By US President Barack Obama

Thank you. (Applause.) Thank you so much. Everybody, please have a seat.

Well, thank you, Lisa, for the introduction. Lisa is an example of the countless dedicated public servants across our government, a number of who are here today, who are working tirelessly every single day on behalf of the security and safety of the American people. So we very much appreciate her. And thanks to all of you for your attendance and participation in this important summit.

For more than 238 years, the United States of America has not just endured, but we have thrived and surmounted challenges that might have broken a lesser nation. After a terrible civil war, we repaired our union. We weathered a Great Depression, became the world’s most dynamic economy. We fought fascism, liberated Europe. We faced down communism — and won. American communities have been destroyed by earthquakes and tornadoes and fires and floods — and each time we rebuild.

The bombing that killed 168 people could not break Oklahoma City. On 9/11, terrorists tried to bring us to our knees; today a new tower soars above New York City, and America continues to lead throughout the world. After Americans were killed at Fort Hood and the Boston Marathon, it didn’t divide us; we came together as one American family.

In the face of horrific acts of violence — at a Sikh temple near Milwaukee, or at a Jewish community center outside Kansas City — we reaffirmed our commitment to pluralism and to freedom, repulsed by the notion that anyone should ever be targeted because of who they are, or what they look like, or how they worship.

Most recently, with the brutal murders in Chapel Hill of three young Muslim Americans, many Muslim Americans are worried and afraid. And I want to be as clear as I can be: As Americans, all faiths and backgrounds, we stand with you in your grief and we offer our love and we offer our support.

My point is this: As Americans, we are strong and we are resilient. And when tragedy strikes, when we take a hit, we pull together, and we draw on what’s best in our character — our optimism, our commitment to each other, our commitment to our values, our respect for one another. We stand up, and we rebuild, and we recover, and we emerge stronger than before. That’s who we are. (Applause.)

And I say all this because we face genuine challenges to our security today, just as we have throughout our history. Challenges to our security are not new. They didn’t happen yesterday or a week ago or a year ago. We’ve always faced challenges. One of those challenges is the terrorist threat from groups like al Qaeda and ISIL. But this isn’t our challenge alone. It’s a challenge for the world. ISIL is terrorizing the people of Syria and Iraq, beheads and burns human beings in unfathomable acts of cruelty. We’ve seen deadly attacks in Ottawa and Sydney and, Paris, and now Copenhagen.

So, in the face of this challenge, we have marshalled the full force of the United States government, and we’re working with allies and partners to dismantle terrorist organizations and protect the American people. Given the complexities of the challenge and the nature of the enemy — which is not a traditional army — this work takes time, and will require vigilance and resilience and perspective. But I’m confident that, just as we have for more than two centuries, we will ultimately prevail.

And part of what gives me that confidence is the overwhelming response of the world community to the savagery of these terrorists — not just revulsion, but a concrete commitment to work together to vanquish these organizations.

At the United Nations in September, I called on the international community to come together and eradicate this scourge of violent extremism. And I want to thank all of you — from across America and around the world — for answering this call. Tomorrow at the State Department, governments and civil society groups from more than 60 countries will focus on the steps that we can take as governments. And I’ll also speak about how our nations have to remain relentless in our fight — our counterterrorism efforts — against groups that are plotting against our counties.

But we are here today because of a very specific challenge — and that’s countering violent extremism, something that is not just a matter of military affairs. By “violent extremism,” we don’t just mean the terrorists who are killing innocent people. We also mean the ideologies, the infrastructure of extremists –the propagandists, the recruiters, the funders who radicalize and recruit or incite people to violence. We all know there is no one profile of a violent extremist or terrorist, so there’s no way to predict who will become radicalized. Around the world, and here in the United States, inexcusable acts of violence have been committed against people of different faiths, by people of different faiths — which is, of course, a betrayal of all our faiths. It’s not unique to one group, or to one geography, or one period of time.

But we are here at this summit because of the urgent threat from groups like al Qaeda and ISIL. And this week we are focused on prevention — preventing these groups from radicalizing, recruiting or inspiring others to violence in the first place. I’ve called upon governments to come to the United Nations this fall with concrete steps that we can take together. And today, what I want to do is suggest several areas where I believe we can concentrate our efforts.

First, we have to confront squarely and honestly the twisted ideologies that these terrorist groups use to incite people to violence. Leading up to this summit, there’s been a fair amount of debate in the press and among pundits about the words we use to describe and frame this challenge. So I want to be very clear about how I see it.

Al Qaeda and ISIL and groups like it are desperate for legitimacy. They try to portray themselves as religious leaders — holy warriors in defense of Islam. That’s why ISIL presumes to declare itself the “Islamic State.” And they propagate the notion that America — and the West, generally — is at war with Islam. That’s how they recruit. That’s how they try to radicalize young people. We must never accept the premise that they put forward, because it is a lie. Nor should we grant these terrorists the religious legitimacy that they seek. They are not religious leaders — they’re terrorists. (Applause.) And we are not at war with Islam. We are at war with people who have perverted Islam. (Applause.)

Now, just as those of us outside Muslim communities need to reject the terrorist narrative that the West and Islam are in conflict, or modern life and Islam are in conflict, I also believe that Muslim communities have a responsibility as well. Al Qaeda and ISIL do draw, selectively, from the Islamic texts. They do depend upon the misperception around the world that they speak in some fashion for people of the Muslim faith, that Islam is somehow inherently violent, that there is some sort of clash of civilizations.

Of course, the terrorists do not speak for over a billion Muslims who reject their hateful ideology. They no more represent Islam than any madman who kills innocents in the name of God represents Christianity or Judaism or Buddhism or Hinduism. No religion is responsible for terrorism. People are responsible for violence and terrorism. (Applause.)

And to their credit, there are respected Muslim clerics and scholars not just here in the United States but around the world who push back on this twisted interpretation of their faith. They want to make very clear what Islam stands for. And we’re joined by some of these leaders today. These religious leaders and scholars preach that Islam calls for peace and for justice, and tolerance toward others; that terrorism is prohibited; that the Koran says whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind. Those are the voices that represent over a billion people around the world.

But if we are going to effectively isolate terrorists, if we’re going to address the challenge of their efforts to recruit our young people, if we’re going to lift up the voices of tolerance and pluralism within the Muslim community, then we’ve got to acknowledge that their job is made harder by a broader narrative that does exist in many Muslim communities around the world that suggests the West is at odds with Islam in some fashion.

The reality — which, again, many Muslim leaders have spoken to — is that there’s a strain of thought that doesn’t embrace ISIL’s tactics, doesn’t embrace violence, but does buy into the notion that the Muslim world has suffered historical grievances — sometimes that’s accurate — does buy into the belief that so many of the ills in the Middle East flow from a history of colonialism or conspiracy; does buy into the idea that Islam is incompatible with modernity or tolerance, or that it’s been polluted by Western values.

So those beliefs exist. In some communities around the world they are widespread. And so it makes individuals — especially young people who already may be disaffected or alienated — more ripe for radicalization. And so we’ve got to be able to talk honestly about those issues. We’ve got to be much more clear about how we’re rejecting certain ideas.

So just as leaders like myself reject the notion that terrorists like ISIL genuinely represent Islam, Muslim leaders need to do more to discredit the notion that our nations are determined to suppress Islam, that there’s an inherent clash in civilizations. Everybody has to speak up very clearly that no matter what the grievance, violence against innocents doesn’t defend Islam or Muslims, it damages Islam and Muslims. (Applause.)

And when all of us, together, are doing our part to reject the narratives of violent extremists, when all of us are doing our part to be very clear about the fact that there are certain universal precepts and values that need to be respected in this interconnected world, that’s the beginnings of a partnership.

As we go forward, we need to find new ways to amplify the voices of peace and tolerance and inclusion — and we especially need to do it online. We also need to lift up the voices of those who know the hypocrisy of groups like ISIL firsthand, including former extremists. Their words speak to us today. And I know in some of the discussions these voices have been raised: “I witnessed horrible crimes committed by ISIS.” “It’s not a revolution or jihad…it’s a slaughter…I was shocked by what I did.” “This isn’t what we came for, to kill other Muslims.” “I’m 28 — is this the only future I’m able to imagine?” That’s the voice of so many who were temporarily radicalized and then saw the truth. And they’ve warned other young people not to make the same mistakes as they did. “Do not run after illusions.” “Do not be deceived.” “Do not give up your life for nothing.” We need to lift up those voices.

And in all this work, the greatest resource are communities themselves, especially like those young people who are here today. We are joined by talented young men and women who are pioneering new innovations, and new social media tools, and new ways to reach young people. We’re joined by leaders from the private sector, including high-tech companies, who want to support your efforts. And I want to challenge all of us to build new partnerships that unleash the talents and creativity of young people — young Muslims — not just to expose the lies of extremists but to empower youth to service, and to lift up people’s lives here in America and around the world. And that can be a calling for your generation.

So that’s the first challenge — we’ve got to discredit these ideologies. We have to tackle them head on. And we can’t shy away from these discussions. And too often, folks are, understandably, sensitive about addressing some of these root issues, but we have to talk about them, honestly and clearly. (Applause.) And the reason I believe we have to do so is because I’m so confident that when the truth is out we’ll be successful. Now, a second challenge is we do have to address the grievances that terrorists exploit, including economic grievances. Poverty alone does not cause a person to become a terrorist, any more than poverty alone causes somebody to become a criminal. There are millions of people — billions of people — in the world who live in abject poverty and are focused on what they can do to build up their own lives, and never embrace violent ideologies.

Conversely, there are terrorists who’ve come from extraordinarily wealthy backgrounds, like Osama bin Laden. What’s true, though, is that when millions of people — especially youth — are impoverished and have no hope for the future, when corruption inflicts daily humiliations on people, when there are no outlets by which people can express their concerns, resentments fester. The risk of instability and extremism grow. Where young people have no education, they are more vulnerable to conspiracy theories and radical ideas, because it’s not tested against anything else, they’ve got nothing to weigh. And we’ve seen this across the Middle East and North Africa.

And terrorist groups are all too happy to step into a void. They offer salaries to their foot soldiers so they can support their families. Sometimes they offer social services — schools, health clinics — to do what local governments cannot or will not do. They try to justify their violence in the name of fighting the injustice of corruption that steals from the people — even while those terrorist groups end up committing even worse abuses, like kidnapping and human trafficking.

So if we’re going to prevent people from being susceptible to the false promises of extremism, then the international community has to offer something better. And the United States intends to do its part. We will keep promoting development and growth that is broadly shared, so more people can provide for their families. We’ll keep leading a global effort against corruption, because the culture of the bribe has to be replaced by good governance that doesn’t favor certain groups over others.

Countries have to truly invest in the education and skills and job training that our extraordinary young people need. And by the way, that’s boys and girls, and men and women, because countries will not be truly successful if half their populations — if their girls and their women are denied opportunity. (Applause.) And America will continue to forge new partnerships in entrepreneurship and innovation, and science and technology, so young people from Morocco to Malaysia can start new businesses and create more prosperity.

Just as we address economic grievances, we need to face a third challenge — and that’s addressing the political grievances that are exploited by terrorists. When governments oppress their people, deny human rights, stifle dissent, or marginalize ethnic and religious groups, or favor certain religious groups over others, it sows the seeds of extremism and violence. It makes those communities more vulnerable to recruitment. Terrorist groups claim that change can only come through violence. And if peaceful change is impossible, that plays into extremist propaganda.

