The Narendra Modi government has decided to issue an executive order to help religious minorities from Pakistan and Bangladesh who live in India, to get stay permits, the national media reports.

The decision will grant rights and dignity to hundreds of thousands of Hindu and Sikh immigrants who are residing across the country without papers to support their residential status. Already in his election campaign, Modi had vowed to grant citizenship to religious minorities coming from the two countries.

According to the Assam Accord of 1985, signed between the Union government and the leaders of the Assam movement, refugees who crossed over from Bangladesh after 1971 are to be deported. But that is yet to be implemented fully, insist the regional parties, and animosity towards Bangladeshi immigrants is a political issue in the state.

On April 27, during his visit to Assam, BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) chief Amit Shah had said Hindu refugees from Bangladesh will be given citizenship once the BJP comes to power in the state.

Also Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi Anche Tarun Gogoi of the Congress Party favours the idea, calling for citizenship for Bangladeshi immigrants on “humanitarian grounds”.

The post India To Offer Hindu And Sikh Immigrants Citizenship appeared first on Eurasia Review.

In the contemporary affairs the importance of media can never be ignored. Apart from being used by states to convey information to the general public, it is also being used by the non-state actors to convey their ideas and sentiments.

With respect to modern day terrorism, it is very important for a terrorist organizations to convey their message to a larger audience. This results in getting more recruits and also provides justification for their narrative. On the other hand, law enforcement agencies, and countries at a larger level, also use the media to counter the narrative of the non-state actors and terrorist organizations. Hence, the concept of idea battle-space, the war of ideas, is the set of contrasting ideologies, concepts or visions and their interpretations which certain groups use to exercise influence and to promote their narrative. Here, the battlefield and target is the hearts and minds of the people. In the war of ideas, the weapons used are print and electronic media, internet, public diplomacy, think tanks, etc.

The United States, which is leading the war against terror, has now been at war with terrorists for more than a decade. It is more of a war of ideas between America and Al-Qaeda or Islamic State. The terrorist organizations have been using various means to export their narrative and ideas to gain more support in the public. In the information age and with growing technological advancements, this war of ideas has been expanding. The terrorists’ organizations are successfully exporting their ideas and posing a challenge to America and its counter-terrorism policy. The internet is an important weapon in this battlefield as it is available to the terrorist organizations. It has served as a great equalizer in this regard as the current age of information has brought the terrorist organizations in line with the great powers in spreading their message on a global level. It is due to the use of internet and other media that the Islamic State has gained much attention and has risen briskly.

The challenge posed by the Islamic State for the United States in the idea battlefield can be analyzed from the unclassified confidential conference calls between Major General Michael Nagata, commander of U.S. Special Operations forces in the Middle East, and some academics regarding how we can defeat IS in the battlefield of ideas. In one of the calls, MG Nagata said, “We do not understand the movement, and until we do, we are not going to defeat it. We do not even understand the idea.”

Such a statement by a leading General shows that the Pentagon is not clear in how to fight the terrorists on the battlefield of ideas. Apart from that, recently, in a White House Summit to counter violent extremism, Sasha Havlicek, CEO of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, in her presentation said that the, “Government is ill-placed to lead in the battle of ideas.”

“We are outdone in content, quantity and quality,” Havlicek added, arguing that the United States is facing a challenge by the Islamic State and other extremist groups in the digital propaganda war and in fact it is losing that war. In 2006, Donald Rumsfeld in a press conference categorically stated that Al-Qaeda is better at public relations then we are and United States has a deficiency in the area of public affairs.

This shows that how these terrorist organizations are successful in gaining support and in maintaining their recruitment lines by exporting their ideas through the use of information means and innovative techniques and thus posing a challenge to the world. These terrorist organizations are using blended tactics and have flexible adaptable structures. They have been adopting all the available information means that are serving as weapons for them and most importantly their ideas are doing the work of ammunition. Recently three persons were arrested from New York who were sympathizers of IS and wanted to join – showsing that Islamic State is not dependent upon material conditions, but it is enhancing its capability by propagating its ideas to get the manpower.

Disrupting the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda structure through military action will only be a short term success. Along with military action there is a dire need to launch a vigorous counter-propaganda campaign to discredit the ideas being propagated by Islamic State. Merely promoting the conventional ideals of freedom and democracy throughout the world won’t make America and the American-led coalition win the battle against the terrorists. The United States of America, a super power and technologically advanced country, lagging behind in the idea battlefield clearly reflects the limitations it faces as a super power. The society of the United States is one of the information dependent societies — which also makes it vulnerable. When the conflict is in the idea battle-space then it cannot be won in the physical world, the terrorist organizations take actions in physical world to gain attention. True success for United States lies in winning the idea battle-space.

*Faiza Rashid Lone is an M Phil scholar at the School of Politics and International Relations, Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad.

The post America And The Idea Battle-Space – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Hassan Abdullah Hersi Turki, a leading figure in the Somali-based al Shabab movement and wanted by the US, died yesterday in Somalia from illness at the age of 73.

The announcement was made by a spokesman for the Islamist group, Sheikh Ali Mohamud Rage, also known as Ali Dhere.

Turki was considered a close ally of al Qaeda’s leader Osama Bin Laden. The US attempted to kill him in 2008 in a raid in the Lower Juba region.

In 2013 he was included on the United Nations list of wanted terrorists.

The post Somalia: Al Shabab Leader And Bin Laden Ally Dies From Illness appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Jason Morris-Jung*

A rising China generates important economic opportunities and considerable anxiety for Vietnam. Perhaps because of its highly contentious nature, natural resource extraction has been a particular focus for public expression of these anxieties. For example, widespread controversy over bauxite mining in 2009 and 2010 generated public concern over the potent mix of incoming Chinese investments, resource development, and national sovereignty. 1 More recently, a riot last May at a massive steel refinery in Central Vietnam and the death of at least one Chinese worker there—notably, in the context of massive demonstrations against Chinese drilling inside Vietnamese waters on the South China Sea—illustrates just how serious these issues have become.2 Such incidents have been both cause and result of public discussions in Vietnam that suggest more than a hint of anti-Chinese sentiment. However, what has been glaringly absent from these discussions is the voice of the companies, workers and communities most directly implicated by them.

This article helps to address this gap by reporting on preliminary findings from a visit to a Vietnamese-Chinese mineral sector partnership in a remote region of northern Vietnam.3 Inspired by an ethnographic approach, the research for this article combined interviews, informal discussions, and direct observation to explore the more practical reasons why these partnerships occur and their implications for Vietnamese companies, workers and communities. It also highlights more enduring problems of lack of transparency and regulation in the mineral sector that can give rise to such anti-Chinese discourses.

ON THE ROAD: WITH ILLEGAL EXPORTS OF IRON ORE?

My trip began on a Saturday afternoon as I flew into Hanoi’s Noi Bai International Airport. A pre-arranged driver picked me up and he immediately had us heading north on Highway Number 2 towards Hà Giang province. Right at our first stop, however, at a roadside eatery in Tuyên Quang province, we encountered half a dozen dump trucks loaded with iron ore.

Illegal exports of mineral ore has been one of the most controversial issues in the Vietnamese mineral sector, much of it believed to be bound for China. Vietnamese officials have estimated that nearly half of the country’s total annual coal output (some ten million tons) is illegally exported to China, while 90 per cent of the coal from the country’s most important coal deposit in Quảng Ninh province is suspected of being illegally exported to China.4 More recently, the Chairman of the Vietnam Foundry and Metallurgy Science and Technology Association, Phạm Chí Cường, noted disparities in Chinese and Vietnamese customs data which suggested that 3.1 million tons of iron had unofficially made its way from Vietnam to China in 2013 with an average price difference of US$36.08 per ton.5 The Chairman further suggested that the difference was equivalent to three trillion VND (US$ 141.2 million) in lost tax revenues and five hundred billion VND in export tariffs. Could these loads of iron ore at the roadside eatery be a part of those missing millions of tons?

Through informal conversation with their drivers, I soon learned that these trucks were transporting the ore from a privately owned mine in Hà Giang to an undisclosed drop-off point along the banks of a nearby river. One reason for the drop-off was that, as the drivers seemed to boast, their loads were five to six times heavier than their legal carrying limits. Thus, they could not continue further in Tuyên Quang because they could not get past the weighing stations. In Hà Giang, on the other hand, a little bit of “greasing money” (tiền bôi trơn) was usually all that they needed to get through, strongly suggesting a network of “under-the-table” relations that extended throughout but did not exceed the provincial border.

Their ruse revealed to us both the level and extent of these relations that, as I later learnt in Cao Bằng, usually played an indispensable part in sustaining mining projects in Vietnam.

At the drop-off point, the iron ore would be picked up by larger trucks and transported to its next destination. However, these drivers could not or did not want to tell us where this would be. They speculated that it could be at a steel refinery in Hải Dương province, or possibly an older one in the adjacent Thái Nguyên province. Almost like a guerrilla cell, they seemed to know or could disclose information on only their own small segment of the network. The iron ore might also have been headed for riverboats that would ferry it out to sea, where it could more easily elude customs patrols on its way to China, but these drivers also did not know or were not privy to disclose further details.

However, the point here is not to speculate. Rather I want to highlight the many and diverse actors necessary to transport and possibly illegally export mineral ore out of Vietnam. They include government officials, security officers, and different companies and traders, as well as their Chinese counterparts. From this perspective, to suggest that China is the source of Vietnam’s illegally exported mineral ore would be a gross simplification of a complex process.

SITUATING CHINESE-VIETNAMESE MINERAL SECTOR COOPERATION

After spending a night in the provincial capital of Hà Giang, we headed east along the narrow mountain Highway No. 34—named after the thirty-one men and three women who first joined Võ Nguyên Giáp in forming the Vietnam People’s Army in 1944 in the hills of Cao Bằng. After a few more hours, we arrived at the mining company offices. The large three- storey concrete building and long arching driveway appeared out of place against the scrub forests, upland cultivation and scattered villages of this rural mountainous setting. Nonetheless, this was the operating base of the mining companies set up here as a joint initiative between a Vietnamese construction company and its Chinese counterpart.

Such arrangements between Chinese and Vietnamese companies are not uncommon in the Vietnamese mineral sector. Rather, as Nguyễn Văn Thuấn, General Director of the Department for Geology and Minerals under the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, has recently complained, they are all too common. In the north, he has suggested that up to 60 per cent of Vietnamese mines show “Chinese traces.”6 In his opinion, “It is like the Chinese were standing behind our backs and controlling our own mining industry.” However, rather than being dominated or manipulated by their Chinese partners, the mine managers I spoke with in Cao Bằng highlighted the more practical—if banal— reasons for their cooperation.

The partnership began with a construction company from southern Vietnam, which, as Vietnam’s relatively nascent minerals sector began to take off in the early 2000s, made explorations in Cao Bằng and confirmed commercially viable deposits of lead, zinc and copper. However, lack of relevant mining experience, technology and expertise pushed the Vietnamese company to form two joint stock companies with a Chinese partner. In each company, the Vietnamese partner held 51 per cent of shares and the Chinese partner 49 per cent. For the Vietnamese company, the partnership provided technology and expertise, while for the Chinese partner it was an opportunity to expand their business investments. Part of that business was in the supply (either through direct sale or as part of the initial investment agreement) of technology and equipment.

Though Chinese technology is often berated as cheap and outdated, Vietnamese mine managers described it to me as affordable and appropriate. One manager admitted that Chinese technology was not always state-of-the-art, but its relative similarity to Vietnamese technology made it easier to learn and, when needed, repair. He emphasized that if an important piece of machinery or equipment broke down, all they had to do was call a partner in China and they would have a special technician or replacement part on-site within 48 hours. In comparison, a similar situation with European or North American technology could take days or weeks. Hence, while Chinese technology might not necessarily be top of the line in an international context, it had distinct advantages in the Vietnamese one.

Neither should these partnerships all be seen as one of a kind or static. This one in Cao Bằng also illustrated how they can fluctuate. Around 2012, after a plummet in global commodity prices, the Chinese partner divested itself of its shares in both companies. For a while afterwards, it then continued to collaborate with its Vietnamese partners as a contractor for Chinese labour and expertise. However, these arrangements also eventually broke down and the Chinese partner withdrew entirely from the projects, though many of the Chinese workers it originally recruited stayed on in an individual capacity. In other words, rather than “standing behind the back” of the Vietnamese company, this Chinese company exhibited a range of relationships with its Vietnamese partner and, in the end, withdrew from the relationship altogether.

While this single case cannot be said to be representative, it disturbs key assumptions about Chinese partnerships and technology used in the mineral sector. It testifies to complex circumstances of cooperation and challenges simple assertions of Chinese domination.

REFLECTING ON “CHINESE WORKERS” DEBATES

The influx of masses of Chinese workers has been another of the Vietnamese public’s main concerns about Chinese economic activities inside Vietnam.7 Government reports have suggested that they number in the tens of thousands in Vietnam, possibly more than one hundred thousand altogether.8 They are repeatedly described in the domestic press and on popular Vietnamese websites and blogs as mainly being “general” (phổ thông) or “unskilled” labour. They are accused of taking jobs away from local Vietnamese and many thousands have also been found to be without legal working permits.9

While these are important issues, they also deserve a subtle treatment that more adequately reflects the experiences of these workers and the companies that employ them.

Indeed, 80 per cent of workers at the mine I visited in Cao Bằng did not have a university degree and, by this criterion, they did not qualify as “expert labour.” However, more than just “general” or “unskilled” labour, people at the mine referred to them as “experienced” labour (lao động có kinh nghiệm). They did jobs that required specific skill sets or work experience, such as operating heavy machinery, repairing technical equipment, drilling into deep rock, igniting explosives, and inspecting tunnel safety. They were not the types of job that any person could perform. Rather, they demanded qualifications that were not readily available in this remote mountainous area, or even elsewhere in Vietnam.10

The legal standing of the Chinese workers was a trickier issue, which, because of its sensitivity, I could investigate only limitedly. Because the mining operations were licensed at the provincial level (which applies to mines with a capacity of less than 15,000 tons per year), provincial authorities were able to license temporary three-month extendable work permits for foreign workers. Applying for visas at the provincial levels has several advantages, notably in processing times and the mine’s closer relations with provincial officials. However, given the considerable administrative burden of renewing visas every three months (notably, for nearly half of the workers in the mine mentioned above), it is conceivable that companies might be less than rigorous in ensuring that the permits are kept up to date and rely on a bit more “greasing money” to avoid problems with local authorities. Once again, upon further investigation, we find that problems directed at Chinese workers in the public discourse are entangled within a much wider network of actors and recurring challenges in their regulation and “under-the-table” relations.

CHINESE WORKERS’ LIVED EXPERIENCES AND RELATIONS WITH LOCAL COMMUNITIES

In Cao Bằng, I was also able to visit the work sites, living quarters and meet with a few Chinese workers. In addition to Chinese companies being accused of lowering labour standards, Chinese workers are also accused of taking away local jobs, creating conflict with local communities, or establishing their own “Chinese villages.” However, rarely is attention given to these workers’ own perspectives and actual experiences of living and working in Vietnam.

