By C. Raja Mohan

Reports that India has objected to Sri Lanka hosting a Chinese submarine last month are not surprising. In September, a submarine of the Chinese navy docked at the Colombo port just days before President Xi Jinping arrived in Sri Lanka. Last December, there were reports that a Chinese nuclear submarine had surfaced in the waters of Sri Lanka.

With Xi making public his determination to expand China’s defence cooperation with Sri Lanka and Colombo backing his Maritime Silk Road initiative, New Delhi can no longer downplay concerns about Beijing’s role in the waters to the south. The issue of Sri Lanka’s military ties to Beijing was apparently flagged last week by Defence Minister Arun Jaitley when he met the visiting Lankan defence secretary, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who happens to be the brother of President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

As it bowed to political pressures from Chennai, the UPA found it hard to balance India’s genuine concerns about the rights of the Tamil minority in Sri Lanka and Delhi’s other national security interests in the island republic. Whether it was voting on Sri Lanka’s human rights record in Geneva, training Lankan defence personnel in Tamil Nadu, or the prime minister’s travel to Colombo to attend the Commonwealth Summit, the Congress leadership simply caved in to pressures from Chennai.

The NDA government is in a much better position to cope with the competing imperatives in Sri Lanka. That Narendra Modi is less vulnerable to Chennai was reflected in his decision to invite President Rajapaksa for his swearing-in ceremony in end-May against the objections of the Tamil parties.

This, in turn, has given Modi a little more space to deal more purposefully with Lanka; but not a lot. For, Modi senses the huge opportunity to expand the BJP’s influence in Tamil Nadu. He is also conscious of the fact that Tamil concerns are very much part of India’s overall approach to Sri Lanka. Modi has begun well by expanding engagement with all the stakeholders involved in the Lanka conflict, including Chennai, Jaffna and Colombo.

The Raj legacy

India has long opposed the military presence of foreign powers in the subcontinent. This is a geopolitical legacy of the British Raj that was the paramount power in the Indian subcontinent and the guarantor of peace and stability in the Indian Ocean. The Raj ensured that no rival European power would get too close to the subcontinent on the land frontiers or establish a threatening naval presence in the Indian Ocean. As the successor state to the Raj, independent India adopted this position in its entirety. India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, vigorously opposed Pakistan’s bilateral and multilateral military alliances with the United States.

While seeking to keep other powers out of the region, Nehru recognised the importance of providing security to its smaller neighbours. He signed security treaties with Bhutan and Nepal after China gained control over Tibet and offered valuable military cooperation to Burma when it faced the threat of a domestic insurgency. Nehru had also initiated defence cooperation with key countries in the extended neighbourhood, such as Egypt and Indonesia.

Yet, Nehru and his successors have found it impossible to sustain the twin security legacies of the Raj. India could neither prevent foreign military presence in the subcontinent nor offer substantive military assistance to its neighbours. And, as India’s relations with the neighbours frayed over the decades, many of them turned to outside powers to counter an India they saw as overbearing and politically insensitive to their concerns.

Regional defence

Initially, India’s neighbours turned to the Anglo-American powers, much to the irritation of Delhi. Recall the 1980s, when Indira and Rajiv Gandhi told Colombo not to host American bases or facilities on its soil. Now, as a rising China becomes the most important extra-regional partner for India’s neighbours, India cannot simply wish away the Chinese influence in the subcontinent. Drawing red lines or mounting public pressure on neighbours will not work. The only way to limit the scope and structure of China’s security profile in South Asia is to expand India’s own cooperation, including in the defence domain, with all neighbours.

The UPA had indeed sought to deepen defence ties with India’s neighbours. But it was not a strategic priority for the foreign office, the defence ministry or the armed forces. Modi must now try and make India the defence partner of choice for its smaller neighbours. This will take a while, but the policies and institutional framework to get there must be put in place now.

(The writer is a Distinguished Fellow at Observer Research Foundation, Delhi and a Contributing Editor for The Indian Express)

Courtesy : The Indian Express, October 29, 2014

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PLO Ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour told the Security Council on Wednesday that, at the request of PA President Mahmoud Abbas, he would present a draft resolution that “contain[s] elements of parameters [of withdrawal] with a time frame to end the occupation.”

Jordan called the emergency session to discuss the Middle East and the “question of Palestine,” following a letter from the Palestinians addressed to the Security Council and the UN secretary-general, to meet and discuss the plans to build over the Green Line approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week.

“Israel is still insisting that they are not occupiers in complete contradiction with [the] resolution of the Security Council,” Mansour said in his address. “They are not listening or abiding by your will, and as long as they continue not to listen, peace will not move forward.”

Mansour went on to assert that “east Jerusalem has always maintained an Arab and Islamic identity and will continue to do so.” Illegal Israeli actions “are severely exacerbating the conflict and obstructing the peace,” he said.

“While the rest of us are seeking peace and trying any and every initiative aimed at ending this nearly 50-year military occupation and salvaging the two-state solution… Israel is instead expanding and entrenching its illegitimate control over occupied east Jerusalem and the rest of occupied Palestine.”

He ended his speech by appealing to the Security Council to “adopt a resolution reaffirming the fundamental parameters of the two-state solution and delineating a time frame to bring an end to the Israeli occupation.”

Israel’s ambassador Ron Prosor slammed the Palestinian statement about east Jerusalem maintaining an Arab flavor, saying that “Jerusalem had a Jewish character long before most cities in the world had any character… It was the capital of the Jewish people before Homer wrote the Iliad.”

Abbas is orchestrating a campaign to vilify Israel, “and you [the Security Council] seem happy to play second fiddle,” Prosor said.

The Palestinian authorities have been bulldozing archeological sites in an attempt to erase history, he added.

“If the Palestinians wish to secure a brighter future, they must stop rewriting history and start making history by making peace,” Prosor said. “The people of Israel are not occupiers and we are not settlers. Israel is our home and Jerusalem is the eternal capital of our people.”

Prosor reiterated his statements to reporters at a stakeout after the meeting, saying that “building housing units in Jerusalem, in places where there are Jewish neighborhoods, is something that we will continue to do.” When a reporter asserted that such building was illegal, Prosor responded “It is not illegal, and it’s important for us to remember that Jerusalem is not a settlement. It was the capital of the Jewish people when other capitals were still swamps.”

When asked what he thought of the proposed Palestinian draft resolution, the ambassador accused the Palestinians of “trying to circumvent negotiations by trying to impose things from the outside. Only through direct negotiations will the Palestinians be able to build a Palestinian state and build peace.”

Under Secretary General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman called the announcement of the new settlements, as well as the recent terror attacks, “worrisome developments.” He admonished the Israeli government for not reversing their settlement activity, and pointed to it as one of the major causes for why things weren’t getting better.

“The reality is that continued settlement activity in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is doing significant damage to any possibility of a lasting peace between the two sides, and is moving the situation ever closer to a one-state reality,” Feltman said.

In response to the proposition of a new resolution to address Israel and the future Palestine, Feltman also boldly asserted that maybe it was time for the council to re-think their approach to the conflict. “We wonder if the current paradigm, almost 50 years into the conflict, does not require revisiting our engagement thus far,” he said.

Original article

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“Some are saying Mr Mugabe is old so he should step down”, but “No, when my time comes I will tell you”, said Zimbabwe’s ninety year-old President Robert Mugabe blasting internal feuding in the ruling party and excluding his resignation as leader of the nation and ZANU-Pf.

“Some war is going on in my party. People want positions. They even want to push senior people out”, Mugabe said in a speech to lawmakers, without naming anyone.

According to analysts, his words may however also been directed at his wife Grace, considered among the aspiring candidates for the presidency, along with his deputy Joice Mujuru, and Justice minister Emmerson Mnangagwa. Grace in the past days had called for Mujuru’s resignation.

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A man known as the Naked Rambler has lost his case at the European court of human rights, where he claimed he had a right to bare all in public.

Former marine Stephen Gough, from Eastleigh, Hampshire (England), had alleged that his repeated arrest, prosecution, conviction and imprisonment for being nude in public and his treatment in detention violated his rights.

The court unanimously found there had been no violation of articles 8 and 10 of the European convention on human rights.

Gough, 54, has walked naked throughout the UK, from John O’Groats to Land’s End, and is a well-known campaigner for his right to be nude in public – even though his actions have often landed him in prison.

He spent total of five years and three months in detention from May 2006 to July 2011, when his arrest for breaching the peace sparked the current case before the ECHR in Strasbourg. On that occasion, he was approached by two police officers on Manson Terrace, a public road leading from HMP Perth to Edinburgh Road, and refused to put on some clothes when they suggested he do so.

He appeared naked in court as he pleaded not guilty to breaching the peace and rejected the sheriff’s warnings that he would be held in contempt if he did not put some clothes on. The sheriff found that Gough’s conduct on 20 July 2011 was severe enough to cause alarm to ordinary people, threatened serious disturbance to the community, and presented as genuinely alarming, in its context, to any reasonable person.

Gough was sentenced to 330 days for breach of the peace and 90 days for the contempt charge, together with 237 days unspent from a previous sentence, a total of 657 days. The sentences were not backdated and they were to run consecutively. It meant the total length of the sentence was one year, nine months and 18 days.

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Successive Indian governments’ failure to prosecute those most responsible for killings and other abuses during the 1984 anti-Sikh violence highlights India’s weak efforts to combat communal violence. The new Indian government should seek police reforms and to enact a law against communal violence that would hold public officials accountable for complicity and dereliction of duty.

Ten government-appointed commissions and committees have investigated the deadly attacks against thousands of Sikhs in 1984 following the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards. Independent civil society inquiries found complicity by both police and leaders of Gandhi’s Congress Party. Yet, three decades later, only 30 people, mostly low-ranking Congress Party supporters, have been convicted for the attacks that resulted in thousands of deaths and injuries. No police officer has been convicted, and there were no prosecutions for rape, highlighting a comprehensive failure of the justice system.

“India’s failure to prosecute those most responsible for the anti-Sikh violence in 1984 has not only denied justice to Sikhs, but has made all Indians more vulnerable to communal violence,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The authorities repeatedly blocked investigations to protect the perpetrators of atrocities against Sikhs, deepening public distrust in India’s justice system.”

In the early 1980s, Sikh separatists in Punjab committed serious human rights abuses, including the massacre of civilians, attacks on Hindu minorities, and indiscriminate bomb attacks in crowded places. In June 1984, the government deployed troops to remove militants who had occupied the holiest of Sikh shrines, the Golden Temple in Amritsar. The military campaign caused serious damage to the shrine and killed hundreds, including pilgrims, militants, and security personnel. On October 31, 1984, Indira Gandhi was murdered in an act of revenge by two of her Sikh bodyguards.

Following the assassination, mobs, often instigated by Congress Party leaders, went on a rampage against Sikhs in Delhi and other cities. Over three days, at least 2,733 Sikhs were killed, their property looted and destroyed. Many women were raped in the capital. Hundreds of Sikhs were killed elsewhere in the country. The authorities quickly blamed every incident of mass communal violence on a spontaneous public reaction—Gandhi’s son and successor, Rajiv Gandhi, declared at a rally in the capital, “Once a mighty tree falls, it is only natural that the earth around it shakes.”