So the essential ingredient to real and lasting stability and progress is not less democracy; it’s more democracy. (Applause.) It’s institutions that uphold the rule of law and apply justice equally. It’s security forces and police that respect human rights and treat people with dignity. It’s free speech and strong civil societies where people can organize and assemble and advocate for peaceful change. It’s freedom of religion where all people can practice their faith without fear and intimidation. (Applause.) All of this is part of countering violent extremism.

Fourth, we have to recognize that our best partners in all these efforts, the best people to help protect individuals from falling victim to extremist ideologies are their own communities, their own family members. We have to be honest with ourselves. Terrorist groups like al Qaeda and ISIL deliberately target their propaganda in the hopes of reaching and brainwashing young Muslims, especially those who may be disillusioned or wrestling with their identity. That’s the truth. The high-quality videos, the online magazines, the use of social media, terrorist Twitter accounts — it’s all designed to target today’s young people online, in cyberspace.

And by the way, the older people here, as wise and respected as you may be, your stuff is often boring — (laughter) — compared to what they’re doing. (Applause.) You’re not connected. And as a consequence, you are not connecting.

So these terrorists are a threat, first and foremost, to the communities that they target, which means communities have to take the lead in protecting themselves. And that is true here in America, as it’s true anywhere else. When someone starts getting radicalized, family and friends are often the first to see that something has changed in their personality. Teachers may notice a student becoming withdrawn or struggling with his or her identity, and if they intervene at that moment and offer support, that may make a difference.

Faith leaders may notice that someone is beginning to espouse violent interpretations of religion, and that’s a moment for possible intervention that allows them to think about their actions and reflect on the meaning of their faith in a way that’s more consistent with peace and justice. Families and friends, coworkers, neighbors, faith leaders — they want to reach out; they want to help save their loved ones and friends, and prevent them from taking a wrong turn.

But communities don’t always know the signs to look for, or have the tools to intervene, or know what works best. And that’s where government can play a role — if government is serving as a trusted partner. And that’s where we also need to be honest. I know some Muslim Americans have concerns about working with government, particularly law enforcement. And their reluctance is rooted in the objection to certain practices where Muslim Americans feel they’ve been unfairly targeted.

So, in our work, we have to make sure that abuses stop, are not repeated, that we do not stigmatize entire communities. Nobody should be profiled or put under a cloud of suspicion simply because of their faith. (Applause.) Engagement with communities can’t be a cover for surveillance. We can’t “securitize” our relationship with Muslim Americans — (applause) — dealing with them solely through the prism of law enforcement. Because when we do, that only reinforces suspicions, makes it harder for us to build the trust that we need to work together.

As part of this summit, we’re announcing that we’re going to increase our outreach to communities, including Muslim Americans. We’re going to step up our efforts to engage with partners and raise awareness so more communities understand how to protect their loved ones from becoming radicalized. We’ve got to devote more resources to these efforts. (Applause.)

And as government does more, communities are going to have to step up as well. We need to build on the pilot programs that have been discussed at this summit already — in Los Angeles, in Minneapolis, in Boston. These are partnerships that bring people together in a spirit of mutual respect and create more dialogue and more trust and more cooperation. If we’re going to solve these issues, then the people who are most targeted and potentially most affected — Muslim Americans — have to have a seat at the table where they can help shape and strengthen these partnerships so that we’re all working together to help communities stay safe and strong and resilient. (Applause.)

And finally, we need to do what extremists and terrorists hope we will not do, and that is stay true to the values that define us as free and diverse societies. If extremists are peddling the notion that Western countries are hostile to Muslims, then we need to show that we welcome people of all faiths.

Here in America, Islam has been woven into the fabric of our country since its founding. (Applause.) Generations of Muslim immigrants came here and went to work as farmers and merchants and factory workers, helped to lay railroads and build up America. The first Islamic center in New York City was founded in the 1890s. America’s first mosque — this was an interesting fact — was in North Dakota. (Laughter.)

Muslim Americans protect our communities as police officers and firefighters and first responders, and protect our nation by serving in uniform, and in our intelligence communities, and in homeland security. And in cemeteries across our country, including at Arlington, Muslim American heroes rest in peace having given their lives in defense of all of us. (Applause.)

And of course that’s the story extremists and terrorists don’t want the world to know — Muslims succeeding and thriving in America. Because when that truth is known, it exposes their propaganda as the lie that it is. It’s also a story that every American must never forget, because it reminds us all that hatred and bigotry and prejudice have no place in our country. It’s not just counterproductive; it doesn’t just aid terrorists; it’s wrong. It’s contrary to who we are.

I’m thinking of a little girl named Sabrina who last month sent me a Valentine’s Day card in the shape of a heart. It was the first Valentine I got. (Laughter.) I got it from Sabrina before Malia and Sasha and Michelle gave me one. (Laughter.) So she’s 11 years old. She’s in the 5th grade. She’s a young Muslim American. And she said in her Valentine, “I enjoy being an American.” And when she grows up, she wants to be an engineer — or a basketball player. (Laughter.) Which are good choices. (Laughter.) But she wrote, “I am worried about people hating Muslims…If some Muslims do bad things, that doesn’t mean all of them do.” And she asked, “Please tell everyone that we are good people and we’re just like everyone else.” (Applause.) Now, those are the words — and the wisdom — of a little girl growing up here in America, just like my daughters are growing up here in America. “We’re just like everybody else.” And everybody needs to remember that during the course of this debate.

As we move forward with these challenges, we all have responsibilities, we all have hard work ahead of us on this issue. We can’t paper over problems, and we’re not going to solve this if we’re always just trying to be politically correct. But we do have to remember that 11-year-old girl. That’s our hope. That’s our future. That’s how we discredit violent ideologies, by making sure her voice is lifted up; making sure she’s nurtured; making sure that she’s supported — and then, recognizing there are little girls and boys like that all around the world, and us helping to address economic and political grievances that can be exploited by extremists, and empowering local communities, and us staying true to our values as a diverse and tolerant society even when we’re threatened — especially when we’re threatened.

There will be a military component to this. There are savage cruelties going on out there that have to be stopped. ISIL is killing Muslims at a rate that is many multiples the rate that they’re killing non-Muslims. Everybody has a stake in stopping them, and there will be an element of us just stopping them in their tracks with force. But to eliminate the soil out of which they grew, to make sure that we are giving a brighter future to everyone and a lasting sense of security, then we’re going to have to make it clear to all of our children — including that little girl in 5th grade — that you have a place. You have a place here in America. You have a place in those countries where you live. You have a future.

Ultimately, those are the antidotes to violent extremism. And that’s work that we’re going to have to do together. It will take time. This is a generational challenge. But after 238 years, it should be obvious — America has overcome much bigger challenges, and we’ll overcome the ones that we face today. We will stay united and committed to the ideals that have shaped us for more than two centuries, including the opportunity and justice and dignity of every single human being.

Thank you very much, everybody. (Applause.)

The post Statement By President Obama At Closing Of Summit On Countering Violent Extremism appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Bosnian police officers arrested six men who were suspected of supporting ISIS (Daesh) on Wednesday, the AP reported. Two were believed to have plans to go to Syria and fight with the jihadist group.

Boris Grubesic, spokesman for the state prosecution office, told the AP the arrests were made in several cities in cooperation with intelligence.

A leader of the salafi movement in Bosnia, Husein Bosnic, was arrested last year and currently waiting trial for recruiting young Muslims to fight in Syria. There is an estimated 200 people who have left in support of Daesh, according to the AP.

Part of the political unrest in Bosnia is believed to have come from political unrest and frustration over the economy, terrorist expert Vlado Azinovic told the AP. Azinovic said the salafi movement is “exploiting” the economic situation when over 40 percent of Bosnians are currently unemployed.

The salafi movement began in the ’90s when Muslim Bosnians fought against the Serbs and Croats, but today salafism is affiliated with jihadist groups such as Daesh.

Original article

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By Ghazanfar Ali Khan

Military chiefs from more than 22 countries battling the Islamic State (IS) group began talks in Riyadh on Wednesday to assess the coalition’s current strategy and map out a plan to tackle other terrorist groups operating in the Middle East.

A formal reception was hosted for the military chiefs of the foreign countries at a local hotel on Wednesday night, a diplomatic source, who requested anonymity, said.

This led to an informal round of discussions, but the main talks are scheduled for Thursday, he said. This high-powered military meeting is significant because of the growing threat posed by IS.

The meeting also coincides with the Summit on Countering Violent Extremism, which started in the US Wednesday.

The summit will highlight domestic and international efforts to prevent violent extremists and their supporters from radicalizing, recruiting, and inspiring individuals and groups.

The talks in Riyadh would include a general assessment of the coalition’s battle against IS, said another diplomat.

“It is more an exchange of information and a chance for coordination,” he said.

The talks also coincide with the rise of IS in Libya, which has heightened concerns in the region. The group seized parts of Iraq and Syria last year.

Arab states have intensified their bombing of IS targets since the militants in early February killed the Jordanian fighter pilot Maaz Al-Kasaasbeh, whose plane went down over Syria last year.

Bahrain has decided to send forces to Jordan to support the country and the international coalition.

Last week, the UAE sent an F-16 squadron to Jordan as part of its support for the coalition. Jordan’s information minister said Bahrain had deployed fighter jets in the kingdom to support the anti-IS air campaign.

Saudi Arabia and its Western allies including the US, France, and Germany have been participating in the airstrikes against IS in Syria since September last year.

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Wither the bomb – as a legal problem. Ever since its inception as a weapon of war, atomic, and subsequently nuclear weaponry, have become the totemic reminders that sovereignty lie in their acquisition. Not having them poses insecurity; acquiring them grants the illusion of safety while pushing the globe towards greater prospects of immolation.

The Nuclear Weapons Non-Proliferation Treaty, which came into force in 1970, was the juggling result of this dilemma. The question that dogs the entire treaty is that of power: where does it lie? Non-nuclear powers are discouraged from acquiring a nuclear weapons potential, though not a civilian potential – indeed, they are encouraged to receive technology for peaceful purposes “on a non-discriminatory basis” at a cheap price.

Nuclear weapons powers, however, are merely required to pay lip service to such misty-eyed visions of a world without nuclear weapons, while happily engaging in that euphemistic word termed “modernisation”. Article Six, a vague provision at best, makes the five nuclear states “undertake to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective means relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date.” Disarmament, in the scheme of things, becomes utopia.

In other words, the NPT is a club of skewed membership with poor credentials, despite the note from the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs calling it significant for having more signatories than “any other arms limitation and disarmament agreement”.[1] Analysts like Fred Kaplan argue that the NPT did prevent the nuclear club from swelling – a prediction of 25-30 countries having such weapons is deemed a more terrifying prospect than having the addition of four or so more powers.[2] Of course, the underlying rationale of the NPT was precisely that: keeping the club exclusive.

But it has been shown over the years of its operation that the NPT is a legal creature with vast, lumbering deficiencies. The supply of technology to produce “peaceful” nuclear energy can just as well be used to create nuclear weaponry – a point emphasised by a thriving nuclear black market, and the easy means by which uranium can be enriched outside the scrutiny of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Countries like North Korea have realised such weaknesses, abrogating its commitment to the regime by employing Article 10. But the system justifies its own abuses, making non-nuclear weapons states compliant by allowing IAEA inspection.

