By Niharika Tagotra*

In July 2014, months after the NDA government returned to power, PM Narendra Modi visited the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) in Mumbai and declared that nuclear power would be an essential part of India’s energy security. The initiatives taken in this regard by the current government are reflective of this intent. While most of these initiatives are a continuation of the previous government’s policy push in the nuclear energy sector, many other initiatives undertaken by the current regime go a step further. It is however important to note that the present government remains conspicuously silent on issues such as improving regulation and transparency in the nuclear sector, and no major policy break from the previous government can be identified in the issue area.

PM Modi’s Nuclear Diplomacy

Continuing with the nuclear diplomacy that was initiated by the previous UPA government, PM Modi has signed civil nuclear deals with over ten countries. Of these, the India-US and India-Japan nuclear agreements were quite significant because they removed some significant bottlenecks in the fuel and technology imports for the sector.

Under the India-US nuclear agreement signed in January 2015 during President Obama’s visit to India, the two countries were able to reach an understanding on the issue of civil nuclear liability. The India side agreed to set up a nuclear insurance pool to the tune of INR 1500 crore under the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act (CLNDA), which was fundamental in assuaging the concerns of foreign and domestic investors regarding the issue of liability in the nuclear sector.

This removed a major bottleneck for private companies and the visit subsequently saw the initiation of commercial negotiations between Westinghouse and the Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL). The personal bonhomie between US President Barack Obama and PM Modi is said to have played an important role in the matter – both leaders circumvented domestic political opposition and were able to ultimately forge a consensus on the liability issue.

The India-France nuclear deal signed in 2010 was again a legacy of the UPA government inherited by the Modi government. The deal had been stuck in limbo because the reactor vessels used by Areva were sourced from Japan and in the absence of an India-Japan civil nuclear arrangement, the supply of these vessels was not possible. A permanent resolution to the issue was achieved in December 2015 when India and Japan signed a landmark civil nuclear agreement, bringing six years of negotiations to a successful end. This was a significant exception for India as it became the only non-NPT country to sign a nuclear deal with Japan. While the agreements did see a long drawn process of negotiations between the countries – a period that spanned the regimes of both the UPA and the NDA – diplomatic efforts led by Modi himself and his emphasis on forging deep personal engagements with the leaders were fundamental in the successful culmination of most of these negotiations.

PM Modi’s efforts at using diplomacy to secure nuclear deals however suffered a setback when India’s diplomatic push for securing a membership to the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) hit a roadblock. A major opposition to India’s bid came from China and a group of other countries including Ireland, Austria and New Zealand. While, the benefits from NSG membership for the domestic nuclear energy sector is debatable, there is no doubt that the failure at achieving its intended goal caused India some major diplomatic embarrassment.

Policy Push for Nuclear Power

Besides the diplomatic overtures, certain important initiatives have also been taken at the domestic front to streamline the flow of investments to the sector. The push for the ratification of the Convention on Supplementary Compensation (CSC) for nuclear damage in February 2016 was a step in this regard. While the convention was signed in 2010, its ratification saw a delay of six years owing to the government’s lack of political will. The ratification of the agreement in 2016 reflected the intent of the current government to implement and abide by the convention in its entirety.

The government has also attempted to alleviate concerns regarding the provision of sufficient investment to the sector by announcing a yearly budgetary allocation of INR 3000 crore to nuclear energy for the next two decades. Making the announcement during his 2016 budget speech, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley categorically stated that the government was looking at nuclear energy as the power source for long-term stability. Recently, the government announced the plan for setting up of ten indigenously developed Pressurized Heavy Water Reactors (PHWRs), an initiative that is expected to fast-track India’s nuclear power programme and provide the much needed push to the domestic nuclear industry by generating manufacturing orders to the tune of INR 70,000 crore and creating over 33,400 jobs in the country. The units, developed in fleet mode, will be one of the flagship ‘Make in India’ projects, and will aim to link India’s nuclear power sector with the indigenous industrial capacities in high-end technologies.

Unaddressed Issues

With regard to nuclear energy, it is not just the economic and political realities that act as an obstacle but also the social mindset that stalls its development. The lack of transparency in the functioning of the sector is the primary cause for the trust deficit between the general public and the nuclear energy sector. The lack of information or misinformation about the sector adds to the distrust of nuclear power in a post-Fukushima world. Some fundamental long-pending reforms in this regard still remain unaddressed. The issue of increasing accountability in the sector – by increasing the regulatory powers of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) and making the atomic energy institution more accountable to the public – remains pending, while the Nuclear Safety and Regulatory Authority (NSRA) bill which lapsed in 2014 with the change of government is yet to be re-introduced in parliament. The continuing problems with the L1 system of procurement, which has been flagged by the private sector as the reason behind the never-ending delays in the construction of domestic power plants and spiralling costs, have also not been taken up.

Thus, while there is no doubt that the Modi government has undertaken some important steps to further the generation of nuclear energy, with PM Modi personally leading some diplomatic initiatives, the reluctance of the government to attend to some of the persistent issues in the sector is a major gap in the Modi government’s policy push for the nuclear sector.

* Niharika Tagotra
Researcher, IPCS

By combining the power of a “natural lens” in space with the capability of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers made a surprising discovery–the first example of a compact yet massive, fast-spinning, disk-shaped galaxy that stopped making stars only a few billion years after the big bang.

Finding such a galaxy early in the history of the universe challenges the current understanding of how massive galaxies form and evolve, say researchers.

When Hubble photographed the galaxy, astronomers expected to see a chaotic ball of stars formed through galaxies merging together. Instead, they saw evidence that the stars were born in a pancake-shaped disk.

This is the first direct observational evidence that at least some of the earliest so-called “dead” galaxies — where star formation stopped — somehow evolve from a Milky Way-shaped disk into the giant elliptical galaxies we see today.

This is a surprise because elliptical galaxies contain older stars, while spiral galaxies typically contain younger blue stars. At least some of these early “dead” disk galaxies must have gone through major makeovers. They not only changed their structure, but also the motions of their stars to make a shape of an elliptical galaxy.

“This new insight may force us to rethink the whole cosmological context of how galaxies burn out early on and evolve into local elliptical-shaped galaxies,” said study leader Sune Toft of the Dark Cosmology Center at the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. “Perhaps we have been blind to the fact that early “dead” galaxies could in fact be disks, simply because we haven’t been able to resolve them.”

Previous studies of distant dead galaxies have assumed that their structure is similar to the local elliptical galaxies they will evolve into. Confirming this assumption in principle requires more powerful space telescopes than are currently available. However, through the phenomenon known as “gravitational lensing,” a massive, foreground cluster of galaxies acts as a natural “zoom lens” in space by magnifying and stretching images of far more distant background galaxies. By joining this natural lens with the resolving power of Hubble, scientists were able to see into the center of the dead galaxy.

The remote galaxy is three times as massive as the Milky Way but only half the size. Rotational velocity measurements made with the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) showed that the disk galaxy is spinning more than twice as fast as the Milky Way.

Using archival data from the Cluster Lensing And Supernova survey with Hubble (CLASH), Toft and his team were able to determine the stellar mass, star-formation rate, and the ages of the stars.

Why this galaxy stopped forming stars is still unknown. It may be the result of an active galactic nucleus, where energy is gushing from a supermassive black hole. This energy inhibits star formation by heating the gas or expelling it from the galaxy. Or it may be the result of the cold gas streaming onto the galaxy being rapidly compressed and heated up, preventing it from cooling down into star-forming clouds in the galaxy’s center.

But how do these young, massive, compact disks evolve into the elliptical galaxies we see in the present-day universe? “Probably through mergers,” Toft said. “If these galaxies grow through merging with minor companions, and these minor companions come in large numbers and from all sorts of different angles onto the galaxy, this would eventually randomize the orbits of stars in the galaxies. You could also imagine major mergers. This would definitely also destroy the ordered motion of the stars.”

The findings are published in the June 22 issue of the journal Nature. Toft and his team hope to use NASA’s upcoming James Webb Space Telescope to look for a larger sample of such galaxies.

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., in Washington, D.C.

The Very Large Telescope is a telescope facility operated by the European Southern Observatory on Cerro Paranal in the Atacama Desert of Northern Chile.

The study by Dr Jacques-Olivier Laloë of the University’s College of Science and published in the Global Change Biology journal, argues that warmer temperatures associated with climate change could lead to higher numbers of female sea turtles and increased nest failure, and could impact negatively on the turtle population in some areas of the world.

The effects of rising temperatures

Rising temperatures were first identified as a concern for sea turtle populations in the early 1980s as the temperature at which sea turtle embryos incubate determines the sex of an individual, which is known as Temperature-Dependent Sex Determination (TSD).

The pivotal temperature for TSD is 29°C as both males and females are produced in equal proportions – above 29°C mainly females are produced while below 29°C more males are born. Within the context of climate change and warming temperatures, this means that, all else being equal, sea turtle populations are expected to be more female-biased in the future. While it is known that males can mate with more than one female during the breeding season, if there are too few males in the population this could threaten population viability.

The new study also explored another important effect of rising temperatures: in-nest survival rates. Sea turtle eggs only develop successfully in a relatively narrow thermal range of approximately 25-35°C, so if incubation temperatures are too low the embryo does not develop but if they are too high then development fails. This means that if incubation temperatures increase in the future as part of climate warming, then more sea turtle nests will fail.

The researchers recorded sand temperatures at a globally important loggerhead sea turtle nesting site in Cape Verde over 6 years. They also recorded the survival rates of over 3,000 nests to study the relationship between incubation temperature and hatchling survival. Using local climate projections, the research team then modeled how turtle numbers are likely to change throughout the century at this nesting site.

Research results

Dr Laloë said: “Our results show something very interesting. Up to a certain point, warmer incubation temperatures benefit sea turtles because they increase the natural growth rate of the population: more females are produced because of TSD, which leads to more eggs being laid on the beaches.

“However, beyond a critical temperature, the natural growth rate of the population decreases because of an increase of temperature-linked in-nest mortality. Temperatures are too high and the developing embryos do not survive. This threatens the long-term survival of this sea turtle population.”

The researchers expect that the numbers of nests in Cape Verde will increase by approximately 30% by the year 2100 but, if temperatures keep rising, could start decreasing afterwards.

