In this week’s address, US President Barack Obama discussed the progress we’ve made because of the Affordable Care Act. As the law’s coverage provisions have taken effect, 17.6 million Americans have gained coverage, and the nation’s uninsured rate now stands at its lowest level ever. The deadline to sign up for 2016 health coverage on the Marketplace is quickly approaching on January 31, and the President encouraged even more Americans to join the more than 11 million people who have already signed up so far this year – and who are enjoying the financial security and peace of mind that comes with knowing you have affordable, portable health coverage.

Remarks of President Barack Obama
Weekly Address
The White House
January 23, 2016

Hi, everybody. When I took office seven years ago this week, more than 15% of Americans went without health insurance. For folks who did have coverage, insurance companies could deny you coverage or charge you more just because you’d been sick. And too many Americans gave up their dreams of changing jobs or going back to school because they couldn’t risk giving up their employer-based insurance plan.

We’ve changed that. As the Affordable Care Act has taken effect, nearly 18 million Americans have gained coverage. In fact, for the first time ever, more than 90 percent of Americans are covered. Up to 129 million Americans with pre-existing conditions can no longer be denied coverage or be charged more just because they’ve been sick. 137 million Americans with private insurance are now guaranteed preventive care coverage. We’ve done all this while cutting our deficits and keeping health care inflation to its lowest levels in fifty years. And we’ve begun filling the gaps in employer-based care so that when we change jobs, lose a job, go back to school, or start that new business, we can still get coverage.

If you want to know how important that is, just ask an American like Heather Bragg.

Heather’s a small business owner in Bluffton, South Carolina. Last year, she wrote me a letter and told me how, for years, her family had depended on her husband’s job for their insurance. But thanks to the Affordable Care Act, her husband Mike had the freedom to switch jobs and join Heather at the small business she’d launched a few years ago.

Through the Health Insurance Marketplace, they found better coverage that actually saved them hundreds of dollars a month. Today, Heather only pays about ten dollars for the asthma inhaler she needs. “For the first time,” Heather wrote, “we’re not living paycheck to paycheck; we’re able to pay our bills and put some money back into savings.” And because Mike doesn’t have to work nights or weekends anymore, he can coach their son’s soccer team and tuck the kids in at night. And you can’t put a price on something like that.

If you haven’t looked at your new coverage options, you’ve still got time to get covered on the Health Insurance Marketplace for 2016. You have until January 31 – next Sunday – to enroll. Just go to HealthCare.gov, CuidadoDeSalud.gov, or call 1-800-318-2596. Most folks buying a plan on the Marketplace can find an option that costs less than $75 a month. Even if you already have insurance, take a few minutes to shop around. In fact, consumers who switched to a new plan for 2016 ended up saving an average of more than $500.

That’s what the Affordable Care Act did. This is health care in America today. Affordable, portable security for you and your loved ones. It’s making a difference for millions of Americans every day. And it’s only going to get better. Thanks, and have a great weekend.

US presidential candidate Donald Trump has opened up a 30-point lead nationally over his rivals for the Republican nomination, according to a new poll.

The billionaire businessman is trouncing his opponents with a 40.6 percent support, a Reuters-Ipsos tracking poll, released on Friday, has found.

Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, his closest competitor, stood at 10.5 percent.

Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson was the third with 9.7 percent, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush was the choice of 9.2 percent of those surveyed and Florida Senator Marco Rubio received 7.2 percent support.

Although Trump is leading nationally, some polls have shown that Sen. Cruz is on top of the race in the key state of Iowa with the caucuses just days away.

A hypothetical match-up found that Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton and Trump are locked in a tight race nationally– 41.4 percent to 40.8 percent respectively, although Clinton’s numbers have been falling steadily across the country.

A separate poll released on Friday showed that Clinton has a 29-point lead over rival Bernie Sanders in Iowa.

The former secretary of state has 59 percent support in the Hawkeye State, while Sanders, a senator from Vermont, stands at 30 percent, according to the Loras College survey.

However, another poll has put Sanders ahead of Clinton by eight points in Iowa.

The Vermont senator received 51 percent support to Clinton’s 43 percent, the CNN-ORC poll released on Thursday found.

The Iowa caucuses now appear headed for a close finish, which is likely to hearten Sanders’s supporters heading into the key state of New Hampshire, where he holds a lead over Clinton.

Sanders is leading Clinton by 27 points in New Hampshire, a new CNN/WMUR poll has found. Sanders is the favorite choice of 60 percent of likely Democratic primary voters in the Granite State compared to 33 percent for Clinton.

New Hampshire holds the nation’s first primary elections and is considered an early measurement of the national attitude toward the candidates.

Along with the Iowa caucuses, the New Hampshire primary is the first in a series of nationwide party primary elections held in the United State every four years to choose the party nominees for the presidential elections to be held in the following November.

The Fatah movement’s central committee, headed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, met on Saturday evening to discuss Palestinian international policy, a spokesperson said.

Presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh said the central committee discussed the possibility of holding an international conference to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and establish a Palestinian state.

According to Abu Rudeineh, Abbas said such a conference should aim to end the Israeli occupation and establish an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.

Abbas also reportedly talked about the preparations to eventually head to the UN Security Council over Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which are illegal under international law.

The continuation of settlement building would force Palestinians to take “decisive” actions based on the resolutions of the central committee, Abu Rudeineh said.

The spokesman added that the meeting also broached the issue of “Fatah’s internal situation,” as well as the possibility of reconciliation with the Hamas movement.

Fatah central committee member Amal Hamad had told Mawtini radio station earlier on Saturday that factions of Fatah were striving towards more responsibility, adding that “there is a real invitation for the Hamas and Islamic Jihad movements to form a serious national partnership.”

The relationship between Hamas and Fatah has been in a dire state after a government of national consensus was dissolved in June, one year after it was first announced.

The two Palestinian parties have had particularly tense relations since Hamas won legislative elections in 2006 and became the ruling party in the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian Authority officials have criticized Hamas for creating a shadow government in the Gaza Strip and blocking efforts to reach political unity.

Hamas has in turn accused the PA of executing a plan to “eradicate” the movement from the West Bank, saying that an arrest campaign of hundreds of members was carried out by the PA to target reconciliation efforts between the two factions.

Many people watching the Democratic presidential debate on Sunday likely considered United States Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) advocacy that the US “move as aggressively as we can to normalize relations with Iran” as a welcome call for replacing decades of US hostility and sanctions toward Iran with peace and trade that would benefit people in both countries. Many viewers may also have noticed that Sanders’ stated opinion shares much in common with former Republican and Libertarian presidential candidate Ron Paul’s long-expressed aspiration that US antagonism toward Iran be replaced with peaceful and prosperous relations.

Paul again expressed his aspiration regarding US-Iran relations in his latest weekly editorial that concludes with the following:

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!

The Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, however, would have none of Sanders’ normalization talk. Two days after the debate, the former senator from New York and US secretary of state’s campaign released a statement from ten high-level US foreign policy crafters taking Sanders to task for, among other things, desiring a quick warming in relations between the US and Iran. Their statement declares:

…Senator Sanders’ call to ‘move aggressively’ to normalize relations with Iran – to develop a ‘warm’ relationship – breaks with President Obama, is out of step with the sober and responsible diplomatic approach that has been working for the United States, and if pursued would fail while causing consternation among our allies and partners.

In other words, do not dare give peace a chance.

Could it be that some of these foreign policy insiders are among the war profiteers that Paul says can be counted on to oppose peace? Paul alludes in his editorial to such advocates of permanent international conflict:

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.

Indeed, this may well be at least part of the explanation for the Clinton campaign’s statement. As Lee Fang explains in a new Intercept article, several of the letter signers enjoy significant financial ties with the military-industrial complex.

In addition to pecuniary motivations, high-level US foreign policy crafters would also tend to reflexively swat down Sanders’ comments regarding Iran, like those Paul has vocalized for decades, because those comments are seen as too far outside the narrow Washington, DC politics orthodoxy to tolerate. While it is important to maintain a debate between “conservatives” and “liberals” to present a semblance of choice in elections so people will think their votes make a difference, elites who benefit from the US government’s militaristic foreign policy will try to keep that debate within narrow confines. Otherwise, people might become carried away and start demanding revolutionary changes instead of a tweak here and there of business as usual.

None of this is to say that Sanders shares fully Paul’s noninterventionist views on foreign policy or even Paul’s views regarding Iran. Such is not the case. For example, in April of 2006, then-House of Representatives member Sanders voted for the Iran Freedom Support Act (HR 282). Paul, who served in the House as a Republican for Texas, voted against the bill. “Let there be no doubt, though the words ‘regime change’ are not found in the bill — that’s precisely what they are talking about,” said Paul regarding the bill in a House floor statement. Paul, who since leaving the House has served as Chairman of the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity, also warned in the speech that the legislation was part of an attempt by “neo-conservative warriors” to condition “Congress, the media, and the American people for a pre-emptive attack on Iran.” Luckily, that attack has not materialized.

HR 6198, a later version of the Iran Freedom Support Act, passed on the House floor by a voice vote on September 28, 2006 and was signed into law two days later by President George W. Bush. Paul spoke against that bill in the House floor debate, saying the bill was “clearly seeking regime change in Iran.”

Sanders is not a Ron Paul-style noninterventionist. But, when Sanders steps out of the dominant foreign policy paradigm far enough that he sounds even somewhat Paulesque, you can expect the paradigm defenders to rush in and attack him — especially as long as Sanders’ presidential campaign polling numbers stay high.

This article was published by the RonPaul Institute.

If you’ve always thought of a zebra’s stripes as offering some type of camouflaging protection against predators, it’s time to think again, suggest scientists at the University of Calgary and UC Davis.

Findings from their study were published in the journal PLOS ONE.

“The most longstanding hypothesis for zebra striping is crypsis, or camouflaging, but until now the question has always been framed through human eyes,” said the study’s lead author Amanda Melin, an assistant professor of biological anthropology at the University of Calgary, Canada.

“We, instead, carried out a series of calculations through which we were able to estimate the distances at which lions and spotted hyenas, as well as zebras, can see zebra stripes under daylight, twilight, or during a moonless night.

Melin conducted the study with Tim Caro, a UC Davis professor of wildlife biology. In earlier studies, Caro and other colleagues have provided evidence suggesting that the zebra’s stripes provide an evolutionary advantage by discouraging biting flies, which are natural pests of zebras.

In the new study, Melin, Caro and colleagues Donald Kline and Chihiro Hiramatsu found that stripes cannot be involved in allowing the zebras to blend in with the background of their environment or in breaking up the outline of the zebra, because at the point at which predators can see zebras stripes, they probably already have heard or smelled their zebra prey.

“The results from this new study provide no support at all for the idea that the zebra’s stripes provide some type of anti-predator camouflaging effect,” Caro said. “Instead, we reject this long-standing hypothesis that was debated by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace.”

New findings:

To test the hypothesis that stripes camouflage the zebras against the backdrop of their natural environment, the researchers passed digital images taken in the field in Tanzania through spatial and color filters that simulated how the zebras would appear to their main predators — lions and spotted hyenas — as well as to other zebras.

They also measured the stripes’ widths and light contrast, or luminance, in order to estimate the maximum distance from which lions, spotted hyenas and zebras could detect stripes, using information about these animals’ visual capabilities.

