Leila Ben Gacem guides a visitor through the Tunis Medina, ducking the cars and carts rattling down narrow, cobblestoned streets, and the occasional smear of dog poop.”Historically, the Medina was the heart of trade, craft and art, and it’s structured with many souks — each dedicated to a specific craft,” she says.She points down the maze of roads towards markets dedicated to coppersmiths, and those making Tunisia’s famous, flat-topped chechia hat, which exports to Libya and parts of sub-Saharan Africa.A rooftop view of the Tunis Medina. (VOA/Lisa Bryant)A municipal councillor in a village outside the capital, Ben Gacem is also a social entrepreneur on a mission; helping not only to preserve the Medina’s ancient buildings and community, but also to revitalize trades that once powered this historic quarter, some of which risk going extinct.”If investments are inclusive and pay attention to shared economy,” she says, “then maybe the whole community will grow together.”It’s a lesson that might inform Tunisia’s next government, still under construction nearly three months after elections. The Arab Spring’s only democracy to date, the North African country is challenged to turn around its sluggish economy and deepening poverty that has fed emigration and unrest. While up to one-third of Tunisia’s youth are jobless, some old Medina trades are struggling for manpower.A fading traditionAt his cramped shop, Mohammed Ben Sassi reverently opens an old Quran he is working on, its pages decorated in blue and gold. Behind him are piles of half-finished tombs. At 64, Ben Sassi is the Medina’s only surviving bookbinder.Bookbinder Mohammed Ben Sassi admires an antique quran he is working on. (VOA/Lisa Bryant)”There’s demand, but young people are no longer interested,” Ben Sassi says.He isn’t the only craftsman facing challenges. While central Medina still houses more than 500 artisan workshops, that number is about half what it was fifty years ago, according to Ben Gacem’s research. The decline, she believes, translates to a broader loss for the country’s very identity.‘’Throughout history, Tunisians have worked with their hands,” she says. “I can’t imagine a Tunisian family that doesn’t have an artisan.”The reasons for the decline are multiple, Ben Gacem says. The country’s sinking economy and currency have made some quality raw materials unaffordable, driving artisans to abandon trades handed down through generations. Others have switched to inexpensive substitutes –making the final product less attractive to buyers.But revitalizing these trades might also suggest a broader rethink of one key economic driver. Tourism has largely turned around Tunisia’s beachfronts and deserts, and less on its artistic heritage — including the centuries-old Medina, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.A man making water pipes. The Medina’s artisans have declined sharply over the past half century. (VOA/ Lisa Bryant)”We’re not promoting Tunisia with all it’s wealth, especially in the tourism industry,” Ben Gacem says. “We haven’t communicated the best story. We have communicated the easiest story.”Revitalizing the MedinaFounded in the 7th century, the Tunis Medina was restored under hardline president Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, but suffered under the 2011 revolution that ousted him, and subsequent instability. Building codes were sidelined, traditional residents fled to safer places, and squatters occupied historic mansions. Tunisians from the south moved in, further fraying a once close-knit community.”But the revolution also had a positive impact,” says architect Soulef Aouididi of the Medina Conservation Association. From the association’s headquarters in a sumptuous, 19th-century palace, she describes new civic groups springing up, including those offering school tours of the Medina, helping the next generation better appreciate its history.Aouididi’s association also organizes events bringing together the quarter’s disparate population, to help restitch relations.”Our strategy is to safeguard the buildings, but also the social heritage,” she says.Several blocks away, a pair of elegant guesthouses offer another experiment in community development. Ben Gacem has converted two dilapidated Medina mansions into boutique tourist hotels, tapping local residents to run them, and sourcing her supplies from area businesses.A dilapidated old mansion being restored in the Medina. Tunisia’s revolution offered a mixed fallout for the quarter. (VOA/Lisa Bryant)She also networks with local artisans like Ben Sassi, organizing workshops so hotel guests can learn about their craft, as one way to bring in business—while offering tourists an “authentic experience” of Tunisia.”It’s part of creating a new economic dynamic to preserve the artistry and culture around historical urban spaces,” Ben Gacem says.The last hat maker?Whether such initiatives can help to preserve old trades however is uncertain.”Young Tunisians aren’t interested in working,” says Mohamed Troudi, a chaouachine, or chechia hat maker, as he points to his own calloused hands. “They want office, Facebook and a coffee at 10 am.”Troudi himself started his career as a computer technician. He soon made a U-turn back to the family trade. Like Ben Sassi, he is part of Ben Gacem’s network of artisans. He has no lack of business—in no small part because the numbers of chaouachine are dwindling.At 28, he is the Medina’s youngest traditional hat maker. One day, he fears, he may be its last.”See that old man,” Troudi says, pointing to a colleague across from his workshop. “His son doesn’t want to work in the trade, so his store will shut. It’s a big problem.”
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Month: January 2020
Boeing Employees’ Emails Bemoan Culture of ‘Arrogance’
Contempt for regulators, airlines and their own colleagues coupled with a casual approach to safety: a series of emails by Boeing employees paint an unflattering portrait of a company culture of “arrogance” imbued with a fixation on cost-cutting.The emails underscore the task awaiting incoming CEO David Calhoun when he takes the company’s reins on Monday, under intense pressure to restore public confidence — and that of aviation regulators worldwide — after two fatal crashes of the 737 MAX aircraft.The emails were contained in some 100 pages of documents dated between 2013 and 2018 and transmitted to U.S. lawmakers by the Seattle-based aviation giant. The messages were seen by AFP after their release Thursday.Often cutting, dismissive, mocking or cavalier, the messages show that Boeing’s current difficulties reach far beyond the 737 MAX, shining a light on a level of dysfunction that seems almost unimaginable for a company that helped democratize air travel — and which builds the US president’s iconic Air Force One airplane.The emails show that Boeing tried to play down the role of its MCAS flight-control system in order both to avoid the costs involved in having to train pilots on the system in flight simulators and to speed the federal green-lighting of the MAX plane.Investigators singled out the role of the MCAS (the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System) in the fatal crashes of MAX planes flown by Indonesia’s Lion Air (Oct. 29, 2018) and Ethiopian Airlines (March 10, 2019).Those crashes claimed 346 lives and led to the plane’s worldwide grounding last March.”I want to stress the importance of holding firm that there will not be any type of simulator training required,” one Boeing employee messaged a colleague on March 28, 2017, a few months before the MAX received federal certification.The message went on: “Boeing will not allow that to happen. We’ll go face-to-face with any regulator who tries to make that a requirement.”A few months later, the same employee — a test pilot — bragged about having “save(d) this company a sick amount of $$$$.”The names of most of the employees who sent the messages were blacked out.’I wouldn’t’In 2018, several employees working on the MAX simulators complained of encountering numerous technical difficulties.”Would you put your family on a MAX simulator-trained aircraft? I wouldn’t,” said a message sent in February 2018, eight months before the first crash.”No,” a colleague agreed.Two other employees said they were concerned about the impact on Boeing’s image at a time, they said, when the company’s leaders seemed obsessed with the idea of gaining ground on Airbus’s narrow-body A320neo.”All the messages are about meeting schedule, not delivering quality,” one employee said.A colleague replied: “We put ourselves in this position by picking the lowest-cost supplier and signing up to impossible schedules.”Why did the lowest-ranking and most unproven supplier receive the contract? Solely because of the bottom dollar.”Robert Clifford, a US lawyer representing victims’ families from the Ethiopian Airlines crash, said the Boeing culture led to “unnecessary and preventable deaths.””Excuses will not be heard,” he said in a statement on his law firm’s website.’Ridiculous’The documents also show Boeing employees questioning the competence of the company’s engineers.”This is a joke,” an employee wrote in September 2016, in a reference to the MAX. “This airplane is ridiculous.””Piss poor design,” said another, in April 2017.And yet for decades Boeing was seen as representing the very best in aerospace engineering and design. It developed the 747, nicknamed the “queen of the skies,” and contributed to the Apollo program that sent man to the moon.The aerospace company and its huge network of suppliers are goliaths of the U.S. economy.In June 2018, one employee messaged his own analysis of the problem: “It’s systemic. It’s culture. It’s the fact that we have a senior leadership team that understands very little about the business and yet are driving us to certain objectives” while not “being accountable.”Michel Merluzeau, an analyst with Air Insight Research, said, “Boeing needs to re-examine an operational culture from another era.”Greg Smith, Boeing’s interim chief executive officer, insisted that “these documents do not represent the best of Boeing.”In a message to staff sent Friday and seen by AFP, he added, “The tone and language of the messages are inappropriate, particularly when used in discussion of such important matters.”Some emails are dismissive of federal regulators, starting with those from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) who approved the MAX.”There is no confidence that the FAA is understanding what they are accepting,” an employee wrote in February 2016.Nor were airlines spared.”Now friggin’ Lion Air might need a sim(ulator) to fly the MAX, and maybe because of their own stupidity,” an employee wrote in June 2017, more than a year before a 737 MAX crashed near Jakarta. “Idiots!”Yet another employee, this one more somberly, wrote in February 2018: “Our arrogance is (our) pure demise.”
