Following the release of a report confirming that Iran has completed necessary preparatory steps to start the implementation of a plan of action aiming to resolve the nuclear issue, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Saturday welcomed the achievement of having reached “Implementation Day,” highlighting that he is heartened by the lifting of sanctions on Iran.

“This is a significant milestone that reflects the good faith effort by all parties to fulfil their agreed commitments,” said Mr. Ban in a statement issued by his Spokesperson.

The report was submitted to the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors and to the United Nations Security Council, after Agency inspectors on the ground verified that Iran has carried out all measures required under what is known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) between the E3+3 and Iran.

In July, Iran and a group of six countries – China, France, Germany, Russia, United Kingdom and United States – reached the JCPOA, entrusting the IAEA with verifying and monitoring Iran’s commitments.

Under the plan, Iran pledged never under any circumstances to seek, develop or acquire nuclear weapons, and the UN Security Council is to consider ending sanctions imposed for its Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) violations.

“The Secretary-General commends the dedication and determination shown on all sides,” the statement indicated. “He encourages the parties to continue to implement the JCPOA in the months and years ahead.”

The UN chief further underlined that this achievement demonstrates that international proliferation concerns are best addressed through dialogue and patient diplomacy.

“The Secretary-General hopes the success of this agreement contributes to greater regional and international cooperation for peace, security and stability in the region and beyond,” the statement added.

Meanwhile, IAEA’s Director General, Yukiya Amano, said “Implementation Day” paves the way to begin verifying and monitoring Iran’s nuclear-related commitments under the agreement.

“Relations between Iran and the IAEA now enter a new phase,” he said in a statement. “It is an important day for the international community. I congratulate all those who helped make it a reality, especially the group of countries known as the E3/EU+3, Iran and the IAEA Board.”

In line with its commitments, Iran will now start to provisionally implement the Additional Protocol to its Safeguards Agreement with the IAEA—which Mr. Amano said “increases the Agency’s ability to monitor nuclear activities in Iran and to verify that they are peaceful.”

“We have come a long way since the IAEA first started considering the Iran nuclear issue in 2003,” he noted. “A lot of work has gone into getting us here, and implementation of this agreement will require a similar effort. For our part, we are ready to get on with the job.”

Separately, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon welcomed reports today of the release of a number of Americans who had been detained in Iran, including Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian, and of a number of Iranians held by the United States following an agreement between the two Governments.

In a statement, he commended these recent moves to improve ties.

By Abdulrahman Al-Rashed

Although most of what Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump says is usually insignificant, this time he has hit the nail on the head. Commenting on the capture of 10 US marines by Iran, he wondered if Iran would have dared to do the same if the ships were Russian. It is clear that the Iranian authorities deliberately arrested and humiliated the soldiers before they were released. Tehran was confident that the consequences of this adventure would be benign. It is common for ships to enter territorial waters by mistake and then get guided out. Iran did not stop at arresting those who were onboard. Photos showing 10 soldiers surrendering and waving their hands above their heads were quickly circulated by the country’s official news agencies. While in captivity, the soldiers were interrogated by Iran’s official media, urging them to admit that they had entered Iranian waters by mistake and that they apologize for their actions.

The idea was to humiliate them.

It is difficult to believe that the Iranian leadership did not learn of the incident until at a later stage and then intervened for their release. The anger toward Iran for launching a missile close to another American aircraft carrier three weeks ago is still echoing in Congress and the US media. It is typical that Iranian naval decisions, such as detaining vessels or arresting US. personnel, turn into a political tussle at higher levels, considering the tensions that prevail in Gulf waters. It is important to look at Iran’s actions in recent times, which show no signs of change. This is the case even though only a few days are left for the lifting of economic sanctions and handing over of $50 billion as part of the implementation of the nuclear deal. Iran has recently surprised the world by testing a missile that is capable of carrying nuclear warheads, which was considered by the United Nations as a breach of the agreement.

The burning of the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and the Saudi consulate in Mashhad amount to another serious offense in the eyes of the international community. Following the arrests of the American sailors, as well as the missile test three weeks ago, the entire scenario suggests that the Iranian regime has not changed much even if the president seems honest when expressing his government’s desire to open up to the world.

The Iranian regime is not the same as most other countries. The president of the Republic, which should be the highest political office, does not in fact govern. The foreign minister does not necessarily reflect foreign policy positions. The supreme leader is considered infallible, even if he is wrong. There is no similar international example other than perhaps that of the Emperor of Japan — before the defeat in World War II and before he relinquished power.

The Iranian president does not have authority over the army and the influential Revolutionary Guard. The military has a political role and takes command from the supreme leader, not the president or the government. Therefore, they can veto any agreement or change any commitment made by representatives of the government even if signed. The supreme leader’s complete authority has caused a lot of frustration for all former Iranian presidents.

Mehdi Bazargan, Iran’s first prime minister after the revolution, pledged to release the US Embassy hostages in 1979. He later resigned following his disappointment over late Ayatollah Khomeini’s decisions related to the hostages. The same happened with the first president after the revolution, Hassan Bani-Sadr, who was forced to flee Iran, after Khomeini unleashed his anger at him. Although Hashemi Rafsanjani was president till 1997, and was close to Supreme Leader Khamenei, he was unable to implement agreements he signed, such as those with the Saudis.

Perhaps, the president who was embarrassed the most was Mohammad Khatami who was elected by popular vote and announced a program that showed openness to the world. But President Khatami found himself in an awkward situation with his people and the government because the supreme leader stopped him from fulfilling his obligations and did not protect him and his men from the domination of the Revolutionary Guard and the Basij militia.

Associations and newspapers close to the president had also been shut down. Even President Ahmadinejad, who was described as the supreme leader’s preferred president has faced enormous problems with the supreme leader’s office in the last two years of his rule. Recent incidents we have witnessed, such as the burning of the Saudi Embassy by protesters and then the Iranian president denouncing them as criminals, reflect the situation in Tehran. We should note that the launch of the missile near the American carrier, the detention of the two ships and the arrest of the American sailors can be seen as part of the power struggle under the mantle of the supreme leader.

These developments raise the most important question, can we really trust what the Iranian government says and the agreements it signs? If the supreme leader presents himself as the “representative of God on Earth,” we should then trust only his words and promises. The rest in the Iranian political circle are merely bureaucrats.

Let us not forget it was only one person who ended the eight-year war between Iran and Iraq; Ayatollah Khomeini had the last word. He announced from the city of Qom that he agreed to a cease-fire although he wasn’t happy about it. It was only then that the war ended even though mediators and Security Council resolutions had been working on this for five years.

A team of astronomers led by Tomoharu Oka, a professor at Keio University in Japan, has found an enigmatic gas cloud, called CO-0.40-0.22, only 200 light years away from the center of the Milky Way. What makes CO-0.40-0.22 unusual is its surprisingly wide velocity dispersion: the cloud contains gas with a very wide range of speeds. The team found this mysterious feature with two radio telescopes, the Nobeyama 45-m Telescope in Japan and the ASTE Telescope in Chile, both operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.

To investigate the detailed structure, the team observed CO-0.40-0.22 with the Nobeyama 45-m Telescope again to obtain 21 emission lines from 18 molecules. The results show that the cloud has an elliptical shape and consists of two components: a compact but low density component with a very wide velocity dispersion of 100 km/s, and a dense component extending 10 light years with a narrow velocity dispersion.

What makes this velocity dispersion so wide? There are no holes inside of the cloud. Also, X-ray and infrared observations did not find any compact objects. These features indicate that the velocity dispersion is not caused by a local energy input, such as supernova explosions.

The team performed a simple simulation of gas clouds flung by a strong gravity source. In the simulation, the gas clouds are first attracted by the source and their speeds increase as they approach it, reaching maximum at the closest point to the object. After that the clouds continue past the object and their speeds decrease. The team found that a model using a gravity source with 100 thousand times the mass of the Sun inside an area with a radius of 0.3 light years provided the best fit to the observed data.

“Considering the fact that no compact objects are seen in X-ray or infrared observations,” Oka, the lead author of the paper that appeared in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, explained “as far as we know, the best candidate for the compact massive object is a black hole.”

If that is the case, this is the first detection of an intermediate mass black hole. Astronomers already know about two sizes of black holes: stellar-mass black holes, formed after the gigantic explosions of very massive stars; and supermassive black holes (SMBH) often found at the centers of galaxies. The mass of SMBH ranges from several million to billions of times the mass of the Sun. A number of SMBHs have been found, but no one knows how the SMBHs are formed. One idea is that they are formed from mergers of many intermediate mass black holes. But this raises a problem because so far no firm observational evidence for intermediate mass black holes has been found. If the cloud CO-0.40-0.22, located only 200 light years away from Sgr A* (the 400 million solar mass SMBH at the center of the Milky Way), contains an intermediate mass black hole, it might support the intermediate mass black hole merger scenario of SMBH evolution.

These results open a new way to search for black holes with radio telescopes. Recent observations have revealed that there are a number of wide-velocity-dispersion compact clouds similar to CO-0.40-0.22. The team proposes that some of those clouds might contain black holes. A study suggested that there are 100 million black holes in the Milky Way Galaxy, but X-ray observations have only found dozens so far. Most of the black holes may be “dark” and very difficult to see directly at any wavelength.

“Investigations of gas motion with radio telescopes may provide a complementary way to search for dark black holes,” said Oka. “The on-going wide area survey observations of the Milky Way with the Nobeyama 45-m Telescope and high-resolution observations of nearby galaxies using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have the potential to increase the number of black hole candidates dramatically.”

By Dr Ghulam Ali*

It appears that the recently announced China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) will remain at the centre of Sino-Pakistan ties during 2016, and even beyond. The CPEC, signed in 2013, got a boost in April 2015 during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Pakistan visit, where he announced the allocation of US$46 billion for its completion. This is the largest investment China has committed to another country, and the largest Pakistan has ever received.

According to some informed quarters, China may add to this volume if the implementation of the CPEC moves forward smoothly on the Pakistani side. The corridor intends to connect China’s western region with Pakistan’s Gwadar Port via a network of roads, rail and fiber optics.

The CPEC is a part of Xi’s grand strategic concept of “One Belt One Road” (OBOR) to connect with over 60 countries and regions. Under OBOR, besides CPEC, China has initiated other projects such as the Bangladesh, China, India, and Myanmar (BCIM) Corridor; Silk Route in Central Asia; and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Route. But the CPEC is regarded as the ‘flagship’ project among them due to various reasons.

It is the only corridor that involves just one other country, Pakistan, and with whom China has a ‘trust’-based relationship. Other corridors consist of different countries with varying degrees of relations with China. Moreover, the CPEC can provide China an access to the Indian Ocean by reducing both time and distance. This route is not only shorter in distance but avoids the Malacca Strait and the vast Indian Ocean dominated by rival Indian and US navies.

For Pakistan, the CPEC can bring large-scale investments in the energy sector, infrastructure building, and industry, giving a boost to its moribund economy. Once Pakistan is prepared, China may also move some of its industry and bring Pakistan into its chain of production. Above all, the CPEC will increase China’s stakes in Pakistan which will leverage Islamabad in regional affairs. It is this backdrop that demonstrates the centrality of the CPEC in future Sino-Pak relations.

From the construction point of view, the corridor has been divided into short, mid and long-term projects. In 2016, progress or completion of some projects for infrastructure development and energy are expected. Actually, it is the top priority of the incumbent government to finish some projects at the earliest to show its performance to the public.