In the mines I visited, most Chinese workers were contracted directly by the Chinese partner company. The workers I spoke to, described their main reasons for coming to Vietnam to be the pay being a little better and the cost of living a little lower than in China. They also described working and living conditions as being very similar to their experiences working on mining projects in China, also usually located in remote areas with limited infrastructure and services. Two workers I spoke with were older men who regretted leaving behind wives, adult children and grandchildren in China. However, the work in Vietnam enabled them to support their families economically. One of them said he earned 20 million VND per month (approximately US$ 1000), of which he usually sent 15 million VND back home and lived off the rest.

A Chinese translator I met described a more winding path that led to Cao Bằng. He was a younger man in his mid-thirties who came from a Chinese town near the Vietnamese border. He had learned to speak Vietnamese at one of the several Vietnamese language tuition centres in his hometown in China. With limited job prospects in his hometown, however, he began searching online for work in Vietnam and found a job, through an online recruitment site, at a garment factory in the south. After a while there, he met a Vietnamese girlfriend and they soon got married. He later quit his job and together with his wife set up a business in the leather industry. Unfortunately for them, the business went sour and their company was bankrupted, leading him to the mining project in Cao Bằng. During this time, his father had also passed away and so he also wanted to work in Cao Bằng to be closer to his mother.

While the riot that occurred last May in Hà Tĩnh has been the most extreme recent example of violence between Chinese migrant workers and local Vietnamese communities, the situation in Cao Bằng provided a stark contrast. Not far from the mines was a small district town, which workers often visited to eat, shop, relax or simply get away from work. However, few, if any, major tensions or problems with workers were reported by government officials, shopkeepers and residents I spoke with. For many of them, Chinese workers meant more customers and better sales. Even during the tense moments of last May, the mining companies had warned their Chinese counterparts against going out or into town. However, the workers went anyway and encountered little out of the ordinary.

To be sure, the context of a remote mountainous town in Cao Bằng with a history of petty trade with the Chinese from across the border is significantly different from the more densely populated lowlands of Hà Tĩnh. Nonetheless, it testifies to a wider set of experiences among Chinese workers and local communities than are usually reported in the domestic press. For both Vietnamese and Chinese workers alike, the high-politics of the South China Sea sometimes appeared a long way away from their daily lives and aspirations in Cao Bằng. As one Vietnamese worker commented to me about the contested islands, “lose them or save them doesn’t matter much to me. What matters to me is how to make a living. How can I make some money? If a machine breaks down, how can I fix it before tomorrow?”

CONCLUSION

The purpose of this piece has not been to refute or dismiss many of the important concerns raised in the public discourse about Chinese-Vietnamese relations inside Vietnam. Its more modest purpose is to add breadth and nuance to these discussions, notably by reflecting on the experiences and perspectives of the companies, workers and communities most directly implicated by the tensions and controversies. This piece has done so through the lens of natural resource extraction—a particularly contested form of development—that has seen a proliferation of Chinese investments, resource development and, inevitably, contestations of national sovereignty. In particular, this piece highlights the more specific and pragmatic reasons behind Vietnamese cooperation with Chinese companies and workers in resource extraction projects. It testifies to a wider set of possibilities for these partnerships and Chinese workers’ relations with local communities than typically represented in the public discourse.

Finally, it also highlights recurring problems with regulation, law enforcement and “under- the-table” relations that appear to pervade the Vietnamese mineral sector. Indeed, overemphasis on Chinese-Vietnamese relations in these issues risks distracting from more enduring and systemic problems related to resource governance and labour rights in Vietnam.

About the author:
* Jason Morris-Jung is Visiting Fellow at ISEAS; email: jason_morris-jung@iseas.edu.sg. This issue of ISEAS Perspective is part of ISEAS’s project on Chinese immigration and capital in CLMV Countries. This project is coordinated by Dr Terence Chong and Dr Benjamin Loh.

Source:
This article was published by ISEAS as ISEAS Perspective #25 May 2015 (PDF)

Notes:
1. Jason Morris‐Jung, “The Vietnamese Bauxite Controversy: Towards a More Oppositional Politics,” Journal of Vietnamese Studies 10, no. 1 (February 1, 2015): 63–109, doi:10.1525/vs.2015.10.1.63; Edmund Malesky and Jason Morris‐Jung, “Vietnam in 2014: Uncertainty and Opportunity in the Wake of the HS‐981 Crisis,” Asian Survey 55, no. 1 (February 2015): 165–73, doi:10.1525/as.2015.55.1.165; Carlyle A. Thayer, “Political Legitimacy of Vietnam’s One Party‐State: Challenges and Responses,” Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs 28, no. 4 (January 14, 2010): 47–70.
2. Jason Morris‐Jung, Reflections on the Oil Rig Crisis: Vietnam’s Domestic Opposition Grows, ISEAS Perspective (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), July 30, 2014).
3. Research for this study is based on a five‐day visit to two Vietnam‐China mining cooperation projects in a remote area of Cao Bng province in northern Vietnam. It included more than a dozen interviews and informal discussions with Vietnamese and Chinese mine managers, engineers, and workers, as well as local government officials and residents from a small town near the mining operations. For reasons of confidentiality, I have suppressed all names and potentially identifying details of informants.
4. K. Chi, “China Attempts to Control Vietnam’s Mineral Industries,” VietnamNet Bridge, January 25, 2014, http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/business/94502/china‐attempts‐to‐control‐vietnam‐s‐mineral‐ industries.html; Jeff Rutherford, Kate Lazarus, and Shawn Kelley, Rethinking Investments in Natural Resources: China’s Emerging Role in the Mekong Region, Policy Brief (Heinrich Böll Stiftung, WWF, IISD, 2008), https://www.iisd.org/publications/rethinking‐investments‐natural‐resources‐chinas‐emerging‐role‐mekong‐ region‐policy.
5. In 2013, Vietnam’s customs records show that Vietnam exported 1.25 million tons of iron ore to China at US$ 48.72 per ton, while Chinese customs shows that China imported 4.5 million tons of iron ore at US$84.75 (Tuoi Tre News, “Vietnam Metallurgy Association Raises Alarm over Illegal Iron Ore Exports to China,” Tuoi Tre News, February 8, 2014, http://tuoitrenews.vn/business/21414/vietnam‐metallurgy‐association‐raises‐alarm‐over‐ illegal‐iron‐ore‐exports‐to‐china).
6. Đăng Nam, “Doanh Nghip Vit Đng Tên Cho Ch Trung Quc Khai Thác,” Tui Tr Online, January 18, 2014, http://vietstock.vn/2014/01/doanh‐nghiep‐viet‐dung‐ten‐cho‐chu‐trung‐quoc‐khai‐thac‐1351‐328672.htm.
7. Nguyen Van Chinh, Chinese Labour Migration in VietnamitationID”:”XHxrBApp”,”propertiesian view of Indones, ISEAS Perspective (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), August 19, 2014), http://www.iseas.edu.sg/documents/publication/ISEAS_Perspective_2014_46.pdf; Le Hong Hiep, The Dominance of Chinese Engineering Contractors in Vietnam, ISEAS Perspective (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), January 17, 2013), http://www.iseas.edu.sg/documents/publication/ISEAS%20Perspective%202013_4.pdf
8. Le Hong Hiep, The Dominance of Chinese Engineering Contractors in Vietnam.
9. Ibid.
10. Indeed, I had met a couple of Vietnamese workers who had come from the Red River Delta provinces, who had some previously relevant work experience before arriving to Cao Bng. However, they also said they had mostly learned their jobs on‐site, often with the help of their Chinese counterparts.

The post An Ethnographic Glimpse: On The Trail Of Chinese-Vietnamese Mining Cooperation – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Nishchal N Pandey*

The devastating earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale on 25 April 2015, and the second tremor on 12 May, with more than 8,000 deaths and 200,000 thousand houses fully damaged, have shaken Nepal to the core. As many as 5,000 schools are estimated to have been destroyed, and roughly 300,000 people are currently homeless. Monsoon is just a month away, and there is a real threat of pandemics. Like in most disaster situations, the poorest of the poor have suffered the most. Relief is just beginning to reach the villages, because initially there was a lot of confusion at Nepal’s only international airport which has just one run-way for both arrival and departure and lacks a warehouse facility. A total absence of disaster-preparedness, non- implementation of building codes, poor construction practices, coupled with the lack of access to the rural hinterlands, contributed to an overall calamity of this magnitude. Surely, it is going to take a decade or even more to rebuild the destroyed infrastructure.

Although experts had been warning for many years that Nepal is situated in a high-risk seismic zone, lack of resources, poor planning, political instability and sheer laxity resulted in the state’s incapacity to act swiftly in the immediate aftermath of the quake. There was scarcity – of tents, packed food, basic medicines, and hospital beds to treat the injured. A total of just six helicopters were at the government’s disposal. The 90,000-strong Nepal Army just had one MI-17 helicopter, an inexcusable negligence brought out by the apathy of successive governments to sufficiently equipping security forces so that they could respond swiftly to a national emergency such as this.

Friends in Need – Friends Indeed!

Fortunately for those affected by the disaster enormous support came from friendly countries, most notably from India, China, the United States, Israel and Pakistan in the immediate aftermath. India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi held an emergency meeting, and within 4-5 hours, about ten teams of National Disaster Management Force were in Kathmandu. From the following day, under “Operation Maitri” (Operation Friendship), the rescue and relief operations were conducted with the help of the Indian Army’s Ilyushin II-76, C-130 J Hercules, C-17 Globemaster and several helicopters. This is continuing, as of writing. Two full-fledged army field hospitals, run by 18 medical teams and 18 army engineering teams, were also sent. It became Indian Army’s largest-ever support operation in any foreign country.

It was also the largest humanitarian aid mission conducted by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in any foreign country since 1949. China sent 1,088 military personnel and members of armed police, and deployed eight transport planes to ferry a total of 416 tonnes of relief supplies to Nepal. Three air force helicopters are still aiding relief operations. The Chinese are also working to clear the debris on the blocked Kathmandu-Kodari highway that links Nepal with the Chinese border town of Khasa. Over the years, this highway has become one of the vital arteries of land-locked Nepal.

The US had been assisting the Nepali security forces on disaster response and emergency preparedness for quite some time. The US mission had constructed US$ 1.4-million worth of deep tube wells across the Kathmandu valley that would provide 10,000 litres of water per day supporting 15,000 residents following an earthquake. These were seismically-safe deep tube wells. In fact, this project was completed just six months ago, and came in very handy after the earthquake on 25 April. The Americans have, after the earthquake, provided US$ 27-million for humanitarian relief activities in Nepal that includes medical supplies, improved sanitation, and hygiene kits to those severely affected by the disaster.

The area that the earthquake struck includes the district of Gorkha that has a sizable number of serving and retired Gurkha officers. Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in a condolence letter to his Nepali counterpart, expressed Singapore’s deepest condolences for the loss of life. Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Home Affairs Teo Chee Hean said in a statement, “We are very saddened at the loss of lives from the earthquake. The Singapore Police Force has a sizable number of Gurkha officers, and some hail from the affected regions. We share their anxiety and concern for their families, and will do all we can to aid Nepal in this time of need”. Singapore Civil Defence Force sent a 55-man search-and-rescue contingent including officers from its Gurkha Contingent who came equipped with cutting and lifting equipment, fibre-optic scopes, life-detector systems, etc.

While the first phase of rescue operation is over, there is now a great challenge of reconstruction of the collapsed and damaged buildings, rehabilitation of families currently in make-shift camps run by the Nepal Army, water, sanitation, health, food, protection and overall economic recovery. The Nepal Government has launched a ‘Post-Disaster Needs Assessment’ in order to assess the socio-economic impact of the earthquake and identify the priority needs of the affected and critical sectors of the economy. Although the assessment teams have been sent to the villages, and their final report is yet to come, the initial estimates by the Finance Ministry show damage of more than US$ 5 billion. The Government has announced US$ 2 billion National Reconstruction Fund, but its own allocation from its coffer is only US$ 2 million.

According to Jamie McGoldrick, UN Resident Coordinator in Nepal, “out of the 415 million US dollars requested for immediate humanitarian intervention by the UN, only 22.4 million has been received till May 8th”. The United Kingdom has pledged 22 million pounds, and Germany 2.5 million Euro. The EU has also approved 16.6 million Euro as assistance.
Aid Accountability

The Nepal Government has insisted that all monetary help come through a single-window of the ‘Prime Minister’s Relief Fund’ as it will be easier to channelize funds through a centralised yet transparent and accountable mechanism with low over-head costs. But a lot of donors and INGOs have misgivings about this mechanism, owing to the lack of local elected-bodies in Nepal, bureaucratic red tape and politicisation of the relief distribution system. There is a strong voice inside the country that aid should neither end up as salaries of consultants nor as relief to particular constituencies of influential parliamentarians.

But as the news about the Nepal disaster recedes from the international headlines, the inflow of resources will become insufficient, and Nepal will be in a tighter position to get the required funding for the herculean tasks that lie ahead. Instead of arguing about which account to deposit donations into, and whether the government or the INGOs should take the lead, both the Nepal Government as well as the international community need to realise that it is already becoming a race against time. Donors must speed up the financing of housing re-construction, and the Nepal Government must start delivering.

There is a very little margin for error. The situation is further compounded by the fact that Nepali youth in their millions are in the Gulf, Malaysia, Korea and other places, with only the elderly and children left in the rural hinterlands. This makes the reconstruction work even more difficult. If this plantation season turns unproductive, there is also a growing concern of wide-spread food shortages.

Another great impact of the quake has been felt at four out of the seven UNESCO heritage sites in the Kathmandu valley. Bhaktapur, Lalitpur and Hanuman Dhoka Palace squares must be re- built, not only to restore Nepal’s golden history but also to protect these sites for tourism and for future generations to see. The Kaasthamandap for instance was 500 years old, the capital city owes its name to this temple. Without these heritage sites, Nepal’s soul will be lost in the rubble of the disaster.

Usually when there is a natural calamity on a scale like this, first there is death and destruction, then there is a humanitarian crisis followed by a political upheaval. Post-disaster situation is always a breeding ground for further instability. Nepal has had seven Prime Ministers in eight years, still without a full-fledged Constitution and without local elected-bodies. If the growing frustration among the citizenry is further aggravated by lethargy on the part of the government, it will be a crisis of an unimaginable scale.

About the author:
*Dr Nischal Pandey is Director of the Centre for South Asian Studies (CSAS), Kathmandu, and Honorary Fellow of the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), an autonomous research institute at the National University of Singapore. He can be contacted at nina@ntc.net.np. Opinions expressed in this paper are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of ISAS.