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Storms Kill 11 in US South, as East Enjoys Spring-Like Weather
It looked more like April than January across parts of the eastern U.S. after powerful spring-like storms pummeled several states over the weekend.Tornadoes, floods, and hurricane-strength winds killed at least 11 people in Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Alabama.About 200,000 people were without electricity Sunday as the strong storms blew down power lines, overturned cars, and tore up trees.Gusty winds also knocked out power along the East Coast while flood warnings were out Sunday in several other southern states.Meanwhile, millions in the Northeast let their winter coats hang in the closet Sunday as record-breaking warmth gave a treat to runners, golfers, and just about anyone who loves the outdoors.Thermometers reached highs of 22 Celsius in Boston and 20 in New York City and Washington, D.C.Meteorologists say an intense polar vortex — frigid air in high altitudes surrounded by powerful winds — has been keeping the cold in the Arctic.But forecasters say the East can expect more January-like temperatures the rest of the week.
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US-China Trade War Seen as Boosting Vietnam Growth
Vietnam will enjoy the fastest economic growth in Southeast Asia in 2020, according to a new forecast from British multinational investment bank HSBC.Vietnam has been a beneficiary of the China-U.S. trade war, enjoying a boost in services and exports that should drive economic growth to 7% this year, HSBC economist Yun Liu said last week. But she said the country remains vulnerable to economic risks including trade protection and inflation.Inflation is increasing as swine flu forces up the price of pork, showing how a single product can weigh on the economic indicators of an entire nation of nearly 100 million people. Vietnam also fears rising inflation if simmering Middle East tensions continue to push up oil prices.Nevertheless, Liu predicted the communist nation’s “impressive” economic performance will give it another “year in the 7% club,” outshining fast-growing Myanmar, the Philippines, and other members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.Nintendo, AppleLiu noted that some of the biggest names in technology, ranging from Nintendo to Google, are relocating to Vietnam, probably because the trade war is making production in China more expensive.FILE – A shop in Hanoi sells electronics, which are becoming a big export product for Vietnam.”Likely due to the trade tensions that have accelerated multinational corporations’ relocation decisions, many tech giants, including Apple, Google, Nintendo and Kyocera, have now followed in Samsung’s footsteps and plan to move parts of their production to Vietnam,” Liu forecastSamsung, the Korean smartphone giant, already accounts for close to one quarter of Vietnam’s exports, but others are following the same path. Total electronics exports to the United States rose 76% in the first 11 months of 2019, as U.S. tariffs made Chinese-made phones more expensive for Americans.”Contrary to many Asian countries which have seen a contraction in industrial activity, Vietnam’s manufacturing sector remained resilient [in 2019], contributing 30% to headline GDP growth,” Liu said.Also contributing to GDP growth are increases in tourism and private consumption among Vietnamese citizens themselves.RisksThe solid growth has brought renewed risk of inflation, a problem Hanoi had mostly brought under control in recent years. Prices last month rose by 5.2% on an annualized basis — the highest monthly figure since January 2014. Economists attribute the unexpected jump in part to higher pork prices.FILE – A butcher in Ho Chi Minh City sells pork, whose price increases are feeding fears of inflation in Vietnam.”The economy faces two key risks over the coming year,” said Gareth Leather, a senior Asia economist, in an analysis for research company Capital Economics. Citing trade protectionism as one risk, he said the other “is the outbreak of African swine fever, which has led to a sharp rise in pork prices.”Liu agrees. She said Vietnam faces “a confluence of factors including higher pork demand in the run-up to the Tet holidays [Lunar New Year] and likely competition with mainland China on pork imports as the latter has recently lowered pork tariffs.”The regional minimum wage in Vietnam has also increased, while oil prices around the world spiked after a U.S. airstrike killed Qassem Soleimani, commander of Iran’s Quds Force. Leather said the most vulnerable Asian nations are Vietnam, India and China.He also voiced a widely held sentiment regarding Vietnam’s trade imbalance with the United States. “Vietnam’s growing bilateral trade surplus with the U.S. could lead to retaliatory action,” Leather said.
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2020 Is Off to an Alarming, Chaotic Start
A violent mob assault on the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. The targeted killing of an Iranian general ordered by President Donald Trump. An accidental missile strike of a Ukrainian commercial airliner. A tightening of U.S. economic sanctions on Iran. The detention of the British ambassador in Tehran.We are barely beyond the first week of a new year and a new decade, but already the alarming and chaotic news coming out of the Middle East makes it difficult not to feel a sense of foreboding for what’s to come. Historical forces seem to be moving on paths impossible to identify precisely, but lead in the general direction of danger, political analysts and historians say.And all this takes place at a time when the world already had plenty to worry about.Trump has been impeached and awaits a trial seeking his removal from office that could begin in the Senate later this week. North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un continues to threaten the U.S. and has declared that he will no longer observe a ban on nuclear tests. Overseas, Australia is on fire. Britain is edging ever closer to Brexit.A Middle East on the edgeWith the crisis in the Middle East one miscalculation away from spiraling out of control, and a suite of other international fires to put out, many key posts in the Trump administration’s national security apparatus are filled by unconfirmed officials or sit empty altogether.It’s little wonder that newspapers across the country are running stories on the rise in the number of people seeking mental health care for anxiety.At times like these, a little historical perspective can be helpful.FILE – Iranians burn an Israeli and a U.S. flag during an anti-U.S. protest in the capital Tehran, Jan. 4, 2020, over the killings of Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi paramilitary chief Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.Parallels to 1968Robert Dallek, noted historian and author, points out that this is not the first time the United States has been beset by seemingly overwhelming problems.”You know, we’ve been through many difficult moments,” Dallek said in an interview with VOA. “Like 1968, when the country was locked into the war in Vietnam and you had inner-city riots, and [Lyndon] Johnson announced he wasn’t going to run for president again.”At the time, a travel agency in France was pitching vacations in the United States with the tagline, “See America while it lasts,” Dallek said.”It was a time when people also thought that America was slowly coming to an end and might be heading into a new Civil War, and so there are echoes of that here,” he said. However, he stressed that there are reasons to be hopeful. The United States did not descend into war, the war in Vietnam eventually came to an end, and civil unrest abated.None of this, however, is to suggest that the real anxiety Americans feel is misplaced or imagined. Perhaps the most stressful issue facing Americans right now is the crisis unfolding in the Middle East.Attack on US Embassy in BaghdadOn New Year’s Eve, Americans woke up to the news that the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad’s Green Zone was under siege by a mob that had broken into a reception area and set part of the structure on fire. The protests followed a December 29 U.S strike against Iranian-backed Kataeb Hezbollah sites in Iraq and Syria in retaliation for the killing of a U.S. civilian contractor near the Iraqi city of Kirkuk two days earlier. The Pentagon announced that it was dispatching troops to the region, a number that quickly grew into the thousands.FILE – Pro-Iranian militiamen and their supporters set a fire in front of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, Jan. 1, 2020.Later on Twitter, Trump promised retribution if the attackers, reported to have connections to an Iran-backed militia group, harmed embassy personnel or damaged U.S. property. “This is not a Warning, it is a Threat. Happy New Year!” he wrote.US drone strike on SoleimaniTwo days later, shortly after landing at Baghdad International Airport, General Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s notorious Quds Force, was killed in a drone strike that had been personally ordered by Trump.Soleimani, who directed operations that have led to the killing of hundreds of American soldiers in Iraq and untold thousands of civilian deaths across the Middle East, was generally considered the second-most-powerful figure in the Iranian government.Iran, promising revenge, observed three days of mourning for Soleimani before launching missiles at two installations in Iraq housing American military personnel. There was reason to believe that the missile strikes were more symbolic than dangerous.But any hope that the limited Iranian response might reduce the tension in the region was dashed just hours later, when a Ukrainian jetliner with 176 travelers on board crashed outside Tehran. By the weekend, it had become