Agrégateur de flux

Après le violent séisme qui a frappé le centre du Maroc dans la nuit du 8 au 9 septembre, se pose la question de la reconstruction et de la préservation du patrimoine la médina de Marrakech a subi de nombreux dégâts.

Alors que commence à se dessiner au Maroc la reconstruction de la province d’Al-Haouz, il faut désormais s’atteler au développement des régions marginalisées, qui n’ont guère profité de la transformation du pays et du tourisme.

Le pape François a conclu son voyage consacré aux migrants par une messe géante au stade Vélodrome de Marseille devant plusieurs dizaines de milliers de personnes, y compris Emmanuel Macron, dont la présence a été critiquée à gauche comme à l'extrême droite. Dans son homélie, il a dénoncé le "tragique rejet de la vie humaine, qui est aujourd'hui refusée à nombre de personnes qui émigrent", martelant une dernière fois ce message d'accueil des migrants.

Samedi dernier, le Mali, le Niger et le Burkina Faso ont signé la charte du Liptako-Gourma instituant ainsi une nouvelle alliance entre ces trois Etats du Sahel.

La Macédoine du Nord a perdu environ 100 000 touristes bulgares, et la Bulgarie 400 000 touristes macédoniens. C'est une conséquence du conflit politique entre les deux pays qui provoque la méfiance de chaque côté de la frontière.

- Le fil de l'Info / Tourisme balkans, Radio Slobodna Evropa, Bulgarie-Macédoine du Nord, Bulgarie, Macédoine du Nord, Economie, Relations régionales

Fin 2022, un musée consacré à l'âge d'or du rock yougoslave a ouvert ses portes à Sarajevo. Un projet porté par une équipe d'amoureux de la musique bien décidés à faire vivre cet héritage à travers les Balkans et au-delà. Visite de ce Ex-Yu Rock Centar.

- Articles / Courrier des Balkans, Bosnie-Herzégovine, Culture et éducation, Yougonostalgie

Two sisters tell the BBC how the earthquake in Morocco has left them traumatised and anxious.

The United States finds itself in a precarious position as tensions escalate between Canada and India. Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau’s startling accusation that India may have played a role in the death of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar on Canadian soil triggered the diplomatic row. The unanimous condemnation of this alleged violation of Canadian sovereignty by the Canadian government and opposition parties prompted Ottawa to expel a senior Indian diplomat, Pavan Kumar Rai, whom Canada claims heads the Canadian branch of India’s foreign spy agency, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). India vehemently denied the allegations, countering that Canada was diverting attention from separatist terrorism and extremism. New Delhi also expelled a Canadian diplomat in a tit-for-tat move.

The diplomatic tensions were apparent during Prime Minister Trudeau’s visit to New Delhi for the 2023 G20 Summit. Indian prime minister Narendra Modi expressed grave concerns about Sikh “Khalistan” protests in Canada, which he perceived as threatening India’s territorial sovereignty and integrity. Canada has the largest Sikh diaspora population outside Punjab, India. A segment of this diaspora advocates for an independent Sikh majority state known as Khalistan. Prime Minister Trudeau defended these protests as exercises of freedom of expression, assembly, and peaceful protest. He raised the alleged Indian involvement in Nijjar’s killing directly with Indian Prime Minister Modi during the G20 sideline meeting. Furthermore, Trudeau discussed this issue with President Joe Biden, British prime minister Rishi Sunak, and French president Emmanuel Macron at the G20 Summit. It complicates efforts by Canada and its allies to strengthen relations with India to counterbalance China’s rise.

Strategic Partnerships with India

For geostrategic reasons, India has long been considered an indispensable partner for Canada and its allies in their Indo-Pacific strategies. The United States, under the Bush Administration, recognized the strategic significance of India and initiated efforts to build a strategic partnership. One significant milestone in this partnership was the signing of the landmark 2005 India-U.S. nuclear deal. Washington agreed to lift all sanctions imposed on India after its nuclear tests in 1998. This strategic partnership is celebrated as a relationship between the “world’s largest democracy” and the “world’s oldest democracy.” India’s democratic foundations, diverse population, and growing economy are critical for strategic and economic considerations. India’s shared democratic values also serve as a pivotal asset in the ideological competition against authoritarian regimes like China. India’s perception of China as an antagonistic neighbor is vindicated by frequent Chinese incursions into disputed border regions. This threat perception prompts India to participate in Washington’s rebalancing policy actively. In this equation, America relies on India to counterbalance China’s growing assertiveness, while India looks to Washington to bolster its position vis-à-vis Beijing.

