclaves along their 4000 km (2485 miles) border, in an attempt to resolve decades old disputes between the two ...

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s apparently unstoppable rise hit a democratic bumper in Turkey’s parliamentary elections on Sunday, despite his presiding over 12 mostly boom years at the top of Turkey’s political system and the fact that his party won more than 40 percent of the vote.

By Paul McLeary with Ariel Robinson Judge not… The nominee to be the next chief of staff of the U.S. Army might have a Bergdahl problem. The lawyers for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, the U.S. soldier charged with desertion after walking off his post in eastern Afghanistan in 2009 and then spending five years in ...

Washington has made its point loud and clear in the South China Sea. But it is likely to be lost on Beijing. 'There should be no mistake: the United States will fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows', Defense Secretary Ashton Carter declared at a late May gathering of Asia Pacific's top defence officials in Singapore. That statement came a few days after a fly-by of the US Navy's P-8A Poseidon surveillance aircraft around the man-made islands China is busy building in the South China Sea. Such actions, Carter said, demonstrate that the US 'will continue to protect freedom of navigation and overflight'.

Turkey’s dominant Justice and Development Party (AKP) lost its parliamentary majority in elections yesterday. Though it retains a plurality of seats after receiving 41 percent of the vote, the election marked its worst showing since 2002. Analysts say it may struggle to form a coalition government — already, three opposition parties have said they will ...

Suite au sondage réalisé sur ce blog, nous avons le plaisir de vous offrir l’article du numéro d’été 2015 de Politique étrangère que vous avez choisi : « Les enjeux du chaos libyen », par Archibald Gallet.

Depuis la révolution de 2011, la Libye s’enfonce dans une spirale destructrice ayant des conséquences en Afrique du Nord, dans le Sahel et toute la Méditerranée. Le conflit a fait près de 30 000 victimes[1], et depuis le début de l’année 2015, le pays se constitue en base régionale du djihadisme. La production et l’exportation du pétrole, qui représente la quasi-totalité des exportations libyennes, ont chuté de plus de 80 % par rapport aux niveaux d’avant guerre. Les déplacés et réfugiés se multiplient, à l’intérieur du pays[2] et dans les pays voisins, et l’absence d’État offre un terrain privilégié à des organisations criminelles, qui contrôlent parfois des portions entières de territoire et se livrent au trafic de drogue, d’armes et de migrants – dont le nombre est en constante augmentation. Continuer la lecture sur Cairn.info.

[1] Source : Libya Body Count.

[2] Près de 287 000 en octobre 2014 (Agence des Nations unies pour les réfugiés).

S’abonner à Politique étrangère.

In a surprising result, President Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party has failed to win a majority in parliament. But can the opposition capitalize?

Braucht der amtierende Ministerpräsident Ahmet Davutoglu nun eigentlich eine ganze Partei als Koalitionspartner, oder könnte er versucht sein, sich seine Mehrheit zu verschaffen, indem er einige Abgeordnete von der Opposition abwirbt?

(Own report) - On the occasion of the G7 summit in Elmau, Bavaria, German government advisors are discussing the significance of the cohesion among the leading western powers. For quite a while, the G7 and G8 have been a sort of global policy "steering committee," according to a recent analysis published by the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP). For the first time in 2008, the global financial crisis compelled the G8 to include other industrial and emerging countries in global consultations in the framework of the G20. By setting the agenda for the G20, the G7 seeks to safeguard its "leadership role" in global policy. At the same time, in Berlin one hears that Russia's exclusion cannot be permanently advantageous. Since its exclusion, Moscow has become even more engaged in the BRICS alliance. Commenting on BRICS' aims, experts write that its members are striving to "pit their collective political clout against the North's claims of its superiority." In a few weeks, BRICS will decide on operative steps in establishing a New Development Bank. As an alternative to the World Bank, it should become operational by the end of the year. Steps are also planned to undermine the US Dollar's hegemony.

The world has before it a unique opportunity to build a better future for all, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon declared today in Bonn, Germany, where he urged broad support for a trio of course-correcting United Nations events in 2015 that aim to lock down agreements on protecting the planet, ensuring sustainable development and unleashing the finances and technology to ensure these vital goals are achieved.