The new study identifies temperature-linked hatchling mortality as an important threat to sea turtles and highlights concerns for species with TSD in a warming world. It suggests that, in order to safeguard sea turtle populations around the world, it is critical to monitor how hatchling survival changes over the next decades.

Dr Laloë said: “In recent years, in places like Florida–another important sea turtle nesting site–more and more turtle nests are reported to have lower survival rates than in the past. This shows that we should really keep a close eye on incubation temperatures and the in-nest survival rates of sea turtles if we want to successfully protect them.

“If need be, conservation measures could be put in place around the world to protect the incubating turtle eggs. Such measures could involve artificially shading turtle nests or moving eggs to a protected and temperature-controlled hatchery.”

A study conducted in Finland has analysed the oral glucose tolerance tests of 1970 men and 2544 women in relation to their preceding three-year employment records. It found that men with high exposure to unemployment had a higher risk for pre-diabetes and screen-detected type 2 diabetes than employed men.

Research, partly supported by the EU-funded DYNAHEALTH project, established that, in the men involved, pre-diabetes was found in 19.2% of those employed, 23.0% who’d been unemployed for less than a year and 27.0% of those unemployed for more than a year. The corresponding figures for screen-detected type 2 diabetes were 3.8%, 3.8% and 9.2%.

In women the results were less dramatic, although the numbers did go up slightly in relation to employment. The analogous figures for pre-diabetes were 10.0%, 12.6% and 16.2% and for screen-detected type 2 diabetes 1.7%, 3.4% and 3.6%. In both cases the data were adjusted for education, smoking, alcohol intake, physical activity and body mass index. Among women, associations were attenuated in the adjusted models.

Diabetes is a growing global epidemic which impacts negatively on economies and involves complex interplay between biological, psychological and social factors. As we now know that progression towards type 2 diabetes can be prevented, or delayed, by lifestyle changes in high-risk individuals, identifying those people early enough is vital for timely diagnosis and treatment. The research presents another parameter to be taken into consideration when identifying those at risk.

What is the relation between unemployment and diabetes?

There is a suggestion of a causal link between stress and the onset of type 2 diabetes. Physiologically this is probably provoked by the over-activity of the hypothalamo–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis and cortisol production. Behavioural factors will also be playing a role. Occurrence peaks in those between 40-64 and it has been hypothesized that employment-related stressors and the impact of shift work, could underlie its development.

In their paper published in the journal ‘Primary Care Diabetes’, the researchers observe that while stress relating to employment has been studied, not much work has been done on the impact of unemployment, a known risk factor for poor health. To their best knowledge, say the team, this is the first study to test for the association with objective data for both the exposure to unemployment (national registers) and the outcome of glucose metabolism (OGTT).

The authors outline what they believe to be the key strength of their study as being, ‘(…) the objective register-based quantification of exposure to unemployment during a precise three-year follow-up period preceding an OGTT, capturing the important acute exposure to unemployment-related hardships during the early stages of diabetogenesis. Since the participants are of the same age, the analysis is not biased by temporal macroeconomic fluctuations in general unemployment rates, which may affect the health effects of unemployment.’

Useful pointer for early diagnosis

High exposure to unemployment may predispose middle-aged men to type 2 diabetes. For clinicians, awareness of the patient’s unemployment status may be helpful in recognizing undiagnosed cases. DYNAHEALTH (Understanding the dynamic determinants of glucose homeostasis and social capability to promote Healthy and active aging) which supported the research is also capitalizing on a number of existing studies harnessing the health, biological and social resource of 1.5 million Europeans. In so doing it is boosting the development of risk-based prevention tools and policies and providing policy-makers with the necessary information on the best periods to invest in cost-effective and sustainable healthcare strategies.

Cordis Source: Based on project information and media reports

Scientists are warning that a water treatment widely used in developing countries could be damaging the DNA of those drinking it.

Despite poor evidence of their effectiveness as a water disinfectant, colloidal silver and silver nanoparticles are increasingly being promoted for treating potentially contaminated drinking water in low income countries.

A study led by the University of East Anglia has concluded that there is a risk these treatments could in fact cause genotoxicity, which is damage to DNA, and affect reproduction and future generations.

Prof Paul Hunter from UEA’s Norwich Medical School, said the study brings together existing research to highlight the potential risks. “Colloidal silver as a water treatment is sold across Africa and in countries like Haiti, despite the fact it doesn’t treat water very effectively. The World Health Organization (WHO) advises against its use as a primary water treatment. If it isn’t doing any good, we wanted to investigate if in fact it could be causing harm.”

The research looked at previous studies where the effects of silver, silver nitrate and silver nanoparticles have been measured ‘in vivo’ – on living animals.

They found that, although results varied, more studies than they expected showed some evidence of genotoxicity, reporting effects including chromosomal aberrations, DNA fragmentation and damage to sperm.

Prof Hunter said: “We already know that there is little evidence that silver in water has any benefit. But this study brings together a body of work which shows it is potentially damaging DNA, and harming reproductive success.”

Colloidal silver is also widely marketed as an alternative health substance which can treat everything from skin complaints to bacterial and viral infections, cancer and AIDS. Again, little research exists to show any beneficial effects, but there are known side effects. One of the more obvious signs of over-exposure to silver is argyria, where the skin and hair turns a blue-grey colour.

WHO guidelines for drinking water quality don’t currently include a value for silver in water, but indicate that a concentration of 0.1 milligrams per litre could be tolerated without risk to health. However, this was determined as a level unlikely to cause argyria, and didn’t take into account potential damage to DNA.

Prof Hunter said: “While none of the previous studies alone are definitive, and we can’t use them to determine a safe level of consumption from this review, we consider that the balance of evidence suggests there is the chance of damage to DNA.

“There is an urgent need for more research on this area to determine if people drinking water treated with silver have evidence of DNA damage.”

The authorities in the Brazilian state of Roraima are failing to investigate or prosecute domestic violence cases, leaving women at further risk of abuse, Human Rights Watch said in a report released Wednesday. The serious problems in Roraima, the state with the highest rate of killings of women in Brazil, reflect nationwide failures to provide victims of domestic violence with access to justice and protection.

The 22-page report, “‘One Day I´ll Kill You’: Impunity in Domestic Violence Cases in the Brazilian State of Roraima,” examines systemic problems in responding to domestic violence in the state. Human Rights Watch documented 31 cases of domestic violence, and interviewed victims, police, and justice officials. The organization found failures at all points in the system for responding to domestic abuse.

“Many women in Roraima suffer violent attacks and abuse for years before they summon the courage to report it to the police, and when they do, the government’s response is dreadful,” said Maria Laura Canineu, Brazil director at Human Rights Watch. “As long as victims of domestic violence can’t get help and justice, their abusers will keep right on injuring and killing them.”

Killings of women rose 139 percent from 2010 to 2015 in Roraima, reaching 11.4 homicides per 100,000 women that year, the latest for which there is data available. The national average is 4.4 killings per 100,000 women—already one of the highest in the world. Studies in Brazil and worldwide estimate that a large percentage of women who suffer violent deaths are killed by partners or former partners.

Only a quarter of women who suffer violence in Brazil report it, according to a February 2017 survey that does not provide state-by-state data. Human Rights Watch found in Roraima that when women do call police they face considerable barriers to having their cases heard.

Military police told Human Rights Watch that, for lack of personnel, they do not respond to all emergency calls from women who say they are experiencing domestic violence. Other women are turned away at police stations. Some civil police officers in Boa Vista, the state´s capital, decline to register domestic violence complaints or request protection orders themselves, Human Rights Watch found. Instead, they direct victims to the single “women’s police station” in the state—which specializes in crimes against women—even at times when that station is closed.

Even when police receive their complaints, women must tell their story of abuse, including sexual abuse, in open reception areas, as there are no private rooms to take statements in any police station in the state.

Not a single civil police officer in Roraima receives training in how to handle domestic violence cases. And it shows, Human Rights Watch found. Some police officers, when receiving women seeking protection orders, take statements so carelessly that judges lack the basic information they need to decide whether to issue the order.

Civil police are unable to keep up with the volume of complaints they do receive. In Boa Vista, the police have failed to do investigative work on a backlog of 8,400 domestic violence complaints. Most cases languish for years until they are eventually closed because the statute of limitations on the crime expires–without any prosecution, according to the police.

Taise Campos, a 38-year-old teacher, filed more than 15 police complaints, she told Human Rights Watch, to report repeated acts of physical and verbal abuse by her former husband. But the statute of limitations expired before he could be tried for the alleged crimes. “A person who needs help loses all faith in the justice system,” Campos said.

Brazil has a comprehensive legal framework, established by the 2006 “Maria da Penha” law, to prevent domestic violence and to ensure justice when it occurs. But implementation of many of its provisions is lagging.

The law, named after a victim who filed a case with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights over the lack of response to her case by authorities in Brazil, called for the expansion of women’s police stations and domestic violence units within non-specialized police stations. But these units remain concentrated in major cities and are often very hard to reach for women who live in other areas. Women’s police stations are also badly overburdened, serving an average population of 210,000 women each.

The law also allows judges to order suspected abusers to stay away from a woman’s home and not to contact her or her family, among other protective measures. But police fail to monitor the vast majority of protection orders.

Authorities in Roraima—and Brazil as a whole—need to reduce barriers for women to filing complaints with police, Human Rights Watch said. And the authorities should ensure that domestic violence cases are properly documented at the time women report them, and then investigated and prosecuted. The authorities also need to allocate more resources to training and investigation—and discipline police officers who fail to carry out their duties.

“While Roraima has the highest rate of killings of women in the country, the problems there are symptomatic of the failure to protect women from abuse nationwide,” Canineu said. “The Maria da Penha law was a major step forward, but more than a decade later, implementation remains woefully inadequate throughout much of the country.”

By Sandip Kumar Mishra*

India’s incumbent National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government showed decisive intent from the very beginning to bring more dynamism in India’s foreign policy. Exemplary of this was its policy towards Southeast and East Asia. The erstwhile Look East Policy (LEP) was not only renamed to Act East Policy (AEP), but it was announced that more substance would be put into India’s relations with these countries. Apart from more economic and political exchanges, the new policy sought to invoke more strategic and deep-rooted cultural connections of India with these countries. It was expected that the Korean peninsula, which consists of North and South Koreas would also receive more attention.