Source:
This article was published by ISAS as ISAS Brief No. 367 – 26 May 2015 (PDF)

The post Nepal After The Mega Earthquake – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Chan Hoi Cheong

In late April, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) concluded its 26th summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The summit took place amidst China’s land reclamation activities in the South China Sea, which continue to be a potential flashpoint in the region. While the issue has received significant attention from member states, meaningful progress on the dispute is still slow with the bloc shying away from criticizing China directly over its behavior in the area. The final statement with a day-later release however was still stronger than usual, as Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak stressed upon an urgent need to address ongoing reclamation works in the South China Sea.

South China Sea

The heavier than usual statement, as expected, triggered an angry reaction from Beijing, with Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hong Lei saying that ASEAN should refrain from making statements about the dispute as not all of its members are involved. This is yet another indication of Beijing’s preference for bilateral solutions instead of those negotiated through multilateral framework such as ASEAN. More importantly, Beijing’s exploitation of the bloc’s inability to come together as a united force in the South China Sea dispute could also be regarded as a driving force in its ever-increasing assertiveness in the region.

As host of this year’s summit, Malaysia’s decision to avoid overtly irking China in the South China Sea dispute is a clear reflection of Najib administration’s desire to lead the bloc in a neutral direction while maintaining Kuala Lumpur’s close economic ties with Beijing. While this year’s statement was stronger than previous ones, vocal critics of China such as the Philippines and Vietnam still insisted that it should have gone further, namely by calling for an international tribunal. The Philippine President Benigno Aquino, for instance has called for a stronger regional stand and said the dispute was a “regional issue” with several ramifications, namely freedom of navigation and damage to maritime environments.

This was not the first time a host country has sought to tone down criticism of China’s behavior in the South China Sea. Similarly in 2012, Cambodia’s refusal to be drawn into the dispute ultimately led to the breakdown of the summit with members failing to agree on a joint communique mentioning the Scarborough Shoals, a contested area between China and the Philippines. The episode was disastrous as it led to acrimonious exchanges between Phnom Penh and Manila as well as demonstrating that the “ASEAN way” of consensus had failed miserably. The absence of a communique that year also illustrated that not all members have shared strategic concerns when it comes to the South China Sea, further dealing a blow to a coherent response to China’s aggressive stance.

Although Indonesia’s then-foreign minister Marty Natalegawa managed to narrow the differences by way of “shuttle diplomacy,” the underlying problem still lies in Beijing’s ability to establish close economic ties with the individual countries of the bloc. In most cases, these countries’ interdependence on China for trade also bears with it an opportunity cost, such as offering concessions on security-related matters like Beijing’s adherence to the 2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC). Without balancing economic interests and security ones, China will be able to jostle the bloc around whenever it feels threatened by individual member states in the bloc by offering various incentives to other members, splitting them further apart.

In addition, ASEAN’s decision-making formula of consensus among all member states for a proposal to move forward is detrimental in this case. As demonstrated in the Cambodia incident, a veto by a member will effectively kill any proposal therefore preventing progress on the matter. This is because in contrast with common economic goals as laid down in the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), members do not share a common view when it comes to their “threat perception” of China. For countries like Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia, the South China Sea dispute is ultimately an issue between their neighbors such as Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam, and Beijing, and as such is not worth risking their bilateral ties for. Without clearly defining the strategic interests of ASEAN, this has not only resulted in frustration among member states but also set a dangerous precedent should there be disputes over security-related matters with other big powers in the future.

Critics have argued that the failure to speak with one voice is ASEAN’s biggest diplomatic challenge since its formation, and it will likely to make the bloc less relevant despite its aspiration to become a viable economic community by 2015. The absence of a clear response to the dispute is worrying against the backdrop of recent developments such as the 2013 showdown at the Second James Shoal and the placement of an oil rig close to Vietnam by China, both of which have the potential to escalate into armed conflict. Increasingly intimidated, it is therefore not surprising that countries such as the Philippines and Vietnam have instead chosen to deepen their security ties via traditional tools such as strengthening bilateral dialogues and improving diplomatic co-ordination on the South China Sea issue. For Hanoi and Manila, China’s so-called “nine-dashed line” is simply illegitimate and the adoption of common positions among them is vital for the ultimate culmination of the South China Sea dispute as a bloc-wide strategic issue.

The division within ASEAN needs to be resolved so that the talks to establish a Code of Conduct (COC), often rejected by China, can move forward and be implemented. However, against a backdrop of China’s closer economic links with individual member states, such unity will most likely be harder to forge as national interests often supersede regional ones therefore making a paradigm shift more necessary than ever. This means the so-called “gradual progress and consensus through consultations” approach that require all ten-member states to reach an agreement will need to be changed. Instead, the “ASEAN-X” formula that has been used on trade, investment, and economic issues shall now be considered for security-related matters of such magnitude. Under this formula, a reasonable majority of member states will be able to make a decision despite a veto so that it can prevent a single state from hijacking the entire agenda due to a conflict of interest. In the South China Sea dispute, this means member states, particularly claimants such as Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Philippines as well as interested stakeholders like Indonesia and Singapore can pursue the establishment of a COC in the area while Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos can opt out by abstaining from the voting process.

The change in voting mechanism however should also come with a pursuit of continuous stability in the region. Malaysia’s chairmanship of ASEAN could be a starting point for a new dynamic in the resolution of the South China Sea dispute. Apart from being a claimant, its close ties with China would also be beneficial in pushing the COC agenda ahead. With a combination of incentives and diplomatic capital, Kuala Lumpur should play smart diplomacy within the bloc and with China in reaching a breakthrough on one of the most dangerous disputes of the present day.

Although the summit in Kuala Lumpur has produced a less than desired result on the South China Sea, the room to maneuver is still available for ASEAN and China to steer themselves away from a collision course and head toward the COC instead. The willingness of both sides to abide by international conventions for now should serve as a foundation in restoring the trust deficit between individual member states and Beijing.

However, the question is how long it will take before such adherence to international convention comes to an abrupt end due to unilateral action by any claimant, or even an outside force that destabilizes the region thus undermining Southeast Asia’s relative stability for decades. There have already been signs of tension last week with the Chinese navy warning the United States to back off from the South China Sea after the latter’s deployment of P-8A Poseidon aircraft for surveillance purpose in the area. If mismanaged, this development, together with the Philippines’ and Vietnam’s alliance with the US, could be a tipping point towards full-blown military conflict between the two major powers in the near future.

This article appeared at Geopolitical Monitor.com

The post Paradigm Shift Needed In ASEAN’s Approach To South China Sea Dispute – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Second-time presidential candidate Rick Santorum announced his campaign for the U.S. presidency on Wednesday, standing behind his goals to shrink the government, heal the middle class, and focus on social issues, while honing in on his image as a “blue collar conservative.”

“I am proud to stand here among you and for you, the American workers who have sacrificed so much, to announce that I am running for president of the United States,” Santorum stated May 27 in his home state of Pennsylvania.

Santorum will try to appeal to Catholic voters in the 2016 race, although he is among two other Republican contenders with a Catholic affiliation – Jeb Bush, a convert from Episcopalianism, and Marco Rubio.

Santorum’s 2012 campaign for president bolstered his transparency on faith, revealing his belief that God and the importance of religion are pivotal in American democracy. The former U.S. Senator has made it clear over the years that he is devoted to his faith, and that the Church has helped shape some of his political stances.

“I am proud of being Catholic. I’m proud of the teachings of the Church,” Santorum told CNA in 2011, upholding the belief that faith and reason go hand in hand.

“When the reason is right and the faith is true, they end up in the same place,” Santorum continued.

The New York Times called Santorum the “boldest candidate in the race” because of his stance opposing abortion and same-sex marriage, making him stand apart from what could be a dozen republican runners.

During his two terms as a U.S. Senator, Santorum worked resolutely to ban partial-birth abortion and continues to oppose the practice. He also told CNA that the “faith teaches very clearly that life is life at the moment of conception.”

Santorum also defended religious-based organizations and helped them receive more assistance during his time as a senator in the 1996 welfare overhaul. He has also spoken out against homosexual acts and supports marriage between one man and one woman, publicly supporting the Defense of Marriage Act of 1996.

Although Santorum admitted on NBC earlier in the year that he had spoken rashly about some sensitive issues during his 2012 campaign, but he is still resolved to speak openly about the importance of family and traditional values.

The former senator, age 57, joins an already crowded race, but his history of winning 11 states against Mitt Romney in the 2012 Republican primaries could prove helpful in the continuously brimming bids.

Although recent polls place him 10th among his fellow Republicans, Santorum will work to make his way towards the early debates in August, pushing his themes of restoring traditional American values and defence against the country’s enemies.

Santorum spoke boldly this week about the impending threat of radical Islam, saying he has been dubbed as an enemy by the Islamic State in one of their English-language magazines. Nevertheless, Santorum believes America should be wary of the brewing storm that extremist Islam may pose.

Other candidates for the Republican nomination include former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, Texas senator Ted Cruz, and Ben Carson, a retired surgeon.

The post Santorum, Catholic And Republican, Announces Bid For US President appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Everyone, from political pundits in Washington to the Pope in Rome, including most journalists in the mass media and in the alternative press, have focused on the US moves toward ending the economic blockade of Cuba and gradually opening diplomatic relations.

Talk is rife of a ‘major shift’ in US policy toward Latin America with the emphasis on diplomacy and reconciliation. Even most progressive writers and journals have ceased writing about US imperialism.

However, there is mounting evidence that Washington’s negotiations with Cuba are merely one part of a two-track policy. There is clearly a major US build-up in Latin America, with increasing reliance on ‘military platforms’, designed to launch direct military interventions in strategic countries.

Moreover, US policymakers are actively involved in promoting ‘client’ opposition parties, movements and personalities to destabilize independent governments and are intent on re-imposing US domination.

In this essay we will start our discussion with the origins and unfolding of this ‘two track’ policy, its current manifestations, and projections into the future. We will conclude by evaluating the possibilities of re-establishing US imperial domination in the region.

Origins of the Two Track Policy

Washington’s pursuit of a ‘two-track policy’, based on combining ‘reformist policies’ toward some political formations, while working to overthrow other regimes and movements by force and military intervention, was practiced by the early Kennedy Administration following the Cuban revolution. Kennedy announced a vast new economic program of aid, loans and investments – dubbed the ‘Alliance for Progress’ – to promote development and social reform in Latin American countries willing to align with the US. At the same time the Kennedy regime escalated US military aid and joint exercises in the region. Kennedy sponsored a large contingent of Special Forces – ‘Green Berets’ – to engage in counter-insurgency warfare. The ‘Alliance for Progress’ was designed to counter the mass appeal of the social-revolutionary changes underway in Cuba with its own program of ‘social reform’. While Kennedy promoted watered-down reforms in Latin America, he launched the ‘secret’ CIA (‘Bay of Pigs’) invasion of Cuba in 1961and naval blockade in 1962 (the so-called ‘missile crises’). The two-track policy ended up sacrificing social reforms and strengthening military repression. By the mid-1970’s the ‘two-tracks’ became one – force. The US invaded the Dominican Republic in 1965. It backed a series of military coups throughout the region, effectively isolating Cuba. As a result, Latin America’s labor force experienced nearly a quarter century of declining living standards.

By the 1980’s US client-dictators had lost their usefulness and Washington once again took up a dual strategy: On one track, the White House wholeheartedly backed their military-client rulers’ neo-liberal agenda and sponsored them as junior partners in Washington’s regional hegemony. On the other track, they promoted a shift to highly controlled electoral politics, which they described as a ‘democratic transition’, in order to ‘decompress’ mass social pressures against its military clients. Washington secured the introduction of elections and promoted client politicians willing to continue the neo-liberal socio-economic framework established by the military regimes.

By the turn of the new century, the cumulative grievances of thirty years of repressive rule, regressive neo-liberal socio-economic policies and the denationalization and privatization of the national patrimony had caused an explosion of mass social discontent. This led to the overthrow and electoral defeat of Washington’s neo-liberal client regimes.

Throughout most of Latin America, mass movements were demanding a break with US-centered ‘integration’ programs. Overt anti-imperialism grew and intensified. The period saw the emergence of numerous center-left governments in Venezuela, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Honduras and Nicaragua. Beyond the regime changes , world economic forces had altered: growing Asian markets, their demand for Latin American raw materials and the global rise of commodity prices helped to stimulate the development of Latin American-centered regional organizations – outside of Washington’s control.

Washington was still embedded in its 25 year ‘single-track’ policy of backing civil-military authoritarian and imposing neo-liberal policies and was unable to respond and present a reform alternative to the anti-imperialist, center-left challenge to its dominance. Instead, Washington worked to reverse the new party- power configuration. Its overseas agencies, the Agency for International Development (AID), the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and embassies worked to destabilize the new governments in Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Paraguay and Honduras. The US ‘single-track’ of intervention and destabilization failed throughout the first decade of the new century (with the exception of Honduras and Paraguay.

In the end Washington remained politically isolated. Its integration schemes were rejected. Its market shares in Latin America declined. Washington not only lost its automatic majority in the Organization of American States (OAS), but it became a distinct minority.

Washington’s ‘single track’ policy of relying on the ‘stick’ and holding back on the ‘carrot’ was based on several considerations: The Bush and Obama regimes were deeply influenced by the US’s twenty-five year domination of the region (1975-2000) and the notion that the uprisings and political changes in Latin America in the subsequent decade were ephemeral, vulnerable and easily reversed. Moreover, Washington, accustomed to over a century of economic domination of markets, resources and labor, took for granted that its hegemony was unalterable. The White House failed to recognize the power of China’s growing share of the Latin American market. The State Department ignored the capacity of Latin American governments to integrate their markets and exclude the US.

US State Department officials never moved beyond the discredited neo-liberal doctrine that they had successfully promoted in the 1990’s. The White House failed to adopt a ‘reformist’ turn to counter the appeal of radical reformers like Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan President. This was most evident in the Caribbean and the Andean countries where President Chavez launched his two ‘alliances for progress’: ‘Petro-Caribe’ (Venezuela’s program of supplying cheap, heavily subsidized, fuel to poor Central American and Caribbean countries and heating oil to poor neighborhoods in the US) and ‘ALBA’ (Chavez’ political-economic union of Andean states, plus Cuba and Nicaragua, designed to promote regional political solidarity and economic ties.) Both programs were heavily financed by Caracas. Washington failed to come up with a successful alternative plan.

Unable to win diplomatically or in the ‘battle of ideas’, Washington resorted to the ‘big stick’ and sought to disrupt Venezuela’s regional economic program rather than compete with Chavez’ generous and beneficial aid packages. The US’ ‘spoiler tactics’ backfired: In 2009, the Obama regime backed a military coup in Honduras, ousting the elected liberal reformist President Zelaya and installed a bloody tyrant, a throwback to the 1970s when the US backed Chilean coup brought General Pinochet to power. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, in an act of pure political buffoonery, refused to call Zelaya’s violent ouster a coup and moved swiftly to recognize the dictatorship. No other government backed the US in its Honduras policy.

There was universal condemnation of the coup, highlighting Washington’s isolation.

Repeatedly, Washington tried to use its ‘hegemonic card’ but it was roundly outvoted at regional meetings. At the Summit of the Americas in 2010, Latin American countries overrode US objections and voted to invite Cuba to its next meeting, defying a 50-year old US veto. The US was left alone in its opposition.