clear that nervous Iranian air defense forces, on alert for U.S. retaliation after the strikes in Iraq, shot down the plane by accident, a fact that Iran eventually admitted.FILE – A picture of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, killed in a U.S. drone strike at Baghdad airport, is seen on a building which formerly housed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 7, 2020.More sanctions for IranThe United States announced Friday morning that it would impose new economic sanctions on Iran. These would come on top of existing penalties that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has described as the most punishing the U.S. has ever levied on another country. Many Democratic lawmakers and some Republicans complained that Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and other senior administration officials have misled Congress and the public in arguing that Suleimani had posed an “imminent” threat.In Tehran on Saturday, the ambassador of Britain was arrested and held for several hours after attending a vigil for the 176 people killed in the attack on the Ukrainian airliner. The highly unusual step by Iran was accompanied by accusations that the diplomat incited street protests against the Iranian regime, a charge the British government hotly denied.Within the U.S., the collective response to the unfolding crisis in the Middle East has been unease about where all this will end. Social media has been rife with references — some joking, some not — to an imminent World War III. But experts point out the likelihood of all-out war between the United States and Iran is low.At the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, professor of political science Michael Horowitz and senior fellow Elizabeth Saunders wrote Friday, “Blowback may be coming, and the U.S. strike against Soleimani may increase the risk of bad outcomes short of an all-out war. Those are reasons for concern. But it’s critical to distinguish such consequences from a general war.”They added, “There will no doubt be consequences — but general war remains unlikely.”FILE – Various rates and prices for currencies and gold coins are displayed at an exchange bureau, in Tehran, Iran, Aug. 21, 2019.A desire for ‘normalcy’Dallek, the presidential historian, said that in his view, the most likely outcome of a lengthy period of civic stress is an electorate primed for a return to perceived normalcy. This is something the Democrats are counting on as the 2020 presidential campaign heats up.”I think the outcome of all this is going to be like in 1968, when the country wanted to get back to some kind of continuity,” Dallek said.It was that election in 1968, of course, that gave the United States the Nixon presidency.
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Trump’s Iran Actions Remain Under Congressional Scrutiny
The White House is voicing strong support for Iranian protesters who took to the streets to decry the shoot down of a Ukrainian commercial jetliner outside Tehran last week. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, the Trump administration faces continued bipartisan pressure from Congress to provide more details on the intelligence that prompted the U.S.’s targeted killing of an Iranian general, as Democrats seek to rein in the president’s ability to unilaterally order military action against Iran.
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HRW Director Denied Entry to Hong Kong
Hong Kong denied entry to the executive director of Human Rights Watch, the international watchdog said Sunday.Kenneth Roth, who traveled to Hong Kong with plans to launch the organization’s “World Report 2020,” was told he could not enter when he landed at Hong Kong International Airport on Sunday. Human Rights Watch said that immigration agents gave no reason as to why the U.S. citizen was denied entry.”I had hoped to spotlight Beijing’s deepening assault on international efforts to uphold human rights,” Roth said. “The refusal to let me enter Hong Kong vividly illustrates the problem.”I flew to Hong Kong to release @HRW’s new World Report. This year it describes how the Chinese government is undermining the international human rights system. But the authorities just blocked my entrance to Hong Kong, illustrating the worsening problem. https://t.co/GRUaGh8QUbpic.twitter.com/iTHVEXdbwO— Kenneth Roth (@KenRoth) January 12, 2020Human Rights Watch was scheduled to release the report on January 15th at a news conference. Roth’s introductory essay to the 652-page report warns that China’s government is “carrying out an intensive attack on the global system for enforcing human rights.”The watchdog said Roth will now present the report Jan. 14 from New York City.
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Trump, Pelosi Taunt Each Other as Impeachment Trial Looms
U.S. President Donald Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi taunted each other Sunday as Trump’s Senate impeachment trial looms in the days ahead.The U.S. leader called Pelosi, his chief impeachment antagonist in the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives, “Crazy Nancy,” even before she told ABC News’ This Sunday show that Trump is “impeached for life” no matter how his Senate trial plays out.The House last month approved two articles of impeachment against Trump linked to his efforts to get Ukraine to launch investigations to benefit himself politically — that he abused the office of the presidency and then obstructed congressional efforts to investigate his Ukraine-related actions.But Pelosi for three weeks has balked at sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate in a futile effort to get Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, a staunch Trump ally supporting his acquittal, to agree to hear key Trump aides testify at the Senate trial about the president’s actions and subpoena White House documents.The House leader is consulting with her Democratic colleagues Tuesday about the timing of sending the impeachment articles to the Senate, but is planning on naming a handful of lawmakers to press the case against Trump. If that happens, the Senate trial could start later in the week.Pelosi warned the majority Senate Republicans, some of whom have sought to quickly acquit Trump without hearing new witnesses, that history would judge them harshly if they do not conduct an extensive impeachment trial, only the third such time in the country’s 244-year history that a president has faced an impeachment trial and possible removal from office.FILE – Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi talks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Nov. 14, 2019.”It’s about a fair trial,” Pelosi said. “They take an oath to have a fair trial and we think that should be with witnesses and documents.””Do that or pay a price,” she said.”We have confidence in our case,” Pelosi said. “This president is impeached for life regardless of any gamesmanship on the part of Mitch McConnell.” She said Democrats believe there is already enough evidence to remove Trump from office, “However, we want the American public to see the truth and why are they afraid of the truth?”Democrats are seeking to hear the testimony of at least four Trump aides, including former national security adviser John Bolton and acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, neither of whom testified in the lead-up to the House impeaching Trump. The president ordered both to not participate in the House impeachment investigation, but Bolton last week said he would testify at the Senate trial if he is subpoenaed.The minority bloc of 47 Senate Democrats would need four Republican lawmakers to join them to override McConnell’s opposition to new witnesses and vote to hear new testimony. Republican Sen. Susan Collins said Friday she is working with a “small number” of Republicans to ensure that new testimony would be heard. McConnell says he has enough Republican votes to ensure that no vote on new witnesses would occur until after House managers present their case against Trump and the president’s lawyers state their defense. Trump is all but certain to win acquittal in the Republican-controlled Senate and remain in office, but the uncertainty of the moment has left him to fume almost daily on Twitter about what he sees as the unfairness of the case against him.”Why should I have the stigma of Impeachment attached to my name when I did NOTHING wrong?” he said Sunday. “Read the Transcripts! A totally partisan Hoax, never happened before. House Republicans voted 195-0, with three Dems voting with the Republicans. Very unfair to tens of millions of voters!”Why should I have the stigma of Impeachment attached to my name when I did NOTHING wrong? Read the Transcripts! A totally partisan Hoax, never happened before. House Republicans voted 195-0, with three Dems voting with the Republicans. Very unfair to tens of millions of voters!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2020The central allegation against Trump is that he abused his office by pressing Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to open an investigation of one of Trump’s chief 2020 Democratic presidential rivals, former Vice President Joe Biden, his son Hunter Biden’s work for a Ukrainian natural gas company and a debunked theory that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 U.S. election to undermine Trump’s campaign.Trump made the request to Zelenskiy in a late July phone call that came as Trump was temporarily withholding $391 million in military aid that Kyiv wanted to help fight pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.But Trump released the money in September without Zelenskiy opening the investigations of the Bidens, proof, Republicans say, that Trump did not engage in a reciprocal, quid pro quo deal with Ukraine –the investigations in exchange for the military assistance.