They found that beyond 50 meters (about 164 feet) in daylight or 30 meters (about 98 feet) at twilight, when most predators hunt, stripes can be seen by humans but are hard for zebra predators to distinguish. And on moonless nights, the stripes are particularly difficult for all species to distinguish beyond 9 meters (about 29 feet.) This suggests that the stripes don’t provide camouflage in woodland areas, where it had earlier been theorized that black stripes mimicked tree trunks and white stripes blended in with shafts of light through the trees.

And in open, treeless habitats, where zebras tend to spend most of their time, the researchers found that lions could see the outline of striped zebras just as easily as they could see similar-sized, prey with fairly solid-colored hides, such as waterbuck and topi and the smaller impala. It had been earlier suggested that the striping might disrupt the outline of zebras on the plains, where they might otherwise be clearly visible to their predators.

Stripes also not for social purposes:

In addition to discrediting the camouflaging hypothesis, the study did not yield evidence suggesting that the striping provides some type of social advantage by allowing other zebras to recognize each other at a distance.

While zebras can see stripes over somewhat further distances than their predators can, the researchers also noted that other species of animals that are closely related to the zebra are highly social and able to recognize other individuals of their species, despite having no striping to distinguish them.

Nearly 60 percent of Americans, if they buy a new handgun, are willing to purchase a smart or childproof gun — a weapon that is only operable in the hands of an authorized user — new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health-led research suggests.

In addition to high overall support, the survey found that four in 10 gun owners and 56 percent of political conservatives surveyed are willing to purchase a smart gun, debunking the widely used argument by gun manufacturers and gun groups that there is no market for smart guns.

On Jan. 4, 2016 President Obama issued a memorandum directing the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security and Defense to develop a strategy to expedite the real-world deployment of gun safety technology to reduce the unauthorized use of firearms, and to consider the purchase of smart guns.

The findings, to be published Jan. 21, 2016 in the American Journal of Public Health, are consistent with the growing national interest in using technology to reduce the toll of gun deaths in the U.S.

The survey findings contrast sharply from earlier estimates. Research from 2013, funded by the gun manufacturers’ trade association, suggested just 14 percent of people would be willing to make their next handgun purchase a smart gun.

Proponents of smart guns say their widespread use would cut down on suicides, stolen or borrowed guns that go on to be used in crimes and accidental shootings of children by other children. The technology uses fingerprint or radio frequency identification (RFID) that only allows authorized people to fire a given handgun. Objections from gun manufacturers and the gun lobby — including opposition to any requirements mandating the sale of smart over traditional guns — have kept them from being produced on a large scale. Smart guns are not currently sold in the United States.

“The results of this study show that there is potentially a large commercial market for smart gun technology,” said Julia A. Wolfson, MPP, a Lerner Fellow with the Bloomberg School’s Center for a Livable Future and a PhD candidate in the Department of Health Policy and Management. “This has been one of the biggest arguments against smart guns, that people just don’t want them. This research shows otherwise.”

To examine public interest in purchasing smart guns, also known as childproof or personalized guns, the study team conducted a nationally representative, web-based survey in January 2015, getting responses from 3,949 people. The respondents were nearly evenly split among gun owners and those who do not own guns. Among the findings: Fifty-nine percent of all respondents said they would be willing to consider a childproof gun if they were to purchase a new weapon. More than twice as many current gun owners said they would be willing to purchase a childproof gun than would be unwilling. The guns were most supported by political liberals (71 percent), but support was also high among political moderates (56 percent) and conservatives (56 percent).

The technology to make guns smart is already being used in other products. Some iPhones can be unlocked by the user’s unique thumbprint. Many cars use RFID to allow for keyless entry and keyless ignitions. For a smart gun, a chip could be embedded in a watch or a ring worn by the authorized user; the gun would then verify the identity of the person holding it as an authorized user and could fire.

In 2014, the most recent year for which final data are available, 33,599 people died in the United States from gun violence. The majority were suicides (more than 21,000 deaths) and firearm homicides accounted for more than 11,000 deaths. Unintentional shootings, in which children are often the shooter and/or the victim, comprised more than 500 deaths that year. In addition to fatalities, in 2013 more than 84,000 people in the United States suffered non-fatal gunshot wounds, requiring hospital or emergency room treatment.

“By simply using technology that already exists and bringing it to the marketplace, the public health benefits could be enormous, allowing us to take a standard injury prevention approach to preventing gun violence,” said study co-author Stephen P. Teret, JD, MPH, a professor in the Bloomberg School’s Department of Health Policy and Management and founding director of the School’s Center for Gun Policy and Research. “Countless lives that would otherwise have been lost to suicide, accidental shootings and guns getting into the wrong hands could be saved. Policymakers and manufacturers should re-examine the potential for smart guns to not only produce a profit, but also to lessen the toll of gun deaths in the United States.”

Najib’s viability as PM in 2016 will be dependent on his ability to manage the current economic problems and overcome political challenges.

By Saleena Saleem*

2016 will prove to be an important year for Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak both in the economic and political realms. While his critics had dismissed the PM’s chance for surviving the challenges that he faced in 2015, Najib has shown his resilience through the adept employment of a carrot and stick approach. It will not be surprising if he emerges at the end of the year with a more consolidated position.

For UMNO members, the PM’s performance this year will be crucial for the party. While the PM has shown his ability to unite UMNO, he remains largely unpopular with the Malaysian public. The Merdeka Centre’s survey in October 2015 showed that only 23% of Malaysians are happy with the government’s performance. It is not likely that these numbers have shifted significantly upwards. Najib will need to demonstrate that he is able to win back the support of Malaysians especially the Malays given that UMNO is now focused on winning the Malay votes to secure victory in the 14th General Election that must be called by 2018.

Worst challenge of 2015

The PM started the year facing the worst challenge of his political career over the debt-ridden state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB). At the height of the political scandal in July, Najib faced allegations of corruption over reports that he received RM 2.6 billion from 1MDB in his personal accounts. He also dealt with allegations of mismanagement over the hefty RM 42 billion debt acquired by 1MDB in the short period since he established it in 2009.

The allegations arose amid a weakening economy and a falling currency, plaguing Najib with a serious crisis of confidence as foreign investors pulled out of the stock market, Malaysians struggled with inflationary pressures, and his political opponents and critics rallied to oust him from office. Six months on though, Najib seemed to have weathered the political storm and strengthened his position within the ruling UMNO following a highly successful performance at the party’s general assembly meeting.

The PM dismissed his deputy, Muhyiddin Yassin and replaced other dissenters in the party leadership, rallied UMNO members around him and promised to focus on national issues that are of concern to the country. Najib’s ability to resolve the current economic problems and overcome political challenges will determine whether he will be an asset or liability for UMNO and hence will decide whether he will survive as prime minister.

Resolving the 1MDB Debt Issue

At the UMNO General Assembly last month, Najib presented a credible case to his supporters that it was time to move forward from 1MDB. In interviews on national television and speeches to UMNO members, Najib maintained that he had broken no laws in accepting a political donation into his personal account for UMNO’s use. He highlighted too that the existence of the donors was verified independently by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission. He also reiterated the debt reduction plan for 1MDB that was already underway, maintaining that critics had politicised the issue needlessly when the indebted fund actually held assets valued more than what it owed.

Last month, 1MDB sold its power plants under Edra Global Energy to a Chinese firm, which reduced its debt load by RM 17 billion. 1MDB also has plans to finalise a sale of the Bandar Malaysia property project in Kuala Lumpur, valued at RM 11 billion. Even when the market was most jittery in July, with the massive foreign capital outflows on expectations of a US interest rate hike and the ringgit’s free fall, Malaysia’s credit rating was never downgraded, and it has maintained a stable outlook.

Investors had been primarily concerned over political instabilities and 1MDB’s ability to repay its debts, which constituted approximately 4 % of Malaysia’ GDP. Now with the reduction of 1MDB’s debt load and Najib’s apparent consolidation of political power, there is some level of market optimism while the ringgit strengthened from October to November. This could help to somewhat ease the fiscal pressures from an expected revenue shortfall due to oil price declines in 2016.

Economic and Domestic Challenges

Despite the easing of 1MDB’s debt woes, Malaysia will still have to contend with external pressures from a weakening global economy: oil and commodity prices are not projected to improve in 2016; China’s economic slowdown portends a decreased demand for Malaysian exports; and a weak ringgit faces a strengthening US dollar.

These external pressures have already resulted in inflation in Malaysia, raising the cost of imported goods and overall cost of living. Malaysia could likely go into the next general election under dismal economic circumstances. Protracted economic problems can easily be politicised by Najib’s political opponents.

Najib has managed to diminish the impact of the 1MDB allegations by taking quick actions to unwind its debt load. This has earned him leadership credibility, which he had lost during the height of the scandal. Najib’s handling of the economic challenges ahead will factor into whether 1MDB can become a point of contention yet again. This could potentially weaken Najib’s political standing in his own party, as his party members’ support could be conditional on his perceived strength to win in the next general elections.

Sarawak Elections

One of the immediate objectives for Najib is to secure a convincing win at the upcoming Sarawak state elections. The highly popular Sarawak Chief Minister, Tan Sri Adenan Satem has distanced himself from the PM and UMNO, preferring to make the elections about his performance as CM. In fact, Adenan was quoted as saying that he needed a stronger mandate from Sarawakians to face Kuala Lumpur and secure Sarawak’s interests. Similar challenge is not expected from Sabah. The Sarawak election will be watched by many within UMNO as a barometer of how much the PM’s unpopularity can affect the outcome of the election especially in the urban areas.

Overall Najib has entered 2016 in a sturdier position than he was in at the beginning of 2015. His challenge is to build a stronger following in the upper ranks of UMNO to prepare BN for the next federal election to be called by 2018.

*Saleena Saleem is an Associate Research Fellow and Mohamed Nawab Mohamed Osman is an Assistant Professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), where he is also the Coordinator of the Malaysia Programme.

By Mitchell Blatt*

Sarah Palin endorsed Donald Trump a few days ago, culminating a journey that began shortly after her ticket lost the 2008 presidential election. Conservatives that had been supporting or defending her for eight years finally broke with her when she broke with conservatism.

It wasn’t hard to see it would happen. Trump and Palin had a pizza summit together in 2011. Palin did a painfully fawning interview with Trump in 2015. Palin’s speaking skills and logical arguments had long been dumbed down. It may be they got even worse as she increasingly tried to create a celebrity brand for herself, or that Republicans overlooked some of her flaws when she was running for VP, but it was probably some of both.

At any rate, Politibunny, a grassroots conservative with 58,200 followers on Twitter, has had enough.

Said no sane or even mildly coherent conservative… ever. https://t.co/B6xUn3D4o4 Sarah Sarah Sarah. smh

— TheFOO (@PolitiBunny) January 21, 2016

In a longer post on her blog, she said,

So I guess this is good luck with the Trump show because I, like many of your defenders and supporters, am done with you.

Many professional conservative pundits and intellectuals have already broken with her. Few of them liked Trump in the first place. With the Palin endorsement, it’s all coming together. Grassroots are losing respect for Palin, and conservatives from all sides of the movement are trying to stave off Trump. A new issue of National Review is dedicated entirely to being “Against Trump.”

