By Mehari Taddele Maru*

Elections for the AU Commission should pass the same rigorous test and uphold the principles that the continental body requires from Member States. Intensive election competition, emanating from a genuine commitment to the Pan-African agenda and with a vision to provide better leadership, would signify marked differences from the past and would result in a more effective and efficient AU.

It has been four years since the controversial, highly contested and divisive campaign and election of the current chairperson of the AU Commission Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma in 2012. With Dr Dlamini Zuma’s incumbency coming to an end and her decision not to run for a second term, once again the upcoming July 2016 AU Commission elections have aroused the interest of many commentators and stimulated further debate. Most related articles written recently have rightly indicated the importance of the AUC and called for the AU to address the elections of its leaders with the appropriate amount of seriousness and consideration.

Tried and true, it is impossible to exaggerate the importance of these elections to the AU Commission. The AUC serves as the collaborative platform for all AU organs. The chairpersons and the commissioners are pivotal in the allocation of resources and determination of the AU’s agenda. More importantly, it plays the role of initiating and facilitating norm-setting, norm-diffusion, and the coordination of norm-implementation and supervision. It prepares the strategic plans of the Union, provides administrative, secretarial and substantive expertise to other organs of the AU, including the AU Assembly, the Executive Council and the Peace and Security Council. It also promotes a collective African voice and defends the position of Africa in the world.

Could these recent extensive media coverages and Pan African conversations of concern rekindle the hope that AUC elections will progressively meet the demands of Africans for competitive and meritocratic elections? As revealed in the candidatures’ list, this is inconceivable.

Even more, the nationalities of the candidates compel one to ponder more about this election. An interesting aspect of the candidature list is the fact that some of the candidates are from countries that are new entrants to the AUC elections. Botswana, rarely known for its competition in Pan African institutions, has a candidate for the top post of the chairperson. Somalia and Djibouti have for the first time forwarded candidates for the post of deputy chairperson. Ghana’s former representative to the AU is also running for the same post. Lesotho’s candidate is also running against a candidate from Cameroon for the post of Economic Affairs, rendering a competition between two male candidates.

The four top tier budget contributor Member States (Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria and South Africa) with 48 percent of the total budget) have only five (16 percent) of the 32 candidates for commissioner posts. None of the top tier nominated a candidate for the post of the Chairperson or the Deputy Chairperson. Of the four top tier budget contributors, Algeria is seeking re-election of the incumbent Amb Smail Chergui, while Egypt has four candidates, thereof, making Egypt with the highest number of candidates, and eighty percent of the candidatures of the top tier contributors. Could this be an indication of change of African policy of Egypt? What primed South African government decision not to fill any candidate for the AUC after the bitter fight for the post of chairperson four years ago? Did it break its eggs by putting them in one basket? In contrast, is Egyptian diplomatic focus now shifted southward, and now bestowing Africa highest importance? Why? Nigeria nominated a new candidate for Peace and Security while failing to seek re-election of the incumbent commissioner of Political Affairs. Later in the process it withdrew its candidate altogether. What considerations informed such drastic decisions?

In this piece I deliberately only deal both with nominations and candidates but with more focus on nominations, as they could be a better indication of the root causes of the muted competition and low level of importance Member States accord to the elections, and thereby the AU organs.

Gender and geographic representation: Legitimacy through meritocracy or/and representation?

The first step in the election process of the leadership of the AU Commission is for the Member States or/and five regions of the AU to forward the names of their candidates in response to calls by the Office of the Legal Counsel of the Commission. Five regions consolidate candidates of Member States to eight commissioner posts and could propose two candidates for each constituting eighty candidates continental pool of commissioners. Of these, the laws of the AU require at least one of the candidates for each region should be a female, leading to forty males, and forty female candidates. The Counsel convenes the Team of Consultants that assesses the documentations and CVs of the nominations and grades them accordingly to a set of marking rules. After a final vetting process by Ministerial Panel that reviews the Report of the Team of Consultants, a shortlist is prepared. As Ministerial Panel only considers the candidates for Commissioners, not the chairs, the vetting process for the Chair and Deputy has to wait for the Summit.

Too few nominations to shortlist

Twelve years ago, in the first elections in 2003, there were more than seventy-three candidates for the post of commissioners. In contrast, in 2008 the number of candidates declined by almost half to forty-five, and in 2012 this number declined even further to twenty-nine. Now, for the 2016 elections, we only have thirty-two candidates (after three were disqualified who failed to fulfil the minimum CV requirements and one late withdrawal). Another crucial concern about the current nominations is the sharp decline in the pedigree and profiles of the various candidates, particularly the chairperson. For example, Professor Alpha Konare, the first chair of the Commission from 2003-2008, was a former head of state of Mali. Since then there have been two former ministers (Dr Jean Ping of Gabon, and Dr Dlamini-Zuma of South Africa) chairing the Commission. The leadership experience and professional profiles of some of the current candidates are somewhat less impressive.

Retrogressive trend continues: Declining Nominations, and Dwindling Competition   

Far from being a competitive election by design, the 2012 AU Commission election by default metamorphosed into an intensively fought campaign that put the AU in the limelight. Since 2004, the number of nominations received by the Legal Counsel of the AU Commission has been drastically declining. In 2012, Central Africa forwarded the greatest number of nominations. Entitled to two posts at the AU Commission leadership, North Africa nominated only two, rendering the nomination and the subsequent election uncompetitive. Similarly, the incumbent Deputy Chairperson ran alone without a challenger and thereby reduced the election for this high post into a vote of confidence.

A competitive election requires adequate numbers of nominations and competent candidates. While the AU’s member states are required to nominate eighty (80) candidates, the continental pool in 2012 had only twenty-five candidates. Consequently, the 2012 elections were characterized by a sharp decline in the submission of nominations. The Ministerial Panel for the Election of Commissioners and the Team of Consultants noted their concerns that the “limited number of candidatures … could be an impediment to the potential of selecting the most competent candidates for the portfolios.” Member States tend to attach minimum importance to the elections. Most of the 2012 submissions were made accompanied by incomplete documentation. In the 2012 election, an AU Member State actually nominated a candidate who had no university education. The Team of Consultants excluded this particular nominee on the grounds that the candidate lacked the minimum AU requirement of a university degree. In fact, no region “complied with the rules and modalities for presentation of candidates.” These actions indicate a lack of rigor and due diligence in the nomination process.

In 2012 Member States and regions also forwarded the names of incumbent leaders of the AU Commission as nominees. In this regard, the Ministerial Panel pointed out that the “fact that no appraisal performance report was submitted for the incumbent Commissioners seeking re-election” contributed to the uncompetitive nature of the elections.

Decreasing numbers of female candidates

Another regressive aspect of the current election process is the fact that the number of female candidates has declined from sixty percent of all candidates in 2012 to thirty-eight percent in 2016. For instance, six candidates for the Deputy Chairpersonship and the Economic Affairs portfolio are male, while all candidates for the Trade and Industry Commission are females. Given that the rules of the AU require that half the commission be female, all fifteen female candidates are effectively competing for five posts, while twenty-five male candidates are vying for the remaining five posts.

Reform of the AU elections

Elections at the Commission need to indicate generational progress towards meeting of the demands of the new generation, the creation of a meritocratic, competitive and gender sensitive Pan-African political landscape. Intensive election competition emanating from a genuine commitment towards a Pan-African agenda, with the vision to provide a better quality of leadership, would certainly signify a marked departure from the past and could result in a more effective and efficient AU. More importantly, if well planned and maintained such competitive elections could enhance the relevance of the AU to its Member States and indirectly to the peoples of Africa.

Furthermore, as the premier integrity guarantor for African elections, the AU needs to achieve a higher standard for the elections of its own leaders.  As the norm-setting body on democratic principles, free and fair elections on the continent, the AU should maintain the highest possible threshold of ethical standards for its leadership elections. The elections for the AU Commission should pass the same rigorous test and uphold the principles that it requires from Member States. Intensive election competition, emanating from a genuine commitment towards the Pan-African agenda and with a vision to provide better leadership, would certainly signify marked differences from the past and would result in a more effective and efficient AU.

The current nominations reflect no such indication of progress. Instead, they are characterized by regression both in quality and quantity. Hence, the upcoming July election offers an opportunity for overhauling and improving the quality of the elections of the various AU organs.

But what measures are required to ensure highly competitive, participatory and representative elections at the AUC?

Overhauling the election process: Towards meritocracy

In 2012, a piece entitled Rethinking and Reforming the AUC Elections, published by Oxford University, identified and examined major shortcomings in the elections of the AU Commission and pinpointed the legal lacunas in the rules of procedure.[2] With a futuristic perspective, the article identified a few areas of reform and forwarded recommendations for more free, fair and credible elections as well as the highest possible public participation and meritocratic competition with the highest ethical standards. Nevertheless, none of these recommendations were heeded except some minor reforms in the election procedure. Key among my recommendations was the need to rethink and reform the nomination process of candidates by member states. The most binding constraint for transformation required a reversal of the low level of importance Member States devote to the AU elections. Without Member States committing to high political urgency and giving greater weight to the elections, no reforms can yield the desired quality of leadership in AU organs that is required to effectively address the challenges facing Africa and its people. Such changes will also ensure the existence of a popularly legitimate and effective leadership at the AU Commission.

The current nomination process lacks transparency at the national level and is not competitive. If the identified shortcomings and failures are addressed effectively, the 2016 election could provide an excellent opportunity to reverse the sharp decline in the quality and submission of nominations that have dogged the past three elections.

The first measure for the 2016 July Summit should be to reject politically expedient election compromises, postpone the elections to January 2017 and re-open the nomination process. As a second measure, criteria for candidacy in the elections should focus on meritocracy and integrity. A clear vision and effective strategic approach that collectively demonstrate a Pan-African commitment and understanding of the AU need to constitute the main elements of the vetting process. One’s achievements and the quality of leadership, corroborated by the popular and performance legitimacy of the candidate in previous posts, should be graded far higher than educational background and prior experience in the current vetting system. As a third consideration, the AU needs to ensure the observance of required criteria by member states and regions. Failure to submit the required documents and evidence of competence of the nominees should be sufficient reason for disqualification. New candidates should be strictly evaluated and incumbent contenders should be appraised based on their popular and performance legitimacy during their incumbency.

A fourth factor could be regions should also ensure that their Member States observe the stated AU rules and criteria in order for them to propose their best candidates for the continental electoral pool. A fifth consideration, and possibly the most essential, is that member states should establish transparent and popular mechanisms for nominations at the national level. Governments need to encourage the highest possible competition at national level through public announcements. In reality this may require the allocation of resources for such a process, but such a procedure would require governments to accord the AU the importance it deserves as the premier continental institution of governance in Africa. Through such national processes, the AU would also be close to the eyes and hearts of the African people.

Finally, ensuring the integrity of the election process demands serious attention and further work by the AU. In this regard, a code of conduct should be developed for future elections at the AU. In the long-term, the AU needs to adopt election voting quotas based on population size. This would ensure an effective process towards transforming the AU from a ‘union of states’ to a ‘union of African peoples’.

* Dr Mehari Taddele Maru is a scholar of international law, and currently a member of the AU High Level Advisory Group, and a specialist in peace and security, migration, public administration and management.

Endnotes:
[1] CH: Chairperson, DCH: Deputy Chairperson, PA: Political Affairs, IE: Infrastructure and Energy, SA: Social Affairs, HRST: Human Resources, Science and Technology, TI: Trade and Industry, REA: Rural Economy and Agriculture.

[2] Mehari Taddele Maru, Rethinking and Reforming the Africa Union Commission Elections, African Security Review, 21.4, Pp. 64-78, Taylor and Francis Group, ISSN 1024-6029 print / 2154-0128 online, available from http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rjpd20/4/1#/doi/abs/10.1080/15423166.2008… (accessed 31 October 2012).

The Islamist militant threat in Bangladesh has been underestimated says the editor of a journal that tracks jihadi groups around the world.

“We now have competition between al Qaeda and the Islamic State in Bangladesh, which means that the jihadist pool is deep enough for both organizations to operate in the country,” said Thomas Joscelyn, senior editor at The Long War Journal, reported Reuters.