India-South Korea economic exchanges, cultural and educational connections and political understandings have been spectacular from the early 1990s. For example, the bilateral trade between the two countries, which was less than US$1 billion, reached over US$20 billion in 2011-12. India and South Korea signed a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) in 2009; in January 2010, India and South Korea also signed a Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA).
However, the momentum in India-South Korea bilateral relations was getting slowed down in the last year of the previous Indian government. The CEPA, especially, rather than propelling bilateral trade was alleged to be creating hindrances after the first two years of its implementations. There were also differences of opinion between India and South Korea over investment and business issues.

With the NDA government coming to power, it was expected that India and South Korea would be able to overcome these hindrances and invest renewed energy in their relations. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited South Korea in May 2015 and expectedly indicated a new and important beginning in India-South Korea relations. During his one-and-a-half day visit, India and South Korea signed a number of agreements and MoUs in all possible areas. The two countries agreed to hold annual meetings of their foreign and defence ministers. Cooperation in the fields of defence, defence production, cultural and educational exchanges and various other common concerns were addressed during the visit. Furthermore, both countries enhanced their SPA to Special Strategic Partnership (SSP) and declared that India’s constructive role in resolving North Korean nuclear and missile issues along with establishment of peace regime in the region would be welcomed. India and South Korea also resolved to hold a review process of the CEPA and revise it.
South Korea was invited to participate in the Government of India’s flagship projects, ‘Make in India’ and ‘Digital India’.

However, subsequent follow-ups have been far from satisfactory. There have been some minor achievements such as starting of daily flights between Delhi and Seoul and clearance to export Indian mangoes to South Korea, but on most of the critical issues, a lot still needs to be done. The inability to bring momentum to bilateral relations is equally attributable to South Korea. For example, while India wants more Korean investments in India’s manufacturing sector, South Korean companies do their manufacturing activities through least connections with Indian companies.

Similarly, South Korea is ready to sell LNG tankers to India without sharing its technology and know-how. While South Korea is worried about decreasing bilateral trade it is unwilling to help with India’s trade deficits. In all truth, however, this was expected to happen and therefore it was upon the NDA government to bring political will to overcome these problems. It appears that India, under the NDA government, has also not been able to look at the broad and long-term reciprocity and the political leadership has left it to bureaucrats to decide foreign policy via their narrow and mechanical approaches. For example, the review of the CEPA was declared by the Indian Prime Minister in May 2015 and even after over two years, the process is far from over. It was reported in early-June 2017 that India is implementing the highest number of trade regulations against South Korea and it does not say well about this bilateral relationship.

It is also important to note that the NDA government’s manifest closeness with Japan and show of little reluctance to be part of an alliance against China, make South Korea uncomfortable. South Korea might have a security alliance with the US but it has strong economic exchanges with China; and it would not like to be in a situation where it has to choose between the US and China or Japan and China.
To South Korea’s further discomfort, the NDA government also had some interactions with North Korea. Overall, India-South Korea relations during the NDA government continue to face the hindrances that crept up right at the beginning.

India-North Korea relations have also been almost static during the three years of NDA government in India. In 2015, North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Su-yong visited India and Indian Minister Kiren Rijiju, after attending a function at the North Korean Embassy in New Delhi, expressed India’s intent to maintain good relations with North Korea. Actually, India had consistent diplomatic relations with North Korea albeit after the revelations of nuclear and missile technology exchanges between North Korea and Pakistan, the relations had become cold. Relations strained further with economic sanctions and the diplomatic isolation of North Korea by the international community.

Notwithstanding these strains, India continues to provide humanitarian assistance to North Korea and maintains bilateral diplomatic relations. Few extra activities in the India-North Korea relations in 2015 may be read as India’s intent to explore whether it could play a more active role in the East Asian region via North Korea.

There are also speculations that former US President Barack Obama’s administration was also in favour of India’s more active role and India’s actions were prompted by covert US support. However, soon India realised that the cost of flirting with North Korea would be huge and it would be premature for India to enter into this venture; it withdrew itself.

Overall, in the past three years of the NDA rule, India’s foreign policy towards South Korea has not brought any significant change in their bilateral relations. Similarly there is nothing new to say about India’s relations with North Korea.

Although, India made good gestures in the first one year, on most of the issues, the follow-ups have been slow or non-existent. The blame for this stagnation cannot be put on the diplomats and bureaucrats, but on the political leadership of both the countries. It is urgent now for the NDA government to show that the dynamism, which was promised in the AEP, is not just loud and empty promises but that they indeed have substance and political will power. The leaders simply congratulating each other over twitter will not achieve this.

* Sandip Kumar Mishra
Associate Professor, Centre for East Asian Studies, SIS, JNU, & Visiting Fellow, IPCS

All the testing work for Sri Lanka’s Moragahakanda hydro-electricity plant, which will generate 25MW to the national grid, have been concluded, according to the government, adding engineers say that the electricity generation could commence when the water level rises in the reservoirs during the upcoming rainy season.

The Moragahakanda hydro-electricity plant was built within the shortest period of time in the history of the country.

The plant was built near the Moragahakanda main dam and the electricity will be generated using four turbines consisting of two 7.5 megawatt turbines and another two 5 megawatt turbines.

The water released after operating turbine machines of 7.5 megawatts, will be taken to the Mahakanadara Reservoir through Ihala Elahera canel. The water released by operating of turbines of 5 megawatts will be sent to Ambanganga and then to Giritale, Minneriya, Kavudulla and Kantale reservoirs through old Elahera cannel.

The Moragahakanda reservoir is situated 132 meters above sea level. When the water level of the reservoir increased to 165 meters from the sea level the power plant will be operated. When it reaches the highest level of 185 meters the power will be generated.

Gross inputs to U.S. petroleum refineries, also referred to as refinery runs, averaged a record high 17.7 million barrels per day (b/d) for the week ending May 26, before dropping slightly to 17.5 million b/d for the week ending June 2 and 17.6 million b/d for the week ending June 9. Product supplied to the U.S. market as well as inventories and exports are also at relatively high levels.

Weekly U.S. refinery runs have exceeded 17 million b/d only 24 times since EIA began publishing the data series in 1990, and all of those instances have occurred since July 2015. Despite record-high inputs, refinery utilization did not reach a new record, because refinery capacity has increased in recent years. Refinery utilization reached 95% for the week ending May 26, slightly lower than the levels reached in mid-July through mid-August 2015.

U.S. refinery capacity has increased by 659,000 barrels per calendar day (b/cd) since mid-August 2015. Refinery capacity—measured in barrels per calendar day (b/cd)—represents the amount of input that a crude oil distillation unit can process in a 24-hour period under usual operating conditions (averaged over the entire year), accounting for both planned and unplanned maintenance.

U.S. refineries have three primary outlets for their products: they can be placed in inventory, provided to end-users to satisfy domestic demand, or exported. Recently, petroleum product inventories, product supplied, and exports have all been higher than previous five-year averages.

Total product inventories for the first week of June 2017 were nearly 83 million barrels higher than the five-year average, although they are almost 3 million barrels lower than at the same time last year.

Similarly, product supplied, a proxy for demand, was greater than the five-year average by nearly 600,000 b/d during the first week of June 2017 but 400,000 b/d lower than at the same time last year. Petroleum product exports were also higher than previous levels. EIA has been publishing weekly petroleum product exports based on near-real-time export data provided by U.S. Customs and Border Protection since August 31, 2016. Previously, weekly export estimates were developed from monthly official export data published by the U.S. Census Bureau, roughly six weeks following the end of each reporting month. Petroleum product exports for the first week of June 2017 were 831,000 b/d greater than the June 2016 average.

This analysis warns of the growing risk of armed conflict in the Korean Peninsula and sets out some options for avoiding it and proceeding towards an agreement that would enable the precarious stability of the region to be underpinned.

By Félix Arteaga and Mario Esteban*

Military tension is nothing new in the Korean Peninsula. North Korea has been responsible for numerous armed incidents in recent decades; that these did not escalate is due to the fact that the conventional military superiority of South Korea and its US ally contained North Korean bellicosity. The containment scenario is no longer valid as North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes have steadily progressed and now the Korean Peninsula finds itself in an unstable situation where any error of judgement or impulsive move could provoke not only armed conflict but also nuclear escalation. In a context marked by the problems faced by the international community to contain North Korean proliferation and by an increase in hostile declarations and the deployment of forces, this analysis sets out the need to adopt dissuasive and tension-reducing measures that could, first, avoid aggravating the current situation and, secondly, make progress towards freezing proliferation at its current levels and constructing a negotiating framework that would make it sustainable.

Analysis

How did we get here?

The current situation has been brewing thanks to commission on the part of the North Korean authorities and omission on the part of the regional powers, which have left unchecked what is now an imminent risk factor for regional security: that of a military confrontation in which conventional and nuclear arms may be used.

It is thought that Pyongyang started to develop a clandestine nuclear arms programme at the start of the 1980s, which it later accelerated at three moments of particular insecurity for the North Korean regime: the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, its inclusion in the so-called ‘axis of evil’ by George W. Bush in 2002 and Kim Jong-un’s ascent to power following the death of his father. In the first two cases, international diplomatic efforts were made in both the 1994 Agreed Framework and the Six-party Talks (2003-09) that failed in their attempt to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear programme in exchange for economic aid and security guarantees. Since 2011 the North Korean regime has sped up its programmes aimed at crossing the nuclear threshold (see Table 1) and reformed its constitution to institutionalise its nuclear programme and strengthen the legitimacy of Kim Jong-un’s leadership. The initial goal of de-nuclearising the Korean Peninsula is therefore no longer viable and those who were seeking to avoid it will now have to choose between military steps that disrupt or terminate the programmes already underway (counter-proliferation) or diplomatic steps that seek some form of accommodation with the new nuclear power (non-proliferation).

Responsibility for arriving at this pass is shared across a range of actors. The chief culprits are the political and military leaders of North Korea, who continue believing and warning the population that there is going to be an external military intervention aimed at wiping out their regime, and have accordingly pushed forward with nuclear programmes on the grounds that their survival depends on them. Hence Pyongyang has stopped complying with the promises made to prevent proliferation and used such agreements to buy time and resources, all the while developing its nuclear programme, putting paid to the various talks processes that were underway.

