Month: April 2018

US Mulls ‘Coordinated’ Response to Syria Gas Attack

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The United States is consulting with allies in preparation for possible expanded military action in Syria following the latest suspected deadly chemical weapons attack on a Syrian rebel-held village.

“We are looking for a coordinated response, whatever that response might be,” said State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert about possible U.S. military action in Syria.

President Donald Trump has warned those responsible will pay a “big price” for Saturday’s attack in eastern Ghouta that killed at least 40 people. Over the past day, Trump has talked repeatedly with his British and French counterparts about a possible response to the attack.

French President Emmanuel Macron said a decision would be made “in the coming days,” and that any airstrikes would target the Syrian government’s chemical facilities.

Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop added her country’s support Wednesday for any action that is “targeted, calibrated and proportionate.”

Trump has blamed the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, as well as his backers in Iran and Russia for the eastern Ghouta attack. Assad denies the allegation. A global chemical weapons watchdog on Tuesday said it will send a team to investigate the incident. 

At the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday, Russia vetoed a U.S.-drafted plan that would have set up a commission to investigate and assign blame for the chemical weapons attack. 

As the U.S. mulled its response, the White House said Trump canceled a trip to Latin America, which was to begin Friday, so that he could “oversee the American response to Syria.” Defense Secretary Jim Mattis also called off domestic travel plans. 

No details

White House officials refused to say whether the response included the possibility of prolonged U.S. military action in Syria or would amount to more than just a “one-off” airstrike. 

“The president and his national security team thought it was best that he stay in the United States while all these developments are taking place,” said press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

The U.S. is already deeply involved in the seven-year-old Syrian civil war. Over 2,000 U.S. troops are in Syria. A U.S.-led coalition has launched thousands of airstrikes there, mostly against Islamic State and other extremist rebels.

Almost exactly a year ago, the U.S. launched 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a Syrian government airbase in retaliation for another chemical weapons attack. 

But too intense a response to the latest attack risks escalating the Syrian civil war and exacerbating military tensions between major world powers that all have proxies on the ground, according to analysts. 

“There’s no easy answer here,” retired Admiral Michael Mullen told VOA contributor Greta van Susteren on Tuesday. “It’s delicate, it’s dangerous. I worry that it could expand fairly rapidly.” 

Trump has said he would like to pull U.S. troops from Syria, citing progress in fighting Islamic State. Many in the U.S. foreign policy community, including Mullen, disagree with such a withdrawal.

“The couple thousand troops that we have there are a stabilizing force,” Mullen said. “I think [they] need to be there until it’s very obvious that they shouldn’t be there or that they don’t need to be there anymore.”

It’s unclear what an expanded U.S. military campaign in Syria would look like, including what the targets would be or which U.S. allies would be involved. 

Options appear few

But the U.S. appears incapable of substantially altering the direction of the conflict, said Andreas Krieg, a Middle East specialist at King’s College London.

“Unlike 2013, the West no longer has the leverage to shape or determine outcomes in Syria’s civil war,” Krieg said. “Punitive air or missile strikes will have limited effect, and neither deter Assad nor deny his ability to use chemical weapons again.”

Trump has for years warned of the dangers of the U.S. becoming too involved in Syria.

“What will we get for bombing Syria besides more debt and a possible long term conflict?” Trump said in a 2013 tweet. “[Former President Barack] Obama needs Congressional approval.” 

More recently, Trump has changed course. In a tweet this week, Trump said that if Obama had pursued more vigorous military action in Syria, “Animal Assad would have been history.”

Daniel Davis, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel who is now a senior fellow and military expert at the Washington-based think tank Defense Priorities, said he thought Trump should follow his earlier inclination.

“This would profoundly worsen our situation here,” Davis said. “We cannot take that kind of risk of escalating a contained civil war. We’ve also got the possibility of armed conflict with Russia, which isn’t in our interest at all.”

Russia has warned of “grave repercussions” if the U.S. strikes Assad. 
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Russian Retailers Warned of Price Increase After Ruble Tumbles

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Russian retailers warned of price increase after ruble tumbles

European electronic and household goods manufacturers have warned Russian retailers of a possible 5 to 10 percent rise in prices after the ruble tumbled this week due to U.S. sanctions, retailers said on Tuesday.

Eldorado, which operates over 400 stores in Russia, said the hikes may mean it has to adjust its retail prices.

“Suppliers have already started warning of a possible 5-10 percent adjustment in prices,” a spokesperson for Eldorado told Reuters, adding that the warnings had primarily come from European manufacturers that do not produce goods in Russia.

A spokesperson for M.Video, which operates a network of 424 stores, also said that some of its suppliers had told them of plans to raise prices by between 5 and 10 percent.

The ruble fell sharply on Monday as investors took fright after a new round of U.S. sanctions against Moscow, targeting officials and businessmen around Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The ruble extended its losses on Tuesday, shedding over 3 percent of its value against the dollar, as investors continued a sell-off of assets fueled by fears that Washington could impose more sanctions and a realization that Russian credit and market risks had substantially increased.
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Macron’s Overtures to Catholic Church Make Waves in Secular France

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Emmanuel Macron has blurred a line that has kept French government free of religious intervention for generations, critics said on Tuesday, after he called for stronger ties between the state and the Catholic Church.

The issue is particularly sensitive in historically Catholic France, where matters of faith and state were separated by law in 1905 and which is now home to Europe’s largest Muslim and Jewish communities.

The president’s remark might have raised fewer eyebrows had he left it until later in a one-hour speech on Monday night to Church dignitaries in Paris, where he began by saying that just arranging such a gathering was an achievement in itself.

“If we’ve done so, it must be because somewhere we share the feeling that the link between Church and State has been damaged, that the time has come for us, both you and me, to mend it,” he said.

Critics, many his natural political opponents, took the president to task.

“It took three centuries of civil war and struggle to get to where we are and there’s absolutely no reason to turn the clock back … because of an intellectual whim of the president’s,” said hardline leftist Jean-Luc Melenchon, a candidate in the election that brought Macron to power last May.

Former prime minister Manuel Valls and Socialist Party head Olivier Faure said the separation of church and state must remain a mainstay of political life, in a country where public service employees are banned from wearing Muslim veils and other dress with religious connotation.

Gay rights groups, who fought a bitter campaign against the Church over the introduction of same-sex marriage in 2013, were also critical.

The role of Islam

Raised in a non-religious family, Macron was baptized a Roman Catholic at his own request when he was 12. His government is now struggling to redefine the role of France’s second most popular religion, following a spate of attacks by Islamist militants that have killed around 240 people since early 2015.

Hardline Islam sits uneasily with France’s secular foundations, and Macron is under mounting pressure to address voter fears that its influence may spread via mosques and prisons that offer fertile ground for radical proselytizers.

Prime Minister Edouard Philippe responded in February by introducing prison isolation zones and more stringent licensing rules for faith-based schools.

France’s guiding principles also hold that religious observance is a private matter, for all faiths.

Catholic leaders present for Macron’s speech seemed less persuaded than his political detractors that might soon again be exerting influence on government.