The diverse lineup of contributors includes think tankers like David Boaz, executive vice president of the Cato Institute, and Yuval Levin, founding editor of National Affairs and Hertog Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, social conservatives, like L. Brent Bozell III, founder of the Media Research Center and board member of the Catholic League, media entreprenuers like Ben Domenech, founder and editor of The Federalist (which I contribute to), neo-conservatives, like The Weekly Standard’s William Kristol, mainstream conservative newspaper journalists like Cal Thomas, and conservative pundits associated with the grassroots, like Dana Loesch and Glenn Beck. In short, if conservatives who disagree on many things can agree on anything, it is that Donald Trump is not conservative, nor would he make a good president.

Now we are starting to see that idea expressed from some the outlets that grudgingly gave him a little bit of respect early on. Red State at times seemed like some of its writers liked Trump’s aggressive “fighting” style, but now they have been prominently featuring a number of posts critical of Trump recently. Caleb Howe says, “Dana Loesch Absolutely SHREDS Donald Trump Over Conservative Credibility.”

(Despite Red State founder Erick Erickson having disinivted Trump from his forum after he invoked Megyn Kelly’s gender in an attack, Erickson called Trump’s plan to ban Muslims “a brilliant move” in December. Now Erickson has written a piece Against Trump in the issue.)

In McCay Coppins’ book, The Wilderness, Coppins evoked the day of the Iowa Freedom Summit almost exactly one year from today, on January 24, 2015, when all the reporters were watching Sarah Palin’s arrival in the lobby the night before in awe, and then watched her bomb the next day, the same day Trump gave a speech. Much like her terrible speech two days ago, conservatives responded by criticizing her, and she lost some of the few remaining professional conservative fans she once had. Matt Lewis wrote “You Betcha I Was Wrong About Sarah Palin” in The Daily Beast, and the Washington Post summarizes how other columnists like Kathleen Parker and Byron York critiqued her. Since then, it has been Palin down and Trump up. She just grabbed on for the ride.

My journey following Palin’s career started in college–I was a columnist on the editorial board of the Indiana Daily Student my freshman year, 2008–and has developed along with my thinking and my career (some of these thoughts are included in unpublished attempts).

Back then I was quoted in Bloomberg Businessweek pointing to sexism in CNN’s coverage of Palin:

“Hillary Clinton’s campaign complained about sexism in the media… and we are seeing now just how right she was,” wrote Mitchell Blatt in his blog on media bias. “Not only are the networks trying to drag this story out, they are also saying Palin is neglecting her children by running for vice president.

(Also quoted in a research paper.)

By the time Palin quit her job as governor, I wrote a post on my then-blog saying “good riddance.” If only.

I had identified some things about her speaking style that are now standard fare for Trump–particularly her (and now his) focus on cultural identity issues over substance and policies. They want to play to some kind of anti-government, anti-intellectual, anti-culture people. When Palin gave a speech adopting grievances against Michelle Obama for promoting healthy lunches and raised a Big Gulp to oppose Michael Bloomberg’s anti-Big Gulp initiative, I thought it was a stupid appeal to Big Gulp obsessives.

Conservatives on this and some other issues they highlight like to say the government shouldn’t choose for people. Sure. But if people choose for themselves, they ought not embrace unhealthy lifestyle, I wrote in an article I pitched:

Obesity is a problem that should concern Palin. She may think that we should have the right to choose any size soda we want, but as a pro-lifer, she should be concerned about people making more life-affirming choices.

In 2010, Palin said she opposed legalization of marijuana. “I think that would just encourage especially our young people to think that it was OK to just go ahead and use it,” she said.

So she’s probably not going to roll a joint at her next speech. If she’s looking for a gimmick, here’s an idea: hold up a cup of fruit.

Palin and Trump (and Cruz) both preach populism. “YOU”–you, the under-educated and uncultured who doesn’t know anything about health, economics, or science–“YOU are the best person to make a decision on whether the Federal Reserve should raise interest rates!!!” Ah, but he doesn’t even say “Fed” (Rand Paul does) because his audience doesn’t know about that. He just says impose a 45 percent tax on imports and then all the jobs will come to America.

One of Palin and Cruz’s favorite lines is “the American people,” as if there is any other people they would be referring, to, but such a populist-sounding phrase is meant to make We The People, the legitimate governors of ourselves, feel special.

This, I identified as being a trait that also belonged to Cruz:

If there’s one group of people Ted Cruz tries to appeal to more than any other it’s the American people. He mentioned the words “the American people” over 200 times in his 21 hour speech against Obamacare.

Here I also identified (in another unpublished piece) the fact that these populists readily exclude anyone who disagrees with them:

But there are a lot of Americans who aren’t part of this mythical “American people.” For starters, if you support Obamacare, you apparently aren’t an American person, nor are you an American person if you want to ban semiautomatic assault riffles or if you work in Washington, DC for a political organization. Then you are a “Washington insider.”

But I was wrong in two ways. First, the phrase is “RINO.” Second, you get labeled it more for your personality/preferences than your policies. Thus Marco Rubio and his supporters are “RINOs” even though he has a 94% conservative rating with no less a hard right activist group than Heritage Action. Now all of the contributors to National Review’s “Against Trump” are “RINOs” even though they took the Republican/conservative side of the argument.

But, still, I was right that the tag was a cultural thing:

The rise of Ted Cruz is the culmination of a trend in Tea Party politics dividing of America into simplistic identity bubbles until only one identity group remains as real Americans. When Cruz speaks of “the American people,” he is referring to conservatives living in idealized rural and suburban towns that vote Republican–or, as Sarah Palin referred to such areas during the 2008 presidential campaign, “the Real America.”
…
The Tea Party’s focus on identity politics is destructive not just to the country but to the Tea Party itself. Stereotyping and dividing hurts our cohesiveness as a nation. Moreover, it hurts the Tea Party’s ability to attract new converts to the conservative movement.

Most Americans do not fit into the Tea Party’s idea of the perfect American. 80 percent of Americans live in urban areas. 66 percent of American households do not own a gun, and that rate has increased for the past four decades. Americans are going to church less frequently and questioning the existence of God in growing numbers.

How can the Republican Party expect to attract new voters when they are targeting their message to such a narrowly defined category of people?

Cruz actually tried such an identity appeal against Trump at the most recent debate, attacking him for “New York values.” Remember the 2013 Virginia Governor’s race?

The conservative group Fight For Tomorrow just put out an ad there warning that liberal boogeymen like “the elite media,” “Wall Street liberals,” and “Hollywood partisans,” are supporting the Democratic candidate, “New Yorker” Terry McAullife.

As for Cruz, he actually is a conservative–very conservative–and intellectually smart, for that matter, with two Ivy League degrees–but he uses these kind of populist tactics. (I address the situation here: The Tragedy of Ted Cruz.)

What am I getting at? Conservatives should have been able to see it coming. Cruz is an example, however, of how a lot of the populist tactics have meshed with conservatism. Early on in the Tea Party movement, a lot of the populist-sounding people really were conservatives. But somewhere along the line, the conservatism detached from the populism.

In the next week, Bombs and Dollars will join National Review in being Against Trump, and others will post their arguments. At the end of the day, this is a fight that is presently happening within the conservative movement, but it’s a fight for America. If we stop Trump in the Republican primaries, we won’t have to fear a general election with a neo-fascist on the ballot.

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.

By Andrei Kortunov*

It finally happened. November 24th, 2015 became a turning point for Russian-Turkish relations. The two sides will probably never agree on who is to blame for the SU-24 tragedy nor on whether this was an unfortunate accident or a deliberately planned action. However, at least one thing should be clear to everybody: a long optimistic chapter in this bilateral relationship is over, and we are now entering a new, still very unclear and potentially very dangerous period. From now on, there’ll be no business as usual between Moscow and Ankara.

But how can we define “business as usual” anyway? If Russian-Turkish cooperation was so great prior to November 24th, then why did one single accident – no matter how dramatic and emotionally sensitive it might have been – turn out to be sufficient enough to negatively change the entire fabric of Russian-Turkish partnership in various fields – from trade to joint energy projects through university partnerships to humanitarian contacts?

I would argue that the crisis between our two countries had been ripening for a long time, and the SU-24 grounding was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back.

For many years, Russians and Turks were trying to convince each other that they could “agree to disagree” on many controversial and potentially explosive political matters. The hope was that the impressive dynamics of bilateral trade, investments, tourism, cultural exchanges, binational marriages and so on would do the trick. Alas, they did not. Russian-Turkish relations demonstrated a spectacular lack of strategic depth – an evident deficit of the ability, courage and political will to look for and to find compromises and common denominators for the most fundamental problems that had been pushing the two states apart from one another.

Over the years, serious disagreements over the Caucasus, the Middle East, Iran, Ukraine, NATO, ballistic missile defense, gas pipelines and other matters were continually swept under the rug. But this mutual hypocrisy could not last forever. In a way, the ongoing crisis became possible only because the notion of a strategic partnership between Russia and Turkey had remained only on paper. Lacking the proper strategic depth, it failed to pass a reality check and collapsed like a house of cards.

Still, though the strategic partnership had been mostly imaginary, the losses appear to be more than real. Today Turkey arguably feels more pain than Russia. Grounding the Russian aircraft has not helped to protect the Syrian Turkmen population close to the Turkish border, on the contrary, Turkmen opposition groups are now more vulnerable than they ever were before. If Turkey aimed to instate a no-fly zone under its control over a part of Syrian territory, it worked the other way around: today such a zone exists, but under Russian tutelage backed by a newly installed S-400 air defense system. Russian air strikes on trucks crossing the Syrian-Turkish border in both directions – on the basis that this traffic supports the so-called Islamic State – do not make things any easier for Ankara either.

Nonetheless, if any exalted politicians or opinion makers in Moscow believe that Russia can “punish” Turkey without paying a high price itself, they are gravely mistaken. Ankara has many ways to make life harder for Moscow ranging from shifting its energy import preferences to the Gulf to utilizing its influence over the numerous communities of Crimean Tatar descendants in Turkey in ways that are detrimental to Russia’s interests. As for Russia’s economic sanctions against Turkey, in the end of the day they are going to hurt both countries and it would make little sense to argue that they are inflicting more pain on the Turks than the Russians.

Considering all of this, what could both sides do to start restoring the relationship? Yet before answering this question, we should also ask ourselves: what can we not afford in the near future? First, we should realize that mutual trust cannot be restored anytime soon – trust between the two national leaders and between the political elites in Moscow and Ankara is completely lost. Second, we cannot realistically discuss any strategic reconciliation between the two countries or a Russian-Turkish Grand Bargain – in the absence of mutual trust and with the deficit of strategic depth, the idea of both Putin and Erdogan confessing their sins and much less forgiving one another seems highly unlikely, if not outright ridiculous. Third, we should be fully aware of the fact that the downward spiral of hostility and mutual animosity is hastening, and both sides will have to spend a lot of energy and time to stop its negative momentum, not to mention reversing it.

Many proponents of better Russian-Turkish relations on both sides of the newly erected barricade argue that the only thing we can do now is to concentrate on non-state dimensions of the crippled relationship – trying to preserve and to expand human contacts, small business interaction, cultural links, joint NGO projects, education mobility, research partnerships and other ‘uncontroversial’ forms of bilateral engagement. In my view, this is an important goal to pursue, but we should not overestimate our ability to set a firewall between state and non-state dimensions of Russian-Turkish relations. In our two countries, the state traditionally exercises a great amount of influence over public opinion, civil society, the media, and cultural and educational institutions. The odds are that it will be increasingly difficult to maintain even the most ‘innocent’ forms of non-state cooperation if both states do not demonstrate at least a benign neglect towards these activities. In this sense, a Russian-Turkish rapprochement at the highest political level, no matter how limited or incomplete, appears to be indispensable.