For its part, the US has been vacillating on its policy towards North Korea, which at times has led it to renege on its commitments and accentuate mistrust in Pyongyang. Preoccupied with embarking upon and terminating other conflicts, recent US Presidents have not paid enough attention to North Korean proliferation. A striking example was Obama’s so-called ‘strategic patience’, which barely put any obstacles in the way of the North Korean nuclear programme. Only after the diplomatic agreement with Iran was signed –and following the second nuclear test of 2016– were the sanctions placed on North Korea taken seriously. The North Korean regime has managed to get round these sanctions, emulating the ‘Iranian way’ of building up a network of logistical, financial and technological intermediaries who have nurtured the umbilical cord of proliferation. Now that President Trump has brought an end to the policy of strategic patience with North Korea and shown his preparedness to use force, the North Korean regime has more reasons for feeling insecure, but less to lose if an escalation should occur.

The North Korean nuclear programme would not have advanced in the way it has without the collaboration of its neighbours. First, China has allowed its ally to play the provocation card at the Six-party Talks table, supplying technology associated with proliferation, directly or through Chinese and Pakistani intermediaries who have provided technological, financial and logistical support to the proliferation programme. Secondly, South Korean governments have been prepared to grant economic incentives to appease its northern neighbour. Although they have tried they have not succeeded in engaging the North Korean elites in any process of building mutual trust; on the contrary, their predisposition has raised doubts among their allies about the possibility that South Korea might jettison its friends in exchange for promises of reunification. Such doubts were evident in the recent election campaign when the then presidential candidate Moon Jae-in argued against the US taking unilateral decisions on North Korea and criticised the US deployment of its THAAD anti-ballistic missile defence system. As expected, since being elected he has shown himself to be more disposed to reopening talks with the north than his predecessor, the impeached Park Geun-hye.

Why are we at a particularly sensitive moment?

Up until now, the risk of a widespread conventional conflict has been contained thanks to the military superiority of South Korea and its American ally. Despite the fact that North Korea wields considerable military might, it is one thing to provoke occasional armed incidents to shore up its threats and a quite different thing to launch a military escalation in which North Korea would have everything to lose. Now that the headway made in proliferation has shifted the conventional balance however, the North Korean leader and his military elite can afford to indulge in more aggressive shows of strength, knowing that they can make up for their conventional inferiority. When they reiterate that they will only use their nuclear weapons if they are attacked, what they affirm is that they are prepared to use them first and –more dangerous still– that their decision rests on a perception that may be removed from reality. Linking first nuclear use to a subjective perception increases the risk of a nuclear escalation in the Korean Peninsula because the decision does not emerge from a rational calculation of the risks stemming from the traditional nuclear powers but rather from the irrationality of the feelings of a small, recently elevated and inexperienced power in a complicated game of nuclear deterrence. By way of comparison, North Korea’s first strike nuclear doctrine is similar to that of India’s, but the likelihood of its being put into action is less of a concern on the India-Pakistan border than in the Korean Peninsula.

Secondly, while North Korea is developing its nuclear and ballistic capacity at an ever-increasing rate, its openness to being dissuaded is limited and this presents the US with the dilemma of whether or not to launch a pre-emptive attack. At the time of writing it is estimated that North Korea has between 10 and 20 nuclear weapons; it has demonstrated a range of up to 1,000km for its short- and medium-range missiles (Scud-ER and NoDong) and of up to 500km for submarine-launched missiles (Bukkeukseong-1 and KN-11). It has also shown its capacity to achieve ranges greater than 4,000km with new-generation intermediate-range missiles, overcoming the shortfalls of the earlier Hwasong-10/Musudan, although its intercontinental ballistic missiles (Hwasong-13/14 and KN-08/14) are not capable of reaching the continental mainland of the US. Similarly, it has not yet demonstrated a capacity to miniaturise nuclear warheads or to solve the problems of warhead re-entry once their trajectories have taken them beyond Earth’s atmosphere. However –despite the firm belief that the advances that had been claimed were false and the targets were beyond their range–, the most recent tests, in April 2017, confirm that unexpected progress has been made on high-thrust engine technologies based on old Soviet ballistic missiles. If new tests on these engines over coming months confirm the advance, the existing KN 08 and 14 ballistic missiles could reach distances in excess of 10,000km within three or four years, placing US territory within their range. Indeed, as its most recent launches on 13 and 21 May 2017 show, North Korea is taking advantage of its intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) tests to develop its intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) covertly. And while the US awaits an intercontinental test to justify a possible preventative attack, North Korea increases the height, distance, reliability and re-entry security of its missiles using tests with its intermediate missiles. It is also seeking to improve its capacity to overwhelm the THAAD defence system directed against its missiles by increasing the number of simultaneous firings, and to reduce the US capacity for anticipation by improving the mobility and concealment of its launchers and reducing the time that transport vehicles require to carry out launches. These are advances that reduce the window of opportunity for carrying out a pre-emptive attack.

Finally, the risk is heightened by the unpredictability of the behaviour of the North Korean and US leaders, who have proved their capacity to take bold decisions involving the use of force. President Trump has left this door open in public statements in an unsuccessful attempt to put pressure on the North Korean authorities, with whom the current US Administration has embarked upon a psychological war. The statements have been accompanied by a deployment of military forces in the region that in some cases have served to strengthen his credibility, but others, such as the ‘straying’ of a carrier group towards Australia, have achieved the opposite effect. In an emotional atmosphere ripe for confrontation and devoid of a rational doctrine for using weapons of mass destruction, there is the risk that any error of judgement or ill-considered decision will trigger an uncontrollable conflict. At this stage of proceedings, no pre-emptive military strike could destroy, damage or seriously delay North Korea’s nuclear capacity, but whatever its nature it would be the attack that the North Korean regime has been announcing for decades and for which millions of its citizens are prepared to die. In any event, in order to forestall it, North Korea boasts a wide repertory of responses that range from cyber-attacks, assassinations, kidnapping and the hybrid operations of the so-called ‘grey zone’ (a situation between war and peace that maintains military tension using planned activities triggering escalations) to nuclear holocaust by way of a conventional confrontation that would devastate the Korean Peninsula. Caught up in the dispute are not only the Korean peoples but also the troops stationed by the US in the region, who are turning into the hostages of the situation.

What do the sides want?

Stabilisation depends on the parties to the dispute, because they have moulded the process prior to negotiation and they control the decisions of the UN Security Council, such that no other actor, including the EU, is able to influence the current situation.

The North Korean authorities view their nuclear programme as a key element in consolidating and maintaining themselves in power. First, the North Korean regime has identified a potential US intervention as the most likely scenario to trigger its immediate collapse, so the overriding goal of developing of its nuclear programme is to deter Washington from launching such an operation. From this it follows that any agreement seeking to contain the programme will need to include security guarantees from the US aimed at avoiding such an intervention. Secondly, Kim Jong-un has invoked North Korea’s development of a military nuclear programme to bolster his authority. This has involved a modification of the statutes of the Workers’ Party of Korea, which has adopted the byungjin doctrine as its new central policy. The latter involves no longer prioritising the military and army and adopting a policy that seeks both a greater level of economic development and a credible nuclear deterrent. From this perspective, North Korea is looking for an agreement that grants it international recognition, even if it is implicit, as a nuclear power and that enables it to reactivate its economy through greater engagement in international trade. Attainment of this would not only boost the regime’s security amid the prospect of a foreign intervention, but also substantially underpin Kim Jong-un’s political capital as the great architect of such achievements.

The US, as a key player in the security of East Asia, is concerned about the threat the proliferation programmes pose to it and its allies in the region. It is also concerned by the risk of nuclear proliferation that could arise from the sale of nuclear material and technology by North Korea to other states and terrorist groups within and beyond the region (witness the North Korean provenance of the Syrian nuclear reactor destroyed by Israel in 2007 and the missiles found when the So San was boarded by Spanish Navy crew in 2002). For both reasons it has consistently been committed to de-nuclearisation.

China’s main priority is to avoid the collapse of the North Korean regime, because, in addition to a possible refugee crisis, this would entail a process of reunification with South Korea on the terms laid down by Seoul and consequently China would have a land border with a country maintaining a security alliance with the US. To avoid this, Beijing continues to maintain a close economic relationship with Pyongyang and, according to official Chinese data, its trade with North Korea grew by 37.4% in the first quarter of 2017 compared with the same period of 2016. However, Beijing now openly opposes the development of North Korea’s military nuclear and missile programme; first because it understands that maintaining a climate of stability in the region is beneficial both for Chinese economic development and for its international reputation, something that deteriorates when Pyongyang carries out nuclear and missile testing, causing such fundamental partners as the US, South Korea and Japan to identify Beijing as the accomplice to the situation. Moreover, it knows that this perception strengthens the ties that exist between them. Secondly, such programmes reduce North Korea’s strategic dependence on China, which undercuts Beijing’s capacity to influence its neighbour and, as a result, the strength of its position when it comes to negotiating with the US on this and other issues. Finally, North Korean proliferation has paved the way for the deployment of the THAAD anti-ballistic missile defence system in the Korean Peninsula, something of a strategic setback for China that it has tried to avoid by all means, including preventative cyber-attacks against South Korea.

South Korea itself wants tension with its northern neighbour defused and, eventually, a reunification in which it is able to maintain its political and economic system. Seoul is inclined more towards economic interaction with Pyongyang, and a gradual process of convergence between the two Koreas, than the use of force or seeking the immediate collapse of the North Korean regime, because Seoul would have to bear the greater part of the costs of reunification and a possible refugee crisis. For its part, Japan feels threatened because it knows that the US bases on its territory would be the most likely target of any hypothetical North Korean nuclear attack, hence the great emphasis it places on ending the North Korean nuclear programme. The Japanese are also concerned that one of the missiles tested by Pyongyang over the Sea of Japan could accidentally or deliberately reach Japanese soil. From their perspective, it would be desirable for any agreement negotiated with North Korea to address the issue of Japanese citizens kidnapped by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 80s. Both countries harbour nationalist factions that advocate wielding their own nuclear deterrence, which could cease being a minority view if US deterrence fails to work or if they have to pay too high a price for it, a prospect that Donald Trump, when still a presidential candidate, once floated.