According to the understanding that exists between the two countries, Chinese state companies will build several CPEC-related projects. 2016 will thus witness a number of Chinese engineers, technicians and workers coming to Pakistan. There are already over 120 companies and 1,20,00 technicians engaged in different projects in Pakistan. This increased number of Chinese nationals in Pakistan will add to two-way exchanges. At the same time, however, it will also raise the question of their safety and security. Pakistan has established a special force of 1,20,00 men under the army to provide security to Chinese expatriates and guard their construction work. But given the law and order situation in the country, these measures appear insufficient. Lack of sufficient security may restrict the free moment of Chinese workers and tourists.

While negotiating the CPEC, China and Pakistan have taken into consideration the issue of low trade and economic ties and limited people-to-people contact. Both sides have realised that one of the main reasons for Pakistan’s bad economic and industrial performance in recent years is its severe energy shortage. Due to this, China has allocated a bulk of its funds (roughly US$33 billion out of the total US$6 billion) for the energy sector. In 2016, some energy projects built with China’s assistance are likely to start production. This will create a positive impact on the overall economic development of Pakistan.

Similarly, both countries have taken steps to promote two-way exchanges. China has increased the number of scholarships for Pakistani students and sponsored visits of people from different walks of life. Pakistan in return has promoted Chinese language in quite a short period of time. As result, Chinese visitors and businessmen can be seen in large numbers in the major cities. This trend can also be measured from the fact that two-way direct flights have risen from four to eight per week and are likely to increase. It can thus be inferred that bilateral trade and people-to-people contact will further increase in 2016.

Importantly, there is no significant defence-related deal in the CPEC. However, this does not mean that the CPEC has no strategic importance. Undoubtedly, infrastructure and the port developed for economic purposes could be equally useful for strategic goals if and when required. China seems to have more confidence in the Pakistani army’s ability to complete projects: Frontier Works Organisation (FWO), a branch of the Pakistan army involved in construction work, has been assigned to build roads, highways and bridges of strategic importance.

The two countries have recently signed a US$4-5 billion deal under which China will provide eight submarines to Pakistan, four to be built in China and the remaining in Pakistan. Another expected defence-related outcome of the year is the commercialisation of the Sino-Pak jointly built JF-17 thunder aircraft. According to Pakistani military sources, Malaysia and Sri Lanka have shown interest in its purchase. If finalised, the deal will pay huge dividends and will give a new boost to defence cooperation especially by encouraging more joint ventures. China could also showcase its joint production with Pakistan to other third world countries as a model.

Besides these mega defence projects, an increase in the number of high profile military visits, training programmes and joint military exercises are expected.

China will continue to meet Pakistan’s defence needs by providing large-scale conventional weapons. Taking these developments into account, it is expected that defence relations will not only remain solid but will deepen further.

Like in the past, during 2016 as well, Pakistan and China will continue the tradition of coordinating their policies on regional and international issues. Key areas of such coordination could be, but not limited to, terrorism, especially in Xinjiang and Afghanistan, security issues in West Asia, and India-Pakistan relations. However, parallel to this, it appears that China will also develop its policies in these areas independently of Pakistan – a trend that has started recently and will gain momentum through the year.

It is also likely that China, without effecting its ‘special’ relationship status with Pakistan, will continue its relative neutrality on the Kashmir dispute, putting emphasis on India and Pakistan settleling it through peaceful means. Apparently, under this status quo policy, China disregarded Indian concerns on the CEPC passing through this ‘disputed’ territory.

The chief irritant in Sino-Pak relations in the recent past has been sanctuaries to Uyghur separatists in Pakistan’s tribal areas, and some Pakistan-based militant groups’ support to them. This issue is likely to become less stressful in the current year. Pakistan’s military operation against militants in tribal areas has reduced the menace of terrorism while Beijing seems satisfied with Islamabad’s measures.

China however is dismayed at the controversy in Pakistan over the route of the CPEC. Some smaller political parties from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Baluchistan insist upon the western route that will pass through their provinces. On the other hand, the ruling Pakistan Muslim League (N) seems determined to build the eastern route which mainly passes through Punjab – its political constituency. Both sides have not shown any flexibility in their approaches. It is well over two years now since the announcement of the CPEC but no consensus has been reached. Some analysts term it this a much bigger challenge than security issues. There are fewer chances of a comprehensive settlement of the issue, which will affect the pace of the development work during 2016.

These above mentioned trends could be affected by certain factors. For example, an early consensus on the route controversy of the CPEC, an improved law and order situation in Pakistan, improved relations with Afghanistan and India could all have a positive impact on the CPEC, and through it, on the Sino-Pak relationship.

Despite the irritants, the relationship between China and Pakistan will not only remain steadfast but will further deepen in 2016 and will be centered on the CPEC.

* Dr Ghulam Ali
Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Pakistan Studies, Peking University, Beijing
Email: ghulamali74@yahoo.com

By Mitchell Blatt*

Donald Trump reiterated his own calls to add an extra 45 percent tariffs on Chinese imports at the Fox Business debate on Thursday night. After initially denying comments the New York Times had clearly reported him making, he later tried to justify those very comments that he claimed to not have made.

At the debate, he made the proposal because China had been accused of devaluing its currency:

What I said to the New York Times, is that, we have great power, economic power over China and if we wanted to use that and the amount — where the 45 percent comes in, that would be the amount they saw their devaluations that we should get.

However, in his original interview with the Times, he didn’t mention currency manipulation.

Here is what the Times reported:

In addressing the trade imbalance with China, Mr. Trump addressed an issue that has been a focus of his speeches going back to 2011, when he considered running for president when President Obama was seeking re-election. In the editorial board meeting, which was held Tuesday, Mr. Trump said that the relationship with China needs to be restructured.

“The only power that we have with China,” Mr. Trump said, “is massive trade.”

“I would tax China on products coming in,” Mr. Trump said. “I would do a tariff, yes — and they do it to us.”

The article didn’t mention “manipulation” once.

As for charges of currency manipulation, the International Monetary Fund said in spring 2015 that the Chinese yuan isn’t even devalued in the first place.

Finally, as a matter of fact, Trump is also wrong that “they [China] send [us] their goods and we don’t tax it — they do whatever they want to do.” In fact, almost every country has some tariffs. It is true that China’s tariffs are higher than America’s. According to the World Trade Organization’s “International Trade and Market Access Data” map, the U.S. has an average applied MNF tariff of 3.51%, while China’s average is 9.55%.

The MFN average of traded TL for Chinese goods to the U.S. is 3.6% on non-agricultural trade and 4.3% on agricultural (China profile at WTO). For U.S. exports to China, those numbers are 9.0% for non-agricultural products and 15.4% for agricultural products.

About the author:
*Mitchell Blatt moved to China in 2012, and since then he has traveled and written about politics and culture throughout Asia. A writer and journalist, based in China, he is the lead author of Panda Guides Hong Kong guidebook and a contributor to outlets including The Federalist, China.org.cn, The Daily Caller, and Vagabond Journey. Fluent in Chinese, he has lived and traveled in Asia for three years, blogging about his travels at ChinaTravelWriter.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @MitchBlatt.

Source:
This article was published by Bombs and Dollars.

India and the BRICS are giving the US dollar the boot? Is it really so?

The last time a country decided to dump the dollar in the oil business, the US destroyed it. Now India, the world’s third largest economy, and Iran have agreed to settle their outstanding oil dues in rupees. What’s more, the two countries may conduct all future trade in their national currencies.

This follows an agreement between Iran and India in mid-2011 in which both sides decided to settle 45 per cent of India’s oil import bill in rupees and the remaining 55 per cent in euros. In March 2012 the two countries inked the Rupee Payment Mechanism that allowed India to buy crude oil in its national currency. Iran then used the funds to buy products from Indian manufacturers.

Ironically, it is the US itself which is responsible for the dollar’s elimination from India-Iran trade. The Rupee Payment Mechanism was set up to skirt American economic sanctions on Tehran. Iranian oil forms a significant portion of India’s energy requirements. Similarly, the Iranians rely upon India for steel, medicines, food and chemicals.

Replacing the dollar

India and the US may have come closer in recent years, but that hasn’t blinded New Delhi to the toxic nature of America’s currency as well as manipulation by Britain.

The US is literally writing its own cheque with its unrestrained printing of the dollar, the bedrock of America’s post-war hegemony. It is the reserve currency status of the dollar that allows the US to fund its endless wars and topple governments with impunity.

Across the Atlantic, the Bank of England is involved in interest rate fixing of an order of magnitude that makes corruption in developing countries look puny by comparison.

Such financial manipulations and currency debasements are negatively and cyclically impacting the global economy. In fact, it suits the West to have periodic booms and busts because it keeps the emergent economies in turmoil. It keeps poor countries poor and the emergent ones stuck in what’s known as the “middle income trap”.

In his luminary piece, Geopolitics of Technology, Prof. Anis Bajrektarevic very accurately diagnoses: “the hydrocarbons and its scarcity phychologization, its monetization (and related weaponization) is serving rather a coercive and restrictive status quo than a developmental incentive. That essentially calls not for an engagement but compliance. It finally reads that the fossil fuels’ consumption (along with the policy of currency-choice and prizing it) does not only trigger one CC – Climate Change, but it also perpetuates another global CC – planetary Competition and Confrontation (over finite resources) – to which the MENA calamities are only a tip of an iceberg. Therefore, this highly addictive petrol – USD construct logically permits only a (technological) modernization which is defensive, restrictive and reactive. No wonder that democracy is falling short.”

India’s central bank has invested a significant proportion of its approximately $500 billion reserves in dollar denominated assets. Any sharp depreciation in the value of the dollar entails significant losses to this massive holding. In this backdrop, the idea of de-dollarisation has resonated with the country’s leadership in recent times.
In 2010, the Reserve Bank of India proposed floating the rupee as an alternative global currency. In a study titled ‘Internationalisation of Currency: The Case of the Indian Rupee and the Chinese Renminbi’, the bank said the dollar was likely to lose its predominance as the global reserve currency in the foreseeable future.

“The Indian rupee is rarely being used for invoicing of international trade,” the study pointed out. It argued that India needs to proactively take steps to increase the role of the rupee in the region. Also, the strength of the growing Indian economy has raised the issue of greater internationalisation of the Indian rupee.

Group remedy

Indian negotiators have actively pushed dollar-free trade at the annual meetings of the BRICS group. This group of five major economies – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – is actively engaged in speeding up the process of increasing mutual trade in national currencies.

The $100 billion BRICS New Development Bank (NDB) and a reserve currency pool worth over another $100 billion are both aimed at weakening the western chokehold on global financial flows.

According to India’s K.V. Kamath, the first president of NDB, exchange rate differences increased the cost of hard-currency loans to emerging and developing countries by 15-20 per cent. In his view, using local currencies would eliminate that risk and ease the burden.

The BRICS have already launched a Contingency Reserve Arrangement to enable the five member states to swap currencies. Another key advantage of using national currencies in trade and investment is that businesses do not have to hedge against two different currencies. Transition to trade in national currencies will also protect countries from the volatility of a particular currency.

China’s action plan

Meanwhile, the Chinese have surprised everyone with the speed with which the renminbi has acquired global acceptance. In a paper titled ‘The Renminbi Bloc is Here’, Arvind Subramanian and Martin Kessler of the US-based Peterson Institute for International Economics provide a dramatic picture of how the renminbi is growing in strength while the US dollar weakens.

Firstly, they say the renminbi is already the dominant reference currency in India and South Africa. Secondly, since mid-2010 the renminbi has made dramatic strides as a reference currency compared with the dollar and euro.

“The renminbi has now become the dominant reference currency in East Asia, eclipsing the dollar and the euro….The currencies of South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, Singapore, and Thailand now more closely track the RMB than the dollar. The dollar’s dominance as reference currency in East Asia is now limited to Hong Kong (by virtue of the peg), Vietnam and Mongolia.”