It is often so that the solution should be searched for where the problem lies. The most critical bone of contention between Russia and Turkey today – all other disagreements and disputes notwithstanding – is the future of Syria. This is not so much related to the future of Bashar Assad, because it is clear that he will not run the country forever and that his days may be numbered, as it is to the future of Syrian statehood itself. Russia is committed to preserving the territorial integrity of Syria, while Turkey feels responsible for the future of the Syrian Turkmen and other Turkey oriented groups opposed to Damascus. This is supplemented by the fact that a number of external players including Iran and the Gulf states have their interests and their claims to protect particular factions of the Syrian population.

I do not like the term ‘soft partition’ because it emphasizes the noun ‘partition’ more than the adjective ‘soft’. But a potential solution to the Syrian riddle might well be connected to the concept of an ‘asymmetrical federation’ that will not question the principle of the county’s territorial integrity, but will guarantee sufficient autonomy for ethnic, religious, regional and political factions in Syria, including the preservation of their traditional links with neighboring countries. The concept of an ‘asymmetrical federation’ may become the platform for a compromise not only between Russia and Turkey, but between all the major players involved in the Syrian conflict. If we agree on the future of Syria, it would be much easier to move ahead on other burning issues.

As for the long term of bilateral relations between Russia and Turkey, a lot will depend on whether both sides can learn their lessons from the current crisis and whether the dialogue between Moscow and Ankara can gain true strategic depth. My modest suggestion would be to establish a high level second track channel of communication between the two countries through which they might compare the long term interests, priorities, threats and challenges that the two are likely to be focused on beyond the time frames of their current political cycles. If we demonstrate due imagination and foresight, we might be surprised to find out that our current disagreements and conflicts appear to be much less critical and irreconcilable if we look at them from a sufficient time distance.

The new strategic depth must embrace both the past and the future. The past should not be forgotten if we wish to maintain our core identities and to learn from our mistakes. But it is the future that has to inspire individuals and nations. The best days of the Russian-Turkish relations may well be ahead of us, not behind.

*Dr. Andrei Kortunov is the Director General at the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC)

**Turkish version of this article was first published at Analist monthly journal’s January 2016 issue.

The brother of murdered Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko has blamed British secret services were responsible and branded today’s report blaming Putin as a simple political smear.

As the story goes, two assassins slipped radioactive polonium 210 into 43-year-old Litvenenko’s cup of tea in a London hotel in 2006, and today’s quasi report claims that Putin “probably” ordered the killing.

But his younger brother, Maxim, today said it was ‘ridiculous’ to blame the Kremlin and that he believes British security services had much more of a motive to carry out the assassination.

Alexander was a former Russian spy who joined MI6 and it was revealed today that he had accused President Putin of being a paedophile in an online article posted on a little known Chechen website. The reason he accused Putin is because he kissed the belly of a small child, something that is quite typical not just in Russia, but for much of Eastern Europe.

Maxim claims the report is a ‘smear’ on Putin, and far from being an enemy of the state, his brother had plans to soon return to Russia and had even contacted old friends about the move.

Maxim, a chef, who lives in Rimini, Italy, said: ‘The sentence is nonsense, a set-up to provide more bad publicity against the Russian government,’ reports The Mirror.

He also went on to downplay Alexander’s role as a spy, working for either Russia or MI6, saying he was ‘more like a policeman’.

Alexander worked to combat serious organised crime such as murders and arms trafficking, but did not know any state secrets, his brother stated.

‘It is the Western media, their misleading reporting that have called him a spy,’ he added, claiming that the report – 10 years after the death – was a set-up to put pressure on the Russian Government.

Maxim said he and his father have no faith in the report, even had little trust in the alleged fact the polonium was responsible for Alexander’s death.

He also suggested that several other deaths could be linked, including the suicide of Boris dissident Berezovsky, who financially supported Alexander, and the owner of a nightclub – where polonium was found – who died.
His views differ vastly from Alexander’s wife, Marine, who today urged Britain to impose sanctions on Russia after the report, which has severely strained international relations between the two nations.

But Maxim today claimed she only made such comments as she lives in London and has to ‘play the game’, after all the British state is taking care of her, what could she possible say? – he asked.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin appear to toy with the British ‘findings’, with spokesperson Peskov stating “the Brits have shown their good sense of humor”, while Russian media have dubbed the report Monty Python-esque.

Obviously, they are not taking the Brits or their ‘report’ very seriously. Lets face it, it is difficult to take any report seriously whose conclusions include the words “probably” “might have” “could have”.

By Victoria Arnold

Two more Muslims who read the works of the late Turkish Islamic theologian Said Nursi were arrested in December 2015 and remain in pre-trial detention on serious “extremism” criminal charges, Forum 18 News Service has learned. The FSB security service launched the investigations into Komil Odilov in Novosibirsk and Yevgeny Kim in the Amur region capital of Blagoveshchensk. Odilov has already served a one-year suspended sentence for alleged “extremist” activity and is currently appealing to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Strasbourg.

Another long-running case against three Muslim men in Krasnoyarsk ended in December 2015 in convictions and large fines for two of the defendants, and will soon go to appeal.

In December 2015, 16 Jehovah’s Witnesses were convicted on almost the same “extremism” charges after the longest such trial yet in Russia, setting what they described as “a dangerous precedent for religious freedom in Russia”. The 14 men and two women have appealed against their convictions for continuing to meet to pray and read the Bible after their Taganrog community was banned and the heavy fines and suspended prison terms they received (see below).

And the criminal trial of an atheist blogger in Stavropol for “insulting religious feelings” is due to begin on 4 February 2016 (see below).

The “crime” of Muslims meeting to read Nursi’s texts

Nothing appears to advocate hatred, violence, or the violation of any human right in Nursi’s writings. Despite this, numerous Russian lower courts have ruled that various Russian translations of them (and of some other Islamic and some Jehovah’s Witness texts) are “extremist”, and have had them added to the Justice Ministry’s Federal List of Extremist Materials.

Sharing such “extremist” texts, even in private homes, can make those involved liable to criminal and administrative prosecution.

Meeting to read Nursi’s books frequently results in criminal charges under “extremism” legislation for membership of “Nurdzhular” (a Russification of the Turkish for “Nursi followers”), a banned “extremist organisation” which Muslims in Russia deny has ever existed. The reasons for Russia’s ongoing nationwide campaign against readers of Nursi’s works are obscure, with quite different reasons offered for banning Nursi writings and “Nurdzhular” in different contexts. But the primary cause appears to be state opposition to “foreign” spiritual and cultural influence.

Little or no reasoning is given in the court decisions which have added Nursi’s works to the Federal List, Forum 18 notes. Among the few specific instances of “extremism” cited, for example, are Nursi’s descriptions of non-Muslims as “frivolous”, “philosophers” and “empty-talkers”. The freedom to criticise any religious or non-religious belief is, however, a central part of freedom of religion and belief. This freedom is also being challenged by the criminal trial of atheist blogger Viktor Krasnov, who is charged with “insulting religious feelings” (see below).

Detained for organising an organisation “which does not exist”

Imam and teacher Komil Odilov has been charged for the second time with organising “extremist” activity in Novosibirsk and is currently being held in custody. His appeal against his first conviction is still under consideration in the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

Odilov was arrested on 6 December 2015, his lawyer Yuliya Zhemchugova told Forum 18 on 11 December. Four days before, he had received a letter from Novosibirsk FSB security service Major Ye. Selyunin, which Forum 18 has seen, informing him that an investigation had been opened under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 1 (“Organisation of an extremist organisation”). On 11 December, he was charged with organising a “cell” of the banned “extremist” organisation Nurdzhular and ordered to be detained until 1 February 2016.

“We are building our objection on the fact that such an organisation does not exist,” Zhemchugova told Forum 18. “Technically, anyone who studies Nursi’s teachings can be linked to the organisation itself, as Odilov has been. His opinion is that such an organisation does not exist. Yes, they are Muslims, they performed traditional religious rites. Naturally, they engaged in no ‘extremist’ activity. Odilov is a cleric at the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Asiatic Russia and is held in great esteem.”

Fellow Novosibirsk Muslims Uralbek Karaguzinov and an underage boy (name unknown) were also arrested in December 2015 on suspicion under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 2 (“Participation in an extremist organisation”). But both were released after 48 hours, according to Zhemchugova. Karaguzinov was also investigated during the first case against Odilov in 2011-13, but was not charged. Only Odilov now remains in custody.

He has not complained about the conditions there, Zhemchugova remarked to Forum 18 on 18 January 2016. However, fellow imam Ilhom Merazhov described them as “severe” and “overcrowded”.

Forum 18 called the Novosibirsk FSB security service on 20 January to ask why Odilov was considered dangerous, when he would be released from detention, and when the case was likely to come to court. A spokesperson said he could not comment by telephone and immediately ended the call. Forum 18 put the same questions to the FSB security service in writing on 18 January, but had received no response by the end of the Novosibirsk working day on 21 January.

Odilov and fellow imam Merazhov were convicted in May 2013 under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 1 (“Organisation of an extremist organisation”) for allegedly organising “Nurdzhular” activity. Each received a one-year conditional sentence. The investigation and trial lasted two years. After fruitless appeals to Novosibirsk Regional Court and the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, they appealed in January 2014 to the European Court of Human Rights (Application No. 6731/14 and Application No. 6738/14)?. An ECtHR spokesperson told Forum 18 on 21 January 2016 that no decision had yet been taken as to the admissibility of the cases.

Detained, raided and charged for meeting

Muslims who read Nursi’s works are also under investigation in Blagoveshchensk in the Far Eastern Amur region. The FSB security service arrested Yevgeny Kim on 26 December 2015, when he and his friends, including their children, had gathered at Kim’s home to celebrate the birthday of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed. He remains in custody and has been charged under Article 282.2, Part 1 (“Organisation of an extremist organisation”), with “disseminating the religious ideas of the international religious association Nurdzhular, fully aware of the fact that .. [it] had been recognised as extremist and its activities prohibited on the territory of the Russian Federation”.

Anton Starodubtsev, who attended the celebratory gathering, described to Moscow-based human rights monitor OVD-Info how armed men in balaclavas stormed the flat between 7 and 8pm, then made the attendees lie handcuffed on the floor for five hours while the property was searched and individuals taken into another room to be questioned. The officers did not show any official documents.

Kim and his friends were then taken to the local FSB security service offices, where interrogations continued. According to Starodubtsev’s comments, published by OVD-Info on 18 January 2016, the FSB is still carrying out searches of homes and workplaces and summoning people for questioning.

Forum 18 called the Blagoveshchensk FSB security service on 20 January to ask when the case might come to trial and whether anybody else remained in custody or had been charged with any offence. A spokesperson refused to comment by telephone, and explained that requests for information must be submitted in writing. Forum 18 had already done this by email on 18 January, but had received no response by the end of the Blagoveshchensk working day on 21 January.