Then come the gentleman’s club of nuclear powers – the ones who came before the others and script a tune they don’t necessarily march to. The treaty prohibits the nuclear club powers, under Article 1, from providing materials, technology and incidental material that would be used for making nuclear weapons. The nuclear weapon states are also not to “assist, encourage, or induce any non-nuclear weapon State to manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices, or control over such weapons or explosive devices.”

In reality, this nuclear club continues to create dispensations and mark out areas of exception. Over time, countries have received nuclear technology in violation of signatory undertakings. The supposed limitations imposed by the NPT on non-nuclear weapons states have been deemed insufficient.

But one such state takes the mantle when it comes to nuclear exceptionalism. Israel has deemed it wise not to sign the NPT, thereby evading the prying eyes of the IAEA. It prefers the state of ambiguity that surrounds its weapons, while insisting that other states not undertake a nuclear weapons program. In December, former speaker of the Knesset, Avraham Burg, decided to wade into dangerous waters by challenging this policy of ambiguity as “outdated and childish,” calling for a “regional dialogue, including with Iran”. He was met by accusations of treason by the Legal Forum for the Land of Israel.[3]

Nuclear countries have also capitalised on this position, while insisting that Israel “become a state party to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.”[4] As far back as January 5, 1968, National Security Advisor Walt Rostow expressed the view to President Lyndon Johnson that Israel would, eventually, sign the NPT.[5] But it was as early as 1966 that the CIA realised that Israel has acquired nuclear capability.

Technology has been supplied to Israel, despite an official position by Washington that it would be “unalterably opposed to Israel’s acquiring of nuclear weapons.”[6] That, in addition to traditional industrial espionage undertaken by the spy ring Lakam, made acquiring the nuclear weapons program a matter of course, to be undertaken even in defiance of its close ally’s position.

As a member of the nuclear club, the United States is on record as having featured in its nuclear program. Initially, it was deemed unwitting – the supply of a 5-magawatt (thermal) research reactor at Nahal Soreq; the supply of heavy water to the Dimona reactor in 1963. France, a point noted in Pierre Pean’s Les duex bombes (1982), did even more, kick-starting the Dimona project and revealing the role of French technicians behind creating a plutonium extraction plant at the same site.[7]

In a declassified report by the US Department of Defence, Critical Technology Assessment in Israel and NATO Nations (April 1987), the schizophrenic nature of US weapons policy towards Israel was revealed. It was acknowledged that Israel was “developing the kind of codes which will enable them to make hydrogen bombs. That is, codes which detail fission and fusion processes on a microscopic and macroscopic level.”[8] (The technical crew did, however, suggest Israel had some catching up to do.) Furthermore, “The SOREQ and the Dimona/Beer [sic] Sheva facilities are the equivalent of our Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore and Oak Ridge National Laboratories.” Ideas on various technologies are noted, including the use of various types of detonator codes.

Roger Mattson, formerly of the Atomic Energy Commission’s staff, found the “degree of cooperation on specialised war making devices between Israel and the US” striking. European powers, and their role behind the Israeli defence complex, are also noted.

Grant Smith, who initiated the Freedom of Information request for the report, has actively argued that the Pentagon proved coy about its knowledge and involvement with the Israeli defence industry, burying it “in violation of the Symington and Glenn amendments, costing taxpayers $86 billion” (RT, Feb 13).

As director of the Washington think tank Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy, Smith has long argued that violations have taken place of the Symington Amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 prohibiting US foreign aid to countries found trafficking in nuclear enrichment equipment or technology, and the Glenn Amendment of 1977, which demanded an end of US foreign aid to countries importing nuclear reprocessing technology.

Certain breaches of the international regime on non-proliferation, in other words, are tolerated. Israel remains the grandest of security exceptions – or ambiguities – free of signing the NPT, obviating the need to deal with the IAEA, and a catalyst, and recipient, of nuclear weapons technology.

Notes:
[1] http://www.un.org/disarmament/WMD/Nuclear/NPT.shtml

[2] http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2005/05/the_real_nuclear_option.html

[3] http://www.timesofisrael.com/avraham-burg-panned-for-breaking-nuclear-ambiguity/

[4] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/15/truth-israels-secret-nuclear-arsenal

[5] http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/israel/documents/battle/02-01.htm

[6] http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/israel/documents/battle/01-01.htm

[7] http://www.wisconsinproject.org/countries/israel/nuke.html

[8] http://www.courthousenews.com/2015/02/12/nuc%20report.pdf

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Dear Mr. Editor,

I write to you as International counsel to His Excellency, former President Rupiah Banda and to Henry Banda (Mr. Banda), regarding serious and urgent concerns over articles published on your website over the past week. I refer to your articles of 9 February 2015, “Henry Banda joins Katumbi, Lungu in Mfuwe”, and 17 February 2015, “Lungu, Katumbi, RB, Henry Banda seal arms deal for Zambian military” (the Articles), containing blatantly fictitious information.

As you are well aware, His Excellency and his family have been subject to baseless allegations by the Zambian government and partisan media such as yourself over the past year. During this period, politically compromised outlets such as the Zambian Watchdog have published a vast array of false accusations against the distinguished former President and his family. We can only assume that these fabricated news articles are an attempt to tarnish the good reputation of my client and manipulate the Zambian people.

The Articles referred to above contains information that is absolutely false and fictitious. This letter is a notice to you to stop mindless defamation against my client, Mr. Henry Banda. Mr. Banda is an honorable businessman who has not been charged with any crime. We have physical evidence that Mr. Banda was not present in Mfuwe at any time during the period mentioned in the Articles; as such the allegations in the Articles are fabricated and untrue. These allegations lack any form of substance. The purpose of these headlines is to stir up an attack campaign on my clients with the intent of damaging the reputation of Mr. Banda and that of His Excellency.

We understand the Zambian Watchdog to now in part be funded by a group known as “the cartel”, who view the Banda family as political opponents. In the past, much has been published concerning the Banda family that have been ignored, but this situation can no longer be tolerated, given the gravity of the bogus allegations now made.

I therefore request that you act expeditiously to remove the above Articles or disable access to the links to their webpage and associated social media platforms, in order to avoid proceedings being issued against you for defamation in the London courts.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,
Robert Amsterdam
International counsel to former President Rupiah Banda and to Henry Banda

The post An Open Letter To Zambian Watchdog – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Allison Deger*

On Saturday night, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released on Facebook a ISIS inspired campaign video in which his Likud party suggests that a vote for his opponents will lead to Israel’s takeover by the Islamic terror group.

The video shows a white pickup truck hauling gunmen in black balaclavas who are waving ISIS flags as they pull up to a sedan with an Israeli driver. Bearded fighters dressed in fatigues inside the vehicle roll down their window and ask the Israeli, “How do we drive to Jerusalem?” Their car has an election sticker on the rear with the slogan for the Zionist Camp, the union of Labor and Hatnua, Netnayahu’s main contenders in Israel’s upcoming March elections.

“Go to the left,” responds the Israeli driver. The ISIS fighters speed away firing rounds into the air.

On a black screen bullet markings barrel out the warning, “The left will surrender to terror,” closing with Netanyahu’s electoral catchphrase, “It’s us, or them. Only the Likud. Only Netanyahu.”

The video is sampled with the Arabic song “Ghorbah” by the Jordanian-based Palestinian hip-hop group Torabyeh. The section audible in Netanyahu’s ad is:

My status is deformed because of my art
My poetry for my people is meaningless
My departure from earth is only a matter of time

…

I want to be buried in the same graveyard my grandfather is in
Ever since I was young I dreamt of being a soldier
With time I discovered whom I belong to
Mahmoud Abbas, Fatah, Hamas or Jabha

Despite the rough/tough sound in “Ghorbah,” the song is not a call to arms, nor does it have anything to do with ISIS. The excerpt used in Netanyahu’s video cuts out the lyrics, “I am not a killer but I can commit a crime to protect my rights. For my country my pen is writing for me.” Moreover, Netanyahu’s version fades out the audio just after Palestinian political parties are listed. The next lines are: “they are all mercenaries. I can no longer deal with these people living a lie. The picture is nice but the background is destroyed.”

If Netanyahu’s video had continued longer, the lyrics would have gone on to show the song is a lamentation on displacement and dispossession:

Now I come to you to share my pain
Because I felt that me and you are the same
The projects in Amman are throwing us around
Mother nature hold me and return me back inside you
Because all this construction above you is adding to my pain.

Within hours of Netanyahu publishing his video online, Torabyeh gave a response also on Facebook. The band threatened legal action for use of the song without permission, as well as endangering the musicians by insinuating they drafted a pro-ISIS anthem, “which is consequently putting the group’s members lives at risk,” Torabyeh said.

Here is their response in full:

In the last propaganda video released by the Israeli Likud Party which is headed by the criminal Benjamin Netanyahu (Zionist right-wing), the song called “Ghorbah” by Torabyeh has been used. The propaganda video shows units from ISIS waving a flag of the Islamic State in an SUV while asking for directions to Jerusalem. This is followed by the Zionist answering “Turn left ” to the question and the video ends with the sentence “the left surrenders to terrorism.”

The use of the song in the particular context cannot be considered anything but deliberate propaganda of the Zionist right for the purpose of electoral propaganda and attacking the so-called Zionist “left wing”. Furthermore, it implicates the Torabyeh group by containing serious accusations of terrorism and association with ISIS which is consequently putting the group’s members lives at risk.

We strongly condemn and reject this ruthless infringement of intellectual property rights and the distortion of the reputation of Torabyeh. What is more, we reject all forms of cooperation with the Zionist enemy (right and left) and the fascist expansionist colonial entity. Torabyeh group will take all necessary legal action against those responsible.

Victory for the Palestinian people and the Arab against colonialism, Glory to the martyrs

About the author:
*Allison Deger is the Assistant Editor of Mondoweiss.net. Follow her on twitter at @allissoncd.

Source: This article was published by Mondoweiss.net here.

The post Netanyahu Says Labor Will Bring ISIS To Jerusalem – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

With the reported fall of the Ukrainian town of Debaltseve, the Minsk II ceasefire looks like little more than a Russian maneuver, one that chips away at Western unity.

From the start, many observers saw Minsk II as only a stopgap measure. Even so, European leaders seemed to cling to hope that the ceasefire could provide a basis for a more comprehensive, permanent solution to the war in eastern Ukraine.

Perhaps it should not be so surprising that Minsk II was so brittle. In retrospect, it seems Moscow was never intent on bargaining in good faith. Ultimately, the ceasefire only handed Russian proxies in eastern Ukraine yet another tactical advantage.

The concept of a ceasefire as a tactical maneuver is hardly new for Russia. It has earlier precedents in Russia’s lengthy experience in the business of propping up separatists in its “near abroad.” In particular, the most recent Minsk II deal has similarities to another conflict in which Russia always denied direct involvement – the 1992-93 war in Abkhazia between local separatist forces and the Georgian army.

As has been the case in eastern Ukraine, the Abkhazia war saw minority separatist forces rescued by a massive influx of Russian “volunteers.” Reinforced by experienced Russian fighters and heavy arms, Abkhaz separatists managed to overpower what otherwise should have been a more capable Georgian military.