The Russian position on the Korean Peninsula consists of strengthening its role as a strategic actor and an indispensible interlocutor in East Asia. Like Beijing, Moscow condemns Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile tests, but is opposed to armed intervention and, in particular, regime-change by force. Given that both in Iraq in 2003 and in Libya in 2011 the economic isolation of these countries was a prior step to military intervention to force a political regime change, both Russia and China reject isolating North Korea economically and support only selective economic sanctions, while maintaining major economic ties with Pyongyang.

How can the situation be stabilised?

Finding a solution to this situation is enormously difficult, owing to the diverging interests of the parties involved, as summarised above. There needs to be an agreement in which all sides gain something, because only then will the parties be able to sustain it, thereby giving rise to a security regime that, although precarious and limited, would avoid the dangers involved in prolonging the current dynamic. When it comes to opening up a pathway to stabilise the zone, it seems inadvisable to take either the military route or to open up a political dialogue based merely on offering economic inducements in exchange for commitments from Pyongyang. The latter course has already been explored by various South Korean governments, including that of Roh Moo-hyun; one of the latter’s advisors was the current President-elect, Moon Jae-in, who therefore knows its limitations at first hand.

The solution will need to combine an effective sanctions regime, aimed at slowing down the development of the North Korean nuclear and missile programmes, and a political agreement that offers Pyongyang sufficient security guarantees in exchange for the suspension of its military nuclear and missile programme. For the former, the existing international sanctions could be broadened and deepened and –above all– their fulfilment enforced, with a view to hindering the nuclear proliferation as much as possible. Since the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 2270, the challenge of the US Administration has been to dismantle the network of ministries, individuals, banks, ships, aircraft and suppliers that feed into the proliferation programme. Up until now, China has turned a blind eye in the belief that it had the neighbouring dynasty under its control, but now that the latest Kim has decided to strike out on his own, it could contain the escalation if it collaborated in implementing sanctions (something it has only done when the US authorities have targeted sanctions against Chinese interests).

It should not be expected, however, that the Chinese will start to perceive North Korea as a greater threat to their security than the US, thereby changing a basic tenet of China’s geopolitics. They could do so if US pressure on their economic interests or the drift towards war on the part of the North Koreans became more pronounced, but otherwise they will resist applying sanctions that affect Chinese companies, individuals and regions living off trade –both licit and illicit– with North Korea. It is a trade that feeds the proliferation programmes and maintains the lifestyle of its ruling elite.

In any event it should be borne in mind that the sanctions are not an end in themselves, but rather an instrument against nuclear proliferation and need to be complemented by a political dialogue geared principally towards freezing the existing programmes. It cannot be a precondition of dialogue that Pyongyang completely renounces its nuclear weapons because, as already pointed out, North Korea’s leaders know that they need these programmes to avoid regime change and in order to be respected in their talks with regional powers. Therefore, the best option would be to give acknowledgement, de facto at least, to this reality and look for an agreement aimed at freezing the North Korean military nuclear programme, something that is especially important with regard to the miniaturisation of nuclear warheads and the development of intercontinental missiles. Acknowledgement would stabilise the current situation and enable the parties to derive minimal face-saving incentives, abandoning the all-or-nothing stances that have proved fruitless. The Iranian model has some usefulness but cannot be applied wholesale because the circumstances and the players are different. The final outcome has the potential to be similarly desirable for the Korean Peninsula: military de-escalation, a moratorium on proliferation, the resumption of dialogue and an improvement in the affected populations’ quality of life. In the much more distant future there lies the prospect, in both cases, of a stable and definitive solution.

Conclusions

The spiral of tension in the Korean Peninsula and East Asia will not abate as long as North Korea continues, as it has been doing in the last four years, to make swift progress on its nuclear capabilities and missile systems. The series of condemnatory resolutions passed by the Security Council since 2006 against North Korea’s nuclear testing and launches of ballistic missiles, combined with a growing but leaky sanctions regime, has not succeeded in halting the proliferation.

To date all the initiatives to persuade the North Korean authorities that it would be more beneficial to renounce their nuclear programme than maintain it, whether through threats or inducements, have foundered. There is no way of succeeding because they know that the programme is the only guarantee to avoid foreign intervention, ensure even-handed talks with the regional powers and prolong the regime’s survival. Attempting military action to avoid this has few chances of success and could create a humanitarian and security crisis on a vast scale. In this situation, reaching an agreement that is not ideal and seeks suspension rather than de-nuclearisation is preferable to prolonging the current situation, in which North Korea continues developing its nuclear capabilities and missiles at great speed.

Such a hypothetical agreement, freezing North Korea’s programmes and verifying its compliance by means of periodic international inspections, would enable the current tension to be defused. The agreement would not put an end to the structural problems posed by North Korea’s relations with its neighbours, but it could be the start of a new talks process with the potential of finding a solution of greater scope, one that reflects the new strategic reality.

*About the authors:
Félix Arteaga, Senior Security and Defence analyst at the Elcano Royal Institute | @rielcano

Mario Esteban, Senior analyst at the Elcano Royal Institute and lecturer at the Autonomous University of Madrid | @wizma9

Source:
This article was published by Elcano Royal Institute

By Amitava Mukherjee

Just as the National League for Democracy (NLD) led government in Myanmar completes its first year in office, questions are being asked in different circles whether Aung San Suu Kyi epitomizes the above quote, which she herself made before the 1990 general election in Myanmar. There is no doubt that her government exhibits a palpable sign of nervousness. But what detracts from her credibility most is the NLD government’s hostile attitude towards the institution of fourth estate in Myanmar.

The most contentious issue in this respect is Article 66 (D) of the Telecommunication Law, which prohibits the use of telecom networks to “extort, threaten, obstruct, defame, disturb, inappropriately influence, or intimidate” people. Violation of the law may lead to a jail sentence of up to three years.

Now the vast scope of the Article makes it quite clear that muzzling the press was the actual intention of the quasi-junta government which drafted it back in 2013. Statistics however reveal an interesting trend. During the regime of Thein Sein, the former junta president, only seven people were charged under this law, while during the government of Suu Kyi, in its short span, the Article has been invoked against 56 people, 12 of whom are journalists.

It is obvious that the NLD government wants to maintain a tight leash on the media. Otherwise it would have taken steps to impliment the Broadcasting Law of 2015, which would pave the way for the participation of private partners in the telecom world. On the contrary, attacks on journalists are increasing. Recently a journalist named Soe Moe Tun was murdered after his expose of illegal logging in Myanmar’s forests came to light.

In November of last year, Than Ttut Aung, the chief executive officer of the Eleven Media Group, and Wai Phyo, chief editor of Daily Eleven newspaper, were jailed. Moreover, a researcher belonging to the NLD itself was put behind the bars for alleged ‘defaming’ the commander-in-chief of the Myanmar army.

There is a distinct dichotomy in the utterances and actions of Suu Kyi. On several occasions, she has expressed herself against government control of media. “I think government-owned media is not good for democracy. We will not abolish it immediately, but we don’t want to delay doing it as well,” Suu  Kyi had said immediately after winning the last election. A year has passed since she took charge of the country. Still there are four government-owned newspapers in Myanmar.

But it would not be proper to conclude that Aung San Suu Kyi has become an autocrat. Those who have known Suu Kyi since her days in the Lady Shri Ram College in Delhi will vouchsafe for her love of democracy and an open society. Being hard on the media, she is perhaps trying to keep the army in good humor, without realizing that it may open a pathway for totalitarianism which has been the bane of many nation-states in Southeast Asia. It is also unfortunate that she has allowed an air of mistrust to come up between herself and the indigenous media. While local newspapers are generally kept at a distance by her NLD managers, the Lady – as Suu Kyi is widely known in international circles – maintains a cozy relation with the Radio Free Asia, and often sits for one-on-one interviews with the BBC, Washington Post, Channel News-Asia, and Xinhua.

This disconnection with ground-level realities has hampered her attempt to initiate a peace process with warring ethnic minorities. As the Lady and her party managers are inexperienced in the art of administration, Article 66(D) is being widely used and misused, not just by the government, but several media organizations as well.

Yet the onus of responsibility rests largely with the government and here the NLD must account for the nine-month jail sentence handed to a man for calling Hten Kyaw, the president, ‘crazy.’ So a course correction is urgently needed for Suu Kyi if she keeps it in mind that in the World Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters without Borders, Myanmar stands at 131 out of 180.

The opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints expressed by the authors are theirs alone and don’t reflect any official position of Geopoliticalmonitor.com, where this article was published.

The Wall Street Journal interviewed a Syrian rebel commander and other fighters, who confirmed the worst kept secret of the Syrian conflict: that Israel is directly aiding Syrian rebel factions with both humanitarian and financial aid:

…Interviews with half a dozen rebels and three people familiar with Israel’s thinking reveal that the country’s involvement is much deeper and more coordinated than previously known and entails direct funding of opposition fighters near its border for years.

“Israel stood by our side in a heroic way,” said Moatasem al-Golani, spokesman for the rebel group Fursan al-Joulan, or Knights of the Golan. “We wouldn’t have survived without Israel’s assistance.”

Israel provides $5,000 per month to the above group, which it uses to pay fighters’ salaries, and purchase weapons and ammunition for its campaigns against the government in the Syrian Golan.  WSJ reports the rebel group’s name as Fursan al-Joulan, which I’ve never heard before.  With approximately 400 fighters, it would appear to be a local militia.  It undoubtedly has an affiliation with a larger Islamist group like Al Nusra or Al Qaeda, but I haven’t been able to determine that yet.  The article makes clear that it isn’t affiliated with the Free Syrian Army, which increases the likelihood it is an Islamist group.  It’s also quite possible there are other groups, perhaps numerous ones, which Israel is aiding in a similar fashion.

This new report confirms several years of my own reporting which have documented extensive Israeli intervention in the Syrian conflict, including numerous air strikes against Hezbollah and Iranian arms convoys, the shooting down of a Syrian jet which had strayed a few meters into Israeli-occupied Golan, assassinations of Hezbollah and Iranian commanders, equipment drops, and direct intelligence briefings between IDF officers and rebel commanders.  All this has belied the repeated false claims in world media (including in this WSJ article) that Israel is a neutral party to the conflict.  Israel is deeply involved in it and seeks to weaken or topple Bashar al-Assad, because Israel’s arch enemies Hezbollah and Iran, are his chief allies.