Blagoveshchensk City Court ruled on 25 December 2015 that the FSB security service should be permitted to search the flat belonging to Darya Starodubtseva (Anton Starodubtsev’s wife). Kim is registered at this address although he lives elsewhere. According to the court document, seen by Forum 18, the case against 41-year-old Kim was opened on 25 December after an FSB investigation showed that he had organised religious gatherings in Blagoveshchensk on ten occasions between early September and the end of November 2015, at which he allegedly “decided to quote from” and discuss Nursi’s collection of writings “Risale-i Nur” (Messages of Light).

According to expert analysis ordered by the FSB security service (and carried out by Krasnoyarsk State Pedagogical University and the Siberian Federal University), speeches made by Kim and others at these meetings “were aimed at inciting religious hatred”, promoted the “superiority of the Turkic peoples”, and contained “negative evaluations” of Armenians and Russians. Kim is accused of presenting “Risale-i Nur” as the “answer to all questions” and as “attractive for believers in comparison with other religious teachings, including official Islam”.

Such “expert analyses” have often been used to justify bans on books and prosecutions. But there can be numerous flaws in such “expert analyses”.

Guilty and fined

Two other men accused of “Nurdzhular” membership, Andrei Dedkov and Aleksei Kuzmenko, were found guilty at Soviet District Court in Krasnoyarsk on 18 December 2015.

Although prosecutors had sought custodial sentences, Judge Yevgeny Repin instead imposed fines of 150,000 Roubles (about 18,750 Norwegian Kroner, 2,025 Euros or 2,205 US Dollars) on Dedkov under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 1 (“Organisation of an extremist organisation”) and 100,000 Roubles (about 12,500 Norwegian Kroner, 1,350 Euros or 1,470 US Dollars) on Kuzmenko under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 2 (“Participation in an extremist organisation”).

A third defendant, Azerbaijani-born Ismat Agzhayev, was also tried under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 2. But on 2 December 2015 the court halted proceedings against him until he recovers from illness, court spokesperson Anna Sheludko told Forum 18 on 15 January 2016. Both Krasnoyarsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office and lawyers for Dedkov and Kuzmenko have submitted appeals against the judge’s decision, she added.

The investigation of the three has been underway since January 2014. Court proceedings began on 24 July 2015 and were interrupted by the judge going on holiday.

No “foreign or international” questions

When Forum 18 called the regional Prosecutor’s Office on 19 January 2016 to ask why it was appealing against the verdict, a spokesperson said that enquiries must be directed to the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Russian Federation, as Forum 18 is a “foreign or international organisation”, not registered in Russia.

Arrests, searches, questions

The Siberian Federal District Investigative Committee’s investigation of 36-year-old Dedkov, 33-year-old Kuzmenko and 19-year-old Agdzhayev began in January 2014 . Law enforcement officers seized copies of Nursi’s text “Risale-i Nur” during searches of their homes.

Texts from this collection have been subject to 34 “extremism” rulings in courts across Russia since July 2007, when the Federal List of Extremist Materials was first published.

Before he was charged, Kuzmenko described to Forum 18 how Dedkov, Agdzhayev, and “several other Muslim brothers” were arrested after Friday prayers at Krasnoyarsk’s Cathedral Mosque, while other worshippers, who had already left, were detained at the exit of a nearby hypermarket. Searches of suspects’ homes “went on deep into the night”. Officers seized more than 400 books from Dedkov’s flat and car, as well as more books, computer discs, laptops and tablets from Agdzhayev and others. Kuzmenko also claimed that the FSB security service confiscated from him a Turkish-language edition of a book by Nursi.

According to Kuzmenko, he experienced “no brutality” from law enforcement officers during the searches and questioning. But he alleged that they “applied pressure” to one witness (which he did not describe in detail) to state that Dedkov had directed him to create a social network group dedicated to Nursi’s writings.

In a press statement of 22 December 2015, the regional Prosecutor’s Office claimed that Dedkov, “having decided to carry out the activities of the international religious association Nurdzhular”, distributed Nursi’s books in Krasnoyarsk and attempted to involve residents in religious lessons at “a network of places” which he had set up. He allegedly instructed Kuzmenko and Agdzhayev also to involve other people in the study of Nursi’s works, to distribute books, and to hold lessons in a flat, “which [Kuzmenko] personally conducted, reading and explaining the contents of what was read”.

“The fantasies of law enforcement agencies”

The FSB security service and prosecutors had no evidence of the existence of Nurdzhular, Kuzmenko told Forum 18, “because a priori there cannot be any, as this organisation does not exist anywhere except in the fantasies of law enforcement agencies”.

In summer 2015, the trials of two Krasnoyarsk residents accused of running a women’s cell of “Nurdzhular” came to an end at the same Soviet District Court. Tatyana Guzenko was fined 100,000 Roubles in July, while proceedings against Yelena Gerasimova were dropped in August as the two-year statute of limitations had expired.

Financial penalties even if not convicted

The names of several Muslims who have been charged with “extremism” offences for meeting to study Nursi’s works have been added to the list of “terrorists and extremists” maintained by the Federal Financial Monitoring Service (Rosfinmonitoring), whose assets banks are obliged to freeze. From 30 January 2014 the law has been relaxed to allow small transactions not exceeding 10,000 Roubles (about 1,250 Norwegian Kroner, 135 Euros or 147 US Dollars) per month.

Merazhov, who was given a suspended sentence in 2013, described to Forum 18 how he was unable to receive his university salary or make any money transfers when on the list.

Forum 18 notes that the list appears to violate the presumption of innocence by including individuals not convicted of terrorism or “extremism”. It also fails to distinguish clearly between those suspected or convicted of terrorism and of “extremism”.

No clear timetable appears to exist for the addition or removal of names from the list. Some individuals known to have been convicted, for instance, have still not been added, yet others who are still only suspected of “extremist” activity, do appear.

In Krasnoyarsk, Andrei Dedkov, Aleksei Kuzmenko and Ismat Agdzhayev all appear on the Rosfinmonitoring list of 21 January 2016. Yevgeny Petry, Aleksei Gerasimov, and Fizuli Askarov, who were tried alongside Dedkov in a previous case (which ran out of time in 2012) do not. Neither Tatyana Guzenko, who was convicted of “extremism” in 2015, nor Yelena Gerasimova, who was not, have been added to the list. In Novosibirsk, Komil Odilov and Uralbek Karaguzinov have been added. Ilhom Merazhov’s name has been removed. In Blagoveshchensk, Yevgeny Kim’s name does not yet appear on the list.

In total, nine Muslims who read Nursi’s works currently appear on the list, out of 31 known by Forum 18 to have been convicted since 2010. A further five (including Odilov) appear despite not having been convicted.

Stavropol “insulting religious feelings” trial to begin

The trial of an atheist blogger charged under Criminal Code Article 148, Part 1 (“Public actions, expressing obvious disrespect for society and committed with the intention of insulting the religious feelings of believers”) is due to begin on 4 February 2016, Forum 18 has learned. Viktor Krasnov (known on social media as Viktor Kolosov) is accused of committing this “crime” in two online conversations in the “Overhead in Stavropol” group on the VKontakte social network in the autumn of 2014.

The two conversations he is accused of holding disparage beliefs held by some Christians but do exercise his internationally-recognised right to freedom of religion or belief.

Criminal Code Article 148 came into force on 1 July 2013 and critics noted it was so poorly defined that it (and the similarly aimed new Code of Administrative Offences Article 5, Part 26) could be used to prosecute actions officials simply dislike. Considerable disagreement exists in both the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) and Russian society over the criminalisation of “insulting religious feelings”.

Krsanov’s preliminary hearing, postponed to allow his lawyer to become acquainted with the case, took place in closed conditions on 19 January 2016 at Magistrate’s Court No. 6 before Magistrate Aleksandr Filimonov. The case had already been transferred from Industrial (Promyshlenny) District Court at the Prosecutor’s request in November 2015.

Taganrog 16 Jehovah’s Witnesses appeal

Sixteen Jehovah’s Witnesses found guilty of “extremist” activity in November 2015 have appealed against their convictions, Jehovah’s Witnesses have told Forum 18.

The 14 men and two women received heavy fines (which the judge waived) and suspended prison sentences at Taganrog City Court after a re-trial lasting more than 60 hearings over ten months. They were convicted of “continuing the activities of an extremist organisation” by meeting to pray and read the Bible after their community was liquidated in 2009.

Although the fines were waived (as the two-year statute of limitations had expired) and the custodial sentences were suspended, all the defendants submitted appeals on 10 December 2015, Jehovah’s Witness spokesperson Ivan Belenko told Forum 18 on 15 January 2016. No hearing date has yet been set.

By Cécile Barbière

(EurActiv) — Romania’s Prime Minister still wants to see his country join Schengen, despite it having an uncertain future.

“We want to join a working Schengen,” said Dacian Cioloș during a visit to Paris on 21 January.

The former European Commissioner for Agriculture was appointed on 17 November to head a technocratic government with a one year mandate. His call to open air borders seems to be the first step in integrating Bucharest into the Schengen area, an issue in which there has been little movement in recent years.

Indeed, Romania, which joined the bloc in 2007, and has the second largest land border of all the member states, has fulfilled the criteria to join Schengen since 2010. But its fellow EU countries have blocked any attempts to further proceedings on political grounds.

The reluctance of the other member states to admit Romania can partly be explained by the fact that Bucharest still receives aid from the European Commission through the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, in order so that reforms to the judicial system can be carried out and so that corruption can be tackled more effectively.

Romania is in the same boat as Bulgaria, which has been excluded from Schengen on much the same grounds, although Romania has made more significant progress is reducing corruption, which the Commission has welcomed on several occasions.

“The first step in integrating Romania into Schengen could be the opening of air borders, in order to reward the progress that has been made,” said Cioloș.

“In regard to the land borders, the priority must be securing the external borders,” said the prime minister, adding that he was “concerned by all the current discussions about national borders”.

Romania, which had initially indicated opposition to the refugee relocation plan proposed by Jean-Claude Juncker, finally voted in favour of the scheme.

“But, without border and migration controls, this plan is not a solution,” warned Cioloș. “We want to be part of the solution and, unlike certain other member states, we are not content to just say no,” he concluded.

For Romania, the dialogue with Turkey, and the proposed European border force that could be mobilised without the expressed approval of the member states, are among the viable solutions.

However, tensions between member states on how to best manage the crisis are visible, particularly in the east with Poland, Slovakia and Hungary, whose governments are completely opposed to the idea of quotas.

“I think that the reaction of some countries is the result of frustrations related to a lack of involvement in the Brussels decision-making process,” added Cioloș. “In the future, we need to find mechanisms that allow all countries, even the smallest, to be involved,” he concluded.

Despite significant market turbulence in the beginning of this year, there are reasons to remain cautiously optimistic about the trajectory of the global economy throughout 2016 and beyond. This was the consensus of panellists at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting, against the backdrop of very low oil prices and bond yields, as well as handwringing about the effect of the Chinese economy on markets and fears over the divergent monetary policies of the United States, Japan and Europe. Overshadowing Europe is the potential Brexit.

Global growth in 2016 will be modest and uneven, according to Christine Lagarde, Managing Director, International Monetary Fund (IMF), Washington DC. Global growth is estimated at 3.4% (it was 3.1% in 2015) and 3.6% in 2017. “We see global growth in 2016 as modest and uneven,” said Lagarde. “There is modest optimism but significant risks.”