Many victims, witnesses, and perpetrators have since died, making hopes for justice and accountability more remote with every passing year. Many legal cases collapsed after powerful suspects allegedly threatened or intimidated witnesses. In other cases, poor investigation and tampering of evidence by the police led to acquittals of the accused.

To address the 1984 abuses and the continuing problem of communal violence, Human Rights Watch urged the authorities in India to:

• Establish an independent, time-bound investigation into the 1984 violence cases, including the 237 cases closed by police, with the authority to recommend cases for prosecution.
• Implement police reforms to insulate the police from political pressure to protect perpetrators, such as occurred after communal violence in 1984 (Delhi), 1992 (Mumbai), 2002 (Gujarat), and 2013 (Muzaffarnagar).
• Create a police complaints authority both at the state and district levels, as recommended by the Supreme Court, that would investigate public complaints of serious police misconduct.
• Establish an effective witness protection program to end the intimidation, threats, and harassment of victims and witnesses such as occurred after the 1984 attacks.
• Enact pending laws against communal violence, compliant with international human rights standards, that would make state officials liable for failure to act to prevent and stop communal violence, including as a matter of superior responsibility. Adopt measures on nondiscrimination for displaced people, access to relief, and voluntary return and resettlement in line with the United Nations Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, and on the right to redress in line with the UN Basic Principles and Guidelines on Remedy and Reparation.

“Thirty years since the horrific massacre, communal violence still breaks out in India, raising the same concerns about accountability,” Ganguly said. “The Indian government’s failure to take even rudimentary steps to bring to justice the authors of the 1984 violence has perpetuated a climate of lawlessness that demands a renewed commitment to ending state complicity in such attacks.”

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Several of the reefs occupied by China in the Spratly Islands are being greatly expanded through land reclamation. China’s reclamation activities cannot enhance its claim to sovereignty over the reefs or change the legal status of the reefs under international law.

By Robert Beckman

THE INTERNATIONAL media has reported that China is undertaking large-scale reclamation works on several of the seven reefs it occupies in the Spratly Islands. The 2002 ASEAN-China Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea states that the parties undertake to exercise self-restraint in the conduct of activities that would complicate or escalate the disputes in the area. Although reclamation works and the construction of installations and structures on occupied features would seem to be inconsistent with this provision, China, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam have all undertaken such activities on the features they occupy and control in the Spratly Islands.

What is new is the scale of the reclamation works currently being undertaken by China. It has been reported that China is expanding Fiery Cross Reef (Yongshu Reef) so that it will be two square kilometres in size. This would be a very significant change, as that reef would then be as large as the combined size of the thirteen largest islands in the Spratly Islands.

Reefs occupied by China

China occupies and controls seven reefs in the Spratly Islands, the legal status of which are at issue in the case between the Philippines and China that is currently before an international arbitral tribunal established under the dispute settlement provisions in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Although China has decided not to participate in that case, the matter is proceeding without China’s participation as provided in UNCLOS.

In the arbitration case, the Philippines admits that three of the seven reefs meet the definition of an island, that is, they are naturally formed areas of land surrounded by and above water at high tide. If so, they are capable of a claim to sovereignty and to maritime zones of their own. However, the islands on the three reefs occupied by China are very small and contain little vegetation. Therefore, the Philippines maintains that they should be classified as “rocks which cannot sustain human habitation or economic life of their own”. If so, they would be entitled to a 12 nautical mile (nm) territorial sea, but not to an exclusive economic zone (EEZ) or continental shelf of their own.

With regard to the remaining four reefs occupied by China, the Philippines maintains that they are not islands under UNCLOS as they are submerged at high tide. Therefore, they are not subject to a claim of sovereignty and are not entitled to any maritime zones of their own.

Issues of international law on the status of the reefs

If the scale of China’s recent reclamation works is correct, this raises interesting issues of international law.

Firstly, will the reclamation works strengthen China’s sovereignty claim to the Spratly Islands under international law? The answer is no. Vietnam, the Philippines and Taiwan also claim sovereignty over the islands/features occupied by China. Once there is a dispute over sovereignty, the State that occupies and controls the islands/features cannot strengthen its sovereignty claim by undertaking reclamation or building installations and structures.

Secondly, can China use reclamation to convert submerged reefs into islands capable of supporting human habitation or economic life of their own that are entitled to maritime zones of their own? Again, the answer is no. This is because an “island” is defined as a “naturally formed” area of land surrounded by and above water at high tide. If a feature is above water at high tide because of reclamation works, it is an “artificial island”. Under UNCLOS, an artificial island is not entitled to any maritime zones of its own, not even a 12 nm territorial sea. Therefore, the reclamation works on features that are submerged at high tide will not change their legal status.

Thirdly, can China use reclamation to convert a “rock which cannot sustain human habitation or economic life of its own” into an island that would be entitled to an EEZ and continental shelf of its own? There is no clear answer to this question. However, since an island is defined as a “naturally formed area of land” surrounded by and above water at high tide, it seems reasonable to conclude that it should not be permissible to use artificial means to change a rock into an island entitled to an EEZ and continental shelf of its own.

Other issues of international law

Questions also arise on whether UNCLOS and international law impose any other restraints on China in conducting reclamation works on the features it occupies and controls.

One issue is whether China’s large-scale reclamation works are consistent with its obligation under UNCLOS to protect and preserve the marine environment. If a State is planning activities in an area under its jurisdiction and control that may have significant harmful effects on the marine environment of other States, it has a ‘duty to cooperate’ with those States. It must consult the States that might be affected in advance and in good faith.

It may also have to undertake an environmental impact assessment and share the results with the potentially affected States. In this case, the Philippines is a potentially affected State because three of the features on which China is undertaking reclamation works are either just inside or just outside its 200 nm EEZ. Vietnam is also a potentially affected State because it occupies reefs very close to those occupied by China.

In addition, given that the geographic features in question are in the middle of an area that is the subject of highly contentious sovereignty and maritime disputes, China is under an obligation under international law to exercise restraint and not take unilateral actions that would permanently change the status quo regarding the features in question. This is especially so in this case because the status of the very features on which China is doing major reclamation works are the subject of an ongoing case before an international arbitral tribunal.

Robert Beckman is Director of the Centre for International Law and an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law of the National University of Singapore (NUS). He is also an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU).

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By Andrea Gagliarducci

Following the publication of a new text by Italian journalist Eugenio Scalfari in ‘La Repubblica’ suggesting that Pope Francis believes in relativism, the Holy See spokesman has questioned whether Scalfari is advancing his own views.

In a recent op-ed in the leftist Italian newspaper, Scalfari mentioned one of his recent conversations with Pope Francis, saying the Pope had acknowledged that truth is relative; and he used this comment to support the idea that the Gospels do not tell the whole truth.

According to Scalfari, “the Pope refuses the word ‘relativism,’ i.e. a real movement with aspects of religious politics; but he does not refuse the word ‘relative’. No to relativism, but that truth is relative is a matter of fact that Pope Francis acknowledges.”

Fr. Federico Lombardi, director of the Holy See press office, told CNA Oct. 28 that “Scalfari pursues his own discourse” and, “if there are no words published by the Holy See press office and not officially confirmed, the writer takes full responsibility for what he has written.”

The founder of ‘La Repubblica’ and a self-proclaimed atheist, Scalfari has made it understood that he often has private conversations with the Pope, saying “these conversations started eight months ago” and that “the last of our meetings took place in September.”

Scalfari had already published two of his conversations with Pope Francis, on Oct. 1, 2013 and July 13, 2014; both of those texts were dismissed by Fr. Lombardi.

While not denying the meetings, Fr. Lombardi had stressed that the meetings were private and that the words of Pope Francis had been biased by the interviewer.

Shortly after the publication of the first conversation, Scalfari himself admitted that he never uses a recording devices nor takes notes, and that he writes by memory, also sometimes putting within quotes words that the interviewed had not said, but that in Scalfari’s view better explain their thought.

This third round of excerpts of the Scalfari-Bergoglio conversations have not been presented as an interview, but are inserted in a wider comment on a lecture given by the Polish sociologist Zygmunt Bauman.

In his lecture, Bauman claimed that “truth is an agnostic idea for origins and for nature,” since it can emerge “only from a meeting with its contrary,” and this is the reason why “using the word ‘truth’ in singular mode in a polyphonic world is like applauding with one only hand.”

According to Bauman, “Pope Francis not only preaches the need for dialogue, but he practices it,” and proof of this is that he had granted his first interview to Scalfari.

Scalfari takes the moves from this to comment that “Pope Francis is one of the very few (Popes), in my view the only one, in fact, who faces the quest for truth this way” – that is, in the way Bauman put it.

For this purpose, Scalfari reported he had asked Pope Francis what a missionary Church is in his view.
Pope Francis replied, underscoring his full belonging to the Society of Jesus, and that despite this he had chosen the papal name of Francis.

Scalfari reportedly objected that the Pope chose the name of Francis because “Francis was a mystic; and you love mystics, though you are not a mystic.”

“This is certainly one of the reasons, but it is not the only reason,” Pope Francis reportedly responded.
The Pope stressed that St. Francis “loved a travelling brotherhood that had renounced all the pleasures of life, but did not renounce joy, or love. Some of them, especially Francis, were profoundly mystic in every moment of their life, since they identified with the Lord and forgot their ego.”

However, St. Francis also took care of “practical matters,” and wrote a rule for his order, that “the then Pope approved many years later.” But – Pope Francis reportedly said – “the Pope approved the rules under a condition: a portion of the Franciscans had to live in convents, while only a portion could be missionary and travelling. Francis accepted. The friars in the convents rediscovered St. Benedict, and study, work, begging; but the real Franciscan and missionary Church is the travelling one.”

Scalfari wrote that he asked the Pope “why the Church must be above all travelling and missionary,” and Pope Francis responded: “We have to speak the ‘languages’ of all the world, which does not necessarily mean the real language – consider that in China there are some 50,000 different languages.”

“A missionary Church must above all understand the people it meets, their way of thinking… this is the premise, that is at once Franciscan and Jesuit, as our Society has always done: understand the other, whether they are socially miserable and culturally poor, or cultivated, remarkable in social life and important for the public life of people, but not for religion.”

Pope Francis also reportedly underscored that “religion abhors political language, which must not be our thing. If we intend with politics a vision of the common good that for us is that of our religion, yes, politics becomes important, and institutions become important for everyone’s good. People should commit to and realize these institution, but not elevating them to the name of a god. No one can appropriate the name of a god that is ecumenical and creator.”

In the end, Scalfari underscored that Pope Francis wants to get in touch with the modern world, and “this means, if I understood well, that the Church must be in harmony with it.”

And what about the truth? “The Pope refuses the word “relativism,” i.e. a real movement with aspects of religious politics; but he does not refuse the word ‘relative’. No to relativism, but that truth is relative is a matter of fact that Pope Francis acknowledges.”

