Quantcast
Channel: Eurasia Review
Viewing all 73339 articles
Browse latest View live

Kahlon, Barak: Alternatives To Bibi? – Analysis

0
0

By Büşra Nur Özgüler

In Israel, where early elections have become a tradition, discussions on an early election have already begun. Nevertheless, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu indicated that he is strongly against early elections, saying that they are the last thing that Israel needs right now. He also called on members of the parliamentary coalition to work together against challenges pertinent to the country, namely, unreported income, bureaucratic inefficiency, and the promotion and development of clean energy.

Kahlon’s newborn party

According to former Likud minister Moshe Kahlon, who served as welfare and communications minister before taking a break from politics, another problem in Israel is the high cost of living. From food to housing, high prices have been a hot topic in the country for years. Kahlon announced on Monday, October 20, that he will form a new party in order to tackle the problem. Kahlon’s party could now possibly garner 10 seats in the Knesset, as shown by recent polls. Aside from his critical stance on the socio-economic policies of Netanyahu, he has also disagreed with the diplomatic policies of the current administration.

There are rumors about the possibility of Kahlon forming a team with former Interior Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who announced his resignation on September 17. Such a partnership would help Kahlon’s party to augment its votes in the upcoming elections based on Sa’ar’s status as a significant figure in Israeli politics. Indeed, Sa’ar was the second man in the Likud after Netanyahu.

Even though these developments pose some challenges for the standing prime minister, they have not been seen as a real threat because two other close associates of “Bibi” (Netanyahu) still remain in Likud, namely Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon and Deputy Foreign Minister Tzachi Hanegbi.

Revival of the center-left with Ehud Barak?

Contrary to the assertion that there is as an absence of viable alternatives to Bibi in Israeli politics, in addition to Kahlon’s party, there have been signals that former Prime Minster and Defense Minister Ehud Barak may return to politics. Key political activists from the Labor Party who participated in a meeting two weeks ago at Barak’s home predicted that Barak hosted the meeting to examine the possibility of returning to politics.

Barak is seen as the leader who can unite the center-left in Israel. Thus, he is regarded as a potential alternative to Bibi. However, keeping in mind his defeat in the 2009 elections, in which he won only 13 seats, claiming that he is a strong choice in the face of Bibi is not that easy, for now at least.

With these developments, discussions on the next elections will be quite controversial in Israel, not only in terms of their date but also with regard to the potential candidates who will vie to take Netanyahu’s seat as the head of the government.

Apart from this, Likud will also hold an internal election on its leadership ahead of the general elections. In this matter, while Netanyahu was seen as possessing an advantage during Operation Protective Edge, conditions have changed after the ceasefire and his popularity has decreased. After the resignation of Sa’ar, who was seen as a potential candidate for the party leadership, Moshe Feiglin has become a new possibility. Having run in Likud’s 2012 leadership elections, Feiglin is known to be an advocate of full Israeli sovereignty over the Temple Mount and the city of Jerusalem, and an opponent to the two-state solution.

The post Kahlon, Barak: Alternatives To Bibi? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.


The Pakistanization Of Turkey Beyond ‘Zero Problems’– Analysis

0
0

By Masoud Rezaei

Post 1923, the Turkish relationship with its southern neighbours has “fluctuated between bad and very bad”. After independence, Turkey showed little interest in the states carved out of the Ottoman Empire’s Arab provinces, propelled by Ataturk’s desire to face westwards and a lingering sense of betrayal directed towards the Arabs for having sided with Britain in the World War I. Today, after a decade of the twenty-first century, Turkey has been wrestling with its neighbors (Syria and Iraq) since 2011 and now this relation is troubled and occasionally terrible.

The AKP previously and to some extend, had very good relations with Syria and Iraq, but after “Arab Spring” in the region, Ankara’s policy has changed radically as a result of the 2011crisis in Syria. The battle in Syria and Iraq consists of “Turkish-backed Sunni jihadis rebelling against an Iranian-backed Shi’ite-oriented central government. In this regard, some of politicians and analyst believe that Turkey’s response to the Iraq and Syria crisis has largely been reactive. However, now that it is involved, removing Assad from power and establish Sunni government in Baghdad is only one of its goals and Ankara wants to ensure that whatever emerges after Assad and post – shi’a government in Baghdad serves Turkey’s local and regional interests.

While Erdogan and Davutoglu aspire to being “regional players”, Turkey lacks the more underhand tools of influence used by regional rivals. By contrast, to achieve this object, in recent years, Turkey after Pakistan has become a major center of radical Islamist ideas and Jihadi radical groups and Erdogan seems even prepared to accept a massacre in Kobani. Turkey’s status as an Islamic ambitious state is rooted deeply in history and is linked closely with the elite’s worldview. For the foreseeable future, Islam will remain a significant factor in Turkey’s politics. Unless Ankara’s objectives are redefined to focus on economic prosperity and popular participation in governance, the state will continue to turn to new version of Islam as a national unifier.

The withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Iraq at the end of 2011 has created a power vacuum that Turkey has attempted to fill. Turkish support of Jihadi radical groups has put Assad’s government and Baghdad in a difficult spot. This can be reversed, to some extent, if Ankara imposes policy of violent and continues to support the terrorist and jihadi groups such as ISIL and Jabhat al-Nusra (Nusra Front).

Independent experts and even the Syrian opposition agree that Turks and foreign fighters have crossed the Turkish-Syrian border at will, often to join IS. Actually, the Turks offered far more than an easy border crossing: they provided the bulk of ISIL funds, logistics, training and arms. A “two-way jihadist highway,” has no bothersome border checks and sometimes involves the active assistance of Turkish intelligence services. Other incidents also suggest a close relationship between Turkish government authorities and radical Islamists. Turkish residents near the Syrian border tell of Turkish ambulances going to Kurdish-ISIL battle zones and then evacuating ISIL casualties to Turkish hospitals. Indeed, a sensational photograph has surfaced showing ISIL commander Abu Mohammad in a hospital bed receiving treatment for battle wounds in Hatay State Hospital in April 2014. Ankara may deny helping ISIL, but the evidence for this is overwhelming. Turkey’s support was vital for the jihadists in getting in and out of the country. Indeed, the ISIL strongholds not coincidentally cluster close to Turkey’s frontiers.

In this regard, the Kurdish issue has also emerged as a source of tension between Turkey and its neighbors. As the unrest in Syria has spread, the Assad regime’s control over the Kurdish areas along the Turkish-Syrian border has eroded, deepening Turkish anxieties that this will strengthen calls for greater autonomy among Turkey’s own Kurdish population. If these internal divisions cannot be overcome, there is a danger that the uprising in Turkey will degenerate into a Turkish-Kurdish conflict that could spread beyond big cities’s borders and further destabilize Turkey and likely to lead to an open confrontation between Ankara and its peoples.

For example, the protests that broke out at the end of May 2013 in Istanbul and spread over 70 Turkish cities have tarnished Erdogan’s image and also twin car bombings struck a bustling market street in Reyhanli, a border town in Hatay province, killing 53 people. Turkish people linked the AKP regime to the attacks, which were widely interpreted as punishment for Turkey’s support of rebel fighters. This could make it more difficult for AKP to obtain popular support for changes in the constitution that address Kurdish grievances. Without agreement on these changes, talks with the PKK could stall or collapse, adding a new element of uncertainty in an already highly unstable security environment. In March 2014, rebels from the hardline Islamic State opened fire on a checkpoint in the Central Anatolian province of Nigde, killing three and prompting a broader operation which saw Turkish counter-terrorism units raid a sleeper cell in Istanbul, leading to another shoot-out with al-Qaeda-linked fighters in the heart of Turkey’s economic and cultural capital. Turkey’s permissive policies have inexorably led to the escalation of this conflict. Specifically, the Turks have not differentiated between jihadi factions and those without extremist ideological leanings.

And on the other hand, if the Syrian Kurds and Iraqi Kurds succeed in gaining local autonomy, pressure for the Turkish Kurds to be granted similar rights is bound to grow, exacerbating internal divisions in Turkey. Many Kemalists see Kurdish calls for autonomy as the first step down the slippery slope leading to the territorial dismantlement of the Turkish national state and are likely to strongly oppose granting the Kurds local autonomy. So, any further disintegration of the Syrian state could provide a launch pad for Turkish Kurdish separatists and might raise questions about Turkey’s own territorial integrity. Economic concerns have also been raised should the crisis spread into the key market of northern Iraq.

While there is much to suggest that Turkey’s role in the world is likely to grow, confidence appears to have turned into hubris. But we know that, there is a fine line between self-confidence and hubris. In fact, Turkey’s current situation resembles the early years of Pakistan’s support of the Taliban. The recent and unprecedented arson attacks on Shiite mosques in Istanbul may indicate that Turkey is entering this phase. It is still not clear however how far Turkey is prepared to continue to support the wider military and logistic Jihadi groups, which risks further complicating Turkey’s already tangled relationships with its own restive Kurdish population.

Looking forward, it is possible to see that as long as the Erdogan and Davutoglu remains in power, ‘double standard’ will likely continue to guide Ankara’s foreign policy. But indeed, many of Western experts believe that, building regional influence of the type to which Turkey aspires is a process that takes place gradually and incrementally over decades and not as an immediate result of the hyperactivity of Divisive diplomacy. At the end, Turkey must end support for radical jihadists for its security and territorial integrity.

Masoud Rezaei
PhD of International Relations, Visiting Research Fellow at
the Institute for Middle East Strategic Studies

The post The Pakistanization Of Turkey Beyond ‘Zero Problems’ – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Turkey: Another Citizen Suspected Having Ebola, Hospitalized

0
0

By Rufiz Hafizoglu

A Turkish citizen, who has returned from the Hajj pilgrimage, has been hospitalized in the Istanbul city with suspicion of having Ebola virus, Turkish Anadolu agency reported on Oct.23.

Thus, the number of people hospitalized with suspected infection with Ebola has reached six. Five of them have returned from the Hajj pilgrimage and one is a Turkish student who is studying in Somali.

Earlier it was reported that 45 special hospitals were allocated in 36 provinces of Turkey in case of detection of people sick with Ebola. Special hospitals are allocated mainly in the provinces with international airports. In particular, three hospitals were allocated in Ankara, and two special hospitals in Istanbul.

According to the latest Ebola Response Situation Report from WHO, a total of 9936 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases of Ebola virus disease (EVD) have been reported in five affected countries (Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Spain, and the United States of America) and two previously affected countries (Nigeria and Senegal).

A total of 4877 deaths have been reported, according to the report.

The outbreaks of EVD in Senegal and Nigeria were declared over on 17 October and 19 October 2014, respectively. EVD transmission remains persistent and widespread in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.

All but one administrative district in Liberia and all administrative districts in Sierra Leone have now reported at least one confirmed or probable case of EVD since the outbreak began. Cases of EVD transmission remain lowest in Guinea, but case numbers are still very high in absolute terms.

Transmission remains intense in the capital cities of the three most affected countries. Case numbers continue to be under – reported, especially from the Liberian capital Monrovia.

On 22 October 2014 , WHO convened the third Emergency Committee on Ebola under the International Health Regulations (2005).

The post Turkey: Another Citizen Suspected Having Ebola, Hospitalized appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Nigeria: Islamists Reportedly Abduct Dozens Of Women

0
0

Dozens of women and girls from two villages in Nigeria’s north-eastern Adamawa state have been abducted by suspected militants, residents say, according to BBC News.

The abductions have not been confirmed by the authorities, but residents say they took place a day after the military announced it had agreed a ceasefire with the Boko Haram group.

The government hopes the Islamist group will free more than 200 girls seized in April as part of negotiations.

Boko Haram has not confirmed the truce.

Following the ceasefire announcement last week, the government said further talks with Boko Haram were due to be held this week in neighboring Chad.

In a separate incident, at least five people were killed in a bomb blast at a bus station in a town in the northern state of Bauchi. Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack.

The abduction of the schoolgirls from their boarding school in Borno state sparked a global campaign to pressure the government to secure their release.

Borno is the group’s stronghold. It has been under a state of emergency, along with neighbouring Adamawa and Yobe states, for more than a year.

The villages that were attacked at the weekend – Waga Mangoro and Garta – are close to Madagali and Michika towns, which have been under the control of the Islamist militant group for several weeks.

According to people in the area, a large group of insurgents attacked the villages, rounding up women and young girls.

Communication with the affected area is difficult, which is why it takes time for news of attacks to filter out, the BBC says.

Other raids by suspected Boko Haram fighters were reported by residents in Adamawa and Borno over the weekend.

News of the new abductions came as MPs approved a $1bn loan – requested by the president in July – to upgrade military equipment and train more units fighting the north-eastern insurgency. Security already costs the country close to $6bn, roughly a quarter of the federal budget.

Since the state of emergency was declared in May 2013, Boko Haram has taken many women and children hostage and has agreed to some prisoner swaps. The name Boko Haram translates as “Western education is forbidden”, and the militants have carried out raids on schools and colleges, seeing them as a symbol of Western culture.

The post Nigeria: Islamists Reportedly Abduct Dozens Of Women appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Russia Training 1,200 Nigerian Special Forces

0
0

More than 1,200 Nigerian security personnel are in Russia receiving anti-insurgent training by Russian special forces. The trainees on return will form a nucleus of the special forces brigade to in particular combat the Boko Haram terrorist group.

The majority of the personnel chosen for training are from the elite groups of the army, the police and intelligence services. Training courses, which last four months, are taking place in an undisclosed location under strict control of Russian authorities.

Nigeria’s Defence ministry confirmed the training program after the last group was photographed leaving Abuja’s Nnamdi Azikiwe international airport on September 25. The ministry also announced that the special anti-insurgent forces will be deployed in the States of Borno and Adamawa.

Apart from Russian training for its special forces, the Nigerian Army is looking for funds to purchase at least three advanced surveillance aircraft from the Czech Republic. Czech ambassador to Nigeria Pavel Mikes confirmed that the two countries agreed on the details of the purchase of up to three surveillance aircraft of unspecified make. Nigeria is also set to acquire 12 Mil Mi-35 helicopters from a Belarusian state-owned defence equipment manufacturer.

Early this month, President Goodluck Jonathan wrote to the Nigerian Senate requesting it to approve a special allocation of $1 billion to fight terrorism.

The post Russia Training 1,200 Nigerian Special Forces appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Jabhat Ansar Al-Din: Analysis And Interview

0
0

By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi for Syria Comment

Jabhat Ansar al-Din (Supporters/Partisans of the Religion Front) is a coalition of four groups originally set up in July of this year, comprising Harakat Sham al-Islam, Jaysh al-Muhajireen wa al-Ansar, The Green Battalion and Harakat Fajr al-Sham al-Islamiya.

Of these groups, Harakat Sham al-Islam was set up by Moroccan ex-Gitmo detainee Ibrahim bin Shakaran, who died in the Latakia offensive this spring. Jaysh al-Muhajireen wa al-Ansar (JMWA)- under Omar al-Shishani- was once part of what was then the Islamic State State in Iraq and ash-Sham (ISIS), but following Shishani and his followers’ break-off to join ISIS in November 2013, the group has effectively become the Caucasus Emirate’s wing in Syria. The Green Battalion was an independent group set up in the summer of last year by Saudi fighters who wanted to stay out of the Jabhat al-Nusra-ISIS dispute but has since pledged allegiance to JMWA, while an amir, Shari’a official and some fighters have joined ISIS’ successor the Islamic State (IS). Finally, one should note Harakat Fajr al-Sham al-Islamiya is a native Syrian, primarily Aleppo-based faction.

As per the ‘manifesto’ of Jabhat Ansar al-Din, the coalition defines itself as ‘independent’ and striving to implement a state-building project with the rule of Shari’a (Islamic law) in its totality, illustrating a broader trend of jihadi groups forming their own state enterprises as IS and the regime increasingly take up territory.

As I have mentioned before, one may ask why the members of this coalition have not simply join Jabhat al-Nusra (which strives for the same goal) in line with the precedent of the one-time Saudi-led independent jihadi group Suqur al-Izz: I submit that this is due to power-politics tension in the sense of not wanting to lose autonomy and be subsumed under Jabhat al-Nusra. The case of Harakat Sham al-Islam in particular seems to be one of an al-Qa’ida front project under Ibrahim bin Shakaran’s leadership but a change in direction after his death.

Jabhat Ansar al-Din’s JMWA purportedly conducting anti-aircraft operations in Handarat, Aleppo province.

Jabhat Ansar al-Din’s JMWA purportedly conducting anti-aircraft operations in Handarat, Aleppo province.

In keeping with the general ‘anti-fitna’ stance of jihadi groups (including al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP)) when it comes to perceived non-Muslim/’apostate’ forces fighting a jihadi group (regardless of the power-struggles), Jabhat Ansar al-Din issued a statement denouncing the U.S.-led coalition against IS as part of a war on Islam and Muslims. The statement cites common grievances such as the U.S.-led invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, the prisons of Begram and Guantánamo with torture therein, “America’s support and aid for the Jews in Palestine…the Jews’ occupation of the al-Aqsa mosque,” crimes committed against Muslims in Burma and the Central African Republic, and supposed U.S. siding with “Arab tyrants” in Libya, Yemen, Egypt and Tunisia.

From these complaints, the statement affirmed that “the target of the Zionist-Crusader-Safavid alliance is Islam and Muslims in general and their mujahideen vanguard in particular.” Denouncing anyone who should enter into the alliance as guilty of apostasy, Jabhat Ansar al-Din concluded with a call for Muslim unity against “this oppressive intervention,” and asked God to “give victory to the mujahideen in Iraq, ash-Sham and every place.”

However, it is notable that unlike AQIM and AQAP (which admittedly tried to avoid the issue of whether al-Qa’ida groups regard IS as a state by simply referring to it as ‘the Islamic State’ rather than ‘the group of the state’ (jamaat ad-dawla)), Jabhat Ansar al-Din does not even refer to IS by name in the statement, which fits a wider pattern of non-al-Qa’ida-affiliated jihadi groups in Syria aiming to stay out of the al-Qa’ida-IS dispute as far as possible.

Indeed, to date, with the exception of Jamaat Ansar al-Islam (which has fought IS in Iraq anyway), none of the global jihadi groups outside of Jabhat al-Nusra- including the few remaining stand-alone ones such as Jaysh Muhammad in Bilad al-Sham and Jund al-Aqsa- is known to have participated in actual fighting against IS. In the case of Jaysh Muhammad in Bilad al-Sham, the refusal to fight against IS sparked tensions with Northern Storm in Azaz and ultimately led to the group’s departure from Azaz. Corroborating the anti-fitna record is the fact that some of the components of Jabhat Ansar al-Din prior to the coalition’s announcement worked with what was then ISIS in early 2014 in besieging Kweiris airbase in Aleppo province under the initiative ‘And Don’t Separate’ (along with Jaysh Muhammad in Bilad al-Sham).

Whether Jabhat Ansar al-Din can truly maintain this ostensibly ‘trouble free’ policy of relations with other jihadis in Syria- particularly IS and Jabhat al-Nusra- remains an open question.

Below is an interview I conducted with Abo Mo’atesem al-Shami, a Jabhat Ansar al-Din media activist based in the Aleppo area, corroborating the points I made above.

Interview

Q: Does Jabhat Ansar al-Din want a Caliphate?

A: Yes. [Among] our goals are the project of an Islamic Caliphate and the rule of God’s law in the land.

Q: But why is Jabhat Ansar al-Din independent and does not join Jabhat al-Nusra which also wants a Caliphate?