The position of Washington was further weakened by the decade-long commodity boom (spurred by China’s voracious demand for agro-mineral products). The ‘mega-cycle’ undermined US Treasury and State Department’s anticipation of a price collapse. In previous cycles, commodity ‘busts’ had forced center-left governments to run to the US controlled International Monetary Fund (IMF) for highly conditioned balance of payment loans, which the White House used to impose its neo-liberal policies and political dominance. The ‘mega-cycle’ generated rising revenues and incomes. This gave the center-left governments enormous leverage to avoid the ‘debt traps’ and to marginalize the IMF. This virtually eliminated US-imposed conditionality and allowed Latin governments to pursue populist-nationalist policies. These policies decreased poverty and unemployment. Washington played the ‘crisis card’ and lost. Nevertheless Washington continued working with extreme rightwing opposition groups to destabilize the progressive governments, in the hope that ‘come the crash’, Washington’s proxies would ‘waltz right in’ and take over.

The Re-Introduction of the ‘Two Track’ Policy

After a decade and a half of hard knocks, repeated failures of its ‘big stick’ policies, rejection of US-centered integration schemes and multiple resounding defeats of its client-politicians at the ballot box, Washington finally began to ‘rethink’ its ‘one track’ policy and tentatively explore a limited ‘two track’ approach.

The ‘two-tracks’, however, encompass polarities clearly marked by the recent past. While the Obama regime opened negotiations and moved toward establishing relations with Cuba, it escalated the military threats toward Venezuela by absurdly labeling Caracas as a ‘national security threat to the US.’

Washington had woken up to the fact that its bellicose policy toward Cuba had been universally rejected and had left the US isolated from Latin America. The Obama regime decided to claim some ‘reformist credentials’ by showcasing its opening to Cuba. The ‘opening to Cuba’ is really part of a wider policy of a more active political intervention in Latin America. Washington will take full advantage of the increased vulnerability of the center-left governments as the commodity mega-cycle comes to an end and prices collapse. Washington applauds the fiscal austerity program pursued by Dilma Rousseff’s regime in Brazil. It wholeheartedly backs newly elected Tabaré Vázquez’s “Broad Front” regime in Uruguay with its free market policies and structural adjustment. It publicly supports Chilean President Bachelet’s recent appointment of center-right, Christian Democrats to Cabinet posts to accommodate big business.

These changes within Latin America provide an ‘opening’ for Washington to pursue a ‘dual track’ policy: On the one hand Washington is increasing political and economic pressure and intensifying its propaganda campaign against ‘state interventionist’ policies and regimes in the immediate period. On the other hand, the Pentagon is intensifying and escalating its presence in Central America and its immediate vicinity. The goal is ultimately to regain leverage over the military command in the rest of the South American continent.

The Miami Herald (5/10/15) reported that the Obama Administration had sent 280 US marines to Central America without any specific mission or pretext. Coming so soon after the Summit of the Americas in Panama (April 10 -11, 2015), this action has great symbolic importance. While the presence of Cuba at the Summit may have been hailed as a diplomatic victory for reconciliation within the Americas, the dispatch of hundreds of US marines to Central America suggests another scenario in the making.

Ironically, at the Summit meeting, the Secretary General of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), former Colombian president (1994-98) Ernesto Samper, called for the US to remove all its military bases from Latin America, including Guantanamo: “A good point in the new agenda of relations in Latin America would be the elimination of the US military bases”.

The point of the US ‘opening’ to Cuba is precisely to signal its greater involvement in Latin America, one that includes a return to more robust US military intervention. The strategic intent is to restore neo-liberal client regimes, by ballots or bullets.

Conclusion

Washington’s current adoption of a two-track policy is a ‘cheap version’ of the John F. Kennedy policy of combining the ‘Alliance for Progress’ with the ‘Green Berets’. However, Obama offers little in the way of financial support for modernization and reform to complement his drive to restore neo-liberal dominance.

After a decade and a half of political retreat, diplomatic isolation and relative loss of military leverage, the Obama regime has taken over six years to recognize the depth of its isolation. When Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Roberta Jacobson, claimed she was ‘surprised and disappointed’ when every Latin American country opposed Obama’s claim that Venezuela represented a ‘national security threat to the United States’, she exposed just how ignorant and out-of-touch the State Department has become with regard to Washington’s capacity to influence Latin America in support of its imperial agenda of intervention.

With the decline and retreat of the center-left, the Obama regime has been eager to exploit the two-track strategy. As long as the FARC-President Santos peace talks in Colombia advance, Washington is likely to recalibrate its military presence in Colombia to emphasize its destabilization campaign against Venezuela. The State Department will increase diplomatic overtures to Bolivia. The National Endowment for Democracy will intensify its intervention in this year’s Argentine elections.

Varied and changing circumstances dictate flexible tactics. Hovering over Washington’s tactical shifts is an ominous strategic outlook directed toward increasing military leverage. As the peace negotiations between the Colombian government and FARC guerrillas advance toward an accord, the pretext for maintaining seven US military bases and several thousand US military and Special Forces troops diminishes. However, Colombian President Santos has given no indication that a ‘peace agreement’ would be conditioned on the withdrawal of US troops or closing of its bases. In other words, the US Southern Command would retain a vital military platform and infrastructure capable of launching attacks against Venezuela, Ecuador, Central America and the Caribbean. With military bases throughout the region, in Colombia, Cuba (Guantanamo), Honduras (Soto Cano in Palmerola), Curacao, Aruba and Peru, Washington can quickly mobilize interventionary forces. Military ties with the armed forces of Uruguay, Paraguay, and Chile ensure continued joint exercises and close co-ordination of so-called ‘security’ policies in the ‘Southern Cone’ of Latin America. This strategy is specifically designed to prepare for internal repression against popular movements, whenever and wherever class struggle intensifies in Latin America. The two-track policy, in force today, plays out through political-diplomatic and military strategies.

In the immediate period throughout most of the region, Washington pursues a policy of political, diplomatic and economic intervention and pressure. The White House is counting on the ‘rightwing swing’ of former center-left governments to facilitate the return to power of unabashedly neo-liberal client-regimes in future elections. This is especially true with regard to Brazil and Argentina.

The ‘political-diplomatic track’ is evident in Washington’s moves to re-establish relations with Bolivia and to strengthen allies elsewhere in order to leverage favorable policies in Ecuador, Nicaragua and Cuba. Washington proposes to offer diplomatic and trade agreements in exchange for a ‘toning down’ of anti-imperialist criticism and weakening the ‘Chavez-era’ programs of regional integration.

The ‘two-track approach’, as applied to Venezuela, has a more overt military component than elsewhere. Washington will continue to subsidize violent paramilitary border crossings from Colombia. It will continue to encourage domestic terrorist sabotage of the power grid and food distribution system. The strategic goal is to erode the electoral base of the Maduro government, in preparation for the legislative elections in the fall of 2015. When it comes to Venezuela, Washington is pursuing a ‘four step’ strategy:

(1) Indirect violent intervention to erode the electoral support of the government

(2) Large-scale financing of the electoral campaign of the legislative opposition to secure a majority in Congress

(3) A massive media campaign in favor of a Congressional vote for a referendum impeaching the President

(4) A large-scale financial, political and media campaign to secure a majority vote for impeachment by referendum.

In the likelihood of a close vote, the Pentagon would prepare a rapid military intervention with its domestic collaborators – seeking a ‘Honduras-style’ overthrow of Maduro.

The strategic and tactical weakness of the two-track policy is the absence of any sustained and comprehensive economic aid, trade and investment program that would attract and hold middle class voters. Washington is counting more on the negative effects of the crisis to restore its neo-liberal clients. The problem with this approach is that the pro-US forces can only promise a return to orthodox austerity programs, reversing social and public welfare programs , while making large-scale economic concessions to major foreign investors and bankers. The implementation of such regressive programs are going to ignite and intensify class, community-based and ethnic conflicts.

The ‘electoral transition’ strategy of the US is a temporary expedient, in light of the highly unpopular economic policies, which it would surely implement. The complete absence of any substantial US socio-economic aid to cushion the adverse effects on working families means that the US client-electoral victories will not last long. That is why and where the US strategic military build-up comes into play: The success of track-one, the pursuit of political-diplomatic tactics, will inevitably polarize Latin American society and heighten prospects for class struggle. Washington hopes that it will have its political-military client-allies ready to respond with violent repression. Direct intervention and heightened domestic repression will come into play to secure US dominance.

The ‘two-track strategy’ will, once again, evolve into a ‘one-track strategy’ designed to return Latin America as a satellite region, ripe for pillage by extractive multi-nationals and financial speculators.

As we have seen over the past decade and a half, ‘one-track policies’ lead to social upheavals. And the next time around the results may go far beyond progressive center-left regimes toward truly social-revolutionary governments!

Epilogue

US empire-builders have clearly demonstrated throughout the world their inability to intervene and produce stable, prosperous and productive client states (Iraq and Libya are prime examples). There is no reason to believe, even if the US ‘two-track policy’ leads to temporary electoral victories, that Washington’s efforts to restore dominance will succeed in Latin America, least of all because its strategy lacks any mechanism for economic aid and social reforms that could maintain a pro-US elite in power. For example, how could the US possibly offset China’s $50 billion aid package to Brazil – except through violence and repression.

It is important to analyze how the rise of China, Russia, strong regional markets and new centers of finance have severely weakened the efforts by client regimes to realign with the US. Military coups and free markets are no longer guaranteed formulas for success in Latin America: Their past failures are too recent to forget.

Finally the ‘financialization’ of the US economy, what even the International Monetary Fund (IMF) describes as the negative impact of ‘too much finance’ (Financial Times 5/13/15, p 4), means that the US cannot allocate capital resources to develop productive activity in Latin America. The imperial state can only serve as a violent debt collector for its banks in the context of large-scale unemployment. Financial and extractive imperialism is a politico-economic cocktail for detonating social revolution on a continent-wide basis – far beyond the capacity of the US marines to prevent or suppress.

The post Washington’s Two Track Policy To Latin America: Marines To Central America And Diplomats To Cuba – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

In a speech delivered to the UN General Assembly by Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane on September 25, 2014, King Mohammed VI called for a new approach to helping developing countries achieve secure, sustainable economic and political stability. The Moroccan monarch stated that “Sustainable development is not something which can be achieved through decisions and ready-made prescriptions,” he said. “Nor is there a single model in this area. Each country follows a path of its own, having taken into consideration its historical development, cultural heritage, human and natural resources, specific political circumstances, as well as its economic choices and the obstacles and challenges facing it.”

In another Royal message to the participants in the Crans Montana Forum held in Dakhla from March 12-14, King Mohammed VI stressed that “Morocco’s African policy is based on a comprehensive, integrated and inclusive approach designed to promote peace and stability, encourage sustainable human development and safeguard the cultural and spiritual identity of our populations, while respecting the universal values of human rights.”

“Morocco has been working untiringly to help forge a modern, bold, entrepreneurial and open Africa; an African continent which is proud of its identity, which derives its vibrancy from its cultural heritage and which is capable of transcending outdated ideologies,” he said

The King acknowledged that “the borders inherited from colonization often continue to be a major source of tension and conflict,” and that “Africa is a continent with growing and unsettling security issues”; but he stressed that “Africa’s tremendous human and natural resources should, instead, be a powerful catalyst for regional integration,” and urged that “It is up to us — Africans — to innovate in order to turn them into open spaces where fruitful exchange and interaction can flourish between African states.”

In 2000, King Mohammed VI revealed the new tone and the new ambitions of Morocco in Africa when he announced, on behalf of South-South cooperation, the cancellation of debts of the least developed countries (LDCs) and Sub-Saharan Africa and to exempt their products from tariffs.

The assistance provided by the kingdom to Sub-Saharan countries is between $2 and $3 billion dirhams (MAD 180 to MAD 268 million) per year, mainly for the benefit of African countries in West and Central Africa.

There is a high demand from these countries, particularly in staff training, contributing to the financing, design and construction of infrastructure as well as socio-economic projects, especially in sanitation, water supply, electricity, health and food.

Morocco organized, in 2007, in Rabat, in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the First African Conference on Human Development. This conference was aimed to meet the ambition of Morocco to promote comprehensive human development through the strengthening of South-South cooperation and the implementation of commitments in various international forums, including those related the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Morocco’s efforts to give the South-South cooperation a face full of solidarity, has resulted in its continued commitment to noble causes of peace and development, as well as its constant position to express solidarity towards the concerns of developing countries, and their aspirations for progress and well-being.

The UNDP ART GOLD Programme has supported Morocco since 2007, improving the effectiveness and aid coordination in order to strengthen local citizenship and to place human beings at the center of development actions.

Morocco is also seeking to develop a strategy for tripartite cooperation channel aid funds made available in the framework of international programs for the financing of infrastructure projects or socio-economic development in African countries and to entrust those projects to Moroccan companies (consultancies, engineering companies, service providers, etc).

Morocco attaches great importance to national education by providing college scholarships to African students. More than 10,000 students pursue their studies each year in universities and schools through scholarships provided by the Moroccan Agency for International Cooperation (AMCI).

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) classified Morocco among the top twenty investors in Africa for the period 2003-2007.

Morocco signed in 2004 an agreement on “double taxation” (which prevents companies with operations abroad from paying tax twice) and encouraging investment with Senegal.

Following the success of this program and the positive results recorded, Morocco expressed to its African partners its willingness to jointly develop a regional development project of artificial inducement of rain in Africa. This would assist African countries with expressed needs in this area, thus contributing to the achievement of the NEPAD strategy for the generalization of access to water in Africa by 2015. Senegal has also been a recipient of technical and logistical support for the country to launch its artificial rain.

Morocco has initiated many African countries to triangular cooperation, rich and varied, based on a true partnership and effective solidarity, in addition to cooperation programs implemented bilaterally. It has many advantages and allows many African countries to benefit from the know-how and expertise already experienced in the land of Africa and to overcome the lack of budgetary resources.

Given the multiple benefits of triangular cooperation, Morocco considers that this type of partnership can be a vehicle for supporting the efforts of developing countries in sub-Saharan Africa and expresses its readiness to invest with donors and regional donors and international collaboration seeking to achieve tripartite programs for countries in SSA.

The Omnium Nord-Africain (ONA), the second largest company in the country after the Office Chérifien Phosphates, operates in Africa in the food & beverage, distribution, financial sector (banks & insurance) and the mining sectors.

Export Morocco spares no effort to promote exchanges between Morocco and many African countries, through participation in international fairs and exhibitions, and the organization of business missions, advising businesses, hosting meetings with economic operators, and finally by sponsoring prospective studies of areas and countries.

Groups Managem Ynna Holding, CCGT and JET Sakane are involved in various sectors: mining, tourism, irrigation, housing and social development. Leading Moroccan banks such as BMCE and Attijariwafa Bank have launched partnerships and signed win-win deals with their African counterparts.