Cardinal Georges Pontier, who met the president on Monday night, told CNews TV he read the remarks as nothing more than an invitation to more open dialogue.

“Some people imagine the Church wants to take power over people’s minds and more, but that’s not true,” he said.

This story was written by Reuters.
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Rare Appearance Fuels Speculation Algeria’s Bouteflika Will Run Again

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A rare public appearance by veteran Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika is fueling speculation he will run for a fifth term next year, a move that would mean at least short-term stability for a key U.S. ally and one of Europe’s main gas suppliers.

Bouteflika has largely disappeared from public view since a stroke in 2013, so his appearance on Monday to open a restored mosque and two metro stations is seen as a sign the country’s ruling elite want him to stay on to avoid an unclear succession.

In power since 1999, the visibly frail, wheelchair-bound 81-year-old saluted a crowd outside the Ketchaoua Mosque in Algiers waving national flags and holding placards with photos of the president.

Bouteflika’s appearance also came two days after the ruling National Liberation Front (FLN) called on him to run again and as state media sought to dispel doubts about his health by showcasing his past meetings with foreign dignitaries.

While another term for Bouteflika would give a ruling caste of FLN officials, generals and business tycoons time to organize a smooth succession, it is likely to be a source of frustration for young Algerians worried about  unemployment and austerity in a state-controlled economy suffering from low oil prices.

“I do not care about politics and politicians. Bouteflika running for a fifth term, a sixth term, or not? Not my problem,” said Amin Ferrah, 22, a student who works in a pizzeria. “Politics is not my world.”

In a country where about half the population is under 25, many young Algerians are looking abroad. Ferrah wants to go to Canada, while others have taken the perilous sea crossing to Europe.

The government has said it wants to diversify the economy away from oil and gas, which accounts for 60 percent of budget finances, but there has been resistance from those within the ruling elite to opening up to foreign investment.

The key decision makers in Algeria are veterans who fought from 1954 to 1962 against French occupation and fiercely oppose what they call foreign interference. That has left the economy dominated by the state and firms run by business tycoons.

‘Delicate situation’

Opponents say Algeria needs a national dialogue to overcome what they call “the gravity of the situation,” a veiled call on the country’s power brokers to assess Bouteflika’s health.

“Our country has never been in such a delicate situation, carrying such a great risk of breaking civil peace, stability and national security as it is now,” Ali Benflis, a leading opposition figure who ran against Bouteflika in 2004 and 2014, told reporters a month ago.

Benflis was referring to strikes by teachers and doctors that have been running for months. The government has been unable to offer them more cash as it has done in the past, because the fall in oil prices has stretched public finances.

Energy revenues have halved since 2014, and the government has launched austerity measures, banning the import of 900 goods and freezing public sector hiring and development projects.

Bouteflika has not said he wants to run again, but previous presidential campaigns have followed similar statements from the FLN that called on him to continue. Bouteflika’s supporters say his mind remains sharp, even though he needs a microphone to speak.

“The president enjoys all his mental and intellectual abilities,” Lakhdar Brahimi, a retired U.N diplomat and close friend, said in a recent interview with local media. “His memory is very strong. And it’s him sometimes who

reminds me of dates and people. Except for his dead voice, he is in good shape and he rules the country.”

Bouteflika is part of a thinning elite of the veterans who fought France in the independence war and have run Algeria ever since. Many also credit him with ending a civil war with Islamists in the 1990s that killed 200,000 people.

He is unlikely to face competition from within ruling circles. Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia, leader of the National Rally for Democracy (RND) allied to the FLN, has already said he will not run if Bouteflika goes for a fifth term.

Analysts say the opposition, fractured between moderate Islamists and left-wing groups, is also unlikely to mount a serious challenge in presidential elections expected in the first half of 2019. No date has been set.

In addition, thousands of former Islamist fighters who accepted a partial amnesty to end the civil war could be potential Bouteflika supporters if he runs again. While the fighters did not get any political rights under the original

deal, Bouteflika is now expected to offer them full rights.

No one has yet said he will run against Bouteflika, even though the president has said he wants more competition. He won with 82 percent of the vote in 2014, 90 percent in 2009, 85 percent in 2004 and 74 percent in 1999.

“The political scene must experience diversity, a confrontation of programs, and a race to power,” Bouteflika said last month in a letter read out by an adviser.
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Italy’s President Calls New Government Talks as Bickering Drags on

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Italian President Sergio Mattarella will hold a second round of talks about the formation of a coalition government on April 12-13, his office said on Tuesday, with no indication that any breakthrough is at hand.

Mattarella has the power to name a prime minister, but elections on March 4 resulted in a hung parliament and a first round of consultations ended in stalemate last week.

Since then, the various political blocs seem to have drifted even further apart, firing daily barbs at each other and showing no sign of wanting to lay aside the rancor of the election campaign and work together on a joint project.

Financial markets have so far shown little alarm about the prospect of prolonged deadlock in Italy, one of the euro zone’s most heavily indebted nations.

The anti-establishment 5-Star Movement emerged as the largest single party from last month’s vote, while a rightist alliance, including the anti-migrant League and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, won the biggest bloc of seats.

5-Star leader Luigi Di Maio has suggested forming a government with the League, but has refused to countenance any accord with Berlusconi, who has been convicted of tax fraud and is standing trial for bribing witnesses — a charge he denies.

The League unexpectedly overtook Forza Italia at the ballot box and its chief, Matteo Salvini, has assumed the mantle of leader of the conservative bloc. He has rejected the suggestion that he should split from his allies to hook up with 5-Star.

Looking to put on a display of unity, rightist leaders will see the president together on Thursday, rather than meeting him separately, as they did in the initial round of consultations.

However, Di Maio has not budged on his refusal even to talk with Forza Italia. There is “zero percent chance that 5-Star will go into government with Berlusconi and the center-right crowd”, he said on Twitter on Monday.

“Di Maio, right now, interests me less than zero,” the League’s Salvini responded.

The third force in parliament, the center-left Democratic Party (PD), has reiterated that it has no intention of helping either side to form a government and plans to spend the coming parliamentary term in opposition after suffering a stinging defeat last month.

With coalition talks apparently going nowhere, political leaders have gone back on the campaign trail for regional elections later this month, suggesting they will wait for these to pass before considering the sort of painful compromises needed to form a government.

If Mattarella fails to overcome the impasse he would have to call new elections, almost certainly in the autumn, but a senior source in his office said he was determined to avoid this.

Italy has a long history of finding a way out of apparently intractable political stalemate and its shortest-lived parliament in the modern era lasted two years.

This story was written by Reuters.
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On 20th Anniversary, Northern Ireland Peacemakers Warn of New Dangers

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The leaders who brokered a peace deal for Northern Ireland in 1998 marked its 20th anniversary on Tuesday by warning that a hardening political divide and Britain’s exit from the EU were creating new dangers for the region.

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton and ex-British Prime Minister Tony Blair joined Irish and Northern Irish politicians in Belfast to mark the breakthrough on April 10, 1998, that called an end to 30 years of sectarian violence in which around 3,600 people died.