The sudden flow of volunteers into Abkhazia, it should be remembered, came on the heels of Georgian government military successes. Thousands of Georgian troops deployed in mid-1992 seemed to force the separatist leadership to the edge of capitulation. Then, in September 1992, Russia helped to hastily broker a ceasefire, which, had it been actually observed, would have led to the disbandment of separatist formations. But that ceasefire, like those in Ukraine, proved little more than a tactical feint, and fighting resumed that October.

By that point, separatist Abkhaz forces had been bolstered by “volunteers,” enabling them to go on the offensive and retake territories in northern Abkhazia. Later, another ceasefire was brokered in July 1993. Like in Ukraine, that second ceasefire was established from a position of Russian strength, and also called for gradual demilitarization, which included the withdrawal of heavy weapons and compliance monitoring by international observers. In Abkhazia, the United Nations was entrusted with monitoring responsibilities. In Ukraine, it is the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE). Neither mission proved able to restrain Russian forces.

The 1993 ceasefire also proved to be a phony peace. By late September 1993, separatist and Russian forces drove Georgian government troops from the Abkhazian capital of Sukhumi, and hundreds of thousands of Georgian civilians were ethnically cleansed. Thousands of these internally displaced persons still live in squalor in provisional housing centers throughout Georgia.

The lesson from Abkhazia, as it is today in Ukraine, appears clear: while a diplomatic and political solution is a preferred option, any sort of durable peace requires both sides to be able to negotiate from positions of strength. With Ukraine currently suffering an extended string of military setbacks, conditions are unlikely to yield a favorable diplomatic or political outcome. Pro-Russia forces, circling the edges of the strategic Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, have little incentive to adhere to any ceasefire – and Moscow has even less reason to restrain them.

Should Mariupol fall, another ceasefire is not out of the question. But it would only be another tactical pause that benefits the rapidly advancing brigades of separatists and pro-Russian forces. Before any ceasefire can be effective, Ukraine needs to find a way to regain the initiative and halt the momentum of pro-Russian forces on the ground.

This article also appeared at Eurasianet.org.

The post Eastern Ukraine Has Parallels To Abkhazia – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Yadigar Sadiqov*

On June 27, 2013 a court in Lenkoran issued a formal arrest warrant, two days after the police had detained me. When I left the courtroom, I was bundled into a police Fiat and taken to the pre-trial detention centre at Kurdakhane in Baku. The investigation phase finished on August 29, and eight days beforehand, I was transferred to Lenkoran [to await a court hearing]. That was the day I first got to know the railway carriages used to transport prisoners, known as “Stolypins”.

Petr Stolypin was prime minister of Tsarist Russia at the beginning of the 20th century. He came to power during the first Russian revolution of 1905-07, and carried out mass arrests of revolutionaries and sent them into exile in Sibera. Because of the huge numbers, special carriages were used to transport the convicts. Hence the name “Stolypin carriages”.

The modern ones are not the same as those 100 years ago, of course, but the name has stuck from generation to the next. There are also prisoners in Azerbaijan who have never heard of Stolypin. Some call them after Stalin instead.

The kind of carriage we were transported in has nine compartments, not including a section set aside for the security detail. Five of the compartments are larger than the rest and designed to hold more prisoners. They have six bunks, three on each side.

The other four compartments are smaller in area and only have three bunks arranged on one wall. They are mostly assigned to women, juvenile offenders and “problem prisoners” (although not “problem” in the sense of prisoners of conscience), so as to keep them separate from the rest. If there is no one falling into those categories, ordinary prisoners are put in these compartments.

On my prison train journeys to Lenkoran and Shirvan, there were women but none of the other special categories eligible for the smaller compartments. The women were put in the last compartment, the only one with lighting. The rest had to make do with whatever light came in from the corridor. The other small compartments were mostly used to hold elderly or sick convicts, and only after that were the remaining places assigned to others.

After my first two trips to Lenkoran, the head of the guard detail saw that the other prisoners treated me with respect and asked who I was. On subsequent trips I was always placed in a small compartment, which afforded relative comfort, and I stress the word relative. Depending on total numbers, the larger compartment had 12 to 15 people in them and the smaller ones only three to five.

Unlike passenger carriages, prison coaches have no windows. Nor is there a table, naturally enough. Instead of having a solid door, they have a grill, which gives the guard detail a full view of the inside. There are windows on the corridor side, although they too are covered in grills. The guard detail is based at the end of the carriage, where there would be a giant samovar in a normal coach. The soldiers take their meals here and rest between shifts. While on duty, they have to stand in the corridor and watch the prisoners.

The Stolypin carriage is hitched to a normal passenger train and makes one return trip every ten days. They run on two routes – Baku to Astara [stopping at Lenkoran], and Baku to Goradiz [via Shirvan]. A prison coach does the former trip on the first, 11th and 21st of each month, and the latter – which we went on to go to the appeals court in Shirvan on the fifth, 15th and 25th of the month.

In each case, the prisoner will go back to Baku on the next day assigned for a transport, meaning that someone who is brought to attend a regional court will go back to the detention centre in Baku ten days afterwards. They await the next transport in a cell at a local police station. There are rules saying that a detained person cannot be held in a police cell for more than ten days.

Sometimes a prisoner is taken back to Baku the same day, on the same train. It depends on the progress of the investigation or the court hearing. It happened to me once. On November 22 I went to Lenkoran and attended a court hearing at which the next hearing date was set for December 4. That meant I was able to return the same day, returning to Lenkoran on December 1.

For “problem” prisoners, hearings are arranged so as to allow them to return the same day. They include the suicidal, the mentally unbalanced (or those faking it), and those who have committed grave crimes of a sexual nature that would make them outcasts among professional criminals. Local police stations are reluctant to have custody of prisoners like this.

Making a round trip in an uncomfortable Stolypin carriage within 24 hours is not an exercise to be relished. I will describe the hardships in greater detail in a future article.

Prisoners can also be transported in special vehicles which still bear the Soviet-era slang name of “voronok” [equivalent to Black Maria]. All eight trips I made to Lenkoran for court hearings were by rail, but on three of those occasions I returned in a Black Maria. I noted earlier that sometimes there are more prisoners than allowed, and then it gets cramped. Once there were more prisoners to be brought back from Lenkoran than expected – on top of those who had been brought from Baku there were a few more who had recently been detained. Among them were five football hooligans arrested after an August 25 [2013] game between Khazar-Lenkoran and Neftchi. Four days later, four people had been arrested for drug dealing. There were others detained individually on various charges. Instead of four, there were five or six to a cell. So on August 31, they sent 16 of us to Baku in a Black Maria.

On December 24 [2013], when the prosecutor requested a seven-year sentence for me, and then on January 14 [2014], the day after I was sentenced , I was again taken back to Kurdakhane in a Black Maria. This was arranged to avoid the risk of public protests.

The main advantage of a Black Maria over a Stolypin carriage is that the journey only takes five hours, although that is not for those of a nervous disposition. The section of road from Lenkoran to Salyan is in particularly poor shape. Add to that the heat and the number of prisoners, and being transported becomes an unbearable experience.

Each time I travelled to the appeals court in Shirvan – where I went on five occasions – I came back in a Black Maria. This often happens in Shirvan. The trip from Shirvan to Shuvelan [in Baku] is a lot more comfortable than the one from Lenkoran. For a start, the journey only takes two-and-a-half hours at most, and once you leave Shirvan, you are on a motorway, which makes the trip relatively comfortable. Of course, that is only relative to a Black Maria from Lenkoran, or to a Stolypin coach.

Prisoners will recall how when they were at liberty wanted a taxi in Baku, they would shun Zhiguli cars and only get into a Mercedes. Now we dream of a Black Maria – anything but a Stolypin carriage. That just about sums up how relative things are.

About the author:
*Yadigar Sadiqov, a leading figure in the opposition Musavat party, is serving a six-year sentence in Azerbaijan.

Source:
This article was published by IWPR at CRS Issue 767.

The post Azerbaijan: Prison Trains And Black Marias – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

On February 15, Saman Naseem, a young Iranian man set to be executed on Thursday, was once again brutally beaten by men believed to be intelligence officials in a bid to make him “confess” again in front of a camera, which he refused to do, Amnesty International said.

“Time is running out for Saman Naseem. The fact that Iran is willing to execute a man who was tortured to confess to a crime he is accused of having committed when he was a child shows the state of injustice in the country,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

“These wrongs can never be undone but it is not too late to immediately stop Saman Naseem’s execution and initiate a thorough judicial review of his case.”

Saman Naseem was sentenced to death following a “grossly unfair” trial in April 2013 by a criminal court in Mahabad, West Azerbaijan Province, for “enmity against God” and “corruption on earth” because of his alleged membership of the Kurdish armed opposition group, Party For Free Life of Kurdistan, and taking part in armed activities against the Revolutionary Guards, according to Amnesty International.. He was 17-years-old at the time.

In a letter seen by Amnesty International, Saman Naseem, now 22 years old, described how he was kept in a 2 x 0.5 metre cell and constantly tortured before being forced, while blindfolded, to put his fingerprints on “confession” papers.

The post Iran: Juvenile Offender Set To Be Hanged Brutally Beaten To Confess, Says Amnesty appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Michele Penna

You might expect the largest Chinese embassy to be in the United States, the world’s biggest economy. Or in Japan, China’s most powerful neighbor. Or, given the growing sympathies between China and Russia, it might be headquartered in Moscow.

Instead, it is in Pakistan. The new embassy was inaugurated on February 13 in the presence of China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who described China’s new diplomatic mission as a “symbol of friendship”. No further details were offered to the public, but the number of exclamation marks dotting the Foreign Ministry’s report seems to prove that a certain amount of excitement was part of the enterprise.

According to the official version of the event, “Wang Yi said that the five-starred red flag, won by martyrs with their blood, carries the Chinese nation’s tradition of unremitting efforts for self-improvement and opens up bright prospects for us, and it will wave in the heart of every Chinese forever!” Furthermore, “as a symbol of the special friendship between China and Pakistan, it will definitely play its due role in China-Pakistan all-weather friendly relations!”

Hype aside, the fact that China’s largest embassy is now in Islamabad says a lot about Beijing’s interest in South and Central Asian affairs. The two countries have been long-standing allies and are currently trying to establish a China-Pak Economic Corridor (CPEC) that will link the port of Gwadar on the Pakistani coast to the western province of Xinjiang with railways, roads and pipelines for gas and oil. The project is meant to be an important part of China’s New Silk Road initiative, as Beijing calls its plan for investments across the Eurasian Continent. In November, Reuters reported that in the coming six years Beijing will back energy and infrastructure projects in Pakistan with $45.6 billion.

Some of the projects that China is supporting are nuclear. The Wall Street Journal wrote in 2014 that China was in talks with Pakistani authorities to get three nuclear power plants worth $13 billion. Earlier this month Wang Xiaotao, vice-minister of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), confirmed what had already been rumored a year before: much to the chagrin of international observers who believe that the deal will undermine non-proliferation, Beijing is backing the construction of six reactors.

Besides economic cooperation, there is also a geopolitical side to the story. The Chinese government is troubled by separatism in the tumultuous province of Xinjiang, which shares a long and porous border with Central Asia. What worries Beijing is the possibility that a crisis triggered by instability in Afghanistan could spill over on Chinese soil, making matters even worse.