A: The problem is with them, not with us: we are prepared to work with all upright factions whose goals are like ours. It is not hidden from anyone that the goals of the majority of factions are like our goals.

Q: In your opinion has Jabhat al-Nusra made mistakes on the ground?

A: In my personal opinion indeed we all make mistakes…and perhaps in Jabhat al-Nusra’s point of view it is not necessary to establish a Caliphate while the gangs of Assad exist in Syria.

Q: In which areas does Jabhat Ansar al-Din operate?

A: We operate in Aleppo, Idlib, Hama, Homs and Latakia. In Aleppo: al-Ramousa, Sheikh Said, Aziza, Air Intelligence, Handarat, Sayfat, and in the southern countryside: the area of Jabal ‘Azzan, al-Wadihi, Mu’amal ad-Difa’. In Idlib: the village of Wadi al-Deif, al-Qarmeed military camp. In Hama: the countryside to the north of the city of Hama. In Homs: the countryside to the north of the city of Homs. In Latakia: Jabal al-Akrad, Jabal al-Turkoman and Kassab.

Q: How are your relations with IS?

A: We have no relation with IS (original: ad-dawla). We don’t fight them and they don’t fight us. But anyone who says that Jabhat Ansar al-Din is affiliated with IS is lying.

This article was originally published at Syria Comment.

The post Jabhat Ansar Al-Din: Analysis And Interview appeared first on Eurasia Review.

UEFA To Rule On Serbia-Albania Match Mayhem

0
0

By Besar Likmeta

The UEFA Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body will hold a hearing on Thursday to discuss disciplinary proceeding against the Serbian and Albanian football federations over the match on October 14, which was called off amid battles on the pitch.

European football’s governing body was expected to deliver a ruling after meeting on Thursday to consider the disastrous first-ever football match between the national teams of Serbia and Albania.

“Disciplinary proceedings have been opened against the Football Association of Serbia, FSF, for the setting off/throwing of fireworks and missiles, crowd disturbance, field invasion by supporters insufficient organisation and use of a laser pointer,” the European football body said in a statement last week.

“Proceedings have also been opened against the Football Association of Albania, FShF, for refusing to play and the display of an illicit banner,” it added.

The first football match ever held between Albania and Serbia – a qualifier for the 2016 cup – ended in chaos and violence in the 41st minute, after a small drone with a banner embossed with Albanian motifs flew over the pitch and Serbian fans erupted.

The banner flown by the drone portrayed a map of “Greater Albania” covered with an Albanian flag and the portraits of independent Albania’s two founding fathers, Ismail Qemali and Isa Boletini.

After Serbian player Stefan Mitrovic pulled down the banner a scuffle ensued between the two teams, as Albanian players grabbed the flag back from Mitrovic.

The scuffle turned into a worse brawl when a group of Serbian fans invaded the pitch and attacked Albanian players, prompting British referee Martin Atkinson to suspend the match. The score was 0:0 at the time.

Videos and pictures show Serbian fans attacking Albanian players with fists and kicks as the Serbian players try to protect them.

Serbian fans also threw torches and lighters at the Albanian players as they left the field. Several Albanian players were hit by hooligan who had invaded the pitch.

Earlier in the match, Serbian fans booed the Albanian national anthem and chanted bloodthirsty, racist slogans, such as “Kill, Slaughter, so that the Šiptar [a pejorative term for Albanians] do not exist.”

Albanians have chided UEFA for not investigating the FSF for racism before the game was abandoned.

An online petition calling on UEFA to investigate Serbia for racism has collected more than 138,000 signatures.

The post UEFA To Rule On Serbia-Albania Match Mayhem appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Tackling Nuclear Terrorism In South Asia – Analysis

0
0

By Feroz Hassan Khan and Emily Burke

Since India and Pakistan conducted their nuclear tests in 1998, every danger associated with nuclear weapons – proliferation, instability, and terrorism – has been linked to the region. And despite nuclear deterrence and the modernization of nuclear forces, South Asia is a far cry from achieving stability. Indeed, the security situation in South Asia has deteriorated and violent extremism has surged to unprecedentedly high levels. In the past decades, both states have operationalized their nuclear deterrent forces, increased production of fissile material and nuclear delivery means, and developed plans to field a nuclear capable triad. Concurrently, both countries are expanding civilian nuclear facilities in their quests for a cleaner source of energy to combat current and future energy shortages. As tensions and violence in the region have increased, both states blame the other’s policy choices for the scourge of terrorism that has seized the region. New leadership in India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan however, creates an opening to tackle the immediate scourge of violent extremist organizations and unresolved historic conflicts. Ironically the traditional stabilizing force in the region – the United States – is drawing down in Afghanistan and shifting its focus to the Asia-Pacific region and to Russia where new tensions have erupted. Within this security context, India and Pakistan will be left on their own to devise mechanisms to mitigate and eliminate the regional risk of terrorism.

As the South Asian threat matrix becomes more complex and with concomitant progress in the nuclear field, these developments provide the basis for the spectacular terror attacks in New Delhi, Mumbai, Karachi, and Islamabad-Rawalpindi. As states possessing nuclear weapons, both India and Pakistan must find a common objective and mechanisms to deal with the metastasizing menace of terrorism. It is imperative that both states acquire the highest standard of nuclear security best practices and learn to live as peaceful nuclear neighbors. Individually, as well as collaboratively, India and Pakistan should direct their efforts to creating a cooperative relationship in the region and developing a nuclear security regime that encapsulates the nuclear security visions set by the three global nuclear security summits.1

In order to analyze the dangers of nuclear terrorism, this article will examine four variables: threat, probability, consequence, and risk. The threat of nuclear terrorism undeniably exists, but the risk of nuclear terrorism is determined by factoring both probability and consequence. To enable state policy and regional discourse to address nuclear terrorism with the maximum effectiveness, an assessment of the risk – not just the threat – is necessary. This article will first outline the evolution of the threat of nuclear terrorism both globally and regionally. Next, we will describe South Asian threat perceptions and the impacts on nuclear safety and security. Then, the article will evaluate the threats based on probability and consequence, and finally identify the highest risk threat. Focusing on this threat, we will assess the current tools available and offer policy recommendations and ideas for regional cooperation between India and Pakistan to combat this threat.

EVOLUTION OF THE THREAT

While fears of nuclear weapons date back to the genesis of the weapons themselves, nuclear terrorism has largely gained attention as a substantial threat to national and international security since the mass casualties and destruction of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks against the United States. Nuclear proliferation, security, and safety have historically been concerns, but only recently has terrorism added a new dimension and elevated nuclear terrorism to the top tier of U.S. national security concerns. For the purposes of this article, nuclear terrorism is designated as the use or threat of use of nuclear material in order to achieve a political goal.2

The threat from nuclear terrorism has for the most part mirrored historical trends. The development of nuclear weapons and then the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki created an existential fear of nuclear weapon use by state actors throughout the Cold War. The post-Cold War era saw a rise in the regulation of nuclear materials, followed by post-2001 strengthening of nuclear sites in hopes of preventing the “loose nukes” syndrome many had predicted.3 In its place, proliferation to weak states and the stability of nuclear states became the greatest concerns in nuclear policy.

In the 21st century terrorism has been linked to all U.S. national security-related policies, including nuclear security policy. The Obama Administration’s 2011 National Strategy for Counterterrorism states, “the danger of nuclear terrorism is the greatest threat to global security.” Preventing terrorists from acquiring WMDs and nuclear materials is ranked as one of the top overarching counter-terrorism goals.4 Furthermore, the United States tied nuclear security to terrorism by stewarding biannual Nuclear Security Summits where member states pledge and work towards safeguarding nuclear materials in order to prevent their transfer to terrorists.

Meanwhile another significant development is the proliferation of nuclear facilities due to the rise of nuclear energy and the expanding ring of legitimacy for nuclear trade. Nuclear energy was seen as a “solution” to the environmental concerns associated with non renewable resources, but fear of terrorism has soured this view. After the Fukushima Daiichi disaster, nuclear energy facilities are seen in a new light as vulnerable to security threats emanating from both natural disasters and man-made attacks.5 This fact brings South Asia into focus in a curious way.

India is the beneficiary of a civilian nuclear agreement with the United States permitting it to retain and develop nuclear weapon capabilities and expand civilian nuclear facilities, with international cooperation in nuclear trade. This sets a precedent for the expansion of civilian nuclear facilities, as well as vertical proliferation of nuclear weapons in the region. Pakistan has responded to the perceived legitimacy conferred upon India’s nuclear weapons program by this agreement by offsetting conventional military force weakness with nuclear deterrence, and plans to increase its civilian nuclear power plants to meet its energy shortages. As a result, nuclear facilities in South Asia are multiplying at the very moment the threat of nuclear terrorism is also growing.

Nuclear Terrorism in South Asia

The waves of terrorism currently afflicting South Asia flow from a long, complex history. Since their independence, both India and Pakistan have used proxies to affect each other’s internal dynamics. This has led to wars, crises, and even secessionism with the creation of Bangladesh in 1971. Before 2001, India and Pakistan were the focus of attention due to proliferation concerns and the implications of being self-declared nuclear powers after the 1998 tests. After 2001, South Asia became the epicenter for the war against al-Qaeda. The problem of terrorism has become so complex that a spectacular terrorist attack could happen in any part of the region. South Asia has already seen such dramatic terrorist attacks as the 2001 attack on India’s Parliament, the 2008 Mumbai attacks, the 2008 Marriott bombing in Islamabad, as well as various attacks on Pakistani government and military facilities. The region has come under even greater scrutiny for nuclear terrorism since the revelation that Osama bin Laden met two retired Pakistani scientists and showed interest in acquiring nuclear technology.6

In addition, both Indian and Pakistani nuclear arsenals have grown at a steady pace. Thus, the fears of WMD terrorism have added to the previous concerns of proliferation and stability, and generated heightened allegations and scrutiny. The permissive regional environment for terrorism is not easily reversed – it requires concerted, time-consuming, and costly efforts. Given the nature of these attacks and the growing nuclear arsenals and civilian nuclear facilities, nuclear terrorism is at the crosshairs of multiple regional trends.

In South Asia overall threat perception has mirrored trends in nuclear politics. The popular perception of nuclear terrorism combines nuclear safety, nuclear security, and terrorism into one issue. As any one of these issues becomes inflamed, the general fear of nuclear terrorism rises. In reality these three issues are distinct concerns with unique causes, solutions, and policy implications.

First, nuclear safety management relates to the technical steps needed to prevent nuclear accidents and ensure optimal and safe operations. Second, nuclear security pertains to prevention of unauthorized access, tampering, accounting, and protection, as well as numerous preventive and reactive steps that require both technical and military security instruments and practices. Third, terrorism pertains to the presence and activities of violent extremist organizations operating with impunity across state borders; this of course is a central concern and its reduction and elimination require different tools and measures. Regardless of its nuclear status, a state is responsible for eliminating terrorism within its borders. The failure to mitigate or eliminate terrorism does not absolve a state from its safety and security responsibilities; rather all nuclear capable states must be committed to the highest standard of nuclear safety and security regardless of the internal or external threats. Without addressing the factors that allow terrorism to exist, nuclear terrorism will always remain a concern.

Another challenge for nuclear terrorism is that it is plagued by an imprecise lexicon. Placing “nuclear” as a prefix to terrorism dilutes the complexity and makes it difficult to differentiate between a hyped threat and a realistic threat. This is compounded by the propensity to use nuclear terrorism and nuclear security interchangeably. The rhetorical tensions result in increased hype concerning the nuclear terrorism threat and are often used by countries as a propaganda tool to defame states with which they have adversarial relationships. At the same time, nuclear security measures such as ratification of international treaties, legislation, and regimes allows nuclear-armed states to gain diplomatic mile- age without identifying the realistic threat and constructing an adequate response. In order to fully understand the threat of nuclear terrorism in South Asia it is necessary to understand the complexity of the threat matrix: the external threat, the internal threat, and the extent of international scrutiny.

ASSESSMENT OF THREAT PERCEPTIONS

The presentation of a balanced assessment of both India’s and Pakistan’s threat perceptions must address a central question: Why have India and Pakistan developed different parameters for nuclear security? We assess that this is primarily due to their differing threat perceptions and distinctive international involvement and approaches to each state.

Pakistani Threat Perceptions

From the outset, Pakistan confronted obstacles and opposition to its nuclear weapons ambitions that affected the nuclear security regime of the country. Over time three threat perceptions emerged that shaped Islamabad’s nuclear security management. First, beginning in the late 1970s, several incidents forced Islamabad to focus on the external threat of a sudden disarming attack that could prevent the nascent buildup of its capabilities.7 Second, like all nuclear weapon states, an “insider threat” was feared – a mole or spy from an external hostile intelligence agency determined to compromise nuclear secrets or sabotage the program from within.

Pakistan had a special reason to focus on this threat because its official policy denied the existence of a military nuclear program due to repressive nuclear sanctions and attempts by Western intelligence agencies to spy on Pakistani centrifuge facilities.8 The third perception developed after 2001, when violent radical threats within the state became ram- pant in Pakistani society in general while specific incidents occurred that targeted Pakistani security forces.9

Today, Pakistan perceives threats to its nuclear facilities from a host of both external and internal threats. Recent events that exacerbate these fears include the fatal attack on Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad; reports of CIA covert operations disguised as vaccination campaigns to collect DNA in the search for bin Laden; CIA contractor Raymond Davis’s killing of civilians in Lahore; relentless drone strikes; and border incidents on the Salala post of the Afghan-Pakistan border. The regional security situation deteriorated further after the Mumbai terror attack and continuing terrorist operations in Afghanistan – especially those led by Afghan Taliban. While external threat perceptions deepened, the Pakistani internal situation has also deteriorated exponentially. The 2007 operation in Lal Masjid and the establishment of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other violent extremist groups and sectarian religious groups have challenged the writ of the state. For over a decade, Pakistan has faced a separatist violent movement in Baluchistan. The combination of tribal border region tensions and al-Qaeda attacks has embroiled Pakistan’s military in multiple counterinsurgency contingencies.10 Given these multiple complex threats, the Pakistani nuclear security regime has evolved much differently in the past decade than was the case in the earlier decades of its nuclear program.

Indian Threat Perceptions

In contrast, India’s nuclear security discourse has developed an entirely different narrative.

While Pakistan braces for both internal and external threats, India is relatively spared from either. China remains India’s primary external threat and India’s worst case threat perceptions are rooted in the persistent belief in Sino-Pakistani collusion on everything from economic deals to intelligence matters. However, this belief does not play a significant role in Indian nuclear security perceptions. India does fear an external attack emanating from China by aircraft or missile, though it has never been subject to a deep aerial attack directly from China. Thus, fear of a preventive strike linked to China or another external power does not compute in India’s threat calculus. Although India’s relationship with China is antagonistic and its threat perceptions are based on long-term perceptions, India’s immediate security focus is on Pakistan. With a bitter history of wars and crises, the most significant perceived threat is a terror attack master-minded by a Pakistan-based extremist organization that India believes is state-sponsored. In any case, even as India’s adversarial relationships with China and Pakistan are likely to continue with ups and downs, the prospect of an external power attacking India’s nuclear facility is perceived as unlikely. Further India’s internal security situation is qualitatively different than Pakistan’s, and as such India’s nuclear security culture has evolved differently.

The composition of India’s internal threat is vastly different from the domestic threats within Pakistan. India is home to a host of secessionist, fifth column, saboteur, and radical extremist groups. These groups range from socio-revolutionary groups like the Naxalites in the “red corridor” in Eastern India, to secessionist movements and centrifugal forces from Kashmir in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south. These movements and the associated tensions have existed with sporadic intensities throughout almost the entire history of independent India. Further, terrorist groups such as Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) are supporting operations in the Kashmiri struggle and elsewhere in India. India is also experiencing a rise of Hindu extremist groups which always have the potential to ignite a communal conflict; sparks have ignited in Mumbai, Gujarat, and the “train terror” (Samjhota Express). These groups have been proven to operate within India and wage high-consequence terror attacks including major ones such as the 2001 Indian Parliament and the 2008 Mumbai attacks.

While these groups within India are numerous, they are of a different level of magnitude than their counterparts in Pakistan, which is threatened internally by terrorist organizations both within Pakistan itself as well as across the porous border in Afghanistan. It is unknown whether a radical insider from any of these movements could possibly penetrate India’s nuclear facilities, though such a possibility cannot be ruled out. From India’s view- point its internal threats are primarily those sponsored by external agencies. The 2008 Mumbai terror attack re-confirmed the belief that the internal terror threat is due to terrorists infiltrating from neighboring states or externally sponsored sleeper cells. However, India does not fear the same challenge from rampant instability that is evident in Pakistan. India’s nuclear security culture has a greater emphasis on an outside sponsored terror attack on its facilities rather than an insider instigating a nuclear security breach.

Quite apart from differing threat perceptions, another factor that has affected Pakistan’s and India’s respective approaches to
nuclear security is the nature of the international approach towards terror in the region during the past decade.

Implications of the International Approach

The international community has dramatically influenced nuclear threat perceptions in Pakistan. In the context of the American-led Global War on Terror, the flourishing terror infrastructure has adversely affected U.S.- Pakistan relations. Internal threats have raised American and international concerns over the legacy and possible survival of the A.Q. Khan proliferation network, and the level of central control over government facilities. In reaction to Pakistani military operations in tribal areas, terrorist organizations have proven their ability to retaliate in kind against both military bases and soft civilian targets. Specifically, terror attacks against military headquarters and bases have undermined the authority of the military and intelligence institutions and widened the opening for international scrutiny and conjecture about nuclear terrorism in Pakistan.

Although Pakistan operates under continuous intense international scrutiny, it has made substantial gains in bolstering its nuclear architecture, safety, and security. Pakistan has developed a Center of Excellence and offered to provide counterpart training in nuclear security practices. Pakistan has also selectively opened its Center and its training facilities to respond to nuclear security incidents. Recently Pakistan allowed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Secretary General to visit the Center of Excellence, who was reportedly very impressed.11 These accomplishments have been recognized and acknowledged by the international community as shown in the recently released 2014 Nuclear Threat Index (NTI).12 Still, the heightened levels of scrutiny undermine Pakistan’s ability to overcome its nuclear legacy and reduce international fears of nuclear terrorism in Pakistan.

The international community has had a profoundly different role in the formulation of India’s nuclear security infrastructure. The most significant factor shaping the international community’s approach towards Indian nuclear safety and security today is the U.S.- India Civil Nuclear Agreement, which governs civilian nuclear trade between the United States and India. The international community has interpreted this agreement as an indicator of legitimacy and tacit approval of India’s nuclear program, as well as symbolic verification of India’s superior nuclear safety and security. Therefore, India faces considerably less international scrutiny than Pakistan.

As noted above, India is not entirely immune from nuclear safety and security concerns; it is only afforded a relative degree of confidence compared to Pakistan. Even though India has demonstrated a past track record of effective nuclear management, this must be understood in the context of the limited tools to measure of effectiveness.13 There is general international agreement with India’s perception that any threat to its nuclear security is likely to originate from an external source and any such threat will be sufficiently addressed before escalating to a nuclear incident. It is likely that India has taken significant steps to ensure nuclear security in an environment of internal and external threats. However, compared to Pakistan, India’s measures and response are less widely known as it does not advertise its nuclear security best practices. This is not likely to change due to the aforementioned international approach that has created an environment where India has little incentive to further improve nuclear safety and security.14 Despite these positive perceptions and modest improvements, India ranked lower than Pakistan in the 2014 NTI Index.15

As a result of both India’s and Pakistan’s perceived external threats and their long-standing strategic rivalry, South Asia does not have a culture of openness on nuclear security. Spotless performance in the absence of meaningful measures of effectiveness does not necessarily equate to nuclear security.16 Rather, India and Pakistan choose to veil site security in secrecy and boast about achievements.