Bangladesh officials say the so-called Islamic State and al Qaeda are not directly involved in the Islamic militant killings of more than 30 people in the country since early 2015.

However Joscelyn said that there is evidence that Bangladeshi Islamic militants have direct links with al Qaeda.

The two international jihadi movements have claimed responsibility for the murders that have targeted minority groups and activists in this Muslim-majority South Asian nation.

A new poll conducted by the Levada Center finds that Russians are more angry about what they see as growing differences between the rich and everyone else in their country than they are about ethnic or religious differences and tensions among the population (levada.ru/2016/06/27/tochki-raznoglasij-v-obshhestve/).

That is not to say that Russians do not see ethnic or religious differences as a problem but rather at a time of economic crisis, they are more focused on economic issues and the differences between the behavior of the very wealthy and the rest of the population are more immediately obvious, experts say (rufabula.com/news/2016/06/29/social-problems).

Three out of four Russians (76 percent) now say that they sense strong tensions between rich and poor, and four out of five (82 percent) indicate that these tensions could spark conflicts. At the same time, however, only half of those (41 percent) said they felt that such tension was currently “’very strong.’”

More importantly, the share of Russians saying that such tensions are “’very strong’” has risen from 36 percent in 2009 near the start of the current economic crisis to the current level. And Russians remain agitated by ethnic and religious differences: 52 percent say that they feel tensions between people of different nationalities and believe they could spark conflicts. Forty-eight percent say the same about religious differences.

Anastasiya Bashkatova, the deputy economics editor of “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” unpacks these new data and concludes that rising concerns about social class tension reflect the relative decline in the incomes of Russia’s middle class rather than changes in the relationship between the very rich and the very poor (ng.ru/economics/2016-06-29/1_poverty.html).

According to experts with whom she talked, the Gini coefficient in Russia, which measures the incomes of the top ten percent of the population as compared to the bottom ten percent, has actually declined since the start of the crisis. Other comparisons of this type confirm the same pattern, Bashkatova says.

But she notes something very important: Those patterns are true only if one compares the situation now with that of ten years ago or more. If one considers a shorter time period, “the picture is different,” with the Gini coefficient rising since the start of this year and income differentiation increasing. That is what this poll is capturing.

She cites the conclusions of Lyudmila Presnyakova of the Public Opinion Foundation, who says that those who have suffered least from the crisis are those at the very bottom of the class structure, those who “don’t have enough money even for clothes.” And that means, she continues, “the relationship between the richest and poorest hasn’t changed, but the middle is becoming poorer, although it is not yet in the situation of the poorest.”

Nina Kozlova of the FinEkspertiza company offers an additional perspective. She notes that in some sectors income inequality has increased such as in the fishing industry while in others like social services it has remained the same or even decreased relative to where it was before the crisis.

But Andrey Lyushin of Loko Bank probably provides the best explanation for the new numbers. He says that anyone can see differences of wealth if he or she simply takes a walk because now some people are driving luxury cars than are “100 times” the price of the kind of automobiles others have.

When times are tough or when the government cuts back on subsidies or increases the cost of services, that matters more to people, and, he suggests, they feel such income differentiation more strongly.

By Elise Harris

As Pope Francis on Sunday backed the idea of apologizing to gay individuals who may feel marginalized by the Church, discussion has once again broken out over how to interpret the pontiff’s words.

Debate flared up overnight after the Pope responded to a question about recent comments made by Cardinal Reinhard Marx, who said the Church must apologize to homosexual persons for having “marginalized” them.

While Pope Francis did not actually make an apology to the gay community, his endorsement of the idea has exploded, in part because it has been taken by many as an open endorsement for the gay lifestyle, deviating from Church teaching.

On the other hand, Francis’ acknowledgement that an apology might be in order on the part of some represents something that many in the gay community have been longing to hear, many of them rightfully so.

The Pope’s comments also drew attention from those who claimed that they were a criticism of the U.S. bishops, who, while mourning the recent Orlando shooting at a gay nightclub, did not explicitly express solidarity with the gay community by name.

What is the correct interpretation of Francis’ comments?

It is difficult to argue that the Pope was critiquing the U.S. bishops’ response to the Orlando shooting, as his own language closely mirrored that of the bishops. The Pope did not mention the gay community in his own response to the shooting, but rather responded as he normally does to tragic events, with prayer and expressions of solidarity for the loss of any human life.

Furthermore, the Pope did not tell anyone to issue an actual apology. And his focus was not limited to the LGBT community. Rather, he made the broader statement that the Church “must not only ask forgiveness to the gay person who is offended,” but also to all of the people “we could have defended and we didn’t,” including the poor, and women and children who are exploited.

He cited the Catechism, saying that homosexual individuals “must not be discriminated against, (but) must be respected and accompanied pastorally.”

The Catechism teaches that based on Scripture, “tradition has always declared that ‘homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.’”

Homosexual acts, it continues, “are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.”

When speaking of homosexual persons, however, the Catechism insists that most gay individuals face “a trial” due to their sexual orientation, and “must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.”

What Pope Francis said, then, is in no way an endorsement of the gay lifestyle, but rather clearly echoes Church teaching and displays his genuine pastoral concern for a group that has and frequently still does face hostility, including, at times, from within the Church.

Benedict XVI, while head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, voiced similar thoughts in a 1986 letter to bishops on the pastoral care of homosexual persons, stressing that “it is deplorable that homosexual persons have been and are the object of violent malice in speech or in action.”

Such treatment, he said, “deserves condemnation from the Church’s pastors wherever it occurs.”

So while Francis is not the first Pope to speak out about the need to respect homosexual persons, he is perhaps more vocal in making sure that message reaches both these individuals and the world.

The Pope’s approval of an apology to the gay community can also be seen as a continuation of the synodal process.

One of the issues addressed at the 2014 and 2015 Synod of Bishops in Rome was how the Church might adopt a new language in communicating her teachings in modern society, particularly in relation to topics such as abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality and divorced-and-remarried Catholics.

In the words of Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, who spoke at an Oct. 8, 2014, event in Rome, adopting a new language was not just “a question of the immutability of the Church’s truth, but our burning desire to find a language that can present it in a more gracious, compelling, cogent way.”

Phrases such as “natural law,” “intrinsically disordered,” and living “in a perpetual state of sin,” which are used in the Catechism to describe various irregular situations, were mentioned by synod fathers as expressions up for re-consideration.

While such phrases might express the Church’s position clearly, the argument was that they are either rarely understood outside of the Church, or that the tone they emit exudes moral judgement rather than an invitation to join the family of Christ.

Viewed through this lens, Francis’ encouragement of an apology for any wrongs done to homosexual persons is not a watering down of Church teaching. Rather, it can be read more accurately as representing his desire to change the Church’s perspective for the purpose of dialogue.

The shift is not an issue of questioning doctrine, but of viewing and treating people, of encountering them with an unchanging doctrine in a more understandable and welcoming way.

Francis seems to be challenging us to see homosexual persons not primarily as those with “intrinsically disordered” inclinations, but as struggling brothers and sisters who need welcome, respect and accompaniment in order to eventually understand and accept the truth.

Another key in interpreting Francis can be found in his days as cardinal in Buenos Aires. In 2010, then-Cardinal Bergoglio wrote that a proposed bill to allow same-sex marriage and adoptions would “gravely injure the family.”

“What is at stake here is the identity and survival of the family,” he said in the letter. “At stake are the lives of so many children who will be discriminated against in advance, depriving them of the human maturation that God wanted to be given with a father and a mother. At stake is the outright rejection of the law of God, engraved also in our hearts.”

Yet the cardinal, while clear in supporting Church teaching, also supported the legalization of same-sex civil unions, a move those close to him described as a strategy to protect the institution of marriage itself.

What is seen in that situation in Argentina – as well as the current situation with the comments on the gay community – is a stance that defends the Church’s doctrine without being afraid to dialogue and encounter, to shake things up and “make a mess,” as the Pope instructed the youth of Argentina to do three years ago.

Over the past decade, religiosity and religious intolerance have seeped into national sports teams in Pakistan and Egypt, societies that have been wracked by faith-based narrow-mindedness and political fanaticism.

The trend is exemplified by two national team managers, a controversial Pakistani cricket captain and a storied Egyptian midfielder-turned-glorified-soccer coach. The trend reflects the devastating impact of religious and/or political intolerance in Pakistan and Egypt.

It has redefined the symbolism of Pakistan’s national cricket team and Egypt’s national soccer squad. Governments as well as national and international sports associations have encouraged the trend by failing to enforce good governance.

Both managers, Inzamam-ul-Haq, widely celebrated as one of Pakistan’s greatest batmen, and coach Hassan Shehata, took their national teams to new heights. Pakistan’s national team won 11 of the 30 Test cricket matches under Mr. Ul-Haq’s captaincy. Mr. Shehata’s squad won three successive African Cup of Nation titles.

Messrs. Ul-Haq and Shehata have more in common than their athletic triumphs. Both men wore their religiosity on their sleeves and made a player’s piety as important a criterion for membership in their national teams as their athletic skill.

In doing so, they redefined national sports teams as reflections of their conservative faith-based worldview rather than a representation of the diversity and pluriformity of their respective countries and a demonstration of the the skill, professionalism and performance they are capable of producing.

Messrs Ul-Haq and Shehata were empowered by leaders and politicians who employed religion to enhance their power. They were further abetted by national and international sports associations that violated their own charters by turning a blind eye to an unwarranted mixing of religion, politics and sports.

The two men’s imposition of values unrelated to their sports paralleled the rise of religious and political intolerance in Pakistan and Egypt even if the two countries’ response often politicized religious militancy differed starkly.

Messrs. Ul-Haq and Shehata’s initial success allowed them to get away with it until their teams’ performance deteriorated as their countries descended into political upheaval and chaos.

Authors Richard Heller and Peter Oborne describe cricket in a just published book as “a bridge to understanding the collective subconscious of Pakistan.”

Mr. ul-Haq fits the bill. His imposed religiosity reflected a society in which ultra-conservative interpretations of Islam, often funded by Saudi Arabia, have been woven into the fabric of Pakistani society, key branches of government and South Asian Diaspora communities. Some of those interpretations propagate sectarian violence against Shiites and Ahmadis with devastating consequences for minority communities.

In Pakistan, lack of political will, corruption and government support allowed intolerant and violent strands of Islam to flourish. In Egypt, it was the military and thugs associated with it rather than the Islamists that killed 28 mostly Coptic Christian protesters in Cairo in 2011 in one of Egypt’s worst incidents of sectarian violence.

Mr. Ul-Haq’s insistence on Muslim orthodoxy said much about the degree to which cricket and society had drifted away from the days when a Christian, a Parsi and a Muslim founded the sport in newly established secular Pakistan.

In contrast to the early days of Pakistani cricket, Mr. Ul-Haq’s national team much like that of Mr. Shehata in Egypt was devoid of religious diversity. Since retiring as a player, Mr. Ul-Haq serves as the Pakistani cricket team’s chief selector of players. The team has since yet to hire a minority player.

The story in Egypt is hardly different.

“In Egypt, there is a problem that many people don’t even consider. This problem relates to not allowing the Copts to play in the national teams of sports, especially soccer which is the most popular game in Egypt. Marginalization of young Copts by the Football Association and the administrations of Egyptian clubs resulted in having no Coptic players in the core teams. Youth teams have very few Copts and they are laid off as soon as they reach certain age and never take the chance to promote,” Safwat Freeze Ghali wrote in 2012 on the website of Copts United.

Charging that soccer discrimination against Copts encouraged discrimination by Muslims and anger and hate among Copts, who account for some 10 per cent of all Egyptians, Mr. Ghali spoke out of personal experience.

“I suffered from this problem with my son who was born in 1995 and has a great talent in soccer. Many people have said so after they saw him playing. My son then started in a small club, but never took a chance to play. His coach treats him so badly and his colleagues make fun of his Christian name. His coach told him: I won’t let you touch the ball (play in the team) and never ask me why! We got fed up and I took him to a bigger club and they liked him very much and promised to recruit him but they never did. Then, I moved him to another club where they liked him too, but when the coach knew his name (a Christian name), he said: We’ll see, later!” Mr. Ghali wrote.

