Africa

Credit: Unsplash / David Clode

By Fairuz Ahmed
NEW YORK, Jul 27 2020 (IPS)

“What do you think happens to kerosene when it is poured on your head?”
Surya stumbles as she speaks to IPS. “It goes down, it goes trickling down.”

When someone speaks to a burn victim, one naturally feels shocked, sad, and sympathetic. But in talking to Surya, who has the major part of her body burned, the feelings were of hope and inspiration. How is it possible to survive this trauma and still have so much love and joy to share?

Among the many domestic abuse survivors I have interviewed over the past several years, Surya stood out. The incident that forever changed her physical attributes paved the way of hope for millions all over the world. She had a shining soul and a beautiful spirit.

Sixty-two-year-old Surya is a mother of two and a burn abuse survivor. She was doused with kerosene by her former husband following a heated argument in Chennai, India, almost three decades ago.

It was a regular summer day and the couple had a rift. At one point both lost their cool and before it became physical she retreated and went to the kitchen. The last thing she remembers is a liquid poured on her that felt like intense burning. She ended up in a hospital for six months. It took another 2 years to get back on her feet. Had it not been for helpful neighbors who transported her to a hospital, Surya might not have survived her burns. Now, many years after the incident she speaks with confidence and says she has fully accepted her fate and the scars have made her stronger and sparked in her a love for life.

Surya’s energy was infectious and it confirmed the fact that people who have experienced trauma, can, in fact, learn to be happy again. She does not harbor hatred or resentment. Rather, she revisited, with great dignity, how she became a burn victim and how the incident unfolded.

“It is important to educate men and women alike to understand the various dynamics of a relationship, and how to foster tolerance from an early age,” Surya said to IPS. She went on to explain in detail how boys should be educated to understand their roles as brothers, husbands, and fathers.

According to the World Health Organization, an estimated 180,000 deaths every year are caused by burns – the vast majority occur in low and middle-income countries. In India, over one million people are moderately or severely burnt every year. According to India Today, twenty-one dowry deaths are reported across the country every day. The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) states that in a single year more than 7,634 women die due to dowry harassment. Either they were burnt alive or forced to commit suicide over dowry demands. Bride burning continues in countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and others.

Surya said to IPS that she had an arranged marriage and, as a dutiful wife, she respected her in-laws and tried her best to be a good wife and a good mother. But something was very wrong from the beginning. The way her husband treated other women in and out of the household was accepted as the norm. It was meant to be the duty of his wife and the mother of his children, to bear everyone else’s wrath. It was also a cultural expectation to remain silent, to uphold the family status, and save face. Her husband showed no empathy and the society Surya lived in made his abuse permissible.

This mindset of blaming women for everything that goes wrong in a household is echoed widely in South Asian countries. Women are taught from an early age to endure abuse. Although it is expected that women will hold the family unit together, this responsibility comes with the added expectation that they do not speak up and suffer in silence.

I asked Surya: “What is the one piece of advice you would give your own self if you could go back in time?” She replied that she would make sure to tell herself that anything and everything can happen to anyone.

No matter how much she would pray for things to be different and for things to get better, the physical and mental abuse continued and increased in severity. Her former husband considered himself as superior, believing he was always right and that women were nothing but objects to be dealt with harshly as he willed.

Surya stressed the fact that from an early age, boys need to be taught that men and women are equal. And everyone must speak up about how they feel. Men need to channel their frustration in a healthy way and should be encouraged to speak up as well.

According to The Lancet, in 2017 there were 197.3 million people with mental health problems in India, comprising 14.3% of the total population. Some 29.5 % of men went through depressive disorders closely followed by women.

Surya is now an advocate, speaking about her journey and inspiring many with her story. She works at a reputable company as a senior advocate and is now self-sufficient. Her journey has inspired many girls to get back on their feet and heal both mentally and physically from brutal trauma. She has also inspired a new tech startup that is working to provide safe and secure communication for domestic abuse victims.