Additionally, India is a member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD), comprising the United States, Japan, and Australia. This group of democratic nations serves as a forum for cooperation in countering Chinese authoritarianism. China has vehemently criticized this group, labeling it as Washington’s attempt to encircle and contain China’s rise and calling it an “Indo-Pacific version of NATO.” Concurrently, China seeks to expand its influence in the Southeast Asian and South Asian regions through its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

India also holds a pivotal role in Canada’s Indo-Pacific strategic vision unveiled in 2022. In this official document, Ottawa designates China as a “disruptive power” and commits to strengthening relations with Indo-Pacific regional states, specifically focusing on India. The strategy acknowledges “India’s growing strategic, economic, and demographic importance” in pursuing Canada’s geostrategic objectives. Canada committed to negotiating a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement with India as part of this strategy. However, following Canada’s allegations, diplomatic tensions have halted negotiations, and Canadian Trade Minister Mary Ng canceled her planned visit to India.

Response of Canada’s Allies

Canada has brought India’s alleged violations of Canadian sovereignty to its closest allies: the United States, Britain, and Australia. It is unlikely that these allies will openly condemn India due to concerns about the impact on their respective relationships with India. The United States expressed concerns over these allegations and called for India’s cooperation with investigations. It was also reported in media that the intelligence for this case is not exclusively sourced from Canada but has been corroborated and shared by fellow members of the Five Eyes alliance, comprising the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. These intelligence sources encompass both human intelligence and intercepted communications of Indian diplomats.

President Biden, in his address to the United Nations General Assembly, emphasized the importance of the “Quad partnership with India, Japan, and Australia to deliver concrete progress for the people of the region on everything from vaccines to maritime security.” Should diplomatic tensions between Canada and India escalate further, it will become increasingly challenging for Washington, D.C., to maintain a delicate balance between a NATO ally and an Indo-Pacific strategic partner.

The United Kingdom has announced its intention to continue free trade negotiations with India despite the “serious allegations” made by Canada. Australian Foreign Minister Wong announced that Canberra is “deeply concerned by these allegations” and “We have conveyed our concerns at senior levels to India.” These are all sympathetic but non-committal statements. London, Washington, and Canberra have prioritized forging stronger ties with India, recognizing its strategic significance in the Indo-Pacific region. These states are unlikely to align exclusively with Canada, given India’s continued strategic importance in the context of their Indo-Pacific interests.

The World’s Largest Democracy

India shares democratic values with Western countries, providing common ground for a strategic partnership against authoritarian China. However, in recent years, India’s democratic credentials have come under scrutiny. The Modi government’s pursuit of Hindu nationalism, allegations of minority rights violations, human rights abuses, and restrictions on free media and civil society have raised concerns among Western nations. During Prime Minister Modi’s state visit to the United States in June, the Biden administration faced pressure from lawmakers to address human rights concerns publicly. Seventy-five U.S. senators and members of the House of Representatives wrote a letter to President Biden, urging him to discuss human rights violations with Modi openly. Additionally, during Modi’s address to the U.S. Congress, several left-wing Democrats boycotted the event. The Biden administration opted not to publicly raise these human rights issues due to concerns about their negative impact on bilateral relations.

India’s recent reclassification from a “free” to a “partly free” country by Freedom House carries significant implications. Instead of serving as a champion of democracy to counterbalance authoritarian regimes like China, the Modi government’s policies appear to push India toward authoritarianism. The United States has been building its strategic partnership with India based on shared democratic values. If India continues on this trajectory towards authoritarianism, the very foundation of this partnership could become shaky. Given India’s status as the world’s most populous country, the fifth-largest economy, and possessing one of the most powerful militaries, such a shift could weaken the global order. The United States should hold India accountable for its deviations from democratic values and must not sacrifice its commitment to democratic values for short-term strategic interests.