But the collapse early last year of the power-sharing administration at the heart of that deal meant there was no devolved government to greet them — and little sign of the province’s Irish nationalists and pro-British unionists resolving the differences that have again divided them.

“We have to be very, very careful,” said former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, who chaired the talks that led to the agreement, when asked by Irish state broadcaster RTE if there was a danger of a return to violence. “Nothing in life is guaranteed.”

Northern Ireland was quickly transformed by the deal, with the Irish Republican Army, responsible for most of the killings, agreeing to give up its weapons and the British army dismantling its armed checkpoints and withdrawing.

But while the outbreaks of violence have all but ended, the region’s politics has become more polarized — leading in January 2017 to the collapse of devolved power-sharing for the first time in a decade.

Divisive

The supporter base of Northern Ireland’s liberal parties has shrunk, allowing the combined vote of the more divisive Democratic Unionist and Sinn Fein to grow from around 34 percent in 1998 to 56 percent at the last election in 2017. In recent months, the rhetoric from both sides has hardened.

“Compromise has to become a good thing, not a dirty word and voters have to stop punishing people who make those compromises and start rewarding them,” said Clinton, whose role in the 1998 Good Friday Agreement is celebrated as one of the key legacies of his chequered presidency.

“The only thing that would be calamitous would be to let the whole thing die,” Clinton said. “To … go back to hell instead of going into a future.”

The political tensions have been heightened by Britain’s decision to leave the European Union, with some Irish nationalists highlighting the risk of next year’s departure leading to the reinstatement of a hard border between the UK province and Ireland, inflaming nationalist opinion.

“This Brexit thing can burn you bad if it’s done wrong,” Clinton told a crowd at Queen’s University Belfast. Blair, who campaigned against Brexit, warned a hard border would be a disaster for the peace deal.

British Prime Minister Theresa May’s decision to do a deal with the region’s largest pro-British party, the Democratic Unionists, to prop up her government has fanned nationalist rhetoric.

“The Tory government has actively encouraged the most negative, intransigent and sectarian elements of political unionism to attack and undermine the Good Friday Agreement,” Gerry Adams, the former Sinn Fein leader who also helped negotiate the agreement, said in a speech Tuesday.

Some unionists pointed the finger instead at the Irish government, saying its suggestion that Northern Ireland might be governed by EU rather than British regulations — or that it might unite with the Republic of Ireland in the coming years — risked inciting pro-British militants.

“I hope people realize that some of the things they are saying are dangerous,” David Trimble, head of the Ulster Unionist Party, the largest pro-British party in Northern Ireland in 1998, told RTE.
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Somalia, UAE Trade Barbs Over Seized Money

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Somalia and United Arab Emirates have exchanged barbs over the seizure of millions of dollars from a plane chartered by Emirati diplomats to transport the cash to Mogadishu.

 

The Somali government seized three bags containing $9.6 million on Sunday and says it only took the action after the UAE ambassador refused to let the bags containing the cash be scanned.

 

“If a ‘diplomatic bag’ is used to deliver illegal articles such as weapons, cash, then the bag is violable,” says a senior government official speaking with VOA Somali on condition of anonymity.

But Tuesday, UAE’s Foreign Ministry condemned the seizure of the money, which it says was for the support of the Somali army.

‘Serious breach’

 

The statement alleged Somali security forces “assaulted” and held those on board the plane “at gunpoint.”  “The action is an illegal step that contradicts the established diplomatic norms,” read the statement.

 

It said the move by the Somali government was a “serious breach” to a Memorandum of Understanding signed by the two countries in November 2014. 

Meanwhile, the Somali government rejected the condemnation by UAE and says no breach of diplomatic protocol occurred.  

The senior Somali official blamed UAE Ambassador to Mogadishu Mohammed Ahmed Othman Al Hammadi, who was at the airport to receive the money.   

“The Ambassador refused the bags to be examined with metal detectors, electronic scanning, or canine sniffing without opening or detaining the bag which was a simple solution to the problem,” says the official.

 

Investigation underway

The official also dismissed UAE assertions that Somalia infringed on diplomatic protocol at Mogadishu airport during the seizure of the money.

 

“Any use of the ‘diplomatic’ bags for non-diplomatic purposes waives the privileges and immunities that are afforded by the Convention,” says the official who was referring to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.  “In the situation on April 8, the three bags were no longer inviolable and could be subjected to inspection.”

 

Somalia also denied people on board the plane were held at gunpoint.  “We have the CCTV that proves nothing of that sort happened,” says the Somali official.

 

Somalia also says the MoU UAE is referring to covered training of Somali military and expired in 2016.

 

Somali officials say the money is stored in the central bank of Somalia pending an investigation.  Officials say the investigation will determine whether the money was brought in to “destabilize” the country.

 

Somalia and the UAE have been at odds since last year when the government of Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed “Farmajo” resisted pressure to cut ties with Qatar and took a neutral position on a dispute between Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

Last month, the Somali government rejected an agreement between the UAE’s Dubai World, Somaliland, and Ethiopia over Berbera port, saying the deal “violates the territorial integrity of Somalia.”
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Turkish Currency Hits Record Lows Over Fears of Overheating Economy

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The Turkish lira Tuesday hit another historic low against the U.S. dollar amid growing financial market concerns that the Turkish economy is overheating.

With elections on the horizon, the government is stoking economic growth. The latest figures saw growth running at over 7 percent, making Turkey one of the fastest-growing economies in the developed world.

But international investors are becoming increasingly alarmed at the cost of such growth, with double-digit inflation and a surge in imports widening Turkey’s current account deficit (the difference between imports and exports).

“Investors are disappointed by the fact the government is pushing growth even faster, rather than addressing the imbalances that show up, such as high inflation and wide current account deficit.” said economist Inan Demir of Nomura banking.

“Some people say this: ‘Too much growth is not a good thing,’ ” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in a speech Monday aimed at challenging financial critics. “Why? Because they are jealous. It is nothing else.”

In another move aimed at defying critics, Erdogan also announced a new $34 billion economic stimulus package. Much of Turkey’s rapid growth has been achieved by the government injecting billions of dollars into the economy.

Erdogan further challenged international markets by renewing his strong opposition to increasing interest rates, which orthodox economic theory demands to protect a falling currency.

“If there isn’t an increase in interest rates, the likelihood will be the lira will continue to depreciate,” warned Demir. “More or less, the lira will remain at the mercy of global sentiment. It’s extremely difficult to draw a line where the depreciation stops on its own.”

Since the start of the year, the lira has fallen over 7 percent against the dollar.

​Reports on Simsek

Last week, the lira fell heavily amid reports that Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Simsek had resigned after a heated telephone conversation with Erdogan over interest rate policy.

Analysts suggest that Simsek, who is responsible for the economy, is key to maintaining the confidence of financial markets in Turkey, having formerly worked for international investment bank Goldman Sachs. According to Ankara sources, Simsek withdrew his resignation only after intense government pressure.