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Support Hedged for Trump Claim Iranian Commander Wanted to Blow Up 4 US Embassies
Key U.S. officials hedged Sunday in detailing President Donald Trump’s claim that Iranian Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani intended to blow up four U.S. embassies before Trump ordered a drone strike to kill him.Defense Secretary Mark Esper told CBS News’ “Face the Nation” show, “I didn’t see the intelligence about Iran posing an imminent threat to four U.S. embassies, but I believe President Trump when he says there was one.”The Pentagon chief added, “What I’m saying is I share the president’s view that probably- my expectation was they were going to go after our embassies.”FILE – Residents look at a crater caused by a missile launched by Iran on U.S.-led coalition forces on the outskirts of Duhok, Iraq, Jan. 8, 2020.Esper, in another interview, told CNN’s “State of the Union” show, that he believed Soleimani was “days away” from launching an attack on U.S. facilities when the drone attack killed him Jan. 3. Iran, in response, fired 16 ballistic missiles at bases in Iraq where U.S. troops are stationed, although the U.S. says it knew of the attacks hours ahead of time, allowing forces to bunker in safety. There were no reports of U.S. casualties.In extensive Capitol Hill briefings on the Soleimani killing, lawmakers, including House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff, said Trump administration officials never mentioned the potential for attacks on the four embassies.But U.S. national security adviser Robert O’Brien told the Fox News Sunday show, “They can trust us on this intelligence” about the threat posed by Soleimani.FILE – A picture of Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani, head of the elite Quds Force, who was killed in an airstrike at Baghdad airport, is seen on the former U.S. Embassy’s building in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 7, 2020.But he said it was “always difficult to know the specifics” of threats, saying they came from Soleimani and the Quds Force. He said there were “very significant threats to American facilities in the region,” without acknowledging any specific threat to four embassies.Speaker Nancy Pelosi, leader of the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives, “I don’t think the administration has been straight with the Congress of the United States.”After Tehran fired the missiles at the U.S. forces in Iraq, Trump backed off earlier threats of further military attacks against Iran, instead imposing more economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic.O’Brien said the U.S.’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran is working. “Iran is being choked off,” he said, making it difficult for Tehran to “get the money” for continued funding for its Quds Force military operations in the Mideast. The U.S. has expressed the view that its economic sanctions against Tehran will eventually force it to renegotiate the 2015 international treaty restraining Iran’s nuclear program, the deal Trump withdrew the U.S. from. In addition, O’Brien said student protests in Tehran on Saturday, after Iran admitted that it mistakenly shot down a Ukrainian passenger jet, killing all 176 aboard, in the hours after its attacks on the Iraqi bases, will also pressure Iranian leaders to renegotiate the nuclear treaty.
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Cooler Temperatures Help Bring Some Australian Wildfires under Control
Fires in Australia are increasingly under control as cooler temperatures and light winds stay consistent, according to fire fighting officials.Teams near the town of Bodalla in New South Wales, the state most affected by weeks of bushfires, said Sunday that they were able to move from defense to offense, working to ensure a fire would not reach a major highway, the Associated Press reported.The Gospers Mountain fire northwest of Sydney, which has been burning since October, is under control as of Sunday thanks to light rain, the Sydney Morning Herald reported Sunday.As of Sunday evening, 111 fires were still burning across the state of New South Wales – 40 of them still uncontrolled, according to the NSW Rural Fire Service.At 8:30pm there are 111 bush and grass fires burning across NSW, all at the Advice alert level, with 40 not yet contained. While it’s been pleasing to hear of rain falling across parts of the state today, many of these fires will still take some time to fully contain. #NSWRFSpic.twitter.com/ZtF2IgDzkc
— NSW RFS (@NSWRFS) January 12, 2020Since September, at least 27 people have died in Australia’s bushfires. More than 10 million hectares (24 million acres) of land — an area bigger than Portugal — have been scorched.Climate change rallies have been held in Australia by thousands of protesters critical of the government’s handling of the bushfire crisis. A demonstration in Sydney Saturday has reportedly drew 30,000 people.Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison has come under scrutiny for his response to the wildfires — most recently for underplaying the role of climate change in the devastating wildfires.The prime minister has previously defended his energy and climate policies as adequate and responsible, but on Sunday said his government was working to create a long-term program designed to reduce the risk of natural disasters “in response to the climate changing,” the Associated Press reported.
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DR Congo Army says ADF Rebels Killed 30 Soldiers
Islamist rebels killed 30 soldiers and wounded another 70, some seriously, during fierce fighting last week in eastern DR Congo, army officials said.They suffered the losses during the latest offensive Thursday against the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), in North Kivu province, Major Mak Hazukai told journalists Saturday.The army captured the ADF’s headquarters during the battle at Madina, and killed 40 rebel fighters, including five of their leaders, Hazukai added.On Friday, the cabinet posted a tweet on the prime minister’s account congratulating the army on their capture of what they described as the one of the last bastions of the ADF.North Kivu sits on the border with Uganda. The ADF, rebels originally from Uganda, has been waging a campaign of violence in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo for years.Hazukai described them as “Islamist fundamentalists”.The army announced its campaign against the ADF on October 30. The rebels are accused of having killed more than a thousand people in the Beni region, in the northern part of North Kivu, since 2014.ADF fighters killed at least 150 civilians over November and December in reprisal according to official sources and local groups. That rising toll has sparked anger over the authorities’ response.There have been demonstrations in the city of Beni, where local people accuse the UN peacekeeping force MONUSCO of failing to protect them. At the end of November, local people looted a MONUSCO base there.Since then, the UN force and the army have announced joint patrols in the region.The ADF began as an Islamist rebellion hostile to Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni. It fell back into eastern DRC in 1995 and appears to have halted raids inside Uganda. Its recruits today are people of various nationalities.
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Young Cambodian Activists Challenge Social and Political Status Quo
With two-thirds of its population under the age of 30, Cambodia is undergoing a generational shift that is challenging the nation’s social and political status quo. VOA’s Brian Padden reports from Phnon Penh that with no memory of the Khmer Rouge’s bloody rule in the 1970s, or the long years of civil war, many young people today are less worried about upheaval than their elders and more willing to advocate for greater freedom and change.