Picture Courtesy: The Parasol Cooperative

Meghana (Megs) Shah, founder of The Parasol Cooperative said to IPS. “At the age of seven, I met Ms. Surya. She was unrecognizable except for a few distinct features. Her face was always covered and she wore a scarf around her scalp and the side of her face at all times. One day I walked in while she was on applying ointment – she was actually resetting ‘silicone prosthetic’ ears. There was a hole where her ears once used to be.

“I was startled, but it reminded me that injustice exists in the world and people can be cruel. It is this moment that shaped my desire to help people and stand up for those who can’t stand up for themselves. She and so many people like her
have had their lives compromised – that is my motivation and the reason behind creating my tech non-profit, The Parasol Cooperative.”

In many cultures, men believe they are especially privileged which creates added pressure and expectation. Suppressing emotions and fomenting anger takes center stage. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals aim to minimize the global gender gap. Awareness from an early age can equip future generations to be more tolerant, expressive, and open.

Girls need to be taught to be vocal and to be aware of their surroundings. If a crime is committed, or if abuse takes place, these need to be exposed and women need space and ways to communicate their fears, without being judged or shunned by society. Community centers, schools, online, and offline outreach programs can come to aid in building such safe grounds for sharing and expressing concerns. In many societies, denial or making light leads to the problem blowing out of proportion. The society needs a collective shift in how abuse, oppression, and gender inequalities are dealt with.

The post Gender Inequality and Oppression of Women: A Survivor’s Story appeared first on Inter Press Service.

UN Staff Day with Secretary-General Antonio Guterres (left). Credit: United Nations

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 27 2020 (IPS)

When the coronavirus pandemic delivered a mortal blow to the United States, grounding the country to a virtual standstill and throwing its economy into a deep recession, hundreds and thousands were forced to work “remotely” while offices remained shuttered, beginning late March.

The United Nations, including the Secretariat in New York and UN agencies worldwide, was no exception– and remained locked down for more than four months with no end in sight.

And now, several major corporations and Silicon Valley high-tech companies, including Facebook, Twitter, Barclays, JPMorgan Chase, IBM and Morgan Stanley, are planning to “reduce real estate footprint” by urging most of their staff to continue working from home— indefinitely.

At the United Nations, more than 6,400 staffers, including those on the payroll of UN agencies based in New York, have continued to work remotely ever since the Organization was grounded.

But will the UN, facing a cash crisis and a severe shortage of office space in one of the world’s most expensive real estate markets in New York, urge hundreds of its own staffers to work from home – permanently?

Perhaps the only exceptions could be those designated by the UN as “critical” and “essential.”

Asked how the COVID-19 lockdown has impacted on the work of the Organization, UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters last week: “Despite the lockdown, we are all working from home (and) the business of the UN has continued full throttle”

“We continue to support our humanitarian operations. We continue to support our peacekeeping operations and our development projects. And the Secretary General is very much out there with the policy briefs we put out on a regular basis. The UN may be physically closed, but it remains open for business,” Dujarric declared.

So, it raises the question: Is there any justification for all of the 6,400 staffers to return to the UN?

Perhaps working from home indefinitely is still a far better option than what corporate America is pushing for, including furloughs, mass layoffs, drastic salary cuts, and in some cases, filing for bankruptcy protection—as with JC Penney, Neiman Marcus, J. Crew and Ann Taylor.

Will the UN also face such calamities in the post-Covid era—particularly if some of the major funders, particularly the high-paying US, defaults on its assessed contributions, cuts off funding and withdraws its membership—as it has already done with UNESCO, the WHO, the World Trade Organization and the Human Rights Council?

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury, a former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the UN (2002-2007), told IPS: “As we are going through the on-going pandemic, very often we hear that “our world would perhaps never be the same again”.

“For many of us who are immersed deeply in the work of UN and its mission for decades and internalized that as part of our living culture, we wonder how would the citadel of multilateralism – the United Nations – shape up when the humanity, if ever, emerges free of this pandemic,” he said.

“It is being said that one clear manifestation of that could be that a big chunk of the UN work force at its Headquarters in New York will continue to work from home – permanently, in the manner some big corporate organizations are adopting the work culture ensuring that many work remotely, he noted.