But with presidential and general elections upcoming in 2019, a booming economy is seen as key to Erdogan and his ruling AKP Party’s re-election chances.

“He [Erdogan] knows the way to win the election is by improving the economic situation,” wrote newspaper columnist and presidential insider Abdulkadir Selvi in Monday’s Hurriyet. “That is why he declared 2018 as the year of performance, growth and employment.”

Analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners asked, “What is left with AKP’s vision? Ten years ago, it was a big-tent party. It talked about human rights, modern democracy advancement, a humane society. Now, there is only mega-construction projects left and economic growth. So, if they stop stimulating the economy, economic growth will immediately fall off the cliff, and they will have no chance to win in a fair election.”

But a plummeting currency brings its own economic risks. Experts warn that heavy currency decreases usually undermine consumer confidence, leading invariably to a fall in consumption, and ultimately hitting growth.

A more imminent threat faced by Turkey is debt. Turkish companies’ short-term foreign exchange debt stands at $220 billion.

“We hear more and more companies requesting loan restructuring from the banks,” Demir said. “In the coming days as the lira depreciates further, more and more companies will find it more difficult to meet their foreign currency obligations with an overwhelming Turkish cash flow.”

​Banks under scrutiny

In the past few weeks, two of Turkey’s largest companies have sought to restructure nearly $12 billion in bank loans. Turkish banks are now facing increasing scrutiny over their corporate loan exposure and how many of their loans are still performing.

“Clearly there is an understanding between [Turkey’s] regulatory authorities, the banks and major companies that the system must go on,” Yesilada said. “It’s in nobody’s interest to declare these loans nonperforming or the borrowers bankrupt, so everything looks good. But nothing is being sustained, to be perfectly honest.”

Turkish banking stocks have fallen heavily in the past few months and are now trading at nine-year lows. Most analysts claim, despite growing financial pressures, that the integrity of the banking system still remains strong.

But the same analysts warn that banks may curtail future lending, which would likely affect growth. Demir predicts Erdogan and his government’s dash for growth could ultimately become self-defeating.

“If the insistence on pro-growth measures continues, and investors become more and more concerned about the external financing requirements and sell liras, the pro-growth measures may actually turn out to be counterproductive, because the weaker lira could hurt company balance sheets, forcing more of them to seek a restructuring of their loans, and forcing them to cut back on investment and generating new employment,” Demir said.
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After Deadly Crashes in Pacific, US Navy Refocuses on Leadership

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After a pair of crashes involving U.S. Navy ships in the Asia-Pacific killed more than a dozen people last year, the Navy’s efforts to develop its leaders is receiving renewed attention.

Last week, the Navy inaugurated the College of Leadership and Ethics at the U.S. Naval War College in Rhode Island.

Seventeen sailors were killed last year in two collisions with commercial vessels involving guided-missile destroyers, the Fitzgerald in June off Japan and the John S. McCain in August as it approached Singapore.

The commanding officers of the Navy destroyers involved in the collisions face courts-martial and military criminal charges. Charges against them include dereliction of duty, hazarding a vessel and negligent homicide.

A series of Navy investigations found rising pressure to meet demands for more and more Navy operations, particularly in the Pacific Ocean, led those in command to rationalize declining standards that ranged from basic seamanship to operational safety.

Some observers, including lawmakers during a congressional hearing, have been critical of the Navy’s handling of the incidents.

Navy officials acknowledge that the inauguration of the new college alone will not be enough and a change in culture will take time.

Chief of U.S. Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson said the incidents in the Pacific reinforced the need for a closer look at leadership training, something officials say was in the works prior to the crashes.

“As we’ve come through the collisions, the investigations focused on the accountability and in some cases discipline; it has just become clear that you can’t emphasize and focus on it too much,” Richardson told a small group of reporters.

Rear Admiral Jeff Harley, president of the Naval War College, said that in a break from the past, the new college would teach leadership courses throughout the year.

“One [issue] that has perhaps not been given the attention that is required, [and] we’re starting to understand that its required on a more continuous basis, is this idea of character competency,” — or leadership development, Harley said.

Another reason for increased focus on leadership is the expectation that the Navy will play a larger role in operations in the years ahead.

The U.S. military has put countering China and Russia at the center of a new strategy unveiled earlier this year.

“The Navy really kind of has unique and specific roles in making all that happen, not only from a security standpoint, but also sea lanes, keeping access to markets open,” Richardson said.
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US Awards Puerto Rico $18.5 Billion in Recovery Grants

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The U.S. government is awarding $18.5 billion worth of disaster recovery grants to Puerto Rico for its housing, infrastructure and economic development needs after Hurricane Maria.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said Tuesday it is the largest single amount for such assistance ever awarded. The money will be issued through the agency’s Community Development Block Grant program.

HUD already had allocated $1.5 billion to the U.S. territory in February for post-hurricane recovery efforts.

The Category 4 storm hit on Sept. 20 and caused more than an estimated $100 billion in damage. It destroyed around 70,000 homes and damaged another 300,000.

This story was written by the Associated Press.
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Global Watchdog to Travel to Syria to Probe Alleged Chemical Attack

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A global chemical weapons watchdog said Tuesday it will send a team to the Syrian town of Douma to investigate a suspected poison gas attack that killed dozens of people last weekend near Damascus.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said it would go to Douma after an appeal to do so.

“This has coincided with the request from the Syrian Arab Republic and the Russian Federation to investigate the allegations of chemical weapons use in Douma,” OPCW said. “The team is preparing to deploy to Syria shortly.”

The White House announced Tuesday President Donald Trump will cancel a planned trip to Latin America to “oversee the American response to Syria.”

Trump said his administration will likely say “after the fact” how it decided to respond to the suspected chemical attack.

“It will be met, and it will be met forcefully,” Trump said before meeting with senior military leaders late Monday.

He highlighted what he said was the power of the United States to stop atrocities like the attack Saturday in rebel-held eastern Ghouta that killed at least 40 people.

“We have a lot of options, militarily,” he said, with out giving specifics.Last year, he ordered airstrikes on a Syrian airfield used to launch another chemical attack.

The U.S. has also requested that the U.N. Security Council vote Tuesday afternoon on a resolution calling for a new investigation into the use of chemical weapons in Syria. A resolution would need nine votes and no vetos by Russia, Britain, China or the U.S. to be approved.Russia says it does not agree with the U.S. draft.

Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he is outraged by continued reports of chemical weapon attacks in Syria and called for a thorough, impartial investigation with the OPCW given full access to do its work.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said later Tuesday that Russia would submit a Security Council resolution proposing OPCW investigators be sent to probe the attack in Syria.

That followed comments from Moscow’s envoy Vassily Nebenzia, who said Russian experts have already visited the site, collected soil samples, interviewed witnesses and medical personnel, and that no chemical weapons attack had taken place.

U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley told the Security Council on Monday that both Russia and Iran could stop the Syrian government’s “murderous destruction,” adding that Moscow’s hands are “covered in the blood of Syrian children.”