And they provide this chilling assessment: “The dollar and the euro still play a greater role beyond their natural spheres of influence than does the renminbi but that is changing in favour of the renminbi.”

Why chilling? The India-Iran rupee trade, Russia-Iran rouble trade and the worldwide acceptance of the renminbi will slowly erode the prestige of the US dollar, which will have dire consequences for American prosperity.

As a country that greatly benefits from – and exploits – the dollar’s reserve currency status, the end of dollar dominance will mean a sharp decline in American incomes and the ability to project power overseas.

About the author:
*Rakesh Krishan Simha, New Zealand-based journalist and foreign affairs analyst. According to him, he writes on stuff the media distorts, misses or ignores. Rakesh started his career in 1995 with New Delhi-based Business World magazine, and later worked in a string of positions at other leading media houses such as India Today, Hindustan Times, Business Standard and the Financial Express, where he was the news editor.

Algeria has approved a budget for 2016 at the limit of the politically feasible after a tumultuous parliamentary session.

By Gonzalo Escribano*

This ARI looks first at the manifestation of austerity in the new Algerian budget and the questions it raises for investment, growth and employment. It then explores the bitter opposition to the structural reforms contained in the legislation, especially insofar as they involve the private sector, foreign investment and reform of the energy industry. Finally it sets out the three lines that the Algerian government has opted not to cross in its 2016 finance bill, but that it will not be able to defer indefinitely: cutting subsidies, opening up to the outside and good governance.

Analysis

On 30 November 2015 the Algerian parliament approved a finance bill for 2016 at the limit of what was politically possible, which did not however prevent bust-ups in the debate amid grave accusations by the opposition. Members of parliament belonging to Front des Forces Socialistes (FFS), Parti des Travailleurs (PT) and the Islamists of l’Alliance de l’Algérie Verte (AAV) and the Front de la Justice et de Développement (FJD) tried by all the means at their disposal to thwart the bill, arguing that the new budget betrayed the social core of the Algerian Republic and enshrined its submission to an oligarchy of business interests (the so-called affairistes).

The bill seeks to stem the rapid decline in the Algerian economy caused by falls in the price of both oil and natural gas (Algeria indexes the gas price to the oil price in its contracts), which together account for almost 98% of Algerian exports. Fiscal overhaul is essential, but there are question marks over its design insofar as it prioritises cuts to investment rather than the bulk of spending, such as subsidies. Other elements implicit in the budget affect the scope of the structural reforms, which aim to remove impediments to the private sector and to foreign investment. In the charged atmosphere of Algerian politics these measures have been received not as a necessary attempt at reform amid a situation of crisis but rather as the umpteenth manoeuvre by the elite to generate new income and act as a Trojan horse for foreign investors, while sidestepping their responsibilities for former economic failings, with an economy that is just as dependent on a single export and as vulnerable to oil price falls as in the past.

A not always well-understood austerity programme

The new budget represents a reality check in the context of the deterioration of the Algerian economy.¹ A few figures are enough to show the size of the external shock suffered by the Algerian economy: the budget deficit forecast for 2015 exceeds 12% of GDP (compared with 7% in 2014); the balance of trade deficit will exceed 14% (4% in 2014) owing to the fact that exports fell almost 40% in the first eight months of the year; and since June 2014, when the fall in oil prices began, foreign reserves have plunged by more than US$35 billion, the Regulation Fund (FRR) by more than 30%, and the Algerian dinar has fallen in value against the US dollar by more than 25%.

The 2016 finance bill is based on the price of a barrel of oil at US$37 (income above this level is channelled into the country’s oil fund, or Fond de Régulation des Recettes (FRR) and anticipates a drop in spending of 9% compared with 2015, which is aimed at cutting the public deficit to the more manageable level of approximately 7%. By contrast, the revised 2015 budget barely cut spending by 1.5%, which accounts for the explosion in the public deficit in the current financial year. This time, however, there will be a significant adjustment, equivalent to more than 3% of GDP, comparable in size to the one that followed the 1986 oil price collapse, which led the country into recession, unemployment and austerity. There are serious concerns about its characteristics and its impact upon employment and growth, however. While it must be acknowledged that current expenditure is being cut by more than 3% for the first time in years, the reduction appears less because it does not substantially affect either social benefits or the main subsidies (food, housing and energy).

Although increases in the prices of energy supplied to large consumers and industry are planned, it seems unlikely that such measures will correct the distortions of one of the most heavily subsidised countries in the world. In fact, the new budget includes an over 7% increase in the cost of direct subsidies, meaning that they will account for 23% of total public spending; if indirect subsidies in the form of low energy prices are added the figure exceeds 40% of spending. Similarly, the recruitment freeze in the public sector fails to tackle in any meaningful way the excesses of a bureaucratic system that, according to Algeria’s own Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security, is overstaffed to the tune of one million civil servants. On the other hand, significant increases in defence spending were announced, which is in line with the trend of recent years and reflects the troubled security situation in the region.

In fact, the heaviest axe fell on public investment, with cuts of 19%, which may have an extremely negative knock-on effect on economic growth and employment, highly dependent as they are on public investment. In concrete terms, investments in infrastructure (roads, railways, power stations and so on) suffered a 50% cut. The balance sought by the government is a precarious one: while it has dodged political costs by not cutting benefits (by, for example, introducing means-tested benefits, rather than regressive benefits for the entire population) or public sector employment, this hampers its scope for stimulating economic growth and private sector job creation. This accounts for the fact that the government’s growth target, 4.6% for 2016, is generally regarded as unrealistic; the Economist Intelligence Unit’s forecast, for example, puts it at less than 3%.²

Controversial reforms

But the opposition is not focused (exclusively) on the considerable cuts or on the magnitude of the austerity measures announced for 2016. What really raised its ire was the combination of additional structural measures and a short-term bargaining strategy on the part of the government in pushing the bill through. In effect the government has taken the opportunity to reintroduce a previously annulled article, number 71, which allows it to decree, at the request of the Finance Ministry, the cancellation of budgeted spending if it jeopardises the balancing of finances, and transfer spending decisions between budget items without any parliamentary control (or scarcely any control from the rest of the government). Cast in this light, the reintroduction of article 71 seems to illustrate both the urgency of the country’s economic situation and the scant regard in which the government holds the parliament.

As if this were not enough, the bill includes almost all of Algeria’s recent economic bogeymen related to foreign investment and energy prices: in line with the newly-announced investment regulations, it seeks to relax regulation 49/51, which limits the shareholdings of foreign enterprises to 49% (although not of course in the energy sector and extending regulation 49/51 to new sectors: things will become clearer when the new investment code is published, claims the government); this would open up the possibility of channelling foreign investments through the Algerian stock market without guaranteeing the right of first refusal to the Algerian State (article 76); it would remove the obligation to reinvest the tax breaks obtained by the foreign companies (article 2); and finally it would mean increases in taxes on energy (articles 14 and 15).

Criticism from an economic perspective has suggested that the cuts could be too abrupt and have excessive consequences on investment, growth and employment, while raising questions about the effective application of the structural reforms. These are differences that by their nature can be resolved through dialogue within the government-opposition dynamic. The problem is rather the political situation in which austerity has finally had to be inserted into the government’s discourse. The claim that a corrupt business oligarchy controls the ‘system’ (and in particular the entourage surrounding President Bouteflika) is more plausible for a large part of Algerian society than the government’s willingness to carry out much-needed and long-heralded reforms.

It seems unlikely that this backdrop, already politically strained by the question of Bouteflika’s succession and the internal tensions of the ‘regime’, is the most conducive to an effective application of the steps that have been passed. And it is even less conducive to accomplishing others –even more controversial but equally necessary– such as in the energy sector or in the public administration. Unless the uncertainty surrounding the succession issue can be dissipated it seems unlikely that the major economic reforms can be credibly tackled. The new budget is a much-needed step, albeit incomplete and economically flawed. But it has been perceived as an exercise in political favouritism and opacity rather than an effort at reform, precisely when the country is most in need of reform.

Clearly this perception is not a new phenomenon, but nor is it entirely coincidental. Before his assassination, Mohamed Boudiaf had denounced the existence of a political-financial mafia, and similar accusations have intensified in recent years, forming part of the tensions at the heart of the Algerian regime. The dismissal in September of General Mohammed Mediène (alias Toufik), who had led the Départment du Renseignement et de la Sécurité (DRS) for 25 years, has been interpreted as a strategy by the Bouteflika clan to ensure a succession that favours their interests in a context where the security apparatus wields less influence.³

Mediène himself has appeared to hint that the main threat to Algeria is not the power struggle being played out in the inner sanctum for the right to succeed Bouteflika, or even Bouteflika’s illness, but the way money has intruded into all the country’s decision-making centres.⁴ Algeria has lost precious time in the wake of the Arab uprisings to improve its economic governance and respond to the demands of a society that is asking not simply for handouts but above all greater control and participation in the mechanisms for redistributing the wealth derived from hydrocarbons and foreign trade.⁵

Three limits for the (immediate) future

The combination of political disaffection and economic deterioration, especially if unemployment rises sharply as a consequence of the austerity measures, raises the prospect of difficult scenarios for a country that also has to deal with a deterioration in the regional security situation. Some analysts have raised the possibility of a vicious circle such as the one that characterised the end of the 1980s. Then, protests against the economic crisis and mass unemployment degenerated into violent outbreaks of urban rebellion that forced a political change, which was later overturned by the army after the election victory of the FIS in the first round of the 1991 elections. At that time the government lacked the economic resources needed to continue financing the economic ‘cushioning’, but also the political capital to appease the population with cosmetic political changes, as it did in 2011. In the event that it is unable to contain social discontent and that this turns into a threat to the regime’s survival, the government may feel obliged to resort to repression and move to responses similar to those of al-Sisi’s Egypt.⁶

Although it is important not to rule out the most adverse scenarios, it is also important not to get carried away in the comparison with the economic crisis the country went through in 1986 or in extrapolating the consequences. Algeria’s macroeconomic management has improved considerably since then, although the reform efforts the country was obliged to introduce in subsequent years were never seriously embraced when oil prices started to pick up again (in practice the more free-market oriented measures were repealed). The level of reserves and the oil fund provide a more comfortable cushion, and the country has virtually no foreign debt: in fact, it is not in its interest to get into debt at interest rates that are higher than the ones it obtains with its reserves or its oil fund, and as a result it will keep on financing itself with both (the government itself anticipates that the FRR will fall by the end of 2016 to a third of its 2014 level).

But above all the authorities appear more alert now than they were then, and to have reacted more quickly, to the gravity of the situation and to the fact that it may persist over time. All this should help prevent macroeconomic instability akin to that suffered in 1986-89, with a subsequently reduced impact on unemployment, which then exceeded 20%; forecasts indicate that unemployment will continue rising over the next few years but not exceed 12%, although the official figures both then and now systematically underestimate it. Political difficulties also hinder the structural reforms. Although the political circumstances that led to civil war in 1991 do not obtain now and social acceptance of the cuts may be greater, the government’s reluctance to cause excessive friction with social cutbacks, especially subsidies, is evident. This is the first of the limits the budget sought not to cross.