The National Electricity Morocco (ONE) and the airline Royal Air Morocco (RAM) are also present in the African continent. Air and sea links have multiplied and contribute significantly to the problem of intra-transportation within the African continent. RAM has more than 30 airlines in Africa and open regional offices in 11 African countries.

Morocco has always supported the initiatives of the United Nations for the restoration of stability in Africa and has, since 1960 to nowadays, has provided military contingents at the disposal of UN peacekeeping operations in the Congo, Somalia, Angola, Democratic Republic of Congo and Côte d’Ivoire.

In December 2006, Morocco sent a contingent of Royal Armed Forces, consisting of specialists and experts to participate in a demining operation in the Casamance region of Senegal. Morocco has also provided medical field camps in many needy African countries to provide immediate medical assistance.

Morocco will continue to be present in Africa and reinforce south-south cooperation to contribute to the development of the African continent and collaborate with American and European allies to bring peace and stability to this continent.

At the Moroccan-Ivorian Economic Forum, held in Abidjan on February 24 2014, King Mohammed VI laid out a compelling vision for Africa’s development – He said that “This objective [prosperity for future generations] will even be more readily attainable when Africa overcomes its Afro-pessimism and unlocks its intellectual and material potential as well as that of all African peoples. Just imagine what our continent will look like, once it frees itself of its constraints and burdens!”

The post Mohammed VI, The African Monarch – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

In Washington, a town in which most people, both government and non-government employees, are involved, one way or another, in public relations spin, the thing that will get you in the most trouble is telling the simple truth. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter recently stepped in it by stating what should have been obvious to the world: He blamed Iraqi forces for the loss to ISIS of Ramadi, an important Iraqi provincial capital, telling CNN that, “The Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight. They vastly outnumbered the opposing force and yet they withdrew from the site.”

Although evidence that Carter’s conclusion was not rocket science came in the form of video showing Iraqi military vehicles fleeing at high speeds from the town, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi diplomatically rebuffed the provider of U.S. military assistance to his forces by saying, “I am sure he was fed with wrong information.” Yeah, right.

In classic Washington form, Vice President Joe Biden had to call Abadi to clean up Carter’s truthful indiscretion. The White House issued the following statement: “The vice president recognized the enormous sacrifice and bravery of Iraqi forces over the past eighteen months in Ramadi and elsewhere.” Although episodes of “sacrifice and bravery” on the part of the Iraqi troops very well could have occurred, these forces, which the United States spent eight years training, cut and ran in critical situations when ISIS forces, inferior in number, initially took over about one-third Iraq last year and in Ramadi more recently.

If all of this wasn’t enough, Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards Quds Force, which is helping the Shi’ite Iraqi government defend against ISIS, countered that the United States “has no will to fight” against ISIS and was leaving everything up to the Iranians and Iraqis. He then added that the United States “didn’t do a damn thing” to stop ISIS’s advance on Ramadi.

There is some truth to Suleimani’s second allegation. Ramadi was besieged for a long time, but neither the United States nor the Iraqi government did much to send assistance. In the case of the Iraqi government, it was scared to arm Sunni tribes to fight ISIS because it was afraid those weapons could later be used for Sunni resistance to the oppressive Shi’ite government. As for Suleimani’s first allegation, that has some truth to it too. U.S. public opinion is tired of overseas military quagmires, especially in Iraq. The American people, reacting to ISIS’s beheading of a few Americans after the United States had commenced bombing the group, seemed to want some U.S. action against the group, as long American military casualties weren’t high and the operation didn’t turn into another quagmire on the ground. That is why the Obama administration has confined itself to ineffectual, and maybe even counterproductive, air strikes instead of reinserting large numbers of ground forces back into Iraq.

Yet, Suleimani’s snide comments, although largely correct, beg the question of why the United States—being on the other side of the world from the conflict—should be involved at all. However, the Iraqi government should be concerned about ISIS, which is largely a threat to the Middle East region, and so should neighboring Iran. The major reason that ISIS could encourage lone wolf terrorists (of much less threat than organized groups, such as al Qaeda or its regional affiliates) to launch attacks on American soil is to get non-Muslim (read: U.S.) forces out of the Middle East. (Come to think of it, that is al Qaeda’s main gripe with the United States, too.) In the 1980s, Hezbollah, a Shi’ite group that was created to counter non-Muslim Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, also attacked U.S. targets until the United States withdrew its troops from that country, then on a one-sided “peacekeeping” mission to help Israel and its Christian allies there. Once U.S. forces pulled out, Hezbollah attacks on the U.S. targets gradually dissipated. The same likely would happen with any lame lone wolf attacks against U.S. targets by ISIS, which is mainly concerned with setting up an Islamist state in Iraq and Syria.

Islamist terrorism against the United States is primarily caused by the fact that it’s a non-Islamic country attacking or invading Muslim lands. One doesn’t need to agree with the terrorists’ methods to scrutinize their motives for attacking. Since the 9/11 attacks in 2001, the Bush and Obama administrations—and Americans in general—have not had the courage to examine this question. Instead, subsequent to 9/11, they merely doubled down and attacked or invaded more Islamic countries—seven to be exact—thus helping to proliferate and strengthen Islamist terrorist groups around the region.

Perhaps the fall of Ramadi will be similar to the Tet Offensive in Vietnam in 1968. The Viet Cong, backed by the North Vietnamese, invaded South Vietnam. U.S. and South Vietnamese forces defeated the Viet Cong militarily, but politically the war effort lost much steam at home because the U.S. government had assured Americans that the United States was winning there. The massive enemy offensive belied that claim. Up until Ramadi in Iraq and Palmyra in Syria were overrun by ISIS, the U.S. government was once again telling Americans that the enemy was on the run. This time, the enemy didn’t just win politically, but militarily, too.

If a “Tet Offensive-style effect” eventually stopped U.S. bombing of ISIS, and all U.S. forces were withdrawn from non-strategic Iraq and Syria, the United States and its people actually would be safer. However, now no military draft exists to involuntarily send young men (and now maybe women) to fight and die in faraway lands for no reason, as there was during the Vietnam War. The only downside to this improvement in policy is that the full cost of war is felt by only the small percentage of the population in the voluntary American military’s families. Thus, unfortunately, the United States probably will continue muddling along in Iraq and Syria, and may even gradually get sucked into another ground quagmire.

This article appeared at Huffington Post  and is reprinted with permission.

The post Hard Truths About Iraq – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Deepak Sinha*

In a TED Talk a few of years back, Mr Niall Ferguson, eminent Scottish economic historian and Harvard professor, makes the interesting point that, by 1977, Britain had become 10 times more prosperous than either India or China, though all three started from nearly the same base around the 16th century. He said that the most important factor for this was that Britain had institutionalised the rule of law.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, despite his emphasis and focus on the developmental agenda for this country, is badly constrained in this regard. Forget the Indian public, even our Ministers and leaders, across the often political spectrum, often display an arrogant disregard for the rule of law. One small example was Mr Ashok Gajapathi Raju’s proud proclamation last month that he carries matchboxes on flights because, as Civil Aviation Minister, he is not frisked at airports. That he made the comment while speaking on aviation security was ironic.

The statement shows the social and cultural difficulties that Mr Modi’s developmental agenda faces, but what is worth highlighting is the utter silence on the part of those who deal with aviation security — the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security. This is understandable because no bureaucrat wants to be pitted against his own Minister, let alone initiate action against him for breach of security protocols. Thus, by its inaction over an innocuous matter, the BCAS has foregone its credibility to supervise aviation security. One wonders at the rationale for such an organisation, undoubtedly at great expense to the tax payer, if it is to only provide sinecures to senior bureaucrats.

While this august body may have held its peace when it comes to dealing with the transgressions of its Minister, it has no qualms about pulling its punches when it comes to other issues, such as the manner in which our martyrs from Jammu & Kashmir are received at Delhi Airport. It may come as a rude shock to most readers that the current area where the martyrs are received and accorded full military honours, before their coffins are transported to the families, is a small desolate spot, around abandoned garages when there is uncleared construction material, broken roofing and discarded liquor bottles, within the car park of the cargo complex of Delhi airport’s Terminal 2.

This is where the Army has received the bodies of at least 26 martyrs over the past few months. This is not because the Army is lacking in sensitivity or avoiding ceremonial gestures but because the BCAS has ensured that the reception area, built at a cost of Rs32 lakh on a 625sqm plot, remains locked and unused, since its completion in August 2014. The BCAS says that regulations do not permit the proposed ceremony and guard of honour at the airport premises.

One presumes this must be due to security concerns, since ceremonial area is just 50m from the aircraft taxi tracks. But it turns out that adjacent to this reception area is a Sufi shrine dedicated to two saints — Roshan Khan Baba and Kaley Khan Baba. The BCAS has no problems permitting more than 500 visitors daily to visit this shrine, under armed escort. It even goes so far as to organise buses for their transportation. It stands to reason that in the eyes of the BCAS none of these pilgrims pose a threat to airport security. That seems to be only posed by those in the military who come to pay their respects and honour their fallen in battle!

*The writer is a consultant with the Observer Research Foundation

Courtesy: (The Pioneer) 26 May, 2015

The post Heroes Humiliated In The Name Of Security – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

China and Latin America

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang’s inaugural visit to Latin America in May 2015 highlighted the shift in China’s economic engagement with the region. Premier Li’s tour of Brazil, Colombia, Peru, and Chile was significant as these countries accounted for over half of China’s trade with Latin America in 2014. Premier Li’s 2015 Latin American tour followed the two visits to the region made by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013 and 2014. Premier Li’s visit and President Xi’s earlier visits together set the agenda for deeper industrial cooperation between China and Latin America. This is important as industrial cooperation represents a new engine for growth for both China and Latin America under China’s “new normal” of single-digit economic growth. In particular, China sees economic cooperation in the expansion of industrial capacity as a key mechanism to help the world recover from the global economic crisis.1

China’s economic engagement with Latin America has become more significant in recent years, with bilateral trade increasing 22 times from 2000 to 2014, transforming China into the region’s second largest trading partner.2 China expects its investments in Latin America to rise from 110 billion USD in 2014 to 250 billion USD in the next decade. Chinese investments in the region are in a range of economic sectors, including housing, telecommunications, energy, and transportation infrastructure. China now seeks to move up the value chain in its engagement with Latin America, and hence has begun investing in higher-value projects including e-commerce, high-speed rail, and industrial parks. Such cooperation is expected to expand bilateral trade to 500 billion USD in the next decade, up from 264 billion USD in 2014. Such diversification of trade and investment is needed. 3 75% of Latin America’s exports to China in 2013 consisted of 5 key commodities, and 90% of China’s investments in the region were in mining and petroleum extraction.4 This concentration of investments is an artifact of China’s pattern of investment in Latin America during its “old normal” period of double-digit growth, when Chinese firms focused on Latin America’s extractive industries, especially minerals and energy.5 Such concentrated focus on extraction poses the threat of market failure, so China’s shift in the “new normal” towards diversification is healthy for its partner economies in Latin America.6

While some experts see China’s increased economic engagement with Latin America as posing a challenge to US hegemony in its backyard, others argue that the US should welcome such engagement as it will stimulate an economic recovery in this important region of the world economy.7 This stimulus promises to be long-term, with China offering financing and expertise for the construction of infrastructure projects which offer their own multiplier effects on the regional economy.8 Apart from infrastructure projects, China will pursue economic cooperation with Latin America though other mechanisms like human resources development and the construction of free trade zones.9 Innovation has been identified by the Chinese government as a key economic engine of growth under the “new normal,” and some of the Chinese businesses operating in Latin America have demonstrated innovation in their product development. For instance, the Chinese air-conditioner manufacturer Gree, which has been active in Brazil for the past 15 years, has launched a solar-powered zero-energy-consumption air conditioner in the Brazilian market.10

In terms of finance, Chinese loans to Latin America reached 22 billion USD in 2014, more than the combined financing from the World Bank and other traditional international financing institutions.11 China has established a 20 billion USD credit line to fund infrastructure construction projects in the region. Likewise, investors interested in agricultural projects can access the China-Latin America Cooperation Fund which offers 50 billion USD in financing.12 Other key financial instruments include a 200 billion USD loan facility from China Development Bank and a 10 billion USD loan facility from the Export-Import Bank of China to boost trade and investment between China and Latin America.13 Premier Li has recently proposed, in his address to the China-Brazil Business Summit, a 30 billion USD industrial fund for Latin American countries to finance the growth of their productive capacity. He also expressed his vision of Latin America’s economy being powered by the development of a logistics corridor built on new and upgraded rail networks, and an energy corridor connected by new high-efficiency electrical grids.14

President Xi’s 2013 and 2014 visits to Latin America

In his inaugural visit to Latin America in 2013 as Chinese President, Xi Jinping visited Trinidad and Tobago, Costa Rica, and Mexico. In Trinidad and Tobago, President Xi scaled up Chinese development assistance to the country as well as its neighbours, and also expanded China’s economic cooperation with the Caribbean nations.15 In Costa Rica, President Xi and Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla agreed to expand the 2011 free trade agreement (FTA) between their countries in the hope of increasing their bilateral trade. China also committed to assisting Costa Rica with the construction of a special economic zone which would increase Chinese investment, and both countries committed to cooperating in a range of economic sectors including tourism and clean energy.16 President Xi’s visit to Mexico saw the upgrading of Sino-Mexican relations to a comprehensive strategic partnership.17 This upgraded bilateral relationship was accompanied with efforts to increase economic cooperation—including investment and trade—in sectors like agriculture, energy, finance, infrastructure, mining, and tourism.18 However, China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC)’s experience in Mexico offers a cautionary lesson for Chinese companies seeking participation in expensive megaprojects. CRCC was negatively impacted in 2014 when the Mexican government suddenly cancelled its 3.75 billion USD high-speed rail contract. The Mexican government subsequently announced in May 2015 that CRCC will be compensated 1.3 million USD.19

In his 2014 visit to Latin America, President Xi visited Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, and Cuba. In Brazil he and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff oversaw the signing of agreements marking cooperation in a range of sectors including aerospace, energy, finance, information technology, infrastructure, and science and technology.20 One key infrastructure project which President Xi, President Rousseff, and Peruvian President Ollanta Humala agreed to start preparatory work on was a proposed transcontinental railroad linking Brazil’s Atlantic coast with Peru’s Pacific coast.21 Premier Li’s recent 2015 visit would see progress in this megaproject. While in Brazil, President Xi also attended the BRICS Summit, through which China’s engagement with Brazil would find another connection through their cooperation on BRICS initiatives like the New Development Bank.22 Brazil’s involvement with the New Development Bank, and more recently the AIIB, will facilitate the internationalization of the renminbi in Latin America.23 More significantly for China’s relations with Latin America, President Xi and the leaders of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) formally launched the China-CELAC Forum, which will provide an important platform for dialogue on economic, political, and foreign policy issues.24