Britain says Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson spoke to Acting U.S. Secretary of State John Sullivan by phone and the two “agreed that, based on current media reports and reports from those on the ground, this attack bore hallmarks of previous chemical weapons attacks by the Assad regime.”

French President Emmanuel Macron has also spoken by telephone with Trump several times to coordinate their response to Saturday’s attack.

William Gallo, Jeff Seldin, Margaret Besheer, Victor Beattie contributed to this report.
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America’s Equal Pay Day Dismay

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Tuesday, April 10, is Equal Pay Day in the United States. Advocates designated the day to mark how much longer women must work, on average, to earn as much as men averaged in the previous year. 

Germany recognized Equal Pay Day on March 10. The Czech Republic will observe it on April 13. While assigning a date to the gender pay gap is a way to make a point, it makes for an easy gauge of whether the pay gap is getting worse or better from one year to the next. In 2017, the U.S. Equal Pay Day was April 4 — meaning the pay gap is slightly worse this year than last.

There are a number of explanations for historic gender gaps in pay.

One of the major ones is known as “occupational segregation,” meaning a particular job is seen as “men’s work” or “women’s work” and is dominated by that gender. In a study by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research in 2017, among the most common occupations for women and for men in the United States, only six occupations overlap.

In the fields that pay best, men tend to dominate, said the IWPR’s Chandra Childers. She adds that when men start to leave a field and women start to move in, the average pay for that field begins to drop.

Some say the pay gap is due to more women taking time off work or assuming less demanding professional roles so they can care for their families. “Women often choose lower-paying jobs that are closer to home and have better, more flexible hours,” conservative commentator Carrie Lukas said in an April 4 column for Forbes.

Childers says she hears that argument often. But “when you look at the pay gap,” she said, “a lot of it is because women are concentrated in low-wage service jobs. Many of these jobs are not flexible. They’re not family friendly,” and they are less likely to have paid family leave.

The Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank that advocates for low- and middle-income workers, found in April 2017 that women are paid less than their male colleagues in almost every occupation, regardless of whether that occupation is traditionally held by men or women. The average wage for preschool and kindergarten teachers was $16.33 per hour for men, and $14.42 per hour for women. Male nurse practitioners made $42.74 an hour, compared to $37.50 per hour for female nurse practitioners. Male software developers made $38.98 an hour, while women software developers made an average $33.65 an hour.

#MeToo movement

Hollywood has recently gotten much attention for starkly different salaries paid to women and men working on the same project. To highlight this point, several high-profile actresses turned up at this year’s Academy Awards ceremony with women’s rights activists as their dates.

Actress Meryl Streep brought Ai-jen Poo, the executive director of the National Domestic Workers’ Alliance. Poo used the opportunity to talk about how attitudes toward women — including those behind the sexual harassment scandal wracking the entertainment industry — affect pay levels at both the bottom of the income scale and the top.

“Equal Pay Day looks different in the #MeToo moment,” Poo said in a column in In Style magazine on April 4. “Each #MeToo story amplified the voice of a woman who has been underpaid, shut out, harassed, assaulted, undermined, ignored, or threatened. We can see clearly how it is that women are paid less when the gender discrimination that leads to the wage gap is exposed.”

Poo goes on to say that pay inequality and sexual harassment are “inextricably linked. They are both the result of a culture in which women’s lives and contributions are devalued.”

Oscar-winning actress Octavia Spencer recently told People magazine how she and Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain teamed up for a tiny experiment in collective bargaining, a tool activists recommend to fight against unfair compensation practices. The two women told producers that they would only take the roles if they were paid the same amount. Spencer — the Oscar winner — said she ended up making five times the amount she had expected for the film.

Technology sector

Women also face tough hurdles in the technology sector. A survey by the job-hunting website Hired.com showed that 63 percent of the time, men were offered higher salaries than women for the same role at the same company. The differences in starting pay for the same job ranged from 4 percent to 45 percent.

Notably, the Hired survey found that 54 percent of the women it surveyed said they had found out at some point in their careers that they were making less money than a man with the same job. Only 19 percent of men had had the same experience.

Equal-pay supporters say the benefit of equal pay is not just confined to the individual earners; it also benefits the employer and the community in which it is based.

Power to employees

There’s no silver bullet, says Jessica Schieder of the Economic Policy Institute, but an important tool in the fight for equal pay is transparency.

“You can’t know you’re underpaid and have a problem until that information is available,” Schieder said. She also recommends collective bargaining, a higher minimum wage, and any other tools that give employees more power. The social taboo against talking about personal income, she says, is not helpful either.

Jess Morales Rocketto of the National Domestic Workers Alliance and We Belong Together, a feminist campaign for immigration reform, says there is one other idea that can’t be overlooked. “There’s nothing more powerful than women coming together. … In the next 10 years, I want to see us close the pay gap. But also, I want ALL working people to be covered by our labor laws. And I want women at every level of public office.

“Our job is to address all forms of gender inequality to ensure that no woman, regardless of where she’s from, is left behind,” she said.
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Top US Homeland Security Adviser Resigns

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Tom Bossert, U.S. President Donald Trump’s top Homeland Security adviser, abruptly resigned Tuesday, the latest in a long line of senior officials to leave the Trump administration.

No reason was given for his resignation, but it came a day after staunch conservative John Bolton took over as Trump’s third national security adviser in the 15 months of his presidency. Both Bloomberg News and CNN reported that Bossert was quitting at Bolton’s request.

The 43-year-old Bossert had served in Trump’s White House since his inauguration, a key adviser to the president on cybersecurity, who also was a prominent official in handling the government’s response last year to devastating hurricanes in Texas, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

Bossert appeared often on television news talk shows to represent the Trump administration’s view on terrorism threats. But he was passed over to become national security adviser in favor of Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, when Trump dismissed H.R. McMaster.

“The president is grateful for Tom’s commitment to the safety and security of our great country.” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said. “Tom led the White House’s efforts to protect the homeland from terrorist threats, strengthen our cyber defenses, and respond to an unprecedented series of natural disasters. President Trump thanks him for his patriotic service and wishes him well.”

Since the start of the year, Trump has ousted his secretary of state, changed national security advisers, dismissed his veterans affairs secretary, named a new CIA director and watched as other key White House advisers departed, including his top lawyer handling Trump’s response to the ongoing criminal investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.
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Congo’s Talented Artists Struggle for Recognition at Home, Abroad

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The art scene in the Democratic Republic of Congo is vibrant and flourishing, but talented local artists still struggle for international recognition. VOA’s Anita Powell takes us to the studios of some of Kinshasa’s top talents, including 25-year-old art sensation Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga.
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UN: More than 130,000 have Fled Syria’s Ghouta in Four Weeks

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The United Nations voiced alarm on Tuesday at “spiralling new displacement” from the Syrian enclave of eastern Ghouta, after more than 133,000 people were estimated to have fled in four weeks, and where U.N. aid agencies still do not have access.

About 45,000 of those displaced are staying in eight collective shelters in the Damascus countryside. Roughly the same number of women, children and elderly men have left the overcrowded shelters after screening by government authorities.