In addition to the internal limitations, the government faces the age-old Algerian mistrust of foreign investment and market liberalisation. For example, the opening up of the energy sector enacted by the hydrocarbons law of 1991, which was later revoked, appears not to be admissible now, although it seems equally necessary to attract investment to the sector and capitalise the country’s energy resources. The reforms needed in order to join the WTO (thereby paving the way to fuller internationalisation) and enter into wide-ranging free trade with the EU also run up against not only the country’s external imbalances but also with the resentment and mistrust harboured by large segments of Algerian society towards the private sector, which is even stronger in the case of the foreign private sector. Despite everything, the 2016 finance bill makes progress in this direction: timid, insufficient and overdue from a foreign perspective, but even so inacceptable to the Algerian opposition. The ferocity of the opposition to these measures, as well as the equation prevalent among a large part of Algerian public opinion that identifies opening up to the outside world with profiteering and corruption, constitute a second barrier that is hard to overcome. Historically it was only possible to do so with the enormous pressure of the oil price collapse in 1986.

The outcome of the headlong dash that the government set off on in 2011 in an effort to immunise itself economically from the Arab uprisings was predictable. What continues to be missing from Algerian economic policy is a firm commitment to reforms, especially institutional reforms. The government is perfectly well aware of the problems caused by corruption (keeping Sonatrach, the state oil company, paralysed for years for example) and an inefficient bureaucracy. It also knows that the profiteering conduct of many businesspeople and the administration itself constitutes a major obstacle to diversifying and liberalising the country’s economy.

The government needs to convince Algerians that the reforms are necessary in order to tackle serious economic difficulties, and that they do not merely constitute a new opportunity for the reviled oligarchs to seize control of them for their own benefit. In reality, it should have started by guaranteeing that the situation would not unfold like this, accompanying the microeconomic reforms and macroeconomic adjustments with reforms to the Algerian economy’s institutional framework: more transparency and competition in the markets, more efficiency in the public sector and credibility in the fight against corruption, and fewer political entrance barriers and parliamentary stratagems. All this would seem not only politically possible but even desirable, and should have constituted the starting point of reforms of 2011 onwards. However, a verifiable commitment to good governance appears to be the third limit that, although it could, the government does not yet wish to cross.

Conclusions

The Algerian 2016 finance bill represents an acknowledgement that the country requires far-reaching adjustments and reforms, which owing to their political difficulty always tend to be postponed for longer than is prudent and take a back seat as soon as the situation improves. Parallels with the 1986 crisis exist but should not be extrapolated unthinkingly. Among the differences are better macroeconomic management, the existence of financial buffers, awareness of the importance of avoiding rapid increases in unemployment levels and a traumatic collective memory of the outcome of the uprisings at the end of the 1980s.

The problem is that, although the government has pushed back the limits of what it believes to be politically possible, its measures satisfy neither the reformists nor the opposition, clearly for opposing reasons. Three limits seem to underlie the current government’s red lines:

• A reform of the system of subsidies to make them less socially regressive and burdensome, and at the same time more efficient in satisfying the basic needs of the most vulnerable groups in society.
• An opening up to the outside that endures over time and attracts the foreign investment that is essential to exploit the reserves of gas (conventional and, in the future, non-conventional) and paves the way to an integration of the Algerian economy into the European and global economies.
• Finally, and most importantly, a clear and verifiable commitment to good economic governance enabling the two aforementioned lines of approach to be legitimised and removing people’s suspicions regarding the private sector and foreign investors.

The greatest unknown quantity is to what extent an unpopular executive, devoid of the leadership of a president who is absent through illness, can step across these three limits without being overwhelmed by a combination of popular uprisings and palace plots. The rocky ride given to the budget in parliament foreshadows the discontent present in both arenas. Unless there is a sudden recovery in the oil price, as happened in 1990 as a consequence of the Gulf War, less uncertain is the size and speed of the deterioration in the socio-economic climate in the absence of the aforementioned reforms: it will be significant and swift. Unfortunately for the Algerian economy, the circumstances surrounding the world’s oil markets are very different now to those that obtained then, so that as things stand the sort of recovery in oil prices needed to lessen the urgency of crossing the three limits seems highly unlikely.

About the author:
*Gonzalo Escribano,Director of the Energy Programme, Elcano Royal Institute | @g_escribano

Source:
This article was published by Elcano Royal Institute as ARI 3/2016

Notes:
¹ See the Elcano Blog posts on how Algeria and the gas exporters have been hit hard by the fall in the oil price and the changes in the gas market.

² The Economist Intelligence Unit, ‘Government to Tighten its Belt’, 13/X/2015.

³ The Economist Intelligence Unit, ‘Clipping the Wings of the DRS’, 8/X/2015.

⁴ Farid Alilat,, ‘Algérie : dans la tête de Mediène, alias Toufik, l’ex-patron du DRS’, Jeune Afrique, 24/XI/2015.

⁵ G. Escribano (2015), ‘A Political Economy Perspective on North African Transitions’, in Zoubir & White (Eds.), North African Politics: Change and Continuity, Routledge, London & New York.

⁶ George Joffé (2015), ‘The Outlook for Algeria’, IAI Working Papers, nr 15/38, Istituto Affari Internazionali, October.

The Austrian government temporarily suspended the Schengen agreement, imposing full border control measures on everyone entering the country, Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann told the newspaper Oesterreich in an interview.

“Everyone who is coming to us would be carefully checked at the border,” Fayman told Oesterreich.

Chancellor Faymann said that from now on Austria would “similar to Germany” have a more strict border control and deport people who, lacking the proper refugee identification, out of the country.

“At border control points everyone has to show a valid ID to Austrian authorities,” Faymann said, adding that if the EU cannot provide the security at its external borders, countries should start controlling their own national borders, according to the Austrian newspaper.

Austria plans to use its army to stop refugees from entering the country. Most refugees are trying to reach Germany and apply for asylum there, but to get to Germany they need to hike across Austria.

The move of the Austrian government essentially means that the Schengen agreement is thrown out the window. The Schengen zone has currently 26 members, including most EU members and four non-EU members.

The idea behind the agreement is that the citizens of Schengen countries can access any country without the need to go through border controls and visitors can travel across the Schengen zone with one common visa that applies throughout the entire Schengen zone.

Earlier this week, other Schengen countries, including Norway, Sweden and Denmark, also temporarily suspended the Schengen agreement and restored border control measures at their national borders.

Europe is currently struggling to cope with a massive refugee crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing conflict-torn countries in the Middle East and North Africa in search of safety and refuge in the stable and wealthy EU states

By Kalinga Seneviratne*

Chinese President Xi Jingping officially launched on January 16 the much anticipated Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) describing it as a “historic moment” while his Finance Minister Lou Jiwei said in an interview that the launch of AIIB marked a milestone in the reform of the global economic governance system.

The $100 billion China-initiated bank took just two years to set up after it was initially proposed by President Xi during his visits to Southeast Asian countries in October 2013. In October 2014, representatives from 22 countries, mainly from Asia and including India, and strong U.S. regional allies – Philippines and Singapore – a signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to establish the AIIB and Beijing was selected to host Bank headquarters.

Japan and the U.S. immediately began to raise concerns about the proposed bank questioning its commitment to transparency and good governance. But, their attempts were dealt a severe blow when U.S.’s European allies including the UK, began lining up to sign as “founder members” in March 2015.

By December 31, 2015 when the list closed, 57 members have signed up to be founder members, among them 28 Asian and Arab countries, 13 European countries including Germany and France plus Russia, Australia and New Zealand.

Upset at UK’s initiative in roping in European allies, in March 2015, the Obama administration even went to the extent of issuing a statement calling upon the UK to “use its voice to push for adoption of a high standard” at the AIIB. In May 2015 Japan even went further by announcing that they would funnel $110 billion over five years via the Manila-based Asian Development Bank (ADB) to fund development projects in Asia, but was vague on how it will be spent.

It is well-known fact that China and most developing countries are unhappy with the U.S.-controlled World Bank (WB) and European-U.S. dominated International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Japan-controlled ADB. While China has been unhappy for sometime with the voting rights regime at the WB and IMF, developing countries have regularly raised concerns about the western powers, U.S. in particular, using these banks for political purposes.

President Xi reflected an upbeat mood in his opening address to the AIIB’s first Board of Governors meeting on January 16. “We are confident that when faced with the task of advancing world peace and development, so long as the international community has the will for consensus building and for win-win progress, we will be able to not only draw the big plan, but also turn it into reality,” he said.

He also said that the new bank would explore new business models and financing tools, and help member states develop more infrastructure projects that are of higher quality and at lower costs. The Chinese leader described the initiative as a Chinese attempt to make the international financial system more just and equitable.

“While developing countries make the mainstay of the AIIB membership, the institution also attracts a large number of developed members. Such a unique strength makes it a bridge and a bond to facilitate both South-South cooperation and North-South cooperation,” President Xi noted. ”The initiative to establish the AIIB is a constructive move. It will enable China to undertake more international obligations, promote improvement of the current international economic system and provide more international public goods.”

Chen Fengying, research fellow at the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, told China’s Xinhua news agency that the opening of the AIIB marks China’s “shift from a participant of the global governance system to a contributor to it,” reflecting a shift in the country’s ability to manage global economic issues.

Vietnam has also welcomed the new bank. Tran Viet Thai, deputy director of the Institute for Foreign Policy and Strategic Studies told Xinhua in an interview that as a founding member, Vietnam was actively involved in setting up operational rules of the bank. He added that since implementing opening up policies in the past decades, “this is the first time Vietnam has been directly engaged in setting up a bank which has significant role in the region and the world”.

In an article in the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of China, the bank’s President Jin Liqun, stressed bridging the digital divide between the regional and global economies would be the bank’s top priority. The bank will focus on digital infrastructure including fixed broadband networks, cross border and undersea fiber optic telecommunication cables, wireless sensor networks, satellite services, new generation mobile telecommunication networks, cloud computing and big data platforms.

“The Board of Governors will formulate policies based on the demand of members to help break down digital barriers and cultivate a new pattern of economic growth,” Mr. Jin noted. Transportation, clean energy, urban infrastructure, agriculture and logistics are some of the other priorities.

Pierre Gramegna, Luxembourg’s finance minister, speaking at the Bank’s opening ceremony said that the AIIB would be a boost to the Asian economy. “I can assure you, President Xi Jinping, that your initiative has received a lot of positive support from many members of the European Union,” he noted.

“The AIIB would enable China to join the international financial system, which would also include its efforts for the Chinese currency Yuan going more international and supporting the Silk Road Economic Belt. It would also enable China to take more global responsibility,” argues Dr. Yang Jin an associate researcher of Institute of Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Suma Chakrabarti, President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) who was in the audience during the January 16 launch, said in an interview with Xinhua that the Silk Road project this bank will to develop will reduce time taken for exports between China and Europe.

“If we can get the infrastructure moving this will reduce the costs of imports and exports both ways between China and Europe,” he observed, describing the formation of the AIIB as a “healthy additional international firepower for the international system.”

*Dr Kalinga Seneviratne is ASEAN Correspondent of IDN, the flagship of International Press Syndicate, for Asia-Pacific. He teaches international communications in Singapore.

Preparations are underway to proclaim an Islamic State branch in the Southern Philippines, while the Indonesian military has pre-empted IS plans to declare a provincial satellite in eastern Indonesia. Such a foothold will have far-reaching consequences for the stability of the region.

By Rohan Gunaratna*

The so-called Islamic State (IS) is likely to create IS branches in the Philippines and Indonesia in 2016. Although the Indonesian military pre-empted IS plans to declare a satellite state of the “caliphate” in eastern Indonesia, IS is determined to declare such an entity in at least one part of Southeast Asia. Preparations to proclaim an IS branch in the southern Philippines reflect the growing influence of IS ideology in the region.