This reasoning brings Scalfari to stress that doctrine was elaborate by “religious thinkers” in the course of centuries, on the basis of the preaching of St. Paul and the Jewish-Christian community of Jerusalem.

Scalfari also dismissed the Gospels, saying “they are the narrations written by people who had never met or seen Jesus of Nazareth … second or third-hand narrations which provided a doctrinal structure.”

Likewise – Scalfari says – “monotheistic religions were born of stories,” because “God has no voice, and no imaginable figure,” while “the Son has, and this is the reason why Christians invented it.”

This is how the culture of encounter pursued by Pope Francis has been completely overturned.

How much Scalfari’s words and reports are reliable, one cannot assess: no proofs are provided that Pope Francis has worded his thoughts the way Scalfari wrote them down.

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By Gwynne Dyer

Last Sunday was a busy day: Three elections, in three different continents, all of them offering at least the hope of better times.

First, Brazil, where President Dilma Rousseff eked out a second-round victory with 51.6 percent of the votes versus 48.4 percent for the challenger, Aecio Neves. But Neves was quick to acknowledge her victory, and she was equally prompt in admitting that things had to change. “Sometimes in history, close outcomes trigger results more quickly than ample victories,” she said.

Most people took that as an admission that she would have to give more attention to growing the economy and a little less to redistributing the proceeds. This will not come easily to her, for the great project of the Workers’ Party (PT) under both Rousseff and her iconic predecessor Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva has been to raise the living standards of poor Brazilians. They have done very well at it, but there was a cost.

In only twelve years, the PT governments have moved around 40 million Brazilians, one-fifth of the population, out of poverty. Brazil’s Gini coefficient (a measure of income inequality) has improved from 0.56 at the start of PT rule to 0.49 now. Such rapid change in Gini is practically unheard of — Brazil is now closer to the United States (0.47) than to China (0.61) — and it has transformed a great many people’s lives.

The overall economy grew fast when “Lula” was in office, but it has slowed almost to a stall under Rousseff. That is not surprising, for it is hard to persuade business to invest when you are busy redistributing income. Now Dilma will have to change her priorities and encourage business — without surrendering the improvements in the lives of the poor.

She seems to understand that, and if she can succeed in entrenching those changes while reviving the economy then she really will have changed Brazil for good. The voters have given her another four years to work on it, and that may be enough.

Secondly, Ukraine. The killing in the southeast has tailed off — only 300 dead in sporadic clashes around Donetsk in almost two months since the cease-fire, compared to 3,400 in the previous four and a half months — and the new frontier with the pro-Russian breakaway areas has solidified. That, plus the Russian annexation of Crimea, excluded some three million people from the vote, but for 36 million other registered voters the election went off quite peacefully.

The result was a landslide. “More than three-quarters of voters who took part in the polls gave strong and irreversible backing to Ukraine’s path to Europe,” President Petro Poroshenko told a news conference in Kiev. With half the ballots counted, his own Solidarity Party and the People’s Front led by his ally, former Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk, each had 21.5 percent of the vote, with another pro-European party, Self Help, winning 11 percent.

With the support of several smaller pro-European, pro-reform parties, a coalition government may even enjoy a two-thirds “super-majority” in Parliament and allow Poroshenko to pass his long-promised reform program with little opposition. Pro-Russian parties that were allied with deposed President Viktor Yanukovich (who fled into exile with Russian help), running as the Opposition Bloc, got only 10 percent of the vote.

Ukraine is not out of the woods. Russia can turn up the fighting again, or just keep its gas exports turned off and condemn the country to a grim winter. The economy is still shrinking and jobs are disappearing fast. But at least Ukraine will now have a government that is both legitimate and more or less united.

Last but not least, Tunisia, the country where the Arab Spring began — and just about the only one where it did not fail. The surprise there was that the secular Nidaa Tounes Party (Tunisia’s Call), formed only last year, out-polled the Ennahda Party, a moderate Islamist party that led the first post-revolutionary coalition government.

Some kind of coalition will still be necessary, as neither party won half the seats in Parliament, and it may be a broad coalition that includes them both. But there is a lesson here for Egypt, although it comes a bit late. As a member of Ennahda’s political bureau told the BBC, “This result is fine. I am not really surprised. Governments that are leading during a political transition are often punished at the polls.”

Egypt threw away its democracy last year. Deposed President Muhammad Mursi was less tactful and more eager to impose his Islamic project on the country than Ennahda’s leaders.

In Egypt, as in Tunisia, a second election would probably have seen the Islamist party evicted from power.

Email: 76312.1476@compuserve.com

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By Andrew Topf

Recent trade deals and high-level cooperation between Russia and China have set off alarm bells in the West as policymakers and oil and gas executives watch the balance of power in global energy markets shift to the East.

The reasons for the cozier relationship between the two giant powers are, of course, rooted in the Ukraine crisis and subsequent Western sanctions against Russia, combined with China’s need to secure long-term energy supplies. However, a consequence of closer economic ties between Russia and China could also mean the beginning of the end of dominance for the U.S. dollar, and that could have a profound impact on energy markets.

Rein of the USD

Before the 20th century, the value of money was tied to gold. Banks that lent money were constrained by the amount of their gold reserves. The Bretton Woods Agreement of 1944 established a system of exchange rates that allowed governments to sell their gold to the U.S. Treasury. But in 1971, U.S. President Richard Nixon took the country off the gold standard, which formally ended the linkage between the world’s major currencies and gold.

The U.S. dollar then went through a massive devaluation, and oil played a crucial role in propping it back up. Nixon negotiated a deal with Saudi Arabia whereby in exchange for arms and protection, the Saudis would denominate all future sales of oil in U.S. dollars. Other OPEC members agreed to similar deals, ensuring perpetual global demand for greenbacks. The dominance of the U.S. “petrodollar” continues to this day.

Russia and China Cozy Up

Recent news coming out of Russia, however, suggests that the era of U.S. dollar dominance could be coming to an end, due to increasing competition from the world’s second largest economy and primary consumer of commodities, China.

China and Russia have been furiously signing energy deals that indicate their mutual energy interests. The most obvious is the $456 billion gas deal that Russian state-owned Gazprom signed with China in May, but that was just the biggest in a string of energy agreements going back to 2009. That year, Russian oil giant Rosneft secured a $25 billion oil swap agreement with Beijing, and last year, Rosneft agreed to double oil supplies to China in a deal valued at $270 billion.

Since Western sanctions against Russia took hold in reaction to the Russian land grab in Crimea and the shooting down of a commercial airliner, Moscow has increasingly looked to its former Cold War rival as a key buyer of Russian crude — its most important export.

Liam Halligan, a columnist for the Telegraph, says “the real danger” of closer Russian-Chinese ties is not a bust-up between China and the U.S., which could threaten crucial shipping routes for China-bound coal and LNG, but its impact on the U.S. dollar.

“If Russia’s ‘pivot to Asia’ results in Moscow and Beijing trading oil between them in a currency other than the dollar, that will represent a major change in how the global economy operates and a marked loss of power for the U.S. and its allies,” Halligan wrote in May. “With China now the world’s biggest oil importer and the U.S. increasingly stressing domestic production, the days of dollar-priced energy, and therefore dollar-dominance, look numbered.”

While no one is arguing that could happen anytime soon, considering the dollar remains the currency of choice for central banks, Halligan’s proposition is gathering strength. In June, China agreed with Brazil on a $29 billion currency swap in an effort to promote the Chinese yuan as a reserve currency, and earlier this month, the Chinese and Russian central banks signed an agreement on yuan-ruble swaps to double trade between the two countries. Analysts says the $150 billion deal, one of 38 accords inked in Moscow, is a way for Russia to move away from U.S. dollar-dominated settlements.

“Taken alone, these actions do not mean the end of the dollar as the leading global reserve currency,” Jim Rickards, portfolio manager at West Shore Group and partner at Tangent Capital Partners, told CNBC. “But taken in the context of many other actions around the world including Saudi Arabia’s frustration with U.S. foreign policy toward Iran, and China’s voracious appetite for gold, these actions are meaningful steps away from the dollar.”

Rise of the Yuan

It is no secret that Beijing has been looking to promote the yuan as an alternative reserve currency. Having that status would allow China cheap access to world capital markets and cheaper transaction costs on international trade, not to mention increased clout as an economic power commensurate with its rising proportion of world commerce.

However, the Chinese have a problem in their plans for the yuan. The government has not yet removed capital controls that would allow full convertibility, for fear of unleashing a torrent of speculative flows that could damage the Chinese economy.

However, “[It] is clear that China is laying foundations for wider acceptance of the yuan,” said Karl Schamotta, a senior market strategist at Western Union Business Solutions,” as quoted in an International Business Times article. IBT pointed out that “more than 10,000 financial institutions are doing business in Chinese yuan, up from 900 in June 2011, while the pool of offshore yuan, non-existent three years ago, is now near 900 billion ($143 billion). And the proportion of China’s exports and imports settled in yuan has increased nearly sixfold in three years to nearly 12 percent.”

Conspiracy Theory Spoiler Alert

Adding some vivid color to this story, Casey Research energy analyst Marin Katusa speculated in a recent column that the death of Total CEO Christophe de Margerie, whose private jet collided with a snowplow in Moscow, may not have been an accident. Instead, Katusa muses that the mysterious circumstances surrounding his death and the unlikely odds of being hit by a snowplow at an airport, could have more to do with de Margerie’s business interests in Russia than being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

According to Katusa, de Margerie was “a total liability” due to Total’s involvement in plans to build an LNG plant on the Yamal Peninsula along with partner Novatek. The company was also seeking financing for a gas project in Russia despite Western sanctions.

“It planned to finance its share in the $27-billion Yamal project using euros, yuan, Russian rubles, and any other currency but U.S. dollars,” Katusa writes, then entices the reader with this: “Did this direct threat to the petrodollar make this ‘true friend of Russia’—as Putin called de Margerie – some very powerful and dangerous enemies amongst the power that be, whether in the French government, the EU, or the U.S.?”

That may be a stretch, but Katusa’s U.S. dollar reference shows that any developments that point to a move away from the dominance of the greenback are not going un-noticed.

Source: http://oilprice.com/Energy/Oil-Prices/The-End-Of-An-Era-Is-The-US-Petrodollar-Under-Threat.html

The post The End Of An Era: Is The US Petrodollar Under Threat? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

GDP grew at a higher than expected 3.5 percent annual rate in the third quarter. The biggest factors in this growth were a 16.0 percent increase in defense spending, which added 0.66 percentage points to growth; an 11.0 percent increase in the export of goods, which added 0.99 percentage points to growth; and a 2.4 percent decrease in the import of goods, which added 0.34 percentage points to growth. These three categories accounted for almost two full percentage points of the growth in the quarter.

In other categories, consumption grew at a modest 1.8 percent annual rate, while non-residential investment grew at a 5.5 percent rate. Housing grew at a 1.8 percent annual rate, while government spending outside of defense grew at just over a 1.0 percent rate. Inventories were a drag on growth, subtracting 0.57 percentage points.