As journalist and author Ahmed Rashid wrote on the Financial Times in January, “of particular concern to China is the national security threat in its northwestern ‘autonomous region’ of Xinjiang, which has seen a recent surge in riots and terrorist attacks. Some Islamic radicals belonging to the Uighur ethnic group have trained with the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Beijing would like to ensure that such militants gain neither training nor protection within Taliban-controlled territory in the future.” This problem is worsened by NATO’s gradual retreat from the region, which could leave a power and economic vacuum behind.

Islamabad’s help is fundamental to work out a political solution to the Afghan problem. The war in Afghanistan is deeply influenced by what happens in Pakistan and fighters operate across the border. In other words, in order to tackle its own problems – real and potential – China needs to have the Pakistani authorities as much as possible on its side. And that might be precisely what Mr. Wang had in mind last week, when he told the press that “Pakistan has always played a unique and irreplaceable role in dealing with the issue of Afghanistan. In future, both China and Pakistan are willing to strengthen communication and coordination with Afghanistan and work with the international community to make unremitting efforts to realize the successful transition of Afghanistan.”

The post China Opens ‘Largest’ Embassy In Pakistan To Strengthen South Asia Presence – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Brussels has done virtually nothing about Hungary’s problematic laws and practices concerning human rights since the European Commission in March 2014 created a “rule of law” measure to address serious abuses in EU member states, Human Rights Watch said in a report released Wednesday.

The five-page Human Rights Watch report identifies a range of outstanding human rights concerns stemming from laws and practices enacted by the government led by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán since its election in 2010. The Hungarian government has introduced a raft of problematic laws and policies while international calls to amend them have gone largely unheeded.

“Hungary is exhibit A for the need for stronger European Union action to protect rights inside its own borders,” said Lydia Gall, Balkans and Eastern Europe researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The EU needs to stand up for its own values and protect the rights of Hungary’s citizens, including by activating the commission’s rule of law mechanism and putting the country’s record on the agenda of the European Council.”

Hungary’s laws and practices that cause concern include limitations on the powers of the country’s Constitutional Court; curbs on media freedom; and limitations on the rights of women, people with disabilities, members of certain religious groups, and homeless people. Since its re-election in 2014, the government has pursued a campaign against independent organizations that receive foreign funds, including smear campaigns and arbitrary financial inspections. International pressure has led only to minor, mostly cosmetic changes to laws and practices and major concerns remain, Human Rights Watch said.

Human Rights Watch identified a series of reforms needed to bring Hungary’s laws and practices in line with its international and regional obligations, including to:

• Cease its campaign against nongovernmental organizations that administer or receive foreign funds and publicly acknowledge the importance of independent groups in a European democracy;
• Restore the powers of the Constitutional Court;
• Ensure judicial independence, including by carrying out recommendations by the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission on judicial appointments;
• Establish a multiparty parliamentary nomination system for members of the Media Authority and Council to ensure its independence from government;
• Reverse the constitutional amendment permitting criminalization of homelessness and repeal all legislation with the same effect;
• Implement the European Court of Human Rights ruling on equality for religious organizations and ensure that eligibility for state subsidies by religious groups is determined by an independent body and subject to appeal in courts;
• Ensure that every citizen is entitled to vote regardless of disability and amend the constitution to reflect this;
• Take concrete action to protect the rights of the Roma minority and at the highest government levels publicly condemn anti-Roma and anti-Semitic speech; and
• Ensure protection for domestic violence survivors by extending protection under the 2013 domestic violence provision to all women regardless of relationship status after a single instance of violence, increasing shelter spaces, and ratifying the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence as soon as possible.

“Every EU member state has room for improvement when it comes to human rights,” Gall said. “But faced with a Hungarian government that appears determined to deliberately undermine human rights protection, it is vital for Brussels to act.”

The post Hungary Sees Little EU Action On Rights Concerns, Says HRW appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Maybe you should take a good look at your partner’s fingers before putting a ring on one. Men with short index fingers and long ring fingers are on average nicer towards women, and this unexpected phenomenon stems from the hormones these men have been exposed to in their mother’s womb, according to a new study by researchers at McGill University.

The findings might also help explain why these men tend to have more children. The study, showing a link between a biological event in fetal life and adult behavior, was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences.

Men’s index fingers are generally shorter than their ring fingers. The difference is less pronounced in women. Previous research has found that digit ratio – defined as the second digit length divided by the fourth digit length – is an indication of the amount of male hormones, chiefly testosterone, someone has been exposed to as a fetus: the smaller the ratio, the more male hormones. The McGill study suggests that this has an impact on how adult men behave, especially with women.

“It is fascinating to see that moderate variations of hormones before birth can actually influence adult behaviour in a selective way,” said Simon Young, a McGill Emeritus Professor in Psychiatry and coauthor of the study.

Smiles and compliments

Several studies have been conducted previously to try to assess the impact of digit ratio on adult behavior. This one is the first to highlight how finger lengths affect behavior differently depending on the sex of the person you are interacting with.

“When with women, men with smaller ratios were more likely to listen attentively, smile and laugh, compromise or compliment the other person,” said Debbie Moskowitz, lead author and Professor of Psychology at McGill. They acted that way in sexual relationships, but also with female friends or colleagues. These men were also less quarrelsome with women than with men, whereas the men with larger ratios were equally quarrelsome with both.

For women though, digit ratio variation did not seem to predict how they behaved, the researchers report.

Digit ratio and children

For 20 days, 155 participants in the study filled out forms for every social interaction that lasted 5 minutes or more, and checked off a list of behaviors they engaged in. Based on prior work, the scientists classified the behaviors as agreeable or quarrelsome. Men with small digit ratios reported approximately a third more agreeable behaviors and approximately a third fewer quarrelsome behaviors than men with large digit ratios.

A previous study had found that men with smaller digit ratios have more children.

“Our research suggests they have more harmonious relationships with women; these behaviors support the formation and maintenance of relationships with women,” Moskowitz says. “This might explain why they have more children on average.”

The researchers were surprised to find no statistically relevant link between dominant behaviors and digit ratios. They suggest future research could study specific situations where male dominance varies – such as competitive situations with other men – to see whether a correlation can be established.

The post Men With Short Index Fingers And Long Ring Fingers Treat Women Better? appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Craig Hicks was a human time bomb in his Chapel Hill, North Carolina neighborhood. He was constantly spoiling for a fight, about noise or parking or anything else that he found irritating. Hicks was always armed, a resident of an “open carry” state which allowed him to wear a holstered gun anywhere at any time. On February 10, 2015, Hicks turned himself in to the police and confessed to murdering three people that day.

The victims were identified as Deah Shaddy Barakat, his wife Yusor Abu-Salha, and her sister Razan Abu-Salha. Hicks had argued with the family about parking spaces but it seems any reason to pull the trigger would have been good enough.

Hicks motive for the killing is murky. Some of his political views could be called liberal and others conservative. But more than anything Hicks was serious about being a white man. He loved his guns and he asserted his right to be armed at all times. It is likely that he had mental health issues, but the sickness did not emerge solely from this particular individual.

Where Hicks fell on the political spectrum is really beside the point. He expressed support for the right to bear arms, marriage equality and abortion rights but more than anything he supported his right to be violent. Because of their passivity everyone around him did as well.

His neighbors are now telling the media about his constant arguments and confrontations while being armed but there are no reports of anyone ever calling the police about his behavior. The Barakats told relatives they feared Hicks but ultimately decided not to call the police either. Hicks’ neighbors discussed their concerns among themselves but took no other action. The complicity led to unintentional enabling and that made the killings inevitable.

The inaction stands in stark contrast to the treatment meted out to black people who are at risk of being killed even when they don’t threaten anyone. North Carolina allows open carry of firearms but so does the state of Ohio. That fact didn’t keep John Crawford or Tamir Rice from being shot down in Dayton and Cleveland respectively. They had toy guns and weren’t a danger to anyone. Yet both of them are now on the long list of black people killed by the police. Open carry laws are obviously reserved for white people only.

It is important to ask if the Hicks murders were a hate crime but there are questions which must be explored and they may be harder to deal with than legal definitions. The most fundamental questions is this. Why are white people seen as benign and their behavior as normative, no matter what they do?

Try to imagine a black man picking fights with his neighbors while armed. Then try to imagine that no one ever calls the police in this hypothetical scenario. In Tampa, Florida a black man named Clarence Daniels was legally carrying a gun when he walked into a Walmart. A white man took it upon himself to confront and assault Daniels. The white assailant was arrested but as a black man Daniels was lucky not to have ended up dead.

Hicks got the kid glove treatment despite the obvious risk he posed to other people. Fealty to whiteness trumps all else including the desire for safety. In 2014 a Nevada rancher named Cliven Bundy sparked a white power movement which threatened the lives of federal marshals. Bundy owed the government thousands of dollars in payment for his cattle grazing on federal land. He didn’t just refuse to pay. He gathered a group of armed followers. Two of them, Jerad and Amanda Miller, went on to kill two police officers.

At least one person knew that the Millers were armed and dangerous. She saw their arsenal of weapons and heard them say they were going to start a revolution. “I should have called the cops,” was the lame admission. That much is obvious but the expression of regret doesn’t explain very much.

The stand your ground and open carry laws are a return to the days when white supremacy was openly expressed through conquest of the native population, slavery, and lynch law terror. Those acts should not be seen as events of long ago history. They became part of this country’s DNA and give angry, unstable white people a pass to do what they want. They aren’t thought of as potential killers or terrorists as they should be. Bystanders aren’t sufficiently concerned because they too give white people the benefit of the doubt even when they don’t deserve it.

Hicks strongly believed in the right to bear arms and had four handguns, two shotguns and six rifles in his home at the time of the killings. No one knows what twisted thoughts finally sparked the violence but the sickness of this country’s history helped him to carry it out. There are thousands of dangerous people like him who call themselves patriots or sovereign citizens or doomsday preppers. But mostly they just believe in being white.

The post An Angry White Man Kills Again – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Cameron McKibben*

On February 3, testimony was presented to the House Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, regarding U.S. strategic interests in the region.[i] The testimony appears to align with the 2015 National Security Strategy (NSS), released February 6, regarding U.S. global strategic positioning. While drug violence, corruption, and economics were discussed as major issues for the region, the concerns of geo-strategic competition and great power politics have subtly begun to dominate the U.S. security strategy discourse. Latin America will become a battleground for influence in the great power game, but Latin American countries are becoming more committed to liberating themselves from dependence on great powers.

The first sentence in the 2015 NSS in which the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is mentioned characterizes current Sino-U.S. relations. “The scope of our cooperation with China is unprecedented, even as we remain alert to China’s military modernization and reject any role for intimidation in resolving territorial disputes.”[ii] Both Beijing and Washington would be remiss to endanger bilateral economic relations, since the U.S. is China’s largest trading partner and the PRC is the second largest trading partner of the United States. Zhong Shan, vice minister of commerce of the PRC, describes U.S.-China trade as a “win-win.”[iii] However, the latter portion of the previously mentioned sentence indicates that tensions remain in Sino-U.S. relations, and there is obvious skepticism emanating from Washington, and Beijing for that matter, on the other’s intentions.