The latest act of terrorist violence in Jakarta on 14 January 2016 highlights the clear danger posed to Southeast Asia by IS. Though their identities and affiliation have not been determined the modus operandi of the terrorists in attacking a major shopping mall in the commercial heart of the Indonesian capital, suggests a close parallel with similar attacks in Istanbul and Paris by IS-related groups. Although the number of casualties has been limited, thanks to the prompt response of the Jakarta police, the attacks by guns and grenades indicate a scaling up of the terror tactics employed.

After a year-long discussion between the local groups that pledged allegiance to the self-appointed caliph Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi in 2014-2015, the Shura Council appointed Isnilon Hapilon to lead the so-called Islamic State (IS) in the Philippines. Hapilon is the leader of the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) in Basilan (the largest island in the Sulu Archipelago). If IS succeeds in creating a safe haven in Basilan and mounts operations from the Sulu Archipelago into both Philippines and Malaysia it will pose a threat to the entire region. The creation of training camps will lure not only Southeast Asians but other nationalities as well – from Australians to Chinese Uighurs, who cannot easily reach Syria. Considering the importance given to Malaysia by Hapilon, Malaysians are likely to travel and join IS in Mindanao. The nationalities trained in the new IS province to carry out the IS vision are likely to be a threat to their home countries. In addition to enforcing the IS brand of governance, IS type beheadings and mass fatality and casualty attacks are likely.

The Context

In January 2016, IS announced the unification of four battalions in the Philippines and the allegiance of their leaders to Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the IS leader. The four battalions are 1) Ansar Al-Shariah Battalion led by Abu Anas Al-Muhajir; 2) Ma’rakah Al-Ansar Battalion led by Abu Ammar; 3) Ansarul Khilafah Battalion led by Abu Sharifah; and 4) Al Harakatul Islamiyyah Battalion in Basilan led by Isnilon Hapilon, who is the overall leader of the four battalions. Al Harakatul Islamiyyah is the original name of ASG. Referring to Hapilon as “Sheikh Mujahid Abu Abdullah Al-Filipini,” an IS official organ Al-Naba’ reported on the unification of the “battalions” of God’s fighters (“mujahidin”). The IS choice of Hapilon to lead an IS province in the Philippines presents a long-term threat to the stability and the security of the Philippines and beyond.

At the oath-taking to Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the battalions were represented by Ansar Al-Shariah Battalion leader Abu Anas Al-Muhajir who goes by the alias Abraham. Abu Anas Al-Muhajir is Mohammad bin Najib bin Hussein from Malaysia and his battalion is in charge of laws and other matters pertaining to jurisprudence. Mohammad bin Najib bin Hussein is an engineer and sundry shop owner. The other Malaysians present – Universiti Malaya comparative religion lecturer Dr Mahmud Ahmad alias Abu Handzalah and a former Municipal Council employee Muhammad Joraimee Awang Raimee – are on the Malaysian police wanted list since April 2014.

Although the leader of the Ma’rakah Al-Ansar Battalion could not attend the event, Abu Ammar sent a representative Abu Harith. The war battalion led by Abu Harith is from the island of Sulu (which is in the Sulu Archipelago), where the overall ASG group leader Radulan Sahiron is based. This demonstrated a split in ASG, where a small but important faction had defected to IS.

After pledging allegiance to IS, Ansarul Khilafah Philippines released a video threatening to deploy suicide bombers in the Philippines and make the country a “graveyard” for American soldiers. On two occasions, attempts by the group to transport weapons to Mujahidin Indonesia Timur (MIT) were disrupted by the Philippine National Police working with their Indonesian counterparts. Based in South Cotabato Province, Sarangani Province and General Santos City, Ansarul Khilafah Philippines is led by Abu Sharifah, who is also fluent in Tagalog.

Emerging Threat

The Philippines has been an important arena for domestic, regional and global terrorist groups for 20 years. Since 1994, when Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) established their first training camp, Hudaibiyah, the Philippines emerged as the training ground for Indonesians, Malaysians, Singaporeans, Thai Muslims and Arabs. Most of the instructors were non Filipinos: they were either Indonesians or Arabs trained by Al Qaeda. In addition to the Sulu Archipelago transforming into a base for training and operations, the area is a strategic bridge linking the Philippines and Malaysia.

With the rise of IS, the ASG kidnapped hostages of various nationalities. While some hostages escaped, others were released after payment, and others were killed. The Malaysian businessman and engineer Bernard Then Ted Fen was beheaded in November 2015. The latest kidnapping by ASG was on September 2015, when a Canadian, Norwegian and a Filipina were kidnapped in Samal Island and transported by two seacraft to Basilan.

In addition to moving IS ideologues to implement the IS brand of Islam, it is very likely that IS will dispatch its explosives experts, combat tacticians and other operatives. The IS plans to declare a state in the Mindanao present a very real threat to the stability and security of Southeast Asia, a region that has hitherto enjoyed relative political stability, social harmony and economic growth.

Government Response

The Moro struggle for independence in Mindanao has been one of the world’s oldest. The Government of Philippines made significant gains by engaging the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in a successful peace process brokered by the Malaysian Government. Nonetheless, the ASG, as a separate and more militant entity, as well as a few smaller groups, continue to fight to create an independent Moro homeland. The Philippine military lacks an operational capability to dismantle the insurgent and terrorist infrastructure in Mindanao especially in the Sulu archipelago.

The Philippine military has dismissed the IS publicity on the unification of the four battalions as propaganda. The sense of urgency to prevent Mindanao from emerging as an IS epicentre is not shared by all. Until an IS declaration of a satellite state, and even attacks mounted in the name of IS, it will be business-as-usual for some in the Philippines.

Shortly, IS will declare a satellite of the caliphate in the Sulu Archipelago. Ideally, President Benigno Aquino should pre-empt the IS declaration. To win Muslim hearts and minds and prevent Muslim support for IS, the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) should move not in a role of containing, isolating and eliminating the ASG, but with a mandate to economically develop the region. President Aquino has to mobilise national and international resources to help achieve this mandate.

To preempt the declaration of a IS satellite state (wilayat) in the Philippines and IS branch shortly, the AFP should deploy in strength in Sulu, Basilan and Tawi Tawi. If the AFP can dominate the Sulu Archipelago, IS cannot successfully declare, operate and expand its satellite in the Philippines with implications for Malaysia, the region and beyond.

*Rohan Gunaratna is Professor of Security Studies at the S. Rajaratnam School of Security Studies (RSIS) and head of the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) at RSIS, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. An earlier version of this article appeared in The Straits Times.

Three out of four Iranian-Americans released from prison in Iran have left Tehran aboard a Swiss aircraft.

The three – Jason Rezaian, The Washington Post’s Tehran bureau chief; Saeed Abedini, a pastor; and Amir Hekmati, an ex-marine – were confirmed to be leaving by a US official.

They will stop in Switzerland, before heading to a US military facility to be checked over by medical staff, The Washington Post reports.

The fourth, Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari was not aboard the aircraft.

A fifth prisoner, American student Matthew Trevithick was released separately from the group of four, according to a US official.

“We can confirm that our detained US citizens have been released and that those who wished to depart from Iran have left,” a senior US administration official announced.

Lawyers also confirmed the release of several Iranian-Americans held in US prisons after being charged or convicted for violating sanctions.

Seven Iranians are said to have been freed from jail in the United States as part of a prisoner exchange.

The swap came on the back of the announcement a landmark nuclear deal had been negotiated between six world powers —including the US — and Iran.

United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon “commends the move to improve ties,” he said in Dubai. Reuters news agency reports he is “heartened” by the lifting of sanctions.

Original article

Iranian President Hassan Rohani on Sunday hailed the nuclear deal with world powers, implemented late the previous evening, as a “golden page” in the country’s history, and looked forward to an economic future less dependent on oil.

Iran emerged from years of economic isolation on Saturday when world powers lifted crippling sanctions after confirming that Tehran had curbed its nuclear program as part of a deal agreed last year.

“The nuclear deal is an opportunity that we should use to develop the country, improve the welfare of the nation, and create stability and security in the region,” Rohani said as he presented a draft budget for the next fiscal year to parliament.

Speaking before the parliament in comments broadcast live on state television, Rohani said, “In (implementing) the deal, all are happy except Zionists, warmongers, sowers of discord among Islamic nations and extremists in the US, the rest are happy.”

Rohani said the deal has “opened new windows for engagement with the world.”

A strong supporter of the agreement, Rohani sent out a celebratory tweet calling it a “glorious victory” late Saturday night while the speeches in Vienna were still taking place.

Rohani also said the deal was a win for all negotiating parties and all factions inside Iran. “Nobody has been defeated in the deal neither inside the country nor the countries that were negotiating with us,” he said, referring to the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, maintained his strong opposition to the deal. Speaking at his weekly Cabinet meeting, he said, “The Israel policy remains as it was — not to allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon.”
Netanyahu was a strong public opponent of the negotiations and drew the ire of the Obama administration last year by speaking in front of the US Congress in an attempt to prevent the agreement. On Sunday he repeated his contention that the deal will strengthen and embolden Tehran, leading to greater regional instability.

“What is clear is that Iran will now have more resources to dedicate to their terrorism and aggression in the region and in the world, and Israel is prepared to deal with any threat,” he said.

Rohani said Iran should use the expected influx of money and investments to spark the “economic mutation” of the country, creating jobs and enhancing quality-of-life for Iranian citizens. Iran has been suffering double-digit inflation and unemployment rates for years.

He also said Iran now needs political tranquility to best benefit from the new economic reality. “All should prevent any domestic and foreign trivialities that thwart us,” he said. “Any irrelevant and diverting dispute is against national expedience.”

Rohani said his country needs up to $50 billion in foreign investment per year to reach its goal of eight-percent annual growth.

For Iran, long out in the economic cold over its contested atomic program, implementing the nuclear deal will be a welcome thaw.

More than $30 billion in assets overseas will become immediately available to the Islamic Republic. Official Iranian reports have set the total amount of frozen Iranian assets overseas at $100 billion.

A European oil embargo on Iran will end. Already, some 38 million barrels of oil are in Iran’s floating reserves, ready to enter the market, according to the International Energy Agency.

Celebrations in Tehran were relatively muted at first, because the Vienna implementation announcement came well after midnight. But on Sunday, many Tehran residents expressed optimism about Iran’s future economic prospects.

“Unbelievable! This is a day without sanction after years,” said taxi driver Reza Khoei. “I lost my technical job in a petrochemical complex in south of Iran because of the damn sanctions.”

Fahimeh Lotfi, a housewife and mother of two, said, “I am very happy. Now we are like other countries. No more will we to go to bed every night while worrying about the worsening situation. Bravo Rohani!“

Hassan Dehghani, a 26-year-old street sweeper, said “I hope this helps the municipality to pay my salary on time. Sometimes they pay us with months of delay.”

But not everyone was enthused about the agreement, which limits Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of sanctions. The deal is designed with so-called “snap-back” elements that can quickly restore sanctions if Iran is judged to be in violation of its obligations.

Tehran resident Hossein Barati angrily asked, “If America restores the sanctions, can Iran restore its nuclear program? No it can’t! They dismantled all the centrifuges. How many years will it take Iran to restore its program?“
Tehran newspapers largely welcomed the implementation of the deal.

The state-owned IRAN daily wrote on its front-page, “The collapse of sanctions.” The pro-reform Shargh daily, allocated part of its front page to pictures of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini with the headline: “Now, without sanctions.”

Even the hard-line Kayhan daily remained impartial and said, “It is the time of implementation of promises,” by the West.

US President Barack Obama on Sunday hailed Iran’s release of five American hostages, as well as the implementation of the negotiated nuclear deal. Following is the complete transcription of Obama’s statement as released by the White House.