Consumption spending was held down by spending on services, which rose at just a 1.1 percent annual rate. This compares to a 1.7 percent average growth rate in the years 2011-2013. Services account for two-thirds of consumption, so weaker growth in services will limit overall consumption growth.

Within services, one of the factors depressing growth in the quarter was a 1.6 percent rate of decline in spending on housing and utilities. This reflects less electricity use due to a relatively mild summer. That will be reversed in coming quarters. The other major factor slowing spending is health services, which increased at just a 1.8 percent annual rate in the quarter. Both health care inflation and total spending have slowed sharply in recent years. Nominal spending in the third quarter is just 3.5 percent above the year-ago level. With real spending up by 2.1 percent, this implies a 1.4 percent inflation rate. It is difficult to determine the extent to which this slowdown can be attributed to the ACA, but clearly the predictions that costs would explode due to the extension of coverage have proven wrong.

The jump in defense spending is almost certainly an anomaly that will be reversed in future quarters. The last double-digit jump in defense spending was an 11.9 percent increase reported for the third quarter of 2012. The following quarter spending fell at a 20.1 percent annual rate.

The improvement in trade largely reflects a reduction in imports of oil. Lower oil prices and reduced oil imports free up money for other consumption. However, increased U.S. oil production may also be a factor contributing to the recent rise in the dollar. This will make U.S. goods less competitive and will be a drag on net exports in future quarters.

This report should further dampen any concerns about growing inflationary pressures. The overall GDP deflator grew at a 1.3 percent annual rate in the quarter and is up by 1.6 percent from its year-ago level. The core PCE deflator that the Fed targets grew at a 1.4 percent annual rate and is up 1.5 percent from its year-ago level.

Going forward, it is likely that GDP growth will be closer to 2.0 percent than 3.0 percent. The surge in defense spending will almost certainly be reversed in the next two quarters, creating a substantial drag on reported growth. Trade will also be more neutral, as we are not likely to see another comparable fall in imports. (There was an unusually large jump in the second quarter.) More normal utility use will provide somewhat of a boost to growth, but there is little reason to expect the pace of overall consumption growth to accelerate much. The saving rate is still relatively low at 5.5 percent (meaning consumption is high relative to income) and with wage growth modest, there is no reason to expect any large upticks in consumption spending. Housing construction may pick-up somewhat, but it is not likely to be a major contributor to demand growth nor is non-residential investment.

In short, we are likely to see the economy continuing to grow at a sluggish pace. With a potential growth rate in the range of 2.0-2.4 percent, the economy is making up little of the ground lost in the downturn.

The post Defense Spending And Net Exports Spur Higher Than Expected Third Quarter Growth – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

When Ramazan Kizil established Dalkurd FF, one of Europe’s most successful immigrant soccer teams, in a remote town in northern Sweden, he dreamt of one day raising the Swedish and the Kurdish flag alongside one another in a European championship. These days, Mr. Kizil’s goals are more immediate: aiding embattled Kurdish fighters fending off attacks by Islamic State, the jihadist group that controls a swath of Syria and Iraq, in the Syrian-Turkish border town of Kobani.

Mr. Kizil’s Dalkurd sparked anger in the Swedish Football Federation (SFF), further fuelled debate within the international sports community about the relationship between sports and politics, and focused attention on the blowback of conflict in the Middle East and North African on migrant communities in Europe, when the club flashed a sign saying ‘Save Kobani’ during a recent soccer match. The club based in Borlänge, an iron and paper mill town 300 kilometres north of Stockholm, raised €3,000 during the match for Kobani that has been a focus of the US-led war on the Islamic State for more than a month.

Against the backdrop of efforts by International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach to acknowledge the intimate relationship between sports and politics in a break with the sport world’s long-standing insistence that the two are separate, Mr. Kizil described his club’s support for Kobani in an interview with Rudaw as “human solidarity.” In response to the SFF’s description of the support for Kobani as “political,” Mr Kizil retorted: “We do not care about their warnings or any eventual penalties.” Adil Kizil, Ramazan Kizil’s son and Dalkurd’s sports manager added: “We can’t just sit and watch while Kobani gets massacred. We must do something.” Some 200,000 people have fled Kobani mostly to Turkey in the last six weeks.

The dispute over the nature of Dalkurd’s support for Kobani raises the question of what the border line is, if there is one, between humanitarian and political aid to groups in distress as a result of conflict as well as the double standards applied by some Western nations towards foreign fighters in the Syrian conflict. Most Western nations have sought to criminalize those of their nationals who join Islamic State as foreign fighters. Some like the Netherlands, however, appear to exempt those who join the Kurds in their fight against the Islamist group.

The distinction between good and bad foreign fighters is likely to loom ever larger. Dalkurd’s support for the Kurdish fight against Islamic State reflects a new resolve among Kurds across Europe as well as a revival of Kurdish hopes for independence. Across Scandinavia, home to many Kurds, groups have demonstrated for Kobani and sought to aid the US-backed Kurdish fighters trying to hold on to the city.

Scores of young German Kurds have joined the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a group that long championed the ideal of a pan-Kurdish state that would be carved out of Kurdish regions in Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran. The group — condemned by Turkey, the European Union and the United States as a terrorist organization — has since lowered its sites to demanding full rights within Turkey in stalled negotiations with the Turkish government.

Sabri Ok, a PKK leader, recently told German magazine Der Spiegel: “The new generation is different from us older people. They are more radical. They have seen the war in Kurdistan and their brothers and sisters have died in Syria. It will be difficult to control them.” For many Kurds, the battle for Kobani, once a secular, democratic Kurdish-governed enclave, represents their aspirations. The fall of Kobani, PKK officials warn, would fuel Kurdish resistance and could revive the Kurdish insurgency in south-eastern Turkey in which some 40,000 people have died since 1984.

The changing Kurdish landscape was highlighted this week with Turkey allowing a convoy of 150 vehicles carrying heavy weaponry and armed Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga fighters to traverse its territory en route to Kobani to strengthen their Syrian Kurdish brethren.

Dalkurd, one of three Swedish clubs that have fielded Europe’s most successful immigrant teams, was initially launched as a project to create jobs for youth. Dalkurd’s Swedish identity is clearly identifiable on maps; its minority Kurdish identity is not. That makes Dalkurd as much a product of the social and economic challenges facing immigrants in Sweden and elsewhere in Europe as it is of the carve-up of the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century that turned Kurds into the largest nation without a homeland, and scattered them across the Middle East and the globe.

Dalkurd’s initial players were Kurdish migrants and refugees, and their descendants. Turkish Kurdish immigrants moved to Europe in search of more fertile economic pastures and to escape the suppression of their cultural identity and political rights in Turkey. Dalkurd co-founder Elvan Cicen said instinctively, the founders had thought of naming the club Kurdistan, but on reflection opted for Dalkurd: Dal for Dalarna, the region where Borlänge is located, and Kurd for Kurdistan. Dalarna’s famous wooden horses frame the yellow sun on the red, white and green Kurdish flag that the club adopted as its own.

“We are both Kurdish and Swedish. Football is our tool to integrate people. We took kids off the streets and away from the gangs. Everybody blamed the kids. But the real problem was the parents, who often were analphabets. The kids lived in different worlds in school and at home. The parents didn’t see what was happening and the kids weren’t integrated. We started involving the parents,” Mr. Cicen said. Dalkurd players have become role models in local high schools. They have sparked a cultural revolution, inspiring girls to form their own team with the support of Dalkurd managers who seek to overcome the objections put forward by conservative parents.

In interviews, Kurdish members of Dalkurd’s board do not hide their empathy for the PKK. Officials in Iraqi Kurdistan, where the PKK has bases, suggested that the group had helped fund Dalkurd, a claim the club’s executives deny. Nevertheless, Dalkurd chairman Kizil, a Kurdish immigrant from Turkey, was sentenced in 2010 in absentia to 10 months in prison in his homeland after giving a speech in his native Kurdish and campaigning on behalf of a pro-Kurdish political party.

Dalkurd’s leadership, much like that of other immigrant communities, draws a distinction between integration and assimilation. “Integration is not assimilation. It’s learning a new culture without losing one’s own. Even if we had Kurdistan, I wouldn’t move there. Sure, my parents didn’t come here to be Swedes. They socialise only with the Kurdish part of Dalkurd. I’m trying to learn from both cultures. Having two cultures is being richer. We would lose if we were only a Kurdish team. They call us the Kurdish national team. That is not a problem but we don’t close the door to other people,” Mr. Cicen said.

The post Kurdish Soccer Team Sparks Swedish FA Ire Over Battle For Kobani, Sparks Debate On What Is Politics? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Parameswaran Ponnudurai

U.S. President Barack Obama held talks over the telephone Thursday with Myanmar President Thein Sein and Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, stressing the need to address communal tensions, forge a nationwide ceasefire pact and hold credible general elections next year.

He made the separate calls hours before Thein Sein was scheduled to host an unprecedented meeting Friday with Aung San Suu Kyi as well as the country’s powerful military chief, and leaders of other political parties and ethnic groups aimed at grappling with the country’s political problems.

Obama, who is scheduled to make his second visit to Myanmar in mid-November, discussed with Thein Sein and Aung San Suu Kyi the status of Myanmar’s ongoing political and economic reforms and the need for an “inclusive and credible process” for conducting the 2015 general elections elections, the White House said in a statement.

Obama gave the United States’ “firm commitment to helping the people” of Myanmar “achieve a more free, open, and prosperous nation,” it said.

Rohingya crisis

The statement said the U.S. leader stressed the importance for Thein Sein’s government to take “additional steps to address the tensions and the humanitarian situation” in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, where bloody communal violence between majority Rakhine Buddhists and minority Muslim Rohingyas since 2012 has left more than 280 people dead and tens of thousands displaced.

Human rights groups have accused the Myanmar authorities of discriminating against the Muslim Rohingya community, who they say bore the brunt of the violence. Rakhine Buddhists however accuse aid groups of favoring the Rohingyas, most of whom are considered illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, even though they have lived in Myanmar for decades.

Obama called Thursday for revisions to the Rakhine Action Plan, which U.S.-based Human Rights Watch says would entrench discriminatory policies that deprive Rohingyas of Myanmar citizenship and lead to the forced resettlement of over 130,000 displaced Rohingya into closed camps.

Human Rights Watch had called on Myanmar’s international donors, the United Nations, and other influential actors to press Thein Sein’s government to substantively revise or rescind the plan.

Obama also called for other measures “to support the civil and political rights of the Rohingya population.”

The U.S. leader welcomed Thein Sein’s commitment to the peace process, saying “every effort should be made conclude a national ceasefire in the short term.”

Delayed

The Myanmar government is negotiating with the country’s ethnic armed groups to sign a nationwide cease-fire agreement, though the process has been repeatedly delayed.

Any agreement is to be followed by political dialogue with ethnic groups aimed at giving greater powers to ethnic states as well as giving them bigger representation in parliament.

But the powerful military had refused to give up its veto on making any changes to the country’s constitution which are key to giving ethnic groups greater powers.