Washington has adopted an offensive realist view of the changing dynamics in the international system. Following the end of the Cold War, the United States reigned as the global hegemon. Despite facing economic competition from the European Union, and recently China, the strength of the U.S. military is unrivaled. Many argue that the world is not unipolar, rather it is led by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) or “Western” coalition, but Washington has largely unilaterally molded the international economic system promoting free markets in which capital accumulation and wealth are key. Even though Beijing may currently be integrating into the U.S.-led global economic system to promote its own development, upon obtaining the necessary relative power, its revisionist intentions will surface.[iv] Aspects of that international system, which the U.S. has created, may be threatened in the near future and Washington will react to protect the system in which it and its allies have prospered.

Offensive Realism in Great Power Rivalry

As the leading proponent of offensive realism, John Mearsheimer argues that due to physical constraints, hegemony is only achievable within a state’s own region, but acquiring regional hegemony is the only way in which a state can ensure its security.[v] Despite only being able to achieve regional hegemony, an offensive realist state will attempt to undermine the efforts of other states to become the hegemon of their respective regions. They accomplish this by using allied regional powers to contain the rising revisionist power, acting as an offshore balancer.[vi] While this is merely a basic explanation of offensive realism, it can be accurately applied to the emerging U.S.-China rivalry.

Within the National Security Strategy, the limitations of Washington’s ability to project its power around the globe are recognized:

“On all these fronts, America leads from a position of strength. But, this does not mean we can or should attempt to dictate the trajectory of all unfolding events around the world. As powerful as we are and will remain, our resources and influence are not infinite.”[vii]

Still, the U.S. should be expected to continue to act as an offshore balancer. While not able to achieve hegemony in the Asia-Pacific, the U.S. has continued to strength its regional relations, particularly with Japan, South Korea, and Australia. Washington has also encouraged the strengthening of relations between its allies and partners there, like the Australia-Japan free trade agreement and the strengthening of their defense cooperation in 2014. As the most economically dynamic region in the world today, the United States hopes to maintain its influence in the Asia-Pacific and to continue to benefit from its close relations there.

Despite the limitations of U.S. power, Washington, subscribing to offensive realism, will perceive China’s increased engagement with Latin America as a potential threat to the homeland and counteract these actions with maneuvers of its own. With the rise of China, a Cold War-like environment is arguably emerging. Washington and Beijing are seeking to build their respective blocs through building economic partnerships dependent on them and utilizing “soft power” tactics, the attraction of partners through exploiting shared cultural ties, values, and institutions in order to achieve a favorable result.[viii] Due to its proximity to the United States, Latin America will become critical in the Sino-U.S. rivalry.

A Struggle for Influence

Given the recent success of the first-ever China-CELAC (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States) forum this January, an encroachment into its “neighborhood” may be perceived as a threat to national security by the United States. The warming of relations between Beijing and Latin American countries has increased Chinese presence in the region. In Washington’s view, this means closer proximity and increased capabilities to conduct reconnaissance on the homeland.

However, these actions by the PRC should be expected. The U.S. “pivot” towards Asia in recent years has been interpreted by the PRC as a containment policy to control its rise to hegemony in the Asia-Pacific. Thus, Beijing is reacting to counter the threat that the United States imposes in the Asia-Pacific through increased engagement in Latin America and attempting to subtly attract traditional U.S. partners into the Chinese orbit of influence. Increased economic exchanges and soft power to increase its regional influence is the preferred tactic for either power because neither currently wants to destabilize the economic system. Direct conflict between China and the United States would be detrimental worldwide.

The blame falls on the United States for the void that Beijing has stepped in to fill in Latin America. As a dynamic and leading world economy with a state accepting of all political systems and similar colonial history as Latin America, although maybe not a natural partner, China’s engagement in the region is appropriate. It is necessary to examine the forces motivating Latin American countries to choose to align closer with Beijing.

The benefit of proximity is where the similarities between the United States and many countries in Latin America, namely the ALBA (Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América) members end. On the other hand, the PRC provides Latin American countries with an economic partner on par with the United States, without the additional weight of potential U.S. interference in their domestic affairs. Whereas Washington’s regional policy can often be seen as pursuant to maintaining its hegemony in the Western Hemisphere, China concerns itself with diversifying its economic partners and satisfying its energy and food security needs, with the added bonus of building strategically beneficial relationships in proximity to the United States.

In addition to regularly clashing with ALBA countries, Washington has recently been rebuked by other Latin American governments for its interventionist actions. United States presidential candidate and Florida Senator Marco Rubio encouraged Secretary of State John Kerry to create an “independent, internationally assisted investigation” of the death of Argentine prosecutor Alberto Nisman. Senator Rubio went on to question the ability of the Argentine government “to conduct a fair and impartial investigation.”[ix] Argentina responded to these statements during a press conference by Chief of Cabinet Jorge Capitanich in which he accused Rubio of having “imperialist vision.”[x] Rubio’s comments have been widely criticized as interfering into the domestic affairs of a sovereign nation.

In 2013, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff condemned the United States after discovering that Washington had been conducting electronic surveillance on Brazil. Connected to information leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, the revelation confirmed that the United States had been spying on Brazil while also seeking closer relations and a strategic partnership with the country. Rousseff described Washington’s actions as “a breach of international law and an affront” to Brazil’s sovereignty.[xi]

Washington’s southern neighbors have gained confidence in their rights as states and are working to develop an identity independent of the United States. CELAC, founded in 2011 as an alternative to the U.S.-led Organization of American States (OAS), is considered a regional action to reduce Washington’s regional influence. Latin American countries are increasingly less likely to tolerate U.S. interference in their domestic affairs. During a meeting with Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, UNASUR Secretary General and former Colombian President Ernesto Samper stated that “any intention produced to destabilize a democracy or intention to destabilize a government should count [on] unanimous rejection from all of the UNASUR nations.”[xii]

Latin America is in a stage of decolonization. Now a regional movement, Latin American countries are banding together to ward off foreign intervention and are expecting the respect of their sovereignty. Since the region was colonized by the Europeans in the late 15th Century, Latin Americans have found themselves dominated by great powers. Championed by the Bolivarian movement, many Latin American countries now attempt to resist U.S. hegemony aimed at continued domination of the region. Latin America is now increasingly integrating through regional multilateral organizations aimed at creating Patria Grande (“Great Nation”), which exclude states such as the United States that have historically executed interventionist policies there. Through this, the region seeks to establish a zone of peace within a multi-polar system.

It is not to say that these states are opposed to having good relations with great powers, especially Washington, as there are significant economic benefits that flow from relations with the United States. However, the people and the states of Latin America place a premium on dignity and liberating themselves from the oppression that they experienced after their colonization and have perceived since then under the domination of hegemonic powers. Enrique Dussel, a founder of the Philosophy of Liberation, argues that states like the U.S. and powerful European countries do not understand the problems faced by post-colonial states.[xiii] Thus, China, as an understanding, formerly exploited country, allows Latin America to avoid becoming economically dependent on the United States.

Conclusion

During the testimony Dr. R. Evan Ellis declared that “Latin America and the Caribbean deserve [U.S.] attention; its security and prosperity are in our common interest.”[xiv] The region provides a significant opportunity for China to achieve a strategic advantage over the United States.

China, as the major rival of the United States, is an economic competitor, but remains decades behind in terms of traditional military strength. As Stephen Walt argues, “a powerful China will not want the United States to have close alliances and a large military presence near its borders, and it will undoubtedly try to push U.S. forces out of the Asia-Pacific region.”[xv] The United States should be expected to act similarly in its region. Still, while coercive power may be pragmatic under certain circumstances, the two powers clearly want to avoid direct military conflict and the United States must avoid these strategies in its relations with Latin America. Instead, pushing their respective influences out of their own regions must occur through increased economic exchange and soft power tactics.

For this reason, a refocus to the Western Hemisphere is necessary, but must promote cooperative engagement and relationship building among states with which the United States has historically had unstable relations. The mistrust of the U.S. and unstable relations have been a result of U.S.-backed wars against popular movements in the 1980s and more recently alleged U.S. support for coups against Latin American leaders. For example, Washington has allegedly supported coups in Venezuela targeting Hugo Chávez in 2002, the 2009 Honduras coup overthrowing Manuel Zelaya, the 2010 uprising against Rafael Correa in Ecuador, and most recently against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.[xvi]

Mutual respect for state sovereignty and emphasizing fair relationships will be critical for the U.S. in advancing its political, economic, and security interests in the region. Despite continued mistrust of Washington, most Latin American countries remain keen to maintain cordial relations with the United States, given the potential economic benefits. United States policy initiatives have largely focused on domestic issues in Latin America, which have led Washington to earn an interventionist label in the region. U.S. policymakers must see the larger picture.

The U.S. has focused inordinately on the domestic affairs in states with little geo-strategic impact on Washington’s interest, raising these countries skepticism of U.S. intentions and increasing the potential for China or other rival powers to exert influence there. It would behoove U.S. policymakers to seek rapprochement, understanding that it will take time to mitigate the mistrust, with these countries and extend one-sided relationships that benefit the Latin American countries, much as it did with its “wheel-and-spokes” plan in Asia. Closer relations and establishing new partners in Latin America could serve to limit the influence that China can exercise within the region.

*Cameron McKibben, Research Associate at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs

[i] Testimony was presented by Dr. R. Evans Ellis, a research professor of Latin American Studies at the Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College; Mr. Eric Farnsworth, Vice President of the Council of the Americas and Americas Society; Ms. Bonnie Glick, Senior Vice President of GlobalConnect Divison of the Meridian International Center; and Dr. Shannon K. O’Neil, Senior Fellow for Latin American Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. For complete witness statements and biographies see, http://docs.house.gov/Committee/Calendar/ByEvent.aspx?EventID=102885.

[ii] The President of the United States of America, National Security Strategy, February 2015.

[iii] Zhong Shan, “U.S.-China Trade is a Win-Win Game,” Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the United States, accessed February 9, 2015, http://www.china-embassy.org/eng/xw/t675646.htm.

[iv] An in-depth analysis of China’s future intention are outside the scope of this examination, but for more information see, John Mearsheimer, “China’s Unpeaceful Rise,” Current History (April 2006): 160-162;

[v] John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 2001), 35.

[vi] Ibid, 141.

[vii] National Security Strategy, President’s Remarks.

[viii] For more on “soft power” see, Joseph S. Nye, Jr., “Soft Power,” Foreign Policy, No. 80 (Autumn 1990): 153-171; Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Soft Power: The Mean to Success in World Politics (New York: PublicAffairs, 2004).

[ix] “Argentina Calls out US Republican Meddling in Nisman Case,” teleSUR, accessed February 5, 2015, http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Argentina-Calls-out-US-Republican-Meddling-in-Nisman-Case-20150130-0024.html.

[x] “Capitanich to US Rubio: Argentina accepts no foreign intromission, imperialist visions,” Buenos Aires Herald, accessed February 9, 2015, http://www.buenosairesherald.com/article/180770/capitanich-to-us-rubio-argentina-accepts-no-foreign-intromission-imperialist-visions.

[xi] “Brazil’s president condemns NSA spying,” The Washington Post, accessed February 6, 2015, http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/brazils-president-condemns-nsa-spying/2013/09/24/fe1f78ee-2525-11e3-b75d-5b7f66349852_story.html.

[xii] Ernesto Samper, “Samper: Injerencia de EEUU en Venezuela cuenta con el rechazo de las naciones de la Unasur,” UNASUR, Caracas, Venezuela, February 4, 2015, unofficial translation by the author.