Looking Ahead

Managing and containing the diplomatic tensions between Canada and India is crucial. Prime Minister Trudeau has clarified that Canada is not “provoking” India and expects full cooperation in the ongoing investigation. However, it is unlikely that New Delhi will readily cooperate with Ottawa. It is important to note that it is equally in India’s interest to improve its relations with Canada and its allies to counter China’s threat. India relies on Western countries as much as they rely on New Delhi. India’s response should ideally involve cooperation in the investigations if it believes it has nothing to hide. Unfortunately, India has chosen an escalatory route, issuing a travel advisory to its citizens in Canada and suspending visa services after vehemently denying Canada’s allegations. In this context, the United States must mediate to ensure that relations between its closest ally and strategic partner remain stable.

Saira Bano is an Assistant Professor of Politics at Thompson Rivers University. Her primary research interests are International Relations theories, great power politics, security issues, the nuclear non-proliferation regime, nuclear weapons concerns in South Asia, and the intersection of domestic politics and foreign policy. She received her PhD from the Centre for Military, Security, and Strategic Studies (CMSS) at the University of Calgary.

Image: Shutterstock. 

Throughout human history, technological progress has translated into military prowess. In most instances, the states that incorporate new technologies more quickly and effectively into their respective militaries have gained a significant advantage over their adversaries. The same is likely to be true for artificial intelligence (AI), with the United States and China currently locked in a competition for global AI superiority. This competition for AI and technological supremacy could very well dictate the future global landscape. 

Although China might disagree with the existence of such a technological competition, the United States firmly believes in it. This was evident in a speech by U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks on August 28, 2023. Deputy Secretary Hicks’ speech was significant for several reasons, primarily because it gave valuable insight into the U.S. military’s strategic thinking about China, AI and autonomous systems, and technological innovation.

At the core of Deputy Secretary Hicks’ speech was that the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) aimed to have a “data-driven and AI-empowered military.” Although AI has gained mainstream popularity within the past few years, great powers have been looking into the military applications of AI for decades now. From 2014 onwards, when the United States announced its Third Offset Strategy, it has been building the foundation for incorporating AI into its military. The 2021 report by the U.S. National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI) was perhaps the most telling. The report stated that the DOD was far from “AI-ready” and urged it to heavily increase investment by 2025 and “integrate AI-enabled technologies into every facet of war-fighting.” This same line of thought informed Deputy Secretary Hicks’ speech.

Deputy Secretary Hicks announced the “Replicator Initiative,” which she described as a new DOD initiative to develop quickly and field “swarms of low-cost air, land, or sea drones that could swarm an enemy.” She called it a “big bet” that could counter China’s most significant advantage—the ability to bring a mass of platforms and people to the battlefield. The DOD hoped to leverage “attritable, autonomous systems in all domains—which are less expensive, put fewer people in the line of fire, and can be changed, updated, or improved with substantially shorter lead times.” 

The initiative would focus on platforms that are “small, smart, cheap, and many.” The immediate objective of the Replicator Initiative is for the U.S. military to “field attritable autonomous systems at scale of multiple thousands, in multiple domains, within the next 18 to 24 months,” Hicks said. This statement deserves thorough analysis. 

Firstly, the scale of the autonomous systems is enormous and will apply to various domains. With the United States currently the technological hub of the world, the widespread use of autonomous systems by the U.S. military would likely force other states to adopt such systems to maintain strategic parity. Autonomous systems would likely proliferate to U.S. allies and strategic partners as well.

Secondly, and more importantly, is the stated timeline of the next 18 to 24 months. This is rather alarming, particularly given that issues surrounding AI ethics and regulation have gathered momentum recently. Although the United States claims to follow a “responsible and ethical” approach to AI in its Replicator Initiative, the specified timeline makes these claims hard to believe. However, it’s also important to note that the U.S. military has likely been working on this initiative for quite some time, so it would have specific rules to reduce the risks of incorporating AI in the military. How AI norms and regulations would affect a crisis, however, is a debate for another day.

Even if the United States had been planning such an initiative for years, it now feels confident enough to announce and implement it. Ukraine has acted as a testing ground for using drones and autonomous systems on the battlefield and has clearly demonstrated their power. Russia and Ukraine regularly deploy drones in military operations. The Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) estimates that Ukraine has lost a staggering 10,000 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) monthly. These drones are helpful for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) purposes, as well as for direct targeting of the adversary’s military and civilian infrastructure.