If terrorist attacks have been thwarted at these facilities, they are not publicized for a host of reasons: (1) a sensitive site could be compromised; (2) intelligence methods on site protection could be publically revealed; (3) admitting vulnerability reinforces propaganda about site insecurity. Without a public record of measured effectiveness or information on how current site security measures have been performed, nuclear site security remains a serious concern and must be acknowledged as a factor leading potentially to a breakout of nuclear terrorism.

A balanced and objective assessment should conclude that the threats facing India and Pakistan respectively are qualitatively different. Pakistan faces a greater internal threat than India and also endures significantly greater international scrutiny on nuclear safety and security. Therefore it is not surprising that Pakistani measures to deal with safety and security are correspondingly greater. India is not subject to the same level of international scrutiny, and experiences less pressure to publicize its nuclear security arrangements and advertise its best practices. From a performance perspective, as recognized in public acknowledgements worldwide concerning both nuclear armed South Asian states, there is a degree of confidence. However, there is little to no public source to analyze measures of effectiveness.

EVALUATING THE RISK

Calculating the risk of nuclear terrorism in South Asia must take into account an understanding of both Pakistani and Indian threat perceptions, as well as their respective internal nuclear politics. The phrase, “nuclear terrorism,” creates the specter of nuclear catastrophe with severe consequences. The fear of these consequences and the dissemination of histrionic literature on the possibilities cause policymakers, academics, and the public to lose sight of the probability and focus only on the devastating outcomes.

Policy proposals should be based on a realistic assessment of the threat in order to maximize effectiveness and cost-savings. To calculate the risk of nuclear terrorism, this article uses the formulation of risk equals probability times consequence. The majority of the current assessment and preventive steps for nuclear terrorism base risk solely on the severity of the consequence instead of factoring in probability. If the probability is zero or near zero, the consequence is irrelevant because the risk is the same as that of the level of probability. To avoid complacency, a sober assessment of probable scenarios is necessary to evaluate the risks and to encourage constructive thinking towards realistic solutions.

Therefore, the increase in terrorism in South Asia in the last decade does not necessarily correlate to an increase in the likelihood of nuclear terrorism. The expansion and strengthening of international nuclear safe-guards along with an increased commitment and buy-in from the state to tackle terrorism are the pathways towards reducing the conditions for terrorism. In our assessment, many of the nuclear terrorism scenarios in the public debate have been substantially exaggerated and overblown in the post-2001 era.

Hyped Threats

Predictably, the buzzword of nuclear terrorism transforms into an imaginative and hyped proposition. Sifting realistic and probable threats on the question of nuclear terrorism challenges from overestimated and improbable assertions allows sober assessment of prob- able scenarios, reduces complacency, and encourages constructive and forward thinking in the international community.

The most realistic threat is determined by an evaluation based on technical and security rationales. We use Ferguson and Potter’s four “faces” of nuclear terrorism to survey the threats: (1) theft of an intact nuclear weapon; (2) theft of fissile material leading to the development of an improvised nuclear device (IND); (3) acquisition of radioactive material to fashion a radiation dispersion device (RDD) or radiation emission device (RED); and (4) an attack on a nuclear facility that releases radioactive materials.17

We assess that the first two of Ferguson and Potter’s scenarios are of high consequence, but the least probable. One of the most pervasive hyped assertions is that the radical religious groups or TTP in Pakistan could usurp state power and gain access to Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. Instead of basing the risk on a measured assessment, these fears are based on multiplying two trends; the rise of religious extremism and TTP in tribal areas, and the growth of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. The combination conjures up images of exponentially increased likelihood and consequence. The surge of religious groups, intolerance towards minorities, and TTP are an outgrowth of three decades of religiously based guerilla wars waged in the tribal lands of Pakistan and Afghanistan. The core of violent radical threats resides in these borderlands, and military operations continue there at the time of this writing. Pakistanis have borne the brunt of ter- ror attacks across the entire country and have repeatedly rejected radical religious parties in its two democratic political transitions. While it is true that Pakistan faces unprecedented threats from radical forces the probability of a takeover of the state is hyperbole and near zero. Similarly, the drivers of growth of nuclear weapons are related to the strategic competi- tion with India and its deterrence requirements, and have no correlation to the threat in the tribal areas. Nevertheless, it is important that this internal threat is recognized and not ignored by the state.

Another exaggerated threat is based on the fear that Islamic militants in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) will gain access to nuclear materials and either auction them on the black market or develop an IND. This fear is based on previous examples of militants utilizing ransom, kidnappings, and drug sales to gain revenue. In an era of increased localized autonomy of al-Qaeda offshoots, there is an increased need for local self-financing.18 The potential for enormous payoff makes selling stolen fissile material a logical venture. However, it is impractical to acquire, transport, safely store, and transfer nuclear weapons materials because this highly sensitive process would be fraught with safety and security dangers that terrorist groups with limited resources would be unable to surmount.19 To date there is no evidence such a theft has occurred in South Asia. States consider nuclear weapons as their national crown jewels and guard them with utmost secrecy and protection. Significant dangers are associated with the acquisition and transportation of such materials and both accounting and protection are receiving greater attention.20 While this threat is exaggerated, the development of a dirty bomb with radioactive materials and conventional explosives cannot be ruled out.

How probable is it then that such a threat would materialize? Even if the most unlikely scenario occurs, what are the consequences and what are the most realistic risks to evaluate? In order to effectively meet the challenges of South Asian nuclear terrorism, the most realistic threats in the region must be separated from the hyperbolic threats.

Most Realistic Threat

The third and the fourth scenarios fall into the higher probability categories, with a spectrum of possible consequences.21 An RED or RDD attack will have immediate economic and psychological consequences and might constitute the classic definition of terrorism. Similarly, an attack on a nuclear facility, whether or not it succeeds, would create a psychological specter of terrorizing the state, as could holding the nuclear facility or material hostage. The psychological impact of a penetration of a nuclear installation will instantly create an international panic based on the possibility of insider-outsider collusion.

First, it is technically less difficult to make an RED or RDD than an IND. In our assessment, an attempt to make an IND by a terrorist group is more likely to result in an RDD due to the scientific design challenges, which are not as simple as some scholars believe. If an RED or RDD were achieved in a terror attack originally designed to detonate as an IND, it would still have significant radiological dispersal consequences. In South Asia, an RED or RDD can be used to replace the conventional terror response such as a car bomb or suicide attack. Over a period of time, Indian and Pakistani security forces have developed counterterror tactics to expose and prevent conventional terrorist attacks; therefore, an RDD is an adaptive replacement. Especially in Pakistan, terrorists have claimed to have carried out attacks on soft targets in cities and military garrisons in retaliation for ongoing operations or drone strikes conducted by the United States. Should a conventional terror attack fail because of countervailing strategies by security forces, an RED or RDD could be the new tool.

In South Asia, we assess an armed attack on a nuclear installation as the threat with the highest combination of probability and consequence. Unlike the other scenarios, there has been evidence of terrorists employing this strategy with some success. In this situation, the probability is high due to the evidence of similar style attacks in both India and Pakistan. A commando-type siege would not show signatures that would exist in the theft or movement of a nuclear weapon or nuclear material. Both India and Pakistan have experienced several attacks on military facilities, government sites, and symbolic soft targets. In Pakistan, examples include the 2012 attack on the Minhas Air Force Base in Kamra, the May 2011 TTP raid on Pakistan Naval Station (PNS) Mehran in Karachi, and the 2009 TTP attack and hostage crisis at the Pakistan Army General Headquarters.22 Examples of attacks on military and government facilities in India include the 2001 Parliament attack, the 2002 attack on an Indian army base in Kaluchak, and the 2008 synchronized attacks and hostage siege in Mumbai.23 Such attacks may not have succeeded in their respective missions, and each resulted in only modest destruction. However, though far short of “success,” the hype and fear created by such events evokes a serious psychological impact that allows terrorists to achieve other objectives.

We believe that such an attack would result in a moderate consequence level – less devastating than the detonation of a nuclear bomb on a population, but more damaging than a radiological attack. Since the probability of the first through third scenarios is close to zero, the probability of this attack is a more important factor than the level of destruction that would result. It is important to note that our threat assessment does not anticipate a situation where the terrorists accessed radioactive materials at the facility. We assess the probability of an attack on the nuclear facility resulting in the release of substantial radiation as small. Ultimately, the actual attack on the facility is the most probable situation; the high consequence interaction with radioactive materials would only confirm and compound the already evident consequence.24

On the other hand, Rajesh Basrur and Friedrich Steinhäusler evaluated such attacks in India and identified security risks for Indian nuclear power plants. They offer scenarios including attackers gaining access to a base and detonating a bomb that releases radioactivity, suicide truck attacks on facility entry points, and a suicide attack on the nuclear facility’s spent fuel storage pool by a civilian aircraft.25 Due to India’s three-pronged approach for its civilian nuclear infrastructure, the different types of reactors have different strengths and vulnerabilities.26

The most probable threat in South Asia is an attack on nuclear infrastructure as its expansion provides more targets for terrorists. The growing number of facilities also increases the potential of vulnerabilities from insider threats. Despite the rigor of personnel reliability screening programs, there inevitably remains a potential for violent attacks from insiders. This has previously occurred in India, for example when Indira Gandhi was killed by her own bodyguards.27 Similarly, Pakistan Governor Salman Taseer was assassinated by his own bodyguard in January 2011.28 Personnel reliability programs are very important in South Asian states and provide opportunities for assurance and cooperation in both countries, but as these examples show they are far from perfect.

Site security is intrinsically linked to site selection. In South Asia, site selection must balance the external and internal threat matrix with the proximity of resources and response capacity. All these factors must be considered from the safety and security standpoints. First, major research centers must be in close proximity to technological hubs and the availability of top scientists and technicians as well as access to reinforcement from military garrisons. Second, power plants have different requirements for water and cooling resources. Plants must be located at a sufficient depth from borders to provide adequate warning of external attack – especially from the air – but cannot be too close to volatile borderlands and hostile areas. Third, storage sites selection may have different criteria to limit vulnerabilities without compromising security. These criteria include limited access, camouflage requirements and proximity to deployment areas. Compared to India’s vast territory, Pakistan’s geography and terrain do not allow the luxury of a wide choice of locations. However, the nature of the terrain and the proximity of garrisons and water sources provide well-controlled venues where site protection and security parameters can be developed into a robust system. And given Pakistani threat perceptions and the role of nuclear weapons as the source of ultimate national achievement as well as a tool for survival, it is not imaginable that these crown jewels would be managed in a lackluster manner.29 On site security, India has the luxury of space and fewer internally disturbed areas which afford it more flexibility. Pakistan is limited by space restrictions and pervasive domestic instability that increases the pressure as arsenals grow.

An attack on a South Asian nuclear facility has not occurred for several reasons. First, existing outward security deters terrorists from waging an assault. It is likely that the trend toward a growing number of nuclear facilities, and as other targets previously deemed impervious to attack are compromised, terrorists will be emboldened to attack even seemingly well-guarded nuclear facilities in the future. A highly guarded facility would be logistically difficult to attack due to multiple rings of security. However, terrorist organizations have proven adaptable and capable of circumventing even the best guarded infrastructure. Another possible explanation is that the locations of many nuclear storage sites are highly classified and unknown to terrorists. It would be reasonable for terrorist groups, having done a cost-benefit analysis, to conclude that conventional weapons are sufficient to create a high-consequence terror attack.

South Asian nuclear facilities are not uniquely vulnerable to terrorist attack. There have been multiple attacks on South Africa’s Pelindaba nuclear facility which is believed to contain the national stocks of highly enriched uranium (HEU). Although the attacks appear to have been crimes of opportunism, they have exposed the deficiencies in protective measures that could be devastating when combined with terrorist motivation.30 Other examples include the 1972 and 1977 attacks on nuclear facilities in West Germany by the Baader-Meinhof Gang (Red Army Faction). The group bombed U.S. military facilities and attempted to seize tactical nuclear weapons. In response to this attack, the U.S. military implemented site consolidation measures and heightened security.31

Given the prospects of realistic terror threats in South Asia and examples in other areas of the world, we recommend that both India and Pakistan respond directly to terrorism, nuclear security, and nuclear safety through a combination of the existing international and multilateral regimes, as well as implementing national legislation to establish future bilateral steps.

Regional Response

South Asia has a long history of developing innovative Confidence Building Measures (CBMs).32 Yet so far, there has been no substantive progress on conflict resolution or the structuring of an arms control regime that encompasses conventional force balances, nuclear restraint measures, and other forms of risk reduction.

Worse, the menace of terrorism that has increasingly bedeviled the region for multiple decades has been met with an inappropriate and inadequate response by both India and Pakistan; terrorism should be elevated as the highest priority to South Asian security and must be effectively addressed. This article has portrayed terrorism as a stand-alone issue and nuclear terrorism as a component of the broader terrorism challenge in the region. We recommend that India and Pakistan deal with regional terrorism above all other cross-border or other disputes. All nuclear arms control negotiations and CBMs must include discussions of terrorism, as well as of nuclear safety and security, cooperation, and bilateral consensus.

In order to identify future steps, we examine below the existing multilateral initiatives that contain binding obligations. By identifying the highest risk, both countries can re-purpose and expand the established mechanisms to deal directly with the nuclear security environment in the region.

Existing International Tools and Obligations

As a first step, India’s and Pakistan’s international obligations require both states to take legislative measures, physical responses, and international cooperation on issues in nuclear safety, security, and terrorism. This creates the foundation for both states to build on their existing individual responses and to cooperate bilaterally and regionally on these topics. Regional responses are necessary because terrorism and the implications of nuclear expansion do not recognize political boundaries.

Taking into account the highest risk nuclear terrorism attack and the threat from terrorism itself, there are many tools to equip the international community to prevent and mitigate nuclear terrorism. However, most of the existing international initiatives and United Nations Security Council Resolutions (UNSCR) regulate proliferation and the transfer of materials. A first proposal is to create a regional regime derived from the UNSCR 1540 (discussed below). A second recommendation is to develop a regime focusing on terrorism utilizing the existing structure created in the 1999, 2004, and 2007 bilateral regional agreements that will each be explained in detail below. In combination, we propose the recently incoming Indian and Pakistani governments develop a regional security response to a potential nuclear incident or nuclear terror attack.

UNSCR 1540 mandated the development and enforcement of legal and regulatory mechanisms for proliferation of nuclear materials and criminalization of non-state actor involvement with nuclear weapons.33 Although this resolution mainly addresses proliferation, it is derived from a series of UNSC resolutions regulating international terrorism. As part of this regime, UNSCR 1540 aims to incorporate counter-terrorism into the nuclear and proliferation legislation and set forth standards for implementation under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter.34 Therefore, non-state actor involvement with anything related to nuclear weapon safety and security is a criminal act recognized as such by both states because the domestic legislation in both India and Pakistan has been brought into line.35 A criminal activity or accidental activity in either territory or in a geographically proximate region obliges both countries to develop a response and cooperate with international efforts. We propose that the domestic and international components should be transformed into a regional obligation in the case of a threat to a nuclear installation. As part of a future regional cooperative agreement, both India and Pakistan must act in a transparent manner and cooperate with international measures.

To weave together a regional regime on nuclear terrorism, existing regional agreements are already available to India and Pakistan. The foremost document is the 1999 Lahore Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which was coincidently signed by the two parties now in power – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India and the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz). Part III of the Lahore MOU commits both states to reducing the risk of accidental or unauthorized use of nuclear weapons and to notify the other of the risk of any decision or actions that would result in adverse consequences. Although at the time this was restricted to unauthorized use of weapons or a nuclear accident, this could now be expanded to incorporate the UNSCR 1540 requirements on terrorism. Second, during the 2004 joint India-Pakistan statement following the Twelfth SAARC Summit, both countries pledged to prevent terrorism in the region and are bound to not support terrorism in any manner.36 In addition, the Islamabad Declaration reaffirmed the commitment to a SAARC Regional Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism, and included the signing of an Additional Protocol on terrorist financing.37 The third instrument was the 2007 CBM between India and Pakistan for the “Agreement on Reducing the Risk from Accidents Relating to Nuclear Weapons.” This agreement pledged each to notify the other in the case of an accident involving nuclear weapons.38 This agreement was originally established for five years and reaffirmed in 2012 for a five-year extension.39

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to multiple CBMs to prevent situations in which non-state actors gained control of any part of their respective nuclear arsenals. These CBMs existed in an environment with limited internal terrorist threats and extensive nuclear security and safety systems to keep the arsenals secure. As discussed above, India and Pakistan have numerous reasons to create a regional nuclear security architecture. Yet there have been no major steps, dialogues, or even the exchange of CBMs and nuclear risk reduction measure ideas since the 2007 bilateral broad based agreement. The shroud of secrecy surrounding nuclear weapons in South Asia must be removed to establish necessary CBMs on nuclear security, nuclear safety, and nuclear terrorism.

Based on UNSCR 1540 and the existing bilateral agreements, we offer a list of policy recommendations to combat the most realistic threat from nuclear terrorism in South Asia:

  • Committed military and political leader- ship: Combating all strains of terrorism requires considerable political will and dedicated leadership from both the political apparatus and the military. While lower levels of bureaucratic engagement can contribute to progress, routine senior meetings dedicated exclusively to terrorism issues are necessary to generate results. Although the Indian and Pakistani Prime Ministers meet on the sidelines of international meetings, there is a need for periodic regional bilateral meetings between the Prime Ministers, Directors General of Military Operations (DGMO), and heads of intelligence agencies.
  • Regional bilateral engagement: We recommend direct regional bilateral contact between the chairmen of the Pakistani Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) and the Indian Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC), as well as between the Pakistani Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) and the Indian Nuclear Regulatory Authority (INRA).
  • National risk reduction centers: Since a host of confidence building measures and nuclear risk reduction measures have failed to create durable peace, nuclear risk reduction centers (NRRCs) should be established. NRRCs can build on the existing CBM and NRRM framework to serve as coordination centers to facilitate communication, identify triggers for escalation, and negotiate conflict resolution. NRRCs are intended to bolster official lines of diplomatic or military communication in the event of a nuclear emergency, not replace established communication.40
  • Exchange of radiation data: We recommend sharing radiation data around nuclear power plants of each country and the exchange of documents that identify steps for protective measures against accidents taken by each country.
  • Civil society summits: In order to incorporate valuable subject matter expertise from regional think tanks and universities, the major think tanks in India and Pakistan should hold joint seminars to directly address regional nuclear questions and issues.
  • Indefinite extension of nuclear agreements: The Agreement on Reducing the Risk from Accidents Relating to Nuclear Weapons was initially signed in 2007 and extended for an additional five years in 2012. This agreement should be extended indefinitely and include an additional protocol agreement to deal with consequence management of a terrorist incident at a nuclear installation and any incidents of nuclear terrorism.41

 

About the authors:
Feroz Hassan Khan is a Lecturer at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA and a former Brigadier General in the Pakistan Army.

Emily Burke is a Research Assistant at the Naval Postgraduate School and is a graduate student in the Combating Terrorism: Policy and Strategy curriculum.

Source:
This article was published in PRISM Vol 5, Number 1 (PDF), by published by the Center for Complex Operations, which is part of the National Defense University (NDU).