[xiii] Enrique Dussel, “The Philosophy of Liberation: An Interview with Enrique Dussel (Part I),” conducted by Mahvish Ahmad, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, Mexico, accessed February 11, 2015 from Naked Punch, http://nakedpunch.com/articles/186.

[xiv] R. Evan Ellis, “The Strategic Importance of the Western Hemisphere: Defining U.S. Interests in the Region,” Testimony to the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, Foreign Affairs Committee, U.S. House of Representatives, Tuesday, February 3, 2015.

[xv] Stephen M. Walt, “Dealing with a Chinese Monroe Doctrine,” The New York Times, accessed February 11, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/05/02/are-we-headed- for-a-cold-war-with-china/dealing-with-a-chinese-monroe-doctrine.

[xvi] Anne Gearan, “Bolivian leader lectures Gates about US behavior,” Associated Press, accessed February 11, 2015, http://www.boston.com/news/world/latinamerica/articles/2010/11/22/bolivian_leader_lectures_gates_about_us_behavior/.

The post Great Power Politics At Play In Latin America? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Asian economy continued to grow impressively in 2014. But Asia is still facing a number of security challenges such as territory disputes in East Asia, South Asia, and South East Asia. Regional players such as China, Japan, India and ASEAN play crucial roles in dealing with these challenges as do outside players including the US and EU. However in 2104, the EU was pre-occupied by security issues in its own neighbourhood and it seemed Europe put less focus on Asian security issues. Furthermore, pressing international security challenges such as ISIS needed to be addressed globally as well.

Under the current international security environment, what role can the EU play with regard to challenges to regional security and human security in Asia? Can Asia impact regional security in Europe? What are the main areas of concerns for closer political dialogue between EU and Asia? Does ASEM have enough potential or parties should set up new initiatives?

Presentations

These were some of the issues discussed at two Egmont conferences on the 9th and 10th of February. The 9th conference was based on the main findings of a multi-year project about cooperation between Asia and EU conducted by the Free University of Berlin. May-Britt Stumbaum, Director NFG Research Group, Freie Universität Berlin introduced the basic principles of security cooperation between Asian countries, the EU and its member states. Her research suggested that the EU can provide Asia with expertise, facilitate exchanges, and act as fount of know-how and capacity. Examples included UK training of police peacekeepers in China; Asian high-level officer exchanges with Germany, France and UK; provision of peacekeeping policy templates; and coordination of antipiracy missions. She also addressed the main challenge EU faces which is the coordination of EU member states’ activities towards Asian security issues.

Michito Tsuruoka, Senior Research Fellow, National Institute for Defense Studies (NIDS) in Tokyo gave an Asian point of view about how Asian view the EU as a security actor in Asia. He said Europe’s has its advantages when it comes to peace-making and reconciliation, aid and the promotion of democracy and the rule of law although the EU does not have the kind of military resources as the U.S does. Alfredo Conte, Head of the Strategic Planning Division in the EEAS then gave an overview of the positive developments the EU has made in Asian security issues in 2014, including a number of official and unofficial security meetings between EU and Asian Countries.

The conference on the 10th aimed to gather the experts in the field and discuss what the future of EU-Asia cooperation entails. Gerhard Sabathil, Director East Asia, EEAS and Maria Castillo-Fernandez, Head of Division India, Nepal, Bhutan, EEAS, respectively introduced the Europe’s engagement with East Asian partners and the role of EU in South Asia. They both said that although the EU is primarily focusing on its security issues in Europe, it had participated in many meetings and projectsdealing with the regional security issues in East Asia and South Asia. . Gerhard Sabathil especially stressed EU’s cooperation with China in the regional and international security issues. Ambassador Ong Keng Yong, Former Secretary-General of ASEAN, Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said that ASEAN is currently drafting its mission for the next 10 years. He called for the further enhancement of ASEAN-EU relations since EU is not just an external player for security issues in ASEAN, but more importantly ASEAN can benefit much more from EU’s integration experience.

Ambassador Chang-beom Kim, Mission of the Republic of Korean to the EU believed that the EU-Korea cooperation is an excellent example of a good partnership between East Asian countries and the EU. He suggested that the EU should regularly participate in the East Asia three parties’ conversation (China, Japan and Korea) to further enhance the cooperation of EU and East Asia.

Rajendra K. Jain, Director and Jean Monnet Chair, centre for European Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India, considered that there was still room for the EU to take more active roles in south Asia. Although India mainly relies on the US to balance the major powers in Asia, there was a supportive role for the EU even though India is more focused on direct dialogue with some member states rather than the EU as a whole.

Thomas Christiansen, Chair in European Institutional Politics, University of Maastricht, Netherlands, said that although ASEAM is considered as a “talk shop”, it has its own advantages because of its non-institutionalized status. He believed that leaders meeting multilaterally and bilaterally under ASEAM framework is playing a very important role in both EU- Asia relations and bilateral relations.

Questions raised by audience and the followed debates were focused on: China’s role in Asia security; Modi’s coming visit in Europe but not Brussels; EU’s unchanged “insignificance” in Asian security issues; and the balance between EU’s internal security issues and Asian security issues.

Conclusion

There is still no conclusive answers in response to these questions. But it is clear that EU-Asia cooperation is crucial to the EU. This month, Obama invited Xi and Abe to visit the U.S. The leaders of South Korea and Indonesia are also scheduled to visit U.S this year. It showed that Asia is still a focus of Obama and the U.S remains the principal actor in Asia, not just in security matters. Although the EU does not have the same political role in Asia, it has the ambition to become a more important actor in Asia. More EU resources might be invested in enhancing EU-Asia cooperation and better coordination between the external policies of the Commission and the EEAS as well as the national foreign policies of the 28 member states would help.

The post What Is EU’s Further Role In Asian Security Issues? – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Khalid al-Taie

Iraq’s High Commission for Human Rights recently released new statistics detailing violations and crimes committed by the “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant” (ISIL) during the second half of 2014.

The independent commission recorded 3,981,597 violations and crimes against Iraqis at the hands of ISIL from the time the group took over Mosul in June 2014 until early this year, according to commission member Fadhel al-Gharrawi.

These included killings, torture, forced displacement, targeting of minorities and violations against women, children and people with disabilities, he told Mawtani.

They also included violations of human rights and freedoms, including freedom of worship and expression, as well as violations related to intellectual and property rights and economic crimes, he said.

ISIL’s crimes included 27,526 violations against the human right to life, 2,531,000 violations against refugees and the forcibly displaced, 5,523 instances of targeting people based on their race or ethnicity and 65,000 violations against the right to religion and belief, according to al-Gharrawi.

The commission also detailed 603,520 violations against women, 401,986 against children, 109,722 against the right to housing and 237,320 against the right to education, health and freedom of expression, in addition to cultural, economic and social rights and those of persons with disabilities, he said.

“The vast amount of atrocities and abuses recorded against public rights made us classify last year as the most violent and the worst in Iraq,” he said.

‘Solid, credible’ documentation

The commission recorded these crimes and abuses through solid, credible and highly accurate methods of investigation and documentation, al-Gharrawi said.

“The statistics have been developed based on interviews and direct meetings conducted by the commission with the victims of terrorism and their families, especially with refugees, displaced people, survivors, families of the martyrs and missing persons, affected people and personal rights plaintiffs [those claiming personal damages through the court system] as well as thousands of complaints received from other victims,” commission member Hayman Bajlan told Mawtani.

“We also were able to record and document the violations at the hands of ISIL through our monitoring teams near events sites, our own sources and eyewitnesses inside the cities controlled by the terrorists, and also through our close partnerships with several local and foreign organisations,” Bajlan said.

The commission has presented a draft resolution to the Iraqi government which condemns all such acts at the national level and asks the UN Security Council and the International Criminal Court to deem them crimes against humanity and acts of genocide.

“In addition to that resolution, which we hope will soon be voted [into law], the commission presented other projects, mainly for compensation and redress for the victims of terrorism and the inclusion of missing people’s families with all the privileges and rights granted to families of the martyrs,” Bajlan said.

The commission will continue to report all violations documented using evidence and the testimonies of witnesses, victims and survivors to the UN fact finding team positioned in the city of Dohuk, he said.

This is part of the commission’s effort to “promote and mobilise international support for Iraq in its fight to eliminate terrorism”, he added.

ISIL among history’s ‘most brutal groups’

“Through the daily violations it practices against all forms of life, ISIL is one of the most brutal human groups throughout history, and this is proven through numbers for its crimes that reflect its reality as a barbaric group,” said Iraqi MP Mithal al-Alusi, who serves on the parliamentary commission on security and defence.

“We at the parliament work continuously to expose and reveal the truth of that bloody group, investigate the violations it committed and find the means and the appropriate decisions to support victims and relieve their suffering,” al-Alusi said.

To this end, the Iraqi parliament has formed several committees to investigate ISIL’s invasion of Mosul and the Speicher military base massacre , in which hundreds of soldiers were killed, and to follow up on the affairs of the victims of these crimes, he said.

The government must “provide all possible services to the refugee and displaced families”, he added, as well as continuing its allocation of financial support to the Kurdish region, which bears the burden of the displacement crisis as it hosts about 1.5 million displaced persons from Iraq’s flashpoint areas.

The post Iraq Rights Commission Says Islamic State Committed 4 Million Violations appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Daniel McAdams*

Pondering the gruesome beheadings of 21 Egyptian Christians by an ISIS which has newly found a foothold in post-“liberated” Libya, it is hard to stop the mind from wandering back to Bernard-Henri Lévy, the swaggering French philosopher who almost single-handedly sired the 2011 western attack on Libya.

Back then Lévy donned the sanctimonious persona of the human rights champion to goad then-French president Sarkozy into leading the charge into Libya. The western attack on Libya was “inevitable” the war’s beaming champion said at the time. He personally undertook to semi-secretly bring the then-rebels from Benghazi in Libya to meet Sarkozy and receive his blessing as the legitimate new rulers of Libya. Then…bombs away.

Here is what he told Sarkozy, according to a new article in the New Yorker magazine:

There are people here, good people; these people hold the same values as we do, and they’re going to die to the last one if we allow Qaddafi to go on to the conclusion of his criminal logic. Would you accept to receive them in Paris and thus send a strong signal to the butcher?

Yes. Good people. Share our values.

“[L]et’s take down Qaddafi,” he told the Christian Science Monitor just before the 2011 bombings of Libya began. “If he (Qaddafi) is beaten, a fair wind of democracy will blow once again – and even harder,” he added.

Lévy’s “fair wind of democracy” has a funny way of blowing. It blew down the US ambassador in Benghazi. It blew the country’s infrastructure to the stone age. It blew the economy to the prehistoric age. It blew in al-Qaeda and ISIS. And, yesterday, it blew off the heads of 21 Egyptian Christians.

One might think Lévy would be a bit chastened by the stench emanating from the “fair wind” he released, but that is not his style.

In the New Yorker article this month he was asked why he picked up the cause of the Libyan rebels in 2011. Here is an excerpt:

“Why? I don’t know!” he said. “Of course, it was human rights, for a massacre to be prevented, and blah blah blah—but I also wanted them to see a Jew defending the liberators against a dictatorship, to show fraternity. I wanted the Muslims to see that a Frenchman—a Westerner and a Jew—could be on their side.”