By US President Barack Obama

This is a good day, because, once again, we’re seeing what’s possible with strong American diplomacy.

As I said in my State of the Union address, ensuring the security of the United States and the safety of our people demands a smart, patient and disciplined approach to the world. That includes our diplomacy with the Islamic Republic of Iran. For decades, our differences with Iran meant that our governments almost never spoke to each other. Ultimately, that did not advance America’s interests. Over the years, Iran moved closer and closer to having the ability to build a nuclear weapon. But from Presidents Franklin Roosevelt to John F. Kennedy to Ronald Reagan, the United States has never been afraid to pursue diplomacy with our adversaries. And as President, I decided that a strong, confident America could advance our national security by engaging directly with the Iranian government.

We’ve seen the results. Under the nuclear deal that we, our allies and partners reached with Iran last year, Iran will not get its hands on a nuclear bomb. The region, the United States, and the world will be more secure. As I’ve said many times, the nuclear deal was never intended to resolve all of our differences with Iran. But still, engaging directly with the Iranian government on a sustained basis, for the first time in decades, has created a unique opportunity — a window — to try to resolve important issues. And today, I can report progress on a number of fronts.

First, yesterday marked a milestone in preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Iran has now fulfilled key commitments under the nuclear deal. And I want to take a moment to explain why this is so important.

Over more than a decade, Iran had moved ahead with its nuclear program, and, before the deal, it had installed nearly 20,000 centrifuges that can enrich uranium for a nuclear bomb. Today, Iran has removed two-thirds of those machines. Before the deal, Iran was steadily increasing its stockpile of enriched uranium — enough for up to 10 nuclear bombs. Today, more than 98 percent of that stockpile has been shipped out of Iran — meaning Iran now doesn’t have enough material for even one bomb. Before, Iran was nearing completion of a new reactor capable of producing plutonium for a bomb. Today, the core of that reactor has been pulled out and filled with concrete so it cannot be used again.

Before the deal, the world had relatively little visibility into Iran’s nuclear program. Today, international inspectors are on the ground, and Iran is being subjected to the most comprehensive, intrusive inspection regime ever negotiated to monitor a nuclear program. Inspectors will monitor Iran’s key nuclear facilities 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. For decades to come, inspectors will have access to Iran’s entire nuclear supply chain. In other words, if Iran tries to cheat — if they try to build a bomb covertly — we will catch them.

So the bottom line is this. Whereas Iran was steadily expanding its nuclear program, we have now cut off every single path that Iran could have used to build a bomb. Whereas it would have taken Iran two to three months to break out with enough material to rush to a bomb, we’ve now extended that breakout time to a year — and with the world’s unprecedented inspections and access to Iran’s program, we’ll know if Iran ever tries to break out.

Now that Iran’s actions have been verified, it can begin to receive relief from certain nuclear sanctions and gain access to its own money that had been frozen. And perhaps most important of all, we’ve achieved this historic progress through diplomacy, without resorting to another war in the Middle East.

I want to also point out that by working with Iran on this nuclear deal, we were better able to address other issues. When our sailors in the Persian Gulf accidentally strayed into Iranian waters that could have sparked a major international incident. Some folks here in Washington rushed to declare that it was the start of another hostage crisis. Instead, we worked directly with the Iranian government and secured the release of our sailors in less than 24 hours.

This brings me to a second major development — several Americans unjustly detained by Iran are finally coming home. In some cases, these Americans faced years of continued detention. And I’ve met with some of their families. I’ve seen their anguish, how they ache for their sons and husbands. I gave these families my word — I made a vow — that we would do everything in our power to win the release of their loved ones. And we have been tireless. On the sidelines of the nuclear negotiations, our diplomats at the highest level, including Secretary Kerry, used every meeting to push Iran to release our Americans. I did so myself, in my conversation with President Rouhani. After the nuclear deal was completed, the discussions between our governments accelerated. Yesterday, these families finally got the news that they have been waiting for.

Jason Rezaian is coming home. A courageous journalist for The Washington Post, who wrote about the daily lives and hopes of the Iranian people, he’s been held for a year and a half. He embodies the brave spirit that gives life to the freedom of the press. Jason has already been reunited with his wife and mom.

Pastor Saeed Abedini is coming home. Held for three and half years, his unyielding faith has inspired people around the world in the global fight to uphold freedom of religion. Now, Pastor Abedini will return to his church and community in Idaho.

Amir Hekmati is coming home. A former sergeant in the Marine Corps, he’s been held for four and a half years. Today, his parents and sisters are giving thanks in Michigan.

Two other Americans unjustly detained by Iran have also been released — Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari and Matthew Trevithick, an Iranian — who was in Iran as a student. Their cases were largely unknown to the world. But when Americans are freed and reunited with their families, that’s something that we can all celebrate.

So I want to thank my national security team — especially Secretary Kerry; Susan Rice, my National Security Advisor; Brett McGurk; Avril Haines; Ben Rhodes — our whole team worked tirelessly to bring our Americans home, to get this work done. And I want to thank the Swiss government, which represents our interests in Iran, for their critical assistance.

And meanwhile, Iran has agreed to deepen our coordination as we work to locate Robert Levinson — missing from Iran for more than eight years. Even as we rejoice in the safe return of others, we will never forget about Bob. Each and every day, but especially today, our hearts are with the Levinson family, and we will not rest until their family is whole again.

In a reciprocal humanitarian gesture, six Iranian–Americans and one Iranian serving sentences or awaiting trial in the United States are being granted clemency. These individuals were not charged with terrorism or any violent offenses. They’re civilians, and their release is a one-time gesture to Iran given the unique opportunity offered by this moment and the larger circumstances at play. And it reflects our willingness to engage with Iran to advance our mutual interests, even as we ensure the national security of the United States.

So, nuclear deal implemented. American families reunited. The third piece of this work that we got done this weekend involved the United States and Iran resolving a financial dispute that dated back more than three decades. Since 1981, after our nations severed diplomatic relations, we’ve worked through a international tribunal to resolve various claims between our countries. The United States and Iran are now settling a longstanding Iranian government claim against the United States government. Iran will be returned its own funds, including appropriate interest, but much less than the amount Iran sought.

For the United States, this settlement could save us billions of dollars that could have been pursued by Iran. So there was no benefit to the United States in dragging this out. With the nuclear deal done, prisoners released, the time was right to resolve this dispute as well.

Of course, even as we implement the nuclear deal and welcome our Americans home, we recognize that there remain profound differences between the United States and Iran. We remain steadfast in opposing Iran’s destabilizing behavior elsewhere, including its threats against Israel and our Gulf partners, and its support for violent proxies in places like Syria and Yemen. We still have sanctions on Iran for its violations of human rights, for its support of terrorism, and for its ballistic missile program. And we will continue to enforce these sanctions, vigorously. Iran’s recent missile test, for example, was a violation of its international obligations. And as a result, the United States is imposing sanctions on individuals and companies working to advance Iran’s ballistic missile program. And we are going to remain vigilant about it. We’re not going to waver in the defense of our security or that of our allies and partners.

But I do want to once again speak directly to the Iranian people. Yours is a great civilization, with a vibrant culture that has so much to contribute to the world — in commerce, and in science and the arts. For decades, your government’s threats and actions to destabilize your region have isolated Iran from much of the world. And now our governments are talking with one another. Following the nuclear deal, you — especially young Iranians — have the opportunity to begin building new ties with the world. We have a rare chance to pursue a new path — a different, better future that delivers progress for both our peoples and the wider world. That’s the opportunity before the Iranian people. We need to take advantage of that.

And to my fellow Americans, today, we’re united in welcoming home sons and husbands and brothers who, in lonely prison cells, have endured an absolute nightmare. But they never gave in and they never gave up. At long last, they can stand tall and breathe deep the fresh air of freedom.

As a nation, we face real challenges, around the world and here at home. Many of them will not be resolved quickly or easily. But today’s progress — Americans coming home, an Iran that has rolled back its nuclear program and accepted unprecedented monitoring of that program — these things are a reminder of what we can achieve when we lead with strength and with wisdom; with courage and resolve and patience. America can do — and has done — big things when we work together. We can leave this world and make it safer and more secure for our children and our grandchildren for generations to come.

I want to thank once again Secretary Kerry; our entire national security team, led by Susan Rice. I’m grateful for all the assistance that we received from our allies and partners. And I am hopeful that this signals the opportunity at least for Iran to work more cooperatively with nations around the world to advance their interests and the interests of people who are looking for peace and security for their families.

Thank you so much. God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.

After the initial excitement and euphoria over the draft agreement on climate issues arrived at the Paris climate conference, careful study of the proceedings, deliberations and agreements arrived at the conference, cannot but make one suspect that the conference has ended as a talk show,with several uncertainties and conflicts of interests remaining unsolved.

The Paris climate summit acknowledges the need to aggressively address climate change, but it fails to detail with clarity as to how that will be done.

Aggregate pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions made by the nation-states of the world fail far short of what is needed to begin to address the looming catastrophic climate change.

The agreement fails to acknowledge the need to decarbonize the world economy, by not mentioning fossil fuels such as crude oil, coal in the agreement.

The agreement sets a floor on conduct of countries but not the ceiling on what people in the world have a right to demand from the governments of the world.

Targets fixed during the conference remain voluntary and the required actions are unspecified and appear daunting.

The decision to conduct review of a 1.5 deg C warming limit by 2018 may come too late, as the world is well on the way to 1.5 deg C with present greenhouse gas levels. It now appears that staying below 2 deg C warming is in itself a formidable task.

Interest and responsibilities of the participating countries diverge widely, ranging from the post industrial economies of the global north to industrializing nations such as China and India to the most vulnerable nations already facing climate change disruptions, such as Kiribati, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu.

Paris deal may be the best deal that could have been struck given the limits of the political economic environment, but that does not mean that it has done what is necessary to protect the life support systems of the actual environment.

Economic risk

Economic impact of large scale reduction of reliance on fossil fuels is untested and not clear and have been conspicuous by lack of detailed discussions during the conference.

Political risks

Political direction of USA?

Currently, in USA all the leading Republican candidates for 2016 Presidential election oppose significant policy measures to mitigate climate change, and most have distanced themselves from mainstream scientific views.

A new skeptical Republican President may abandon Obama Administration’s current climate change commitments, including its emissions-reductions target for 2025 and, in effect, withdraw support for the Paris Agreement. He may undermine Environmental Protection Agency’s efforts via the Clean Air Act to curb emissions from power stations. If Republicans retain clear majorities in the House and Senate after 2016, additional legislative and fiscal initiatives to thwart mitigation efforts are highly probable.

Political direction of China?

Will China stick true to its commitment if it faces a large economic downturn as is forecast by leading economists, as its shifting from a manufacturing/investment led to consumption led economy ?

Will the talk lead to results ?

Real work on decisions made during COP21, has to begin now and in earnest globally by all major countries. Agreements-in-principle needs to be translated into action by individual member countries. Developed nations need to determine their projected peak emissions level plan with urgency.

This requires more specific and aggressive policies in a massive expansion of clean-energy investment, and industry needs to plan to shift away from fossil fuels.

While developing nations are allowed more flexibility, due to rising populations and pollution levels due to economic growth, they need to make a careful assessment of total cost of polluting with fossil fuels and the cleanup thereafter, and hence decide their fossil fuel based energy profile carefully.

The first revisiting of 2025 and 2030 goals will come in 2018, with another stock-taking review in 2023.
Going by current trends in global warming, the earth would have become warmer in 2018 by 0.1C compared to 2015 levels, moving closer to the target of 1.5 deg C warming levels. There is little time to act.