In Argentina, President Xi and Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner upgraded their countries’ bilateral relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership. China and Argentina also expanded their economic cooperation to include infrastructure development in sectors like hydropower.25 In Venezuela, President Xi and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro agreed to upgrade Sino-Venezuelan relations to a comprehensive strategic partnership. They also agreed to increase cooperation in a range of economic sectors including energy, infrastructure, and mining.26 In Cuba, President Xi met with the Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro and also the country’s current President Raúl Castro. Both Presidents Xi and Castro agreed on a range of cooperative ventures to support Cuba’s path of socialist development.27 An example of such cooperation can be seen in the modernization by China Communications Construction Company of Santiago de Cuba’s Guillermon Maoncada port.28 President Xi’s visit to Cuba offered an interesting historical juxtaposition of Cuban socialism with China’s capitalist turn after the Maoist era. China’s Maoist phase had a significant impact on Latin America, of course, as can be seen in the human toll of Maoist insurgencies like Peru’s Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) guerilla movement.29

Venezuela

While Venezuela was not on Premier Li’s itinerary, his trip to Latin America followed an announcement in April 2015 that China had extended 5 billion USD in loans to Venezuela. China had previously extended almost 50 billion USD in loans to Venezuela, which Venezuela has repaid in oil and gas exports. Venezuela has also announced an investment by the Chinese bus manufacturer Yutong of a bus manufacturing plant in the state of Yaracuy, which will produce 3,500 buses annually both for use in Venezuela’s upgraded national transportation system and for export.30

Brazil

While China is the largest developing country in the eastern hemisphere, Brazil is the largest developing country in the western hemisphere. Given their importance to the world economy, Premier Li pointed out that Sino-Brazilian economic cooperation will not only accelerate growth among emerging markets, but will also accelerate the world’s economic recovery from the global economic crisis.31 In 2014, Chinese investments in Brazil stood at 18.9 billion USD. China has become Brazil’s largest trading partner, and Brazil is China’s largest trading partner in Latin America. Between 2001 and 2013, China’s and Brazil’s bilateral trade increased 13 times, and reached 86 billion USD in 2014.32

During his visit to Brazil, Premier Li and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff oversaw the signing of 27 billion USD worth of trade and investment agreements. (President Rousseff estimated the value of the agreements to be 53 billion USD; this figure includes the value of past and the projection of future Chinese investments.) To further expand trade, China and Brazil will work towards easing trade barriers, including facilitating the settlement of trade using local currency. Concerning investment, Brazil hopes to draw on China’s successful experience with industrialization to advance its own industrialization program and reap the economic benefits including job creation. To help Brazil achieve this goal, China will export advanced heavy equipment to Brazil and open manufacturing plants in the country. The industrial sectors to be enhanced through Sino-Brazilian industrial cooperation include aerospace, agriculture, clean energy, metals, oil and gas, petrochemicals, automobile and other heavy manufacturing, shipbuilding, and infrastructure construction. In the aerospace sector, China announced a purchase worth 1 billion USD of passenger jets from the Brazilian aircraft manufacturer Embraer. In the infrastructure construction sector, a 50 billion USD fund will be established by the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) and Caixa Econômica Federal to finance investments in infrastructure projects.33

Brazil’s state-owned oil company Petrobras, which is emerging from a corruption scandal, received a much-needed financing package from China consisting of a 5 billion USD loan from China Development Bank, and an additional 5 billion USD in loans from ICBC and the Export-Import Bank of China. The terms of the arrangement have not been made public, but an earlier 10 billion USD loan from China to Petrobras in 2009 had Petrobras supplying 150,000 barrels of oil per day to China in the first year and 200,000 barrels per day in the remaining nine years. The new loan package may involve a similar arrangement.34 The Brazilian mining company Vale received 4 billion USD in loans from ICBC as well as a 1.2 billion USD financing arrangement for iron ore shipping from the Export-Import Bank of China, China Ocean Shipping Company, and China Merchants Group.35

Earlier Chinese economic cooperation projects with Brazil had focused on mineral resources and agricultural products. The new focus on industrial cooperation enables China to leverage its manufacturing and technological expertise to help Brazil with its industrial restructuring program. This is an opportunity for Brazil to stimulate regional growth as Chinese investment in Brazilian industry and infrastructure can transform Brazil into a hub for the expansion of trade and industrialization across Latin America. China’s industrial firms, including those involved in construction, heavy machinery, railways, and steel, will benefit from the overseas expansion. For instance, China CNR Corporation, which had supplied the subway trains used during the 2014 World Cup in Rio de Janeiro, as well as the 15 additional subway trains for the 2016 Rio Olympics, has won a contract to supply over 600 more subway and commuter trains.36 In turn, the growth of China’s consumption economy, fueled by the Chinese government’s ambitious urbanization program, will create an important market for Brazil’s export sectors.37

As with China’s economic cooperation in Africa, Eurasia, South Asia, and Southeast Asia, infrastructure construction is a prominent mode of China’s economic engagement with Latin America under the “new normal.” These infrastructure projects range from energy, telecommunications, and ports, to roads and railways.38 The Brazilian government has welcomed the bids of Chinese companies for rail projects in Brazil, including the ambitious transcontinental railway.39 This proposed railway, which is also known as the Two Oceans Railway or the Cross-Andes Railway, is the subject of an ongoing feasibility study between China, Brazil and Peru. If built, it will facilitate trade within Latin America as well as between Latin America and China.40 By providing a new access route to the Pacific Ocean, the transcontinental railway will offer a third gateway between China and Brazil, following the Panama Canal and the maritime route across the Atlantic Ocean around the Cape of Good Hope.41 The proposed oceanic canal in Nicaragua will offer yet another gateway, as will the proposed Aconcagua Bi-Oceanic Corridor between Argentina and Chile which will be discussed later.42 The transcontinental railway will cost an estimated 60 billion USD, and if they agree to construct it, China, Brazil, and Peru will seek financing from a variety of sources including the World Bank and the upcoming BRICS New Development Bank.43

While Sino-Brazilian cooperation over rail development, including the proposed transcontinental railway, will facilitate the development and integration of South America’s infrastructure network, there are other impacts from the construction of such a megaproject to consider.44 Environmentalist and other social activist groups are already warning of the potentially negative impacts of the transcontinental railway on the Amazon ecosystem as well as on the traditional lands of the indigenous tribes.45 These are important as similar civil society intervention prompted Myanmar to suspend the similarly controversial Myitsone Dam project.46

Colombia

Premier Li’s visit to Colombia marked the 35th anniversary of the establishment of Sino-Colombian diplomatic relations. Premier Li and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos signed cooperation agreements in a range of economic sectors including agriculture, finance, industrial manufacturing, infrastructure, and science and technology. Agreements in education and culture were also signed.47 Most significantly, China and Colombia agreed to launch a feasibility study on the creation of a FTA. Even without a FTA, trade between China and Colombia has increased to 15.6 billion USD in 2014, making China Colombia’s second largest trading partner, and Colombia China’s fifth largest trading partner in Latin America.48

Recognizing Colombia’s and Latin America’s rich literary heritage, Premier Li called for greater cultural linkages between Latin America and China, including cultural and literary exchanges.49 Chinese writers like the Nobel literature laureate Mo Yan, for example, have been greatly influenced by the literary works of Colombian writers like the late Gabriel Garcia Marquez.50

Peru

In 1971 Peru became the third country in Latin America to establish diplomatic relations with China. China and Peru upgraded their bilateral relationship to a strategic partnership in 2008, and this was further upgraded to a comprehensive strategic partnership in 2013.51 The 2010 FTA between China and Peru has boosted their bilateral trade, which reached 14.3 billion USD in 2014, making China Peru’s second-largest trading partner. China has also become Peru’s main investor, with Chinese investments in Peru reaching 14.2 billion USD in 2014.52 In addition, China has become Peru’s largest export market, and the Peruvian government is encouraging its exporters to diversify beyond their traditional exports to nontraditional export commodities like seafood and agricultural produce, with the goal of expanding the value of their nontraditional exports to China from 467 million USD in 2014 to 25 billion USD in 2024.53

During Premier Li’s visit, he and Peruvian President Ollanta Humala oversaw the signing of agreements expanding their economic cooperation into new sectors including agriculture, hydropower, mining, petrochemicals, transportation and education.54 Premier Li also called on Chinese businesses in Peru to move up the manufacturing value chain into heavy industries like steel production. Not only would this increase their profitability, it would also support Peru’s efforts at improving and expanding its infrastructure. Peru faces a deficit in infrastructure construction worth almost 80 billion USD—in transportation, energy, electricity supply, healthcare, and telecommunications—and foreign investment, from China and other countries, is needed and welcomed.55

Chile

Premier Li’s visit to Chile marked the 45th anniversary of the establishment of Sino-Chilean diplomatic relations, and the 10th anniversary of the signing of their FTA. Chile was the first country in South America to establish diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China, and was also the first country in South America to sign a FTA with China. Trade between China and Chile reached 34.1 billion USD in 2014, a fivefold increase from 2005 when their FTA was signed. China is now Chile’s largest trading partner.56 This increase in trade has impacted various economic sectors including automobile manufacturing, where China-made automobiles have grown to 15% of the Chilean market; and agriculture, where Chilean wine-makers and fruit producers have benefitted from increased exports to China.57

Premier Li and Chilean President Michelle Bachelet oversaw the signing of agreements in a range of cooperative ventures including agriculture, finance, mining, and science and technology. The financial cooperation includes a three-year 3.5 billion USD currency swap deal between China and Chile that will boost trade and investment. The new Chilean branch of the China Construction Bank will serve as South America’s first official renminbi clearing bank. In addition, to further increase their bilateral trade, China and Chile have agreed to reduce tariffs to zero for 97% of their trade commodities, and both governments will explore further ways to upgrade their FTA.58

China has increased its investment in various sectors of the Chilean economy, including agriculture, clean energy, infrastructure, mining, and telecommunications.59 Chinese construction companies will also bid for contracts for the construction of Argentina’s and Chile’s ambitious Aconcagua Bi-Oceanic Corridor railway project that will tunnel through the Andes to connect South America’s Atlantic and Pacific coasts.60 Chile, in turn, has become the first country in Latin America, and the thirteenth in the world, to join the Renminbi Qualified Foreign Institutional Investors (RQFII) program. Participation in the RQFII program allows institutional investors from Chile to use their renminbi holdings to purchase up to 50 billion renminbi worth of stocks and bonds in the Chinese securities market.61

In the field of cultural exchange, groups of Chinese artists will visit Chile this year to commemorate Chile’s Year of Chinese Culture.62 In turn, Beijing and Shanghai will celebrate a “week of Chile” which will mark the 45th anniversary of Sino-Chilean diplomatic relations.63 Such cultural exchanges will continue next year which has been designated the China-Latin America and the Caribbean Cultural Exchange Year.64 Such cultural exchange is also present in the education sector, with over 100 volunteer instructors from China teaching the Chinese language to 5,000 Chilean students, and with Chile serving as the regional center for Latin America’s growing network of 35 Confucius Institutes. The Chinese government has increased its scholarships for Chilean students to pursue their further studies in China, and is also encouraging cooperation between Chinese and Chilean universities.65 This is part of a program announced by President Xi during his 2014 tour of Latin America to grant scholarships to 6,000 students from Latin America.66

Latin America and the “Belt and Road”

Given the deepening of China’s economic engagement with Latin America, one important open question is whether Latin America will eventually come under China’s “Belt and Road” development framework. Even though Admiral Zheng He’s 15th century voyages did not extend to the New World, China does share a historical connection with the region dating from the 17th century Manila Galleon trade that connected China with the New World via the Philippines. This was followed in the 19th century by the arrival of Chinese migrants to the New World to serve as coolie labor on plantations, mines, and railways. Hence there is historical precedent for an expansion of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road to Latin America.67 The case of the South Pacific offers a more recent precedent. Even though Admiral Zheng He’s voyages did not extend to the South Pacific, this region was recently added to the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road.68 This decision came five months after President Xi’s visit to the region, which witnessed the upgrading of Sino-Australian and Sino-New Zealander relationships to comprehensive strategic partnerships, as well as the completion of China’s FTA negotiations with Australia.69

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Notes:
1. “China, Latin America solidify cooperation with premier’s visit,” Xinhua, May 19, 2015, accessed May 20, 2015, http://en.people.cn/n/2015/0519/c90883-8894413.html. Alvin Cheng-Hin Lim, “China’s Transition to the ‘New Normal’: Challenges and Opportunities,” Eurasia Review, April 2, 2015, accessed May 24, 2015, http://www.eurasiareview.com/02042015-chinas-transition-to-the-new-normal-challenges-and-opportunities-analysis/. Zhao Yinan, “Li: China has built up industrial muscle,” China Daily, May 26, 2015, accessed May 26, 2015, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2015livistsa/2015-05/26/content_20819259.htm.
2. Alicia Bárcena, “China and Latin America: Diversification is the Key Word,” Dominican Today, May 21, 2015, accessed May 25, 2015, http://www.dominicantoday.com/dr/opinion/2015/5/21/55160/China-and-Latin-America-Diversification-is-the-Key-Word.
3. David Shambaugh, China Goes Global: The Partial Power (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 117. “China, Latin America.” Juan Pablo Spinetto and David Biller, “China Grows Its South America Influence After Commodity Bust,” Bloomberg, May 20, 2015, accessed May 24, 2015, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-19/china-grows-south-america-sway-as-commodity-bust-cheapens-assets. “China eyes 500-bln-USD annual trade with LatAm in 10 years,” Xinhua, July 18, 2014, accessed May 26, 2015, http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2014-07/18/c_133493879.htm.
4. Bárcena, “China and Latin America.”
5. Ruben Gonzalez-Vicente, “Mapping Chinese Mining Investment in Latin America: Politics or Market?” in From the Great Wall to the New World: China and Latin America in the 21st Century, ed. Julia C. Strauss and Ariel C. Armony (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 37. Lu Guozheng, “Post-Financial Crisis Trade Relations: A New Phase of China-Latin American Cooperation,” in China-Latin America Relations: Review and Analysis, Volume 1, ed. He Shuangrong (Reading: Paths International, 2012), 59.
6. “Where Does Latin America Go from Here?” in The Emergence of China: Opportunities and Challenges for Latin America and the Caribbean, ed. Robert Devlin et al. (New York: Inter-American Development Bank, 2006), 212.
7. Catherine Wong Tsoi-lai, “Li brings continental railway to Brazil visit,” Global Times, May 19, 2015, accessed May 24, 2015, http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/922347.shtml.
8. Zhao Yinan, “Li: Industrial capacity is way out of recession,” China Daily, May 27, 2015, accessed May 28, 2015, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2015livistsa/2015-05/27/content_20830082.htm.
9. “China, Latin America.”
10. Lim, “China’s Transition.” “Chinese company launches new zero energy consumption air conditioner in Brazil,” Xinhua, May 23, 2015, accessed May 24, 2015, http://www.china.org.cn/business/2015-05/23/content_35641999.htm. “Flourishing Chinese enterprises witness enhanced Brazil ties,” Xinhua, May 18, 2015, accessed May 24, 2015, http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/922207.shtml.
11. Paulo Trevisani and Rogerio Jelmayer, “Beijing to Unveil South America Investments,” Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2015, accessed May 24, 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/beijing-to-unveil-south-america-investments-1431907168.
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13. “China, Latin America.”
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50. Liu Sha, “Li’s visit sees.”
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53. Zhao and Zhang, “China, Peru.”
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61. Li Yuqian, “China Gives Chile’s Institutional Investors 50 Bln Yuan Quota,” Caixin, May 26, 2015, accessed May 27, 2015, http://english.caixin.com/2015-05-26/100812717.html.
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Back in April, the Washington Post suggested that ten prisoners were in line to be freed from Guantánamo in June, and that Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, “may be resettled as early as this summer.” A Saudi national, Shaker was granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK, where his wife, a British national, and his four children live, including his youngest son, born on the day he arrived at Guantánamo in February 2002.