Chowdhury said one can argue that in case of UN, it could be cost-effective and more efficient. Travel budget and operating expenses would be greatly reduced. No more files, paper trails, no more flyers, brochures, publicity materials.

“Think of how many trees would be saved and how environment would be less stressed. No overtime. Less security expenditure. Also, one issue would not arise – no possibility of sexual harassment in the absence of physical contact,” he argued.

For staff members, he pointed out, no more baby-sitters … household and related responsibilities would be shared hopefully.

“One can think of many other benefits, I guess,” said Chowdhury, Permanent Representative of Bangladesh to UN (1996-2001) and Chairman of the UN General Assembly’s Administrative and Budgetary Committee (1997-1998).

Faced with a growing need for more office space, the Assistant Secretary-General for Human Resources delivered a message titled “Flexible Working Arrangements,” providing staffers with an option to work from home – and that was back in June 2019 long before the virus outbreak.

Guy Candusso, a former First Vice President of the UN Staff Union, told IPS that many staff like working from home —but they should be aware that with today’s technology the Organization can shift quite of bit of work to lower cost areas of the world.

As a cost cutting measure, the UN has been debating a proposal to relocate some of its offices to new locations, including Budapest, Nairobi, Montreal and Shenzen, but there has been no final decision.

A robot named Sophia had an interactive session last year with Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed. Meanwhile, will artificial intelligence (AI), which is expected to replace humans, be the wave of the future, even at the UN? Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elias

The total number of staffers in the global Secretariat, including over 32 UN agencies, is estimated at more than 37,500, according to the report titled “Composition of the Secretariat: Staff: Demographics.”

In a report to the Administrative and Budgetary Committee, back in December 2015, the Under-Secretary-General (USG) for Management Yukio Takasu said about 5,342 of UN staffers, including those working for liaison offices of UN agencies based in New York, were located in eight leased buildings outside the UN campus at a cost of $56 million a year.

He said rents were expected to spike in the coming years, and in 2023, favorable term leases of the DC1 and DC2 buildings, across from the Secretariat, which together housed over 2,060 staff members, would expire.

But when some of the existing leases expired, the staffers were gradually moved to the secretariat building causing a severe shortage of office space during the last few years.

Ian Richards, former, President, Coordinating Committee of International Staff Unions and Associations (CCISUA), told IPS Covid-19 has accelerated a lot of trends that were already underway.

One of these, he said, is telecommuting, for which the UN Secretariat was relatively behind, compared with both other international organizations and governments in general. “We are likely to see more staff making use of one or two days of telecommuting a week.”

At the same time, he argued, “we shouldn’t draw too many conclusions from this exceptional period”.

History shows that normal life eventually resumes. Offices and meeting rooms will come back to life and permanent telecommuting won’t be an option, only partial telecommuting will, said Richards.

If you look to Europe, he pointed out last week, Vienna is almost fully back. Meanwhile Geneva is slowly resuming, with the Human Rights Council and the WTO General Council both meeting physically.

Salim Lone, a longtime Director of Communications under Secretary-General Kofi Annan, told IPS what is needed is office work being altogether redefined in a way that simultaneously addresses the challenges the world’s people and our planet are mired in.

“We have seen, entirely without any input from our thinkers and visionaries, a new world emerge in which tens of millions of office workers working from home have had reduction of the intense stress levels that increasingly lengthy commutes generate, resulting in much time being spent with families and significant reduction in greenhouse gases through reduced vehicular traffic and other activity”.

Moving away from the long, stagnant history of working from offices, he said, provides an exceptional opportunity for the United Nations to showcase its unique multi-lateral, multi-disciplinary and global norm-setting expertise, embedded in the Secretariat and organizations like the International Labour Organization, Habitat, UNEP and WHO.

He pointed out that the US corporate sector has taken a huge leap on the issue of remote work, making it permanent measure for large numbers of staff, given the significant implications for productivity and office space costs.

But the private sector inevitably is over-invested in profitability and in the last few decades has overseen drastic losses in formal jobs, pushing tens of millions into the so-called “gig economy” with lower wages, and without health insurance and annual or sick leave, he noted.