Lévy said that he returned to Paris and told President Nicolas Sarkozy that humanitarian intervention wasn’t enough. “The real objective had to be to topple Qaddafi,” he told me. Sarkozy agreed, and Lévy became his emissary. Lévy accompanied a Libyan opposition leader to meet Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to lobby for U.S. involvement. “It was hard to convince the Americans,” he said. “Robert Gates was totally opposed. Obama as usual was hesitating. But Hillary got it.”

Lévy’s reputation as a humanitarian and human rights activist is certainly misplaced. Indeed, everywhere he appears, chaos, murder, and destruction follow. He is not unlike the lead character in the Rolling Stones’ old tune “Sympathy for the Devil,” appearing wherever blood is to be spilled.

He was there in 1999, lobbying for a NATO attack on Yugoslavia.

He was a resolute supporter of US-backed Saakashvili’s suicidal war on Russia in 2008.

He was among the loudest voices demanding western support for the rebels seeking to overthrow the Assad government in Syria — “freedom fighters” who, as in Libya, soon donned the black flags of al-Qaeda and ISIS. He praised the warmongering Sen. John McCain at a 2012 event held by the neoconservative “think tank” Foreign Policy Initiative (successor to the discredited PNAC). The American attack on Libya “saved” America, said Lévy at the FPI event:

America was saved, the honor of America was saved by your President — of course, Obama — but by three women. Three women: Samantha Power, Susan Rice, and Hillary Clinton.

Ah yes, Hillary again.

At the same 2012 FPI event on Syria, Lévy went on to urge a US attack on the country, promising the same great results as were produced by his attack on Libya:

[I]t is more doable today in Syria than it was doable yesterday in Libya.

And he was there in Maidan Square in Kiev last year, addressing the mob with slogans such as a John McCainian “we’re all Ukrainians now!” And once his Ukrainian coup produced an impoverished, desperate country cut off from its natural trading partner next door, he penned an op-ed in the New York Times with George Soros demanding untold billions from the US and western taxpayer.

The blood of the 21 Egyptians is on the hands of “humanitarian” Bernard-Henri Lévy as it is on those who did the cutting. Like the other interventionists, “humanitarians,” and neocons who urge the use of force overseas, his every promise of a cakewalk has produced a death march. His every analysis has been wrong. His impulses are malevolent and self-centered. His blazing sartorial splendor masks the true nakedness of the humanitarian would-be emperor.

Will anyone notice the stench of Bernard-Henri Lévy’s “fair wind”?

The post Bernard-Henri Lévy’s ‘Fair Wind’ Blows Foul In Libya – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Rajeev Sharma

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, hitherto known as Hindu fundamentalists’ mascot, has now donned a secular mantle. In the past few days he has embarked on a conscious exercise in image makeover and projected himself as a leader having an inclusive agenda with sole mission of development.

On Feb. 13, Modi summoned Delhi Police Commissioner B. S. Bassi and expressed his deep concern and anguish over rising number of criminal incidents directed at the Christian community.

It is rare for a prime minister to summon Delhi Police chief as normally this job is left to the home minister. But by making this unusual departure in protocol and summoning the police chief, Modi sent out a no-nonsense message that his government won’t tolerate incidents of religious intolerance.

He went a step further on Feb. 17 when he vowed to protect all religious groups at an event organized by the Christian community to celebrate the beatification of two priests from Kerala — itself a rarity of sorts as he seldom attends events organized by minority communities.

In his address at this event, Modi did not mince his words and sent out a strong message to the minorities that he was there to protect their interests.

Why this sudden image makeover from Modi? Is the leopard changing its spots?

Well, even the staunchest critics of Modi should give full marks to him of speaking his mind and taking an inclusive approach even though this won’t be music to the ears of rabid elements within his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the BJP’s ideologue Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS).

Here is a BJP leader who is trying to project a secular image as the country’s prime minister, something which the BJP’s tallest leader and former Premier Atal Bihari Vajpayee tried to do but with not much success.

Modi knows that he is more powerful than Vajpayee as he has the requisite clear majority in Parliament, a luxury that evaded Vajpayee, the only other Prime Minister the BJP produced before Modi.

But the million-dollar question is why now? Is it the direct fallout of the solid drubbing the BJP faced in recently concluded Delhi assembly elections?

This may well be so. After all, Modi had maintained stony silence on attacks on Christian community in the national capital during campaigning for Delhi polls.

He had kept silent even after United States President Barack Obama flagged the issue of religious intolerance in India twice — first on the last day of his India visit last month and then again from the American soil.

Expectedly, the Congress party promptly lambasted Modi and said there was “an element of doubt” in his remarks. Hours after his speech before the Christian gathering Congress leader P.C. Chacko said the prime minister ought to have made this solemn assurance in Parliament and not at a private function.

“Narendra Modi had assured in the meeting that India will be an inclusive society and all religions will be given its due share and respect. Any attack on any of the religion will not be tolerated. This statement is what people expected to hear from the prime minister in the Parliament. In spite of the fact that the Parliament was disturbed for many days, Modi refused to give the same statement in the Parliament. So there is an element of doubt in what he says.”

Modi will inevitably face impediments in implementing his inclusive politics agenda and the greatest threat he faces is from within. The RSS has been increasingly vocal since the Delhi polls humiliation. It has openly found fault in the BJP’s strategy of announcing controversial former top cop Kiran Bedi as its chief ministerial candidate for Delhi elections. Now there are signs that the RSS may get more pro-active in drafting strategy for Bihar assembly elections due later this year, implying that Modi’s clout may not go unchallenged as it has been for past nine months.

To make matters worse for Team Modi, prominent social activist Anna Hazare has roundly criticized Modi for failing to deliver on his tall promises. Hazare is now scheduled to begin a three-day agitation against the Modi government in the national capital from Feb. 23, albeit on other issues.

None other than Modi would be realizing the relevance of the famous Shakespearean quotable quote: “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.”

The post India’s Modi Dons Secular Mantle – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By PR Chari*

Foreign Secretary Jaishankar is scheduled to visit Pakistan for resuming the interrupted Indo-Pak dialogue, which has got the talking heads in New Delhi into a tizzy. Why on earth did the Prime Minister reverse course after taking the firm position that Pakistan could not indulge in unacceptable conduct and hope to continue efforts to normalise relations with India? It would be recollected here that the Pakistani Foreign Secretary had gone ahead last year during his visit to India to meet separatist leaders from Kashmir in New Delhi, despite being specifically urged not to do so. That act of deliberate intransigence had caused Prime Minister Modi’s ire, and his announcement that no further dialogue with Islamabad was possible due to its obduracy.

What has happened then to occasion this policy reversal? It has been alleged that US pressure on New Delhi was responsible. President Obama has made the inclusion of Pakistan within the structure of various dialogue processes into an article of faith, despite Pakistan’s many transgressions. This is vividly demonstrated by Obama’s Afghanistan policy, which privileges Pakistan above all others for being doled out financial largesse, despite its proven links with al Qaeda, Taliban and militant groups of all descriptions. It is therefore quite possible that President Obama strongly urged Modi to resume the dialogue with Pakistan and not complicate the American plans for withdrawing its forces from Afghanistan. Indeed, there are committed elements in India who also believe that dialogue with Pakistan should be an uninterrupted and uninterruptable process that is not subject to the vagaries of day-to-day occurrences.

Conspiracy theorists have also speculated that the BJP’s humiliating defeat in the Delhi state elections, despite Modi’s personal canvassing, alongside other stalwarts of the BJP and the RSS, made it imperative to divert public attention away from this electoral disaster. Hence, the dramatic decision to resume the shelved India-Pakistan dialogue although nothing has changed in the bilateral situation. This conclusion has some merit. But subsequent clarifications by the Government have sought to play down the significance of this overture to Pakistan by urging that the Foreign Secretary’s visit to Islamabad is part of a larger diplomatic endeavour. Visits are also planned thereafter to the other SAARC capitals to infuse new life into this moribund organisation. The policy implications of this modality are of the essence and need to be emphasised, especially in the light of Prime Minister Modi’s radical declarations during the last SAARC Summit meeting in Kathmandu held in November 2014.

After identifying terrorism as the major security threat confronting the regional grouping, Modi predicted that regional integration could occur “through SAARC or outside it” if the group failed to reach consensus on the many fundamental issues that were bedevilling this regional organisation. Modi also asserted, significantly, that India would work “through SAARC or outside it, among some or all of its members,” which presages a new approach to dealing with India’s South Asian neighbours. Plainly, this was Modi’s instinctive reaction to Pakistan’s obstructive conduct during the Summit meeting, where it did not allow several proposals for achieving regional cooperation to be passed. Under its Charter, unfortunately, the founders of SAARC had opted for all its decisions being taken by consensus, and not on the basis of majority votes, which has enabled intransigent members to halt decision-making for frivolous and implausible reasons.

Modi’s message to Islamabad was plain. If the situation so warranted India could work within the SAARC modality or with individual SAARC countries or with smaller groupings of its members. A new relevance was thereby accorded to bilateral relations and sub-regional groupings within the ambit of SAARC. Reportedly, a BJP spokesperson had declared earlier that “South Asia will grow without Pakistan if they don’t want to be on board. They anyway see themselves as a part of the Islamic West Asian world; good luck to them.” The Foreign Secretary could pursue these propositions during his forthcoming visit to Pakistan, in addition to the set-piece agenda for Indo-Pak meetings that must perforce include border incidents, terrorist activities, hostile propaganda, apart from more constructive items like strengthening trade relations and facilitating people-to-people relations.

In his subsequent visits to the other SAARC countries the Foreign Secretary could also explore the possibility of invigorating the possible sub-regional groupings within SAARC where some natural affinities are available, and trade, communications and similar cooperative linkages are already existing. A sub-regional grouping that would include Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal (BBIN), or India, Maldives and Sri Lanka (SIM) is presently conceivable. And, a sub-regional grouping comprising Afghanistan, Pakistan and India (API) can be visualised in the fullness of time if the politics of these countries transcends their present dissensions.

Viewed in the SAARC perspective the resumption of the Indo-Pak dialogue offers Pakistan both a challenge and an opportunity to redeem its present image of being the global centre for jihad and religious terrorism. It would be in the self-interests of both China and the US to support these initiatives that derive from the SAARC modality.

PR Chari
Visiting Professor, IPCS

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The US Court of Military Commission Review (CMCR) on Wednesday vacated former Guantánamo prisoner David Hicks’s conviction in the military commissions for providing material support for terrorism.

Hicks was the first prisoner to be convicted in a Guantánamo military commission and a party to the Center for
Constitutional Rights’s (CCR) historic Supreme Court victory in Rasul v. Bush, which established that Guantánamo prisoners have a right to access U.S. courts to challenge their detention.

Today’s ruling comes in the wake of an en banc decision by the D.C. Circuit, Al Bahlul v. United States, which held that material support for terrorism is not an offense triable by military commission.

“We are very happy for David. Today’s decision is a powerful reminder that he committed no crime, he is innocent of any offense,” said CCR Senior Staff Attorney Wells Dixon. “David Hicks can now be truly free of Guantánamo.”

According to CCR, Hicks pled guilty to providing material support for terrorism in 2007 because he was tortured and desperate to be free from Guantánamo. His torture is detailed in a 74-page affidavit released in 2004.

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