The forces of globalization have not been able to dismantle national, sub-national and ethnic identities. Apologists of globalization follow the logic of the modernists who emphasize that socio-economic and political modernization would gradually replace ethnic, religious and other primordial identities in favor of a national identity. This reasoning of modernists has not proved right.

Similarly, the argument that increased modernization and interactions among people across nations unleashed by the forces of globalization would dampen the inclination among people to cling to their national, sub-national and ethnic identities seems to be flawed. Modernity has not replaced tradition as the latter enjoys mass appeal not only because it provides a sense of rootedness amidst economic, political and social changes, it has also scientific and rational elements (the core elements of modernity) within it. Globalization implies expansion of market economy under the supervision of the global financial institutions such as IMF, World Bank and WTO and at the same time underlines the growth of political institutions beyond nation-states as manifested in the evolution of European Union and universalization of norms as witnessed in the process of universalization of human rights norms. However, neither the political institutions nor the human rights norms have transgressed the nation-state system in reality.

Globalization seems to be an unfinished project given the complications involved in the process. While the more developed countries want free flow of capital, they wish to see more restrictions in the movement of labor. On the other hand, developing and underdeveloped countries wish to see their people getting employment in different parts of the globe given their small and underdeveloped economy but they do not favor free-flow of capital lest their indigenous small-scale and handicraft industries should get washed out.

Additionally, most of the developing economies perceive globalization as it has manifested itself, as of now, as westernization and fear their culture being swamped by western culture and value system. The negative fallouts of globalization like increasing inequalities both in terms of unequal distribution of wealth and knowledge, displacement and migration and rise of consumerism remain unresolved and have pushed individuals further to cling to their identities at various levels. In this context, the Bhutanese attempt at redefining its development in terms of Gross

National Happiness can be justified in its defense against anti-democratic and consumerist tendencies of globalization. In the US, there is a growing feeling among certain sections that Indians are ‘job stealers’ even though globalization has opened up enormous opportunities for Indians in different sectors of the American economy. There are cases of racial onslaughts on Indian students in Australia. In India, like many other countries, forces of modernization and globalization have not prevented fringe groups from making attempts at redefining the nation by invoking history. Similarly, other South Asian countries have not hesitated to assert their own identity in order to distinguish themselves from India’s more prominent legacy.

Contemporary liberal theories defend a thin version of nationalism on the ground that democracy, redistributive justice and welfare of people depend on a conception of national identity based on shared moral beliefs and commitments and these ideals cannot be achieved at the global level. The liberal theorists argue that a shared identity is prerequisite for ensuring social solidarity that motivates citizens to make the sacrifices necessary not only for political participation but also for social redistribution. The sense of obligation that underwrites redistributive taxation derives from a strong sense of attachment to and identification with one’s fellow citizens and political community.

However, they fail to suggest how the concept of shared identity has to be realized on the ground. They also fail to effectively reconcile citizen’s freedom with the universal notions of human rights leading to depoliticization and naturalization of nation-state system without diminishing the prospect of ethnic identities, religion, language and other cultural aspects (which were supposed to be relegated to the background with advent of modernity) being invoked for ensuring human freedom. There is every possibility that the prescription for a thin version of shared identity would take a thicker form on the ground.

The political integration of in South Asia is marred by bilateral disputes between the regional powers which remain as a reminder of the recurring role of nationalism in the era of globalization. But the irony is that the regions where integration has been achieved to a large extent in political and economic terms such as Europe also defend nationalism of small states setting a precedent for other regions to follow. The wave of integration that started in Europe in the 1980s was primarily a reaction to the increasing pressures of global markets with the purpose of formulating common economic policies. Though European Union (EU) is known for free movement of people, free trade, and political participation across the member states, the EU had never intended to bypass the nation-state system and instead offered a vision where nation-states could coexist with other institutions at multiple levels. For instance, while the EU was trying to bring Hungary back into the European club of prosperous democratic states, at the same time, it was attempting to satisfy the Hungarian desire to have closer ties with the Hungarians living in the neighouring states. In the case of Macedonia, European Union played an important role in stabilizing the nation-state by bringing majority and minority communities to negotiating table.

World society contains many normative elements which authoritatively define the nation-state as the preferred form of sovereign and responsible actor. The external recognition and construction of sovereign statehood has been a crucial dimension of the western system for centuries, with new claimants especially depending on obtaining formal recognition from dominant powers. With the anti-colonial and self-determination movements of twentieth century, all sorts of collectivities have learned to organize their claims around a nation-state identity. They have not been able to find any alternative to the ‘state system’ pioneered by the West against whom they had waged the struggle for self-determination in the past. These states also function within the larger discourses of liberalism, multiculturalism and welfare state nationalism as developed in the West. The learning of the smaller states is complete with the availability of a ready-made formula of state-building and nation-building process.

Although human rights have been incorporated into international declarations and conventions turning individuals into subjects of international law like states, individuals and states enjoy unequal status within international law as individuals are considered merely bearers of rights and not authors of law like states. Human rights norms are negotiated and adopted by the governments of sovereign states and more tellingly the adjudication of human rights in the UN system does not allow individuals to appeal directly to an international court against their governments. It is noteworthy that groups or associations at intermediate levels between individuals and states have no firm place in international law. Even the cultural minority rights of Article 27 of the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) from 1966 are not formulated as group rights, but as rights of individual persons to enjoy “in community with the other members of their group…their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, or to use their own language.”

The right to self-determination has not found a reference in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. However, two major human rights Covenants, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights mention it in their first article. The UN General Assembly’s 1960 Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples stipulates at paragraph 6 that any attempt at the partial or total disruption of the national unity and the territorial integrity of a country is incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations. The 1970 Declaration on Principles of International Law Concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation Among States in Accordance with the Charter of the United Nations – adopted by the General Assembly goes on to affirm the fundamental limitation to the right to self-determination set out and expressed in the 1960 Declaration.

All these unresolved issues associated with the process of globalization have led the modern state to seize the universal language of enlightenment in its favor. The modern state has become the upholder of people’s rights, liberty and equality. However, the possibility of politicization of religious and ethnic identities has not diminished as they can be tied to modern aspirations of human freedom. Elites who have influence over the modern state apparatuses can manipulate these primordial sentiments and make selective use of symbols and ethnic markers to promote their own socio-economic interests. The emotive and indigenous element of identity propel the elites to use it as the basis of their rise to power and on the other hand, the influence that elites exercise over decision-making process enables them to distribute welfare goods and influence identity groups in a desired way. As it has been observed, uneven tendencies of globalization can lead to greater politicization of identities thereby making it banal.

By Matt Hadro

An increasingly violent wave of anti-Semitic words and acts in France threatens the very existence of Jewish communities there, one human rights advocacy group warned in a new report.

The attacks are “a harbinger of societal breakdown,” said Susan Corke of Human Rights First. “Left unchecked, antisemitism leads to the persecution of other minorities, and to an overall increase in repression and intolerance.”

Reported anti-Semitic hate crimes in France have more than doubled from 423 in 2014 to 851 in 2015, according to numbers cited in the report “Breaking the Cycle of Violence: Countering Antisemitism and Extremism in France” released Jan. 7 by the group Human Rights First and authored by Corke.

“These incidents are increasingly violent,” the report stated.

Jews only comprise one percent of France’s population, but over half of the reported hate crimes in France were anti-Semitic in 2014. And anti-Semitism was almost exclusively responsible for the 30 percent increase in “racist acts” between 2013 and 2014, according to numbers cited in the report from the French Ministry of the Interior.

And over 80 percent of incidents are not reported, according to one European Union survey.

Most incidents are verbal threats and insults made against Jews, but they also include physical assaults as well as graffiti and vandalism against Jewish stores and synagogues.

The most notable acts of violence in recent years were a 2012 shooting at a Jewish school in Toulouse that killed four and was linked to Islamic extremism and anti-Semitism, and the shooting of four hostages at a kosher supermarket in Paris in January of 2015.

Jews have a long history in France having settled there since the 6th century and enjoying citizenship since the time of Napoleon. Yet today’s hate crimes seem to have a chilling effect.

The number of French Jews emigrating to Israel spiked to 3,295 in 2013 and more than doubled to 7,230 in 2014, according to the Jewish Agency for Israel which monitors the numbers of Jewish immigrants from France. Previously the annual figure was around one to two thousand.

Jews who stay in France are more afraid to wear public symbols and identifications of their faith. Parents are transferring their children from public schools to private schools to escape discrimination and harassment, and many teachers have reported critical or outright anti-Semitic responses from students when they teach about the Holocaust or Jewish history.

The commissioner of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett, told CNA/EWTN News last March of the fear in the Jewish communities that she witnessed during a visit to France. Many Jewish parents “don’t see a Jewish future” for their children there, she said. The government has stationed security outside of Jewish buildings and synagogues to protect them from vandalism and violence.

The decline of the situation is largely due to two major factors: the rise of the far-right National Front political party, and the resentment of disenfranchised immigrant and minority groups, the report said.

The National Front has soared into the mainstream of French politics recently, winning first place in the 2014 elections and the first round of the 2015 regional elections in November. The party “rallies its supporters around animosity towards Muslims, Roma, foreigners, and migrants,” the report stated, and although leaders have tried to cleanse it of anti-Semitic and Holocaust-denying rhetoric, its platform “still contains positions on ritual animal slaughter and public subsidies that are discriminatory against Jews as well as Muslims.”

Many members of its base still hold anti-Semitic views. In two French surveys – a 2014 report on tolerance submitted to the French government, and a report by a French think tank – over half of the respondents who supported the National Front espoused anti-Semitism.

Outside of the party, many immigrants and descendants of immigrants have been unable to assimilate into the societal mainstream and may harbor resentment toward Jews who they mistakenly see as controlling wealth and power.

“French Muslims, immigrants, and French citizens of Middle Eastern, North African, or Sub-Saharan African heritage, especially those living and attending school in marginalized areas, experience prejudice and suffer from hate crimes as well as official and private discrimination,” the report noted.

Many young people in these communities suffer a lack of education and social mobility and are exposed to extremist views on the internet that “bombard” them with anti-Semitism.

Some of the most common anti-Semitic beliefs are that the Jews control too much power or too much wealth, the report noted, and some of the other less common attitudes are that the Jews “use the Holocaust to their advantage,” and are more loyal to the state of Israel than France.

The discrimination is concentrated more among the elderly, poor, less educated, and more religious, the report added, and is more likely to occur during heightened Israeli-Palestinian conflict and right after terror attacks or well-publicized anti-Semitic hate crimes.

However, even some French “observant Catholics” have shown anti-Semitic attitudes, according to a 2014 survey by a French think tank FONDAPOL cited in the report. Twenty-two percent of practicing Catholics surveyed said there too many Jews in France, while 16 percent of all those surveyed answered that way.

According to the report, the U.S. must speak out against the rise of anti-Semitism but should also refrain from aggravating the marginalization that many groups currently experience in France. In part, “official statements should avoid fueling a ‘clash of civilizations’ narrative between Jewish and Muslim communities and instead urge tolerance and inclusion,” the report recommended.

By Henriette Jacobsen

(EurActiv) — Danish wind turbines set a new world record in 2015. Wind power is now counted for 42.1% of the total electricity consumption in Denmark, according to data published on Friday (15 January).

The percentage of wind power in Denmark’s overall electricity mix is the highest in the world. Last year, the share was 39.1%, which was a record, according to Energinet, which runs the power grids.

Out of the 8760 hours of 2015, the western part of the country produced wind power during 1460 of them, said Energinet’s Carsten Vittrup.