President Obama also underscored “the need for an inclusive and credible process” for conducting the 2015 elections, the White House statement said.

Aung San Suu Kyi may not be able to become president if her National League for Democracy (NLD) party wins the elections.

The constitution bars her from becoming leader of the country because her two sons are not Myanmar citizens and the ruling party and the military are reluctant to amend the charter to pave the way for her to be in the running for the presidency.

The White House said Obama also discussed with Aung San Suu Kyi “how the United States can support efforts to promote tolerance, respect for diversity, and a more inclusive political environment.”

Timing

Since the end of last year, Aung San Suu Kyi has been pushing for talks on Myanmar’s political reform process with Thein Sein, Parliamentary Speaker Shwe Mann, and military commander-in-chief General Min Aung Hlaing, all of whom are to attend Friday’s meeting at the president’s residence in the capital Naypyidaw.

Some political party leaders have questioned whether Thein Sein had arranged the meeting solely to demonstrate to Obama and other world leaders that he is serious in his reform efforts considering recent criticism over the delay in forging a nationwide cease-fire with armed rebel groups and the refusal by the military to give up its veto power in parliament.

“If this meeting is just to appease the world leaders who will be visiting, then it is up to the people who will be attending the meeting [to do something],” said Khin Maung Swe, chairman of the Federal Democratic Alliance (FDA), a coalition of nine political and ethnic parties and a leading official of the opposition National Democratic Force (NDF) party.

Myanmar will next month host a high level meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the East Asia Summit.

Obama will attend the East Asia Summit with leaders from China, Russia, India, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand as well as the 10 Southeast Asian nations.

The post Obama Pushes Reforms In Phone Calls To Myanmar’s Thein Sein And Suu Kyi appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The nuclear issue had emerged as an extremely sensitive one in Japan after its experience of atomic bombing in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 that brought World War II to a close. Japan remained under the US’ extended nuclear deterrence for its security. However, nuclear as a source of energy remained a priority for the government as a means to meet the country’s energy needs, until the nuclear accident in Fukushima triggered by the earthquake and subsequent tsunami in March 2011, when the sentiment against nuclear intensified, leading the government to stop all the 48 nuclear reactors from operation. Being a resource-deficient country, Japan used to source almost a quarter of its energy needs from the nuclear alone.

Fukushima led to a dramatic rethink of Japan’s energy policy. Having experienced difficulties to readjust to the new situation, the government led by Abe Shinzo of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is keen to restart some of the reactors in his growth strategy if the reactors pass through stringent safety regulations to prevent Fukushima-like occurrences. The path to achieve such an aim is not easy but some incremental move to achieve the aim has been made. The Abe government firmly believes that Japan has no choice but to return to the nuclear energy age if the ailing economy has to be resuscitated.

Global impact

The impact of Fukushima was felt not in Japan alone but across continent. Though triggered by the earthquake and then tsunami, these two became secondary news items when in its aftermath countless tons of radioactive water was released into the ocean, dooming the local fishing industry for many decades to come. A large swath of land area around Fukushima became unsafe for human life. The government was suddenly faced with the huge responsibility of permanently evacuating and resettling over 170,000 people.

The repercussions of the incident were far reaching globally. Public opinion against nuclear energy gathered sudden steam and nuclear as a source faced critical blow. Many countries across continent started revisiting their nuclear policies. Malaysia, Philippines, Kuwait and Bahrain abandoned plans to develop nuclear reactors. China suspended its nuclear development program for some time. Germany started to close down its old nuclear reactors to prevent risk of accident and toyed with the plan to completely shut down all of them by 2022.1

Before Fukushima happened, nuclear power was seen as the cleanest non-renewable power source, far exceeding in efficiency the coal or natural gas based power. Fukushima led to a dramatic turnaround to such perception. It dawned that if there is a single mistake, either misplaced builds location, or security breach, or even just human error, it could create unmanageable and unimaginable outcomes for generations, across vast swathes of land and sea.

Policy of Abe government

The Abe government wants Japan’s idled nuclear reactors to be switched back on. The government has approved an energy plan that backs the use of nuclear power, despite public opposition after the Fukushima disaster. The plan reverses an earlier decision to phase out nuclear power by the previous government led by the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ). The present opposition DPJ, which was in power during the time of the 2011 tsunami and earthquake that triggered the Fukushima nuclear disaster, had promised to phase out nuclear power. Abe’s plan is to undo this. If the plan is allowed to go ahead, it will set the stage for the government to restart some reactors, all of which are currently idled. The move comes days after the first Fukushima evacuees returned to their homes inside the exclusion zone. Under the plan, the government would proceed with activating nuclear power plants that had met tough regulatory standards, while also working to reduce nuclear dependence as much as possible. The plan did not specify Japan’s future energy mix, but promised to increase its reliance on renewable energy.2 Majority of the Japanese people distrust the government’s assurances that nuclear power is safe. Before Fukushima, Japan had relied on nuclear energy for almost a quarter of its energy needs. Though Abe has been persuading the law makers to back his stance, his decision is unpopular with a wary public.3

Even Abe’s aim to revive nuclear power generation has been criticised by former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, a firm opponent to nuclear power following the Fukushima meltdowns. He disputes the government’s claim that Japan has the world’s toughest safety standards and says that they are not really tough compared with regulations in the US, France or Finland. Addressing a symposium in Tokyo in October 2014, Koizumi urged Abe to break away from nuclear power, and said “people would not cooperate” over the matter of finding a final disposal site for high-level radioactive waste unless the government vows “not to increase nuclear waste anymore.”4

Japan shut down its last functioning nuclear reactor 4 at Ohi in western Japan on 16 September 2013, with no timetable for a restart. With no supply of electricity from the nuclear source since then, this has been the longest shut-down since the 1960s.5 Japan went without nuclear power during May and June 2012, but operator Kepco was allowed to restart its reactor at Ohi. Getting the reactors back online is a vital part of Abe’s plan to turn the economy around. Since the Fukushima disaster, Japan has been forced to import huge amounts of coal, liquid natural gas and other fuels. These imports have contributed to the huge trade deficits posted by Japan since 2011. The average household electricity bill has risen by 30 per cent since Fukushima, denting the government’s attempts to boost consumer spending. If the consumption tax is hiked as planned in October 2015 to 10 per cent, it could further depress consumer spending.

Though all 48 commercial reactors in Japan are currently offline since September 2013, Abe however is pushing for the restart of reactors that have cleared the post-Fukushima regulations. The two-reactor Sendai’s Nos. 1 and 2 reactors in Kagoshima Prefecture in south-western Japan’s main island of Kyushu operated by Kyushu Electric Power Co. may go back online as early as the beginning of 2015.6 In May, Koizumi established a body to promote renewable energy together with another former Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa, who unsuccessfully ran in the Tokyo gubernatorial election in February on an antinuclear platform.

In the wake of the Fukushima disaster, the government introduced more stringent safety standards in July 2013 setting a higher hurdle for reactors. The Sendai plant emerged in March 2014 as the leading candidate for resumption after clearing key agendas related to earthquake and tsunami hazards that could affect the plant. On 10 September 2014, the five-member decision-making Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) panel of the nuclear safety regulator unanimously approved the final version of its screening report. The regulatory watchdog received 17,819 comments from the public after the panel approved a draft version on July 16. Some criticised the regulator’s judgment that the chance of volcanic eruptions affecting the Sendai plant located in the region of active volcanic sites were small, while others conveyed technical concern that safety measures against a variety of possible hazards such as tsunami and cyber attacks are inadequate.7

As the next step, Kyushu Electric Power Co., the operator of the Sendai plant, will have to submit to the NRA construction plans that include designs of equipment and the company’s new safety regulations detailing operation procedures and accident responses.
Kyushu Electric will also have to gain the consent of local governments. The Satsuma-Sendai municipal government and the Kagoshima prefectural government have both indicated a willingness to go along with resumption of operations. Concerns have been raised about the effectiveness of the prefectural and municipal government’s evacuation plans in the event of an emergency at the plant. The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry is working out a coordination program with the local and central governments to meet emergency situation. Though the utility has said it would use the current observation system to detect signs of a major volcanic eruption in the vicinity of the Sendai plant, volcanologists have raised opposition to Kyushu Electric’s policy.8 On experts’ advice, the NRA has asked Kyushu Electric to take additional measures against possible eruptions.

On 28 October 2014, the local city assembly approved restarting, a step towards the first resumption of a nuclear facility in the country since new regulations were adopted following the Fukushima meltdowns. The city assembly of Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture, adopted a petition in favour of restarting the two-reactor Sendai plant and became the first nuclear facility to meet the stricter post-Fukushima safety requirements. Though Satsumasendai Mayor Hideo Iwakiri gave the green light for the restart once operator Kyushu Electric Power Co. finishes the necessary paperwork and on-site operational checks, other municipalities around the Sendai complex said it was not acceptable to bring the plant back online without their consent, citing safety concerns among locals. Kagoshima Governor Yuichiro Ito, however, said that it was not necessary to obtain approval from the municipalities that do not host the plant as it is not a legally required process.9

What Next?

When Shunichi Tanaka, Chairman of the nuclear watchdog confirmed that Kyushu Electric had ensured the level of safety it was looking for, Japan is set to begin the next phase of a nuclear restart as more reactors pass muster. Yet, the government’s nuclear policies are bound to remain controversial as the people continue to feel unease with nuclear issue. However, once the Sendai reactors are fired up, it will spell the end of Japan’s zero-nuclear status. Close
The Sendai plant may come back online as early as winter.

Though all of Japan’s 48 nuclear reactors remain offline, applications are pending for safety checks at 18 more reactors at 12 plants, which the authority hopes to proceed with efficiently.
The go-ahead from the NRA in July 2014 came after it issued a more than 400-page safety report, saying two reactors at the Sendai plant in southern Japan were safe to switch back on. This was followed by a month-long public consultation period. Any restart quickly was not possible because the operator was to get two more NRA approvals for other facilities at the site. It is not clear how the Abe government is going to gain the consent of the communities living near the plant.

Greenpeace Japan argues that Japan has survived without nuclear power for more than a year and charged the government of “ignoring the lessons of Fukushima and attempting to prevent the renewable energy revolution, trying to take the nation back to its dependence on dangerous and unreliable nuclear power”.10 Though the Abe government has been trying to persuade a wary public that the world’s third largest economy must return to an energy source that once supplied quarter of its power, widespread anti-nuclear sentiment has simmered in Japan since the Fukushima meltdown, sparking the worst atomic disaster since Chernobyl.