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British Ambassador Detained Briefly While Attending Tehran Vigil for Jet-Crash Victims
Britain’s ambassador to Tehran has said he was detained briefly by Iranian authorities as he attended a vigil for the victims of last week’s crash of a Ukrainian passenger jet.Iran’s Mehr news agency said Rob Macaire was arrested on Saturday for his alleged “involvement in provoking suspicious acts” at the gathering in front of Tehran’s Amir Kabir University.People gather for a candlelight vigil to remember the victims of the Ukraine plane crash, at the gate of Amri Kabir University that some of the victims of the crash were former students of, in Tehran, Jan. 11, 2020.Students held a gathering at the school after Iran said the Ukrainian airliner was downed by mistake by Iranian antiaircraft missiles.In a post to Twitter Sunday, Macaire said he attended the event to pay respects to the victims, and was not attending any demonstration.Thanks for the many goodwill messages. Can confirm I wasn’t taking part in any demonstrations! Went to an event advertised as a vigil for victims of #PS752 tragedy. Normal to want to pay respects- some of victims were British. I left after 5 mins, when some started chanting.— Rob Macaire (@HMATehran) January 12, 2020The British Foreign Ministry called Macaire’s detention “a flagrant violation of international law.””The Iranian government is at a crossroads moment. It can continue its march towards pariah status with all the political and economic isolation that entails or take steps to deescalate tensions and engage in a diplomatic path forwards,” the ministry said.Iranian officials did not immediately make any statement about the incident.More protests were expected later on Sunday, amid building outrage among some Iranians about the downing of the Ukrainian jet.
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Iranians Protest Military’s Role in Downing Ukrainian Airliner
Hundreds of people protested in several cities around Iran on Saturday after the military admitted to mistakenly shooting down a civilian Ukrainian plane, killing all 176 on board. VOA’s Julie Taboh has more.
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UN Faces Many Challenges as it Sets to Commemorate 75th Anniversary
Preparations for the observation of the United Nations’ 75th anniversary are underway as the world body’s ability to maintain global peace and security appears ever more tenuous. The United Nations was founded in the aftermath of World War II on October 24, 1945, to prevent another devastating conflict. The 51 founding members hoped this new body would succeed where its predecessor, the League of Nations, had failed in maintaining global peace and security.U.N. Undersecretary General Fabrizio Hoschschild is special adviser on the preparations for the commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the United Nations. He acknowledges the world body has fallen short of this mark, but he tells VOA conflicts would have been more intense and frequent, and longer without the United Nations. Moreover, he adds, some superpower confrontations have certainly been averted.”But at the moment, the conflict resolution aspect of the United Nations, the principle body of which is the Security Council, is clearly not fulfilling its promise. And, perhaps the most painful testimony of that is the hundreds of thousands of dead that have come out of the Syrian conflict,” he said. Against these setbacks, Hoschschild says, are significant achievements made over the last 75 years in the betterment of the social, economic and human rights of people throughout the world.”If we think of health, the average life expectancy when the U.N. was founded was around 50 years. Today it is around 75 years. People are living 25 years longer … if we think of poverty eradication — when the U.N. was founded global poverty levels were 50%. Today they are down to 10%,” he said. Special events are being planned in the lead up to the U.N.’s 75th anniversary on October 24. These include a large-scale youth forum at the end of March in New York and a ceremony in San Francisco on June 26 to mark the signing of the U.N. charter there on that day in 1945.On September 21, world leaders will gather in New York at a U.N. Summit coinciding with the opening of the U.N. General Assembly. They will discuss opinions and suggestions gathered throughout the year on ways to increase global cooperation.
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Australian Village Ready for ‘The Beast’ to Burn on through
As the sky darkened and the smoke billowed through the village, it seemed to those hunkering at the fire station that “The Beast” would finally roar through. But the wildfire only crept closer, prodding forward a few tentative fingers before falling asleep again as the winds died.The weary volunteer firefighters of Burragate returned to bed early Saturday after a week of worry and false alarms. Many have had enough. If the fire is going to burn through their southeast Australian town, they say, then they want it to get on with the job so they can start cleaning up.”I’d prefer it not to come, but if it’s going to come, stop teasing,” said resident Joe Seamons, who has taken to describing what’s officially called the Border Fire as “The Beast.”Resident Joe Alvaro put it more bluntly. “I just want to get it bloody over and done with,” he said.Across Australia, wildfires have killed at least 27 people, including a firefighter on Saturday, and burned down more than 2,000 homes since September. They have focused international attention on climate change and caused political problems for Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who has been criticized for his lackluster response.Sheep graze in a field shrouded with smoke haze near at Burragate, Australia, Jan. 11, 2020.The wildfires have lurked near Burragate for over a week, filling the sky with noxious smoke that is burning people’s eyes and making them cough. The sun has turned red and distant hills have disappeared behind a shroud of haze.The village in New South Wales is tiny, with about 100 residents, according to the latest census, although some locals say there are fewer than half that. With no shops or bars, the fire station has become the focal point for the community. Sometimes they hold movie nights there. On Friday, the station was filled with stacks of donated goods, more carrots and toothbrushes than people knew what to do with.An Australian Army combat engineer from the 5th Engineer Regiment utilizes a JD-450 Bulldozer to spread out burnt woodchip at the Eden Woodchip Mill in southern New South Wales, Australia, in support of Operation Bushfire Assist, Jan. 11, 2020.On Friday night, with strong winds expected to make the fire flare up, a convoy of trucks — including some from the army and others carrying a strike team of volunteer firefighters — rolled into town. At one point, more than 30 people were at the station, hoping to save lives and homes but prepared to retreat inside if the flames were too intense.Among them was Bill King, an operations section chief from the U.S. Forest Service in Colorado. He’s part of a reciprocal arrangement in which more than 250 Americans are being posted to Australia to help battle the blazes. He’s also the dad of a 3-month-old daughter, and jokes that he’s sleeping better on his assignment.As some of the convoy moved on to other towns, the local volunteers remained, drinking espresso made from an overworked machine and poring over maps.Seamons, who is retired, said he and his wife moved to Burragate because they didn’t want to live in a crowded town any longer. But he said their lifestyle has been affected by three years of drought, with his garden plants dying and his apple trees not producing any fruit.Lately he’s taken to sitting inside with the fan going to get away from the smoke. Some places in Australia have recorded air quality worse than in New Delhi or Beijing as a result of the fires. Seamons said he has had enough of The Beast.”Hopefully it gets sick of hanging around Burragate,” he said. “But I don’t wish it on anyone else, either.”
Alvaro said that on Friday, he was ready for the fire.”When I saw the smoke and everything, I was relieved,” he said. “I thought, come and get it.”But now he’s hoping that with favorable weather forecast for the next week, fire crews will finally be able to move from playing defense against the fires to attacking them. He said he just hopes he doesn’t have to go through the stress of another night on high alert.And if the fire does come, he said, he’s going to fight it all the way.“We’re a pretty close-knit community. There are some beautiful people here,” Alvaro said. “So it’s worth protecting.”