Deputy Secretary Hicks also directly mentioned China as the sole target for the Replicator Initiative. She added: “We must ensure the PRC leadership wakes up every day, considers the risks of aggression, and concludes, ‘today is not the day’—and not just today, but every day, between now and 2027, now and 2035, now and 2049, and beyond.” She also mentioned that “all-domain, attritable autonomous systems (ADA2) will help overcome the challenge of anti-access, area-denial systems (A2AD). Our ADA2 to thwart their A2AD.” This is a critical point. China’s A2AD strategy focuses on the South China Sea. The United States stating that it would use drones to counter China’s A2AD strategy indicates that it is willing, directly or indirectly, to intervene militarily in the region.

China, on the other hand, holds an entirely different understanding of AI than the United States does. Although China aims to become the global leader in AI by 2030, it has so far remained characteristically secretive about its military incorporation of AI. However, this has not stopped the United States from viewing China’s AI progress as a major challenge to its global leadership.

Ultimately, the future of warfare will be data-driven and AI-enabled, and, in many ways, it already is. However, we must better understand the potential dangers of integrating AI into autonomous military systems. Given the rapid pace of advancements in AI and the importance given to the military applications of AI by major states, the incorporation of AI into the militaries of major states is a matter of when not if. Deputy Secretary Hicks’ speech mentioned the impact of the Replicator Initiative on the speed and scale of the U.S. military. That will likely be the character of future warfare: it will be fought rapidly, and human combatants will operate alongside many autonomous systems. Although this might seem to be a more effective method of warfighting for some, the risk of escalation from autonomous systems might be too great.

Shayan Hassan Jamy is a research analyst in emerging technologies and global power competition. He tweets @shayanjamy.

Image: Shutterstock. 

The United States and its allies face a comprehensive, multidimensional challenge from Xi Jinping’s China. One axis of this unfriendly competition runs through the ballot boxes of the liberal democracies, where the evidence continues to mount that Beijing is seeking to undermine democratic systems throughout the Western alliance.

Take Canada: founding member of NATO, partner in securing North American air defense, and one of the United States’ most important commercial and political relationships. To the extent that Americans think about security vulnerabilities stemming from thoroughly benign Ottawa, it might be related to the air quality from last summer’s wildfires or a wincing memory of learning about the War of 1812, where Canadians disproved of Thomas Jefferson’s optimistic conjecture that conquering our northern neighbor would simply “be a mere matter of marching.”

Beijing appears to have conducted a comprehensive attack on Canada’s political institutions: allegedly meddling in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections with the intent of producing a chaotic Liberal minority government; allegedly targeting critics of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Parliament, such as the Tory shadow foreign affairs minister Michael Chong and the New Democracy Party’s Jenny Kwan; allegedly conducting efforts “to build a pliable cadre of politicians in the 2022 local Vancouver elections,” and, particularly shockingly, allegedly trying to recruit and run a candidate against Port Coquitlam, British Columbia’s anti-CCP mayor Brad West, that same year.

This unfolding scandal, the consequence of disquieting, anonymous leaks from the Canadian intelligence services, caught the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau flat-footed. It took over half a year before the Trudeau ministry’s sluggish response finally yielded the necessary convening of a 9/11 Commission-esque public inquiry to, inter alia, “examine and assess interference by China, Russia and other foreign states or non-state actors, including any potential impacts, in order to confirm the integrity of, and any impacts on” Canada’s 2019 and 2021 elections and “examine and assess the capacity of relevant federal departments, agencies, institutional structures and governance processes to permit the Government of Canada to detect, deter and counter any form of foreign interference directly or indirectly targeting Canada’s democratic processes.” Canada will now embark on a sorely needed public reckoning with the CCP’s electoral espionage, which will hopefully be able to provide conclusions and recommendations well in advance of the country’s next parliamentary elections.