Only practicing Muslims could join Mr. Shehata’s team. It was an unwritten rule. Players prayed before games for God’s intervention and offered up prayers of thanks for goals and victories. They were invited to join the national team as much because of their pious behaviour as because of their soccer skills.

“Without it (religiosity), we will never select any player regardless of his potential. I always strive to make sure that those who wear the Egypt jersey are on good terms with God,” Mr. Shehata said. In one instance, Mr. Shehata dumped a talented player for visiting a nightclub rather than a mosque.

In a similar vein, Dawn newspaper described how Mr. Ul-Haq one day brought Naeem, a “bearded chap in shalwar kameez” into the locker room as players prepared for a game. Naeem, Mr. Ul-Haq announced in a tone signalling that he would brook no dissent, would be leading prayers before and after the match as well as in the intermissions. No player was allowed to excuse himself.

“It became increasingly evident that with the growing influence of religion and for skipper’s overwhelming tilt towards it, players would make the grade more for their display of faith, abhorrence for the shaving kits and bird-watching rather than their ability to perform on the field… That, clearly, was the beginning of a new trend in Pakistan cricket, a trend totally alien to the game in this part of the world,” Dawn reported.

Messrs. Ul Haq and Shehata’s tenure ended when the performance of their teams deteriorated. With few exceptions, both teams have yet to return to their heyday stellar performance.

To be sure, both teams have been effected by severe political turmoil.

The public has largely been banned from attending Egyptian matches since mass protests toppled President Hosni Mubarak more than five years ago. More than 90 fans have been killed in two politically loaded incidents.

Sectarian and criminal violence has wracked Pakistan in recent years. The violence is fuelled by conflict in neighbouring Afghanistan, Pakistani support for jihadist groups and the government’s refusal to confront militant religious ultra-conservatism.

However, attributing poor performance to troubled political circumstances is too simplistic. Governments as well as national and international federations stood aside, if not abetted, the intrusion of intolerance, non-inclusivity and prejudice into national sports teams, projecting a view of the nation that could only serve to deepen their countries’ political malaise.

Following Boris Johnson’s decision to exit the contest to become Britain’s next prime minister, the front-runner is Home Secretary Theresa May.

May’s chief opponent, Michael Gove, when asked last month whether he was interested in being prime minister, said: “No, I’m not. There… I don’t want to do it and there are people who are far better equipped than me to do it.” In 2012, he said: “I could not be prime minister. I’m not equipped to be prime minister. I don’t want to be prime minister.”

Here are some clips from the launch of May’s Conservative leadership bid:

The principal role of whoever becomes Britain’s next prime minister will be negotiating with the EU.

The Guardian notes about May:

After 10 years she is now the most experienced interior minister in Europe and has proved highly influential in justice and home affairs policies. She has recently secured agreement for a new Europe-wide database logging passenger information for all flights in and out of Europe. Although a professed Eurosceptic it was little surprise when she announced she was backing the remain in Europe campaign. In an earlier life she was a Brussels lobbyist for the Association for Payment Clearing Services for six years and is very much at home trying to secure what she wants in Europe.

While argument among legal experts persists on whether Brexit must indeed move forward, May, although having campaigned against withdrawal, now insists there is no alternative.

In line with positioning herself as the candidate of stability, she has made it clear that it is the UK, not Brussels, which will determine the time to invoke Article 50 and that if she is prime minister, this will not happen before the end of the year.

Oxford University’s Professor Richard Ekins writes:

Parliament having decided to hold the referendum, and the public having participated fully in it, the result should be respected and not undone.

Political fairness and democratic principle require one to respect the outcome of the referendum even if one is persuaded that Brexit would be a very bad idea. One might think it wrong to hold the referendum, but it was held – and Parliament invited the people to decide this question. There was a lengthy, wide-ranging, high-powered campaign that culminated in high public turnout and a clear outcome. The remain camp had a fair hearing: it was led by the PM and most of cabinet, with the support of most MPs with much business and international support. In short, the important constitutional question of whether Britain should remain in the EU was fairly settled by public vote.

The proposal to ignore or undo the vote is unjust. It bears noting that the relatively powerless in our polity – the poor – overwhelmingly supported exit. Ignoring the referendum would be particularly unfair to them. It would not be consistent with treating them as free and equal persons entitled by the law and constitution of their land to a share in self-government, not least since the rationale for ignoring the process in which they participated has so often been framed in terms of outright contempt for them. Any failure to act on the decision made in the referendum that the UK should leave the EU would be a profound betrayal. It would be no mere failure to recognize the perspective of the dispossessed, but would be the betrayal of holding out to them, as to others, a question for decision and then ignoring their decision because one does not like it.

The fact that May sees no reason for there to be a general election until 2020, could provide the Labour Party with an opportunity to reconstruct itself rather than continue digging its own grave.

John Harris writes:

Labour is in the midst of a longstanding and possibly terminal malaise, and now finds itself facing two equally unviable options.

On one side is the current leader and a small band of leftist diehards, backed by an energetic, well-drilled movement but devoid of any coherent project and out of touch with the voters who have just defied the party in their droves. On the other is a counter-revolution led by MPs who mostly failed to see this crisis coming, have very few worthwhile ideas themselves, and are a big part of the reason the Brexit revolt happened in the first place. As the activist Neal Lawson says, the choice is essentially between different captains of the Titanic, and therefore is no choice at all.

As with the centre-left parties across Europe in the same predicament, Labour is a 20th-century party adrift in a new reality. Its social foundations – the unions, heavy industry, the nonconformist church, a deference to the big state that has long evaporated – are either in deep retreat or have vanished completely. Its name embodies an attachment to the supposed glories of work that no longer chimes with insecure employment and insurgent automation.

Its culture is still far too macho, and didactic; it has a lifelong aversion to analysis and ideas that has hobbled it throughout its existence, and now leaves it lacking any real sense of what is happening. I am a lifelong party member who was raised in a Labour family – my grandfather was a south Wales coal miner, my father a Labour activist – for whom the party was a kind of secular church. But if we do not confront the crisis now, then when? Look at any number of what we still laughably call “core” Labour areas, and you will find the same things: a vote share that has been steadily declining since 2001, an MP more often parachuted in from a different world, and voters who either vote for the party thanks to fading familial loyalties (“I vote Labour because my granddad did”) or have no idea what the party stands for.

By Denis MacShane*

(EurActiv) — Boris Johnson has underlined the truth of the dictum “He who wields the dagger never wears the crown.” Johnson destroyed the career and place in history of his fellow Old Etonian David Cameron. If Lord North in the 18th century was the Prime Minister who lost America, David Cameron in the 21st century is the PM who lost Europe.

Another Old Etonian chum of Johnson, James Landale, is the BBC’s deputy political editor. In the 1990s he was a journalist colleague of Johnson in Brussels. He wrote this about the Boris approach to truth when writing about Europe: “Boris tells such dreadful lies, it makes you gasp and stretch your eyes.”

Simon Heffer, one of the senior right-wing columnists in the British media and a noted historian, has written that Johnson is a “proven liar”.

The whole of the Leave campaign was based on a series of lies – namely that outside the EU there would be no immigration from Europe into Britain or that Britain would have £350 a million a year to spend on the NHS or that Turkey was about to join the EU and so 75 million Turks would arrive in Britain tomorrow.

Johnson and Leave fought the campaign on “the bigger the lie, the more it is believed.”

He became Nigel Farage’s useful idiot as the UKIP leader was perfectly justified in his claim to the European Parliament that he was the initiator of the demand for a Brexit referendum which David Cameron so casually gave him in January 2013.

We can leave the Tory Party and “Borisologists” the pleasure of working out why he did it but the significance of his standing down is important for what happens now on the UK and Europe.

Almost certainly the main beneficiary of Johnson giving up is Theresa May, the Home Secretary.

Sir Nicholas Soames MP, grandson of Winston Churchill, and a roistering ebullient supporter of Remain immediately switched his support to May.

Last night a senior Tory MP who backed Remain told me he was supporting Boris Johnson, “Because we need someone as duplicitous, opportunistic and cynical as him to be Prime Minister and perhaps, with luck, he will turn his coat again and keep us in.”

Johnson himself wrote on Monday (27 June) that the UK would have to accept free moment if it wanted to keep Single Market access.

It was a warning to his Leave believers that he, Johnson, might have to make concessions in his Brexit negotiations that the Leave camp campaigned against.

Now if May becomes PM she is formally a Remainer. She has criticised the EU and is hostile to the ECHR but she stood side by side with David Cameron making it clear that Britain should not leave the EU.

Can she now find means that avoids a permanent rupture with Europe and the loss of the UK’s geo-political role and attractiveness to foreign investors?

Of course the majority vote in the referendum must be respected. But it represented only a third of the electorate and Cameron foolishly did not insist that a higher bar should be set as is the norm in other countries where referendums on major constitutional change require two-thirds majorities or the consent of all four component nations in the UK.

Constitutional lawyers have raised questions about the need for Parliament where there is a clear pro-EU majority to be consulted on any final decision to leave the EU.

As it becomes more and more clear the very high economic price of losing Single Market automatic passporting access for all banks and businesses in the UK – the City, for example, losing its profitable business trading and clearing Euros – there is a definite sense that the English are waking up to the economic consequences of Brexit.

In Scotland there is now near unanimity that in the event of Brexit, Scotland would hold a referendum and become an independent state in the European Union – thus ending the history of the United Kingdom.

Four million people have signed an online petition calling for a second referendum – far more than the difference between the Remain and Leave camp.

Thus the possibility opens as in other EU member states that have reversed initial No votes in referendums and stayed as EU members that a second referendum could be held.

The probable replacement of the weak, sad Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader by a strong purposeful woman, Angela Eagle, who shares some of the flinty determination of May opens the vista of an effective united party leadership of two women who want to stay in Europe.

Of course the off-shore owned press and the City Europhobes who funded UKIP and the Leave campaign would be furious.

But these are the elites that seek to dictate British global policy in their own interests and with a re-invigorated campaign focused on the truth and a BBC that stopped pandering to Eurosceptic truth-benders like Farage and the obsessive anti-EU Tory MPs, the British people can be awakened to vote in a second referendum to uphold their vital national interests which have always been damaged by relapses into isolationism.

In short the Battle for Britain and the Battle Against Brexit is not over. May can redeem the lost honour of the Conservative government which David Cameron foolishly threw away with his casual plebiscite pledge and like the last female leader of the Conservative Party make her mark on history.

*Denis MacShane is a former UK Minister of Europe and author of Brexit: How Britain Will Leave Europe.

Immigration, blood source of the United States, its motor of development, has been rocked by judicial pronouncements of late. The Obama administration had put much stock in reforming the general approach to immigration in 2014, ostensibly employing a wide reading of executive power against the possible deportation. It was always going to be haphazard, merely another periodic panacea in a continuing problem.

On November 20, 2014, the President announced that there would be a unilateral suspension of immigration laws applicable to 4 million of the roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States.

The reasons were simple enough, and reflect a problem typical of the US imperium. Presidents over the last half century have found themselves providing patch remedies for those at risk of mass deportation. In 1987, the Reagan administration exempted two hundred thousand Nicaraguans from deportation, and legalising their entitlement to work.[1] (There were, of course other political motivations as well.)

Closest to the Obama administration’s mark in terms of precedent remains the 1990 Family Fairness program of President George H.W. Bush, designed to expand the previous administration’s Immigration Reform and Control Act. The latter’s defect lay in excluding the spouses and children of those placed on the path to legalization. The policy resulted in relief for 1.5 million family members pending formalisation by Congress.

At stages, xenophobic spikes and concerns of porous borders have marked the discussion about immigration reform in Congress. No better illustration of this exists than Donald Trump’s threat of building an anti-Mexican wall. Such discussion has resulted in painful constipation, a situation that sees politicians happy to exploit the spectacle of cheap labour without accompanying rights and liberties.