Notes
1 The first Nuclear Security Summit was held in Washington, DC in 2010 with the aim of preventing nuclear terrorism around the globe. Succeeding summits were held biannually in Seoul, South Korea in 2012 and in The Hague, Netherlands in 2014.
2 A full definition of nuclear terrorism is found in the 2005 International Convention on the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism: “The convention defines the act of nuclear terrorism as the use or threat to use nuclear material, nuclear fuel, radioactive products or waste, or any other radioactive substances with toxic, explosive, or other dangerous properties. The definition includes the use or threat to use any nuclear installations, nuclear explosive, or radiation devices in order to kill or injure persons, damage property, or the environment, or to compel persons, States, or international organizations to do or to refrain from doing any act. The unauthorized receipt through fraud, theft, or forcible seizure of any nuclear material, radioactive substances, nuclear installations, or nuclear explosive devices belonging to a State Party, or demands by the threat or use of force or by other forms of intimidation for the transfer of such material would also be regarded as acts of nuclear terrorism.” http://www.un.org/en/sc/ctc/ docs/conventions/Conv13.pdf.
3 Justin Bresolin, “Fact Sheet: The Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program,” The Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, (July 2013), http://armscontrolcenter.org/publications/factsheets/ fact_sheet_the_cooperative_threat_reduction_program/.
4 2011 National Strategy for Counterterrorism.
5 “Nuclear security after Fukushima,” International Institute for Strategic Studies (August, 2011).
6 David Albright, Kathryn Buehler, and Holly Higgins, “Bin Laden and the bomb,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 58 no. 1 (January 2002); see information on Dr. Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood in Feroz Khan, Eating Grass: The Making of the Pakistani Bomb (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2012): 360-63.
7 Such threat perception was reinforced when Israel successfully destroyed Osirak reactor in Iraq in 1981. India then contemplated mimicking Israel to destroy Pakistani centrifuge facility program. See Khan, Eating Grass, 212-13.
8 For an example, see Adrian Levy and Catherine Scott-Clark, Deception: Pakistan, the United States, and the Secret Trade in Nuclear Weapons (New York: Walker Publishing Company, 2007), 92-93.
9 A detailed analysis is given in Feroz Hassan Khan “Nuclear Security in Pakistan: Separating Myths from Reality,” Arms Control Today (July/August 2009); Also see Naeem Salik and Kenneth N. Luongo, “Challenges for Pakistan’s Nuclear Security,” Arms Control Today (March 2013).
10 Pakistan has often alleged Indian intelligence agencies to be involved in the support for Baluch insurgency just as India alleges Pakistani intelligence agency involvement in internal instability within India.
11 “Visit of DG IAEA Pakistan’s Center of Excellence for Nuclear Security,” Inter Services Public Relations Pakistan Press Release, March, 12, 2014, https://www.ispr.gov.pk/front/t-press_release. asp?id=2499&print=1.
12 See the 2014 NTI Index at http://ntiindex.org/ data-results/2014-findings/; Salik and Luongo, “Challenges for Pakistan’s Nuclear Security.”
13 For more information on Indian regulatory non-practices, see M V Ramana, “Flunking Atomic Audits: CAG Reports and Nuclear Power,” Economic & Political Weekly, 47 no. 39 (September 29, 2012).
14 Almost like a default response to any Western publication or assertion of nuclear security concern, Pakistani official reaction is to contemptuously dismiss the report and state that its nuclear security regime is foolproof and iron-clad. For example, see “Pakistan: Nuke security fool-proof,” CNN, January 26, 2008.
15 2014 NTI Index at http://ntiindex.org/data- results/2014-findings/.
16 Conversely, the United States has a culture of openness and is able to publicize shortcomings in site security. One example is a May 2014 admission that the U.S. Air Force failed to effectively respond to a simulated assault on a nuclear missile silo. Although questions are raised regarding the implications of security, ultimately it has allowed corrective measures and do not undermine the missile’s safety. See http:// hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_NUCLEAR_MISSTEPS?SITE =AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CT IME=2014-05-22-02-54-38.
17 Charles D. Ferguson and William C. Potter, The Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism (Monterey, CA: Center for Nonproliferation Studies, 2004), 3.
18 State Department Country Reports on Terrorism.
19 Abdul Manan, “Preventing Nuclear Terrorism in Pakistan: Sabotage of a Spent Fuel Cask or a Commercial Irradiation Source in Transport,” in ed. Henry D. Sokolski, Pakistan’s Nuclear Future: Worries Beyond War (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2008), 221-276.
20 The 2014 Nuclear Security Summit in The Hague recognized the significance of accounting process. See Jonas Siegel, “How Nuclear Material Accounting Can Contribute to Nuclear Security” Nuclear Security Matters Project at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, May 16, 2014.
21 An IND manufactured by a terrorist group is more likely to behave like a RDD than a full-fledged nuclear explosive device with nuclear explosion and chain reaction.
22 Declan Walsh, “Militants Attack Pakistani Air Force Base,” August 16, 2012; Salman Masood and David E. Sanger, “Militants Attack Pakistani Naval Base in Karachi,” The New York Times, May 22, 2011; Hassan Abbas, “Deciphering the attack on Pakistan’s Army headquarters,” Foreign Policy, October 11, 2009.
23 Celia W. Dugger, “Suicide Raid in New Delhi; Attackers Among 12 Dead,” The New York Times, December 14, 2001; Luke Harding, “Kaluchak keeps the flag of vengeance flying,” The Guardian, June 7, 2002; CNN Library, “Mumbai Terror Attacks,” CNN, September 18, 2013.
24 See “Releasing Radiation: Power Plants and Other Facilities,” in Ferguson and Potter, The Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism, 190-258.
25 Rajesh M. Basrur and Friedrich Steinhäusler, “Nuclear and Radiological Terrorism Threats for India: Risk Potential and Countermeasures,” Journal of Physical Security, 1 no. 1 (2004).
26 The three-pronged approach includes utilizing indigenous uranium to fuel thermal reactors, harvesting the plutonium produced in the thermal reactors for fast breeder reactors, and created thorium- reactors to produce uranium-233 to power these reactors. For more information, see Charles D. Ferguson, “Assessing the Vulnerability of the Indian Civilian Nuclear Program to Military and Terrorist Attack” in ed. Henry D. Sokolski, Gauging US-Indian Strategic Cooperation (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2007), 131-185.
27 Basrur and Steinhäusler, “Nuclear and Radiological Terrorism Threats for India.”
28 Salman Masood and Carlotta Gall, “Killing of Governor Deepens Crisis in Pakistan,” The New York Times, January 4, 2011.
29 Some western writings have made comical assertions. See “The Ally From Hell,” Jeffrey Goldberg and Marc Ambinder, Atlantic Monthly, October 28, 2011
30 “Another Infiltration Reported at South African Atomic Site,” Nuclear Threat Initiative, July 13, 2012. http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/new-infiltration- reported-south-african-atomic-plant/
31 Leslie Cockburn and Andrew Cockburn, One Point Safe (New York: Doubleday, 1997), 1-12.
32 For a full list of CBMs in South Asia, see the Stimson Center “South Asia Confidence-Building Measures (CBM) Timeline at http://www.stimson.org/ data-sets/south-asia-confidence-building-measures-cbm-time- line/.
33 United Security Council Resolution 1540 (2004), http://www.un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc. asp?symbol=S/RES/1540%20%282004%29.
34 Peter van Ham and Olivia Bosch, eds. Global Non-Proliferation and Counter-Terrorism: The Impact of UNSCR 1540 (Baltimore, MD: Brookings Press, 2007), 6-8.
35 “South Asia 1540 Reporting,” Nuclear Threat Initiative, http://www.nti.org/analysis/reports/south-asia- 1540-reporting/.
36 Full text of the joint statement between Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee during the Twelfth SAARC Summit at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/ south_asia/3372157.stm.
37 “Islamabad Declaration,” Twelfth SAARC Summit, Islamabad, 4-6 January 2004.
38 Full text at http://www.stimson.org/research-pages/ agreement-on-reducing-the-risk-from-accidents-relating-to- nuclear-weapons/.
39 “Pakistan, India Renew Nuke Accident Accord,” Nuclear Threat Index, February 22, 2012, http://www.stimson.org/research-pages/agreement-on-reduc- ing-the-risk-from-accidents-relating-to-nuclear-weapons/.
40 Rafi uz Zaman Khan, “Nuclear Risk- Reduction Centers,” in Nuclear Risk Reduction in South Asia, ed. Michael Krepon (New York: Palgrave MacMillian, 2004), 171-81.
41 http://www.stimson.org/research-pages/agreement- on-reducing-the-risk-from-accidents-relating-to-nuclear-weap- ons/

The post Tackling Nuclear Terrorism In South Asia – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.


US Crude Exports And Re-Exports Continue To Rise; Some Volumes Sent To Europe And Asia – Analysis

0
0

The United States exported 401,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) of crude oil in July 2014 (the latest data available from the U.S. Census Bureau), the highest level of exports in 57 years (Figure 1) and the second highest monthly export volume since 1920, when EIA’s published data starts.

Recent crude oil exports are also noteworthy for both their origins and destinations. Typically, crude exports are sourced domestically and are sent only to Canada. However, since April, crude exports have included modest amounts of Canadian-produced barrels that were moved through the United States and re-exported to Switzerland, Spain, Italy, and Singapore (Figure 2).

twip141022fig1-lgTo export crude oil from the United States, a company must obtain a license from the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) of the U.S. Department of Commerce. Pursuant to Section 754.2 of the BIS export Administration Regulations which codifies the export licensing requirements, the following kinds of transactions will generally be approved: exports from Alaska’s Cook Inlet; exports to Canada for consumption or use therein; exports in connection with the refining or exchange of strategic petroleum reserve oil; exports that are consistent with international energy supply agreements; exports of foreign-origin crude; exports of California Heavy crude up to an average of 25,000 bbl/d; and temporary exports or exchanges. Licenses for other exports of U.S.-origin crude are considered on a case-by-case basis. For such other exports, the regulations describe the characteristics of transactions that will generally be approved as in the national interest.

twip141022fig2-lgSeparate legislation passed in 1996 permits the export of Alaska North Slope (ANS) crude oil. The recent shipments to Switzerland, Spain, Singapore, and Italy were small volumes of permitted re-exports of Canadian crude oil that were not commingled with U.S.-produced barrels.

As is the case in the United States, some of the growth in Canada’s crude oil production is taking place in areas with limited infrastructure to bring the crude to refineries for processing. With limited pipeline and rail takeaway capacity, some Canadian producers are testing the economic viability of moving crude oil to the Gulf Coast for re-export to other markets.

twip141022fig3-lgIt is unclear if this recent trend of Canadian re-exports from the Gulf Coast will continue, and if so, for how long. Several proposed Canadian pipeline projects may provide producers with alternative routes for delivering crude to markets beyond North America, but the timing of each of them is uncertain (Figure 3). Enbridge Inc.’s Line 9 reversal project is in its second phase, which is expected to be in service next month. The first phase, which began eastward flows earlier this year, currently enables shipment of crude from Sarnia, Ontario, to North Westover, Ontario. When completed, the second phase will expand capacity to 300,000 bbl/d and continue on from North Westover to Montreal, Quebec, where the crude could access refineries in Montreal or global markets via the St. Lawrence Seaway.

A separate project proposed by TransCanada, called Energy East, would move 1.1 million bbl/d from Alberta and Saskatchewan to refineries in eastern Canada. This plan includes conversion of an existing natural gas line to crude service and construction of new pipe on both the gathering and terminal ends. The company submitted a project description to Canada’s National Energy Board in March but has yet to file an official application, meaning this project is several years away from being operational. Additionally, both TransCanada and Kinder Morgan are seeking approval for projects that would carry barrels from Alberta west to the Pacific Coast in British Columbia. But both of those projects face resistance along the pipeline siting routes, so the outcome of these options remains to be seen.

Another development in U.S. crude oil exports is the recent shipment of Alaska North Slope (ANS) crude to South Korea, the first export of ANS in more than 10 years. ANS barrels were loaded for export in late September and delivered earlier this month. ANS shipments abroad must use U.S. coastwise-compliant ships for transport, and market analysts estimate that ANS would need to trade at a discount of $5/bbl to Brent to make such a movement economical. Although Alaskan crude production has recently been declining, the recent retirement of the remaining 79,000 barrels per calendar day of crude distillation unit capacity at the Flint Hills refinery in North Pole, Alaska, which had been running ANS crude, means that ANS producers may consider sending additional volumes to export markets.

Gasoline prices fall to lowest level since 2011, diesel fuel prices decrease

The U.S. average price for regular gasoline fell nine cents from the previous week to $3.12 per gallon as of October 20, 2014, 24 cents lower than the same time last year, and the lowest average price since January 31, 2011. The West Coast had the largest decrease, down 11 cents to $3.42 per gallon. The East Coast and Gulf Coast prices were each down 10 cents, to $3.13 per gallon and $2.91 per gallon, respectively. The Rocky Mountain price decreased nine cents to $3.25 per gallon, and the Midwest price fell six cents to $3.03 per gallon.

The U.S. average diesel fuel price decreased four cents to $3.66 per gallon, down 23 cents from the same time last year. The biggest price decline was on the West Coast, down six cents to $3.84 per gallon. The East Coast and Gulf Coast each fell five cents, to $3.67 per gallon and $3.59 per gallon, respectively. The Midwest decreased three cents to $3.61 per gallon, and the Rocky Mountain price fell a penny to $3.74 per gallon.

Propane inventories rise

U.S. propane stocks increased by 0.2 million barrels last week to 81.6 million barrels as of October 17, 2014, 15.6 million barrels (23.7%) higher than a year ago. Gulf Coast inventories increased by 0.2 million barrels and East Coast inventories increased by 0.1 million barrels. Rocky Mountain/West Coast inventories remained unchanged while Midwest inventories decreased by 0.2 million barrels. Propylene non-fuel-use inventories represented 2.8% of total propane inventories.

Residential heating oil and propane prices decrease

As of October 20, 2014, residential heating oil prices averaged $3.48 per gallon, almost 5 cents per gallon lower than last week, and 38 cents less than last year’s price of $3.86. Wholesale heating oil prices averaged nearly $2.65 per gallon, 2 cents per gallon lower than last week and nearly 46 cents lower when compared to the same time last year.

Residential propane prices decreased by less than one cent last week to $2.37 per gallon, half a cent less than the price at the same time last year. Wholesale propane prices averaged nearly $1.08 per gallon, 4 cents lower than last week’s price and just under 20 cents per gallon lower than the October 21, 2013 price.

The post US Crude Exports And Re-Exports Continue To Rise; Some Volumes Sent To Europe And Asia – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Bosnia And Herzegovina: Is Komšić A Better Lagumdžija? – Analysis

0
0

The impact of the recent election could become more “civic” than it might appear, if politicians seeking to represent that term examine their own motives, drop their international crutch, and craft an alternative to the patronage bedrock on which the current Bosnia and Herzegovina depends.

By David B. Kanin

The Democratic Front (DF) actually did not do that badly in what were default elections.  People appear to have voted out of habit, to protect their personal status as links in one of the patronage chains, or as a statement of their status in the ethnic communities Western activists keep telling us do not (or should not) matter.  The only evidence of principled commitment was negative—the clear vote to get rid of Zlatko Lagumdžija, whose play-acting as a champion of multi-cultural politics had worn pretty thin.  The DF did not receive as many votes as Lagumdžija’s Party (the mis-named Social Democrats) did last time around, but it did put itself in a position to establish credentials as an alternative to ethnic communalism, if its leading personalities can focus on something besides being leading personalities.

Assuming Komšić and other DF figures really are concerned with the problems facing communities forced together in an unworkable Bosnia, they might consider tacking a few central questions:

Is there a workable alternative to patronage?

Calling politics in Bosnia (or, for that matter, in other shards of former Yugoslavia, Albania, Bulgaria, or Romania) “corrupt” does not do the system justice.  Big Man-focused structures—whether formed around familial, religious, ethnic, local, or other exclusivist ethics—feed, protect, and employ their constituents.  They negotiate with other similar structures, and organize resource inhaling tools (we call the current form of these things “political parties”) to maximize the Big Man’s ability to be—in the words of Anthony Quinn in “Lawrence of Arabia”—a river to his people.  This remains the diachronic core of politics and economy in the Balkans and much of the rest of the world, no matter Western blather about democracy, so-called “free” markets, transparency, and governance.  Patronage subsistence systems cannot be wished or legislated away—Komšić and his party need a much better idea than the Western slogan of constitutional reform.

What is Bosnia going to produce and who is it going to sell it to?

No one in the country—or among the legion of foreigners who tell Bosnians what to do—has figured out how the first “Bosnia” since the 15th Century forced to function outside a larger imperial or Yugoslav market is going to survive (much less prosper).  The EU remains the Holy Grail for Bosnia and other supplicants, but the experiences of Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia, and Croatia after achieving membership should give the “outs” some pause.  It would be worthwhile for DF notables to discuss with like-minded people in the new EU members and in countries waiting outside the gates of “Europe” how they might organize a regional market and transportation system (current road building programs matter a lot more than constitutions).  Such a social cardiovascular arrangement is essential to mutual material progress toward escaping the deepening dependence on a Germany that is taking down the rest of Europe and cannot be good for the weak Balkan economies.

Is there actually a “civic” alternative in Bosnia?

The fictionalized memory of Bosnia’s multi-cultural past forms the mirror myth to the legend of ethnic conflict that now is so out of fashion.  The catastrophes of the 1870s, 1912-1919, the 1940s and 1990s demonstrated the fragility of various regional arrangements and externally imposed security caps and ideologies.  This record leaves it unclear why ordinary people should do anything other than remain loyal to their families and patronage networks—no matter if these advertise themselves using tribal, ethnic, religious, class-based, or “civic” rhetoric.  Željko Komšić, by bucking “authentic” Croats and rejecting Lagumdžija’s performance repertoire now has to decide if he wants to take on the encrusted layers of politics as usual.  This would involve a rejection of the temptation to become just the next Big Man, and a commitment to providing a social umbrella under which those people in both entities who chafe under the dead hand current authorities hold to their throats can usefully engage in a no-holds barred consideration of the hard work it would take to change things.

How should the DF and other parties come together? 

One of the real “what ifs?” in Bosnia is what would have happened if Selim Bešlagić had become a civic standard bearer in the 1990s instead of Lagumdžija.  Bešlagić’s record in Tuzla suggests he really would have tried to put together a cross-ethnic Party capable of earning public respect.  It likely will be harder for Komšić now to do what Bešlagić might have done then because so much political and social damage has been done in the meantime.  The key is for all concerned to accept that their party labels are irrelevant and their personal ambitions should take a back seat to the common goal of forming an institution capable of taking on the patronage bosses and forging an alternative to the Big Man system.  It is essential that all concerned prevent any effort by Lagumdžija to force his way back into the political picture.  It also is important that Komšić and the others find someone in the RS willing to join them while taking on the weakened but still self-important Dodik and his cronies.  Whoever has the courage to do this will have to stomach personal insults, political bullying, and—early on—likely electoral defeat.

How should Bosnia manage international noise?

This is not a rhetorical question.  The Europeans and Americans are going to continue to lecture the locals in the attempt to get them to focus on the wrong things—constitutional “reform,” conditions set by an EU far from certain ever to let Bosnia join the club, and the menu of demands laid down by various international institutions, NGOs, and self-certain Western activists.  After two decades, it should be clear to Bosnians of all flavors that the West can offer markets and material assistance but not much in the way of organizing principles or strategies for social cohesion.  The internationals will like the idea of Komšić—just as they bought into Lagumdžija and Dodik—but might well not like it if Bosnia’s next civic option decides not to be a supplicant but to engage them in real negotiations.  In my view, that is what the DF and any partners it attracts should do.