These downside risks include the profound transition of the Chinese economy, lower-trending commodity prices as a result of oil prices and asynchronous monetary policies around the world. Lagarde said the global economy is presenting a “completely different picture that is changing.” This is due to growth in India and China and a downturn in Russia and Brazil. She pointed to the financing for development agreement reached in Addis Ababa, the Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Climate Agreement (COP21) as significant events that will result in “changes in our economies”.

Europe’s economy is in better shape at 1.5% growth, but Lagarde pointed to two major concerns: potential Brexit and the refugee crisis. “If the refugee crisis is handled well and the integration process is conducted in a cohesive and organized way, it will be an upside for growth,” she said.

The United Kingdom has been a bright spot in an otherwise gloomy European Union context, said George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer and First Secretary of State of the United Kingdom. “We are the fastest growing of the advanced economies, with record labour participation and low unemployment,” he said. The United Kingdom’s challenge is its call to reform the EU. “What we are seeking is reforms for all of Europe,” he said. “We want a more competitive Union.”

Osborne said that, within his party and among citizens, there will always be those who want to leave the EU. He noted that the reforms Britain is seeking are very significant. “I am optimistic we will get a deal for Britain and for the EU,” he said. “I want our continent to be a source of innovation, growth and jobs. If people see we are delivering that change, they will want to stay in a reformed EU.”

Another bright spot on the global stage is India, with 7.5% expected growth. However, people are still living in poverty, said Arun Jaitley, Minister of Finance, Corporate Affairs and Information and Broadcasting of India. “We need a high growth rate sustained over a long period of time,” he said. Oil prices have been helpful in sustaining the country’s growth, but shrinkage of exports is a concern. The government has a list of high-priority reforms, including tax reform – including a lower goods and services tax – and bankruptcy law

One main reform remains “a work in progress”, which is ease of doing business. Jaitley pointed to India’s culture of innovation and said the government plans to support start-ups with tax breaks, funding and a no-interference policy.

Japan’s economy grew 1% to 1.5% in the current fiscal year. The corporate sector reported high-level profits, the labour market is becoming tighter and unemployment is at just 3%, according to Haruhiko Kuroda, Governor of the Bank of Japan. The inflation rate remains at zero, but the economy has been making a moderate recovery. “We will expect this growth to continue for some time and inflation could improve substantially once oil prices start to bottom out,” he said.

Kuroda said that monetary policy divergence among major economies simply reflects divergent financial situations.

The world has changed a lot since the financial crisis in 2008, said Tidjane Thiam, Chief Executive Officer, Credit Suisse, Switzerland, a Co-Chair of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2016. “There is no worry about contagion risk with banks,” he said. “This is a huge tick for the central banking system. Look at our total capital; we will be holding $4 trillion. Even if there is a good degree of commotion, the system can withstand it. We can look forward to a normalized environment.”

The worst start to any year on the record of financial markets three weeks into 2016 was driven by several factors, including fears about a hard landing for China. “The market is very worried about China,” Thiam said. “We believe China will have a soft landing.”

There was consensus that the markets had “overreacted” to China. Lagarde said the transition of the Chinese economy, moving from industry to services, from exports to the domestic market, and from investment to consumption is a massive undertaking. “We forecast China to be at 6.8% growth in 2015,” she said. “For those who pretend to be surprised, it was expected … this is a good way to facilitate the transition.”

Martin Wolf, Associate Editor and Chief Economics Commentator, Financial Times, United Kingdom, commented: “The basic lesson is not to be worried about markets; we have some big issues, but the United States, Europe and China look okay and they are the core of the world economic system. So, it should be alright – cheer up.”

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman yesterday warned Bernie supporters that change doesn’t happen with “transformative rhetoric” but with “political pragmatism” – “accepting half loaves as being better than none.” He writes that it’s dangerous to prefer “happy dreams (by which he means Bernie) to hard thinking about means and ends (meaning Hillary).”

Krugman doesn’t get it. I’ve been in and around Washington for almost fifty years, including a stint in the cabinet, and I’ve learned that real change happens only when a substantial share of the American public is mobilized, organized, energized, and determined to make it happen.

Political “pragmatism” may require accepting “half loaves” – but the full loaf has to be large and bold enough in the first place to make the half loaf meaningful. That’s why the movement must aim high – toward a single-payer universal health, free public higher education, and busting up the biggest banks, for example.

But not even a half loaf is possible unless or until we wrest back power from the executives of large corporations, Wall Street bankers, and billionaires who now control the whole bakery. Which means getting big money out of politics and severing the link between wealth and political power – the central goal of the movement Bernie is advancing.

A poet always looks into invisible objects inside and outside of his existence. Then he discovers the world through the use of words, dreams, time, attraction, love, solitude, memory or metaphors while making the world more transparent and visible. In the infinite sky, Xhevdet Bajraj, a great Albanian poet who has crossed international borders, is looking for his shadow below the sky.

In the awakening, verses almost of a melancholic mood are born without any question marks; they flow just like matured apples, approached just like a fatherland, and are falling asleep over an extinguished cigar. In its smoke is freedom, poison, the hidden rays of the sun. There is also the poet, time and poetical space.

Earlier, I read poems written by Xhevdet Bajraj and was surprised. In their core, I discovered, that the author who comes from a small Albanian town, was writing more about the winter of his motherland, than the burning sunny summers of Mexico (where he currently lives).

As a result, Bajraj was submitted to poetry as much as he has been overwhelmed by peace, emotions, life and reality. Xhevdet Bajraj is a prophet in the art of words and makes all of us to speak with poetry, with the world, with time while creating his artistic space.

As he uses literary figures to share his verses, he gives them life and voice to communicate with men. The poet is looking only for a single path, right there where the verses meet, where inspiration is encountered, pain, and hope even when there is sorrow. This is why his poetry has the weight of the word, as the best ally of an artist. What makes Bajraj highly unique is that he is obedient to poetry, the same way as poetry is bowing to the poet. Each one has his own heritage.

During the night and day they have their sun and shade. In the morning a word is juxtaposed through the images of a human face, that person who is not missing anything, except the steps on earth where his soul is taken hostage. He leads a dialogue with verses while using the inner feeling to find the philosophical truth, against evil, or a monologue with him against human conflict.

While hating war, this free poet is in love with freedom. I have never accepted to compare a writer with another one similar to him, because from similarities no one can profit. Poets cannot solve the problems of the world, but they can create imaginations through the freedom of speech.

The true personality of this poet creates a parallel instability with the great world around human freedom. Here is what Bajraj is writing about in the poem: “In my song”: if you encounter a person in my song, in a sunny day, while drinking water in a river, with the knees over the stone, leave him alone, he was born free.

All poets have written songs to freedom, however with the earthly sounds that Bajraj is writing for is the absence of freedom in his genuine fatherland. Everyone sings to freedom based on his culture! Freedom has no space. It is infinite. Why is Bajraj remembering his fatherland? Well, because he is certainly missing it.

It seems that without a fatherland you cannot feel free. You may feel pain, experience illnesses, or go through winter nightmares. This becomes also a true painful gland. Let’s see again his verses. In the poem “The peak of solitude” the author writes: somewhere in foreign soil, in the name of freedom, run around the world, or in the poem: “A dance with a flute” the poet says: the river of blood came out of its bed, what a habit, someone lives every day, and I die every day!

In his poem “Peace”, Xhevdet Bajraj is annoyed by the evil done against freedom: expels the world from his room right after closing his window, I save the flag of Red and Black for my grave. A poet with universal culture with ideas and a style that is universal within the circuit of originality in his poetry he brings what is called today as the freedom of soul. Every verse of Bajraj has a metaphor.

Such a magic inspiration with a deep sentiment, with the power of words, makes his verses to be covered by a wind of love meaning which make us to consider this poet, a great value to Albanian poetry. As I read with emotions his poetry “Somewhere Beyond the Ocean,” I ask myself: why the handkerchief of pain follows the Sun and the dove is descending over the grave stone, as a vivid piece of mud, where somewhere beyond the ocean, a man is crying in Albanian.

How distinctive is the greatness of the poet in this meditational poetry covered by metaphors! Who would cry besides a well-talented poet? Aren’t there dreams, doves, cemeteries, poetical symbols for the poet even though he only dreams in Albanian? Why is the dream turning into verses for a piece named Albania? Isn’t there Xhevdet Bajraj a poet who is inspired by his fatherland and who always prays in Albanian? Isn’t there the poetry of Bajraj filled with surrealist reflexes?

I have also thought about this! He writes about the dreams of Albanian men, the same as he writes for the world, since his poetical soil is praying for peace! The writer has won the fight with poetry while filling it up with life. The universal uniqueness of creative spectrum is penetrated by deep messages where emotions and perception are dedicated to a lifelong dreamer of human soul. In his creative profile are shaped through philosophical ideas, the artistic talent and poetical identity.

It is the message that comes from the language of soul which is the language of all poems that are impressive with their expression and a vision of universal freedom which is in harmony with the energy of a writer through his free verses, structure and figurative language. The poetical theme that is sensitive for the common reader would make him a marvelous poet who would travel with the reader in the forefront of Albanian poetry and beyond.

Today he is without a doubt one of the best poets who has shaped his own unique artistic contours, a master of selected verse with the power of literary expression, with a deep affection and a lucid Albanian language that breaths and brings poetical sounds. He turns a dream into a poetical hymn. Here is a poem that has remained in my memory “Dreams”: sheltered in a silver cave, licking the wounds under the shadow of memories, o God, pardon me for dreaming this much, love was far away, and life was too short.

He turns into hope and infinite light the sensitive and radiating feeling, the pretty and pain as an aesthetical value that breathes. To make this through the verses is an action that goes beyond the art and even humanism. It is equally significant as to the invasion of the world and men with love instead of war. This can only be done by a unique poet that has invaded all of us while dreaming and singing in Albanian language amid such a great universe of poetry.

*Violeta Allmuça, is a renowned Albanian writer, she was born in Dibër, Albania. Studied at the University of Tirana and graduated in 1991. She is a poet, journalist, author and literary critic. Is the author of four novels, two volumes of poetry and a book with essays on Kosovo published in English and Italian in 1999. The poems of Violeta Allmuça are published in various international magazines in Italian and English languages.

Translation from Albanian: Peter M. Tase

Europe is at a critical tipping point and, depending on how much political will is mustered in Brussels and by member states, it could go either way. This year is a determining year for the Union as it faces crisis within its borders and from outside. Running through Europe is a mounting fear of more terrorist attacks. This was the message delivered at a BBC debate held at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting.

The European project is facing division and disintegration, and Schengen (the border-free area that guarantees EU citizens free movement) is under attack. Europe’s leaders are deeply divided over how to handle the refugees fleeing war and persecution, particularly with the rise of xenophobic, populist parties.

Last December, Federica Mogherini, High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy; Vice-President of the European Commission, European Union, Brussels, said that the EU is at risk of “committing suicide”. Today, in Davos, she said that leaders and citizens realize that, without the European Union and its unity, “we could not face the problems of terrorism, migrants and refugees.”

Mogherini pointed out that, although it has taken eight months of summits to craft a coherent Europe-wide response to refugees, it is now up to the national governments to implement the response. “I do not see it as a failure that it took this long. This is a European issue; finally we are doing something … we need to implement the European solution,” she said.