Two dozen or more US states took issue with Obama’s moves back in December 2014, particularly with his remarks that, “What you’re not paying attention to is, I just took an action to change the law.[2]

The Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, the real instrument in this endeavour, subsequently issued a directive purporting to legalise the set number of undocumented immigrants, effectively granting them benefits and rights.

The primary aim was to permit undocumented immigrant parents of US citizen children protection from involuntary removal. This became known as a deferred action program known as “Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents” (DAPA).

As the legal suit submitted by the states went, “This lawsuit is not about immigration. It is about the rule of law, presidential power, and the structural limits of the US Constitution.” This, as we shall see, was not necessarily the case at all. A Texas federal judge subsequently blocked the programs nationwide until necessary legal channels had been exhausted.

On June 23, the Supreme Court in United States v Texas split 4-4 in attempting to resolve the issue, a result that affirmed the lower court’s ruling blocking the deferred action program.[3] The result, scantily expressed in one page, chilled the process regarding the assessment of millions of undocumented immigrants who are permanently under the threat of deportation.

The administration has attempted to work around the obstacle which effectively leaves a brake on executive action from a lower court. US Attorney-General Loretta Lynch has few options, but is nonetheless keeping up an optimistic front. “We will be reviewing the case and seeing what, if anything else, we need to do in court.”[4]

What then, to do? Certainly, the now Supreme Court justice Elena Kagan had argued previously in the Harvard Law Review that presidents should make the bureaucratic policy realm their own.[5] Since the days of the Clinton administration, the regulatory activity of the executive branch agencies became “an extension of his own policy and political agenda.”

Kagan, rather generously, suggested that Clinton showed that an assertion of personal ownership over such regulatory activity demonstrated “in the process, against conventional wisdom, that enhanced presidential control over administration can serve pro-regulatory objectives.”

The obvious point, and confusion in this entire case, has not been Chapter II powers of the president under the Constitution, but the statutory powers of the DHS Secretary, Jeh Johnson. “Put simply,” argues Peter M. Shane, “the question is whether Johnson is reading the statutes properly.”[6]

Shane’s points are solid. In terms of procedure, most of the technical aspects were lover court issues, whether, for instance, Texas had standing to bring the lawsuits in question, and whether Johnson should have abided by a notice-and-comment process before promulgating DAPA.

Assertions of executive reach do works both ways, though Obama has done himself few favours in declaring US v Texas as something more than dry, earth bound administrative law. The constitution is far less relevant than the parties assert.

The threat of an executive falling into imperial tendencies has always been a danger, and Obama’s critics have pounced on that point. When it happens, it should be curbed. But the relevant issue is whether Johnson had legal justification to implement the program, rather than Obama per se. That issue has been all but lost in the legal and political melee, much to the detriment of the undocumented immigrants in question.

Notes: 
[1] http://www.nytimes.com/1987/07/09/world/immigration-rules-are-eased-for-nicaraguan-exiles-in-us.html

[2] https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/files/epress/files/ImmigrationStatesFirstAmendedLawsuit12092014.pdf

[3] http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/15pdf/15-674_jhlo.pdf

[4] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-immigration-idUSKCN0ZE2X5

[5] http://cdn.harvardlawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/vol114_kagan.pdf

[6] http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/06/us-v-texas-wasnt-really-about-presidential-power/489047/

The ideological influence of the Islamic State is spreading rapidly in Southeast Asia. The terrorist attack in Selangor, Malaysia demonstrates that the threat is growing.

By Rohan Gunaratna*

After repeated threats the Islamic State (IS) mounted their first successful terrorist attack in Malaysia on 27 June 2016, with a bomb assault on an entertainment venue in Puchong, Selangor. Two IS operatives threw an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) into the Movida Bar and Lounge in IOI Boulevard in Bandar Puchong Jaya at 2.15 a.m., injuring eight patrons, one seriously.

Malaysian media quoted the nightclub owner as saying that the attack may be due to a personal dispute between two patrons. Claiming the attack, however, IS central located in Syria issued a statement saying “two soldiers of the Caliphate from the wilayat of Malaysia” conducted the first attack in Kuala Lumpur, “the heart of Malaysia” by targeting a nightclub with a bomb. The statement said the nightclub was attacked for not respecting the month of Ramadhan “by conducting sinful activities”.

From group to networked attacks

Since the declaration of the so-called Islamic State in June 2014 in Syria and Iraq, the Malaysian authorities have prevented nine plots to attack Malaysia. However, they were unsuccessful in detecting and disrupting the attack in Puchong. The nature of the current wave of terrorism had changed from group attacks to networked attacks making it a challenge even for the best security and intelligence services to prevent all the attacks.

Initially, the Malaysian authorities ruled out the incident as an act of terrorism. At the scene, Selangor deputy police chief Datuk Abdul Rahim Jaafar said: “At this point it could be anything, the attack could have been fuelled by revenge or the suspects could have been targeting specific individuals at the bar.” The Malaysian media and wire services reported the attack as an act of crime, until IS claimed the attack.

A week before the attack in Malaysia, Mohd Rafi Udin alias Abu ‘Awn al-Malizi appeared on a video released by the Islamic State Philippines on 21 June 2016, threatening Malaysia. In response to the video, Malaysian Police Chief Khalid Abu Bakar challenged Rafi Udin who is from Negri Sembilan, to return home from Syria and take the authorities head-on, saying: “If you dare to make threats from afar, come back here and do it.”

The Malaysian Special Branch Counter Terrorism Division had assessed the IS threat to Malaysia accurately. After disrupting nine attacks in the planning and preparation phases since 2014, its counter terrorism chief Dato Ayub Khan Mydin Pitchay had warned the Malaysian government of the rising terrorist threat to Malaysia.

The authorities had identified Muhamad Wanndy Mohamad Jedi, a Malaysian in Syria as the directing figure of the terrorist network in Malaysia. Raised in Durian Tunggal, Wanndy migrated to Syria in February 2015 and joined the external operations wing of IS. Together with his Malaysian wife Nor Mahmudah Ahmad, Wanndy lives in Syria planning and preparing attacks in Malaysia. Working with Rafi Udin and other operations managers, Wanndy’s task has been to disseminate propaganda, recruit, raise funds, and organise attacks.

Growing Threat

The IS attack in Malaysia, despite continuing counter terrorism operations, demonstrates that the IS ideology has spread and established a regional presence, in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Philippines, with support in Thailand, Singapore, and Brunei.

With IS planning to create a satellite of the caliphate in the Southern Philippines, the centre of gravity of the IS regional threat has shifted to the Philippines. To build support for the emerging IS base in the Philippines, the Syria-based Malaysian operative Rafi Udin said in a statement that Abu Abdullah al-Filipini has been assigned by IS to lead in the Philippines.

The regional governments and their partners are building up their capacity to respond to the ideological threat. With the exception of the Philippines the regional capacity to counter the operational threat is significant. Malaysia is planning to create several capabilities including a Regional Digital Counter-Messaging Communication Centre in Kuala Lumpur to fight the threat. With their vast experience and expertise, Malaysian authorities will continue to disrupt other IS cells operating throughout the country.

More Needs to be Done

However, to fight the threat strategically, government security and intelligence services will have to work closely with both their domestic law enforcement and military counterparts as well as with their foreign partners. There needs to be a shift to collaboration where governments build common databases, exchange personnel, conduct joint training and operations, and share expertise, technology and experience, otherwise the Southeast Asian region will suffer more attacks in the coming months.

Since the Russian air campaign in Syria in 2015, IS has suffered but continues to replenish its losses. Although the IS threat in Iraq and Syria has plateaued, IS is in a growth phase in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and the Caucasus. To counter the threat, governments will have to develop greater intelligence and operational capabilities both in the physical and cyber space to counter the extant and emerging threat. With its mastery in exploiting the social media, IS succeeded in creating pockets of supporters and sympathisers throughout the Muslim world, including in Southeast Asia.

In addition to building greater capacities to monitor and counter the threat, the strategy of governments and their community partners should be to reach out to vulnerable segments of Muslim communities to prevent radicalisation and enhance detection.

*Rohan Gunaratna is Professor and Head of the International Centre for Terrorism Research and Political Violence (ICPVTR) at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He is lead author, Handbook of Terrorism in the Asia-Pacific (Imperial College Press, London, 2016).

After months of anticipation, the United Kingdom has decided to leave the European Union (EU). Although, the results were fairly close – 51.9% voted to ‘Leave’ vs. 48.1% elected to ‘Remain’ – the consequences of the decision will be far-reaching. Not only will the Brits negotiate their exit from the EU (thus, the term ‘Brexit’) within the next two years, but the decision is likely to usher in an upheaval unwitnessed before in EU history.

But is it good for Palestine?

In the shadow of the so-called Brexit debate, a whole different discussion has been taking place: ‘is Brexit good for Israel’, or as an Israeli commentator, Carlo Strenger phrased it in the Israeli daily, ‘Haaretz’: “what does (Brexit) mean for the Jews?”

In a last minute pandering for votes, British Prime Minister, David Cameron – who, to his credit, had the dignity to resign after the vote – made a passionate appeal before a Jewish audience on Monday, June 20. He told the Israel supporters in the Charity, ‘Jewish Care’, that staying in the EU is actually good for Israel.

He presented his country as if the safeguard of Israeli interests at the Union. The gist of his message was: Britain has kept a watchful eye on Brussels and has thwarted any discussion that may be seen as hostile towards the Jewish state.

“When Europe is discussing its attitude towards Israel, do you want Britain – Israel’s greatest friend – in there opposing boycotts, opposing the campaign for divestment and sanctions, or do you want us outside the room, powerless to affect the discussion that takes place?” he told the largely Jewish audience.

Predictably, Cameron brought Iran into his reasoning, vowing that, if Britain remained in the EU, his country would be in a stronger position to “stop Iran (from) getting nuclear weapons.”

While the ‘Leave’ campaign was strongly censured for unethically using fear-mongering to dissuade voters, Cameron’s comments before ‘Jewish Care’ – which were an extreme and barefaced example of fear-mongering and manipulation of Israel’s so-called ‘existentialist threats’ – received little coverage in the media.

Indeed, Britain has played that dreadful role for decades, muting any serious discussion on Israel and Palestine, and ensuring  more courageous voices like that of Sweden, for example, are offset with the ardently and unconditionally pro-Israel sentiment constantly radiating from Westminster. Who can forget Cameron’s impassionate defense of Israel’s last war on Gaza on 2014, which killed over 2,200 mostly Palestinian civilians?

Unequivocally, Cameron, along with his Conservative Party, has been a “staunch ally of (Israeli) Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu,” as described by Israeli commentator Raphael Ahren, writing in the ‘Times of Israel’. His love for Israel can also be more appreciated when compared to, also according to Ahren, “current head of the Labour party, Jeremy Corbyn – who is a harsh critic of Israel and has called Israel’s arch-foes Hamas and Hezbollah ‘our friends.’”

Since Corbyn was elected to the helm of the Labor Party with a landslide victory in September of last year, an apparently manufactured controversy alleging rampant anti-Semitism within Labor has taken away from the party’s attempt to refocus its energies on challenging the Conservative’s neoliberal policies, and slowing down the momentum of the ultra-right Independence Party of Nigel Farage.

That contrived ‘crisis’ was largely the work of the Israel lobby in the UK, per the assessment of investigative journalist, Asa Winstanley. It was a ‘witch-hunt’ that reached an unprecedented degree of incongruity. “It has reached such an absurd volume that any usage of the word ‘Zionist’ is deemed to be anti-Semitic,” he wrote, “although, tellingly, not when used by self-described Zionists.”

Indeed, many members of Labor were either themselves involved in that ‘witch-hunt’ or succumbed to its pressure, taking outrageous steps to defend against the unwarranted accusations. As a result, the embattled and disorganized Labor, too, urged its supporters to stay in the EU and they, too, lost the vote.

As for Israel, Brexit meant uncertainty and also opportunity.