Other U.S. allies have been publicly coming to terms with the threat of Beijing-backed interference. In August, the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service (NZSIS) took the unprecedented step of issuing a public report giving “the public … access to NZSIS’s consolidated analysis on New Zealand’s threat environment,” particularly singling out “the continued targeting of New Zealand’s diverse ethnic Chinese communities” via “activities carried out by groups and individuals linked to the intelligence arm of the People’s Republic of China.” In sum, Chinese political and election interference is likely to remain an ongoing concern for the foreseeable future.

At a minimum, this means that America and her democratic allies must “develop safety valves for swift and dispassionate reviews of election interference claims” to “speedily vet all interference claims and identify wrongdoers.” One can only hope that Canada’s public inquiry may ultimately show part of the way. (Nor, it must be noted, must other countries wait to learn from the Canadian experience via the public inquiry—Michael Chon testified in Washington about the Chinese party-state’s agenda of “transnational repression.”) But the development of these safety valves is only a first step, a means to an end of devising a real strategy to preclude China’s next move against a Western democratic election.

In his 2008 book Terror and Consent, Philip Bobbitt analogized the struggle against twenty-first-century globalized, networked asymmetric warfare using the concepts of supply and demand, noting that while “most analytic work on terrorism … focused on the demand side … the characteristics and the causes that motivate” terrorists, with the upshot that a strategy focused on driving that demand curve down necessitated a deterrence strategy with all the attendant “retaliatory requirements” of such an approach. Bobbitt argued that this focus ignored ways of reducing “the supply side of terrorism”—the field of risks and targets available to malign actors.

When it comes to handling covert election interference by China and other adversaries, however, the conversation often seems flipped, with a focus on how to control supply by hardening civil society against the effects of such chicanery. In Canada, one such proposal in particular, a foreign agents registry akin to the U.S. Foreign Agents Registration Act, has been bruited about for several years. No doubt the public inquiry will burrow into “the supply side of election interference,” and make recommendations on the advisability of a registry and other “supply” issues.

But the public inquiry, and any other reviews carried out against the People’s Republic of China’s electoral espionage operations, ought to also address the question of reducing demand. One downside of a supply-side strategy against foreign interference is the risk of going too far. Going to American history, neither the Sedition Acts of 1798 or 1918, nor the domestic anti-communism crackdowns of the 1950s, are fondly remembered for good and sufficient reason. Liberal democracies function best when they maintain “a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open.”

To that end, the public inquiry ought to consider how to restore deterrence against further and future interference in Western elections, such as by signaling to China and other interfering states that efforts to co-opt political activists, launder funds into the Canadian political system, or engage in candidate recruiting is the functional equivalent of an attack on critical infrastructure. The integrity of an election, after all, may well have the same value as the integrity of a bridge or a communications system. If it takes that path, the inquiry ought to also deal with how red lines can be communicated to adversaries and what might be considered a proportionate response. After all, the Chinese do not have similarly situated popular elections that the Canadians (or anyone else, for that matter) can execute a retorsion against.

As a result, such a conversation will ultimately need to bring in all Western governments under the threat of potential Chinese election intervention. What Professor Bobbitt noted in the terrorism context likely also holds true in these circumstances as well: “with respect to global, networked agents … the effective deterrence policy of one target state simply diverts attacks to allied states.” And while public reporting suggests that China only considered, but ultimately declined, to substantially interfere in the 2020 American elections, we should not wait for that shoe to drop in future contests here at home.

Zac Morgan is an attorney specializing in First Amendment and campaign finance law. He previously worked for the Institute for Free Speech, and currently serves as counsel to Commissioner Allen Dickerson of the Federal Election Commission.

The views expressed in this article are his own and do not express an official view of the U.S. government.

Image: Shutterstock.

Le Débat BBC Afrique - Africa Radio avec Tahirou Guimba

Le conseil d’administration de la banque de développement présidée par Serge Ekué a autorisé le financement de cinq nouvelles opérations. Revue de détails.

L’accord d’Alger pour la paix et la réconciliation au Mali était censé régler la crise malienne. 8 ans après sa signature, la mise en œuvre de l’Accord issu du processus d’Alger est compromise par la reprise des hostilités entre les parties signataires.