“We are aware of screening taking place as civilians are leaving eastern Ghouta, but as you know we are not part of current evacuation deals or its implementation,” Andrej Mahecic, spokesman of the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR, told a briefing.
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Ambassador Haley: US Will Respond to Deadly Attack in Syria

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The U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley says the United States will respond to a suspected deadly chemical weapons attack in Douma, whether the U.N. Security Council finally takes action to protect the people of Syria or not. President Donald Trump is consulting with his national security team and says he will make a decision on whether or not to retaliate militarily within hours. VOA diplomatic correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.
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Trump: Alleged Chemical Attack ‘Will Be Met Forcefully’

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U.S. President Donald Trump says his administration will likely say “after the fact” how it decided to respond to a suspected chemical attack on the outskirts of Syria’s capital.

“It will be met, and it will be met forcefully,” Trump said before meeting with senior military leaders late Monday. 

He highlighted what he said was the power of the United States to stop atrocities like the attack Saturday in rebel-held eastern Ghouta that killed at least 40 people.

“We have a lot of options, militarily,” he said, with out giving specifics. Last year, he ordered airstrikes on a Syrian airfield used to launch another chemical attack.

Trump was critical of former President Barack Obama for what he said was a failing strategy of publicizing planned military maneuvers ahead of time.

Syria has denied using chemical weapons throughout the conflict that began in 2011, including the most recent suspected chemical attack.

Russia said there is no evidence Syria carried out such an attack.  Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday the United States has taken an unconstructive position and is refusing to face reality.

Trump said Monday, “We are getting some very good clarity,” regarding who was responsible, a task that has been difficult throughout the Syrian war and the source of conflict among the many international players involved.

Earlier he told his Cabinet at a White House meeting that the U.S. would figure out who was responsible for the attack, whether it was Syria, Russia, Iran or “all of them together.”

Assigning responsibility was the domain of investigators from the Joint Investigative Mechanism between the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which was dissolved after Russia vetoed a renewal of its mandate in November. The United States put forward a new proposal Monday to Security Council members for a new attribution mechanism, but it was not immediately clear whether it would win the necessary Russian support.

U.N. diplomats said the United States was pushing for a vote on the resolution on Tuesday.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged the council in a statement Tuesday to “redouble its efforts to agree upon a dedicated mechanism for accountability.”

He said he is outraged by continued reports of chemical weapon attacks in Syria and called for a thorough, impartial investigation with the OPCW given full access to do its work.

“The norms against chemical weapons must be upheld,” Guterres said.

U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley told the Security Council on Monday that both Russia and Iran could stop the Syrian government’s “murderous destruction,” adding that Moscow’s hands are “covered in the blood of Syrian children.” 

WATCH: Haley on US reaction to Syria attack

New attribution mechanism

Britain says Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson spoke to Acting U.S. Secretary of State John Sullivan by phone and the two “agreed that, based on current media reports and reports from those on the ground, this attack bore hallmarks of previous chemical weapons attacks by the Assad regime.”

French President Emmanuel Macron has also spoken by telephone with Trump several times to coordinate their response to Saturday’s attack.

Cecile Shea, a non-resident fellow in global security and diplomacy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, also said Syria is likely responsible, citing a lack of other forces capable of manufacturing and deploying such chemical weapons.

“But I think we really need to find out as quickly as we can what the hallmarks of this attack were, and I do believe that we will be able to figure out if it was an attack by the Assad regime,” Shea told VOA.  “And if it was, then that is an example of a nation violating a treaty that has been in force for 95 years, a general rule of law and just fundamental strictures of humanity.  And then I think the president and our allies should take action together to punish whoever did this.

The United Nations refugee agency expressed alarm Tuesday at the continuing violence in Syria, particularly in eastern Ghouta, that is causing deaths and forcing people to leave their homes.

The UNHCR said sends of thousands of civilians remain trapped in eastern Ghouta after an estimated 133,000 left the enclave during the past four weeks.

The agency reiterated calls for all sides in the conflict to protect civilians and allow them to move freely.

 William Gallo at the White House, Jeff Seldin at the Pentagon and Margaret Besheer at the United Nations contributed to this report.
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Iran Unifies Official and Open Market Exchange Rates as Rial Hit New Low

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Iran unified the country’s official and open market exchange rates, state media said, after its currency, the rial, plunged to an all-time low on Monday on concerns over a return of crippling sanctions.

The U.S. dollar jumped in a day from 54,700 rials to 60,000 rials in the open market in Tehran on Monday. A dollar was worth 36,000 rials in mid-September.

After an emergency cabinet meeting, Iran’s First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri was quoted by the state media as saying that from Tuesday the price of the dollar would be 42,000 rials in both markets, and for all business activities.

Iran has long been trying to unify its open market rate, used for most commercial transactions, with the official rate, which is a subsidized rate that is only available to government departments and some importers of priority goods.

Jahangiri said from Tuesday the government would not recognize any rate but the official rate, and “it would be illegal to trade dollars with an unofficial rate.”

U.S. sanctions lifted under Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2015 will resume unless U.S. President Donald Trump waives them again on May 12. Trump has effectively set that as a deadline for European powers to fix what he called “the terrible flaws” of the deal.

President Hassan Rouhani warned on Monday that Trump will regret it if he pulls out of the nuclear deal.
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Azerbaijan’s Incumbent President Set Up for Easy Re-Election

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Voters in the oil-rich Caspian Sea nation of Azerbaijan are set to cast ballots in a snap presidential election Wednesday that is all but certain to extend the rule of the country’s long-serving leader by another seven years.

President Ilham Aliyev is expected to win the vote by a landslide. Leading opposition parties boycotted the race, leaving seven token challengers. Opinion surveys have put support for the incumbent at over 80 percent.

Aliyev, 56, has led Azerbaijan since 2003. He succeeded his father, Geidar Aliyev, who ruled Azerbaijan first as Communist Party boss and then as a post-Soviet president for the greater part of three decades.

Like his father before him, the son has cast himself as a custodian of stability, an image that resonates with many in a nation where memories of the chaos and turmoil that accompanied the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union are still fresh.

Since Aliyev won the last election in 2013 with 85 percent of the vote, Azerbaijan’s Constitution has been amended to extend the presidential term from five to seven years. Aliyev’s critics denounced the 2016 plebiscite as effectively cementing a dynastic rule.

The presidential election that had been due in the fall was moved up to April. Officials said the move was made because the country would be busy with various high-profile events at the end of 2018.

Aliyev has allied the majority Shia Muslim nation of almost 10 million with the West, helping to protect its energy and security interests and to counterbalance Russia’s influence in the strategic Caspian region.

Critics

At the same time, his government has long faced criticism in the West for alleged human rights abuses and suppression of dissent.

The opposition has denounced the election as lacking a viable challenger. Most of the seven candidates seeking to unseat Aliyev ran for president in the past but never pulled in more than 2 percent of the vote.

“We will urge the people to resist that game being played by the authorities,” said Jamil Hasanli, the head of the National Council of Democratic Forces of Azerbaijan, a leading opposition movement.