The EU is Israel’s largest trade partner, and an economically weaker Union is destined to translate to less trade with Israel, thus financial losses. But Israel has also been sharply critical of the EU, with Israeli leaders making all sorts of accusations against supposed European anti-Semitism, and with Netanyahu himself calling for mass emigration of European Jewry to Israel.

Part of the reason why Tel Aviv has been fuming at the EU is the nuclear agreement with Iran, in which the EU is a co-signatory. The other reason is a decision last November by the EU to impose new regulations on products made in Jewish settlements built illegally on Palestinian land. According to the new guidelines, goods produced in these settlements must be labeled “made in settlements”, a decision that further strengthened calls throughout Europe for boycotting Israel altogether.

That decision, and others, increasingly made the EU appear as an untrustworthy ally to Israel; and precisely because of that, David Cameron desperately tried to sell himself at the last minute before the vote as the vanguard against other allegedly unruly EU members who refuse to play by the well-established rules.

Yet, interestingly, one of the loudest, and also fear-mongering groups that campaigned for Britain to exit the EU is ‘Regavim’, a right-wing NGO that advocates on behalf of the illegal Jewish settlements in the Occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Unsurprisingly, ‘Regavim’ used scare tactics by pushing a Palestinian bogeyman into the midst of Britain’s historical debate. Its campaign included a mock video of a masked Palestinian fighter“purportedly from the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, urging UK citizens to remain in the European Union because it supports the Palestinians,” reported Al-Monitor.

According to Regavim’s Meir Deutsch, the organization’s aim was to “harm the EU over ‘its intervention in the internal conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.’”

Now that, according to Deutsch’s ruthless logic, the EU is duly ‘harmed’, Israel is seeking another bulwark in the European Union to defend its interests.

Israeli analyst, Sharon Pardo, while regretting the loss of a ‘friend’ in the Union, asserted that such a loss is not a ‘catastrophe,’ for the likes of Germany and the Czech Republic are even friendlier than Britain.

Israel is particularly concerned about its status within the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council, now that the UK is leaving. “Germany has good chances of taking the lead here and the fact that Germany is a close ally of Israel will clearly have implications,” according to Pardo, who added, “Germany is the responsible adult here.”

While Israel is likely to move fast to ensure its interests, both financial and political, are protected following Brexit, the Palestinian Authority is likely to move much slower and without a decisive, centralized strategy.

The UK’s departure from the EU might not have an immediate impact on the conflict in Palestine, especially during the coming months of projected upheaval, negotiations and transition; however, it could still offer Palestinians an opportunity for the future.

While pressure must continue to be applied on Westminster to end its unconditional backing of Israel, a possibly friendlier EU without the staunchly pro-Israel Britain, may emerge. The UK’s support for Israel in the Union, and the backing of all American steps in the same direction, has seriously hampered the EU’s chances of being anything but a rubberstamp to US-UK policies not only in Palestine but also throughout the Middle East.

While it is too early to make any significant political forecast following Brexit, one can only hope that the efforts of pro-peace countries such as Ireland and Sweden will be strengthened, and that more such friendly nations will join to rein in Israel for its military occupation and demand justice for Palestine.

By Victoria Arnold

In separate cases in four different Russian regions, 11 Muslims are known to be facing criminal charges of “extremist activity” for reading the works of the late Turkish theologian Said Nursi, Forum 18 has found. Five men are being held in pre-trial detention and three have been placed under travel restrictions. Of the others, one has been released on bail, one’s whereabouts is unknown, and another is currently outside the country. The FSB security service is continuing its investigations of all of them.

A twelfth Muslim who reads Nursi’s books has been given a two-year suspended sentence by a court in Chelyabinsk for sharing their contents on social media.

Among the five prisoners of conscience imprisoned in pre-trial detention, one has been banned from praying in prison. Another sentenced earlier for reading Nursi’s works has been ordered to the prison’s “internal jail” for six months without the right of correspondence (see below).

The eleven accused are being prosecuted under Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code, Part 1 (organisation of extremist activity) or Part 2 (participation in extremist activity). If convicted under Part 1, they could receive fines of 300,000 to 500,000 Roubles, compulsory labour of up to five years or prison sentences of two to eight years. If convicted under Part 2, fines of up to 300,000 Roubles, compulsory labour of up to three years, or prison sentences of up to four years.

Each 100,000 Roubles (13,000 Norwegian Kroner, 1,400 Euros or 1,570 US Dollars) is equivalent to about three months’ average wages for those in work.

Harsher punishments awaited

These punishments, last increased in 2014, are about to become even harsher under an amendment to the Criminal Code adopted by parliament’s lower chamber, the State Duma, on 24 June as part of a package of anti-terrorism and public security laws. The upper chamber, the Federation Council, approved the amendment on 29 June, alongside many other legal changes in the package including the introduction of restrictions on “missionary” activity.

If President Vladimir Putin signs the new amendments into law, the following penalties will be imposed:

Part 1: a fine of 400,000 to 800,000 Roubles; or 2 to 4 years’ income; or 6 to 10 years’ imprisonment with a ban on working in one’s profession of up to 10 years and restrictions on freedom for 1 to 2 years.

Part 2: a fine of 300,000 to 600,000 Roubles; or 2 to 3 years’ income; or compulsory labour for 1 to 4 years with a ban on working in one’s profession for up to 3 years or with restrictions on freedom for up to 1 year; or 2 to 6 years’ imprisonment with a ban on working in one’s profession for up to 5 years or with restrictions on freedom for up to 1 year.

Even if this amendment is signed into law, the eleven men currently facing charges would be tried under the old regulations.

Banned books, banned “organisation”

All four ongoing prosecutions have arisen from circumstances similar to those of previous cases, in which people who have met to read and discuss Nursi’s books are accused of creating “cells” of the banned “extremist” organisation “Nurdzhular”, which Muslims in Russia deny exists. They are then charged under Criminal Code Article 282.2, either under Part 1 (“Organisation of an extremist organisation”) or Part 2 (“Participation in an extremist organisation”).

Nothing in Nursi’s writings appears to advocate hatred, violence, or the violation of any human right. Despite this, numerous Russian lower courts have ruled that various Russian translations of his works (and of some other Islamic and 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 homes, can render those involved liable to criminal and administrative prosecution.

The grounds 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. The primary cause, however, 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.

Financial penalties even if not convicted

The names of nine of the eleven Muslims awaiting trial currently appear on 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 per month.

Yakov Tselyuk, convicted in Chelyabinsk (see below), has also been added to 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”.

Suspended sentence for sharing Nursi online

In what appears to be the first criminal conviction for sharing Nursi’s writings on the internet, a 31-year-old resident of Chelyabinsk in Siberia received a two-year suspended prison sentence at the city’s Soviet District Court on 18 May.

Judge Aleksandr Zimin found Yakov Tselyuk guilty under Article 282.2, Part 2, of distributing audiobook versions of Nursi’s works on the VKontakte social network between November 2012 and February 2013. According to a 19 May statement by the Chelyabinsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office, this activity was aimed at “the involvement of new members in the religious organisation from among social network users through persuasion, offering reading materials and promoting activities of ‘Nurdzhular'”.

The telephone at the Regional Prosecutor’s Office went unanswered when Forum 18 called on 29 June to ask why Tselyuk’s actions had been considered a criminal offence.

Despite avoiding incarceration, Tselyuk will be on probation for two years and under restriction of freedom for one year. No written verdict has been made available, but according to Article 53 of the Criminal Code, these limitations mean that Tselyuk may not be able to leave Chelyabinsk, participate in or go near large public events, or move house or change his place of work (without the agreement of the relevant state authorities). During the one-year term, he will have to register with the authorities between one and four times every month.

If Tselyuk does not abide by these terms, the court may order that he be imprisoned or sentenced to compulsory labour for a period of one day for every two days of the period of restriction of freedom.

Krasnoyarsk

In Krasnoyarsk, 37-year-old Andrei Dedkov is undergoing his third criminal investigation in six years for alleged involvement in “Nurdzhular”, in a case which appears to be beset by delays. After raids and searches carried out at several homes in the city, Dedkov was arrested on 13 March while travelling to Kazakhstan, and later charged under Article 282.2, Part 1, with organising a “cell” of “Nurdzhular” adherents. His pre-trial detention has been extended until 13 July.

In jail, Dedkov is “moved from room to room”, a fellow Muslim who also reads Nursi’s works told Forum 18 on 22 June, and is “not allowed to perform morning or evening prayers, on the grounds that this is a violation of internal regulations”. He added that Dedkov’s case has already had three investigators and is now the responsibility of a fourth, but that no investigative work is being done and nobody is being summoned for questioning. It therefore remains unknown when the case will come to trial.

Forum 18 called the jail in Krasnoyarsk on 28 June and asked why Dedkov was not being permitted to pray. A spokeswoman said she could not answer this question and advised Forum 18 to contact the prison director, Colonel Ivan Kakoulin, by post.

Dedkov’s prison address is:

660075 Krasnoyarskaya Oblast
Krasnoyarsk
ulitsa Respubliki 72
Sledstvenny Izolyator No. 1

Another Krasnoyarsk Muslim, 22-year-old Andrei Rekst, was charged on 21 March with participation in extremist activity under Article 282.2, Part 2, the Moscow-based human rights group Memorial noted. He was released on bail 48 hours after he was arrested with Dedkov.

Forum 18 wrote to the Krasnoyarsk FSB on 6 April to enquire when the case is likely to come to court and why Dedkov was considered dangerous. Forum 18 had received no reply as of the end of the Krasnoyarsk working day of 29 June.

Dedkov was first prosecuted for reading Nursi’s works in 2010, but the case against him and three fellow Muslims – Aleksei Gerasimov, Yevgeny Petry and Fizuli Askarov – ran out of time in February 2012.

Dedkov then faced identical charges in 2014-5, and was convicted alongside Aleksei Kuzmenko on 18 December 2015 at Soviet District Court. They were fined 150,000 Roubles and 100,000 Roubles respectively. On 26 January 2016, Krasnoyarsk Regional Court upheld Dedkov and Kuzmenko’s convictions but waived their fines as the two-year statute of limitations had expired by the time their appeal was heard.

Blagoveshchensk

Yevgeny Kim’s conditions in pre-trial detention in Blagoveshchensk are “tolerable”, his friend Anton Starodubtsev told Forum 18 on 25 June. Kim, 41, was arrested on suspicion of involvement in “Nurdzhular” in December 2015. His detention period was extended by court order until 27 June. Forum 18 has been unable to find out if this has been extended further.

Starodubtsev himself, previously involved in the case only as a witness, has now also been charged under Article 282.2, Part 2, but is currently abroad.

The address of Blagoveshchensk’s Investigation Prison, where Forum 18 believes Kim to be detained, is:

675007 Amurskaya Oblast
Blagoveshchensk
Seryshevsky pereulok 55
Sledstvenny Izolyator No. 1

Kim, Starodubtsev, and several of their friends were detained and interrogated after an armed unit of the FSB raided Kim’s flat on 26 December 2015, during a gathering to celebrate the birthday of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed. All but Kim were later released.

Starodubtsev has since complained of the treatment they received during both arrest and questioning, including threats and attempted blackmail, and has categorically denied any involvement in extremist activity.

Novosibirsk

Imam Komil Odilov, charged for the second time with organising “extremist” activity for reading Nursi’s works, also remains in pre-trial detention. This was most recently renewed for two months until 2 August (making a total of eight months since his arrest), Ilhom Merazhov, a fellow imam who has been following the case, told Forum 18 on 30 May.

Odilov’s prison address is:

630010 Novosibirskaya Oblast
Novosibirsk
ulitsa Karavayeva 1
Sledstvenny Izolyator No. 1

Thirteen people are being held in Odilov’s cell with beds for only eight, a fellow Muslim told Forum 18 on 22 June, so “they take turns to sleep”. Odilov is also undergoing psychiatric evaluation.

Odilov has been charged under Criminal Code Article 282.2, Part 1. Three other Novosibirsk Muslims – 61-year-old Uralbek Karaguzinov, 18-year-old Mirsultan Nasirov and 28-year-old Timur Atadzhanov – have been charged alongside him under Article 282.2, Part 2. Karaguzinov and Nasirov have been placed under travel restrictions, while Atadzhanov’s whereabouts are unknown and he has been added to the federal wanted list.