At best, Bosnia is looking at more years of political, economic, and social uncertainty.  To have a chance, any new effort to construct a civic politics will have to be a lot different than what has come before.  If it is not, ordinary Bosnians should not be blamed for sticking to their patronage defaults when it comes time to vote again.

David B. Kanin is an adjunct professor of international relations at Johns Hopkins University and a former senior intelligence analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

The post Bosnia And Herzegovina: Is Komšić A Better Lagumdžija? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Doctor In New York Tests Positive For Ebola – Preliminary Results

0
0

A healthcare worker who recently returned from Ebola-stricken Guinea where he treated patients has been rushed to a New York City hospital with a fever and gastrointestinal symptoms. Tests returned “preliminary positive results” for Ebola.

Preliminary test results show that the patient is positive for the Ebola virus, the New York Times reports. The federal Centers for Disease Control will conduct further tests to confirm the initial result.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio are expected to speak at 9 pm ET from Bellevue Hospital where the patient was quarantined.

The doctor suffering symptoms of the disease was rushed to hospital on Thursday with “all necessary precautions”, according to the New York City Department of Health. He was identified as Dr. Craig Spencer who works with Doctors Without Borders.

New York City Councilor Mark Levine said earlier that authorities were discussing possible evacuation of the Harlem apartment building where he lived. “Our understanding is that very few people were in direct contact with [Spencer],” NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio said.

Spencer was a medic working in Guinea but has been back in the United State for 10 days. He quarantined himself after developing a high fever, said the Daily News.

“Today, EMS HAZ TAC Units transferred to Bellevue Hospital a patient who presented a fever and gastrointestinal symptoms,” Bellevue Hospital administrators said in a statement. “The patient is a health care worker who returned to the US within the past 21 days from one of the three countries currently facing the outbreak of this virus.”

The statement went on to say the patient was transported in protective equipment, and the hospital along with the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene “has decided to conduct a test for the Ebola virus because of this patient’s recent travel history, pattern of symptoms, and past work.”

“We’re aware of the case and we’re working with the New York City health department,” a spokesman for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement. “We’re consulting with them as they assess the case and any plan to test the patient will be announced by the New York authorities.”

Bellevue Hospital said disease detectives are trying to trace all of the patient’s contacts to identify anyone who may be at potential risk. His apartment in Spanish Harlem is sealed-off.

Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan’s midtown has been designated for the identification and treatment of Ebola patients by the City and State.

Hospital administrators said that “the chances of the average New Yorker contacting Ebola are extremely slim. Ebola is spread by directly touching the bodily fluids of an infected person.”

New York’s John F. Kennedy airport was the first American airport to start conducting screenings of passengers coming from the three countries stricken by the Ebola virus – Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Passengers are asked questions about potential exposure to Ebola, and have their temperature taken.

The post Doctor In New York Tests Positive For Ebola – Preliminary Results appeared first on Eurasia Review.

China’s Latest Growth Data Indicate ‘Soft-Landing’ Of Economy – Analysis

0
0

By Emre Tunç Sakaoğlu

The latest official data on China’s GDP growth were released on Tuesday, October 21. Alongside data on GDP growth, the Chinese National Bureau of Statistics’ quarterly release also included new data on fixed-asset investment, retail sales, and industrial output.

This economic data for the third quarter, covering the three months from July to September, revealed that the Chinese economy grew at a rate of 7.3 percent year-on-year. Figures from earlier this year showed that the Chinese economy grew 7.5 percent in the second quarter, and 7.4 percent in the first.

After the sluggish growth rate, for Chinese standards, of 6.6 percent in the first quarter of 2009 due to the global financial crisis, the latest quarter’s growth rate represent a five-year low for China.

Since the Chinese government’s growth target for 2014 is 7.5 percent, the exact growth target will not be attained if the economy performs better in the upcoming fourth quarter of 2014 than it did in last year’s fourth quarter. But growth targets are flexible, and the latest data nevertheless indicate a healthy trend, according to analysts.

Likewise, Spokesman of China’s National Bureau of Statistics Sheng Laiyun said that the slowdown in China’s economic growth was due to ongoing structural reforms and the downtrend in the real estate market. Still, he said, China’s growth remains within a “reasonable range”.

Further indicators

The growth in factory output was revealed to be significantly above earlier forecasts of 7.5 percent as it climbed to an impressive 8.0 percent year-on-year in the first nine months of 2014, while it increased by only 6.9 percent in the first eight months of the year, marking the lowest rate in six years.

Alternately, growth in fixed-asset investment for the January-September period remained below the forecast of 16.3 percent, as a rise of only 16.1 percent year-on-year was reported. August’s data concerning fixed-asset investment showed a 16.5 percent growth, therefore signs of a cooling-down in this sector are clearly observed in this latest quarterly report. This figure also reveals that the Chinese economy is becoming less reliant on infrastructure construction, the main driver of the Chinese economy in the previous decade

A similar slowdown was observed concerning investment in property and housing. The growth rate in this sector for the first three quarters, 12.5 percent year-on-year, proved well below August’s figure of 13.2 percent.

Finally, retail sales rose 11.6 percent year-on-year in September, below the forecasts of 11.8 percent and the previous month’s rise of 11.9 percent. But considering the combination of the steep slump in real estate sales and the significant increase in exports and imports, media reports suggest that the data remains relatively hopeful as it implies that high demand in a vast variety of sectors other than housing is present in the Chinese economy.

What to expect?

Observers, including businessmen, equity-investors, and economists had eagerly been awaiting the disclosure of the latest data. They believed signs of a more serious slump in the property sector, coupled with an inflation level which remained under expected figures and a slimmer rate in credit growth would give a hint as to whether authorities intend to unleash new stimulus into the economy.

In this vein, Chinese officials were quoted by several media outlets prior to the release of the latest economic data suggesting that the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) was planning to pump $32.6 billion dollars (200 billion yuan) into the banking system as part of a new targeted easing program.

Chinese authorities may have felt the urge to take an additional, last-minute step and design a new stimulus package as a “safety valve” in case the recently-released quarterly report, which is the last one to be released before the end-year results are revealed, didn’t meet their expectations.

Nonetheless, after the latest report on growth data was released, experts suggest that the PBOC, which functions as China’s central bank, and the central government in Beijing will probably avoid a large-scale stimulus as they released a collective sigh of relief when the third quarterly data concerning key indicators proved to be satisfactory.

Analysts point out that a further effort to stimulate credit growth and the property market may even boost fixed-asset investment by real estate developers and state-owned enterprises, thus leading to overcrowding and further capacity in already unproductive sectors. In this way, such a move would deepen severe structural distortions in the economy rather than help to rejuvenate it.

Therefore analysts suggest that even though the Chinese economy can be expected to slow later down the road due to downward pressures, policy-makers will probably exercise restraint and refrain from aggressive pushes because they are well-aware of the risks. At the end of the day, China’s leaders have no need to panic as long as the labor market remains stable.

The post China’s Latest Growth Data Indicate ‘Soft-Landing’ Of Economy – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Unlocking Economic Growth – Speech

0
0

By Min Zhu, Deputy Managing Director, IMF

Opening Remarks at the 2014 High-Level Caribbean Forum

The most honorable Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller,

Honorable Ministers and Central Bank Governors,

Members of the Diplomatic Community,

Representatives of International Organizations and Bilateral Partners of the Caribbean,

Friends and Colleagues,

Good morning. On behalf of the IMF, I would like to welcome all of you to the 2014 High-Level Caribbean Forum, Unlocking Economic Growth.

I would like to express my appreciation to the Government of Jamaica for their warm hospitality and for hosting the 2014 forum in this beautiful location. I would also like to thank our colleagues and development partners from the international community, and especially Caribbean policymakers, for sharing with us their valuable time and their ideas. The Caribbean Forum is an important platform for collaboration and for advancing solutions to the key challenges facing the region, and a young tradition I am proud to champion.

In the 2014 Forum, we continue to focus attention on the core issue of growth. The Managing Director also addressed the growth challenge at the Caribbean breakfast during the Annual meetings earlier this month, and we have heard very clearly from you that reinvigorating growth remains the top priority.

While the 2013 conference program took a comprehensive approach to the growth challenge, this year we have streamlined the agenda to cover three specific topics, to permit us to drill down in greater detail into the issues that have the biggest impact on growth, and where barriers and impediments may be inhibiting growth in the region. To help deepen our understanding of these issues, we have invited a broad range of experts from the region to share their insights and expertise. The IMF will be in “listening mode”, and we hope to learn from the region about how to tackle these challenges, and about how the IMF can be of assistance.

So what are these three topics?

First, the energy sector. It is well known that energy costs are an important factor in addressing competitiveness in the Caribbean― we are kicking off the forum with this important topic.

Caribbean countries are extremely dependent on imported oil for the generation of electricity and transportation. Many believe that there is potential for the use of other sources, including sustainable energy alternatives. Today we will benefit from the insights of private sector experts on improving energy efficiency, developing alternative energy sources and policies to encourage their development. We concur that the private sector has a critical role to play in this area and are grateful for their participation in the discussions. I will be particularly interested to hear their views on how governments can best help them achieve their objectives for better energy development.

Second, we will turn to the topic of private sector investment, the engine of economic growth and employment, and how it is taxed. We will focus on developing a more appropriate tax regime for the region, and in particular for investment. At present, the array of tax incentives offered in the Caribbean to attract investment has become wider and increasingly complex. This is an issue of great policy significance because, besides eroding the tax base in a way which is expensive for the budget, such incentives can distort investment decisions—all to the detriment of the collective good. The Fund has analytical expertise in this area—which we would like to share—and has collaborated with a number of countries in the region through our technical assistance programs. But also the Forum will benefit especially from the perspectives of successful reformers and other partner international organizations as well as investors themselves. That said, the key to a successful discussion will be to hear from Caribbean policymakers about what reforms are realistic within the Caribbean context. I also pose the question of whether there is scope for a collaborative approach to limit costly tax competition, since I believe the region would be in a better position to negotiate successfully with investors if it could speak with one voice.

Third, we will discuss, on day two, the importance of a robust financial system for sustainable economic growth.

We have seen from crises elsewhere how difficult it is for countries to grow if the banking system is under threat. Hence, maintaining strong banks and safeguarding financial stability are key prerequisites for delivering better Caribbean growth.

The presentations are centered on several important inputs to financial robustness:

For one thing, effective financial sector regulation and supervision are critical. We will benefit from a Canadian perspective on this issue and there is much we can learn from that country in this area.

Furthermore, successful resolution regimes are an integral part of a strong financial architecture. Typically such regimes facilitate decisive action to ensure the orderly exit of unviable banks, and the availability of the necessary regulatory and legal tools to restructure weak banks and rebuild capital buffers – without disruption to the system and at minimal cost to the taxpayer.

In addition, the recent global financial crisis brought to our attention the importance of financial interconnectedness, and the Caribbean experienced first-hand the downside impact of financial interconnectedness through the CLICO-BAICO crisis. We are collaborating closely with the region to gain a deeper understanding of regional interconnectedness, and we will have an interesting presentation on this issue in the last session.

Finally, we are aware that a part of your economic diversification strategy is the development of international financial centers (IFCs). Potential benefits include local employment opportunities, labor skills development and technological advances to the communications infrastructure. However, these fruits will be realized only if IFCs find an acceptable place in the global financial community. We recognize that the region is deeply concerned about global initiatives that are enforcing greater oversight and increased transparency of IFCs. Despite the costs involved in the implementation of these initiatives we know countries are making best efforts to meet the new standards. We will look closer at IFCs in the current global economic environment.

The Caribbean Forum has evolved into a genuine dialogue and partnership between the region and development institutions. With a meaningful exchange of views and experiences, we are developing a better understanding of what works and what might not work for the region, and forging a better mutual understanding of your policy priorities. We expect to continue moving in this positive direction at our 4th Forum here in beautiful Montego Bay. Let us aim for practical and concrete recommendations that will reduce or remove key constraints to unlock growth in the Caribbean.

The post Unlocking Economic Growth – Speech appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Abkhaz Leader Makes TV Address On Moscow-Proposed Treaty

0
0

(Civil.Ge) — In a televised address to the nation, Abkhaz leader Raul Khajimba said on October 22 that Moscow does not try to “impose” its proposed draft of new treaty on Abkhazia and called for “calm working atmosphere” to develop Sokhumi’s proposals and to avoid “discrediting idea” of expanding ties with Moscow.

Reiterating that he too has disagreements with some parts of the Moscow-proposed draft, Khajimba said that the ongoing public discussion in Abkhazia will lead to development of “balanced” text, which will then be negotiated by the Abkhaz team of negotiators, composed of representatives from executive and legislative authorities, with Russia.

“I want to stress that my vision about the treaty on a number of its provisions differs from the draft of the Russian side. But no one tries to impose on us certain position. It is subject of further negotiations. This is an absolutely normal practice in relations between two friendly states; therefore, there is no need to portray the situation as if a certain ultimatum has been set to Abkhazia. The Russian side is ready for open friendly dialogue and hopes that we will reciprocate,” Khajimba said, adding that “calm working atmosphere” is required for productive negotiations because “it is about the interests of the entire country and not of separate political groups.”

“I will not accept groundless accusations,” the Abkhaz leader continued. “The Abkhaz leadership is working in the interests of the country and its people; we seek to resolve the issues based on opinion of wider public.”

“Therefore, I call on all political forces in the country for mutual tolerance and cooperation and to refrain from aggressive rhetoric and to create conditions for the stability, which are necessary for discussing this and other important issues of state building.”

“Abkhazia has no ally other than Russia and we have no right to discredit idea of expanding and deepening of our cooperation in various directions. I want to especially stress that we will carry out such cooperation solely based on our constitution and inviolability of sovereignty.”

He also said that outlining “common defense”, strengthening border protection with Georgia, creation of “conditions for freedom of movement of people and cargo across Russian-Abkhaz border, easing of customs procedures”, which should be addressed by the new treaty, “correspond to our interests.”

Rejecting these issues, Khajimba said, would hamper Abkhazia’s further economic development and would also make “irreparable damage” to Sokhumi’s bilateral ties with Moscow.

“There are all the possibilities to include in the document very concrete formulations, which on the one hand will not cause any concern over our sovereignty, and on the other will give new impetus to strategic alliance with Russia,” Khajimba said.

“This issue should not divide, but unite our society. We have all the possibilities for constructive dialogue and for resolving differences in calm” atmosphere, Khajimba said.

The post Abkhaz Leader Makes TV Address On Moscow-Proposed Treaty appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Decline Of United States Influence And The Rise Of Evo Morales – Analysis

0
0

By Ronn Pineo

“I’m convincedf that capitalism is the worst enemy of humanity and the environment, enemy of the entire planet.” ~ Evo Morales1

After winning six nationwide elections since his first presidential victory in 2005, on October 12th Bolivian President Evo Morales made it seven, taking over 60 percent of the vote. His party, the Movimiento a Socialismo (MAS or Movement Toward Socialism) also swept to victory in the legislature, winning 86 of the 130 positions in lower chamber and 25 of the 36 senate seats. There was no serious contender to Morales. The leading opposition candidate, conservative businessman Samuel Doria Media of the center-right Unidad Nacional (UN or Democratic Union) trailed badly, limping in at 24 percent. Other candidates were even further behind, including former president (2002-2003) Jorge Quiroga of the centrist Partido Demócrata Cristiano (PDC or Christian Democratic Party); center-left urban La Paz party, Moviemiento Sin Miedo (MSM or Movement Without Fear) candidate Juan del Granado, a former La Paz mayor; and Partido Verde (PVB or Green Party) standard-bearer Fernando Vargas, head of an indigenous opposition movement.2 To win in the first round of voting Morales needed either 50 percent of the vote, or failing that, 40 percent with at least a 10 percent lead over the nearest competitor. He did both easily, finishing nearly 37 percentage points ahead of Doria Media.3 A fifty person team from the Organization of American States was on hand to certify the election.

Morales was not supposed to be a candidate this time. Under the new constitution, no immediate reelection for a third term in the presidency was to be permitted. However, in 2013 the Supreme Court, a body highly sympathetic to the MAS, ruled unanimously that Morales could run in the 2014 election, reasoning that his first term came before the new constitution in 2009 and therefore should not count against the two-term limit. There is talk now about changing the constitution, now that the October balloting is over, to allow for unlimited presidential reelection.

This essay seeks to examine the causes of the large and really stunning changes that have come to recent Bolivia. How was it possible for a relatively small and impoverished nation like Bolivia to move out from under the shadow of United States influence? What can explain the nation’s shift from the historical domination by a handful of élite to the present popularly-based left-wing governance? This essay then considers how successful has Morales been in delivering social benefits to the poor of Bolivia, before looking at the new vision of democracy that is coming into focus in the nation.

The Past as Prelude

Democracy is strong in Bolivia today, but it certainly has not always been so. With over 190 coups in the nation’s troubled history–a hemispheric record–Bolivia had long been the butt of endless jokes about quintessential Latin American instability. Government was often brutally repressive, with the generals holding power from 1964 until 1982, sometimes directly and sometimes deploying pliant civilian figureheads.

Change began to come in the 1980s, a time of two significant transitions for nearly all Latin America. The region moved from military governments toward democracy, albeit a form of western-style liberal democracy that could offer free elections, but too often ones with narrowly limited choices. At the same time Latin America transitioned away from state-led economic development policies to embrace the Milton Friedman vision of unbridled free market policies, or neoliberalism.

The 1980s were a “lost decade” for economic progress in Latin America and Bolivia. Bolivia fell into an extreme economic crisis, with a mounting foreign debt and out of control inflation, reaching over 11,000 percent in 1985. That year the incoming president, Víctor Paz Estenssoro (president 1952-1956, 1960-1964, and 1985-1989), looked to Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs to help design Bolivia’s conversion to free market policies. “Bolivia is dying on us,” Paz Estenssoro declared as justification for the launch of his neoliberal shock therapy program, dubbed the “New Economic Policy” (Executive Decree 21060) on August 29, 1985.4 Paz Estenssoro pressed the economic reset button with across the board deregulation and tax increases. Paz Estenssoro eliminated price controls on basic necessities, froze wages, and eliminated rights and protections for union workers. Advisor Sachs helped make the necessary arrangements with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, accepting their recommendations for implementing a socially punishing structural adjustment program while maintaining a tight focus on the goal of paying the interest due on the nation’s foreign debt. These neoliberal economic policies extracted an immediate and severe human cost, but Paz Estenssoro dealt with the mass protests and strikes by imposing a three-month state of siege. The economy suffered massive job losses, in the state oil company, in industry, in mining, while the number of those seeking to scrape out a living in the informal sector exploded. For all this pain, Paz Estenssoro could point to only one economic victory: inflation in 1987 fell to 11 percent for the year.5

Paz Estenssoro depended on U.S. financial aid and its leverage and support with the World Bank and IMF, but Washington wanted something back from Bolivia in return: compliance with U.S. directives to carry out an assault on coca production. Responding to U.S. pressure, Paz Estenssoro adopted Law 1008 in 1988, moving hard to crack down on local coca growers, cooperating in the U.S.-led Operation Blast Furnace.6 Under Paz Estenssoro the U.S. war on illegal drugs moved to the coca fields of the Chapare.