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Thousands of Thais Join ‘Run Against Dictatorship’
Thousands of Thais joined a run in the capital Sunday in what appeared to be the biggest show of dissent against the government of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, although he also drew a big show of support at a rival event.Police estimated nearly 13,000 runners and supporters gathered before sunrise at a park in Bangkok, wearing athletic outfits and colorful shoes, to participate in the “Run Against Dictatorship” event.Some of them shouted slogans such as “Prayuth, get out!” or “Long live democracy!” while running the 2.6-km (1.6-mile) course amid a sprinkling of security forces. Many also gave a three-finger salute of resistance to authority.A man is pictured while attending a “Run Against Dictatorship” event at a public park in Bangkok, Jan. 12, 2020.“I want things to be better,” said Bangkok resident Waraporn Waralak, 45, after completing her run. “I want Prayuth to get out.”Thailand’s government is headed by Prayuth, 65, after an election in March 2019 that the opposition described as having been manipulated to favor the leader’s pro-army party.“This is the biggest gathering since the coup,” said Anusorn Unno, dean of the sociology and anthropology faculty at Bangkok’s Thammasat University, adding that the harmless nature of the activity had spurred greater participation than usual.An excited crowd watched as organizers auctioned bibs bearing numbers significant in Thai politics, such as 2475, the Buddhist calendar year of the revolution that ended absolute monarchy in 1932.To loud cheers, a bib numbered 0044, in reference to the former ruling junta’s Article 44 that gave Prayuth absolute executive power, was ripped in two on stage.The event was held in line with people’s rights and no laws were broken, a government spokeswoman told Reuters.Thailand’s opposition Future Forward Party leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit attends a “Run Against Dictatorship” in Bangkok, Jan. 12, 2020.The run followed a rally last month staged by Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, the 41-year-old leader of the progressive Future Forward Party, who has emerged as the most outspoken opponent of Thailand’s new civilian government.Thanathorn was charged Friday with breaching a law on public assembly over the December rally, and Future Forward faces dissolution this month by the constitutional court.Run or walk?Sunday’s event was called “Wing Lai Loong” in Thai, which translates as “Run to Oust the Uncle,” in an apparent reference to Prayuth’s nickname of “Uncle Tu.”It prompted a rival “Walk to Cheer the Uncle” event, held in another park, about 14 km (9 miles) away, to show support for Prayuth, where thousands also turned out.The clashing views of the two camps aroused memories of protests that periodically roiled the Thai capital before culminating in coups in 2006 and 2014.Supporters of Thailand’s Prime Minister Prayut Chan-ocha hold a banner and signs as they walk to show their support for the government at a park in Bangkok, Jan. 12, 2020.Supporters of Prayuth, who as army chief, had led the 2014 coup, put nationalism on display by brandishing the Thai flag, while branding Thanathorn and his supporters “nation haters” for their liberal views.They took turns hitting giant fruit piñatas with a wooden stick, to symbolize frustration at the Future Forward Party, with an orange, for example, signifying the party’s official color.Both crowds encompassed a wide age range, but Prayuth’s supporters were older on the whole.“We support the prime minister because he shows loyalty to the monarchy, our king,” said Sorasak Katkonganapan, a 62-year-old retiree at the walk.
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Hifter’s Eastern Libya Forces to Abide by Cease-fire
Libya’s east-based forces have announced that they will abide by a cease-fire brokered by Russia and Turkey that is to start Sunday.If it holds, the cease-fire would be the country’s first break in fighting in months, and the first brokered by international players. It comes as Libya is on the brink of a major escalation, with foreign backers of the rival Libyan governments stepping up their involvement on the ground.A spokesman for the self-styled Libyan Arab Armed Forces, which are led by ex-general Khalifa Hifter, said in a video statement that the cease-fire would take effect starting early Sunday. Spokesman Ahmed al-Mosmari said any violations of the cease-fire by their fighters would be dealt with “severely.”It was not immediately clear if Hifter would also agree to a withdrawal of forces from around the capital. His rival, Fayez Sarraj, who is prime minister of the U.N.-supported government in Tripoli, had demanded previously such a pull out as the truce’s condition. Libya is governed by dueling authorities, one based in the east and one in Tripoli in the west, led by Sarraj. Each rely on different militias for support.Hifter’s eastern-based forces launched a fresh offensive to take the capital in April, sparking international efforts to try to contain the crisis in the North African nation.FILE – Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, right, shakes hands with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, outside Moscow, Aug. 27, 2019.Earlier this week, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin released a joint statement after a meeting in Istanbul calling for a Jan. 12 truce. They did not specify what the conditions would be.The calls for a cease-fire between the warring eastern and western Libyan forces came amid a flurry of diplomatic activity by European powers. The west-based government welcomed the calls for a stop to the fighting. A spokesman for Hifter’s forces said initially that they would continue their push to take the seat of their rivals, Tripoli, from “terrorist groups.”A U.N. peacekeeping body has welcomed the development. The United Nations Support Mission in Libya said in a statement that it hopes all parties will demonstrate “complete adherence” to the agreement to stop the violence. The United Nations and European powers, along with Libya’s allies in the region, have been calling for a peace summit in Berlin early this year that would bring together the leaders of the rival governments.The east-based government, backed by Hifter’s forces, is supported by the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, as well as France and Russia. The western, Tripoli-based government receives aid from Turkey, Qatar and Italy.The fighting has threatened to plunge Libya into violent chaos rivaling the 2011 conflict that ousted and killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi.In the decade since Gadhafi’s death, the oil-rich nation has increasingly become a setting for proxy battles between regional players vying for influence in the Mediterranean region. Russia and Turkey, with their support of the eastern- and western-based Libyan governments, have become the latest additions.
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Reaction Swift, Stern to Iran’s Downing of Ukrainian Jetliner
In the face of mounting evidence, Iran acknowledged Saturday that it had shot down a Ukrainian jetliner by accident this week after it took off in Tehran, killing all 176 people aboard. Once Iran made the admission, after three days of denying it was responsible, the reaction came swiftly, from Iran and around the world. From Iran: General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ aerospace division, said his unit accepted full responsibility for the shootdown. In an address broadcast by state TV, he said that when he learned about the downing of the plane, “I wished I was dead.” Hajizadeh said the missile operator mistook the 737 for a cruise missile and didn’t obtain approval from his superiors because of disruptions in communications. “He had 10 seconds to decide. He could have decided to strike or not to strike and under such circumstances, he took the wrong decision,” Hajizadeh said. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, expressed his “deep sympathy” to the families of the victims and called on the armed forces to “pursue probable shortcomings and guilt in the painful incident.” President Hassan Rouhani acknowledged his country’s responsibility. “Iran is very much saddened by this catastrophic mistake and I, on behalf of the Islamic Republic of Iran, express my deep condolences to the families of victims of this painful catastrophe,” the president said. Rouhani added he had ordered “all relevant bodies to take all necessary actions [to ensure] compensation” to the families of those killed. A leader of Iran’s opposition Green Movement, Mehdi Karroubi, called on Khamenei to step down over the handling of the downed airliner. FILE – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, right, leads a meeting of the emergency response team on the crash of the Ukraine International Airlines plane in Iran, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Jan. 9, 2020.From Ukraine: Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy thanked the U.S, Britain, Canada and others for information about the crash. He said it “undoubtedly helped” push Iran to acknowledge its responsibility. Zelenskiy said the crash investigation should continue and the “perpetrators” should be brought to justice. “It’s absolutely irresponsible,” Ukraine International Airlines Vice President Ihor Sosnovskiy told reporters. “There must be protection around ordinary people. If they are shooting somewhere from somewhere, they are obliged to close the airport.” From Canada: Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau demanded Iran provide “full clarity” on the downing of the plane, which Ottawa said had 57 Canadian citizens aboard. FILE – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks during a news conference, Jan. 9, 2020, in Ottawa, Ontario.”What Iran has admitted to is very serious. Shooting down a civilian aircraft is horrific. Iran must take full responsibility,” Trudeau told a news conference in Ottawa. “Canada will not rest until we get the accountability, justice and closure that the families deserve.” Foreign governments condemned the downing of the plane, with Ukraine demanding compensation. Canada, Ukraine and Britain, however, called Tehran’s admission an important first step. The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse, and Reuters contributed to this report.