The men were among nine Muslims originally detained by the FSB at an Azerbaijani cafe in Novosibirsk on the night of 5 December 2015, Vitaly Ponomarev reported for Memorial on 7 April. Most were released the next morning after questioning, but their homes were searched. Copies of Nursi’s books were seized from Odilov’s flat, along with his computer and phone. He has remained in custody ever since.

Dagestan

After multiple FSB raids across the north Caucasian republic of Dagestan in March, three more Muslims who read Nursi’s books are awaiting trial in Makhachkala. Two of them – 34-year-old Ziyavdin Dapayev and 34-year-old Sukhrab Kultuyev – remain in detention, while Kultuyev’s 30-year-old younger brother Artur (also known as Ramazan) is under travel restrictions. Dapayev faces charges under Article 282.2, Part 1 – the Kultuyevs under Part 2.

“During his arrest, [Sukhrab] Kultuyev suffered torn ligaments in his hand, although he offered no resistance,” a fellow Muslim who reads Nursi’s works told Forum 18 on 22 June, adding that Kultuyev had not been allowed to see a doctor for his injuries.

The raids in four Dagestani cities – Makhachkala, Khasavyurt, Izberbash, and Derbent – resulted in the seizure of hundreds of books, including allegedly “extremist” material, as well as suspects’ computers and phones. Fourteen people were arrested, most of whom were later released.

Forum 18 wrote to the FSB’s branch in Dagestan on 7 April, asking when the case was likely to come to court and why Muslims who read Nursi’s works are considered dangerous. Deputy director of the Dagestan FSB V. Nazarov responded on 4 May, confirming only that it had opened a case related to “Nurdzhular” activity on 4 March, and that the preparatory investigation would last two months. “The circumstances and progress of the investigation of a criminal case constitute an investigatory secret, in accordance with which official information will be published upon its completion,” Nazarov added.

Ziyavdin Dapayev and Sukhrab Kutuyev’s prison address is:

367012 Respublika Dagestan
Makhachkala
ulitsa Levina 45
Sledtsvenny Izolyator No. 1

Dapayev was previously convicted of “extremist” activity for alleged involvement in Nurdzhular in May 2011 and received a three-year suspended sentence.

Ulyanovsk

The 32-year-old Bagir Kazikhanov, convicted and imprisoned in 2015 for studying Nursi’s writings, has been held in the “internal jail” of his correctional colony for six months without the right to communication after an inspection by a senior prison official, a fellow Muslim told Forum 18 on 22 June. “It seems that the general asked what he was in prison for, and he didn’t like Kazikhanov’s answer.”

Kazikhanov is incarcerated at Omutninsk in Kirov Region, having been sentenced in February 2015 under Article 282.2, Part 1, to three and a half years’ imprisonment. The judge at Ulyanovsk’s Lenin District Court found him guilty of setting up a “cell” on instructions of “the steering centre of Nurdzhular”. He was the first reader of Nursi’s works to receive a jail term since September 2013, and the first to be sentenced under the harsher provisions introduced in February 2014.

Kazilkhanov’s prison address is believed to be:

612744 Kirovskaya oblast
Omutninsk
Ul. Trudovikh reservov
Ispravitelnaya koloniya 17

Kazilkhanov’s fellow defendants, Stepan Kudryashov and Aleksandr Melentyev, were tried under Article 282.2, Part 2, and received suspended sentences of two years and one year and eight months respectively.

Stavropol atheist

The trial in Stavropol of an atheist blogger charged under Article 148, Part 1 of the Criminal Code (“Public actions, expressing obvious disrespect for society and committed with the intention of insulting the religious feelings of believers”) has been suspended to allow further expert analysis to be carried out. 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 autumn 2014.

He is accused of disparaging beliefs held by some Christians. Nevertheless, Krasnov was exercising his internationally-recognised right to freedom of religion or belief.

At Krasnov’s seventeenth appearance at Magistrate’s Court No. 6 on 28 June, Judge Aleksandr Filimonov ordered that psychological and linguistic experts should attempt to ascertain whether it is possible to discern the “communicative purpose” of Krasnov’s remarks based only on fragments of text and whether Krasnov’s remarks contained language which was abusive towards individuals, beliefs or “attributes of faith” on the grounds of belonging to the Orthodox Church.

It is unknown when the trial will resume.

Burma’s new government should use its parliamentary majority to repeal or amend the many military and colonial-era laws used to criminalize peaceful speech and assembly, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

“Successive Burmese governments have enacted broad, vaguely worded laws to control and criminalize basic freedoms, creating thousands of political prisoners,” said Brad Adams, Asia director. “The new government, led by the National League for Democracy, has moved quickly to release many of those imprisoned for peaceful expression or protest and to drop charges against others. But it’s crucial that the legal infrastructure of repression be dismantled so that there is no chance Burma will ever hold political prisoners again.”

The 113-page report, “‘They Can Arrest You at Any Time’: The Criminalization of Peaceful Expression in Burma,” documents the use and abuse of a range of broad and vaguely worded laws to criminalize peaceful expression, including debates on matters of public interest, and provides specific recommendations for the repeal or amendment of those laws.

The report is based on an in-depth analysis of provisions of Burma’s Penal Code, as well as laws such as the Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Processions Law, the Telecommunications Act, and the News Media Law. It draws on interviews with individuals prosecuted under these laws, as well as journalists, civil society activists, and lawyers. Detailed recommendations spell out specific legislative reforms that the government should tackle without delay.

The past five years have been a time of liberalization and change in Burma, but under former President Thein Sein, those who embraced the new freedoms to vocally criticize the government or military often found themselves arrested and convicted. This backlash against critics was facilitated by laws that violate internationally protected rights to expression and peaceful assembly, some dating from the British colonial era, some enacted under successive military juntas, and others the products of ostensible reform efforts by the Thein Sein government. As Pang Long, an attorney in Rangoon, told Human Rights Watch in January 2016: “They can arrest you at any time under these laws. There is no guarantee.”

One of the most abused laws is the 2012 Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Processions Law, which has been used to arrest and prosecute large numbers of peaceful protesters over the past few years, including students protesting the military’s involvement in government, farmers who protested the confiscation of their land for mines or military installations, journalists who protested the arrest of other journalists, and even a solo protester who called for national unity. Charges under the Peaceful Assembly Law were often combined with charges under section 505(b) of the Penal Code, a broadly worded provision that criminalizes speech “likely to cause alarm to the public.” For example, students Zeyar Lwin, Paing Ye Thu, and Nan Lin were arrested, held without bail, and charged with two counts under each of those laws. As a result, they faced the possibility of up to five years in prison, until charges were dropped by new government.

The release of those arrested during Thein Sein’s presidency has been offset by new arrests of peaceful protesters in April and May 2016. While the new assembly law passed by parliament’s upper house in late May is a significant improvement over the 2012 act, it retains many of the same flaws and should be amended in line with international standards.

Section 66(d) of the Telecommunications Act has been used to arrest and prosecute those viewed as having “insulted” the government or military, or somehow casting them in a bad light. For example, both humanitarian worker Patrick Khum Jaa Lee and activist Chaw Sandi Tun served six months in jail for Facebook posts deemed “insulting” to the military commander-in-chief.

The criminal defamation provisions of the Penal Code and the News Media Law have been used to prosecute journalists for reports critical of the government. Five journalists from Unity Journal were sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2014, later reduced to seven, under the Official Secrets Act. The journalists were among those released in April by the new government, but the law used to imprison them remains intact.

“After its landslide election victory, the new government has a mandate to overhaul Burmese law to ensure that everyone can peacefully express their views without a knock on the door from the police or being hauled into court and charged with a crime,” Adams said. “But the window for bold reforms will not stay open forever, so the government should put this at the top of its agenda when parliament reconvenes.”

It has been two years since the self-styled Islamic State (IS) announced the establishment of a “Caliphate”. How will this construct evolve and what form would it take?

By Romain Quivooij*

After 23 months of war the determination of the Islamic State (IS) Caliphate is being put to the test, with a significant decline of its revenues and a total combat casualties estimated to exceed 26,000 fighters since 2014. The United States reported in January 2016 that the group would have lost respectively around 20% and 40% of the populated territories it used to control in Syria and Iraq.

IS has the potential to fight back, especially as its strongholds in the Syrian provinces of Aleppo and Deir ez Zour have not been reconquered yet. However, should the erosion of the Caliphate continue over the coming months, it would be more and more difficult for IS to defend the entity it created against the assaults of its enemies and ensure governance at the same time. Retrospectively, the first two years of the Caliphate might thus be seen as a period of transition leading to the reconstitution of the “state”. It is an open question how the latter could evolve and which forces might benefit from that process.

Loss of Popular Support?

IS, also known as ISIS, based the legitimacy and the credibility of the Caliphate on the Sunni-Shia divide and the power vacuum plaguing large parts of Iraq and Syria. The IS organisation is used to present itself as the defender of Sunnis against the Shia-led regimes of Baghdad and Damascus. It remains dependent on the active or passive support of Sunnis living in areas under its influence and control.

These local populations stand at a crossroads. The Caliphate provided them with basic services, the administration of “justice” and an embryonic welfare state, but it also brought disillusionment among its “subjects” and exposed the latter to the risks associated with a state at constant war. According to political scientist Myriam Benraad, “[IS] pledged to hand power back to the Sunnis and secure their prosperity … not only did it not keep its promise but it took civilian populations hostage”.

Territorial losses are likely to lead IS to intensify its “indirect strategy” that aims at forcing enemies of the group to reconsider their military involvement in Iraq and Syria by targeting their civilian populations.

The domestic cost of this approach may nonetheless be high. Sunnis living in the Caliphate are primarily interested in ensuring their security, improving their conditions of life and increasing their political influence. Terrorist activities led or claimed by IS will not meet these expectations and could widen the gap between locals and the “state”.

IS might enforce stricter policies of coercion and repression to reassert societal control, which would further expose the dictatorial nature of its rule and make the Caliphate lose more of its appeal.

Hammer and Anvil

Such a scenario would have positive implications over the long term if a viable alternative to the Caliphate had emerged from the war. This has not been the case so far. Arab Sunni populations are caught between IS on the one hand and different actors they still consider to be hostile to their interests on the other.

In Iraq, feelings of mistrust shared by a majority of Sunnis towards the Iraqi central government as well as their fear of indiscriminate attacks from the Iraqi army and retaliation from Shia militias make a shift of power from IS to Shia forces doomed to failure.

The challenge is even greater in Syria, where a potential but unlikely reimplantation of the Assad regime in governorates it used to control before the civil war would face considerable opposition from Syria’s Sunni majority. In both countries, growing resentment between Arabs and Kurds might sow the seeds of new ethnic clashes.

The campaign against IS is over focused on the objective of military defeat, with little attention paid to post-conflict peacebuilding efforts. This is a shortsighted policy. To be sustainable, territorial gains that are made by anti-IS forces need to be followed by reconstruction, governance and inclusive political processes.

This agenda is severely jeopardised by sectarian cleavages and, in the immediate future, displacements of population who fled fighting. Political scientist Gilles Dorronsoro noted that “the cities of Tikrit, Ramadi and other Sunni bastions passed under the control of IS are falling one after the other, but they are almost depopulated. Return of inhabitants is very limited”.

From Caliphate to Emirate?

Three factors suggest that al-Qaeda (AQ) and its Syrian affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra (JN) would be likely to take advantage of a new balance of power.

First, the conflict between IS and AQ/JN has been a major bone of contention within the Jihadist community since the two organisations split in 2013. Setbacks suffered by IS would be an ideal opportunity for JN and its parent organisation to attempt to restore the leadership of AQ.

Second, any failure of the Caliphate as a “Sunni project” could entice JN to portray itself as a more authentic and effective defender of Sunni populations. The group aims at establishing an Islamic “Emirate” that would rely on a harsh interpretation of Sharia law. To this end, JN developed a dense network of rebel alliances and a genuine base of local support in the North-western Syrian governorate of Idlib where it established a low-key but influential presence.