“The UN needs to add it’s much more credible voice to the many initiatives under way for the post-Coronavirus world,” said Lone, onetime spokesman for Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga for more than a decade and author of an upcoming book on Kenya in the Global Context (with a focus on the UN).

Chowdhury said all these, of course, relate mainly to the nearly 6,000 staff members in New York. But UN is an intergovernmental organization and the Member States are supposed to be the governing entity. The experience of a “new normal” should not be limited only to the change in physical aspects of its work culture.

How about the change of heart, change of behaviour, change of mindsets on the part of the Member States, the governors of the UN?, he asked.

“The hope of a “new normal” which we are anticipating would be dashed when we find that the today’s normal is dusted up and branded as the so-called “new normal”.

He said the plethora of UN online meetings preoccupying the delegations time and energy since March have shown no sign of any real change for the better decision-making.

The same old language, the same old obstinacy of holding on to the so-called national position, the same old irrational opposition to good ideas and thoughts in the name of instructions from the capitals, the same old manipulation of the decision-making processes by powerful Member States, the same old marginalization of the voice of the small, vulnerable Member States in pursuing their genuine, legitimate interest as the weakest part of humanity, Chowdhury pointed out.

“There has to be a leadership initiative for such a real change to happen. Who will provide that? My first choice is the world’s topmost diplomat, the Secretary-General of the United Nations,” he declared.

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@ips.org

The post If UN is Working “Full Throttle” While Locked Down, Shouldn’t Most Staffers Work from Home –Permanently? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

More than 80 people were killed in two attacks in Sudan's restive western region, the UN says.

As coronavirus infections surge, Andrew Harding notes meaningless statistics and a fear of hospitals.

From $800 of clothes in a suitcase to a ticket to Milan Fashion Week.

Somalia has fewer than 100 official Covid-19 deaths. But its cemeteries tell a different story.

Former Nigeria goalkeeper Ndubisi Egbo talks of the racism he has endured as he coached KF Tirana to the Albanian title.

Two people were killed during a protest in Garissa sparked by the arrest of a murder suspect.

Dozens of inmates fled after a group at Malmesbury Prison overpowered staff during exercise on Friday.

The Rwandan refugee, who worked as a volunteer warden, has admitted arson, prosecutors say.

The use of racial slurs in Sudan shows how deeply entrenched racism is there, writes Zeinab Mohammed Salih.

The battle to be the first African female gold medallist was fought in the 10,000m in Barcelona between Ethiopia's Derartu Tulu and South Africa's Elena Meyer.

The BBC's Ferdinand Omondi, a former soap actor himself, remembers an infectious comedic talent.

By Samira Sadeque
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 24 2020 (IPS)

Rohingya women are coming together to feature their own work, plight and stories in mainstream conversations about their community — a space they say they’ve been left out of.

“If we think of revolutions or liberty or think of any ways to liberate ourselves from the shackle of suffering and being dubbed as ‘the most persecuted minority on earth’, women have to be part of it,” Yasmin Ullah, president of the Rohingya Human Rights Network, told IPS.

On Jul. 24, the first ever Rohingya women-only panel, facilitated by Ullah and other organisations, brought together Rohingya women leaders from around the world who shared their experiences and knowledge at the “Her Voices, Her Journey: The Gendered Experiences of Rohingya Women” webinar.

It featured Azizah Noor, a refugee ambassador for the Refugee Council of Australia; Hasnah Hussin,  a refugee advocate who works with refugee support organisation Tenaganita in Malaysia; Razia Sultana, chairperson of the RW Welfare Society; and Zainab Arkani, co-founder of the Rohingya Association Canada.

“There are lots of challenges that Rohingya women face such as gender-based violence, societal and community expectations and these are things we need to address in our community,” Noor told IPS.

The webinar aimed to provide Rohingya women with the agency to tell their own stories and be included in the larger conversation surrounding Rohingya rights, the genocide and refugee crisis. Rohingya women are often not seen at the forefront of advocacy efforts for the community. Ullah said that often Rohingya women were invited to speak only around a certain narrative, or the same woman speaker would be invited to different events and talks.