“It’s not unusual that we have hours where the wind production is greater than the actual consumption. But in the western part of the country, it has sometimes been 16% more, and that illustrates that with a volatile electricity production, we are able to import and export across our borders,” Vittrup said in a statement.

The new Danish wind power was exported to Norway, Sweden and Germany, while Denmark bought hydropower from Norway and solar power from Germany.

Power plants that run on coal and bio mass still play an important role as “buffer” in the power supply, Vittrup pointed out, when there’s no production of wind power or solar enegy.

The Danish parliament wants the Scandinavian country to get at least half of its electric power from wind by 2020. According to the forecast, this target looks to be met. By 2030, the country hopes that 90% of the electricity and heating supply will come from renewable energy.

In 2005, wind energy counted for 18.7% of the total electricity consumption. In 2010, the share had increased to 22%, and in 2012, the share was 30%.

In the UK, wind power likewise had a record-breaking year. According to figures from the National Grid, 11% of the UK’s electricity was sourced from wind power in 2015 – up from 9.5% the previous year.

Overall, wind provided enough electricity to meet the demands of more than 8.25 million homes – almost a third of UK households – compared to 6.7 million homes in 2014.

This has been the most dramatic week in US/Iranian relations since 1979.

Last weekend ten US Navy personnel were caught in Iranian waters, as the Pentagon kept changing its story on how they got there. It could have been a disaster for President Obama’s big gamble on diplomacy over conflict with Iran. But after several rounds of telephone diplomacy between Secretary of State John Kerry and his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif, the Iranian leadership – which we are told by the neocons is too irrational to even talk to – did a most rational thing: weighing the costs and benefits they decided it made more sense not to belabor the question of what an armed US Naval vessel was doing just miles from an Iranian military base. Instead of escalating, the Iranian government fed the sailors and sent them back to their base in Bahrain.

Then on Saturday, the Iranians released four Iranian-Americans from prison, including Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian. On the US side, seven Iranians held in US prisons, including six who were dual citizens, were granted clemency. The seven were in prison for seeking to trade with Iran in violation of the decades-old US economic sanctions.

This mutual release came just hours before the United Nations certified that Iran had met its obligations under the nuclear treaty signed last summer and that, accordingly, US and international sanctions would be lifted against the country.

How did the “irrational” Iranians celebrate being allowed back into the international community? They immediately announced a massive purchase of more than 100 passenger planes from the European Airbus company, and that they would also purchase spare parts from Seattle-based Boeing. Additionally, US oil executives have been in Tehran negotiating trade deals to be finalized as soon as it is legal to do so. The jobs created by this peaceful trade will be beneficial to all parties concerned. The only jobs that should be lost are the Washington advocates of re-introducing sanctions on Iran.

Events this week have dealt a harsh blow to Washington’s neocons, who for decades have been warning against any engagement with Iran. These true isolationists were determined that only regime change and a puppet government in Tehran could produce peaceful relations between the US and Iran. Instead, engagement has worked to the benefit of the US and Iran.

Proven wrong, however, we should not expect the neocons to apologize or even pause to reflect on their failed ideology. Instead, they will continue to call for new sanctions on any pretext. They even found a way to complain about the release of the US sailors – they should have never been confronted in the first place even if they were in Iranian waters. And they even found a way to complain about the return of the four Iranian-Americans to their families and loved ones – the US should have never negotiated with the Iranians to coordinate the release of prisoners, they grumbled. It was a show of weakness to negotiate! Tell that to the families on both sides who can now enjoy the company of their loved ones once again!

I have often said that the neocons’ greatest fear is for peace to break out. Their well-paid jobs are dependent on conflict, sanctions, and pre-emptive war. They grow wealthy on conflict, which only drains our economy. Let’s hope that this new opening with Iran will allow many other productive Americans to grow wealthy through trade and business ties. Let’s hope many new productive jobs will be created on both sides. Peace is prosperous!

This article was published by the RonPaul Institute.

As decision makers from around the world congregated in Paris to prepare a global climate agreement at the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21), many discussions focused on how to reduce greenhouse gases, including ozone.

While efforts to limit ozone precursor emissions tend to focus on industrial activities and fossil fuel combustion in the United States and China, a new study suggests that future regulations may need to address the burning of forests and vegetation. The study, which was published online January 13, 2016 in the journal Nature Communications, indicates that these types of “biomass burning” may play a larger role in climate change than previously realized.

Based on observations from two aircraft missions, satellite data and a variety of models, an international research team showed that fires burning in tropical Africa and Southeast Asia caused pockets of high ozone and low water in the lower atmosphere above Guam–a remote island in the Pacific Ocean 1,700 miles east of Taiwan.

“We were very surprised to find high concentrations of ozone and chemicals that we know are only emitted by fires in the air around Guam,” said the study’s lead author Daniel Anderson, a graduate student in the University of Maryland Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science. “We didn’t make specific flights to target high-ozone areas–they were so omnipresent that no matter where we flew, we found them.”

For the study, two research planes on complementary missions flew over Guam measuring the levels of dozens of chemicals in the atmosphere in January and February 2014. One aircraft flew up to 24,000 feet above the ocean surface during the U.K. Natural Environment Research Council’s Coordinated Airborne Studies in the Tropics (CAST) mission. The other flew up to 48,000 feet above the ocean surface during the CONvective Transport of Active Species in the Tropics (CONTRAST) mission.

“International collaboration is essential for studying global environmental issues these days,” said CAST Principal Investigator Neil Harris of the University of Cambridge Department of Chemistry. “This U.S./U.K.-led campaign over the western Pacific was the first of its kind in this region and collected a unique data set. The measurements are now starting to produce insight into how the composition of the remote tropical atmosphere is affected by human activities occurring nearly halfway around the world.”

Researchers examined 17 CAST and 11 CONTRAST flights and compiled over 3,000 samples from high-ozone, low-water air parcels for the study. In the samples, the team detected high concentrations of chemicals associated with biomass burning–hydrogen cyanide, acetonitrile, benzene and ethyne.

“Hydrogen cyanide and acetonitrile were the smoking guns because they are emitted almost exclusively by biomass burning. High levels of the other chemicals simply added further weight to the findings,” said study co-author Julie Nicely, a graduate student in the UMD Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

Next, the researchers traced the polluted air parcels backward 10 days, using the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Hybrid Single Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory (HYSPLIT) model and precipitation data, to determine where they came from. Overlaying fire data from NASA’s moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) onboard the Terra satellite, the researchers connected nearly all of the high-ozone, low-water structures to tropical regions with active biomass burning in tropical Africa and Southeast Asia.

“The investigation utilized a variety of models, including the NCAR CAM-Chem model to forecast and later analyze chemical and dynamical conditions near Guam, as well as satellite data from numerous instruments that augmented the interpretation of the aircraft observations,” said study co-author Douglas Kinnison, a project scientist at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research.

In the paper, the researchers also offer a new explanation for the dry nature of the polluted air parcels.

“Our results challenge the explanation atmospheric scientists commonly offer for pockets of high ozone and low water: that these zones result from the air having descended from the stratosphere where air is colder and dryer than elsewhere,” said UMD Professor Ross Salawitch, the study’s senior author and principal investigator of CONTRAST. Salawitch holds joint appointments in the university’s Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, and Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center.

“We know that the polluted air did not mix with air in the stratosphere to dry out because we found combined elevated levels of carbon monoxide, nitric oxide and ozone in our air samples, but air in the higher stratosphere does not contain much naturally occurring carbon monoxide,” said Anderson.

The researchers found that the polluted air that reached Guam never entered the stratosphere and instead simply dried out during its descent within the lower atmosphere. While textbooks show air moving upward in the tropics, according to Salawitch, this represents the net motion of air. Because this upward motion happens mostly within small storm systems, it must be balanced by air slowly descending, such as with these polluted parcels released from fires.

Based on the results of this study, global climate models may need to be reassessed to include and correctly represent the impacts of biomass burning, deforestation and reforestation, according to Salawitch. Also, future studies such as NASA’s upcoming Atmospheric Tomography Mission will add to the data collected by CAST and CONTRAST to help obtain a clearer picture of our changing environment.

Moscow may be forced to dispatch as many as seven army divisions to Central Asia lest the destabilization of that region by ISIS and its allies spark a massive flood of refugees into Russian cities that would make the current situation in the EU look like child’s play, according to MGIMO expert Andrey Kazantsev.

The director of that foreign policy training institute’s Analytic Center is not the first Russian writer to make that point. Mikhail Khodorenok, the editor of Voenno-Promyshlenny Kuryer, made a similar point in a Gazeta article at the end of December (gazeta.ru/politics/2015/12/23_a_7987919.shtml).

But Kazantsev’s is the more authoritative voice, and his warnings about just how dire the situation now is in Central Asia and what Moscow must do to counter the emerging threat there undoubtedly reflect the views of many senior defense and security planners in the Russian capital (mgimo.ru/about/news/experts/tsentralnaya-aziya-rost-ugrozy-religioznogo-ekstremizma-i-poiski-putey-borby-s-nim/).

Over the last 12 months, the security situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated sharply and that has all the governments of Central Asia worried. The Afghan military is ever less able to resist the rising number of militants and terrorists flowing in from the outside, including from neighboring Pakistan and the Middle East.

“In principle,” Kazantsev says, Moscow and the Organization of the Collective Security Treaty have sufficient forces to counter any threat from Afghanistan. “The question is how ready Russia will be for ‘a third front’ of war after Ukraine and Syria.” But there are compelling reasons why ignoring the situation is “not an ideal strategy.”

“In the event of a complete destabilization of Central Asia, Russian megalopolises would feel the consequences of massive flows of migrants, in comparison with which the European migration crisis of 2015 would appear quite unserious.”

Moreover, there are additional threats emerging in the region, the MGIMO expert says. ISIS is expanding its influence not only in Afghanistan but also in Central Asia. “The black banners of the Islamic State have been raised by representatives of Turkmen tribes living along the Afghan-Turkmen border where there are many descendants of the basmachi who fought against Soviet power in the 1920s and 1930s.”

Adding to the danger from that direction, he says, is the fact that one of the wins of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan has now sworn allegiance to ISIS.

The Islamic State is finding it easy to recruit in Afghanistan and in Central Asia as well. In Afghanistan, ISIS now pays its fighters seven times more than the Taliban does, a disparity that is leading to the strengthening of the former at the expense of the latter. And within Central Asia, the economic situation is dire.

The fall in world prices for raw materials, the effect of sanctions, and the failure of these countries to address underlying structural issues have all added to the problem. The economic situation is especially dire in Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan as a result of ruble devaluation and the return of thousands of their citizens from Russia.

Such people often have no jobs and thus are quite ready to be recruited by ISIS emissaries who promise high pay to their fighters, Kazantsev says.

The situation in Tajikistan is especially bad, he says, because unemployment is high, the country’s security services are in disarray, and the government in fighting Islamism has “committed definite excesses which could lead to the strengthening of the Islamist underground. Among those mistakes was the ban of the moderate Islamist Party of Islamic Rebirth.

Kyrgyzstan’s position is not much better, especially because tensions between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks have become invested in many cases with Islamic ideas. Turkmenistan has seen its economy deteriorate and that has led as many as 360 of its citizens to go to fight for ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan face additional problems: both countries are now facing the prospect of leadership change given the age of their presidents. The situation in Kazakhstan is “comparably stable” because Astana has created “an effective market economy and become a powerful financial center.”

In fact, the MGIMO specialist says, “economic well-being is a good path for neutralizing the problems of religious extremism, the growth of which in other countries of the region is connected not in the last with social-economic problems.” For the time being at least, Kazakhstan is “’a bastion’ protecting Russia from threats from the south.”