These assets could be used to gain further traction and expand JN’s outreach, provided that the group would be able to overcome internal disagreements as well as feelings of suspicion and animosity expressed among militant factions and parts of the population that are opposed to its objectives.

Third, a protracted loss of momentum of the Caliphate might be used by AQ and JN as a decisive argument in support of the long-term methodology favoured by their respective leaderships. JN took great care in gradually entrenching itself in the opposition and the social fabric of Syrian communities, as opposed to IS who adopted a strategy for immediate action. The latter approach may well be much frailer than initially thought.

*Romain Quivooij is an Associate Research Fellow with the Centre of Excellence for National Security (CENS), a constituent unit of the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

By Jim Garamone

Former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright received the Defense Department’s highest award for public service today from Defense Secretary Ash Carter during a Pentagon ceremony.

Carter presented Albright with the department’s Distinguished Public Service Award.

Albright was the first woman secretary of state and served from 1997 to 2001. She was one of the first to recognize the importance of a whole-of-government approach to meeting challenges and championed this principle in Bosnia, Kosovo and the Middle East.

Strategic Perspective

“It might seem odd to some of you that a secretary of defense would give the Department of Defense’s highest award to a secretary of state, but it shouldn’t seem strange to you,” Carter said during the ceremony. “That’s because this award represents an enduring truth: our defense is so vital that we must shepherd it from strategic era to strategic era, from administration to administration, across parties and across our government. Defense requires a strategic perspective – that we understand our connections to the leaders and challenges of the past.”

Albright served in President Jimmy Carter’s National Security Council and as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations in the Clinton administration before President Bill Clinton nominated her to be secretary of state.

Carter said that in all her jobs, Albright stressed the need to use American power wisely to protect the country and make a better world.

“She’s always demonstrated a deep understanding of which mix of our nation’s foreign policy tools – whether it’s the nation’s exceptional diplomatic corps, our economic might or the finest fighting force the world has ever known – is best for a given issue,” he said.

Complex World

It is a complex world that has grown more chaotic, Carter said, citing Russia’s aggression, a growing and changing China, North Korea, Iran and the problem of extremist groups such as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant as the major issues of our time.

“While we do not have the luxury of choosing among these challenges, we do have the ability to set a strategic course for the future — a future that’s uncertain, and that will bring with it new and unforeseen challenges, but that will surely demand America’s leadership, values and military strength,” he said.

These are issues that demand the whole-of-government approach that Albright has championed throughout her career, he said.

“As we set that strategic course, meet those challenges and contend with that uncertain future,” he said, “we can learn important lessons from Madeleine’s remarkable career about the need for whole-of-government policy responses, about the strategic benefits of global partners, and about the enduring importance of American values and ideals.”

Victory in War Requires More than Combat Power

Ensuring victory in war requires more than just combat power, Carter said – it also requires just governance, meaningful reconciliation, improved education, economic progress and the rule of law. “At State and in her continued work as chair of the National Democratic Institute, Madeleine has helped develop and advance the instruments and institutions needed to make and keep peace,” he added.

Albright demonstrated the effectiveness of this policy in the 1990s when she worked for whole-of-government responses to end crises in Bosnia and Kosovo, to counter nuclear proliferation, to normalize trade with China and to normalize diplomatic relations with Vietnam.

“Madeleine’s work on Bosnia and later in Kosovo also reminds us of the importance of working with – and listening to – our unrivaled network of allies and partners,” Carter said. “That long-time network is an important strategic asset, one nurtured by generations of policymakers like Madeleine.”

Albright thanked the secretary for the award and praised his stewardship of the department. The former secretary sits on the Defense Policy Board, and she explained why the award means so much to her.

“I was not born in the United States,” she said. Albright was born in Czechoslovakia, and her family had to flee the Nazis at the start of World War II, taking refuge in England. Following the war, her family again had to flee from their home country, this time when the Soviets put a communist government in place in Prague in 1948.

Her first memory of Americans was of the GIs who traveled to England to liberate a continent in 1944, she said. She recalled “their boundless energy, their confident wisecracks and jaunty way of walking.”

She said she never lost that admiration and respect for American service members, and this influenced her decisions at senior levels.

“You can’t imagine how humbled I felt when, as secretary, I participated in meetings that resulted in brave men and women being sent into harm’s way,” she said. “It never occurred to me that one of the things I would do when I raised my hand was to send people to war. I vowed never to forget the human lives at stake in these decisions.”

While serving as secretary of state, Albright took every opportunity to visit with troops around the world. “At each stop I would read their names and study their faces,” she said. “These were men and women from across the land representing every variety of background, race, color and creed. I was impressed by their enthusiasm and commitment.”

Albright said the country should mirror service members’ enthusiasm and commitment. “It seems to me that if we are to protect the security and prosperity of our country, we should put an end to partisan squabbling, do a little arithmetic and develop a unified and lasting approach to the federal budget,” she said. “In the process, we should invest first in the education of our young people so they will be able to meet the demands that modern military service and the marketplace require.”

She praised Carter for his Force of the Future initiative, which seeks to do just that, and for his decision, announced earlier in the day, to allow transgender service members to serve openly. “Using the talents of our entire population will be key to building lasting security in the 21st century,” she said.

The United States must not turn its back on the rest of the world, Albright said. “American leadership is still needed in the world today,” she added. “Past lessons inform us that we cannot allow our country to become tired, we cannot turn our backs on responsibilities and we cannot pretend we are not the United States.”

By Gautam Sen*

By S. Binodkumar Singh*

In Nepal, to probe instances of the serious violation of human rights and find the status of those who were disappeared in the course of the armed conflict between the state and the then Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist (CPN-Maoist) from February 13, 1996, to November 21, 2006, two transitional justice mechanisms – Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and Commission of Investigation on Enforced Disappeared Persons (CIEDP) were formed in February 2015 in the spirit of the interim constitution of 2007 and the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) of 2006. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Nepal Conflict Report 2012, between February 1996 and November 2006, the conflict between the government of Nepal and the CPN-Maoist left over 13,000 people dead and 1,300 missing.

On June 16, 2016, the TRC, which had started recording testimonies regarding insurgency-era rights’ violations and crimes from April 17, 2016, at District Peace Committee offices in all 75 districts, and was supposed to wrap up the collection of complaints on June 16, 2016, decided to continue complaint collection until July 16, 2016, after it learnt that hundreds of victims are yet to lodge their complaints related to the war-era. The TRC had distributed 40,000 forms to victims and, as of June 15, 2016, had received 33,592 complaints.

Earlier, on June 13, 2016, another transitional justice mechanism, the CIEDP, which started receiving complaints on April 14, 2016, extended the time period for registering cases related to conflict-era disappearances by another month, as complaints continue to pour in. As many as 4,000 forms were circulated in all 75 districts, where disappearance incidents occurred during the decade-long Maoist insurgency. The Commission had received 2,084 complaints as of June 12, 2016.

On May 19, 2016, in a major development in Nepal’s prolonged process of transitional justice, TRC started preliminary investigation on complaints received from conflict victims. TRC commissioner Madhavi Bhatta, stated on the occasion, “we have distributed 14,581 complaint forms from our office and the local peace committees and received 7,789 complaints so far. Therefore going through all the complaints is a crucial step toward investigation”.

However, at a time when the victims and international human rights agencies have been urging the government to bring the Transitional Justice Act on par with international standards, five Maoist parties – Naya Shakti Nepal led by Baburam Bhattarai, CPN-Revolutionary Maoist led by Mohan Baidya, CPN (Maoist) led by Matrika Yadav and Revolutionary Communist Party Nepal led by Mani Chandra Thapa, besides ruling Unified Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist (UCPN-M) led by Pushpa Kamal Dahal – in a joint statement on April 21, 2016, called on the government to scrap conflict-era cases, claiming that such cases violated the CPA of November 12, 2006.

Further, on May 19, 2016, ten Maoist parties at a joint convention in Kathmandu united to form a new force under the former rebel commander Pushpa Kamal Dahal to give birth to what they have decided to call the Communist Party of Nepal-Maoist Centre (CPN-Maoist Centre). Addressing the function organized to announce the unification, chairman Dahal declared, “the days of conspiracy against the revolutionary agenda of republic, secularism and proportional representation are over. This unification is a message loud and clear that the days of people’s victory are here. This unification guarantees that the transitional justice mechanisms will function in line with the CPA”.

Earlier, on May 5, 2016, UCPN-M signed a pre-emptive nine-point agreement with the Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML), the senior partner in the ruling alliance. The fact that five of the nine points in the agreement address issues of transitional justice shows just how worried the Maoists are to answer for the crimes they committed between 1996 and 2006. One of the points of the agreement obliges CPN-UML and the Maoists to amend the laws on transitional justice within 15 days, so that they ‘reflect the spirit of the CPA’. The two leaders also agreed to register the ownership of the lands that were transacted on the strength of household papers during the conflict era on the basis of those same documents. They also agreed to immediately initiate the process to withdraw or give clemency on insurgency-era cases and other ‘politically-motivated’ cases filed on various occasions.

Expectedly, expressing their fear at a discussion programme held at Mahendranagar of Kanchanpur District on June 16, 2016, conflict survivors said that they were still fearful of lodging complaints, as no assurance of maintaining confidentiality of personal information had been given. The participants claimed that most the families of conflict victims had not yet registered their complaints after it was found that the responsible agencies were disclosing the names of the complainants. Conflict Victim Society Kanchanpur chairperson Dharma Singh Chaudhary noted, “many victim families have not come to lodge their complaints with the rise in threats and intimidations after the disclosure of confidentialities of personal information of complainant (sic)”.

However, on June 7, 2016, Professor Bishnu Pathak, spokesperson of CIEDP, claimed, “initially, there were fears among victims and human rights defenders that the commissions might not be victim-centric. There was mistrust initially but we have overcome that situation. The way we are receiving complaints has encouraged us”. Similarly, TRC chairperson Surya Kiran Gurung noted, “political comments on transitional justice could create some confusion for the victims but TRC is firm in its intention of carrying out its tasks as per the provisions of the CIEDP and TRC Act. TRC is clear that any amendment to the existing act should be only for meeting international standards and adhering to court verdicts. We are not bothered by politicians’ comments or actions as we are governed by the laws”.

The former combatants are not the only ones under the scanner of transitional justice mechanisms; complaints have also been filed against various high ranking officials, including former Prime Ministers. Moreover, around 70 to 75 per cent of complaints received by the TRC and CIEDP have been lodged against the State. However, despite the political developments in the country, CIEDP Chairman Lokendra Mallick, speaking at a function organized by the Social Justice and Human Rights Committee of Parliament on June 17, 2016, claimed that the Commission will try to complete all the investigations in the remaining eight months before its deadline. Speaking at the same function TRC Chairperson Gurung observed, “a situation might arise tomorrow when our leaders cannot visit foreign countries freely if conflict-era cases are internationalized by the victims”.

Indeed, after the end of the internal conflict, there was demand for transitional justice measures in Nepal. However, as high profile figures are dragged into war-era cases, many are skeptical the transitional justice mechanism can conduct thorough investigation and provide justice to victims. It remains to be seen whether Nepal is able to reconcile the demands of political stability and continuity, on the one hand and of justice for war era excesses, on the other, to establish an enduring constitutional and political order that will meet the demands of equity and governance.

*S. Binodkumar Singh is a Research Associate at the Institute for Conflict Management, New Delhi. He can be reached at: salambksingh@yahoo.co.in)

By Habibe Özdal

Extremely rapid developments have taken place in the last couple of days regarding Turkish-Russian relations. Letter diplomacy, which commenced on the 12th of June with the letters send by the Turkish President Erdoğan and Prime Minister Yıldırım to their Russian counterparts, was followed by a letter sent to President Putin by President Erdoğan on the 27th of June.

This step seems to have paved the way for the process of overcoming the warplane crisis, which has dramatically affected bilateral relations over the past seven months.