According to Reliefweb International’s 2018 report, more than 52 percent of Rohingya refugees were women, but that was not reflected in panel talks or rallies for and by Rohingya refugees. 

“Not having a proportionate representation of our voices in different discussions at different tables is just so unjust,” Ullah said.

Moreover, it risks trapping Rohingya women in a constrictive narrative where they are only seen as victims. Ullah said when more women were included in the conversation about the refugee crisis as well as about the trials of Rohingya women, the narrative would eventually shift to also include their triumphs.

“It’s so important for the outside world to see that there are more to Rohingya women than a bunch of suffering women, a bunch of raped women, a bunch of survivors and know nothing about the outside world, there are so many exemplary women out there for their word to be shared, their ideas to be shared,” Ullah said.

How a fear perpetuated the invisibility

In many ways the invisibility of Rohingya women in the global movement around the rights of the Rohingya began in Myanmar. 

Ullah said many Rohingya women are encouraged to stay home for their own protection against the Myanmar military. Over time, she said, this has normalised Rohingya women’s absence in larger political conversations. She added that the deep fear of Myanmar’s military attacking Rohingya women lessened their overall participation in society. 

Myanmar’s military is notorious for sexual violence against Rohingya women, which some experts say is a genocidal tactic used against the ethnic minority.

Ullah said it’s so prevalent that the military could just show up to one’s door and drag a woman out to rape — rape survivors have shared their testimony of this.

While Rohingya women are encouraged to always stay indoors for their safety, this creates a shift in the views of the gender roles, which Ullah said are “a direct correlation of the military strategies, tactics and propaganda used on the Rohingya [people]”.

“The traditional value of Rohingya culture has kind of shifted multiple times, and it shifted because there is a lot of fear, insecurity for women being protected,” Ullah said. “That’s why women are kept home because there are so many things that could go wrong.”

“As a result, slowly Rohingya women have receded and became homebound and that turned into the kind of mindset that we see today,” she said.

Education and security

Ullah said that when given opportunities and a safe environment, Rohingya women thrive. One such example is Sultana, who documented sexual violence Rohingya women were subject to and received the prestigious International Women of Courage Award in 2019, among others.

“There is so much more to us, so many things that we are able to do, especially when we’re given the security granted by the state, human rights, education, access to healthcare, essential services,” Ullah said. “Those few things really pushed Rohingya women to excel in their career in their respective field of studies.”

Meanwhile, access to education for Rohingya refugees in itself remains a challenge, especially under the pandemic, said Noor, a former Rohingya refugee from Australia.

“Factoring in equity during COVID-19  is extremely important,” Noor told IPS. “Refugee families are already struggling with fitting in, and are often marginalised. Technology is something that not all refugee families have and resources are not available for all families.”

As for the panel, Ullah said this was the first of many to come and was optimistic about the turnaround for the event.

“The time is now because if we wait 20 to 30 years from now, the damage would already be done and it would be too late for women to even be involved in any of these discussions.”

Related Articles

• Dying for a Better Life – How Rohingya Refugees Risk their Lives to Cross into Malaysia
• Concerns for the Nearly 400 Rohingya Refugees Rescued off the Coast of Bangladesh

The post Rohingya Women Take a Seat at the Table & Share Stories in a Growing Rights Movement appeared first on Inter Press Service.

The inmates absconded while being transferred to court in Malmesbury, in an escape caught on camera.

Many of the tools needed to tap into the potential of Africa’s livestock sector exist already. But with limited resources, they must be deployed smartly to improve the entire value chain. Credit: Miriam Gathigah/IPS

By External Source
KAMPALA, Jul 24 2020 (IPS)

There is no shortage of technological innovations designed to boost animal agriculture in Africa. These range from GPS tracking systems which identify and trace pastoralists’ herds to livestock vaccine SMS services that alert farmers to disease outbreaks.

But to unlock the economic potential of the sector as demand for meat and milk swells threefold towards 2050, countries must invest in the critical areas that will improve quality across the whole value chain. That is increasing productivity and quality from the breeding of the animal throughout the production process to the end product. This includes safe storage, handling and sale.