Longtemps, Singapour a fait figure de modèle de prospérité et de stabilité, inspirant la Chine. Mais la cité, qui a élu un nouveau président de la République — un poste en partie honorifique — le 1er septembre, connaît des ratés : migrants maltraités, hausse du coût de la vie... Le mécontentement populaire (...) / Singapour, Asie du Sud-Est, Chine, Autoritarisme, Société - 2023/09

Enhancing energy security empowers nations to heavily invest in renewable energy sources such as wind, solar, and hydroelectric power. But with a stable supply of LNG, Europe can also speed up its shift away from fossil fuels.

Thousands of Greek state workers are protesting against changes to the labour law proposed by the conservative Mitsotakis government. These include a six-day week, working hours of up to 13 hours and 'on-call' contracts.

Poland's ruling party has swerved even further right as elections approach, auguring badly for EU relations.

Au cours des prochains mois, Heinie Werth et son équipe se concentreront sur l’intégration des systèmes de Sanlam et d’Allianz à travers le continent. Rencontre avec le DG du nouveau géant de l’assurance.

Kooperation, Finanzhilfen, Handelsausgleich, aber keine Sanktionen: Das fordern Medienberichten zufolge die Mercosur-Staaten Brasilien, Argentinien, Uruguay und Paraguay. Sie reagieren damit auf die Forderung der EU vom Frühjahr, den Wald- und Klimaschutz im EU-Mercosur-Abkommen mit einer Zusatzerklärung noch einmal nachzubessern. Parallel dazu wurden ohnehin Regeln für den Absatz in die EU hinsichtlich der Entwaldungsfreiheit definiert.

Schwieriges Ringen um einen Abschluss

Eigentlich hatten sich die beiden großen regionalen Märkte nach mehr als 20 Jahren bereits im Juni 2019 auf ein gemeinsames Handelsabkommen geeinigt. Doch dann verabschiedete sich die damalige brasilianische Regierung unter Jair Bolsonaro von ihren Klimaschutzverpflichtungen und tolerierte großflächige Brandrodungen. Unter diesen Umständen war die EU nicht bereit, das Abkommen abzuschließen. Nach seiner Wahl 2022 kündigte Präsident Luiz Inácio »Lula« da Silva an, zu seiner früheren klimabewussten Politik zurückzukehren. Aber damit gab sich die EU nicht zufrieden. Die Vorgänge hatten in der EU die kritische Bedeutung der Entwaldung bewusst gemacht und zu einer deutlich härteren Gangart geführt: Die im Mai in Kraft getretene Entwaldungsverordnung verpflichtet europäische Importeure bestimmter Produkte wie Soja, Rindfleisch oder Kakao dazu, für eine entwaldungsfreie Lieferkette zu sorgen und praktisch nur noch entsprechend zertifizierte Ware einzukaufen. Dies wirkt sich auf die Produktionsweise, deren Dokumentation und damit auf die Kosten in Lieferländern wie Brasilien aus. Darüber hinaus wollte die EU auch das ausgehandelte Abkommen nachhaltiger gestalten: Eine Zusatzerklärung sollte entsprechende Schwächen des Textes auffangen, auch um eine Zustimmung bislang ablehnender EU-Länder wie Frankreich und Österreich zu ermöglichen.

Die Mercosur-Staaten kritisierten zunehmend die zeitgleich entstehenden unilateralen EU-Initiativen, die sie als übergriffig und konträr zur Idee bilateraler und damit gemeinschaftlicher Abschlussverhandlungen wahrnehmen. Dabei sieht die Entwaldungsverordnung als unilaterales Instrument durchaus Kooperationen vor, etwa bei der Entwicklung von Standards. In diesem Zusammenhang bietet sie auch Raum für eine günstigere Risikoeinstufung der Exportländer, was den administrativen Aufwand und die Kosten mindert. Ob diese Möglichkeiten in den Vertragsverhandlungen umfassend berücksichtigt wurden, ist nicht bekannt. Die im Februar und damit vor Inkrafttreten der Entwaldungsverordnung vorgeschlagene Zusatzerklärung der EU geht jedenfalls noch nicht darauf ein.