Letter Diplomacy as an Art of Diplomatic Language

In the letter that was sent to President Putin and subsequently published on the Kremlin website President Erdoğan expressed his deep condolences to the family of the Russian pilot who has lost his life after Turkey shot down the Russian warplane flying by its Syrian border. Moreover, President Erdoğan stated that “he is sorry about that [the death of the Russian pilot]”! As for the shooting down Russian warplane, President Erdoğan repeats once more that “we regret this incident”, as has been stated before since the incident took place on the 24th of November 2015. The letter also emphasized the importance of the two country’s bilateral relations and calls for relieving the damage in order to have friendly relations once more. [1]

The most important question was whether the letter would be accepted by the President Putin as an important step. As is well known, every initiative of Turkey to overcome the effects of the incident since November 2015 has been met with three demands from Russia: apology, compensation, and trial of the people who were responsible. It seems that all of these demands were mentioned in the letter send on the 27th of June. By using the art of diplomatic language President Erdoğan says “excuse us”[2] (izvinite) to the family of the pilot; makes it clear that Turkey is “ready to undertake any initiative that could lessen the pain and severity of the damage caused”; thirdly, it was also mentioned that “a judicial investigation is underway against the Turkish citizen said to be involved in the Russian pilot’s death”.

These statements in the letter have been evaluated as comprising an “apology” by the Russian media. Sources also said that the letter will be accepted by Kremlin as an important step in the way to leave behind the crisis. On the other hand looking at how the letter was seen in Turkey, picture is quite different. Mr. Kalın, President Erdoğan’s spokesman made it very clear that the letter does not amount to an “apology”. According to Kalın, the Turkish president extended condolences to family of Russian pilot whose warplane was downed by Turkey last November.

It seems that by using diplomatic language efficiently the formula of re-starting relations was found. Both of the leaders had the room for maneuver and convinced public opinion that they were/and still are decisive and consistent on that issue.

Why Now?

It seems that geostrategic and geo-economics reasons lay behind the letter initiative. First of all, cutting dynamic economic relations – which has gained great momentous since the mid 2000’s – right after the incident has had dramatic effects on both sides. Turkey’s tourism, construction and agriculture sectors, as well as ordinary citizens who work in those fields, were hit seriously due to the sanctions Russia applied in terms of import restriction on Turkish foods, a ban on tourist travel to Turkey, an embargo on hiring Turkish citizens in Russia and a ban on Turkish organizations’ activities in Russia. From this standpoint moving on bilateral relations and leaving the crisis behind will indeed bring relief to society. On the other hand, since EU sanctions against Russia still continue, regaining access to Turkey’s agricultural exports would also be a boon to Russian consumers. Moreover, political and military contacts also are expected to commence in the near future. Considering that regional conflicts continue in different neighborhood of Turkey, the importance and need of re-starting this dialogue is obvious. Lastly, President Erdogan’s letter to Putin – along with the normalization of relations with Israel – should also be evaluated as a part of foreign policy re-orientation taking place following the cabinet change in Ankara.

For Russia, as the second biggest customer of Gazprom, Turkey is not only an important market but also an important transit country for Russian energy. The warplane incident introduced uncertainty into the future of vitally important energy projects. Normalization of bilateral relations may positively affect the future of those energy projects as well. However for such developments to take place it will be necessarily to overcome the ‘confidence crisis.’ At this point it is important to note the statement made by the Chairman of Russia’s Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs, Konstantin Kosachev, to the effect that “in order to re-start dialogue and have good relations with Russia Turkey needs to reformulate its foreign policy towards Syria and Iraq”. It is still important to bear in mind that restoring relations and limiting the damage of the warplane crisis is very important in terms of regional developments. Recent developments in Black Sea (especially the upcoming NATO summit in Warsaw) and the Caucasus also remind both sides of the importance of cooperation.

What Next?

Following reception of President Erdogan’s letter to President Putin, the two leaders held their first phone call since the warplane incident last year. According to the Turkish Presidency “Reiterating their commitment to reinvigorate bilateral relations and fight terrorism together, the two leaders agreed to remain in contact and meet in person”. After the call, President Putin ordered his government to begin the process of lifting sanctions against Turkey by declaring that “I ask that the Russian Government begins the process of normalizing general trade and economic ties with Turkey”.

Even though there seems to be general expectation in both Turkey and Russia that “it will not be possible to normalize everything in several days”, the atmosphere between the two political leaders seems to be changing faster than expected. It is possible to say that bilateral relations are moving towards normalization. The new period of Turkey-Russia relations will be determined by many different regional developments. However, the two leaders are also to shape the new term, as was also the case before.

In conclusion, the ‘letter diplomacy’ that was started by the Turkish side and the positive response from the Kremlin have paved the way for normalization of bilateral relations. This initiative must be supplemented with certain foreign policy applications. Surprising developments regarding the letter diplomacy and Putin’s decision to lift the sanctions have once again shown that the two leaders are the main actors shaping and deciding the nature of their countries’ bilateral relations. As for the motivation behind the leaders, geostrategic and geo-economics reasons may be found.

Notes:
[1] “Владимиром Путиным получено послание Президента Турции Реджепа Тайипа Эрдогана”, Kremlin.ru, 27 June 2016, http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/52282
[2] “Vladimir Putin received a letter from President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Kremlin.ru, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/52282

Brexit might actually be an opportunity in disguise for Brussels; without the constant British impediment, proponents of the European Union’s Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) could actually start building a truly European security structure that is willing and able to intervene in crises and make peace.

By Ulas Doga Eralp*

The Brexit vote took a lot of strategic experts by surprise. Hardly anyone, including the Leave campaign itself, expected a majority of British voters would actually want out. The economic and social implications will be seen in the coming months. More strikingly though, the UK’s departure from the EU will significantly transform the European Union’s footprint in security and peace frameworks. It is imperative to consider how the European Union’s Common Security and Defence Policy structures be impacted and whether the Brexit process would culminate in a more robust defence and security framework for the EU.

A soft power with hard aspirations

Since the 1998 St. Malo Declaration between France and Britain during the Kosovo crisis, the EU has been looking for ways to leverage its so-called “soft power” into a meaningful footprint in conflict intervention. The UK was seen as the key player in the Berlin+ Agreement that allowed for the EU to make use of NATO assets in emergency situations. Over the last 18 years, the EU’s CSDP has failed to bear any fruits to solidify the aspirations of the nineties. NATO’s debacle in Afghanistan and later in Libya proved two things. First, the CSDP never materialized in terms of hard military power. Second, there was never a shared will among EU members to turn CSDP into a standing European Army.

The CSDP remained more an idea than an act. The gradual emergence of a military-police-civilian Euro-bureaucracy has led to a number of rule of law missions in fragile and post-conflict territories, with a heavy concentration on providing trainings to local law enforcement officials. Missions in places such as South Sudan, Somalia, Georgia and the Sahel region are indeed instrumental in capacity building at the local level, but lack teeth in terms of building and supporting defence and deterrence. Many EU countries, primarily France until recently, chose to put the blame on the UK for the lack of development. UK always defended the primacy of NATO over the EU’s CSDP; the Libya areal bombardment further demonstrated that French and British jets were not enough to turn the tables around without US military support. As a result, the division of labor in combat missions between NATO and the EU has continued evolving on an ad-hoc basis. European countries preferred to rely heavily on existing NATO assets rather than fully developing the rapid reaction force concept.

Second, whatever was left of the earlier aspirations of developing a standing European Army eroded with the Eurozone crisis. When you consider that the UK and France’s military spending make up 50% of the overall EU spending on military and deterrence capabilities, the UK’s exit from the EU is a blow to building-up an EU military. No wonder US President, Barack Obama, campaigned heavily against Brexit; Washington’s changing pivot to Trans-Pacific envisions a militarily self-reliant European where NATO plays more of a supportive role. However, when the push comes to shove, Baltic countries along with Poland who feel the re-emergence of the Russian firepower, prefer to rely on the proven NATO assets than fictitious EU CSDP tools. Furthermore countries such as Italy, Spain, Holland and even Germany would not be willing to divert their attention from dealing with the economic crisis to increasing military spending for a European Army.

Nevertheless, even amid the never-ending economic stagnation, the political uncertainties unearthed by the refugee crisis and now Brexit, the EU has to make a decision. Brexit might actually be an opportunity in disguise for Brussels; without the constant British impediment, proponents of the CSDP could actually start building a truly European security structure that is willing and able to intervene in crises and make peace. European leaders somehow need to find a way to sell the idea to their constituencies. If that’s not really a possibility, maybe it’s time to give up on the idea altogether.

*Dr. Ulas Doga Eralp is a scholar and practitioner of international conflict, human rights, development and democratization. He has a PhD from the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution from George Mason University, and currently works as a Professorial Lecturer at the International Peace and Conflict Resolution Program of the School of International Service (SIS) at American University in Washington, DC.

The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of TransConflict.

The US economy has never been as mismanaged as it is today. Don’t take my word for it, just look at the bond market.

On Thursday,  the yield on 30-year US Treasuries dropped to a record-low 2.18 percent while the benchmark 10-year Treasury slid to 1.37 percent. (less than 1 basis point above its all-time low!)

In plain English, what this means is that the US economy stinks. Unfortunately, “stinks” does not adequately express how badly the economy is actually doing, so let’s break it down a little bit.

Credit is the life’s blood of the modern economy. When credit demand is weak, the economy struggles and growth falters. Falling yields on long-term bonds (like the 30-year Treasuries) indicates that the demand for credit is weak, therefore the price of money falls. It’s just supply and demand.

So let’s cut to the chase: At present, investors are willing to lend the government their money for 30 years expecting a miserable 2 percent return on their investment. What sort of fool would do that? There have to be better outlets for profitable investment than that, right?

Wrong. There are no other “safe” profitable outlets, because the economy is still in the doldrums 8 years after the Crash of  ’08. And the reason the economy is in the doldrums is because that is where policymakers want the economy to be. Because as long as the economy is in the doldrums the Central Bank can continue to keep interest rates locked at zero so its crooked crony buddies on Wall Street can make beaucoup profits off stock buybacks and dividends.

Get the picture? The Fed is not “experimenting” with a policy which, it believes, ‘may or may not’ put the economy back on a strong growth-path sometime in the future. No. That’s not it at all.  It is continuing to implement a policy that works “just fine” for the people who count, that is, the chiseling bankers and corporatists who own the government and who dictate policy behind the curtain of our political charade.

Now, typically, you might think that stocks would fall when bond prices rise or vice-versa, but that’s not how things work anymore. Now when the bond market rallies, stocks rally too on the prospect of more “extraordinary monetary accommodation”, which is a fancy term for more free money.   This is precisely what’s happening at present. Stocks have shaken off their massive 2-day losses following the Brexit earthquake, and climbed to near-record highs again due to promises from the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Bank of Japan (BOJ) to boost their stimulus.

More free money means higher stock prices and a comforting return to the new centrally-planned market where stocks stay perennially bubbly while the economy staggers along at an anemic 2 percent GDP.

This is why investors are willing to lend the government their money for next-to-nothing for 30 years. It’s because they anticipate that this low rate, low inflation, low growth environment will continue for the foreseeable future. And they’re probably right, too. The Fed and its cronies have an absolute lock on power and investors in the “world’s biggest and most liquid market” (USTs are a $13 trillion market) don’t see that changing anytime soon.

It would be impossible to overstate how pessimistic this view really is. Basically, bond yields are telling us all that there is no hope for the future, that what you see is what you get. There won’t be an economic recovery because an economic recovery is not in the interests of the people who are getting rich off the current policy. So just suck it up and get used to it.

So, how low are long-term bond yields?

They’re lower than they were after Lehman Brothers defaulted. They’re lower than they were after the dotcom crash. They’re even lower than they were during the Great Depression! How do you like them apples?

The 30-year is lower than anytime on record and its bound to go lower still because the people who are conducting the policy are determined to suck every drop of blood out of the economy before moving on to their next host. That’s just how parasites work.

Long-term yields are lower because the economy is worse not better.  Can you see that?

The bond market is saying in simple, straightforward language that the Fed is doing a shitty job.

After 8 years, I don’t know how anyone could disagree with that.