Under pressure from the NRA, Kyushu Electric’s Genkai Nos. 3 and 4 reactors and Kansai Electric Power’s Takahama Nos. 3 and 4 reactors are upgrading their safety checks. These facilities have scaled up the level of earthquake protection and ready for final NRA checks. Measures have been implemented at both sites to ensure power in the event of an accident. If these facilities pass NRA certification by the 2014-end, they will likely be brought on stream by the spring of 2015. Earthquake-proofing remains an issue at many facilities. Shikoku Electric Power’s Ikata No. 3, Kansai Electric’s Oi Nos. 3 and 4, and Hokkaido Electric Power’s Tomari Nos. 1-3 reactors have a long way to go and it is difficult to tell when these will pass inspection. Implementing safety measures will take time and it is unlikely that they may resume operations until mid-2015 or later, depending how fast the safety standards are put in place.11

Complexity

The situation in other eight reactors is far worse and may take even longer time. Tokyo Electric Power’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nos. 6 and 7 are in this category where testing has barely begun. Like the reactors at the ill-fated Fukushima Daiichi plant, these are boiling water reactors, which must meet stricter requirements than pressurized water reactors, such as those at the Sendai plant.
As nuclear power makes a comeback with the prospect of a restart of the Sendai reactor, the government must address to three issues urgently. One is how to handle old reactors. The basic energy plan adopted in April 2014 calls for minimizing dependence on nuclear power. How is this going to be achieved without decommissioning reactors whose safety is difficult to ensure remains unclear. If the government strictly follows what it envisages in the basic energy plan, it will have to push utilities hard to decide soonest whether to scrap aging facilities.

The second issue is decommissioning. Since the disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, it remains the only facility officially slated for decommissioning. Decommissioning and scrapping reactors come with huge cost. For each scrapped reactor, the utilities’ loss comes to the tune of 10 billion yen ($93 million). It also remains unclear how the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry will help the utilities so that their losses are reduced. One way could be allowing companies to pass them on to customers in the form on higher rates, which could further complicate the issue.

The third challenge is how to dispose of the radioactive waste generated during the dismantling process since decommissioning work takes 20 to 30 years. No decision has been made on this. The NRA plans to speed up discussions regarding a decommissioning oversight system and it is a long way to go. Since the basic energy plan envisages some level of nuclear capacity, identifying it as an important power source, it remain unclear how much that dependence would be. During the zero-nuclear period, utilities focussed on such means as fossil-fuel-burning plants, raising emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by 10% from pre-accident levels.12 Even if the 20 reactors for which utilities have applied for testing return to operation, they will likely supply at most 10% of Japan’s electricity, a drop from 30 per cent that it accounted for during pre-Fukushima period. Once the aging reactors are scrapped, Japan will be unable to hold down emissions without building more nuclear facilities. Is the government ready to take this controversial step is a tough question to answer? Even if reactors that are 40 years old or more are weeded out, it remains unclear if the government can win support for the long process of restarts from a public that turned against nuclear power after the 2011 Fukushima disaster.

Banishing nuclear as a power source will cripple the country’s economy over the long run. Such measures will undo some of the measures that Abenomics has rendered to resuscitate the ailing economy. The inevitable rise in electricity rates will have a significant impact on the nation’s foundering economic recovery.

Household power prices already jumped 20% since the Fukushima Daiichi disaster, as swelling fossil fuel costs were passed on to customers. Seven utilities have raised rates, and nuclear-reliant Hokkaido Electric has applied for another increase of up to 17 %. If it takes a longer time to bring reactors back online, there is greater likelihood that others will also ask for further rate hike.13 Chairman of Tepco Fumio Sudo told a conference on 4 September that his company would not seek any rate hike until December 2014 and would prioritize cutting costs, if restart of its key Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant could be possible. But if Tepco and Kansai Electric seek rate hikes, it could put pressure on Abe if the consumption tax will be further hiked to 10 per cent in October 2015 as planned.

Closing aging reactors?

Under post-Fukushima rules, reactors are supposed to be decommissioned after 40 years. They can receive a 20-year extension but that is subject to more rigorous and costly safety regulations. As many as two-thirds of Japan’s 48 idled nuclear units may never return to operation because of the high costs, local opposition or seismic risks, while one-third will probably come back online eventually. Though the Sendai units have obtained the NRA approval for restart, the units still have to undergo operational safety checks before given the green light to restart. Utilities that want to extend the operating life of old reactors must submit detailed safety applications by July 2015, and explain how those facilities could be updated to meet the tougher safety standards put in place.14

Extending life of the aging reactors comes with huge cost and would make no economic sense for massive investments. For example, scrapping the No. 1 and No. 2 nuclear facility located in western Japan’s Fukui Prefecture, both over 40 years old, operated by Kansai Electric could be a viable option. Being old with relatively small capacity, restarting them would ring only a limited profit boost and cost several hundred billions of yen for inspections and safety measures. If Kansai Electric decides to scrap the reactors in the current fiscal year ending in March 2015, its extraordinary losses could be to the tune of 30 billion yen ($285 million). Kyushu Electric may also see merit to decommission its 38-year-old Genkai No. 1 reactor. According to Chugoku Electric Power Co President Tomohide Karita, as told in March, the utility was considering scrapping the 40-year-old Shimane No.1 reactor. The government is likely to ask the operators of 12 reactors that began operations before 1980 to decide by the end of the year whether to decommission them. That way, the government expects to gain public support to restart newer units. There are News
12 reactors that will reach 40-year limit within five years and the government is asking operators to come up with plans for de-commissioning older units by the end of 2014.

Future

If the principle of decommissioning nuclear reactors after 40 years of operation is applied strictly and no new nuclear plants or reactors are allowed to be constructed, there will be no nuclear power plants operating in Japan in 2049. Therefore, renewal of aged nuclear plants and reactors is an important task for the government.

Electric power companies have also been faced with the growing burden of additional safety measures. The key to a stable power supply lies in enabling utilities to continue operating their nuclear power businesses in the long term. As a first, the government needs to work for a standard price set on electricity generated at nuclear plants, which would guarantee a certain level of revenue to power companies. If utilities generating electricity resort to rate-cutting to outdo the competitor, the strategy will work against the companies and would not be economically sustainable. If the companies are guaranteed fixed revenue that would help them to strategise plans to build new nuclear reactors, each of this is likely to cost 400 billion yen. Therefore a standard pricing system could be a good option.

There are some good examples in Britain and the US and Japan can as well examine the merits of such systems and adopt something similar to that suitable to Japan.

Japan aims to decide the percentage of electricity to be generated by nuclear power by late 2015 when a U.N. climate conference is to be held in Paris. Though in the revised national energy plan adopted in April 2014, nuclear power generation remains as an “important base-load power source”, the debate on how much atomic power should play in the country’s energy-mix remains inconclusive. As the country debates, no breakdown for the proportion of power to be generated by nuclear power was included in the plan as it was difficult to determine how many reactors would be in a position to resume operation amid widespread public concern over nuclear safety as well as meeting stringent NRA safety standards. Nuclear is and shall remain a serious challenge for Japan to cope with.

Notes:
1. “Amazing CCTV Footage of Japan’s Tsunami in 2011”, by lifeintheknow, 20 October 2014, http://www.lifeintheknow.com/the-aftermath-of-japans-tsunami-in-2011/
2. See, Rajaram Panda, “Nuclear Power Back in Focus in Japan’s Basic Energy Plan 2014 – Analysis”, 14 April 2014, http://www.eurasiareview.com/14042014-nuclear-power-back-in-focus-in-japans-basic-energy-plan-2014-analysis/
3. “Japan approves energy plan backing nuclear power”, 11 April 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26984113
4. “Ex-PM Koizumi raps Abe’s aim to revive nuclear power”, 23 October 2014, http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20141023p2g00m0dm040000c.html
5. “Japan halts last nuclear reactor at Ohi”, 15 September 2013, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-24099022
6. “Japan moving toward nuclear restart, but hurdles remain”, 11 September 2014, http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Economy/Policy-Politics/Japan-moving-toward-nuclear-restart-but-hurdles-remain
7. “Japan nuclear plant gets safety OK, moves closer to resumption”, Mainichi Japan, 10 September 2014, http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20140910p2g00m0dm037000c.html
8. Toshio Kawada, “NRA approves safety at Kagoshima nuclear plant; paperwork next step”, 10 September 2014, http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201409100050
9. “Local city assembly OKs restart of nuclear plant”, Mainichi Japan, 28 October 2014, http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20141028p2g00m0dm064000c.html
10. “Japan nuclear watchdog backs restart of 2 reactors”, 10 September 2014, http://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/japan-nuclear-watchdog-backs-restart-of-2-reactors/article1-1262189.aspx
11. “Japan moving toward nuclear restart, but hurdles remain”,n.5
12. Ibid.
13. Ibid.
14. Kentaro Hamada and Osamu Tsukimori, “Regulator gives OK to restart 2 Sendai reactors in Kyushu”, http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/regulators-expected-to-ok-nuclear-plant-restart-in-kyushu

The post Japan Closer To Restart Idled Nuclear Reactors – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Morocco has decided to provide immediate military and intelligence support to the United Arab Emirates in its fight against terrorism, UAE’s state news agency WAM reported on Tuesday, citing a statement by the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Upon directives of King Mohammed VI, “the Kingdom of Morocco will provide an active support to the UAE in its fight against terrorism and its efforts to maintain regional and international peace and stability,” the statement said.

“This action, part of the tradition of successful partnership and strong solidarity between the two brotherly countries, reinforces a historic and multifaceted military and security cooperation with Gulf States,” the Moroccan ministry said, according to WAM.

“It supports and complements the other measures taken on the Moroccan territory to preserve the security and tranquility of Moroccan citizens face to the threat of international terrorism,” the Moroccan ministry added.

Morocco’s counter-terrorism support will focus on military, operational and intelligence aspects, according to WAM.

According to the ministry, the contribution of the kingdom will focus on military operational and intelligence aspects.

WAM noted previous security cooperation between the two countries, saying: “hundreds of Moroccan soldiers had, over several decades, been deployed on the UAE territory, as part of their contributions to training and security of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi.”

This action, part of the tradition of successful partnership and strong solidarity between the two brotherly countries, “reinforces a historic and multifaceted military and security cooperation with Gulf States,” the ministry said in a statement.

“It supports and complements the other measures taken on the Moroccan territory to preserve the security and tranquility of Moroccan citizens face to the threat of international terrorism,” the same source added.

According to the ministry, the contribution of the kingdom will focus on military operational and intelligence aspects.

In addition to its recognized international humanitarian operations and peacekeeping commitment, the Kingdom of Morocco has participated in several military operations to defend national security and territorial integrity of brotherly and friendly countries, including in Congo, Golan, Zaire (now DRC) and Saudi Arabia in 1990 following the invasion of Kuwait, the statement recalled.

Similarly, hundreds of Moroccan soldiers had, over several decades, been deployed on the UAE territory, as part of their contributions to training and security of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi.

The post Morocco Vows To Help UAE In Fight Against Terrorism appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Ivan Lidarev*

Are China and Russia moving toward an alliance? Since the outbreak of the Ukraine crisis and the visible rapprochement between the two sides this question has provoked concerns and even occasional fits of panic.