The suggestion that he might be released soon gave hope to his supporters, who have been campaigning for years for his release  — and, more generally, for those who are appalled that anyone should be held in Guantánamo year after year without charge or trial, and after twice being approved for release by high-level US government review processes, in 2007 and 2009, as is the case with Shaker, a vocal critic of the US “war on terror,” who has always fought for the prisoners’ rights throughout his 13 years in US custody.

The suggestion that he might be released soon also gave impetus to the delegation of MPs that visited Washington, D.C. last week, meeting Senators including John McCain and Dianne Feinstein, and stressing the urgent need for a timetable for Shaker’s release — see, for example, the strong words of Andrew Mitchell MP, as reported in the Daily Mail just two days ago.

“We have been unable to shake off the depressing notion that the US administration is indifferent to the request of the British Government … for the reasonable release of one of our residents, a request made specifically by the Prime Minister,” Mitchell said, adding, “We’ve shed blood and treasure in two controversial wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And for our Prime Minister and us to be treated this way by America is insulting to their oldest ally. It is doing increasing damage to the Anglo-American relationship and is a thorn in the side of our friendship. Is it not a slap in the face from our oldest ally and staunchest friend?”

Now, however, we hear from Clive Stafford Smith, the founder of the legal action charity Reprieve, and Shaker’s lawyer for many years, that Shaker may indeed be freed within weeks. Speaking to Victoria Derbyshire of the BBC, he said, “I have heard from various sources, which are very reliable I hope, that he is to be released in June.”

He added, “But of course we’ve had promises before and the worst thing one can do is, both for Shaker and for his wife and children, to promise something that may not happen. But there’s no good reason why it wouldn’t happen.”

As the BBC explained, Stafford Smith said that President Obama’s pledge to close Guantánamo is “the primary reason behind Mr. Aamer’s likely release,” adding, “And he can’t do that unless he gets rid of the 57 people who have been cleared at least — and Shaker has been cleared for eight years now.”

Stafford Smith also said that “it’s also down to the incredibly good work by so many people, like Andrew Mitchell who visited the US with three other MPs. I have a letter here with me from Shaker where he’s incredibly grateful for that. So many people have done so many great things to help him and I think that’s had a great impact.”

The BBC mentioned US allegations that Shaker Aamer “had led a unit of Taliban fighters and had met former al-Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden,” although Shaker himself has always “maintained he was in Afghanistan with his family doing charity work,” and in response Stafford Smith said, “In Shaker’s case, the proof in the pudding is that he was cleared by the Bush administration and cleared by the Obama administration. So if they clear him and all six of the national security agencies say he should be released, then it’s quite hard to make the argument that he’s guilty of something.”

He added, “The world is insane. I go to Guantánamo and see a place where still half of the prisoners who are there have been cleared for release. What other prison is there in the world where 50% of the prisoners are told you’re free to go but you can’t go?”

Andrew Mitchell also spoke to Victoria Derbyshire, telling her, when asked about the US visit he undertook with David Davis, Andy Slaughter and Jeremy Corbyn, “We’re hopeful we advanced the case. We spoke to a number of senior senators who were as perplexed as we are about why it was taking so long for him to be released for transfer back to the United Kingdom.”

He added, in a variation of what he told the Daily Mail, “Our prime minister asked for him to be transferred earlier this year on his visit to the United States and it is incomprehensible that the United States would treat its oldest ally and staunchest friend in this very cavalier way.”

You can watch a clip of Clive Stafford Smith speaking here, and, while preparing to publish this article, I also heard from former Guantánamo prisoner Moazzam Begg that he too had heard similar news about Shaker’s imminent release. “This is what it was told last week too,” he wrote on Twitter, adding, “I pray it’s true.”

Speaking personally, as someone who has been writing about Shaker for nine years, and speaking on behalf of the We Stand With Shaker campaign, which I co-founded in November with Joanne MacInnes, and as a long-time supporter of the Save Shaker Aamer Campaign, I also fervently hope that it’s true.

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By David Inserra*

On the evening of May 3, two men armed with rifles attacked the Muhammad Art Exhibit and Contest in Garland, Texas. While both shooters were killed before they could get inside the exhibit, this attack is the 68th Islamist terrorist plot or attack against the U.S. since 9/11. This incident has raised significant questions about the way terrorists are being recruited in the U.S. and what the U.S. can do to stop them. With Congress set to debate portions of the Patriot Act, it should consider how it can provide intelligence and law enforcement officials with the tools they need to find and stop terrorists, while respecting individual liberty and privacy.

Attack in Texas

While the FBI has not completed its investigation of the incident, FBI Director James Comey provided details to reporters last week and the Garland police have provided updated information as well. The first shooter, Elton Simpson, had been watched by the FBI since 2006 when it appeared that he was going to travel overseas to join al-Shabaab, a terrorist group that is based in Somalia and affiliated with al-Qaeda.[1] While his travel plans were thwarted, he was only convicted of lying to federal officials and received three years probation in 2011. The FBI stopped monitoring him in 2014 but reopened their investigation in March after he expressed interest in jihad and the self-styled Islamic State (ISIS) on social media.[2]

Hours before the attack, the FBI sent a bulletin to Garland Police to notify them of Simpson, but they had no definitive information that he was headed from Phoenix to the event much less that he was set to attack it. So far, little is officially known about the other shooter. According to the Garland Police, he was Nadir Soofi, Simpson’s roommate.[3]

Arriving at the art contest in Garland, Simpson and Soofi opened fire with rifles, wounding one unarmed security officer in the leg.[4] The first officer to confront the shooters wounded both before other members of the Garland police department returned fire, killing the shooters. ISIS reportedly claimed credit following the attack and also claimed that it has “71 trained soldiers in 15 different states ready at our word to attack.”[5]

While the investigation will uncover more specifics, there is sufficient detail available to declare this a terrorist plot: Simpson had expressed interest in jihad and proceeded to attack an event that he viewed as contrary to his faith. The investigation may provide us more insight into Simpsons’ connection and communication with ISIS, how this target was chosen, and how Soofi became radicalized, but for now many of these details are unknown or unconfirmed by law enforcement.

Implications of the Attack

This 68th Islamist terrorist plot or attack is the 57th homegrown terrorist attack or plot and the 10th targeting a mass gathering, the third most common target. The attack also comes as part of a recent wave of attacks and plots, as this is the sixth Islamist terrorist plot or attack in 2015. All of the plots and attacks this year have been perpetrated by individuals who claim to support the Islamic State to varying degrees. The FBI has stated that Simpson wanted to commit jihad with ISIS, and press reports indicate that he may have been in secret communications with ISIS members.[6]

Regardless, with these attacks and the increasing numbers of individuals in the U.S. seeking to support or join ISIS and al-Qaeda affiliates, the U.S. is currently facing what is arguably the most concentrated period of terrorist activity in the homeland since 9/11. Director James Comey of the FBI has recent warned that “hundreds, maybe thousands” of individuals across the U.S. are being directly solicited by ISIS and urged to attack. Other senior officials, including Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson, the Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and the director of the National Counterterrorism Center Nicholas Rasmussen have also noted the increasing threat of terrorism here at home.[7]

Strengthening the Counterterrorism Enterprise

In light of these warnings, the U.S. cannot be passive. Heritage has recommended numerous counterterrorism policies for Congress to address, including:

• Streamlining U.S. fusion centers. Congress should limit fusion centers to the approximately 30 areas with the greatest level of risk as identified by the Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI). Some exceptions might exist, such as certain fusion centers that are leading cybersecurity or other important topical efforts. The remaining centers should then be fully funded and resourced by UASI.
• Pushing the FBI toward being more effectively driven by intelligence. While the FBI has made high-level changes to its mission and organizational structure, the bureau is still working to integrate intelligence and law enforcement activities. This will require overcoming cultural barriers and providing FBI intelligence personnel with resources, opportunities, and the stature they need to become a more effective and integral part of the FBI.
• Ensuring that the FBI shares information more readily and regularly with state and local law enforcement and treats state and local partners as critical actors in the fight against terrorism. State, local, and private-sector partners must send and receive timely information from the FBI. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) should play a role in supporting these partners’ efforts by acting as a source or conduit for information to partners and coordinating information sharing between the FBI and its partners.
• Designating an office in DHS to coordinate countering violent extremism (CVE) efforts. CVE efforts are spread across all levels of government and society. DHS is uniquely situated to lead the federal government’s efforts to empower local partners. Currently, DHS’s CVE working group coordinates efforts across DHS components, but a more substantial office will be necessary to manage this broader task.
• Supporting state, local, and civil society partners. Congress and the Administration should not lose sight of the fact that all of the federal government’s efforts must be focused on empowering local partners. The federal government is not the tip of the spear for CVE efforts; it exists to support local partners who are in the best position to recognize and counter radicalization in their own communities.
• Maintaining essential counterterrorism tools. Support for important investigative tools is essential to maintaining the security of the U.S. and combating terrorist threats. Legitimate government surveillance programs are also a vital component of U.S. national security and should be allowed to continue. The need for effective counterterrorism operations, however, does not relieve the government of its obligation to follow the law and respect individual privacy and liberty. In the American system, the government must do both equally well.

Ensuring Security

In the midst of this surge in terrorist activity, the U.S. must recommit itself to counterterrorism efforts. Improving intelligence tools, information sharing with state and local law enforcement, and local civil society outreach to counter radicalization should be a priority for Congress.

About the author:
*David Inserra is a Research Associate for Homeland Security and Cyber Security in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign and National Security Policy, of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy, at The Heritage Foundation.

Source:
This article was published by The Heritage Foundation

Notes:
[1] Evan Perez, Pamela Brown, and Jim Sciutto, “Texas Attacker Had Private Conversations with Known Terrorists,” CNN, May 7, 2015, http://edition.cnn.com/2015/05/07/politics/fbi-warning-elton-simpson-cartoon-event-attack/index.html  (accessed May 14, 2015).

[2] Pete Williams, “FBI Alerted Garland Police About Elton Simpson Hours Before Shooting,” NBC News, May 7, 2015, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fbi-says-it-alerted-garland-police-about-elton-simpson-n355526  (accessed May 14, 2015).

[3] Press Conference, Garland Police Department, May 11, 2015, http://www.garlandtx.gov/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?BlobID=24125  (accessed May 14, 2015).

[4] Scott Shane, “FBI Says It Sent Warning on One Gunman in Attack at Texas Gathering,” The New York Times, May 7, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/08/us/fbi-says-it-warned-of-gunman-in-garland-texas-attack.html?_r=0  (accessed May 14, 2015).

[5] Eyder Peralta, “ISIS Claims Credit for Shooting in Garland, Texas,” National Public Radio, May 5, 2014, http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/05/05/404374339/isis-claims-credit-for-shooting-in-garland-texas  (accessed May 14, 2015), and Sasha Goldstein and Jason Silverstein, “ISIS Threatens Controversial Blogger Pamela Geller in Message Boasting of ‘71 Trained Soldiers in 15 Different States,’” New York Daily News, May 5, 2015, http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/isis-appears-threaten-pamela-geller-claims-militants-article-1.2211913  (accessed May 14, 2015).

[6] Perez, Brown, and Sciutto, “Texas Attacker Had Private Conversations.”

[7] Elise Viebeck, “DHS Secretary: Lone Wolf Attackers Could ‘Strike at Any Moment,’” The Hill, May 10, 2015, http://thehill.com/homenews/sunday-talk-shows/241562-dhs-secretary-lone-wolf-attackers-could-strike-at-any-moment  (accessed May 13, 2015); James R. Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, “Statement for the Record: Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence,” February 26, 2015, http://www.dni.gov/files/documents/Unclassified_2015_ATA_SFR_-_SASC_FINAL.pdf  (accessed May 13, 2015); and Nicholas Rasmussen, “Statement before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence,” February 12, 2015, http://www.nctc.gov/docs/Current_Terrorist_Threat_to_the_United_States.pdf  (accessed May 13, 2015).

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A bomb threat was received at the FIFA congress in Zurich on Friday, prompting authorities to search the meeting venue. No evacuations were carried out, and the congress later resumed. It comes as the organization holds its presidential election.

Zurich police said the anonymous bomb threat was made by telephone to a Zurich-based newsroom, and that the congress room was searched.

Police spokeswoman Brigitte Vogt earlier confirmed to AFP that a bomb alert had been received at the venue, and that officers were at the scene.

No one was evacuated, but congress participants were initially denied re-entry into the auditorium while authorities conducted a search, a witness told Reuters.

“A search was carried out. The premises have been cleared by the authorities,” FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke told the congress after it resumed. Journalists were also allowed back in the building.

Authorities were alerted around 11 a.m. local time, police spokesman Marco Cortesi confirmed. FIFA also acknowledged receipt of the threat to news website handelszeitung.ch.

Local journalists reported that they were forced to leave their places at the venue.

The FIFA presidential election is set to take place on Friday, with many calling for current president Sepp Blatter to step down following the corruption investigation into several of the organization’s officials. However, Blatter is expected to be re-elected for a fifth five-year term.

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At least 40 Houthi militants were killed by Saudi-led coalition strikes and ground clashes in the Yemeni city of Aden Thursday, AFP reports.

Residents in Yemen’s second city said ongoing air raids by Saudi forces continued, with ground support from allied forces loyal to fugitive President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

“Coalition forces carried out qualitative and successful operations against the rebels after coordination between the coalition leadership and the Popular Resistance Council leadership,” Aden’s deputy governor Naef al-Bakri said to AFP.

Al-Bakri did not specify details of Saudi logistics but confirmed a number of rebel vehicles and checkpoints were hit during the strikes.

The Saudi-led campaign against Iran-backed Shia Houthis began on March 26 with over 2,000 people killed and 8,000 wounded, according to the World Health Organization.

Original article

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By Amit Gupta*

The current allegations of bribery and corruption against some executive members of the Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) are important because both national and international sporting bodies have to be effectively policed to display transparency and good governance. But there is also a subtext to this war against FIFA: it is the struggle for power between the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and the rest of the world that mirrors the ongoing power transition in the international system.

Corruption is not a new phenomenon in international sporting bodies given how allegations of cash based lobbying has been ongoing for decades in both the Olympic movement and in the award of the World Cup. Similarly, the International Cricket Council was pushed to adopt anti-corruption measures once it was revealed that match-fixing was rampant in international cricket games.