However, Aliyev’s critics have a limited following in Azerbaijan; only a few thousand people attended recent opposition rallies.

‘Political stability’

The public indifference stems from Azerbaijan’s relative stability under Aliyev, who has used the nation’s oil riches to transform the once-gritty capital, Baku, into a shining metropolis. Some of the oil wealth has trickled down to reach even the poorest residents, helping secure Aliyev’s rule.

“People want to see the preservation of political stability, the deepening of economic reforms and an even more active fight against corruption,” Elkhan Sahinoglu, head of the independent Atlas Research Center in Baku, said.

He added that Aliyev has dismissed some of the worst government ministers and the public hopes he will continue getting rid of corrupt officials.

“Social problems, including low wages, remain, but most people think that political stability is the most important thing,” Sahinoglu said.

Samir Aliyev, a Baku-based independent economic expert who is not related to the president, said that while the opposition boycott may affect turnout, most voters focus on economic and social issues and don’t pay much attention to the opposition.

“People are mostly worried about their material situation, wages and inflation,” he said.
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Bolton Takes Helm on US National Security at Time of Tumult

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The U.S. military is bracing for a possible strike in Syria. Preparations for a high-risk North Korea summit are barreling forward. The White House staff is on edge, unsure who will be fired next, and when. And the national security team is holding its breath to see whether their new leader will be a shock to the system.

Enter John Bolton, the pugnacious former U.N. ambassador who took over Monday as President Donald Trump’s national security adviser — the third person to hold the job in barely 14 months. Trump’s selection of Bolton last month set off a guessing game in Washington as to just how much of an imprint his take-no-prisoners approach to foreign policy will have on Trump’s team, already beleaguered and exhausted after a tumultuous first year.

If Bolton had any first-day jitters, he had little time to indulge them. A daunting to-do list has awaited him, punctuated over the weekend by a suspected chemical weapons attack by Syria’s government that led Trump to start exploring potential military retaliation.

Although Bolton didn’t formally start until Monday, he was spotted entering the White House over the weekend, carrying an umbrella as he strolled down the driveway toward the West Wing on a rainy Saturday.

And on Monday, he appeared at his first Cabinet meeting, where Trump talked up his forthcoming meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, chided China for taking advantage of the United States and condemned the “atrocious” chemical attack in Syria. Bolton didn’t speak, but was seated prominently behind Trump as reporters were briefly allowed into the meeting.

“I think he’s going to be a fantastic representative of our team,” Trump said later in the day. He pointed out the fact that Bolton was starting in the midst of an urgent situation with Syria, adding: “Interesting day.”

Inevitably, Bolton’s past statements in public jobs and as a Fox News commentator follow him into the job. At the White House press briefing Monday, spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked about a comment Bolton made in 2013 on Fox and Friends — he said he would have opposed an authorization to use force in Syria.

“The point of view that matters most here at the White House, as you well know, is the president’s,” Sanders replied.

Next to go?

Apprehension outside the White House about Bolton’s influence has been matched by hand-wringing in the West Wing about whose fortunes will rise and fall as the new national security adviser takes charge.

In Trump’s reality-show-infused White House, it’s become a truism that when a powerful aide departs — like the chief of staff, national security adviser or a Cabinet secretary — others who were considered aligned with that aide are often the next to go. There have been many such shake-ups, even in just the past few weeks. And Bolton, in his former jobs at the U.N. and at the State Department, developed a reputation as someone who doesn’t suffer fools quietly.

Even before Bolton started, rumors were circulating about potential exits on the national security team. The night before Bolton started, the White House said National Security Council spokesman Michael Anton would be departing, a high-profile public face of national security team. The White House said Trump thanked Anton for his service, but his departure marked another moment of upheaval in an administration marked by months of in-fighting and high-level departures.

Although it’s unclear whether Bolton will “clean house,” two U.S officials and two outside advisers to the administration said that the White House has been considering a significant staff shake-up in the part of the NSC that handles the Middle East. That comes as Trump prepares for a key decision next month on whether to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, the 2015 accord that Bolton has long derided.

Traffic cop

In the weeks since being named to the post, Bolton has quietly sought to calm concerns that he would push a more militaristic, hawkish approach on the president, considering his previously expressed support for pre-emptive military action against North Korea and regime change in Iran.

Although he stayed out of the public eye, showing deference to outgoing national security adviser H.R. McMaster, Bolton privately told some foreign embassies and influential foreign policy experts that he planned to approach the job more like a traffic cop, guiding a decision-making process in which the president can hear competing views, said individuals familiar with those conversations who weren’t authorized to discuss them and requested anonymity.

Frank Gaffney, a longtime Bolton associate and former Reagan administration official who runs the far-right think tank Center for Security Policy, said Bolton views his role as “to help the president get his program implemented.” Bolton has been “preparing his whole life to be in this job,” Gaffney said.

Yet in his 2007 book Surrender is Not an Option, Bolton reflected on his decision to take a job at the U.S. Agency for International Development after President Ronald Reagan was inaugurated rather than work at the White House, out of concern his own voice would not be heard.

“Being on the White House staff was fun,” Bolton wrote. “But I wanted ‘line’ responsibility — to manage something and to change it, not simply to be ‘staff,’ even at the White House.”

Bolton’s start comes after the tortured exit for McMaster, Trump’s second national security adviser, a three-star general who never developed a strong personal bond with the president. While the White House said McMaster’s exit had been under discussion for some time and stressed it was not due to any one incident, it came after months of speculation about his future in the administration.
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George Soros’ Hungary University Signs Deal to Open Campus in Vienna

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Hungary’s Central European University, an international school embroiled in a conflict with the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban, said Monday it had signed an agreement with the City of Vienna to open a new satellite campus there.

CEU has found itself in the eye of a political storm since last year, when Hungary passed a law setting tougher conditions for the awarding of licenses to foreign universities.

Critics said the law would hurt academic freedom and was especially aimed at CEU, founded by Hungarian-born George Soros after the collapse of Communism and considered a bastion of independent scholarship in the region.

The new law stipulated that CEU must open a branch in its “home state” of New York alongside its campus in Budapest and secure a bilateral agreement of support from the U.S. government.

The university has since set up a U.S. site at Bard College in New York State.

Orban’s ruling Fidesz party, which won Sunday’s election with a landslide, vilified Soros in a fierce anti-immigrant election campaign that helped the 54-year-old premier win a third successive term in power.

CEU said last month it was in talks with Vienna about a memorandum of understanding that would enable it to open a satellite campus there, complementing its Budapest campus and its U.S. site.

“CEU has signed an MoU with the City of Vienna and looks forward to working with city representatives to open a satellite campus there. We consider Bard College in New York a first satellite campus and Vienna would be a second satellite campus,” said CEU International Media Relations Manager Colleen Sharkey.

CEU is still waiting for its agreement with New York to be signed by the Hungarian government, prolonging a period of uncertainty over the Budapest operation.