Under the next two presidents, Jaime Paz Zamora (1989-1993) and Gonzalo “Goni” Sánchez de Lozada (1993-1997), Bolivia deepened its free market impulse. Sánchez de Lozada, a multi-millionaire mine owner, University of Chicago trained free market disciple, and intellectual author of the New Economic Policy decree 21060, pushed through the Capitalization Law of 1994, bringing a rash of new privatizations. President Sánchez de Lozada’s Bolivia peddled off the national electrical company, state-run railroad, and the oil and gas company, all at fire sale prices.7

Believing that the less government there was the better all things would be, Sánchez de Lozada moved to downsize government. He decentralized political power with the enactment of the Law of Popular Participation in 1994 and the Law of Decentralization in 1995. These measures promoted the formation of new municipal governing authorities and re-directed a fifth of national revenues down to the local level. While Sánchez de Lozada’s actions were an effort to pass off national government responsibilities and sidestep paying for social needs, this initiative had an unexpected result. Sánchez de Lozada’s laws actually served to invigorate local government. New social movements formed to pressure the expanding municipal authorities, and local governments came to be the political focus point for anti-neoliberal agitation. With the union movement crushed, social movements and municipal governments stepped in to fill the political void, and together they began to pressure for addressing the needs of ordinary people harmed by neoliberal economics.8 In 1994 Sánchez de Lozada hardened the anti-coca push as well after the United States again threatened to withdraw aid. The first coca growers protest march followed that August. The new coca growers union organized the protest. At the head of the movement was Evo Morales.

Hugo Bánzer followed in the presidency, taking office in 1997 and serving until 2001. Trained in the infamous School of the Americas, Bánzer had previously been the nation’s military dictator, 1971 to 1978. As president Bánzer’s signature initiative, Plan Dignidad, sought to root out remaining coca production, and by 2001 Bolivia’s coca production had fallen to less than a third of what it had been just six years earlier, a real “Andean success story,” the U.S. State Department cheerily announced.9

One critical aspect of neoliberalism in Bolivia was the privatization of potable water service, a step mandated by the World Bank as a loan condition in 1997. Bánzer, acting in November 1999, moved to sell all public potable water service in the nation to private companies, Law 2029. Bánzer sold off water rights in the city of Cochabamba to Agua del Tunari, a consortium owned by Italian interests and the U.S.-based Bechtel Corporation. The company soon raised potable water rates an average of 35 percent and began charging people for collecting rainwater or for drawing water from their own wells. As the chorus of objections began to rise, the World Bank recommended taking a hardline stance, advising that “no subsidies should be given to ameliorate the increase in water tariffs.”10

Vast protests, the “water wars,” erupted from November 1999 to April 2000, initially centered in Cochabamba but by September spreading to the capital of La Paz as well. In April, Bánzer ordered a state of siege, but was met by continuing, massive, and determined opposition in the streets. In the end Bánzer was forced to back down. He could not impose by force a measure so universally unpopular and manifestly unfair. Aguas del Tunari was asked to leave Bolivia. Shortly thereafter the 75-year-old Bánzer resigned for health reasons–cancer of the liver and lungs–and Vice President Jorge Quiroga finished what was left of the presidential term.

The 2002 general election brought the return of Sánchez de Lozada, running against a wide array of candidates including coca growers union leader Evo Morales. Just four days before the balloting the United States Ambassador Manuel Rocha made the decision to weigh in. “I want to remind the Bolivian electorate that if you choose the candidate who wants Bolivia to go back to being a cocaine exporter, that will put the United States aid at risk,” Rocha announced. Comparing coca growers to members of the Taliban, Rocha warned that “a Bolivia led by the people who have benefited from drug trafficking cannot expect the United States markets to remain open for traditional textile exports.”11

The ambassador’s comments did not have the desired effect, instead launching a groundswell of support for Morales, who enjoyed a sudden surge in the polls. (Teasingly, Morales publically thanked Rocha and began to refer to him as his “campaign manager.”) Thanks to Rocha, Morales nearly rallied to win the 2002 election, in the event taking 20.9 percent of the votes cast to 22.5 percent for Goni. The election was thrown into congress which selected the leading vote getter, Goni, to serve as Bolivia’s next president.

In 2003 the IMF mandated more austerity measures, and Goni, ever a neoliberal true believer, readily agreed to their implementation. Fresh rounds of mass opposition emerged in the presence of sharp tax increases, privatizations, the sale of Bolivian natural gas to foreign firms, and the announcement of the construction of a gas pipeline to Chile. The outpouring of popular resistance came to be known as Bolivia’s “gas wars,” centered in the highland city of El Alto and spilling out into adjacent La Paz, September through October of 2003. Determined to show strength, President Sánchez de Lozada ordered that the protest movement be smashed. The ensuing police and military repression left some 67 to 97 peaceful protestors dead, some killed in the raking gunfire from helicopters passing overhead. A nationwide torrent of anger and grief followed, finally resulting in Goni’s resignation on October 17, 2003. He fled to Miami as Bolivians celebrated in the streets. He had lasted in office just 15 months.12

The water and then the natural gas protest movements had not merely forced a stop to neoliberal excesses and toppled the second Sánchez de Lozada government. The change was larger than just this, for activists had begun to articulate a reform plan, what came to be called the “October Agenda,” calling for a rollback of neoliberal water and gas measures, the end to the flat tax, and, most importantly, the convening of a constitutional convention. As Bolivia observer and author Kepa Artaraz has correctly noted, what Bolivia was experiencing was a “double crisis of legitimacy,” a widespread belief that neoliberalism had failed and that liberal democracy was not responsive to the popular will. But, as Artaraz adds, “the political questions and the proposed alternatives did not come from traditional forces and actors from the left, such as trade unions, as they had been decimated by the neoliberal attack.”13Rather, the fresh solutions being offered were emerging from Bolivia’s budding social movements growing up at the local level around the newly formed municipalidades. The dual transition to a U.S.-style liberal, representative democracy, and the U.S.-inspired and mandated free market policies, had, in the end, come to dual failures. Bolivia was beginning to find its own way.

Vice President Carlos Mesa Gisbert assumed the presidency from Goni, calling for a July 2004 national referendum on the re-nationalization of Bolivia’s natural gas. The measure passed overwhelmingly. Still, social conditions remained a matter of widespread concern, with circumstances the worst in the countryside. Under neoliberalism the proportion of rural people living in extreme poverty had risen from under two-thirds in 1997 to over three-quarters by 2002. In 2005 Bolivia’s per capita GDP was lower than it had been in 1998.14 As protest mounted against Mesa—his brief administration faced over 800 mass demonstrations—he gave in to popular pressure. Mesa resigned on June 6, 2005, leaving Supreme Court Chief Justice Eduardo Rodríguez Veltzé as caretaker president.

Politically the Bolivians had shown their complete disaffection with the country’s three dominant political parties: the chameleon-like Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario (MNR or Revolutionary Nationalist Movement), initially left, then centrist, and finally neoliberal; the center-left Movimiento Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR or Revolutionary Left Movement); and the right-wing Acción Democrática Nacionalista of Hugo Bánzer (ADN or Nationalist Democratic Action). The three parties had ruled Bolivia by forming governing pacts since the restitution of democracy in 1982. In the 2005 presidential vote they took a combined total of less than a third of the vote.15

Bolivian voters plainly had arrived at the view that the existing political system was without legitimacy. To the wide majority, Bolivia under the old pacted political system had been a sham democracy, one dominated by the moneyed interests, snaked through with corruption, and presenting voters no authentic choices, forcing them to try to pick between near identical elites who did the bidding of foreign capital. To most Bolivians, voting seemed only to grant legitimacy to what was a rigged game. As analyst Raúl Madrid sums up, “the rise of the MAS [was] driven by … growing disenchantment with market-oriented policies and the parties that implemented them.”16 Madrid is right, but there is more to it.

Diminishing U.S. Influence in Bolivia

Bolivia’s economy is less than one-thousandth the size of that of the United States, and given the considerable asymmetry between the two nations, the United States has long used its considerable power advantages to compel Bolivia to bend to its wishes. Beginning in 1985 the U.S. demanded that Bolivia press forward on two fundamental policies: the adoption of free market economic policies and an aggressive assault on coca leaf production. For Bolivia the problem was that these two policies could not be pursued at the same time.

Neoliberal policies brought fiscal austerity, the elimination of virtually all programs that aimed at reducing poverty, coupled with sharp reductions in employment, especially as a result of the end to government support for the lagging tin mining industry. Due to these measures, tens of thousands of miners were thrown out of work, dumped into an economy that was not creating jobs, while the government did nothing to help them or their families. The one growth area that the Bolivian economy could offer was in coca production, responding actively to booming U.S. demand for cocaine. As a direct result, former miners, well-schooled in labor militancy, poured into the Chapare region and took up coca farming. There they met the determined military opposition of the United States and Bolivian government. And this was the paradox at the heart of U.S. policy. Compelling Bolivia to launch neoliberal policies while aggressively pursuing a war on coca growers led to a time of extraordinary crisis. The contradictions of the U.S.-imposed policy agenda were so severe that the U.S.-backed regime suffered a complete collapse.

It is possible that Bolivia could have moved to neoliberal policies on its own, but the unbending nature of the implementation of these measures was a result of U.S. pressure, either directly or through the World Bank and the IMF. The new free market philosophy was not a Bolivian creation, it was made in America, especially at the University of Chicago, and the depth of its adoption in Bolivia was in large measure a result of U.S. demands. On the other hand, it is not possible that Bolivia would ever have launched the coca eradication programs on its own. Coca is part of daily life for most Bolivians, from the city people who drink it as tea for breakfast to the rural indigenous who chew it throughout the day. The spike in new demand for coca for making cocaine, and then the war on cocaine, were entirely U.S. creations. Bolivia would never have grown more coca if not for U.S. consumer demand, and Bolivia would never had undertaken a war on coca production if not for considerable and sustained U.S. pressure. U.S. pressure demanded that Bolivia launch an unflinching implementation of neoliberalism and a military assault on coca both at the same time, and it was doing both of these things at once that led to the collapse of the old regime in Bolivia. Neoliberalism created the severe social pressure of mounting poverty and widespread unemployment, while the war on illegal drugs killed off the best available option for gainful employment. Therefore it is fair to conclude that it was U.S. power and U.S. overreach that led to emergence of the Movement Toward Socialism’s Evo Morales in Bolivia, elected to the presidency in 2005.

Evo Morales to Power

On December 18, 2005 Evo Morales won the presidency with 53.7 percent of the vote, the highest percentage for a winning candidate in the nation’s history. “¡Causachun coca! ¡Wañuchun yanquis! (Long live coca! Death to the Yankees!),” he exalted in his native Aymara language, giving the protest cry of the cocaleros.17 Taking office in January 2006 Morales immediately embraced the street protestors’ “October Agenda,” moving to gain a larger share of natural gas export profits and to rewrite the constitution. Change had come.

In May 1, 2006 Morales declared the partial nationalization of Bolivia’s natural gas industry, with the state company, Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos (YPFB), gaining majority control from the Spanish and Brazilian corporations that held the natural gas fields, pipelines, and refineries. Morales increased Bolivia’s share of the profits to 82 percent. Before 2005 Bolivia had taken but 18 percent of the profits, a rate that had risen to 50 percent under President Mesa.18

Gaining control of this key resource was vital; Bolivia enjoys the second largest natural gas reserves in Latin America, after Venezuela. Since Morales has taken office Bolivian natural gas production has more than doubled, while proceeds from sales increased from 5.6 percent of GDP in 2004 to 25.7 percent by 2008. Today natural gas makes up nearly half of Bolivia’s exports by value, with over half flowing to neighboring Brazil. Gas sales are also the key component of government revenues: whereas in 2002 natural gas income made up just 7 percent of government earnings, they now constitute over half of the national government’s earnings.19

In gaining control of Bolivia’s key export Morales had achieved a minor miracle, standing up to foreign firms and opening a significant source of financial resources for his government and nation. Still, one complaint from the impacted companies did seem fair. Under neoliberalism Bolivia had opened its natural gas fields to foreign firms, offering generous terms if they would bear the costs of searching for, locating, and ramping up production. After they did this, Bolivia changed the terms of the deal, demanding more money. It was bait and switch, and the foreign firms have a right to be angry. But it is also a done deal. By the end of 2013 the state-owned portion of the economy had reached 35 percent, up from the low of 17 percent under the prior neoliberal governments.20 Beyond natural gas, the telecommunications industry, Empresa Nacional de Telecomunicaciones (Entel), which used to be Italian owned, is now also run by the state, as too is electricity generation. In 2012 Morales moved to nationalize tin and zinc production. There will be more moves in this direction. Bolivia’s economy today has been reoriented, its leading trade partners shifting. South Korea, which purchases much of Bolivia’s booming soy production, and Argentina, a key buyer of natural gas, are now the leading markets. The United States has fallen to fourth place as a destination for Bolivian exports.21

Change and Conflict: The Drafting of a New Constitution and the Media Luna Revolt

In the summer of 2006 voters selected members for a Constitutional Assembly, and on August 6 delegates convened in the city of Sucre. In December 2007 the Constitutional Assembly approved a draft, but the charter remained unratified, the nation locked in political turmoil between Morales and his supporting social movements that sought fundamental reform, and those who wanted to turn back to the past.22

The élite, especially those from Santa Cruz and the surrounding lowland media luna, or half-moon district, were outraged at what they regarded as Aymara Indian Morales’ usurpation of their birthright, their self-arrogated entitlement to rule over the lives of the indigenous majority. In May 2008 the media luna departments of Santa Cruz, Beni, Tarija, and Pando moved toward session, holding an unauthorized autonomy vote. Both the Organization of American States and the European Union refused to send election monitors, citing the illegality of the referendum. MAS voters boycotted the unsanctioned election and so, predictably, those who voted in this extra-legal ballot favored severing ties with the rest of the nation.23

Bending to the demands of the anti-MAS movement, on August 10, 2008 Bolivia held a recall election on the Morales presidency. Amidst a heavy turnout, Morales won a resounding victory, taking two-thirds of the vote. The separatists, incredulous over their stunning and lopsided defeat, organized into the Consejo Nacional de Defensa de la Democracía (CONALDE or National Council for the Defense of Democracy), and recruited paid thugs to attack government buildings and prey upon pro-Morales activists. The separatist movement seemed to be gaining in support when, on September 11, 2008, at least thirteen pro-MAS protestors were murdered in the far eastern Pando department. Ordered by the opposition governor Leonel Fernández, this ugly episode served to deeply discredit the separatists. The anti-Morales movement proceeded into sharp decline.

The day of the attack Bolivia expelled U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg, accusing him of assisting in organizing the violent opposition to Morales. The U.S. ambassador had met openly with the separatist movement. Said Morales, “we do not want people here who conspire against democracy.”24 In retaliation, U.S. President George W. Bush expelled the Bolivian ambassador, Gustavo Guzmán, and placed Bolivia on a list of nations not cooperating with the war on illegal drugs. The United States also put trade restrictions in place, canceling Bolivian participation in the Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act (ATPDEA). Morales responded by kicking out the remaining U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency agents later that year, and subsequently expelled USAID workers as well.25 Normal diplomatic relations, broken in 2008, have still not been restored between the two nations.

In October 2008 two-thirds of the constitutional assembly agreed upon an additional series of revisions to the constitution, what some Bolivians regard as the “third draft,” a watered-down compromise version of the stronger document initially proposed by indigenous and left-wing groups. In a referendum in January 2009 Bolivian voters approved the new constitution, with an amazing 90 percent turnout and more than 60 percent backing the new national charter. At the celebration parties in the street, Morales joined the revelers, and he wept.

The constitution formalized a broad agenda of progressive social and economic reforms, with several new poverty reduction programs, especially conditional cash transfer initiatives; the extension of educational services; infrastructure development; assurances of indigenous rights; and a series of re-nationalizations of utilities and public services. The constitution enshrined the indigenous community (or ayllu) values of ama sua, ama llulla, ama qhella (don’t steal, don’t lie, and don’t be lazy). The constitution denounced neoliberalism, called for an active role for the state in guiding the economy, and explicitly forbade the privatization of water.26 The document reflected much of the October 2003 Agenda. It was what people had voted for. Democracy was working.

Morales called for general elections under the new constitution, and in December 2009 won reelection with 64 percent of the vote. Conservative opposition candidate Manfred Reyes Villa, hampered by a fraud indictment, and running mate Leopoldo Fernández, campaigning from his jail cell where he waited to face murder charges, took just 38 percent of the vote. The media luna secessionist movement was effectively over. The MAS was emerging as the ruling party in a single party state.

Explaining Morales’ Success

Bolivia’s recent economic growth under Morales is, as Tulane’s Martín Mendoza-Botelho has observed, “one of most prosperous periods in the nation’s history.”27 Bolivia’s per capita GDP has doubled since Morales came to office, rising from $1,182 USD in 2006 to $2,238 USD in 2012. Under Morales GDP growth has averaged 5 percent a year, and the 2014 estimate is projected at 5.5 to 5.7 percent. Bolivia’s GDP growth rate is second in Latin America only to Panama (estimated 6.7 percent for the year).28 Much of this solid economic performance can be attributed to strong natural gas prices.

Morales should probably not try to take credit for Bolivia’s winnings in the “commodity lottery,” the inevitable boom-bust cycle in raw material prices. Still, he can take credit for the building up of Bolivia’s financial reserves. In fact, Bolivia presently boasts the highest proportional rate of financial reserves of any nation in the world, with Bolivia’s rainy day fund totaling some $14 billion USD, or nearly two-thirds of total annual GDP. Even the IMF is impressed by this accomplishment, lavishing praise on Morales’ fiscal prudence. It is not clear that Morales really welcomes the IMF’s avuncular head patting given that he has long refused any new IMF accords. Indeed the IMF stamp of approval has triggered some second thoughts among Bolivian government economists, pondering whether maybe they have been overly cautious.29

Vastly more important than economic growth is poverty reduction, for it is absolutely possible to have the former but not the latter. In the years from 1990 to 2002 about two-thirds of the population of Bolivia lived in poverty, according to United Nations estimates. In 2005 still over half of the population lived in poverty. Today it is less than a third. Income inequality has also come down under Morales and the MAS. In 2002 the richest 20 percent took 58 percent of the income while the poorest 20 percent received 2.2 percent. In 2011 the share of the poorest fifth had doubled to 4.4 percent while the portion going to the richest fifth had dropped to 43 percent. Put another way, the ratio of the share of income of the top 10 percent to the poorest 10 percent had dropped from 128 to 1 in 2005 to 60 to 1 in 2012. Inflation has also slowed, falling from 11.8 percent in 2008 to 4.7 percent in 2012, one of the lowest rates in Latin America.30

Social Programs

What most distinguished the Morales administration is its commitment to provide government programs to assist those in the nation’s 11.5 million population most in need. The Bono Juana Azurduy de Padilla or Bono Madre Niño Niña Program extends small cash payments for expectant mothers when they see a doctor, with $7.25 USD paid to mothers for each of up to four doctor visits; $17 USD if they have the birth in a medical facility; and $18 USD to return for follow-ups for both mother and child after delivery. This program spent $15.6 million USD in 2012, helping 133,00 mothers and half a million children.31

The Bono Juancito Pinto Program (named after a twelve year old drummer boy from the nineteenth century War of the Pacific) actually started under President Bánzer back in 2000 but now has been greatly expanded by Morales. This program involves cash payments to mothers who keep their children in school (public schools only, not private) up through the eighth grade. Families receive $14 USD twice a year, once when school starts and again at the end of the school year. Bono Juancito Pinto cost $55.8 million USD in 2012, and helps nearly 2 million people.32

The Bonos Renta Dignidad Program provides retirement benefits to Bolivians over 60 years old. This program is a significant expansion of the previous 1997 Bonosol initiative begun under Sánchez de Lozada. Dignidad is the most expensive of the three social support initiatives, costing a third of a billion dollars annually. The program helps nearly a million elderly Bolivians, providing $344 to $432 USD a year in retirement support. Together, these three initiatives reach about a third of all Bolivians, roughly 3.3 million people, and helps three of every four families in the nation.33 The benefits have become so socially institutionalized as a common expectation that even the opposition candidates in the October election pledged to continue these popular social programs.