I expect that Israeli escalation will continue since Assad and his allies are in the ascendance.  They are routing ISIS in the eastern part of the country.  Once they do so, it’s very possible Assad could turn his attention to the west, including the Golan, trying to consolidate his territorial gains.  That is when the true test will come.  Israel wants a divided Syria.  It wants a country riven by ethnic and religious disputes so that it can dominate the Golan and protect its northern border.  How far is it willing to go to prevent Assad from reasserting control there?

Israel does not want to negotiate a peace agreement with Assad as it has tried to do in the past.  It prefers maintaining its illegal conquest of the Golan and maintaining the status quo.  To do so, it must continue to sow discord and military adventures in the Golan.

Two other ominous escalations in the Syria conflict occurred in the past 24 hours.  Iran announced that it had fired missiles from its territory to attack ISIS positions in eastern Syria.  No sources have been able to confirm the Iranian claim.  But if true, it would mean that Iranian forces had advanced technically in order to fire its weapons and hit targets hundreds of miles away.  The last time it attacked an enemy beyond its borders in this way was during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s.

Iran explained that the missile attack was in revenge for a recent terror attack by Iranian Kurds for which ISIS has taken credit.  Since Iran has also blamed Saudi Arabia for the Tehran attack, which killed 17 mostly civilians, it’s highly likely the missile attack is a veiled warning against the Saudis: ‘just as we can reach ISIS in Syria, we can reach you in Riyadh as well.’  Or as Al Jazeera’s correspondent said:

“And, of course, we need to see this in the wider geopolitical context: it will be very interesting what the reaction is going to be from countries such as Saudi Arabia, the United States and Israel, because Iran is saying it can retaliate and it will.”

A U.S. fighter jet downed a Syrian war plane which had bombed a target close to U.S.-backed Syrian rebel forces.  The U.S. military claims these were Syrian Democratic Forces (which were routed from the town by Syrian regime troops), while the regime claims they were ISIS.  At any rate, what isn’t in dispute is that Assad is attempting, and largely succeeding in taking back territory that had been formerly held by ISIS.  While the U.S. is attempting to stymie Assad in this effort.  This means, in effect, that U.S. policy largely mirrors that of Israel.  We appear not to want a united Syria.  Rather we appear to want a Syria divided up into ethnic cantons.

This is part of a U.S. escalation of its own involvement which has included bombing a Syrian government military convoy, the accidental bombing of a Syrian hospital, and now this.

Clearly, the Trump administration is permitting our military to flex its muscles in this arena.  The problem is that this is a very crowded field of battle and there are many parties involved including Russia.  The plane we shot down was a Russian Sukhoi bomber, for example.  All it will take is one split-second mistake for this to turn into a major bloodbath which could suck the major parties in far deeper than they prefer to go.

This article was published at Tikun Olam

On June 20, Pew Research Center released the findings of a new poll on President Trump’s job performance. It found that 39 percent of the public approves of his performance in office, while 55 percent disapproves. But among those who attend church weekly or more the respective figures are 48 percent and 45 percent. This suggests that it is secularists who are driving down his approval ratings.

Among white non-Hispanic evangelical Protestants, Trump wins the approval of 74 percent; 20 percent disapprove. Among white non-Hispanic Catholics, he wins the support of 52 percent; 42 percent disapprove.

Overall, 48 percent of Protestants approve of the president’s performance, while 45 percent disapprove. Among Catholics, the figures are 38 percent and 56 percent. The drop-off in support overall is clearly due to the Hispanic input. Here’s more proof.

White non-Hispanics, independent of religious affiliation, approve of Trump’s handling of the job by a margin of 50 percent to 44 percent. But among Hispanics, the figures are 20 percent and 72 percent, respectively.

Trump’s lack of support among Hispanics is well known, but more controversial is his support among the faithful. To take a line from President Bill Clinton, he feels their pain.

Two weeks ago, President Trump told religious Americans that the “bitter voices” of elites are responsible for the “hatred” and “prejudice” toward religion. Saying the faithful are “under siege,” he vowed to “put a stop to the attacks on religion,” pledging to “end discrimination against people of faith.”

This is a welcome change from the Obama years where the executive branch used its powers to challenge the autonomy of churches and religious non-profits. The faithful are taking note, redounding to the favor of President Trump.

With regard to the role of religion, two conclusions seem plain. One, religious Americans like the president. Two, secularists don’t like him. A third conclusion, based on other data, is also warranted: militant secular activists are the “bitter voices” of hatred and prejudice against the faithful.

This is one more reason why the culture war is not going away, and why practicing Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Mormons, and Muslims must stand up to the bullies who are leading the attacks against them.

The government of Iraq announced that Islamic State of Iraq and Syria terrorists on Wednesday destroyed the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in western Mosul, Iraq, according to a Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve news release.

The mosque was well known as the place where ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi made his infamous speech announcing the Islamic State’s caliphate on July 4, 2014, the release said.

“As our Iraqi Security Force partners closed in on the al-Nuri mosque, ISIS destroyed one of Mosul’s and Iraq’s great treasures,” said Army Maj. Gen. Joseph M. Martin, commanding general of Combined Joint Forces Land Component Command-Operation Inherent Resolve.

“This is a crime against the people of Mosul and all of Iraq, and is an example of why this brutal organization must be annihilated,” Martin said. “The responsibility of this devastation is laid firmly at the doorstep of ISIS, and we continue to support our Iraqi partners as they bring these terrorists to justice. However, the battle for the liberation of Mosul is not yet complete, and we remain focused on supporting the ISF with that objective in mind.”

CJFLCC-OIR is the ground forces command in Iraq that supports Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve’s ongoing multinational coalition mission to defeat ISIS in Iraq.

According to the release, the mosque had stood in Mosul for over eight centuries, and its famous leaning minaret earned the city of Mosul the nickname “the hunchback.”

The coalition is working by, with, and through the government of Iraq to defeat ISIS in Mosul and throughout Iraq. The coalition contributes to the defeat of ISIS by providing the Iraqi forces with equipment, training, intelligence and surveillance, precision fire support and military advice to leaders. The coalition has enabled the Iraqi Security Forces to reclaim over 47,000 square kilometers of their land from ISIS for the people of Iraq.

By Lisa Ferdinando

US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said he and the top U.S. diplomat affirmed with high-ranking Chinese officials Wednesday that North Korea’s nuclear missile program is a threat to peace and security in the Asia-Pacific region.

Mattis spoke at the State Department with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, after they hosted the first iteration of the U.S.-China Diplomatic and Security Dialogue.

“We also affirmed our strong commitment to cooperate, including through the U.N. to realize our shared goal of denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” Mattis said. “Meanwhile, we will continue to take necessary measures to defend ourselves and our allies.”

The dialogue with China’s State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Gen. Fang Fenghui, chief of the Chinese joint staff department, is a result of the summit in April between President Donald J. Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, Mattis explained.

Mattis Committed to U.S.-China Defense Relationship

The talks were a “unique opportunity,” Mattis said, for the United States and China to engage in “philosophical-level discussions” about the way ahead on shared security interests.

The United States seeks a constructive and results-oriented relationship with China in which differences are managed when they arise, Mattis said.

“I’m committed to improving the U.S.-China defense relationship so that it remains a stabilizing element in our overall relationship,” Mattis said. “Our two nations can and do cooperate in mutually beneficial ways.”

The United States and China agreed to explore new areas of military-to-military cooperation, Mattis said. That includes, he explained, exchanging officers to improve transparency and mutual understanding.

“We welcome the opportunity to engage with the Chinese counterparts on strategic topics to discuss our differences and will now press forward where we can work together,” the defense secretary said.

Decreasing South China Sea Tensions

Discussions also focused on freedom of navigation through the Asia-Pacific region, and the peaceful resolution of disputes in the maritime space, Mattis said.

“We discussed ways to decrease tension and reduce risk in the South China Sea,” he said, adding, “As we maintain open dialogue on this topic, the United States will continue to fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows.”

Chinese Contributions to Global Security

The United States and China “decided to adopt greater coordination to face the global threat posed by terrorism,” Tillerson said.

Those efforts, he explained, include China helping Iraq as that Middle Eastern country seeks to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

“We will be looking to China to help the Iraqi government in specific, meaningful ways to ensure the country’s long-term stability and economic growth as it battles ISIS and begins its long process of rebuilding,” Tillerson said.

Letters written by Albert Einstein about God, Israel and physics fetched nearly $210,000 at a Jerusalem auction Tuesday, June 20 with the highest bid going to a missive about God’s creation of the world, AFP reports.

Eight letters, written in English between 1951 and 1954 and signed by Einstein, were sold by Winners auction house which had initially estimated their combined value at between $31,000 and $46,000.

The highest bid of $84,000 was for a letter to eminent physicist David Bohm.

In it Einstein wrote: “If God has created the world his primary worry was certainly not to make its understanding easy for us”.

In another missive to Bohm, which sold for $50,400, Einstein discussed the link his colleague made between quantum theory and “relativistic field theory”.

“I must confess that I am not able to guess how such unification could be achieved,” Einstein wrote.

The typewritten letter includes an equation added in neat handwriting and the writer’s signature.

Bohm, born in the United States to Jewish immigrant parents, had worked with Einstein at Princeton University before fleeing to Brazil after losing his post in Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist witch-hunts.

Israeli illusionist and magician Uri Geller bought a 1954 letter in which Einstein discusses the possibility of Bohm moving to Israel.

“Israel is intellectually alive and interesting but has very narrow possibilities and to go there with the intention to leave on the first occasion would be regrettable,” wrote Einstein.

Bohm took up a visiting professorship at Israel’s renowned Technion technological institute in 1955 and moved to England two years later.

The auction house said the letters came from the estate of Bohm’s late widow.

By Jill Richardson*

There’s a lot to say about Trump reversing some of the Obama administration’s policies on Cuba. The White House recently announced it was banning individual travel to the island and further restricting what business Americans can do there.