My native Uganda offers some useful lessons from its use of smart investments in technology and farmer organisation. These have made it the only East African country that is self-sufficient in milk.

With meat and milk being perishable goods, innovation in the cold chain and sustainable energy supplies will help strengthen the sector. For example, an East African initiative which centralised milk quality testing and storage in chillers prior to sale increased yields sixfold within five years

In recent years, some private sector players in Uganda have invested in testing systems to detect aflatoxin in animal feeds. The goal is to prevent milk and meat contamination. Others have developed refrigeration units that are powered with biogas from manure. Both are among the innovations that improve the quality of the final product.

As highlighted by a new report from the Malabo Montpellier Panel on which I sit, the same can be achieved elsewhere. It can also benefit other livestock commodities, to give Africa food sovereignty across animal-sourced foods and greater access to international markets.

The report makes 11 recommendations for Africa’s livestock sector. These range from technological innovations and supportive policies to addressing trade barriers and challenges specific to each commodity.

 

Priority areas

African nations must be strategic in prioritising the infrastructure that will make the most difference to quality and productivity. The first priority is to increase consumer awareness around food safety, nutrition and sustainability to kickstart demand for better quality products.

Partly as a response to European consumer expectations around quality and safety, for example, Morocco developed a new system for animal identification and traceability in 2015.

Livestock can be identified using electronic tags that communicate with the national database via mobile phone networks. This increases transparency and traceability. It also promotes Moroccan animal products on international markets such as the European Union.

The second priority is then to direct technology towards opportunities to open up market access.

To unlock trade means investing in improved animal health, processing operations, storage and distribution. Meeting regional and international standards for food safety and quality is a vital goal. Africa currently contributes 2.8% of the global meat market, which translates to 14 million tons. The continent produces just over 10% of the world’s milk.

There are a number of barriers to increasing this production and gaining greater market share. They include limited availability of quality animal feed, access to affordable energy needed in producing and processing livestock, and limited infrastructure, particularly in the last mile.

With meat and milk being perishable goods, innovation in the cold chain and sustainable energy supplies will help strengthen the sector.

For example, an East African initiative which centralised milk quality testing and storage in chillers prior to sale increased yields sixfold within five years.

The volume of milk supplied to the 30km catchment area rose to three million litres a month. This increased income per smallholder household by more than 160% in Uganda, 120% in Kenya, and almost 65% in Rwanda.

The success of such projects in turn drives demand for continued innovation, such as solar-powered cold chains or interventions that protect other resources like water and grasslands.

Finally, countries also need to prioritise policies that support new technologies across the livestock sector.

To transform its milk production sector, Uganda privatised the state-owned processing company Dairy Corporation as well as creating a Dairy Development Authority.

The Dairy Industry Act of 1998 empowered the authority to enforce milk hygiene standards and quality controls. As a result, traders were licensed to meet public health and milk quality standards. This encouraged the modernisation of the sector through the expansion of pasteurisation plants and processing infrastructure as well as processing of high value products.

Certainly, the gains have trickled down to the farmers in better farm gate prices.

 

Conclusion

As the Malabo Montpellier Panel points out, many of the tools needed to tap into the potential of Africa’s livestock sector exist already. But with limited resources, they must be deployed smartly to improve the entire value chain.

Scaling up innovation at critical points will unlock new opportunities and help ensure animal agriculture keeps pace with a rising demand from a growing population.

 

Noble Banadda, Professor and Chair of the Department of Agricultural and Bio Systems Engineering, Makerere University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The post How Smart Investments in Technology Can Beef up Africa’s Economy appeared first on Inter Press Service.

The consequences of rape, maltreatment, disease and racism are revealed by the findings.

By Ippei Shibata
Jul 24 2020 (IPS-Partners)

There has been much discussion in recent months about how workers who transitioned to working from home—and those who were deemed “essential”—are less affected by the layoffs and job losses brought on by lockdowns than are workers in “social” jobs that require closer human interaction (e.g. restaurant workers). However, our new IMF staff research suggests that this does not tell the full story.