There are other initiatives. Some 900,000 impoverished Bolivians have access to price-controlled electricity. Morales also launched a feeding program, desnutrición cero, providing free school lunches. At the same time Morales has quadrupled the number of land titles transferred to small holders, positively impacting nearly one million Bolivians. The literacy campaign Morales launched has likewise been a great success, and in 2010 Unesco declared that Bolivia had eradicated illiteracy. Meanwhile, highway building has doubled under Morales and a rush of government spending has helped stimulate a construction boom. Bolivia’s economy is at nearly full employment.34

The Economic Plan

Morales’ economic development strategy, announced in June 2006, is called the Bolivia digna, soberana, productiva y democrática para vivir bien, or the Bolivian dignity, sovereignty, productivity, and democracy plan to “live well” or “live correctly.” The phrase “vivir bien” is hard to translate into English. Derived from the Quechua concept of “sumak kawsay,” and the Aymara “suma qamaña,” the idea is to live in harmony with nature, placing spiritual well-being over acquisition of material goods, and emphasizing “collaboration over competition, sharing over accumulation, solidarity over disagreement, cohesion over discord,” “ñandereko (harmonious life), teko kavi (good life), … and qhapaj ñan (noble life).”35 These notions, solemnly enshrined in the new constitution, are ignored in practice.

Instead, Morales has followed an extractive, raw material dependent, economic policy. This pattern of “narrow-based economic development … that depends on primary natural resource exports,” researcher George Gray Molina explains, leaves Bolivia “highly vulnerable to changes in world commodity prices.“36 It is this decision to aggressively exploit Bolivia’s natural resources, above all natural gas, that has done the most to drive some erstwhile Morales supporters into open opposition, especially indigenous and environmental groups. Morales has decided to take advantage of high natural gas prices to fund poverty reduction, and hope that the impact on sacred Pachamama, mother earth, will not prove too severe.

The Run Up to the October Election

Morales took a number of steps to buttress his popular support in the October 2014 balloting. One key move was to ramp up his small-scale infrastructure program, “Bolivia cambia, Evo cumple,” (“Bolivia is changing, Evo delivers”). Since coming to office he has spent roughly half a billion dollars on this local infrastructure initiative, much of it funded by Venezuela. Needless to say, the schools, clinics, potable water projects and the like are quite popular, and the president tries never to miss a ribbon cutting, especially as the election approached.37

In November 2013 Morales declared a special double holiday bonus instead of the usual one month additional pay benefit at Christmas time, the aguinaldo. Then on August 27, 2014 the administration announced a 10 percent pay bump for workers in nine key state-run enterprises, with the increase back-dated to the first of the year. Workers in the oil industry, electrical workers, TV employees, and mining companies, among others, all got the raise. The Morales administration also added on an extra month’s bonus to seniors, recipients of the Renta Dignidad, with monthly payments rising to $36 USD to those with no pension and $29 USD for those who receive some additional form of pension. Meanwhile, the government’s price controls on gasoline, electricity, potable water, flour, sugar, rice, bread, milk, and chicken remain in place. The government also ended all fees for obtaining copies of official documents, including birth certificates, high school diplomas, and the like.38

The Opposition

As in much of Latin America, one continuing problem in Bolivia has been that, as researcher Benjamin Kohl notes, “the right-wing-controlled media feed[s] … the … fears [of voters] through deliberate misinformation.“39 Only one of the top twelve communications companies in Bolivia supports Morales.40 All the others are in the right-wing opposition camp. Yet despite the fact that Bolivians have, on average, far less education than do U.S. voters, they have proven themselves to be less easy to manipulate. This stems in large measure from the historic desperateness of their socio-economic circumstances. They cannot afford to be deceived. Another potential threat, a military coup, seems at this time to be minimal. As Kohl notes, “military support for Morales can be explained by significant salary increases and grants of military hardware.”41 For Morales the most important opposition groups are no longer on his right flank.

Instead, the most serious opposition Morales faces is from groups and causes on the left, often coming from indigenous people. In Bolivia today some 41 percent of Bolivians self-identify as indigenous; some 2.5 million Bolivians speak Quecha and another 2.1 million speak Aymara. The flashpoint issue in this regard involves a 182 mile road project to cut a road through the 3,860-square mile Isiboro-Sécure National Park and Indigenous Territory, or TIPNIS.

The TIPNIS area had been designated a national park in 1965, and then an indigenous reserve in 1990, homeland to the Moxeño-Trinitario, Yuracaré, and the Chimáne indigenous peoples. Together these groupings comprise about 10 percent of the population in the region, a total of about 8,000 to 12,500 people.42

The proposed highway would open up important new commercial links for area farmers and ranchers. There is really no other practical route for this road, designed to connect the Cochabamba region to Trinidad, Beni in the far northeast of the nation. The road will cut travel time from two to three days to just four hours. But one leading concern of the TIPNIS indigenous people is that building the road through would open up the area to yet more colono squatters from the sierra. Over 20,000 colonos live in the reserve already.43

Morales signed a construction contract with a Brazilian firm in 2008, but the 2009 constitution called for a process of prior consultation with impacted indigenous groups. Despite this new mandate, Morales did not reach out to the indigenous communities until they began to protest in March of 2011. In August 2011 Morales announced that he was standing firm, declaring that the road was going forward, “like it or not.”44

Accepting the challenge, over a thousand protestors staged a 360-mile march to the capital. When police sought to break up their approach to La Paz, seventy protesters were injured. Who is to blame remains an open question, and while President Morales accepted no direct responsibility for the violence, he did nonetheless ask for forgiveness. Then, on October 24, 2011, Morales canceled the road project (Law 180) and ruled the park “untouchable” for further development.45

Morales interpreted the law to mean the halting of virtually any sort of economic activity in TIPNIS, even that favored by the indigenous living in the region. This was enough to forge a coalition of developers, colonos, and some indigenous groups in the region to push to allow the road after all. These groups staged their own march to La Paz, demanding that the road construction go forward.

In February 2012 Morales implemented Law 222, calling for a vote, or consulta, on the road. The plebiscite showed that eight of ten voters backed the road construction, evidently holding to the view that the highway would provide greater access to employment opportunities, health care, and education. Morales revoked the earlier Law 180, but the road project was placed on hold until after the election.46 It is not clear what will happen next, but most think that construction will soon resume.

Other opposition movements have likewise pushed their agendas, demanding action from Morales and the MAS. In August 2010 the central highland city of Potosí went through nineteen days of marches, punctuated with rioting, with protesters charging that the MAS was not delivering on promised government infrastructure development in the city and region.47 Demonstrators also said that they wanted an international airport for the city. The movement died down, however, without winning a clear commitment from the government to provide more money.

In December 2010 widespread protests erupted in response to a proposed end to government gasoline subsidies; the measure would have triggered a 73 percent price hike at the pump. Morales backed down on this initiative in the wake of the gasolinazo protests. In January 2012 other demonstrations emerged after Morales signed Presidential Decree 1126 establishing workplace rules for health care workers. Hospital workers went out on strike, halting delivery of medical services throughout much of Bolivia. After 52 days on strike, Morales reached a compromise accord with the health care workers, repealing Decree 1126 and restoring lost wages from the walkout. During 2014 there have been strikes by transport workers, students, farmers, and junior ranking members of the military.48 It is a restive democracy that Bolivia now has.

Conclusions

Democracy in Bolivia will not fit into U.S.-centric models of political parties, elections, and liberal representative government. As Kohl and Bresnahan have noted, there is a strong “difference between Western-liberal-individualist and communitarian indigenous (Andean) democracies.49 Kohl and Bresnahan write that:

Whereas Western[ers] … have been socialized in a one-person, one-vote ideal of democracy, in many Andean communities democratic deliberations take place at the level of the community itself. Communal decision making of this type is commonly seen, for example, in decisions on land use. The ‘community’—which is defined in different ways according to the setting—decides on how to rotate land, guarantee access to pastures, assign land in colonization zones, etc., through a consensual process. Thus it is not surprising for a similar community consensus to be reflected in voting behavior, especially among indigenous groups that see that the MAS will represent their interests.50

The MAS is, as researcher Santiago Anria correctly notes, “a hybrid organization … participating in representative institutions without abandoning nonelectoral street politics.”51 Bolivians like it this way. Latinobarómetro polling shows that popular satisfaction with democracy in Bolivia has risen from under a quarter of those surveyed in 2005 to more than half in 2009. President Morales has not given up his involvement in Bolivia’s social movements, and even now remains head of the coca growers union. He is often seen crossing over and joining the people protesting in the streets.52

Democratic governance in Bolivia in more activist, inclusionary, direct, and participatory than that in the United States and the West. But above all politics in Bolivia are not so much about elections these days. At polling time the left sets aside its differences and votes for Morales and the MAS. But as we are seeing, it is between the elections that normal politics begin. The left fractures, and communities and various associations begin to clamor for attention to their needs.

In Bolivia, as in Ecuador and Venezuela as well, the right is in retreat. Indeed, the right is becoming, or has become, all but irrelevant as a political force. In Bolivia the violent overreach of the right in 2008 severely reduced its national political influence. The parties of the right have been reduced to rump voting clubs, the remnants of prior political configurations. Instead, democracy in Bolivia is the contestations, the testing of relative strength, of President Morales and the MAS, and social groups expressing their politics directly, on the streets, in protests, marches, in highway blockages. Between elections politics begin in earnest, as the cycle of left-wing pressure begins anew. This is what democracy looks like in Bolivia.

In 2009, at her confirmation hearings before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Bolivia under Morales was pursing “policies which do not serve the interests of the … [Bolivian] people or the region.”53 U.S. political observers like former Secretary Clinton don’t know what to make of Bolivia and Morales, don’t have language to talk about it, and may not like it, but Bolivians do not care anymore. But for those in the United States and the West who are disillusioned with politics, the new Bolivian democracy should provide considerable inspiration, demonstrating vividly the parameters of the possible.54

Ronn Pineo, Senior Analyst with the Council Of Hemispheric Affairs and Chair of the Department of History, Townson University.

References

Notes

1. Morales, quoted in, William Powers, Whispering in the Giant’s Ear: A Frontline Chronicle from Bolivia’s War on Globalization (New York: Bloomsbury, 2006), 133.

2. Robert Kozak, “Bolivia President Evo Morales Leading in Election Poll: Socialist Leader Boosted by Strong Economic Growth, but Nationalization Moves Remain a Concern,” Wall Street Journal August 5, 2014, online.wsj.com; “Opposition Electoral Alliance Unlikely,” Latin American Weekly Report 12 June 2014, 5-6; and Jeffery R. Webber, “Managing Bolivian Capitalism,” www.jacobinmag.com, 2014.

3. “Morales Leaves Nothing to Chance in Bolivia,” Latin News Daily Report 28 August 2014.

4. Paz Estenssoro, quoted in Martín Sivak, Evo Morales: The Extraordinary Rise of the First Indigenous President of Bolivia (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 41; and see Eduardo Silva, Challenging Neoliberalism in Latin America (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 107, 110.

5. Silva, Challenging Neoliberalism,109; Kepa Artaraz, Bolivia: Refounding the Nation (London: Pluto Press, 2012), 22, 23, 29; Herbert S. Klein, “The Historical Background to the Rise of the MAS, 1952-2005,” chapter in, Adrian J. Pearce, Evo Morales and the Movimiento al Socialismo in Bolivia: The First Term in Context, 2006-2010 (London: Institute for the Study of the Americas, nd.), 50; Roger Burbach, Michael Fox, and Federico Fuentes, “Bolivia’s Communitarian Socialism,” chapter in, Latin America’s Turbulent Transitions: The Future of Twenty-First Century Socialism (London: Zed Books, 2013), 81; Jeffery R. Webber, “Rebellion to Reform in Bolivia. Part I: Domestic Class Structure, Latin-American Trends, and Capitalist Imperialism,” Historical Materialism 16 (2008), 37; Raúl Madrid, “Bolivia: Origins and Policies of the Movimiento al Socialismo,” chapter in, Steven Levitsky and Kenneth M. Roberts, The Resurgence of the Latin America Left (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011), 243.

6. Martín Sivak, “The Bolivianisation of Washington-La Paz Relations: Evo Morales’ Foreign Policy Agenda in Historical Context,” chapter in Pearce, Evo Morales,155; Silva, Challenging Neoliberalism, 114.

7. Silva, Challenging Neoliberalism, 115; Artaraz, Bolivia, 245.

8. Klein, “Historical Background,” in Pearce, Evo Morales, 57; and Artaraz, Bolivia, 47-48.

9. The U.S. Department of State, quoted in, Powers, Whispering in the Giant’s Ear, 207; and see Silva, Challenging Neoliberalism, 116.

10. The World Bank, quoted in, Degol Hailu, Rafael Guerreiro Osorio, and Raquel Tsukada, “Privatization and Renationalization: What Went Wrong in Bolivia’s Water Sector?” World Development 40:12 (2012), 2565; and Benjamin Kohl and Linda Farthing, “’Less Than Fully Satisfactory Development Outcomes’: International Financial Institutions and Social Unrest in Bolivia,” Latin American Perspectives 36:3 (May 2009), 69.

11. United States Ambassador Rocha, quoted in Sivak, Morales, 87; and Sivak, “Bolivianisation of Washington-La Paz Relations,” in Pearce, Evo Morales,144, 159.

12. Powers, Whispering in the Giant’s Ear, 240; Silva, Challenging Neoliberalism,134; Kohl and Farthing, “’Less Than Fully Satisfactory,’” 70; Benjamin Kohl and Rosalind Bresnahan, “Introduction: Bolivia Under Morales, Consolidating Power, Initiating Decolonization,” Latin American Perspectives 37:3 (May 2010), 5-17; and

Benjamin Kohl and Rosalind Bresnahan, “Introduction: Bolivia Under Morales, National Agenda, Regional Challenges, and the Struggle for Hegemony,” Latin American Perspectives 37:4 (July 2010), 5-20.

13. Artaraz, Bolivia, 8.

14. Madrid, “Bolivia,” in Levitsky and Roberts, Resurgence, 243.

15. Germán Darío Valencia Agudelo, “Bolivia, 2003-2008: un período de profundas transformaciones políticas y económicas,” Perfil de coyuntura económica (Antioquia, Colombia) 12 (December 2008), 180; and George Gray Molina, “The Challenges of Progressive Change under Evo Morales,” chapter in, Kurt Wyland, Raúl Madrid, and Wendy Hunter, editors, Leftist Governments in Latin America: Successes and Shortcomings (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 58.

16. Madrid, “Bolivia,” in Levitsky and Roberts, Resurgence, 239; Valencia Agudelo, “Bolivia,”184; and Artaraz, Bolivia, 42.

17. Morales quoted in, Sivak, Morales, 42; and Sivak, “Bolivianisation of Washington-La Paz Relations,” in Pearce, Morales, 161.

18. Gray Molina, “Challenges,” in Wyland, Madrid, and Hunter, Leftist Governments, 65.

19. “Bolivia Earns $16 Billion Since Nationalizing Energy,” green left Weekly May 20, 2013; Benjamin Kohl, “Bolivia Under Morales: A Work in Progress,” Latin American Perspectives 37:3 (May 2010), 116; Mark Weisbrot, Rebecca Ray, and Jake Johnston, “Bolivia: The Economy During the Morales Administration,” Center for Economic Policy Research, December 2009, 12; Emily Achtenberg, “Contested Development: The Geopolitics of Bolivia’s TIPNIS Conflict,” Nacla: Report on the Americas 46:2 (2013),9; “Bolivia’s Rentier Republic: Evo Morales is Popular but not Invulnerable,” The Economist May 3, 2014, www.economist.com; and Benjamin Kohl and Linda Farthing, “Material Constraints to Popular Imaginaries: The Extractive Economy and Resource Nationalism in Bolivia, Political Geography 31 (2012), 230.

20. “Participación del Estado en la economía permitió cambiar la imagen financiera del país,” Agencia Boliviana de Información 26 December 2013.

21. Weisbrot, Ray, and Johnston, “Bolivia,” 25; and Manuel Mejido Costoya, “Politics of Trade in Post-Neoliberal Latin America: The Case of Bolivia,” Bulletin of Latin American Research 30:1 (2011), 87.

22. Madrid, “Bolivia,” in Levitsky and Roberts, Resurgence, 253.

23. Kohl, “Bolivia Under Morales,” 110.

24. Morales, quoted in, Madrid, “Bolivia,” in Levitsky and Roberts, Resurgence, 247.

25. Mejido Costoya, “Politics,” 86.

26. John Crabtree and Ann Chaplin, Bolivia: Processes of Change (London: Zed Books, 2013), 24; Artaraz, Bolivia, 60, 73-75.

27. Martín Mendoza-Botelho, “Bolivia 2012: Entre Buenos y Malas Noticias,” Revista de ciencia política (Santiago, Chile) 33:1 (2013), 36.

28. Hedelberto López Blanch, “La bonanza económica y social de Bolivia,” Rebelión 7 December 2013; Katu Arkonada, “Bolivia: A Balance Sheet for the ‘Process of Change,’” green left Weekly February 4, 2013; Kozak, “Bolivia,” Wall Street Journal August 5, 2014; “Morales Leaves Nothing to Chance,” Latin News Daily Report 28 August 2014; “Labour Unions,” Latin American Weekly Report 5 December 2013, 7.

29. Mendoza-Botelho, “Bolivia,” 36; “Bolivian Political and Social Landscape: Primer for Pending Presidential Elections,” Andean Information Network, August 1, 2014, ain-bolivia.org; Fernando Molina, “Why is Evo Morales Still Popular: The Strengths of the MAS in the Construction of a New Order,” translation and introduction by Richard Fidler, Links: International Journal of Socialist Renewal, July 14, 2013, originally published in the May-June issue of Nueva Sociedad.

30. Valencia Agudelo, “Bolivia,” 181; “Bolivia’s Rentier Republic,” The Economist May 3, 2014, www.economist.com; United Nations. ECLAC. Social Panorama of Latin America, 2013, 16; Frederico Fuentes, “Bolivia: Nationalisation Puts Wealth in Hands of the People,” green left Weekly May 28, 2013; and Mendoza-Botelho, “Bolivia,” 36.

31. Mendoza-Betelho, “Bolivia,” 39; and Weisbrot, Ray, and Johnston, “Bolivia,” 15.

32. Mendoza-Betelho, “Bolivia,” 39; and Weisbrot, Ray, and Johnston, “Bolivia,” 15.

33. Mendoza-Betelho, “Bolivia,” 38-39; and Weisbrot, Ray, and Johnston, “Bolivia,” 15.

34. Molina, “Why is Evo Morales Still Popular,” Links July 14, 2013.

35. Artaraz, Bolivia, 109, 209.

36. Gray Molina “Challenges,” in Wyland, Madrid, and Hunter, Leftist Governments, 70.

37. Molina, “Why is Evo Morales Still Popular,” Links July 14, 2013.

38. “Morales Leaves Nothing to Chance,” Latin News Daily Report 28 August 2014; and Molina, “Why is Evo Morales Still Popular,” Links, July 14, 2013.