Emmanuel Macron, Minister of the Economy, Industry and Digital Affairs of France, agreed. “We are at a critical point and we have just a few weeks to deliver concrete European solutions,” he said. Solutions include border controls with Turkey and deeper cooperation with countries such as Lebanon and Jordan, which have accepted hundreds of thousands of refugees. “If we enter into a non-European approach, it will kill the right European approach,” he said.

The hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the war in Ukraine into Poland is an unrecognized crisis, said Witold Waszczykowski, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland. Poland is hosting 1 million refugees. The minister said that it is important to focus on the conflict on Europe’s eastern borders. “We are alone in handling this crisis,” he said. In terms of refugees from the south, Europe was caught by surprise. “But, in 2015, Europe managed to organize itself and started dealing with Turkey.” The Polish minister reminded participants that the refugees arriving in Europe are now safe.

Europe’s choice is “disorganized chaotic arrivals or a more organized response”, including a stronger humanitarian response in Syria, said David Miliband, President of the International Rescue Committee, USA. “Relocation is part of the answer in Europe, but it isn’t the only answer.” According to Miliband, evidence shows that the greatest terrorist threat to the continent comes from people born in Europe. To those who believe most people arriving in Europe are not refugees, he noted that 59% are from Syria and 22% are from Afghanistan. Today’s challenge is integration, employment, education and citizenship. Evidence also shows that, the higher one builds the wall, the more one opens up routes for smugglers.

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel took a strong, principled stand and opened German borders when refugees started arriving en masse. She is now under tremendous political pressure and her leadership is being questioned by some of her constituents. Josef Joffe, Publisher-Editor, Die Zeit, Germany, pointed out that “the great moral superpower of Sweden started closing its borders,” a trend that is cascading. “European values aside, the highly regulated welfare state stands in the way of absorbing vast numbers of people,” he said. “It is easy to talk about values; how do we do it?”

Iranian authorities say they have arrested the administrator of the Triple A (AAA) Persian-language satellite network.

The Fars News Agency reported on Thursday January 21 that the Revolutionary Guards had arrested head of AAA without identifying the individual.

A later report on Iranian state television indicated, however, that the individual was arrested by the Intelligence Ministry.

The Fars News reports says the individual “guided by British intelligence operatives intended to sell two networks under his control to Persian BBC and also had close links to Gem TV”.

The report alleges that the arrested individual was involved in “immoral issues” and aimed to “destroy the moral and religious foundations of Iranian youth”.

The AAA network airs films, series and music through two channels, AAA Family and AAA Music. The broadcasts on both channels have currently stopped.

Iranian authorities have warned Iranians against links to foreign satellite programs.

By Sandip Kumar Mishra*

In his new year’s speech in 2016, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un expressed willingness to have talks with South Korea but just a few days later, conducted North Korea’s fourth round of nuclear tests. The inconsistency in North Korea’s policy and actions is not easy to decipher. North Korea seems to seek proposals for peace while escalating tensions. In the past one year, the dynamics of East Asia has also been quite similar.

There have been a few bilateral and multilateral proposals intended to bring peace but there have been simultaneous counter actions by countries of the region, which have further heightened regional insecurity. There are indications of change in regional political and economic exchanges but there are equally strong trends underlining continuity. It seems that the region is passing through a cusp in which any clear trend is difficult to decipher, with a lot of activity, both positive and negative.

For the past few years, bilateral relations in East Asia have been characterised by mistrust, provocations and counter-actions on the surface and continued economic and other exchanges beneath, among the countries of the region. Shinzo Abe in Japan, Xi Jinping in China, Park Geun-hye in South Korea, and Kim Jong-un in North Korea have all been less compromising on their respective positions and this has led to the emergence of many security hotspots in the region. The only exception has been continuous improvement in China-South Korea relations.

Looking Back

In 2015, China became more overtly assertive in the region with the establishment of the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), activities to establish One-Belt, One-Road, constructing artificial islands in the South China Sea and its behaviour in the East China Sea. In the process, China had serious contentions with the US and Japan. Unlike previous few years, it tried to reach out to North Korea in 2015 while maintaining good relations with South Korea. Chinese representative Liu Yunshan, who is ranked number five in the hierarchy of the Chinese Communist Party, participated in a celebration to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the establishment of the Workers’ Party of Korea in Pyongyang. It has been the highest exchange between the two countries after the death of Kim Jong-il in late 2011.

Meanwhile, China was able to make South Korea join the AIIB as one of the founding members, keep Seoul away from the US proposed Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) and also welcome the South Korean President Park Geun-hye to participate in the Victory Parade organised in Beijing to commemorate the 70th year of the victory over Japan in World War II.

The Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe continued his hard-line policies vis-à-vis history and territorial issues by evoking nationalist sentiments. However, on 1 November, Abe visited Seoul to participate in the three-nation summit meet, which happened after a gap of three years. On 28 December, Abe also conveyed his apology to South Korea on the comfort women issue and promised a contribution of US$8.3 million to create a fund for the victims. Japan wants to mend its relationship with South Korea but without softening its nationalist fervour and hard-line stand. The change in the Japanese approach is not a change of heart but just an attempt to neutralise its isolation in regional politics.

South Korea in the past few years has been trying to walk a tight rope. It has been consistently cooperating with China in the economic sphere and also on the issue of the North Korean nuclear programme, and at the same time,ha been trying to maintain its close relations with the US. China’s strategy to reach out to Seoul has not been able to create any substantial gap in South Korea-US relations. However, Beijing has been successful in creating a gap between South Korea and Japan, though the gap may be attributed to Japan’s aggressive behaviour more than Chinese efforts. The improvement in China-South Korea relations looks quite consistent. However, after North Korea’s self-proclaimed thermonuclear test and China’s reluctance to put forth tougher sanctions on North Korea via the United Nations Security Council, it would be difficult for South Korea to continue its tightrope walking strategy.

North Korea appears to be making all effort to reach out to other countries across the globe in the context of its relatively strained relations with China. In the past year and a half, the North Korean Foreign Minister and Prime Minister have visited more than fifteen countries with the intention to diversify economic exchanges, including India. North Korea’s uncompromising stance vis-à-vis China appears to be paying off, with China trying toto placate North Korea again through high level visits and Xi Jinping’s message to North Korea. However, China and North Korea relations have had to face a few unpleasant developments: for example, when North Korean music band Moranbang returned to Pyongyang without performing in China because of a reported misunderstanding about the level of Chinese leadership participation. The so-called North Korean thermonuclear test is also going to be an issue between the two countries.

Looking Ahead

On the basis of these trends in the East Asia, the following projections could be made about the region for 2016.

First, even though China’s economic attractiveness in the region has been acceptable, Beijing’s political assertiveness is going to be a cause for discomfort. Either China will have to change its course or the regional players will be compelled to more overtly create a network of resistance. The US, Japan, Australia, India and even South Korea along with some Southeast Asian countries are going to cooperate more closely to counter Chinese political and military assertiveness.

With the recent North Korean nuclear test, even South Korea has indicated that it might join THAAD, and this would definitely be a setback for China. China appears to be adamant in its demand to have ‘great power relations’ with the US and Xi Jinping seems to want to continue his two-pronged policy of ‘economic allurement’ and ‘political assertiveness’ for some time.

Second, Japan will try to mend its relations with South Korea. Recently, both countries have had an agreement on the issue of comfort women. If Japan and South Korea area able to improve their relations, it would be a positive for the US which has security alliances with both. After the North Korean test, it is obvious that the US, Japan and South Korea are in favour of tougher sanctions , but China seems to be returning to its old policy of protecting North Korea by asking for dilution of sanctions.

Third, the current year would be critical for South Korea, as it may have to choose between economic opportunities in China and the security imperative emanating from China’s assertiveness and North Korean nuclear and other brinkmanship. If China is unable to contain the North Korean nuclear and missile programmes and its provocative behaviour, South Korea would certainly have to rethink its policy of cooperating with China, even at the expense of the US’ displeasure.

Fourth, North Korea’s uncompromising stance on its nuclear programme makes it almost certain that there is only a thin possibility of denuclearising North Korea and regional players have to make peace with a nuclear North Korea. However, continuous purges of political and military elites in North Korea along with its economic miseries make it difficult to predict its future. A more provocative North Korea does not mean a strong North Korea but rather a weak and unstable state, and any implosion would have serious repercussions for the region.

Finally, it is going to be a critical year for US foreign policy in the region. With the growing positive and negative vibes created by China, the US also needs to come out with its responses in a more planned and coordinated way. It seems that the US has been reluctantly reacting to China – it needs to have a pro-active policy for the region. However, it is not sure whether the US has the willingness or the capacity to do so as a relatively weaker Washington is entangled in several other issues and regions.

Thus, in brief, it is going to be a critical year for East Asia, where the future course of the regional architecture will become clearer. All the countries of the region have to make critical decisions with regard to their foreign policies. There are enough political contests, which indicate an unstable time ahead. However, going by the economic interdependence and exchanges among these countries, there is a possibility that some modus vivendi might be evolved to not only co-exist but also co-prosper. Rapprochement between Japan and South Korea and a trilateral summit meet among China, Japan and South Korea are basically driven by these possibilities. The future of East Asia would depend on the choices made in this by the leaders of the region.

* Sandip Kumar Mishra
Assistant Professor, Department of East Asian Studies, Delhi University

By Joshua Meservey*

There were some positive developments for U.S. interests in Africa in 2015. Nigeria, the continent’s most populous nation and boasting its largest economy, peacefully elected a new president. Congress reaffirmed the U.S.’s commitment to Tunisia, a fledgling democratic ally in the crosshairs of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The African Growth and Opportunity Act, a linchpin of U.S. engagement with the continent, was renewed.

However, many challenges remain for 2016. The U.S. and its allies still lack a strategy for Libya even as the nation descends deeper into chaos. Democratic gains are being rolled back across the continent, and terrorist and political violence threatens a number of American allies in the region.

Here are four African policy priorities for the U.S. in 2016:

1. Counter political and Islamist terrorist violence. Africa hosts an array of transnational Islamist terrorist groups that are destabilizing important American allies and inflicting terrible suffering in parts of the continent. Some of these terrorist groups pose a threat to the U.S. itself.

In Nigeria, the ISIS-affiliated Boko Haram terrorist organization surpassed ISIS as the deadliest terror group in the world in 2014. Al-Shabaab continues to terrorize Somalia and neighboring Kenya, and is trying to reinvigorate its recruitment of Americans. ISIS has established a significant beachhead in Libya, and has designs on the country’s lucrative oil fields, while al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and a rat’s nest of other armed groups destabilize northern Mali and other parts of the Sahel region.

Political violence will be a real danger as well in 2016. In the Central African Republic, tensions remain high between Muslims and Christians in a sectarian battle exacerbated by dysfunctional politics. Election-related violence in Burundi, a country with a history of genocide, is threatening to metastasize into an ethnic conflict that could inflame the central African region. South Sudan has been locked in civil war since December 2013, with the leaders of each side showing no commitment to peace, all while the nation faces a looming famine.

To respond to these crises in Africa, the U.S. should:

• Continue providing military support—particularly training and intelligence—to responsible countries battling terrorism.
• Make enabling regional responses a priority. Neighboring countries often have a deeper understanding of these conflicts and strong incentive to solve them.
• Remain strongly engaged, as circumstances dictate, with countries gripped by political violence.