In particular, we find that while teleworkable jobs are indeed more secure than non-teleworkable occupations during the current pandemic-related recession, this pattern has also been observed during the Global Financial Crisis of 2007–09—meaning that something more than pandemic-related restrictions is at play.

As the chart shows, unemployment has increased less for teleworkable occupations during both recessions. This pattern suggests that people in teleworkable occupations tend to keep their jobs not only because they satisfy the need for social distancing and other novel requirements of the current pandemic, but also because such people tend to be more highly-skilled and educated—and hence less vulnerable to recessions. The paper also finds that essential jobs have been less affected not only during the current recession but also during the Global Financial Crisis. On the other hand, while social jobs have been severely affected during the current recession, they were indeed less affected during the Global Financial Crisis.

Our research also confirms some interesting observations regarding the distributional aspects of recessions. It finds that young and low-skilled workers have always been harmed more in recessions, while women and Hispanics are more severely affected during the current recession. Women in particular are more likely to work in industries and occupations that are being affected more severely during today’s recession. During both recessions, low-income workers have suffered more than top-income earners.

The post Unemployment in Today’s Recession Compared to the Global Financial Crisis appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Dr. Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury
SINGAPORE, Jul 24 2020 (IPS-Partners)

On the first Sunday of July, there was an important telephone call between the Chinese Foreign Minister and State Councillor Wang Yi and the Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Duval. Some important decisions were announced thereafter. This is not to say that these were the outcome of that interaction only. For weeks the militaries of both China and India and their diplomats had been negotiating on the grounds of the disputed territory along the Line of actual Control at the Galwan Valley, as well as through other channels to end the bloodiest border stand-off between the two Asian powers that had lasted two months. True, while not a bullet was fired in anger, troops had battled with sticks and stones that left twenty Indian soldiers dead and, reportedly, an unknown number of Chinese casualties. Indeed, it appeared that the two sides, who had fought a war in the Himalayas in 1962, was yet again on the brink of a possible war.

Dr. Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury

The situation was rendered dangerous by a combination of other factors. Over the immediate past, thanks largely to the policies pursued by President Trump of the United States, the multilateral global institutions such as the United Nations were left with eroded powers. The US itself embroiled in deeply divisive domestic issues and the burgeoning movement to reshape traditional values viz., ‘Black Lives matter’, was becoming disinterested in any further global engagements. Moreover, elections due come November speeded up the process of the return to ‘Fortress America’. The entire world was reeling under the merciless spread of the deadly coronavirus COVID-19 which had rendered their populaces vulnerable, and governments looking inwards. Amidst the global turmoil, China was racing to reach the status of a peer of the US with aggressive assertiveness, and had signalled that it would brook no opposition from any quarter along the way to reaching this goal. So, there was no global supervision of conduct of states in an anarchical system, and no watchman to keep any combatant nations apart.

The crisis between China and India seemed to have gone ignored by much of the world. Some Indians, if social media was any indication of prevalent sentiments, appeared to veer towards the US, as a source of traditional counterbalance to China. The embattled US Administration did little to assuage Indian friends, and in a Hawaii between US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Chinese senior leader Yang Jiechi the Indo-Chinese spat found a mention only in passing. The Europeans urged calm on both parties reluctant to choose sides. India’s immediate neighbours, nearly each of whom had issues with India,( either bilateral or flowing out of India’s domestic legislations alienating Muslims) and being beneficiaries of China’s deep pockets, remained silent, except India’s arch-rival Pakistan, which unsurprisingly supported China. So, both China and India seemed bereft of any significant external support, and were largely left on their own to resolve the issues.

Only Russia, friend to both China and India, seemed interested to constructively engage to help stabilize. In late June, in a celebration of Russian victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World war, the two key guests who turned up in Moscow, even in masks, were the Defence Ministers of India and China, though neither country had any significant contribution to Moscow’s wartime triumph over Berlin. It would be naïve to believe Russian diplomacy did nothing to try close gaps between the battling protagonists, though Delhi claimed the two never met, which ironically, might have yielded better results, and probably did, than if they had actually interacted frontally!