Yes, there’s a lot to say, but I wonder if there’s any point in saying it. After all, most Americans want to relax the embargo on Cuba. Even most Republicans disagree with Trump on Cuba, polls show.

That requires a bit of explanation. America has a longstanding embargo on Cuba, preventing the U.S. from selling much of anything there. The policy traces back to the Cold War. The economic harm to the island resulting from the policy is obvious when one sets foot in Cuba.

When I visited in 2010, life had gotten better for Cubans since the hardest times in the early 1990s. Still, life was difficult. Meat was a luxury for Cubans. Milk was only rationed to young children. I bought a handmade dress for $15, a handsome sum to a Cuban but a pittance to me.

Obama didn’t end the embargo. It’s still in place.

What Obama overturned were other Cold War-era measures. He restored diplomatic relations with Cuba and relaxed a travel ban on U.S. citizens visiting the island.

The only way I was able to visit Cuba in 2010 was with a special government permit, and by going for business instead of pleasure. The U.S. government also limited how much I could spend there. And, of course, I couldn’t bring any Cuban rum or cigars home.

I’ve traveled all over on five different continents. In college, I spent an entire summer in China, a Communist country with a bad human rights record — quite a bit worse than Cuba’s, arguably — that the U.S. is on perfectly good terms with, thank you very much.

Yet I’ve never been hassled, searched, and investigated as much upon my return home as I was when I came back from Cuba.

On the way out, I had to first fly to Cancun and then board a second flight the next day to Cuba. On my return, I was questioned, searched, and scolded until I nearly missed my connecting flight.

The hypocrisy was jarring. Why is the U.S. on good terms with China but not Cuba?

After Obama relaxed America’s anti-Cuba policies, you could literally fly Southwest to Havana.

I think the best comment on Trump’s policies came in the form of a satirical “news” article: “President Trump Orders the Execution of Five Turkeys Pardoned By Obama.” No, not really. It’s a joke. But it exposes the motives and sentiments behind many of Trump’s actions.

In part, Trump is probably working to secure the hard liner Cuban vote in Florida by undoing Obama’s Cuba policies.

But more than that, Trump wants us to believe that Obama made America a “mess.” To show us what a great president he is, Trump wants us to believe that everything was awful before him — so bad that it required Trump to make it “great” again, by undoing obvious boons like Obama’s mild Cuba reforms.

If Obama did it, it’s bad. Therefore Trump will do the opposite. Yet he has no interest in understanding complex issues that cannot be solved easily. Health care, ISIS, and North Korea come to mind — and now Cuba, too.

To Trump, trying to understand the complex background of America’s relationship with Cuba is superfluous, since Trump himself doesn’t understand it. Yet he’s hurting both Americans and Cubans in the process.

OtherWords columnist Jill Richardson is the author of Recipe for America: Why Our Food System Is Broken and What We Can Do to Fix It. Distributed by OtherWords.org

Jacob Sullum wrote Monday at Reason regarding the United States government’s spin on survey results regarding smoking and vaping by teenagers. Sullum relates that, while the results of the US government’s yearly National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) indicate that from 2011 to 2016 teenagers significantly substituted less-dangerous-to-health vaping for traditional cigarette smoking, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggests in the June 16 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report that the substitution is of no health benefit.

This spin on the data is in line with the CDC’s promoting of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations, including of e–cigarettes, in the final paragraph of the CDC report. These regulations, Sullum writes, “threaten to cripple an industry that could help millions of smokers prolong their lives by switching to a far less hazardous source of nicotine.”

The CDC, looking at a rather steady rate of use of e-cigarettes and traditional cigarettes combined, glosses over the fact that the numbers are putting together apples and oranges. The CDC thus can conclude rather deceptively that “[c]urrent use of any tobacco product did not change significantly during 2011–2016 among high or middle school students,”

Instead of addressing differences in safety of different activities, the CDC’s report in the first paragraph makes the general assessment that “[a]mong youths, use of tobacco products in any form is unsafe.” Even if this assessment is supportable, it should not be the ending point of consideration if one is seeking to understand health consequences. It is important to consider, beyond whether activities fall into the “safe” category or the “unsafe” category, the comparative degrees of safety of alternative activities, such as vaping and smoking.

The CDC report is another example of why it is important to be skeptical when government agencies proclaim they are seeking to make people healthier, whether by restricting individuals’ activities or by providing health-related information.

Read Sullum’s article here.

This article was published by RonPaul Institute.

By Alasdair Macleod*

Britain’s general election went horribly wrong, with the Conservatives forced into a putative coalition with the Democratic Ulster Party. Theresa May’s failure to secure a clear majority has provoked indignation, bitterness, and widespread pessimism. The purpose of this article is not to contribute to this outcry, but to take a more measured view of the situation faced by the British government with regards to Brexit, and the consequences for Europe. In the interests of an international readership, this article will only summarise briefly the current situation in the UK before looking at the broader European and geopolitical consequences.

While it would be wrong to dismiss the precariousness of Mrs. May’s position, there are some positive factors, which are being generally ignored. Most importantly, Brexit negotiations are due to start next week. These negotiations matter more than anything else on the government’s agenda, so are a unifying force. Mrs. May recognises this, which is why she has brought Michael Gove back into the cabinet (as Environment Secretary), and Steve Baker as a minister in the Brexit ministry. Gove is a committed Brexiteer with a track record as a capable minister, and Baker was the motivating influence behind the parliamentary campaign for Brexit.

All ambitions to replace Mrs May are being put to one side in favour of Brexit. This message of unity has been endorsed by Conservative MPs. They will be regularly updated with developments in future, to keep them onside. There are already signs that the government is reaching out to the opposition as well. This has been read as a separate negotiation, potentially leading to a softer Brexit. While it is dangerous to prejudge the outcome, this is probably incorrect: the purpose is more likely to keep the Labour Party leadership fully briefed on both progress and the rationale behind negotiation tactics.

If this works, and it is an if, we can expect the mainstream political establishment to align itself behind the negotiating team, more interested in supporting it in a common objective than carping from the side lines. This is how things have always been fixed in Westminster, with the political parties cooperating out of the public eye to get things done. Furthermore, the Labour Party is likely to become increasingly distracted by its own internal affairs as time goes on.

Much has been made of Jeremy Corbyn’s success in securing enough seats to eliminate the Conservative’s majority. I suspect we are looking at Peak Corbyn. He is driving Labour into adopting Marxist policies, likely to cause increasing dissent in Labour’s Parliamentary Party. His popularity can be expected to decline under these strains, and Labour’s with it. This should help restore public support for the Conservatives, as the memories of the botched election fade.

In short, handled correctly, Brexit has the potential to be a unifying force, not just for the senior members of the cabinet, but for Westminster and the country as well.

The Negotiations

This is not to say the dangers facing the UK Government should be lightly dismissed, but the EU’s negotiators will find that the British sense of purpose remains strong. There are three broad issues that have already been flagged. First is the status of European citizens in the UK, and of UK citizens in Europe. The EU’s opening position, that European citizens in the UK should in effect have the continuing protection of European courts, is likely to be a sticking point. Otherwise, there appears little reason why an agreement cannot be concluded over related issues, so long as there is a desire on both sides to do so.

Second, there’s the status of the physical border in Northern Ireland, which only becomes a significant problem if there is no trade agreement. In that event, the British could take a free trade approach on the ground, keeping the border open, and leaving it to the Irish government to put in whatever customs restrictions it feels necessary. Large companies attempting to export goods to the UK will still have to fill out the post-Brexit paperwork and pay the duties (if any), while it should be ignored by the British authorities for routine cross-border customs traffic. This would have the advantage of being the least disruptive solution for a divided sectarian community.

Third, are the trade talks themselves. The EU is insisting that negotiations proceed according to its agenda, which includes a demand for up to $100bn from Britain to pay for Britain’s leaving as a quid pro quo. There is no legal basis for this demand. There might however be a basis for Britain to obtain compensation for property in Europe which it has financed, in return for an agreement that Britain has no further claim. It’s called enforcing property rights, though establishing them could be tricky.

This highlights the importance of Britain being prepared to accept that no deal is better than a bad deal. If Britain terminates discussions, the EU loses far more than Britain. One group of losers will be the large continental corporations, and they will almost certainly lobby both their own governments and Brussels for a quick resolution with the lowest tariffs possible. Furthermore, the Brexit ministers appear to have a good grasp of the benefits of genuine free trade, and free-trade agreements.

The tactical response to the EU negotiators trying to control the agenda is for Britain to accelerate negotiations for trade agreements with other countries, ready to be formally signed following Britain’s final departure. Early success in this effort will not only help concentrate minds in Brussels, but will reassure investing businesses of the improved trade prospects for Britain after she leaves the EU. The more of these agreements the better, and it is likely that public concerns about the details of an EU agreement will in turn be replaced by a desire to move on.

Time will tell. However, it would be a mistake to get too distracted by the minutiae of Brexit negotiations. That issue is now in capable hands, at least from the British end. It is better to accept that it is in everyone’s interest to get a sensible deal concluded within the two-year time-frame, and that it will therefore happen.

Germany (and France) Wants To Move On as Well

President Trump has made it clear he will no longer tolerate having NATO members not paying their share of the defence budget. Furthermore, he has said several times that Germany exporting so many cars to America is neither right nor fair. Putting to one side Trump’s economic illiteracy (Americans buy German autos because they like them), it is clear to the Europeans that America no longer supports the integrated Europe originally set up by the American Committee on United Europe (ACUE) in 1948. Germany now finds the post-war status quo is over, and her interests are best served in a wider context than the Europe devised by ACUE.

Under American and British military control, Germany has been continually repentant for her Nazi past. Reunification was a first step to reforming Germany as an independent nation. While politically she has kowtowed to the Anglo-Saxons, she has gained enormous regional power, based on her economic strength. And by dominating the EU as its largest paymaster, the EU itself has become the platform for her wider commercial and political ambitions.

Anyone who doubts Germany’s potential aspirations has failed to notice the strong national and cultural identities of the German people. And with respect to trade, Fortress Europe’s trade policies are increasingly disadvantageous to her. Germany now exports more to China than to any individual European country, benefiting big businesses. The power of the large German corporations, and their influence on the federal government, should not be under-estimated. She sees on her Eastern flank, of what used to be Prussian territory, a pan-Asian phoenix arising in the form of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), led by Russia and China. And it is growing.