“As we have said repeatedly, Budapest is our home and this is where we want to stay. We have no reason to believe that the Hungarian government would not sign the agreement … but we are still waiting for the signature to bring the lexCEU issue to a close,” Sharkey added. She said the Vienna campus would be functioning from the autumn of 2019.

The government has said it did not want to close down CEU and only wanted to ensure all universities are governed by the same rules.

Orban has been locked in a series of running battles with the EU, where Western states and the Brussels-based executive Commission decry what they see as his authoritarian leanings, the squeezing of the opposition and the free media.

The crackdown on CEU triggered mass protests in Budapest last year, and the European Commission took Hungary to court over the legislation targeting the university.
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Yazidis Still Suffering Years After IS Genocide

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Thousands of displaced Yazidis in the Sinjar mountains in Northern Iraq are still suffering and afraid, almost four years after Islamic State attacked Yazidi villages.

“The situation of the Yazidis in Iraq is of great concern. It is an ongoing humanitarian catastrophe with still close to 400,000 internally displaced scattered throughout the provinces of northern Iraq,” Lisa Miara, founder of Springs of Hope Foundation, told VOA.

Miara said three-and-a-half years after the Yazidi genocide, some villages are still unreachable and no major effort has been made to enable thousands of Yazidis to restore their lives and businesses.

Yazidis, an ethno-religious minority group of about 550,000 people, mostly reside in northern Iraq, in an area also populated by Kurds and Arabs.

In August 2014, the Islamic State attacked the Yazidi-populated Sinjar mountain, killing thousands of men and taking thousands of women and girls as sex slaves. Yazidis consider the attack one of 74 genocides in their history.

The massacre against Yazidis was one of the reasons the U.S.-led military operation, under the authority of President Barack Obama, targeted Islamic State in Iraq in August 2014, the first offensive action by the U.S. in Iraq since it withdrew ground troops in 2011.

“Targeted airstrikes to protect our American personnel, and a humanitarian effort to help save thousands of Iraqi civilians who are trapped on a mountain without food and water and facing almost certain death,” Obama said at the time.

Humanitarian aid

Given the large-scale humanitarian demand among displaced Yazidis, a number of local and global organizations are pleading to remain focused on the plight of the Yazidis.

Saad Babir, communication manager at Yazda Organization, told VOA that basic needs such as electricity, water and education are lacking. In addition, more than 70 percent of houses have been destroyed, and many religious temples targeted by IS are in rubble.

Thousands of Yazidi women kidnapped by IS are still missing. After the defeat of IS in Iraq and Syria, Yazidis feel they have been marginalized and efforts to find the girls — missing since 2014 — have receded.

“More than 3,000 women, men and children are still missing. Once IS was gone, no more attention is paid for the victims, no post-IS rehabilitation for the victims, and not just for Yazidis but everyone affected by ISIS,” said Babir, using an acronym for the group.

Reconciliation

Babir said the atrocities committed by IS have created mistrust in the region between minorities and their communities in general.

USAID and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) are working jointly on the recovery of minority groups.

“One thing we are doing is working to help restore some of the cultural diversity that has been a hallmark in Iraq,” USAID’s Mark Green, the United States’ top foreign aid official, said at United States Institute of Peace last week.

“In northern Iraq, we have been helping Yazidis and Christian minorities to be able to return home, to feel secure enough to be able to re-establish their communities,” Green said.
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US National Guard Troops Head to US-Mexico Border

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Arizona is sending 225 National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border and Governor Doug Ducey said more troops would be deployed Tuesday.

“Border security is a top concern here. Two-thirds of our border already has a wall. If we want to fill in the other third with a wall, I would welcome that. I don’t like how our border is wide open and unsecure, specifically in the Tucson [border city and county] sector. I also think we can use boots on the ground and technology,” Ducey told reporters Monday.

Arizona joins Texas, which sent 250 Guard troops to the border Friday.

The other two border states, New Mexico and California, have not called up any guardsmen, although New Mexico’s governor has indicated that the state will participate in the activation. California’s governor has not said what his state will do.

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis signed an order last week authorizing up to 4,000 National Guard troops to secure the border. The order provided Pentagon funding for the troops through September.

Mattis’ directive also specified that Guard troops cannot participate in law enforcement and could be armed only when necessary for self-defense. A Defense Department memo said Guard members will not “interact with migrants or other persons detained” without Mattis’ approval.

President Donald Trump has said that he wants the military to remain at the border until a wall is built. But in its recently passed budget, Congress approved funding for only a limited section of new wall and some repair work.

The National Guard are 435,000 reserve soldiers who can be called up by either the federal government or the states. Every state has its own National Guard, as well as Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. Governors often send their guardsmen to deal with natural disasters or with civil unrest, such as rioting.

The U.S. Constitution authorizes the federal government to use the National Guard to “execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions.”

The number of people apprehended while trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border declined last year, but has been creeping up in 2018. Last week, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol announced that more than 50,000 people were detained trying to cross in March. That is up from 16,500 in March of last year, but still not as high as apprehensions in March of 2013 and 2014.

Border apprehensions remain well below the numbers when former presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama deployed the Guard to the border in 2006 and 2010 respectively.
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Somaliland Elders Approve ‘Historic’ Law Criminalizing Rape

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Rapists in Somaliland face up to 20 years in jail after the breakaway conservative Islamic region passed its first law against rape in a drive to combat gender violence, a senior official said Monday.

The bill, which passed parliament’s upper house Saturday, also criminalizes other forms of gender violence such as forced marriage, trafficking for sexual slavery and sexual harassment.

Ayan Mahamoud, Somaliland’s representative in Britain, said the draft law had been awaiting parliamentary approval for years — and that President Musa Bihi Abdi’s government, which was elected in November, saw curbing sex crimes as a priority.

“This really is a historic law for Somaliland. For the first time, potential rapists will be scared that they will be punished and end up in jail for years,” Mahamoud told Reuters by phone from London.

“It also means that survivors can, at last, seek redressal and have access to justice, instead of being forced to marry their rapists to save the so-called family honor.”

The bill was passed by the lower house in January.

Mahamoud said it was expected to be signed into law by Abdi in the coming weeks.

Until now rape was not defined as a crime in Somaliland, a self-declared republic in the Horn of Africa.

That meant perpetrators faced no penalty. Victims’ families were instead paid off or the victim was forced to marry her rapist to avoid public shame.

Women’s groups said they were encouraged that parliament’s more conservative upper house, known as the House of Elders, had approved the bill with 35 out of 50 votes in favor.

“This bill provides both procedural provisions to support managing sexual offenses and substantive provisions on the punishments of the offenses,” said a statement from Nagaad, a network of 46 women’s organizations in Somaliland.

However, they stressed that the government would need to ensure people knew about the law, and that adequate resources be provided to ensure law enforcement agencies and the judiciary implemented and enforced it.

Somaliland, which has a population of about four million, declared independence from Somalia in 1991 following a bloody civil war, but is not internationally recognized as a country.

Somalia does not have legislation against sexual violence.

This story was written by Reuters.
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