It is not difficult to see why. A Russia-China alliance would unite the second and the third most powerful militaries in the world and connect the enormous, dynamic economy of 1.3 billion Chinese with Russia’s colossal natural resources. Pictured on the map of the world this alliance would look formidable. Covering most of Eurasia’s vast landmass, a Sino-Russian alliance would emerge as a major regional actor in Europe, Central Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and, to lesser extent, the Middle East. With its sheer gravity, this huge alliance would inevitably expand its influence beyond China and Russia’s periphery and attract allies across the globe. The outcome would be a new world bloc which, on account of its ideational differences with the West and its conflicting interests with the US, can easily lead to a new global competition for influence. As the existing world order collapses, such competition would unleash a long period of conflict and instability, at great human, economic and political cost.

Undoubtedly, there are legitimate reasons for such concerns. On strategic level, the emergence of a Sino-Russian alliance is logical. Both Beijing and Moscow’s relations with Washington are increasingly strained and they have no other great power partners to turn to for alliance. Both sides also oppose US involvement in the domestic affairs of other countries and seek the replacement of the American-dominated unipolar world order with a multipolar one. On tactical level, the last months have witnessed many signs of rapprochement between the two giants. Among these stand out a historic 400 billion dollar gas deal signed in May and a string of forty agreements which include Chinese credit lines for embattled Russian banks, plans for building transportation infrastructure and a currency swap agreement which promotes the internationalization of the yuan at the dollar’s expense.

Does all this mean that a Sino-Russian alliance is forming? The straightforward answer is “No”. Such an alliance is not on the horizon for four reasons.

First, a Sino-Russian alliance would result in a major confrontation with the West, something which neither China nor Russia wants. The long-term cost of such a confrontation will be huge. China would endanger its vital economic relationship with the US and suffer from massive capital flight, huge decrease in foreign direct investment and embargo on the import of technologies necessary for its industry. These consequences would slow down China’s economic growth and hence would undermine its political and social stability. A conflict with the US would also push Washington to try to balance and even contain Beijing in Asia. In such case, the US would beef up its military presence around China’s borders and ally with PRC’s antagonists in the South China Sea and the East China Sea territorial disputes. Most likely, the US would also adopt a much harder policy on the Taiwan issue and a sympathetic one toward China’s internal dissenters. For Russia, the cost of a clash with the West would be smaller but still steep. The Russian economy, already seriously affected by the Ukraine crisis, would be severely damaged if the West further restricts its access to the Western financial markets and blocks the transfer of technologies needed by Russia’s energy sector. More ominously for Moscow’s finances, Europe might initiate a concerted push to reduce its dependence on Russian energy and block Russian energy projects such as the South Stream gas pipeline. Other consequences of a confrontation with the West would include the installation of an American missile defense shield in Eastern Europe, a prospect Moscow dreads, a stronger push by the West into the post-Soviet space, and an arms race with Washington at devastating cost to Russia. In short, the cost of a China-Russia alliance would be so high that Moscow and Beijing would pay it only if it is absolutely necessary.

Second, a Sino-Russian alliance would not be in China’s best interest, at this stage. The benefits of such an alliance for China would be smaller than those for Russia, as China is much stronger and can easily hold its own against the US. The costs for China, however, would be much greater, as Beijing boasts far greater economic ties with the West. An alliance with Moscow would also force Beijing to abandon its longstanding and highly beneficial policy of simultaneous cooperation and competition with Washington, to replace it with costly confrontation. Moreover, as Russia presently needs China much more than the other way round, Beijing can reap many of the benefits of an alliance with Moscow without committing to it and absorbing its substantial costs. The recent gas deal between the two sides, at prices and conditions more favorable to China (although details remain murky), exemplifies this state of affairs.

Third, distrust and clashes of interest mark the Sino-Russian relationship. Predictably, distrust is much stronger on the weaker side, Russia, as it faces the rise of the Chinese colossus on its eastern borders. Many Russian observers fear that their motherland would gradually become an economic appendage of its powerful neighbor and turn into underdeveloped source of natural resources. To them, an alliance with China will leave Russia politically and economically dependent on Beijing and open the door for the gradual absorption of Russia’s Far East into China. Beijing also does not thrust Russia, which it sees as a country with Eurocentric strategic priorities and conflicted relationship with the West which would sell China off for a good bargain in Europe and better relations with the West. The complex history of Sino-Russian relations and the two sides’ decade-long bargaining over various energy projects have also fueled mutual suspicion. Beyond mistrust, there are important issues on which the interests of the two giants clash. Russia fears China’s growing economic and political influence in Central Asia and works hard to balance Beijing’s influence in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and prevent the organization from becoming an economic community dominated by China. Such efforts run counter to Beijing’s “Go West” and “New Silk Road” policies which promote economic engagement with Central Asia. Similar dynamics of Chinese push and Russian balancing characterize their relations within BRICS. The politics of Russian arms sales are another point of tension. China resents Moscow’s arms sales to rivals like Vietnam and its unwillingness to sell its most modern defense systems to China while Russia fears that the PRC will pirate its most advanced weapons and systems. Naturally, the impact of all these conflicting interests on relations will be temporarily mitigated by Russia’s need to accommodate China in the face of Western sanctions, for example on issues like arms sales. However, it will inevitably reemerge.

Finally, the preconditions necessary for an alliance are not present in Sino-Russian relations, at least not sufficiently. An alliance is based on one of three preconditions: an acute sense of threat, a shared vision for the future of the international order or a preponderance of overlapping interests. At present, all three are, largely, lacking in Sino-Russian relations. Both sides perceive the US and, to lesser extent, Islamic radicalism as threats but neither is grave enough to provide the glue for an alliance, particularly in Beijing’s eyes. Although China and Russia seek to build a multipolar and illiberal world order, their visions differ. China likely aims to build a regional and international order that will guarantee its preeminence and provide it with institutional levers to shape the international political and economic system. Such vision is unacceptable for Russia which seeks to build a more balanced international order that would constrain China’s huge power. Finally, many of China and Russia’s key interests differ substantially, something which makes an alliance difficult to operate. At the end of the day, China would hardly risk a confrontation with the US over Ukraine or Georgia, while Russia is unlikely to sacrifice its relations with the West over Taiwan or the South China Sea.

For these four reasons, a Sino-Russian alliance is unlikely to emerge under the present circumstances. However, circumstances can change. If the relations of the two great powers with the US deteriorate dramatically, Beijing and Moscow might overcome their mutual distrust in the face of the shared American threat and decide that the high price of their alliance is worth paying. Such an outcome is even more likely if the two powers, particularly China, decide that the existing international system dominated by Washington does not serve their interests and that the returns of their participation in it are diminishing.

But even if such an alliance does not emerge, the China-Russia rapprochement is already a fact, with important consequences. This rapprochement, tentatively inaugurated in the nineties but recently accelerating, has improved Moscow and Beijing’s security situation and increased their self-confidence. As a result, both sides’ position vis-à-vis Washington has been strengthened and each has been able to adopt a tougher line toward the West. The rapprochement has also helped the two sides to coordinate their policies, particularly at the UNSC, on international issues such as the role of the ICC in Syria and Iran. More important, the Sino-Russian partnership has enabled Kremlin and Zhongnanhai to increase their international leverage by establishing international institutions alternative to those dominated by the US, such as BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and BRICS’s New Development Bank. In a larger perspective, the rapprochement between the two sides has laid down the institutional, policy and strategic foundations on which a future alliance can be built. Beyond politics and security, the Sino-Russian partnership also brings substantial economic benefits. China gains access to Russian energy and mineral resources at favorable prices, increasingly paid in renminbi, and supplied through secure routes beyond the reach of Washington which dominates most of the world’s sea lines of communications. For its part, Russia gains Chinese investment, technologies, new markets for Russian energy and, most important, opportunities to decrease its dependence on the West. These benefits and the prospect to increase them have served to lubricate Sino-Russian relations. All said, even without an alliance the Sino-Russian rapprochement affects international relations and shifts the global balance of power away from the West.

In summary, under present conditions, a Sino-Russian alliance is not on the horizon. From mutual mistrust to the perils of a confrontation with the West and from to the lack of preconditions for an alliance to Beijing’s disinterest in allying with Moscow, there are many reasons why a China-Russia alliance is unlikely. Nevertheless, this conclusion comes with two caveats. If tensions between Washington and the two powers escalate, such an alliance might appear on the cards. As mentioned above, a shared perception of threat is a key precondition for the formation of an alliance. But even without such an alliance, the progressive rapprochement between the two sides is consequential as it affects the global balance of power and serves as a foundation on which an alliance can be built.

Whether China and Russia will try to build on this foundation remains uncertain. It depends on the leaders of Moscow and Beijing but, just as important, on their counterparts in Washington and Brussels. But one thing is certain, the relations between Russia, China and the West are entering a delicate period.

* Ivan Lidarev is an independent analyst and a recent MA graduate from George Washington University’s Elliott School, where he studied International Relations with a focus on Asia. Ivan also has a rich think-tanking experience, having done research and interned at various institutions such as CSIS, India’s IDSA, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Center for the National Interest and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. Ivan specializes in Chinese foreign policy, Asian security and Sino-Indian relations and speaks Bulgarian, English, French, Russian and Mandarin Chinese. He is about to start work as an advisor to an MP at Bulgaria’s Parliament.

The post Is A Sino-Russian Alliance In The Making? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Joy Mitra*

There seems to be no thaw in relations since the Ukrainian crisis began. The US is belligerent and fails to understand the Russian imperative in Ukraine even as Russia, led by Putin, engages in military adventurism by trying to punch far above its weight in the post cold-war era. The actors have overlooked the genesis
of the crisis which has assumed newer proportions with the annexation of Crimea, the downing of MH-17, the ensuing border conflict and mounting causalities of the civil war between Ukrainian forces and Russian separatists of Ukraine.

Even though the whole episode might look like a return to cold war era the bottom-line is that this cold war is not as ‘cold’ as it should be, nor do we have a Gorbachev who would be open and courageous to make those risky initiatives that resulted in ‘détente’. If we look back at how all of this began we see that it was when the people of Ukraine aspired for the economic standards that only an EU membership could provide. Putin pulled the strings and Viktor Yanukovych went against the wishes of his people, an extra-constitutional coup was engineered which some argued was with the backing of ‘West’ and a cleavage was driven into the Ukrainian society between the Russian speaking people and the Ukrainians. As always West chooses whom to call ‘democratic’ and a  ‘legitimate representative of the people’. Russia took Crimea despite the multiple agreements it had signed with Ukraine regarding territorial integrity and did it under the garb of ‘humanitarian intervention’ something that surprised the US, but actually should not have considering its own record of using ‘humanitarian interventions’ for political ends.

Yanukovych’s political rival, Yulia Tymoshenko’ regime came down hard on its own Russian people inside Ukraine, but the West led by the US, overlooked this in the name of ‘resurgence of democracy’ and ‘Ukrainian territorial integrity’.

