Month: March 2019

A dissident organization committed to overthrowing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was behind a raid on the North Korean embassy in Spain last month, The Washington Post reported Friday, quoting people familiar with the planning and execution of the mission.

The newspaper, which did not further identify its sources, identified the group as Cheollima Civil Defense, which also goes by the name Free Joseon. It said the group came to prominence in 2017 after evacuating a nephew of Kim from Macau when potential threats to his life surfaced.

The Post’s sources said the group did not act in coordination with any governments and U.S. intelligence agencies would have been especially reluctant to be involved given the sensitive timing of the mission ahead of a second summit between Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump in Hanoi from Feb. 27-28.

According to Spanish media accounts, broadly confirmed by a Spanish Foreign Ministry source, a group of unidentified men entered North Korea’s embassy in Madrid on Feb. 22, bound and gagged staff, and drove off four hours later with computers.

There has been no claim of responsibility.

The dissident group identified by The Washington Post could not be reached for comment and its purported website has made no mention of any involvement in the raid.

On Feb. 25 the website posted a statement saying the group had “received a request for help from comrades in a certain Western country” and that “it was a highly dangerous situation but (we) responded.” The group said an important announcement would be coming that week, but no details of any operation have been released.

The Madrid embassy is where North Korea’s chief working-level negotiator in talks with the United States, Kim Hyok Chol, was ambassador until 2017.

Intelligence experts said computers and phones reportedly seized in the raid would be eagerly sought by foreign intelligence agencies given the information they might contain on Kim Hyok Chol and others.

Asked about The Washington Post report, the U.S. State Department referred queries to the Spanish authorities. The CIA declined to comment.
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As British politicians wrestle with Brexit, Britain’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community — like others around the world — is grappling with a potential split of its own.

Can the coalition of allies, which traces its roots back to the early days of gay liberation in the 1960s, survive in its current form?

Caught in the crossfire between trans activists and feminists over the nature of what it is to be a woman, calls for a break-up of the longstanding LGBT+ alliance back to its constituent elements are starting to emerge.

At the heart of the increasingly toxic debate is whether trans rights are compatible with those of other women, particularly in terms of access to single-sex spaces, such as rape crisis centers or women’s refuges.

On one side, trans campaigners say that transgender women are women and deserve equal access. On the other, some feminists and lesbians disagree, making the distinction between natal and trans women.

The result has been a progressively poisonous row that threatens to tear the LGBT+ community apart.

Last year, a group called Get the L Out staged a protest against what they saw as “lesbian erasure” — or lesbians being written out of history — at the beginning of London’s annual Pride march.

“The only way to fight lesbian erasure within ‘LGBT+’ groups is to … create an autonomous and strong lesbian community and build alliances with all feminists willing to fight against male domination,” a spokeswoman said in an email.

Yet, while the debate has raged with particular ferocity in Britain, other countries have also seen tempers flare.

In New Zealand, a lesbian group said on Wednesday that it had been banned from Wellington Pride on Saturday for “not being inclusive enough” of trans people.

On Twitter, Charlie Montague, spokeswoman for the Lesbian Rights Alliance Aotearoa, said the group would now organize “a lesbian-only event of our own.”

Wellington Pride has not replied to a request for comment.

And in the United States, lesbian activist Julia Beck was last year voted off the Baltimore city LGBTQ commission after clashes with fellow commissioners over trans issues.

Community must remain together

At an event organized by campaign group LBQWomen in the Victorian Gothic splendor of one of the British parliament’s grand state rooms, Baroness Barker, LGBT spokeswoman for the Liberal Democrat party in the House of Lords, is adamant.

The community must remain together, she told Reuters.

“It matters, because we [LGBT+ people] are all outsiders and [on our own] we can be picked off by the forces that are against us,” Barker said.

However, she added a caveat.

“I stand alongside my gay brothers, as I always have done, but there comes a time when lesbians and bisexual women have to be able to come to the fore,” she said, referring to one of the aims of the LBQWomen event.

But for many, the trans debate is at the heart of the matter.

The tension partly stems from ignorance on the part of the LGB community about the issues faced by trans people, said Michelle Ross, founder of cliniQ, which provides sexual health services to the trans community and others.

“There’s a lack of awareness and there always has been in the LGB community,” she said. “Things have changed for the better … but there is some kickback around not seeing trans people as part of the LGBTQI community.”

National debate

In recent months, the debate has spilled out of social media and onto the letters pages of Britain’s national newspapers, drawing in characters as disparate as Star Trek actor George Takei and former British cabinet minister Lord Mandelson.

In October, a group of high-powered campaigners took aim at Britain’s leading LGBT+ charity, Stonewall, which they saw as stifling debate over the issue.

Last month, chief executive Ruth Hunt said she would step down in August after a tenure marked by debates that she said have “not always been a comfortable conversation” as transgender rights took greater prominence.

“We will only make progress if we stand together,” said Paul Twocock, Stonewall’s executive director of campaigns and strategy.

“We are a diverse community made up of lesbian, gay, bi and trans people, who come from different faiths, who live in different neighborhoods and do different jobs.

“But we are united in our desire to create a world where we can be free to be ourselves.”