39. Kohl, “Bolivia,” 114.

40. Valencia Agudelo, “Bolivia,”194.

41. Kohl, “Bolivia,” 111.

42. Achtenberg, “Contested Development,” 6, 8; and Kohl and Farthing, “Material Constraints,” 230.

43. Achtenberg, “Contested Development,” 6, 9; and Crabtree and Chaplin, Bolivia, 16, 17, 30-31.

44. Morales, quoted in Achtenberg, “Contested Development,” 6.

45. Achtenberg, “Contested Development,” 7; and Kohl and Farthing, “Material Constraints,” 230.

46. Achtenberg, “Contested Development,” 7-8, 10; Mendoza-Betelho, “Bolivia,” 41; and Arkonada, “Bolivia,” green left Weekly February 4, 2013.

47. Kohl and Farthing, “Material Constraints,” 233.

48. Kohl and Farthing, “Material Constraints,” 233; Mendoza-Betelho, “Bolivia,” 42-43; and “Bolivia’s Rentier Republic,” The Economist May 3, 2014, www.economist.com.

49. Kohl and Bresnahan, “Initiating Decolonization,” 12.,

50. Kohl and Bresnahan, “Initiating Decolonization,” 12.

51. Santiago Anria, “Bolivia’s MAS: Between Party and Movement,” chapter in, Maxwell A. Cameron & Eric Hershberg, editors, Latin America’s Left Turns: Politics, Policies & Trajectories of Change (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2010), 103.

52. Madrid, “Bolivia,” in Levitsky and Roberts, Resurgence, 254; and Artaraz, Bolivia, 5.

53. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, quoted in Artaraz, Bolivia, 152.

54. Artaraz, Bolivia, 6.

The post The Decline Of United States Influence And The Rise Of Evo Morales – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.


Lessons From Versailles For Today’s Middle East – Analysis

0
0

Discontent and chaos in the Middle East are rooted in treaties drafted at the close of World War I.

By Marc Grossman and Simon Henderson

The summer of 2014 was a season of analogies and anniversaries. European leaders commemorated the start of World War One. Russian President Putin’s annexation of Crimea and destabilization and invasion of eastern Ukraine recalls the threatening and testing days before September 1939.

But as the Middle East and North Africa implode, perhaps focus should be directed on the end of the first World War – and specifically the settlement fashioned by US President Woodrow Wilson, British Prime Minister David Lloyd George and French Prime Minister George Clemenceau at Versailles in 1919.

Much of the chaos in the region today has its roots in Versailles and its associated treaties, so policymakers are contemplating the relevance of Henry Kissinger’s observation in 1994 that “whether an international order is relatively stable, like the one that emerged from the congress of Vienna, or highly volatile, like those that emerged from the peace of Westphalia and the Treaty of Versailles, depends on the degree to which they reconcile what makes the constituent societies feel secure with what they consider just.”

There are multiple echoes of Versailles in current headlines.

As David Gardner pointed out in the Financial Times, the frontiers that now appear to be shattering were sketched by the initially secret Sykes-Picot Agreement on spheres of influence in 1916, a “deal meant to limit Anglo-French rivalry in a Levant that might undermine the alliance against Germany.” Those lines were not intended to create cohesive future nation states in the Middle East, but rather preserve spheres of influence tailored to Europe’s empires, by dividing the region among them, and historian Margaret McMillan reminds us that “Sykes-Picot was made in the midst of the war, when promises were cheap, and the prospect of defeat very real.” After the war, T.E. Lawrence, the Lawrence of Arabia, arrived at Versailles determined to overturn Sykes-Picot, but failed. It is no coincidence the Islamic State’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, declared in a July speech after his forces seized the Iraqi city of Mosul that “this blessed advance will not stop until we hit the last nail in the coffin of the Sykes–Picot conspiracy.”

Syria, a Sykes-Picot creation, is now racked by sectarian bloodshed. The Syrian conflict has spilled into both Lebanon and Iraq, the latter virtually fragmented into three blocks with the Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the center and Shia in the south.

There are also echoes of Versailles in the continuing tension between the principle of self-determination Wilson carried to Paris and the state system established in the Treaties of Westphalia in 1648. Many groups came to Versailles to plead for the chance to determine their own futures only to discover that it was a principle not to be universally applied.

The consequences of this legacy can be found in the Arab Spring, the collapse of Syria as a state and the emergence of an increasingly independent Kurdistan in northern Iraq, as well as the calls for change in Iran and the Gulf monarchies. Journalist and scholar Robin Wright has gone so far as to imagine a “remapped” Middle East, where “new borders may be drawn in disparate and potentially chaotic, ways,” and “The question now is whether nationalism is stronger than older sources of identity during conflict or tough transitions.”

The conflict between Sunnis and Shias reflects tensions dating back to Islam’s earliest days, but the severity of today’s fight has grabbed the world’s attention. As writers like Richard Haass and Borzou Daragahi note, today’s local or regional combatants struggle to maintain control over amorphous statelets and appeal to potential foreign backers for help – echoes of the Thirty Years’ War in Europe, 1618-1648. Haass writes for Project Syndicate that, while there are obvious differences between the events of 1618 to 1648 in Europe and those of the modern Middle East, the similarities are sobering: “The region’s trajectory is worrisome: weak states unable to police their territory; the few relatively strong states competing for primacy; militias and terrorist groups gaining greater influence; and the erasure of borders.”

The Obama administration confronts the enormous challenge of untangling this host of problems. It is easy to imagine US Secretary of State John Kerry asking of his director of policy Planning: What if the Versailles settlement continues to unravel? How can America pursue and protect its interests when states are increasingly weak while there is simultaneously an emergence of new authorities – like the Islamic State, also known as ISIL or ISIS – without recognized states?

Here are five ideas for planners to consider:

First, as President Barack Obama announced on September 10, ISIS must be degraded and ultimately defeated. This will be a long, hard project, which cannot be accomplished by America alone. Creating a coalition with echoes of the one fashioned by President H.W. Bush to fight the first Gulf War in 1991 is key. Leaders of the Muslim world – religious and political – must stand up to publicly renounce ISIS.

Second, a foundation for the military, financial and diplomatic effort required against ISIS must be a public reassertion of the values crucial to a peaceful future in the region. These have their roots in the Fourteen Points Wilson also took to Paris in 1918, but cannot be imposed from Washington. They must include an emphasis on pluralism and tolerance, the rule of law, the sanctity of the individual, and the desire of people around the world to make choices about their own lives – as well as modern values that have emerged since the era of Versailles, such as the role of women in society.

Third, the United States, its friends and allies must support those states in the region that are under stress but can succeed as national entities, even if their birth is linked to Versailles era. Israel, Jordan and Lebanon are all examples. But Kerry’s policy planners need also to be thinking about the outcome of a Syria which can never be put back together as well as a splintered Iraq.

Fourth, although hard to contemplate after the recent Gaza fighting, America will need to renew an effort to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That struggle, connected to the end of WWI through the Balfour Declaration of 1917, is not the primary cause of the region’s turmoil, but two states living side by side in peace would help all other regional policies.

Fifth, there must be a focus on creating regional institutions and promoting economic growth. The United States and its allies and friends need to support regional institutions that would provide a larger vision for the people of the area but also mitigate the fracturing of states. Washington should also consider a second chance at a “Marshall Plan” for North Africa to try to bend history toward the original yearnings for dignity and justice of the Arab Spring.

As Richard Neustadt and Ernest May taught in their 1986 book, Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision Makers, it is important to reason from the right analogies. Even though there are vast differences in the scope and circumstances of today’s challenges, reviewing the now all-too-relevant history of Versailles may help President Obama and Secretary Kerry manage the present crisis.

Sources:

Henry Kissinger, Diplomacy. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994.

David Gardner, “Cracking Up,” Financial Times, November 27, 2013.

Margaret McMillan, Paris 1919. New York: Random House, 2003.

Robin Wright, “Imagining a Remapped Middle East,” The New York Times, September 29, 2013.

Richard Haass, “The New Thirty Years’ War,” Project Syndicate, July 21, 2014.

Borzou Daragahi, “Three Nations, One Conflict,” Financial Times, May 28, 2014.

Richard Neustadt and Ernest May. Thinking in Time: The Use of History for Decision Makers. New York: The Free Press, 1986.

 

Ambassador Marc Grossman is a vice chairman of The Cohen Group. A Foreign Service Officer for 29 years, he retired in 2005 as US Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs. The ambassador was the US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, 2011-2012 and a Kissinger Senior Fellow at Yale in 2013. Simon Henderson is the Baker Fellow and director of the Gulf and Energy Policy Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

The post Lessons From Versailles For Today’s Middle East – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Canada Terror Attack: The Shots That Echoed Through A Nation – Analysis

0
0

By Glen Watson

In the hours following the October 22 killing of Cpl Nathan Cirillo as he stood guard at the War Memorial in Ottawa, the reactions coming out of the nation’s capital made it clear that things in Canada would likely never be the same again.

Details are still emerging about gunman Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, the Quebec-born man that had recently converted to Islam. After killing Cirillo, Zehaf-Bibeau calmly jumped in a vehicle and made the 400-yard trek from the War Memorial to Parliament Hill. He then entered the Centre Block, which is where the majority of Members of Parliament and Senators have their offices. Zehaf-Bibeau was able to get troublingly close to where the three federal parties were having their weekly caucus meetings before being killed by the House of Commons Sergeant-at-Arms. Images later emerged showing that Conservative caucus members had piled tables and chairs several feet high to barricade themselves in the room they occupied.

The unprecedented attack marked the second time in three days that a Canadian solider had been killed, and while there is nothing to suggest that the two incidents are connected, the similar style of ‘lone wolf’ attack has authorities on both sides of the border concerned.

Earlier this week in Quebec, Martin Couture-Rouleau laid in wait for at least two hours in his car in a parking lot before running down two soldiers, killing one and injuring the other. Rouleau, who was later killed by police, had also recently converted to Islam and had been on the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s (RCMP) radar for at least five months. In July, the assailant was arrested and his passport confiscated as he tried to board a plane for Turkey. He was never charged but had been interviewed by police as recently as two weeks before the attack. CNN has reported that like Couture-Rouleau, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau also had his passport confiscated by Canadian authorities.

As more becomes known about the attack in Ottawa in the days and weeks to come, two narratives are likely to dominate the discourse. The first relates to security surrounding Parliament Hill and how the gunman was able to get so close to elected officials. The other, broader narrative will focus on the kind of homegrown terrorism that is now evident in Canada.

While the extent of the Ottawa attack has never before been seen in Canada, there is precedence for would-be assailants getting extremely close to the steps of Parliament. According to Paul Wells of Macleans, a hijacked Greyhound bus drove onto the front lawn of the legislature in 1989, and in 1996 a man drove his car into the front door.

It seems troubling that a gunman was able to walk through the front doors of the main Parliament building to get so close to Canada’s politicians and senators before being stopped. It is even more troubling when one considers the heavy security that surrounds congressional buildings in the United States (despite a man being able to climb the fence and enter the White House last month).

There are probably two explanations for the seemingly lax security. While Parliament Hill is home to the federal legislature, it is also a large, open and mostly public area. In addition, the Parliament buildings are a popular tourist destination that attract upwards of 1.5 million visitors each year. There were some changes made after 9/11 but as one politician said, “that building is the people’s building and we’ve been able to pride ourselves on its accessibility to people.”

The other, related reason is that Canadians have never taken security all that seriously, especially in relation to their US counterparts. There just is not the same kind of underlying culture of fear and need for protection in Canada that seems to exist in America.

Adding to the perception of inadequate security around Ottawa is that Canada’s Auditor-General called for a unified security presence around Parliament Hill more than two years ago. There are currently four different security forces that patrol parliamentary buildings, the surrounding grounds, and nearby streets. The report called for security efforts to be controlled by a single point of command, something that was agreed to in principle by Members of the House and Senate in 2010, but had not been implemented. This attack will surely renew security concerns, and there will almost certainly be changes made.

The sum of this week’s attacks has reminded Canadians that they are not immune from the terrorist attacks taking place throughout the world. The killing in Ottawa came just two days after the first attack. On the day in between, Canada’s CF-18s took off from Alberta to join in the fight against ISIS in Iraq. All of this came about a month after ISIS called for these types of one-off attacks in Canada and the United States.

The RCMP is aware of approximately 130 people who have allegedly left Canada to help terrorist fights abroad, 80 of which have returned back to Canada. Consequently, the Mounties have opened 63 criminal investigations targeting 90 individuals on the basis of intelligence provided to them by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). Couture-Rouleau, who carried out Monday’s vehicular attack in Quebec, was allegedly one of those 90 people.

Lawmakers recently altered the Criminal Code to give authorities the jurisdiction to charge people who travel for terrorist purposes. But after consulting with prosecutors, Mounties were unable to charge Couture-Rouleau because there was insufficient evidence that he was travelling for these purposes, or that he would commit a crime in Canada.

But these attacks have heightened concerns not just about terrorists who are returning to Canada, but about a new breed of extremists who never had any intention of going abroad to fight.

And whether these two men were legitimate terrorists in the traditional sense of the word, or just fringe wannabes acting out disturbed fantasies misses the point of what ISIS is about. Unlike Al-Qaeda, which operates on the basis of well-organized, large-scale attacks, the Islamic State seems to promote the lone wolf style of attack that can be advocated through their impressive command of social media.

These events also have important domestic policy and political considerations. Prime Minister Stephen Harper now has to strike a balancing act of confronting the terrorist threat without going too far. While the current situation is markedly different than what led Pierre Trudeau to invoke the War Measures Act during the October Crisis of 1970, Harper needs to emphasize national security without being seen as impinging on personal freedoms. Failure to find the right balance will likely have political consequences. Trudeau became wildly unpopular after calling the army into the nation’s capital, but it would likely be even more detrimental to be seen as not acting strongly enough in response to these attacks.

The federal Conservatives will also make foreign policy and national security a significant aspect of their campaign for next fall’s election. This is the leading issue that the Conservatives can use to demonstrate the chasm in leadership abilities between Harper and Liberal heir-apparent Justin Trudeau, who continues to make foreign policy remarks that register with the electorate as immature and ill-considered.

While it is still unclear how far the effects of this week’s attacks will reach, what is clear is that things in Canada are unlikely to be the same anytime soon.

This article was first published at Geopolitical Monitor.com.

The post Canada Terror Attack: The Shots That Echoed Through A Nation – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Canada Finds Difficult Balancing Public Security, Respecting Individual Rights: Expert

0
0

Canadian authorities will be challenged with balancing public safety and respect for individual liberties in the wake of the recent shootings, Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa’s School of International Development and Global Studies Benjamin Zyla said.

“The difficulty for the authorities in Canada and abroad thereby is to find the right balance between providing more security for the public on the one hand while respecting individual rights and freedoms of citizens on the other,” Zyla told RIA Novosti Thursday. “They must also avoid stereotyping certain groups and thereby pushing them into isolation.”

Zyla noted that the shooting at the National War Memorial in Ottawa raises a lot of questions on many levels, which will be addressed in the coming days and weeks.

“It seems to me that the most pertinent at this point, perhaps, is to find answers to the question how this individual was able to walk across the front lawn of the House of Commons and then enter the building with a rifle without being stopped at the door,” he said, adding that as a result of this there might be increased police activity, especially in downtown of the capital.

“We will also see heightened security at airports, rail stations, and public places of importance, not only in Canada but also abroad. Germany, for example, has also increased its security provisions for the Bundestag and government ministries,” Zyla underlined.

Zyla stressed that it was well known to law enforcement agencies that the Islamic state has singled out Canada as a potential target country, and encouraged its followers to target Canadian forces personnel.

“On the larger scale of things, this country knows since the terrorist attacks on 9/11 that North America was a target of terrorist activities,” he went on to say. “Canadian authorities always knew that such activities could also spread to Canada.”

“Moreover, the terrorist incidents in 2004 [firebombs in Montreal], 2006 [Toronto 18], and 2013 [Via Rail plotting] on Canadian soil have shown that this country is a target. In that sense, sadly, the notion of a lack of immunity should not necessarily be new or surprising,” Zyla asserted.

Canadian Defense Minister Rob Nicholson has stated Thursday that Canada will continue with the deployment of forces in Iraq.

“Either way, certain MPs are right to demand full information about the extent of Canada’s military operation against ISIL in Iraq from the government; that is how many troops, especially special forces operators are deployed, where exactly, and what are they doing there exactly,” Zyla said.

“Moreover, the government should lay out the rules of engagement for this operation and deliver a so-called exit strategy of how and when to pull back,” he concluded.

On Wednesday morning, a gunman Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, 32, shot dead a soldier guarding the National War Memorial in Ottawa and then proceeded to Parliament Hill’s Center Block, where he was killed in a shootout with a policeman.

On October 23, Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper stated that the attacks on the soldiers in Quebec and the shooting in Ottawa showed that Canada lacked immunity from terror attacks. Harper has vowed to strengthen the nation’s anti-terrorism laws.

The post Canada Finds Difficult Balancing Public Security, Respecting Individual Rights: Expert appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Croatian Boxer Banned For Life After Attacking Ref

0
0

Croatian boxer Vido Loncar has been banned from boxing for life after he brutally attacked a referee when he found out he had lost the European youth championship in Zagreb.

Polish referee Magej Dziurgot was hospitalised after Loncar punched him several times MMA style in the head and body before he was dragged from the ring by his ankles – still swinging punches.

His opponent in the blue corner, instead of making some sort of an attempt to defend the helpless ref, he quickly fled the scene.

The national boxing federation handed out a life suspension for a “brutal attack on an official” and has apologised to the World Boxing Organisation, the European Boxing Organisation and other relevant boxing bodies for the “damage Loncar caused by his act.

The post Croatian Boxer Banned For Life After Attacking Ref appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Saudi Arabia: Women Warned Anew, Hands Off Cars

0
0

By Ghazanfar Ali Khan

Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry warned on Thursday that it would punish women who drive, and those men who support them, as the one-year anniversary approaches of a nationwide campaign calling on the Saudi government to lift the ban on women driving.

The campaign was launched on Oct. 26 last year.

“Female drivers in Saudi Arabia will be dealt with strictly,” said a statement released by the ministry. “The ministry will apply regulations firmly against those who violate the country’s laws,” it said.

Speaking to Arab News, Hoda Abdulrahman Al-Helaissi, a female member of the Shoura Council, supported the move to allow women to drive but said this was not the right time.

“We are not fully prepared as Saudi society is undergoing massive changes on all fronts. There is still substantial resistance from a huge segment of Saudi society, who do not want women to use cars on the roads.”

Maj. Gen. Mansour Al-Turki, the ministry’s spokesman, was quoted as saying on an online news website that people “should not undermine the Kingdom’s social cohesion by spreading discord …”

A Saudi woman, who preferred anonymity, said that the campaign has been enlisting women willing to take cars onto the roads on Oct. 26.

Last year, the ministry issued similar warnings to the organizers of the campaign, which saw women posting videos of them driving on roads across the Kingdom.

Many activists are using social media to promote the campaign.

They have encouraged women to post pictures of them driving on Twitter under the hashtag #IWillDriveMyself, and on Instagram, YouTube and WhatsApp.

The post Saudi Arabia: Women Warned Anew, Hands Off Cars appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Viewing all 73339 articles
Browse latest View live




Latest Images