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Iran Standoff Shines Spotlight on New Trump Security Adviser
In a defining week for President Donald Trump on the world stage, national security adviser Robert O’Brien was a constant presence at the president’s side as the U.S. edged to the brink of war with Iran and back again.The contrasts with O’Brien’s predecessor along the way — in secret consultations at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, in the Oval Office and in basement deliberations in the White House Situation Room — could not have been more stark.While former national security adviser John Bolton spent decades as a conservative iconoclast in the public arena, O’Brien is far from a household name. While Bolton had strong opinions he shared loudly in the Oval Office, O’Brien has worked to establish an amiable relationship with Trump.And while Bolton’s trademark mustache was a target of Trump’s mockery, the president is drawn to O’Brien’s low-key California vibe and style.“Right out of central casting,” Trump says of O’Brien.FILE – President Donald Trump and Robert O’Brien, the new national security adviser, board Air Force One at Los Angeles International Airport, Sept. 18, 2019, in Los Angeles.Rapport with TrumpFor all the differences between the two men, though, O’Brien ended up signing off on the same course of action that Bolton had long endorsed: a strike to take out Iran’s top general, Qassem Soleimani. The decision drew retaliatory missile strikes from Tehran.The way that O’Brien steered the Trump White House through the process endeared himself to the president and widened his rapidly growing influence in the West Wing.“He’s a deal guy and the president’s a deal guy,” said Jared Kushner, a senior White House adviser. “A lot of people inside the foreign policy establishment are good at explaining why things are wrong but are petrified to put things in play and take calculated risks.”The Iran drama was set in motion when Trump summoned O’Brien from Los Angeles to the president’s Palm Beach spread, where Trump was spending a two-week winter holiday. While other top aides, including Secretary of State Michael Pompeo and acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, consulted with the president from afar, Trump wanted O’Brien at his side.“Robert was calm, cool and collected, constantly keeping the president updated,” Kushner said.More than a half-dozen current and former administration officials and Republicans close to the White House contributed to this account. Many spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.Rise of a new voiceTrump has long been known for tuning out old voices in favor of new ones, but O’Brien’s rise in the president’s inner circle has been rapid. The 53-year-old O’Brien, who has handled scores of complex international litigation, has a corner office on the first floor of the White House, a few steps from the Oval Office.A sharp-dressing Republican lawyer who worked in the administrations of Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, O’Brien was appointed by Trump in May 2018 to be the nation’s top hostage negotiator. He successfully worked for the release of several Americans, including pastor Andrew Brunson, who spent two years in a Turkish prison. O’Brien also traveled to Sweden to lobby for the release of rapper A$AP Rocky, imprisoned on an assault charge.Bolton, Trump’s third national security adviser, fell out of favor with the president after a series of sharp disagreements, including over North Korea and Iran policies. He was forced out in September. Trump’s previous national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, never developed a personal rapport with the president, who tuned out on McMaster’s long-winded briefing style.Bolton had frequently tussled with Pompeo and Defense Department officials and, at times, frustrated the president with his sharp clashes and bureaucratic knife-fighting.FILE – Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, back left, and National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien head to the Oval Office of the White House, in Washington, Nov. 25, 2019.Honest, collaborativeO’Brien, in contrast, makes it a point to collaborate with the State Department and the Pentagon. People familiar with his work style describe an honest broker who is diplomatic but direct. He is known to present the views of Pompeo and top defense and intelligence officials to the president as he would brief a legal client.Colleagues say he doesn’t try to push his own foreign policy ideas on the president and is more deferential to the views from other agencies than was Bolton. He has a plaque on his desk that says, “There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.” It’s a replica of the one President Ronald Reagan kept on his desk in the Oval Office.Administration officials, at least for now, point to a new camaraderie in the latest incarnation of Trump’s national security team: Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark Esper were West Point classmates; Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has grown close to Trump; and O’Brien, unlike Bolton, has not tried to pull an end run around others in the decision-making process.“I think he’s very comfortable with the idea of the job as a staff job, which I think is the model,” said former Sen. Jim Talent, a Missouri Republican who met O’Brien more than a decade ago when they were advising Mitt Romney’s 2008 presidential campaign. “Obviously when the president asks for his advice, he gives his personal opinion.”FILE – Then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis speaks beside President Donald Trump during a briefing in the Cabinet Room at the White House in Washington, Oct. 23, 2018.Critics see ‘yes’ men without gravitasWhere Republicans see as collegial team, some Democratic critics worry that Trump is surrounding himself with advisers too eager to accede to his views.New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the administration’s national security team seems to lack “discerning voices.”Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., lamented this past week that Trump’s current team lacked the gravitas of earlier advisers, including former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and McMaster, both retired generals.“People like Mattis and McMaster, who disagree with the president because he’s so erratic, leave — leaving a bunch of ‘yes’ people, who seem to want to do whatever the president wants,” Schumer said recently on the Senate floor.After the drone strike on Soleimani, there was a deliberate effort to give the Iranians some space to react without committing the U.S. to a military response. Even as Trump delivered fire and brimstone warnings, the rest of his national security team gave indications that not every Iranian response would send American missiles flying. When Tehran’s rockets left no casualties in attacks on U.S. bases in Iraq, the crisis abated, at least for the moment.While former advisers such as Mattis and McMaster, attempted to check some of the president’s impulses, O’Brien has been regarded as enabling some of Trump’s high-risk inclinations.O’Brien’s style has been to offer pros and cons before ultimately agreeing with Trump’s decisions, including the moves to abruptly withdraw U.S. troops from Kurdish-held territory in Syria and the military raid that killed Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.O’Brien has established good relationships at the White House and on Capitol Hill, said Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah.“Every time I talk to the president about him — and his name comes up a fair amount when the president and I are talking — the president just always speaks glowingly about him,” said the Utah senator. He added that O’Brien “has a client. He doesn’t have his own agenda that he’s pursuing.”
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Trump Tweets Support, in Farsi, to Iranian Protesters
U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday tweeted support for the Iranian people, in Farsi and in English, as they took to the streets after their government admitted unintentionally shooting down a Ukrainian jetliner, killing all 176 people aboard. “To the brave, long-suffering people of Iran, Trump began on Twitter: به مردم شجاع و رنج کشیده ایران: من از ابتدای دوره ریاست جمهوریم با شما ایستادهام و دولت من همچنان با شما خواهد ایستاد. ما اعتراضات شما را از نزدیک دنبال می کنیم. شجاعت شما الهام بخش است.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2020 To the brave, long-suffering people of Iran: I’ve stood with you since the beginning of my Presidency, and my Administration will continue to stand with you. We are following your protests closely, and are inspired by your courage.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2020He followed with words of caution for the Iranian government, warning its leaders against cracking down on the protests that erupted. دولت ایران باید به گروههای حقوق بشر اجازه بدهد حقیقت کنونی اعتراضات در جریان مردم ایران را نظارت کرده و گزارش بدهند. نباید شاهد کشتار دوباره ی معترضان مسالمت آمیز و یا قطع اینترنت باشیم. جهان نظاره گر این اتفاقات است.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2020The government of Iran must allow human rights groups to monitor and report facts from the ground on the ongoing protests by the Iranian people. There can not be another massacre of peaceful protesters, nor an internet shutdown. The world is watching.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2020On Saturday evening, police dispersed students who had converged on Amirkabir University in Tehran to pay tribute to the victims, after some among the hundreds gathered shouted “destructive” slogans, the Fars news agency said. Earlier, in the first official U.S. statement after Iran’s admission, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo posted on Twitter a video of the protests in Tehran. “The voice of the Iranian people is clear. They are fed up with the regime’s lies, corruption, ineptitude, and brutality of the IRGC under @khamenei_ir’s kleptocracy. We stand with the Iranian people who deserve a better future.” (Pompeo was using Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s Twitter handle in the tweet.) The voice of the Iranian people is clear. They are fed up with the regime’s lies, corruption, ineptitude, and brutality of the IRGC under @khamenei_ir’s kleptocracy. We stand with the Iranian people who deserve a better future. pic.twitter.com/tBOjv9XsIG— Secretary Pompeo (@SecPompeo) January 11, 2020Even as top Iranian officials and the military issued apologies, protests against authorities spread across Iran, including in Tehran, Shiraz, Isfahan, Hamedan and Orumiyeh. “There are once again massive protests in Iran against the regime,” U.S. Special Representative for Iran Brian Hook told VOA News on Saturday, “and we stand with the brave Iranian people 100%. Protesters are chanting about the shameful actions of the IRGC and are ripping down posters of [Quds Force commander Qassem] Soleimani put up by the regime. They are saying Soleimani was a murderer and so is Khameini. The protesters are right!” The new demonstrations followed an Iranian crackdown on street protests that broke out in November against an increase in the price of fuel. Amnesty International has said that crackdown left more than 300 people dead. According to media reports, internet access was effectively cut off in multiple Iranian provinces ahead of memorials planned a month after the protests. Agence France-Presse, the Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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AP Analysis: New Questions Arise as Iran Says It Downed Plane