2. Promote economic freedom in Africa. A recent global slump in commodity demand is bringing economic challenges to the significant number of African economies that are overly reliant on commodity exports. Zambia is in economic free-fall as copper prices tank, while major economies such as Angola and Nigeria are scrambling to plug budget shortfalls due to the plummeting price of oil. China, a major importer of African commodities, is also slowing economically, adding to the pain for many countries.

The World Bank still estimates that sub-Saharan Africa grew at a 4.2 percent clip in 2015, although that is down significantly from the 6.4 percent average growth it enjoyed from 2002–2008.[1] Moreover, this rate of growth is insufficient, in many countries, to meaningfully raise the standard of living for their swelling populations.

The current crunch is an opportunity for countries to undertake reforms that will bring long-term, stable growth. The U.S. should:

• Urge and assist commodity-dependent countries to build more competitive economic climates. Only seven African countries are ranked “mostly free” or “moderately free” in The Heritage Foundation/Wall Street Journal 2015 Index of Economic Freedom,[2] while in the World Bank’s latest Doing Business report, the majority of African countries rank in the bottom quarter.[3]

3. Remain watchful toward other countries’ growing influence on the continent. In 2009, China overtook the U.S. as Africa’s largest trading partner, although the U.S. still outstrips China in aid and investment to the continent. China’s need to protect its large investments in volatile areas of the continent has led to change in its traditional non-interference policy in African countries’ internal affairs. In January 2015, for the first time in its history, China began deploying an infantry battalion to a U.N. peacekeeping mission, in this case to South Sudan, where it has significant oil interests. This is part of a major increase since 2000 of China’s contributions to U.N. peacekeeping operations, more than 80 percent of which are in Africa.[4]

In November 2015, China announced that it would build its first overseas military outpost in the strategically located nation of Djibouti, which also hosts the U.S.’s only permanent military base in Africa. Additionally, Chinese President Xi Jinping attended a December 2015 summit in South Africa, the first time China has engaged in such a high-level event on African soil. At the summit, Xi doubled China’s previous aid pledge to Africa by promising $60 billion over three years to African countries.[5]

Russia, too, is looking to the continent. Its trade with Africa increased more than tenfold between 2000 and 2012. Russia needs some African natural resources, but it is also pursuing commodities such as oil and natural gas as a hedge against Western diplomatic and economic pressure. State-owned companies Gazprom and Lukoil are developing major hydrocarbon deals in Algeria, while two state-owned Russian commercial entities under Western sanctions have struck a recent deal to develop platinum mines in Zimbabwe, despite Russia already controlling 30 percent of the global supply of platinum.[6]

Africa has more than enough opportunity for all, but nations such as China and Russia, which frequently challenge U.S. interests in other parts of the world, are likely to follow the same playbook in Africa.

The U.S. should:

• Nurture its African friendships by all available means to prevent potential challenges from competitors. A good start would be making the successful 2014 U.S.–Africa Leaders Summit an annual or bi-annual event.
• Enhance U.S. influence with African states by increasing cooperation with allies active on the continent, such as Germany, the U.K., and France.

4. Encourage countries to recommit to their democratic transitions. President Obama has, to his credit, explicated the importance of democracy in a number of prominent speeches delivered in Africa. The Obama Administration has also decried the undemocratic activities proliferating around the continent, and has tried to stem the election-related crisis currently gripping Burundi.

Yet the President last year also visited Ethiopia, one of Africa’s most repressive and least-democratic countries, a few months after Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman praised the country’s democracy.[7] Ethiopia is important to U.S. interests, but a presidential visit was an unnecessary reward, and a setback for the cause of democracy on the continent.

The Administration has also been reluctant to push a strategy of democracy promotion, despite a democratic slide on the continent. Vaguely worded security laws have been used to crack down on political opposition and the press, while laws targeting nongovernmental organizations have hollowed out civil society in a number of countries. Since 2001, 16 African heads of state have fiddled with constitutions, and engaged in a range of other machinations, in an attempt to extend their stays in power.[8]

The U.S., as the world’s standard-bearer for democracy, should:

• Revitalize its commitment to African democracy by assisting and rewarding those countries making democratic gains, and by working to put regressing countries back on track for democracy.

The Growing Importance of Africa

Africa’s resources, security challenges, and economic opportunities ensure that its global importance will increase in the coming decades. Now is the time for the U.S. to enhance its activities on the continent to ensure its long-term interests are protected and promoted.

About the author:
*Joshua Meservey is Policy Analyst for Africa and the Middle East in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy, of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy, at The Heritage Foundation.

Source:
This article was published by The Heritage Foundation

Notes:
[1] Gerard Kambou, “Sub-Saharan Africa,” Global Economics Prospects, The World Bank, January 2016, http://www.worldbank.org/content/dam/Worldbank/GEP/GEP2015b/Global-Economic-Prospects-June-2015-Sub-Saharan-Africa-analysis.pdf (accessed January 8, 2016).

[2] Terry Miller and Anthony B. Kim, 2015 Index of Economic Freedom (Washington, DC: The Heritage Foundation and Dow Jones & Company, Inc., 2015), http://www.heritage.org/index/ranking.

[3] The World Bank, Doing Business 2016, October 27, 2015, http://www.doingbusiness.org/rankings (accessed January 7, 2016).

[4] “Peacekeeping Fact Sheet,” United Nations, August 31, 2015, http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/statistics/factsheet.shtml (accessed January 14, 2016).

[5] Rene Vollgraaff et al., “Xi Unveils $60 Billion Funding Pledge at South Africa Summit,” Bloomberg Business, December 4, 2015, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-04/xi-announces-60-billion-funding-package-as-china-summit-opens (accessed January 13, 2016), and Patrick McGroarty, “China’s Xi Pledges $60 Billion for Africa Development Over Three Years,” The Wall Street Journal, December 4, 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-xi-pledges-60-billion-for-africa-development-over-three-years-1449224028 (accessed January 13, 2016).

[6] Dave Forest, “Russia Is Making a Big Play in Africa,” Business Insider, October 20, 2015, http://www.businessinsider.com/russia-is-making-a-big-play-in-africa-2015-10 (accessed January 13, 2016); Godfrey Marawanyika, “Zimbabwe Sees $1.6 Billion Platinum Pact with Russia,” Bloomberg Business, August 5, 2014, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-08-04/zimbabwe-sees-1-6-billion-platinum-pact-with-russia (accessed January 13, 2016).

[7] Mohammed Ademo, “US Official Praises Ethiopian ‘Democracy,’ Rest of World Begs to Differ,” Al Jazeera America, April 18, 2015, http://america.aljazeera.com/blogs/scrutineer/2015/4/18/us-official-praises-ethiopian-democracy-us-begs-to-differ.html (accessed January 14, 2016).

[8] “What Do Burundi, Burkina Faso, Djibouti, Algeria, Tunisia, Cameroon, Uganda, Chad, Congo, Rwanda, Have in Common?” Mail and Guardian Africa, October 27, 2015, http://mgafrica.com/article/2015-10-27-clinging-onto-power-in-africa-nguesso-the-latest-example (accessed January 13, 2016).

By Chris Miller*

Why the Baltics? Of the European Union’s half a billion residents, scarcely more than 1% live in one of the Baltic countries. Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are tiny countries in terms of their landmass and their population. Yet they punch far above their weight. From energy policy to e-government, from geopolitics to economic policy, the Baltic countries are playing an outsized role in Europe’s future.

If the Baltics are known for anything today, it is for their precarious geopolitical position. Located on the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea, these countries are on the frontlines of the struggle between Russia and the West for influence in Europe’s borderlands. The Baltics are nearly surrounded by Russia and its ally Belarus, save only for a short border that Lithuania shares with Poland.

Since the invasion of Ukraine, security has been at the top of the Baltics’ to-do list. As members of NATO and the EU, the Baltics are protected by treaty commitments with the United States and European powers. Yet they have been taking steps to bolster their defense, spending more on their own militaries and encouraging NATO allies to station troops and supplies on their territory.

Given the Baltic countries’ history—they were occupied by the Soviet Union for half a century—security is an inevitable concern. Yet it is wrong to reduce Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania to nothing but a geopolitical battleground. The reality could not be more different. Small though they may be, each of these countries has important lessons for its neighbors and for all of Europe.

Take energy. For two decades, Europe has been debating how to diversify energy supplies in order to guarantee energy security. Across much of Central and Eastern Europe, Russia is the largest—and in some places, the only—natural gas supplier. That gives Gazprom, Russia’s state-owned gas monopoly, significant pricing power. Because of this, Lithuanians paid significantly more for gas than Germans, for no obvious commercial reason. Yet Europeans have been divided over how to respond, with some countries recommending legal action, other countries focusing on energy infrastructure, and many—perhaps most—European leaders preferring not to deal with the problem at all.

But Lithuania took action. Fed up by higher prices, and fearful that Russia would use its control of gas supplies as a political weapon, Lithuania chose to diversify its energy supply. It built a terminal for accepting shipments of liquid natural gas on the shores of the Baltic Sea. The terminal was expensive. But now Lithuania is far less dependent on Russia for energy. Today Lithuania can import gas from as far afield as America and the United Arab Emirates, all but eliminating Russia’s pricing power. Many are now asking whether the rest of Europe can learn lessons from Lithuania as it debates how to construct its Energy Union.

If Lithuania has been a leader in energy policy experimentation, Latvia has been a testing ground for debates about how Europe should respond to its economic crises. The Eurozone’s crisis is often described as a clash between Greek and German models of economic policy. But it is more accurate to think of a contest between Greece and Latvia. Both countries faced similar problems when the financial crisis of 2008 hit Europe: an explosion of debt coupled with a declining ability to repay. In 2008 Latvia faced a current account deficit of 23% of GDP and inflation of 18%.Yet where Greece chose to default on some of its debt and seek loans from other European countries and the IMF, Latvia hiked taxes and aggressively slashed its government budget. Indeed, Latvia adjusted its economy so rapidly that it was able to join the Euro in 2014—at the very moment Greece was thinking of leaving the single currency. Latvia’s experience was different from Greece’s in many ways—it has weaker labor unions, for example, and a less-developed welfare state. Some question whether Latvia’s success at adjusting its budget came at too high a social cost, as unemployment briefly hit 21%, though it has since fallen sharply. Many people in Europe now look at Latvia as a model for how to confront economic crisis.

Estonia, too, is at the forefront of public policy in an important sphere. It has made its mark above all in e-government. The home of Skype, Estonians have long been proud of their technological prowess. They have gone further than anyone in using technology to make government work better. From online voting to government-issued digital IDs, the tech tools that Estonia is applying to government today is shaping how countries across the world think about technology.

The Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Baltic Initiative, which is being formally launched this month, will cover these issues in depth through our Baltic Bulletin and Baltic Briefs. Our aim is to publish research from top American and European analysts on the Baltics, but also to showcase leading experts from Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Questions of security, diplomacy, and politics will be an area of focus, because these are key questions in these countries’ own political debate. Yet the Baltics’ story is much broader than most people realize. From energy to economics, from trade to technology, the future of Europe is being debated and decided in the Baltics.

About the author:
*Chris Miller, a Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, recently received his Ph.D. in history from Yale University. In 2012-2014, he worked as a visiting researcher at the Carnegie Moscow Center while on an Alfa Fellowship and taught history at the New Economic School, a university in Moscow. He is currently completing a book manuscript on the collapse of the Soviet Union.

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This article was published by FPRI