Mehr Kooperation für das Handelsabkommen gefordert

Die Antwort der Mercosur-Staaten auf die Zusatzerklärung der EU greift diese Kooperation nun konsequent auf: Sie fordern die Unterstützung der EU bei der Umsetzung der notwendigen Standards auch mit finanziellen Mitteln, schließen Handelssanktionen von den Verpflichtungen aus und bringen vor allem einen Ausgleichsmechanismus ins Spiel. Dieser soll greifen, wenn die EU einseitig Gesetze erlässt, die die Handelsvorteile aus dem Abkommen zunichtemachen. Letzteres ist aufgrund der Vielzahl neuer Nachhaltigkeitspflichten nicht aus der Luft gegriffen: Neben der Entwaldungsverordnung ist die ähnlich gelagerte, aber produktumfassende europäische Lieferkettenrichtlinie im Brüsseler Gesetzgebungsverfahren weit fortgeschritten, ein Importverbot für Produkte aus Zwangsarbeit wird vorbereitet. Alle diese neuen einseitigen Ansätze stellen zum Teil unterschiedliche Anforderungen an den Absatz in der EU in Bezug auf Entwaldung, Klimaschutz, Arbeitsstandards und Menschenrechte.

Die Forderungen der Mercosur-Staaten berühren die grundlegende Frage, wie Nachhaltigkeit und fairer Handel möglich sind. Europäische Gesetze können ausschließen, dass die EU und ihre Konsumentinnen und Konsumenten unbeabsichtigt zu Entwaldung, Umweltzerstörung, menschenunwürdigen Arbeitsbedingungen und Menschenrechtsverletzungen beitragen. Bei globalen Nachhaltigkeitszielen wie dem Klimaschutz durch Entwaldungsschutz können strenge Regeln aber dazu führen, dass der Handel in andere, weniger streng regulierte Absatzmärkte umgelenkt wird. Dann ist das Nachhaltigkeitsziel verfehlt, wenn auch nicht durch europäische Konsumentinnen und Konsumenten. Nachhaltigkeitsziele lassen sich daher nur mit Akzeptanz und Unterstützung der Handelspartner umfassend erreichen. Dazu können Handelsabkommen in kluger Abstimmung mit den genannten unilateralen Instrumenten beitragen. Im Gegenzug werden die Partner aber von der EU Klarheit darüber erwarten, welche Verpflichtungen sie übernehmen müssen und welche Beiträge die EU und ihre Mitgliedstaaten zu deren Umsetzung leisten können. Zudem werden eigene Handels- und Wettbewerbsvorteile bei gleichzeitig größeren Nachhaltigkeitspflichten stärker eingefordert werden.

Der Mercosur-Vorschlag bietet nun Optionen für die Verbindung von unilateralen Ansätzen und Handelsabkommen. Genau das hatte die EU selbst nach in ihrer Überprüfung von Nachhaltigkeit in Handelsabkommen vom Sommer 2022 vorgesehen. Der Vorschlag der Mercosur-Staaten sollte daher konstruktiv als Vorlage genutzt werden, wenn auch die Ausgestaltung einzelner Elemente noch weiterer Diskussionen bedarf: So sollte die EU - aus Synergiegründen und mehr noch als Zeichen der Wertschätzung - verstärkt versuchen, bestehende Nachhaltigkeitsansätze auf Mercosur-Seite, etwa zur Zertifizierung, zu nutzen und zugleich zu unterstützen.  Auch der vorgeschlagene Ausgleichsmechanismus könnte die dringend nötige Akzeptanz von Nachhaltigkeitszielen erhöhen. Er folgt einer in Handelsabkommen durchaus bekannten Logik. Denkbar wären Schutzzölle auf Seiten des Mercosur oder umgekehrt ein ausgleichender erweiterter Marktzugang in die EU - bei Einhaltung der unilateralen Nachhaltigkeitsvorgaben.

Die EU kann nun einen wegweisenden Beitrag leisten, um Nachhaltigkeit und Handel zu verbinden und einen fairen Handel auch aus Sicht der Partner zu fördern. Ein Scheitern des Abkommens würde vor allem China nützen, das einzelnen Mercosur-Staaten schon ein Handelsabkommen angeboten hat. Nicht zuletzt sollte die EU die Chance nutzen, mit einem zukunftsweisenden Modell für die Verbindung von Nachhaltigkeit und Handel den Weg aus der Sackgasse für geostrategisch wichtige Abkommen mit anderen Partnern zu ebnen.

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