Iran’s acknowledgement that it shot down a Ukrainian airliner, killing 176 people, raises new challenges for the Islamic Republic both externally amid tensions with the U.S. and internally as it deals with growing discontent from its people. The country did itself no favors by having its air-crash investigators, government officials and diplomats deny for days that a missile downed the flight, though a commander said Saturday that he had raised that possibility to his superiors as early as Wednesday, the day of the crash. While its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard took responsibility, the same commander claimed it warned Tehran to close off its airspace amid fears of U.S. retaliation for Iran’s launch of ballistic missiles at Iraqi bases housing U.S. forces. That retaliation never came, but the worries proved to be enough to allegedly scare a missile battery into opening fire on the Boeing 737 operated by Ukraine International Airlines. Wider tensions between Iran and the U.S., inflamed after Iran’s top general was killed in Iraq by a U.S. drone strike January 3, have for the moment calmed. However, President Donald Trump vowed to impose new sanctions on Tehran, and on Friday his administration targeted Iran’s metals industry, a major employer. Meanwhile, thousands of additional U.S. forces remain in the Mideast atop of the network of American bases surrounding Iran, despite Tehran’s demands that the U.S. leave the region. FILE – U.S. President Donald Trump shows a signed memorandum after delivering a statement on the Iran nuclear deal from the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House, May 8, 2018.Nuclear dealThat sets the stage for Iran’s further steps away from its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, an accord Trump unilaterally withdrew the U.S. from in May 2018 over his concerns it didn’t go far enough in restraining Tehran. Iran said after the targeted killing of General Qassem Soleimani that it would no longer abide by any of its limits, while saying U.N. inspectors could continue their work. Further steps could spark an Israeli strike if it feels Iran is close to developing a nuclear weapon, something Tehran denies it wants but the West fears could happen. Iran, through Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, has sought to offer legal justifications for its decisions following Soleimani’s death, including missile strikes on Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops that caused no casualties. Now the country must contend with repercussions of its officials’ wrongheaded denials in the days after the plane crash. “There has been no missile launched in that area at that time,” said Hamid Baeidinejad, Iranian ambassador to the United Kingdom, in an interview Friday with Sky News, calling further questions on the allegation “absolutely unacceptable.” Then the story changed early Saturday morning, with Iran’s general staff of its armed forces saying the flight had been “targeted unintentionally due to human error.” Baeidinejad later apologized on Twitter. “In my statement yesterday to the UK media, I conveyed the official findings of responsible authorities in my country that missile could not be fired and hit the Ukrainian plane at that period of time,” he wrote. “I … regret for conveying such wrong findings.” Ultimately, the Guard answers solely to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. But Khamenei himself only Saturday acknowledged the missile strike, citing the report by Iran’s conventional armed forces. ‘Sensitive’ spotYet even the army statement itself raises questions, as it said the flight moved “very close to a sensitive military spot” belonging to the Guard. “The altitude and the direction of the flight’s movement were like an enemy target, so the aircraft was targeted unintentionally due to human error,” the statement read. That’s despite the fact that flight data for every Ukraine International Airlines flight out of Tehran since early November show Wednesday’s flight followed a similar altitude and flight path, according to flight-tracking website FlightRadar24. Planes leaving Imam Khomeini airport routinely take off going west as the Ukrainian flight did. Ukraine International Airlines President Yevhenii Dykhne stands next to a map of Flight PS-752’s departure path at a briefing about the crash of the plane on the outskirts of Tehran, at Boryspil International Airport in Ukraine, Jan. 11, 2020.Nine other flights flew out of the airport early Wednesday morning before the Ukrainian airliner without encountering trouble. The Guard claims it asked Iranian authorities to shut down airspace in Tehran amid the ballistic missile strikes and fears of reprisals, but nothing happened. Analysts have questioned the decision not to close Tehran’s airspace in the days after the shootdown. “The first thing a country should do in case of escalation of the military conflict is to close the sky for civilian flights,” said retired Ukrainian General Ihor Romanenko, a military analyst. “But this entails serious financial losses, fines and forfeits, therefore a cynical approach prevailed in Iran.” The Guard has wide autonomy in Iran. It prides itself on its aggressive posture, whether having tense encounters with the U.S. Navy in the Persian Gulf or shooting down a U.S. military surveillance drone last summer. Concerns about that aggression saw the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration reissue a warning about flying over Iran just days before the shootdown, warning that “misidentification” remained a risk. Service rivalriesThat Iran’s conventional military — long limited in the years since the 1979 Islamic Revolution by purges and obsolete equipment — issued the report shows the rivalries between the services. The Guard’s own position could be challenged, though it maintains a strong grip on Iran’s security and economic sectors. The U.S. did not retaliate the night of the ballistic missile strikes on Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops. However, that has not stopped Iranian officials like Zarif and others who sought to try to blame “U.S. adventurism” for Iran shooting down the airplane. That may not fly with the Iranian public, already battered by economic sanctions and openly protesting in recent rallies. Saturday night, hundreds gathered at universities in Tehran to protest the government’s late acknowledgement of the plane being shot down. They demanded officials involved in the missile attack be removed from their positions and tried. Police broke up the demonstrations.
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Eleven Migrants Die After Boat Sinks Off Turkey
Eleven migrants, including eight children, died Saturday when their vessel sank in the Aegean Sea off the coast of Turkey, state news agency Anadolu reported. The boat sank off Cesme, a popular tourist resort in western Turkey opposite the Greek island of Chios, Anadolu said, adding that eight others were rescued. The nationality of the victims was not yet known. The sinking came hours after another boat sank in the Aegean near the Greek island of Paxi, leaving at least 12 dead. Turkey has taken in around 4 million migrants and refugees, most of them Syrians, and is an important transit country for those fleeing conflicts and seeking to reach Europe, largely via Greece. An agreement reached in March 2016 between Ankara and the European Union succeeded in considerably reducing the number of people arriving on the five islands closest to Turkey.
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Security Sources: Niger Army Base Attack Death Toll Hits 89
The death toll from Thursday’s attack by suspected jihadists on a Niger army base has risen to at least 89, four security sources said, surpassing a raid last month that killed 71 soldiers as the deadliest against Nigerien forces in years. The government said Thursday that 25 soldiers had been killed, according to a provisional toll, while successfully repelling the attack by assailants aboard motorcycles and other vehicles in the western town of Chinagodrar. Four security sources told Reuters that at least 89 members of Niger’s security forces killed in the attack were buried Saturday in the capital, Niamey. One source said the actual death toll was most likely higher because some soldiers were buried immediately Thursday in Chinagodrar. Defense Minister Issoufou Katambe said that an updated death toll would be announced after a national security council meeting on Sunday. Deteriorating situationThe Chinagodrar attack, coming a month after the raid in nearby Inates by fighters from an Islamic State affiliate that killed 71 soldiers, highlights the deteriorating security situation near Niger’s borders with Mali and Burkina Faso. Attacks have risen fourfold over the past year in Niger, killing nearly 400 people, according to data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, a nonprofit research organization, despite efforts by international forces to stop militants linked to Islamic State and al-Qaida. French fighter jets were scrambled Thursday to scare off the attackers, France’s regional task force said, possibly averting an even heavier casualty count. No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but Katambe said Friday that the army would launch a new offensive against jihadists. West Africa’s Sahel region, a semiarid belt beneath the Sahara, has been in crisis since 2012, when ethnic Tuareg rebels and loosely aligned jihadists seized the northern two-thirds of Mali, forcing France to intervene to temporarily beat them back.
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