Would Ukraine’s integration into EU have harmed Russia so lethally that it risked a showdown with NATO? Perhaps not, but then why did Russia intervene? The irony is that Russia’s primary motive was to avoid a confrontation with NATO; it never wanted a NATO base on its borders, but for a man like Putin who is addicted to absolute power, ‘soft power’ and ‘subtle negotiation skills’ are phrases that do not exist in his dictionary. If not for the hawks with the cold war mindset in the US State Department and Pentagon, the US could have still negotiated and ensured a peaceful integration of Ukraine into the EU without Ukraine becoming NATO launch pad for an offensive against Russia. Instead, the US offensive interest in a traditional Russian ‘sphere of influence’ has ensured that belligerence by all sides is the way forward.

NATO, which faced a lot criticism and some even dismissed it as a redundant cold war era collective security organization, may have found a purpose in the current Ukrainian-Russian tussle, and by pushing Russia into the Chinese embrace it may have just made sure that with the rising Chinese power the world will see a transition from a US hegemony to a bipolar structure with the US initiatives delivering the allies what China needs.

The episode definitely shows the UN in poor light. It exposes the redundancy of UN in a crises situation when the big powers are involved. Whether in Ukraine or in Syria the power structure of UNSC was found wanting of the capabilities required to mitigate a crisis that acquired newer and more dangerous proportions by the day.

If one were to guess who has taken the greatest hit, the most expected answer would be the Ukrainians and sure they have. But it is in fact the concept of sovereignty that has taken the biggest hit in the turmoil. It turns out that sovereignty is a concept only applicable for superpowers and not for small nations. Big powers engage in their power games, while small nations become pawns in the chessboard of geopolitics.

Russian actions will resonate in the whole of Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have all been increasing their engagement with China, and their efforts to balance Russia with China have simultaneously seen China’s rise as a Central Asian power. It is important to note that in the whole jamboree of sanctions and counter sanctions if there is one country that has benefited then it is China.

US foreign policy may have forced Russia to act far more in concert with China than it would have wanted given the competitive element in their relationship over influence in Central Asia. Europe was the main consumer of Russian gas until now, but as evinced by the massive $400 billion deal between Russia and China, Russia seeks to diversify the markets it caters to, thereby reducing its dependency on the European market. But creating the required infrastructure would inevitably take an appreciable interval of time before gas starts flowing. Gazprom, the Russian gas giant, has very little access to credit as a result of the sanctions to finance the
infrastructure, and so while China has agreed to finance it in part it will extract heavy concessions on price — something that had stalled the development of this deal. In a way Russia’s bid to reduce its dependence on Europe has only been replaced with a similar situation with the Chinese. To a large extent US actions are also the result of the frustration of this inevitable power transition that is taking place in the world. But whether the US policy will actually impede this transition is anybody’s guess.

It is important to know that gas is not something that one can cease extracting simply by turning a tap off. From the time gas starts flowing from Russia to China Gazprom will suffer losses and hence the Russian economy, which is highly dependent on the export of this commodity at high prices. It does not look like a fairy tale for Europe either because when winter sets in despite the gas reserves that it has accumulated, the European-US strategic alliance will be tested. Some of the European economies that have already been performing lethargically can ill-afford this game of sanctions and counter-sanctions by Europe and Russia. The Russian intervention in Ukraine has in-fact for the first time created a divergence of interests between the US and its European allies in what is an offensive power projection interest on one side and economic and energy security on the other. The nature of world politics has hardly moved beyond ‘zero-sum games’ ‘sanctions’, ‘spheres of influence’, ‘hegemony’ and ‘territorial expansion’. Realism, which was a result of the cold-war, has been revitalized thanks to the impetus given by a ‘not so cold’ cold-war. The failure of liberal-institutionalism is most evident in a world where power is conceptualized only in material terms and power structure is all that determines the interaction of its constituents.

Joy Mitra is second year student at the Master of Arts in Diplomacy, Law and Business program at Jindal School of International Affairs. His research interests include conflict negotiation and security studies in Af-Pak and Kashmir,India-China comparative studies and US-China-India strategic relations.

The post What Does Russian Intervention In Ukraine Tell Us About Nature Of World Politics? – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

A District Court judge in Maine has authorized an order restricting the movements of a nurse who recently returned to the area from West Africa over fears that she might spread the deadly Ebola virus.

In response to a request filed earlier this week by state officials, District Court Chief Judge Charles LaVerdiere wrote that the nurse, Kaci Hickox, must stay at least three feet away from all other persons effective Friday, as well as adhere to a half-dozen other restrictions pending further instruction expected to come in the next 10 days.

“This decision has critical implications for [Hickox’s] freedom, as guaranteed by the US and Maine Constitutions, as well as the public’s right to be protected from the potential severe harm posed by transmission of this devastating disease,” the temporary order reads in part.

Hickox, 33, arrived in New Jersey last Friday from Sierra Leone after volunteering there with Doctors Without Borders amidst a historically tragic Ebola outbreak. Officials in the Garden State immediately quarantined the nurse over concerns that she could spread the highly contagious disease, but subsequent tests suggested she never contracted the disease; because it may take upwards of 21 days to show symptoms, officials in Maine have insisted Hickox isolate herself from others since she returned home to the town of Fort Kent on Tuesday.

The court order — signed Thursday but not published until Friday morning — says Hickox must submit to direct active monitoring; coordinate her travel with public health authorities; not use public transportation; avoid public places, such as malls and movie theatres; avoid workplaces; stay within Fort Kent’s boundaries unless told otherwise; and “maintain a 3-foot distance from others when engaging in non-congregate public activities (i.e., walking or jogging in the park).”

According to the document, a full hearing will be held sometime between this Sunday and next in order to assess Hickox’s situation further.

Earlier this week, the nurse said she would reject the state’s attempt to have her adhere to voluntary restrictions, and Thursday morning she went for a bike ride in Fort Kent, defying officials’ orders.

That same day, the National Nurses United and an affiliated union, California Nurses Association, announced they’d be protesting next month to demonstrate against the treatment of health care workers returning from Africa.

The post Court Orders Movement Restrictions On Maine Nurse Over Ebola Fears appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Fighters from Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government forces, known as Peshmerga, are set to enter the Syrian town of Kobani to join the fight against the ISIL militants.

The Syrian Kurdish fighters in Kobani say a group of ten Peshmerga fighters entered the besieged town on Thursday through the border crossing with Turkey to study the geography of the area.

They later went back to the Turkish side of the border to prepare for the arrival of a group of 150 fighters who are awaiting deployment to the embattled town.

The Turkish government had long been refusing the Kurds to join the anti-ISIL fight, but Ankara unexpectedly announced last week that it would allow the Peshmerga to enter Kobani through the Turkish border.

Kobani and its surroundings have been under attack since mid-September, with the ISIL militants capturing dozens of nearby Kurdish villages and killing hundreds of people. More than 200,000 people have also fled across the border into Turkey.

Syria has been grappling with war for more than three years. The violence fuelled by armed groups has so far claimed the lives of nearly 200,000 people, according to reports.

Original article

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By Majid Izadpanahi

After the presidential elections of 14 June 2013, Iran’s Hassan Rouhani has proved that he is introducing changes in the country’s foreign policy based on cooperation and moderation as he did when he was nuclear negotiator. Iranians have shown that they seek moderation and reject a hardline policy. This election has therefore created opportunities and opened the door for a rapprochement between Iran and the West.

The results of this election was a clear message from Iranians to the world, particularly the US, that they prefer a rational policy and dialogue with the West, a moderate approach, and the preference to be a part of the international community, rather than following an adventurous policy, confrontation with the West, and isolation. The radicals in Iran faced a dramatic defeat despite their eight-year old domination of the executive system.

Why Change?

Ahmadinejad’s maladministration led to economic chaos, devaluation of the Iranian currency and decline of the rate of economic growth. The conservatives’ hardline policies led to the internationally isolation of Iran. Admadinejad’s controversial speeches and policies raised suspicions in the West about Iran’s nuclear programme. This led to the to imposition of international sanctions on Iran with the purpose of curbing Iran’s nuclear weapons programme at the United Nations Security Council. The sanctions targeted the Iranian oil industry, banks and its economy, which had an adverse impact on the Iranian economy as well as Iran’s economic relations with other countries. Through the sanctions, there was an attempt to deprive the Iranian government of oil revenue and finally influence the nuclear programme. In response to this, Ayatollah Khamenei termed the sanctions barbaric.

Today, Iranian President Rouhani is determined to bring to end speculation about Iran’s nuclear weapons programme and rebuild relations with the world and the West. Beyond that, he seeks to normalise the relationship with the US – as he himself said, Iran cannot be resentful of the US forever.

Iran-Middle East

Relations between Iran and its neighbours are on an upward slope. Sultan Qaboos of Oman, who mediates between Tehran and Washington, visited Iran, perhaps to discuss mediation with the government. The ruler of Dubai, Shaikh Al Maktoum, in his interview with BBC in January 2014 demanded that the sanctions on Iran be lifted. Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Saud Al faisal met Iranian Foreign Minister, Zavad Zarif in New York, where they discussed bilateral cooperation to fight terrorism and other regional problems.

Iran-Europe

There has been a significant change in Iran’s behaviour towards major European countries. After the seizing of the British Embassy by radicals and break in relations in 2011, the Iranian Foreign Minister recently met the British Foreign secretary and the respective embassies were reopened in Tehran and London. President Rouhani in his visit to Davos for the World Economic Forum invited oil companies to invest in Iran and was warmly welcomed by the large oil companies. Further, Iran and the P5+1 group reached an interim nuclear deal and the West has temporally suspended some of the sanctions on Iran until a final agreement is reached, when all sanctions will hopefully be removed.

Nuclear Deal

Just one month after Rouhani took the office Ayatollah Khamenei paved the way for flexibility in negotiations with the West by saying, “As long as red lines are not crossed … artful and heroic flexibility in all the political arenas are accepted.” This can be interpreted as Ayatollah Khamenei’s support for Rouhani’s foreign policy based on interactions with the West and integration in the international system.

Iran-US

Thirty five years after the Revolution and subsequent break in ties, the Iranian and American presidents had a landmark telephonic conversation, and the foreign ministers of both states have met several times in the form of bilateral and multilateral talks. The optimism that now has appeared is not only due to the gradual lifting of sanctions but also the results of the 2013 elections that brought back the pragmatists and reformists to power, who have already shown their eagerness for friendly relations with the West.

How Long Will the Change Last?

Everything now depends on how the US perceives the political situation in Iran and responds to the policy of the moderates. If the moderates and reformists get the expected results, it can increase their political manoeuvrability against the conservatives and radicals. The bottom line would be that the radicals would then not be able undermine the moderates’ authority.

Given the upcoming parliamentary elections in December 2015 in Iran, it becomes important to point out that parliament today is under the rule of conservatives. If the moderates hope to win, they will have to strengthen their position against the conservatives, and for this they need tangible achievements in terms of the economy and a comprehensive nuclear agreement. The nuclear deal can change Iran’s political and economic situation. And the sooner they achieve it, the better able they will be to change the power equation.

Majid Izadpanahi
Research Intern, IPCS, and PhD Candidate, Centre for West Asian Studies, SIS, JNU
Email: majid.izadpanahi@yahoo.com

The post Rohani And Iran’s Foreign Policy: Charting The Change – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.