While the standstill was in progress, there was a huge display of nationalism, particularly in India, where the electronic and print media went to town in criticism of China. Stiff retaliation was being urged upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi, himself struggling to lead India out of the twin crises of COVID19, and a major economic downturn. Modi was aware that war would mean taking on China and Pakistan simultaneously, a tall order at any time, and now more so given the global situation. So, Modi opted for discretion as being the better part of valour, did the right thing by visiting troops at the borders, and also by being extremely circumspect in getting Indian forces to exercise ‘fire control’ at the borders. The Chinese public opinion was eerily quiet, as if nothing significant was happening, except that the ‘Global Times’ often seen as Beijing’s mouthpiece, would issue warnings from time to time urging India to desist from provocative actions. China put across that its primary ‘contradiction’ was the US, not India, but any attempts to join efforts to constrain China would be severely dealt with. What China was doing was reading India the riot act from the textbook of ‘scientific realism’ in international affairs.

Immediately following the Duval- Yang Jiechi talk, Delhi issued a Press statement which said that “it was necessary to ensure at the earliest the complete disengagement of the troops along the LAC and de-escalation from India-China border areas for full restoration of peace and tranquillity” (Peace and tranquillity , ironically, is an oft cited expression that the Indians and Chinese use to describe their relations- this is also how they call the LAC line- however incongruous it may sound to the existing realities!) The Chinese Foreign Office also said, after the phone conversation, that the two sides had made ‘positive progress… to disengage frontline troops and ease the border situation. The Chinese were reportedly seen removing tents and structures in the Galwan valley. However, they will doubtless ensure capabilities are close at hand for instant deployment, if needs be. Indian withdrawal is as yet unreported at writing, but will surely happen, because India cannot afford to be engaged in a firefight with China at this time. It remains to be seen how far this disengagement can translate into genuine de-escalation. In July 1962 Chinese troops had disengaged from the Indians only to sweep down the Himalayas with a full-blown invasion in less than four months!

Even as they were withdrawing this time, the Chinese took out an insurance on Indian good behaviour, from China’s perspective. This was a Chinese fresh claim over Sakteng wildlife sanctuary in eastern Bhutan’s Trashigang district, supposedly based on an agreement between Bhutan and Tibet in the early eighteenth century. This is far away from Ladakh, on the eastern side of the LAC. Now, Bhutan, though sovereign, is bound by treaty obligations to India’s oversight of its foreign relations. Should it entertain any aspiration for untrammelled relations with China, this is not likely to be approved by Delhi. Now this Chinese claim is on territory that has no border with China, but with Arunachal, the Indian State, the entirety of which China claims for itself.

Obviously, this is something the Chinese now have on the files, to be brought up at any time in the future, if so required. It also serves as encouragement to Bhutan to obtain its full autonomy from Delhi, with a warning that links with India henceforth will come at a price! Also, it is noteworthy that the lesson of history is that China might give up on territories tactically, but not on its claims.

In future, the two dominating powers will be the US and China. But in the meantime, there will be a period of instability as China maneuvers to position itself to be a peer of the US, which the US will oppose. At this time some deft crisis management will be necessary. If there is a new Administration in Washington after the November elections, it will settle down to business as usual with Beijing because of the pre-existing economic linkages, and sober policy analysis will support such policy-direction. The course of deglobalization that COVID 19 has set in motion is likely to be corrected. Just as no man is an island, States in the global -system cannot also function in isolation over a long period of time. Depending on the nature of post-COVID recovery, it will be a slow process, but an inexorable one.

Dr Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury is Principal Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asia Studies, National University of Singapore. He is a former Foreign Advisor (Foreign Minister) of Bangladesh and President of Cosmos Foundation Bangladesh. The views addressed in the article are his own. He can be reached at: isasiac @nus.edu.sg

Source: UNB United News of Bangladesh

This story was originally published by Dhaka Courier.

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The 28 bodies are thought to be army officers involved in a failed coup against Omar al-Bashir in 1990.