Only this week, India and Pakistan also became full SCO members, taking the rapidly-industrialising membership to nearly half the world’s population. The Silk Road is sending goods to Europe, and will transport Mercedes, BMWs, and VWs the other way. Asian demand for German engineering and capital equipment is likely to become the largest market by far for the foreseeable future.

It is becoming pressing for Germany to have Britain leave the EU, because the British support the Americans in their hegemony, and America is virulently anti-Russia. No wonder that only this week Mrs. Merkel said, “We want to negotiate quickly.” Germany’s interest is to be free to pursue her own trade objectives, which will mean a change of focus toward trade with Russia and the East, dragging the rest of the EU with her. She will also want to reduce her dependency on NATO, the mechanism through which US and UK strategic policy in Europe is deployed. Plans are already advancing for a joint EU defence force. With the EU becoming both militarily and economically independent from US and UK influences, the world’s geopolitical order is taking another major step away from American domination.

The speed at which this transition happens is likely to gather pace after Germany’s federal elections in September. Britain is no longer able to restrict Germany’s diplomatic ambitions, now that Article 50 has been triggered, except through NATO. We can therefore expect to see moves toward a German-led EU rapprochement with Russia over Ukraine to emerge later this year, and for sanctions against Russia to be gradually lifted by the EU, irrespective of the outcome of the turf wars in Washington over foreign policy toward Russia.

Germany has had a bonus in the election of Emmanuel Macron as president of France, a pragmatic banker and businessman who is strongly pro-EU. Macron hopes to change France’s labour laws, which are crippling the French economy. Good luck to that. He will be far better to expose France to global competition, to force the unions to accept that change must occur. He will need the excuse that events are moving beyond the French government’s control. Germany’s ambitions, which he must support, provide him with the pretext.

For all these reasons, it should become increasingly clear by the end of this year that the interests of the EU’s dominant players will call for a speedy resolution of the Brexit issue. Brussel’s room for prevarication will be restricted accordingly. You could say that Britain is now being kicked out of the EU at Germany’s behest. We shall now look further into why Germany must refocus her trade eastward.

India and Pakistan “Shanghaied”

The announcement this week that implacable enemies, India and Pakistan, are now full SCO members is a major milestone in global geopolitics. This agreement comes only weeks after India boycotted China’s One Belt One Road summit in Beijing on 14^th May, over China’s investment in Pakistan and in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. The fact that India and Pakistan are effectively at war over Kashmir makes their sudden joint membership of the SCO truly remarkable.

The population of this economic unit is now estimated to be nearly half the global total, to which must be added the populations of the Southeast Asian countries, where there are strong Chinese influences and economic ties. With South Korea and Japan turning toward China as well, very quietly Russia and China have managed to put together a political bloc that will dominate future world trade, with hardly anyone outside Asia noticing.

More importantly, these are the dynamic economies responsible for most of the world’s economic progress, while the affluent welfare-states have become mired in debt. China’s economy is well on the way to becoming a technologically-driven miracle, no longer dependent on the manufacture of cheap goods for export. Her Silk Road projects will link efficient trade and communications over the whole Eurasian land mass. Industrialisation and infrastructure development will proceed rapidly.

There are still a few building-blocks to put in place. Iran is slated to join soon, maybe in the coming months. Turkey is now on-side to become a member of the SCO, and only this week Russian politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky called on the SCO to speed up Turkey’s membership process. That would extend the SCO’s reach from the Pacific to the shores of the Gulf and the Mediterranean.

From Germany’s perspective (she has long held close ties with Turkey), Turkey must be another nail in the coffin of the post-war American order. It is hard to see how Turkey can remain a member of NATO while she aligns herself with Russia, Iran, and the SCO. And as NATO diminishes in its authority, it will leave a military vacuum in Europe. This is the background to the plans to establish a separate European army, and while it is fronted by the EU, there can be little doubt that the prime mover is Germany, backed by France.

Germany will remain a staunch supporter of the EU and the euro, if only because it is still the glue holding together European relationships that can be moulded to her own objectives. Furthermore, she is the dominant creditor of the weaker member states, and Germany has no intention of writing off obligations owed to her. However, the sooner Brexit is dealt with, the sooner plans for an EU-wide taxation system can progress. Macron is strongly in favour, and Brussels will need to replace British contributions. Only when the tax issue is dealt with can the EU become a true super-state.

The election of Macron in France has subdued France’s anti-EU movement, at least for the time being. Both Germany and Brussels will want to seize the opportunity to take the EU project to the next level. This can begin immediately, now that Britain has triggered Article 50. It will also make it easier for Britain to accept no deal on Brexit, if need be, because there is no support in the British public for personal and corporation taxes to be paid direct to Brussels.

The good news in all this is that a German-led EU will be steered toward freer trade. It has long been apparent to Germany’s leaders (informed by Germany’s corporations), that freer trade benefits her own economy, and a strong economy is the route to political power. In this appreciation, she is now joining China and the other SCO members. Too few British politicians appreciate this fact today, but increasing numbers are likely to do so in future.

If the EU negotiators try to impose trade penalties on Britain, they will find themselves arguing against their own long-term policy direction. The focus for every nation, outside the Americas, is increasingly on Asia. While there is much work yet to be done, China and Russia have successfully advanced their security and trade policies through the establishment of the SCO. When over three billion people are on a journey from relative poverty to Western standards of living, no one can afford to ignore the opportunities.

Perhaps we will look back from a future time and see that the only major country left sinking under its self-imposed trade delusions is America, with the president still grouchy about the unfairness of foreign competition.

About the author:
*Alasdair Macleod is the Head of Research at GoldMoney.

Source:
This article was published by the MISES Institute

Qatar has been making waves for some weeks now, and in the deluge, it has also strung along a few companions. One is the UK bank Barclays, which prided itself for having avoided a government bailout in the financial crisis of 2008. In the ensuing chest thumping, executives could claim to have spared the British taxpayer the need to fork out for private deals gone wrong.

In a statement by the bank, it was revealed that the UK Serious Fraud Office had filed charges “in the context of Barclays’ capital raisings in June and November 2008.” The statement from the bank continues to note how it “awaits further details of the charges from the SFO.”

The charges relate to three alleged offences constituting what has been termed financial assistance – effectively, a bank loaning itself money via its own investing instruments. The first two charges assert that former senior officers and employees of Barclays had committed fraud by false representations regarding two advisory service agreements entered into with Qatar Holding LLC. The third centres on a claim of unlawful financial assistance from a loan from the State of Qatar in November 2008.

The aftermath of the 2008 crisis did much to give capitalism – at least of the bankster variant – a blackened name. This was made even more acute by the mild response from authorities indifferent to culpability in the banking system. Rotten financial decisions did not necessary entail rotten criminality. Financial colossi of such standing as John Varley, Barclays’ former chief executive, were deemed untouchable.

“There is little doubt,” suggested David Wighton in the Financial News, “that the lack of legal action against individuals linked to the financial crisis has fuelled the populist backlash against free market capitalism that has swept the western world.”

It is instructive to cast an eye on the four chief figures involved in the efforts of the fraud office. Varley has tended to be considered the Old School version of the City banker, linked by marriage to the founders of Barclays, a solid though unspectacular figure.

Scotland-native Roger Jenkins had all the smells and bells, doing well out of the bank. In 2005, he pocketed 75 million pounds, making him the highest-paid individual in the FTSE 100. Deemed the “deal maker” in the set, he was vital in the 2008 Qatar deal.

Jenkins had company in the deal making stakes: the bold wealth magician Thomas L. Kalaris, who did much for the American side of the bank’s operations. He proved an important figure in the Qatar talks, nudging matters along to their ultimate conclusion.

The quartet is completed with the fallen Richard Boath, who claimed in 2014 that he was fired by Barclays after supplying the Serious Fraud Office confidential material about the bank’s policies. His insistence that he had little to do with those decisions, a mere cog in a degenerate machine, comes as little surprise. “I repeatedly raised concerns about the decisions taken by the bank with both senior management and senior lawyers and was reassured that those decisions were lawful.”

What became standard policy for governments in the US and Europe after 2008 was the socialisation of losses: the issuing of government bailouts that effectively led to the ownership of bad debt, not to mention decisions, by the taxpayer. The Lloyds Banking Group did well out of this. Wall Street banks were also delighted, essentially being force fed liquidity from the public purse to keep them afloat.

The issue of funds came with natural fetters, those nasty little things banks dread when it comes to making financial decisions. Bonuses would be capped and curbed; operations would be curtailed. (Since 2008, Barclays has rewarded employees with 18 billion pounds worth in bonuses.)

Barclays executives were aware that joining the bailout bandwagon would see government scrutiny enter the boardroom, with the British Treasury insisting on a possible trimming of investment operations specific to its operations. “Incentive pay” options would be cut. The City Minister in 2008, Paul Myners, suggests that the red spectre of nationalisation was feared by the higher-ups in the bank, who “didn’t want to have anything to do with a Labour government.”

The heads at Barclays could certainly point out the fate of the Royal Bank of Scotland. The RBS, having accepted the government as virtual majority owner after the bailout run, saw decisions made on its investment bank. The battle between financial-driven desire and taxpayer directed interests persists as an ideological hallmark of the modern market system.

A considerable problem in this affair is whether the SFO is up to the task. The body’s record on keeping financial deviancy in check is patchy, even lamentable. Attempts to prosecute alleged manipulations of the Libor system, the benchmark interest rate, have shown it up as a body with less than sharp teeth.

The office will have to assess whether the regulatory bypassing by the Barclays executives was tantamount to illegality, or something short of it. Was this merely exotic round tripping, with transactions that were not entirely connected? The pudding has yet to be baked, but evidence is strong.

The SFO will also have to convince such figures as Jonathan Pickworth of the law firm White & Case, who argues that prosecuting a former management team over decisions made “years ago” would merely “hurt the current shareholders and today’s hardworking employees.”

The spin in such arguments turns banking organisations into noble toilers who defend, rather than undermine, the public interest. Having crossed their Rubicon, the SFO will test the viability of a system that may well have legislative backing, but has, thus far, failed to yield much by way of results.