National sporting bodies have been no better. They not only permit corruption—Italian soccer has a long history of bribing referees and fixing matches—but also engage in egregious violations of political and human rights. The United States Olympic Committee rigged the vote in 1936 to ensure that the US participated in the Berlin Olympics (there were calls for a boycott and the decision to participate passed with a narrow vote of 58-56) while the Australian, English, and New Zealand cricket boards worked hard to retain apartheid South Africa in international cricket. It took mass protests by students, church groups, and trade unions in England (1970) and Australia (1971-1972) to stop cricket tours by the Springboks. The respective cricket boards kept talking about not mixing sports with politics.

FIFA has long been accused of being opaque and arbitrary in its dealings and the US indictments, while over relatively small amounts by American standards (after all $150 million in bribes and money laundering pale in comparison to the billion dollar fines that US investment bankers have paid the Justice Department to obtain a get-out-of-jail-free card) will encourage other countries to investigate their national and regional football associations. But will it bring about meaningful changes in these institutions, particularly greater transparency in their operations?

Given how sports are tied to nationalism and corruption and the former acts as a catalyst for the latter, the answer is no.

The prestige associated with hosting a World Cup or the Olympics will always tempt nations to use different illegal means to achieve their goals. After all, despite four decades of measures and sanctions, doping continues in many sports. From a historical perspective, corruption in cricket did not begin with the match fixing scandals of the 1990s. It began with the 19th century British aristocracy betting on cricket games and paying professional cricketers to throw games. So one should not hold one’s breaths on substantive structural changes in the institutions of international sporting. FIFA will survive and the world will view the organisation and its current president Sepp Blatter as victims of bullying by the lone superpower.

This is because FIFA is one of the battlegrounds for the power transition struggle currently ongoing in the international system. Just as China is building new international institutions such as the BRICS bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to create a parallel set of international economic institutions in which it is prominent, a move is afoot in the footballing world to reduce the dominance of the European nations. Thus, Qatar has become the battleground between a traditional European-dominated footballing order and a new one being constructed by the rest of the world.

The Europeans are not keen to play in Qatar because it would wreck their domestic schedules—the Qatar World Cup is to be played in December because of the extreme summers in that country (the fact that Nepalese workers have been dying in construction accidents in Qatar adds a convenient human rights rationale to UEFA’s protests). FIFA and the Blatter presidency, however, are keen on giving a World Cup to the Arab world and Blatter’s overall game plan is to increase the number of non-Western slots at the World Cup finals—at the expense of European countries that are disproportionately represented. Cancelling the Qatar cup is the first step in re-establishing European control in the organisation, something that has been slipping away for the last four decades.

European over-representation in the World Cup was particularly glaring till the early 1970s when the Brazilian Joao Havelange took over the presidency of FIFA by promising Asians and Africans more slots at the finals. Under successive European presidents, FIFA had shut out the Asians and the Africans. In the 1966 World Cup, North Korea was the only country to represent Africa, Asia, and Oceania (famously beating Australia in a playoff game to reach the finals); in 1970, Morocco was the sole representative from Africa, and Israel represented the whole of Asia. This hardly made it a universal competition.

Blatter’s plan is to reduce European slots to get more Asian and African countries into the finals and this is a long term threat to European interests. Thus, the battle being waged in the UN and the International Monetary Fund for greater non-Western representation is the same being waged in FIFA. The smart money in this is on FIFA and Blatter (if he survives Friday’s vote for president) since he has the support of Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Furthermore, with the US indicting football representatives from Costa Rica and Uruguay, there is likely to be closing of ranks because the US will be seen to act as an enforcer for the Europeans.

Therefore, the battle for FIFA is not just one of petty corruption (FIFA after all has the same market value as a medium sized US business) but also another battlefront in the ongoing power transition struggle in the international system.

*Amit Gupta is an Associate Professor in the Department of International Security at the USAF Air War College and is currently writing a book on the globalization of sports and the rise of non-Western nations. Views expressed in this article are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of the USAF or the Department of Defense (although he suspects both organizations are too busy with real world threats to have a position of global football).

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By William Chislett*

Spain’s two-party system is not dead, as predicted, but it took a beating in municipal and regional elections where the upstart parties, the leftist anti-austerity Podemos and the centrist market-friendly Ciudadanos, made big inroads into the ruling conservative Popular Party (PP) and the Socialists (PSOE), which between them have dominated political life for more than 30 years.

The PP gained 27% of the votes cast in the municipal elections, down from 37.5% in 2011, and the Socialists won 25% (27.8%). Between them they captured 52% of the vote, compared with 65.3% in 2011. The PP drew comfort from still being the most voted party, but not by very much. The party, as hoped, is not benefiting from the firm economic recovery and from saving the country from a sovereign bail out by the EU that was on the cards.

The PP lost its absolute majorities in eight of the 13 regions that held elections (out of a total of 17) including Madrid and Valencia, its two fiefdoms, where it has been badly damaged by a spate of corruption scandals. The PP also failed to win another absolute majority in Madrid’s municipal elections and could lose control of the town hall, after 24 years, if the Socialists back Podemos, which ran under the banner of the Ahora Madrid coalition and won only one fewer seats than the PP. If this happens Madrid’s new mayor will be the 71-year-old Manuela Carmena, a retired judge of the Supreme Court and a former member of the Spanish Communist Party (PCE).

The other significant victory for the anti-austerity Podemos was in Barcelona and also for another charismatic woman, Ada Colau, a 41-year-old anti-eviction activist. She snatched control of the town hall from the nationalist CiU by winning 11 of the 41 seats (25% of the vote), but will need to form alliances in order to govern. Her victory in the Catalan capital was a blow for the independence movement. The Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC), the most pro-independence party, only won 11% of the city’s vote.

Podemos, led by the 35-year-old pony-tailed Pablo Iglesias, was born out of the grassroots movement of los indignados (the indignant ones), which grabbed world headlines four years ago this month when thousands of mainly young people occupied the Puerta del Sol square in the heart of Madrid and set up camp for a month. Voters under the age of 30 played a key role in Podemos’ latest success.

The results of Ciudadanos, led by the 35-year-old Albert Rivera, did not live up to expectations. While Podemos’s support was waning, that for Ciudadanos was continuously rising. Like Podemos, however, it will be the kingmaker in some areas, particularly those where the PP won the most votes but not an absolute majority. Until a year ago, Ciudadanos was hardly known outside its base in Catalonia where it was formed in 2006 to counter, among other things, the growing movement for that region’s independence.

Whereas the 2011 elections saw landslide victories by the PP in cities and regions and heralded its routing of the Socialists in that year’s general elections, this time round the municipal and regional elections suggest a very fragmented parliament when the next general election is held by the end of the year.

An extrapolation of the municipal results shows a parliament with the PP holding 132 of the 350 seats, 54 fewer than now, the Socialists with 119 (nine more), Podemos 16 and five other parties including Ciudadanos with between 10 and 14 seats each. If this proves to be the case, the national parliament could well face the same deadlock as in Andalusia where the Socialists won the March 22 snap election in that region but more than two months later have still been unable to form a majority government after three attempts.

The new political era ushered in by these elections will need coalitions or pacts in many cities and regions if Spain is to continue to enjoy the stable governments that have characterised the country to its benefit since the end of the Franco dictatorship in 1975. The country, however, has very little experience of this, unlike most other European nations.

Spaniards turned against the two main parties not only because of the economic crisis of the last seven years, which has worn down much of the population (the unemployment rate is still almost three times higher, at close to 24%), and corruption, but also because of the high degree of partisan polarisation.

An opinion poll by Metroscopia two weeks before the elections showed that 69% of Spaniards considered it positive that the two parties would not win absolute majorities and that there would be new players on the political scene which would force negotiations.

The PP, the party most affected by corruption cases, did not do enough in the eyes of the electorate to disassociate itself from its bad apples. According to a study by the sociologist Perico García Azorín published this month, 467 mayors around Spain faced indictments, most of them since the onset of the crisis in 2008 resulting from the bursting of the massive property bubble. Of those, 89 had been sentenced and 90 absolved, while the rest still awaited court decisions.

Corruption has been particularly rampant in the PP-controlled region of Valencia, where the party still won the most votes but far from an absolute majority. Around 50 indicted politicians sought re-election in that region, even as they prepared to appear before courts in cases mostly related to the mishandling of public money, despite the PP leader of Valencia, Alberto Fabra, drawing what he called a ‘red line’ under years of corruption.

Turnout was 65% compared with 43% at last year’s European elections when Podemos hit the headlines by winning 8% of the vote and five seats in the parliament. Since then the party has been on a roll.

Podemos’ victories in these elections would appear to suggest that Spain is moving radically leftward, but this is refuted by the ideological self-placement scale which over the last 20 years has hardly ever dropped below 4.5 where 5.0 is the centre (10 extreme right and 0 extreme left). The average indicator is currently 4.7 compared with 4.9 in December 2011 when the last general election was held. A majority of Podemos sympathisers, according to surveys, see this party as far more radical than themselves. Its recent U-turn towards social democracy and away from radical policies has paid dividends, but whether this was merely a tactical move remains to be seen.

Spaniards are not up for adventures and do not want a rupture with the past, which despite its defects is still the best phase of Spain’s history in terms of prosperity, modernisation and peaceful co-existence. The country is living interesting times.

About the author:
*William Chislett
Associate Analyst at the Elcano Royal Institute | @WilliamChislet3

Source:
This article was published by Elcano Royal Institute.

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A suicide bomber blew himself up outside a Shiite mosque in Dammar, in eastern Saudi Arabia, killing four people.

Based on official reports, the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber in a car at the end of Friday prayers at the Al Anoud mosque, in a busy neighbourhood.

The Islamic State claimed the attack on its Twitter account, attributing it to Abu Jandal al-Jazrawi.

The attack comes a week after another suicide blast targeted a Shiite mosque in eastern Saudi, killing 21 people. It was the first claimed by the Saudi IS branch founded in November.

The post Saudi Arabia: Suicide Bomber Attacks Mosque appeared first on Eurasia Review.

One the occasion of the BJP government’s one-year anniversary, Neelam Deo, director, Gateway House, delivered a series of lectures across the U.S., analysing Modi’s foreign policy. His energetic style, she said, has created several milestones—including a revival of relations with the U.S. and Russia, and a new approach to China and to India’s neighbourhood—that can cumulatively transform India’s growth trajectory. This is an abridged version of her lecture.

By Neelam Deo*

In his first year as prime minister, Narendra Modi has had to craft a foreign policy in a global setting that has been transformed by the rapid rise of the Chinese economy and its increasing belligerence towards its Asian neighbours. Meanwhile, Russia’s stand-off with NATO has forced it to lean towards China; West Asia is in turmoil; and the retreat of the remaining U.S. forces from Afghanistan will encourage terrorism emanating from Pakistan that primarily targets India but has also become global.

It is in this complex and changing global setting that Modi has emerged as a bold deal-maker—with flexible and strategic negotiations with the U.S. that are balanced by a reaching out to China and rejuvenating relations with Russia.

Modi’s visits to Myanmar, Nepal, and Sri Lanka—three of India’s six South Asian neighbours—have restored warmth to relations with these countries too, at a time when China is heavily cultivating its own ties with these countries. India believes that China’s lavish investments and armaments for its South Asian neighbours is an “encirclement” of India.

In this fluid Asian strategic backdrop, the U.S. has become Modi’s strategic focus—and India can attain more influence in global security and financial institutions only with American support. Besides, India needs investment and the involvement of American companies in its infrastructure build-out, collaboration in the indigenisation of defence industries, and an enhanced technology partnership between the navies of the two countries.

At present, Russia remains the largest supplier of weapons to India, and it is willing to share high-technology so that India can indigenise its nuclear and defence production sectors. An example of India’s rejuvenated relations with Russia was President Pranab Mukherjee’s presence on May 9 at Russia’s 70th anniversary victory ceremonies to mark the end of World War II, while the West, including Russia’s wartime allies UK and the U.S., stayed away.

At the same time, it is imperative for India to consolidate its working relations with China. But this bilateral equation suffers from a shortfall of trust that has been widened by the 4,050 kilometre un-demarcated border and a trade deficit of approximately $40 billion.

Middle powers in the Indo-Pacific, such as Canada, Australia, and Japan need to balance against the newly-risen China. They recognise that India is the only country in Asia of comparable size and potential—and this is facilitating the building of India’s relations with these countries. All of them also happen to be treaty allies of the U.S.

Among the middle powers, Japan is especially important. Both India and Japan feel the pressure from China and Modi’s warm overtures to Japan early in his term will go a long way. This is evident from Japan’s potential sale of high-technology weapons systems to India, which will make India the first non-treaty ally to receive defence technology from Japan.

The prime minister’s interactions with Canada and Australia have been equally important—both countries are sources of uranium for India’s nuclear energy programme. Additionally, Australia and Japan are also important for the revival of quadrilateral maritime cooperation—along with the U.S.—in the Indo-Pacific. Modi has also reached out to France as a source of high-technology weapon systems, nuclear energy technology, and for support in international institutions.

Closer to home, Modi visited Mauritius and Seychelles—nations that, along with Sri Lanka, are integral to India’s strategy to balance China’s push into the Indian Ocean Region through its proposed Maritime Silk Road project.

In his first year, Modi also made the time to attend meetings of multilateral institutions such as the G20, BRICS, and the East Asia Summit. His pragmatic style helped unlock stalemates at the World Trade Organisation and on climate change issues, while making it clear that India will continue to use coal to generate power, but wants to simultaneously expand investment in solar and wind power.

At the end of one year then, it can be said that Modi has successfully enlarged India’s strategic autonomy by cultivating close relations with its neighbours, with the P5 countries, other middle powers, and Indian Ocean island countries. But Pakistan remains a big conundrum for India.

In terms of inbound investment—which has been a major thrust of Modi’s foreign policy—there is significant progress. The U.S. ($40 billion), Japan ($35 billion), China ($20 billion), and South Korea ($10 billion) have all made commitments from a mix of public and private sources in infrastructure and defence industries. Even if only a small percentage of these investments flow in soon, it will give an impetus to the Indian economy, especially in improving infrastructure and creating employment.

From here on, the best way India can advance its foreign policy will be to secure a high rate of growth as rapidly as possible. The Modi government is working towards this goal through domestic policy reforms that include transparent governance (as seen in the e-auction of telecom spectrum and coal); the abolition of obsolete institutions like the Planning Commission; harmonisation of taxes under the pending Goods and Services Tax; a digitisation of the economy; and the creation of a modest social security net.

In addition, the devolution of more revenue and power to the states is likely to set in motion a cycle of competitive federalism that will make the overall Indian economy more competitive and will add to India’s global strategic weight.

About the author:
*Neelam Deo is Co-founder and Director, Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations; She has been the Indian Ambassador to Denmark and Ivory Coast; and former Consul General in New York.

Source:
This feature was written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.

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