The debate has polarized society at large, and pitted former allies within the LGBT+ movement against one another, said singer and actor Mzz Kimberley.

“Unfortunately, some parts of the LGBT+ community are not coming together,” she told Reuters.

“There are many different communities under the LGBT+ umbrella, but you also have [the] radical feminist community who are very against the trans community. You even have parts of the gay community who are against the trans community.

“It’s quite sad as we fought so hard to establish where we are at the moment and there are many who are starting to fight with each other.”

Gay men support trans colleagues

On Thursday, more than 70 prominent gay men, including YouTube star Riyadh Khalaf and Oscar-winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, backed an open letter from Britain’s equalities tsar Anthony Watson to rally together and support the trans community.

“One of the things I find flabbergasting is that we wouldn’t enjoy the rights we have today without trans activists,” Watson told Reuters, citing the involvement of campaigners at the start of gay liberation in the late 1960s.

“For gay men to sit silent on the sidelines and say it is not our battle is tremendously arrogant.

“And guess what?” Watson added. “[The bigots] are coming for our rights next.”

Tensions at play

Sport has become the latest frontline.

Tennis star Martina Navratilova and British Olympic medalist swimmer Sharron Davies both spoke out recently in support of more research into what they saw as competitive advantages for trans women.

Others have countered that the testosterone-blocking effects of hormone therapy undergone during transition would negate any advantage.

For many, the debate is reminiscent of how gay men and lesbians were portrayed by the media in the 1970s and ’80s when headlines warned of a “gay plague” at the advent of HIV/AIDS and similar concerns were raised about bathrooms and changing rooms.

“Rights can easily slip backwards,” said Watson.

But the question many are now asking is what is next for the LGBT+ community? Calls for a break-up may remain on the fringes, but concerns for its future are growing.

For the Lib Dems’ Barker, the current tensions are signs that the 50-year-old gay and trans community needs to address concerns from both sides.

“We should start to create spaces in which — safely — the LGBT+ community can have arguments and differences,” she said.

“And we need to do it so we’re not giving ground to those who are doing us down.

“We’re a community that is 50 years old and we are maturing. We should be big enough to do this.”
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Slovakia could get its first woman president as voters elect a new head of state on Saturday.

The leading contenders are Zuzana Caputova, an environmental activist who is in favor of gay rights and opposes a ban on abortion in this conservative Roman Catholic country, and Maros Sefcovic, an establishment figure who is the European Commission Vice-President.

In all, 13 candidates are vying to become the country’s fifth head of state since Slovakia gained independence in 1993 after Czechoslovakia split in two.

Andrej Kiska, a successful businessman-turned-philanthropist, is not standing for a second five-year term in the largely ceremonial post.

His term in office was marked by clashes with former prime minister Robert Fico, considered a populist leader.

Kiska supported the huge street protests that led to the fall of Fico’s coalition government amid a political crisis triggered by the slayings last year of an investigative reporter and his fiancee. The reporter, Jan Kuciak, was investigating possible widespread government corruption and Italian mob influence.

If no single candidate wins a majority on Saturday, a runoff will be held on March 30 in this central European nation of 5.4 million people.

What’s at stake

The president has the power to pick the prime minister, appoint Constitutional Court judges and veto laws. Parliament can override the veto with a simple majority, however. The government, led by the prime minister, possesses most executive powers.

The favorites 

Zuzana Caputova

Caputova, a 45-year-old lawyer, is a rising star of Slovak politics. She became known for leading a successful fight against a toxic waste dump in her home town of Pezinok near the capital of Bratislava, for which she received an international environmental prize in 2016. She was also part of a campaign in 2017 that led to the annulment of pardons granted by former authoritarian prime minister Vladimir Meciar. She is deputy chairman of “Progressive Slovakia,” a non-parliamentary party that supported the massive street protests after Kuciak’s death.

Maros Sefcovic

A career diplomat, 52-year-old Sefcovic was a member of the Communist Party before the anti-Communist 1989 Velvet Revolution. Sefcovic accepted an offer to stand from Fico’s left-wing Smer-Social Democracy party, a dominant political group in Slovakia in recent years whose reputation has been tarnished by corruption scandals. 

Other notable candidates

Stefan Harabin

A former justice minister and chief judge of the Supreme Court, 61-year-old Harabin was a close ally of Meciar, whose rule in the 1990s was marred by repeated flouting of the law. A populist, Harabin exploits the fear of migration and presents himself as a guardian of traditional conservative values. As a vocal opponent of the sanctions against Russia for its actions against Ukraine, Harabin is a favorite candidate of pro-Russian media.

Marian Kotleba

The 42-year-old heads the neo-Nazi People’s Party Our Slovakia, which has 14 lawmakers in the 150-seat Slovak Parliament. Kotleba and his party speak admiringly of Slovakia’s time as a Nazi puppet state during World War II. Party members use Nazi salutes and consider NATO a terror group. They want Slovakia to leave the military alliance and the European Union.

What’s ahead

Caputova and Sefcovic are predicted by polls to be the two candidates to advance to a runoff. But the last polls allowed were published two weeks before Saturday’s ballot. Analysts say there’s a room for a surprise result, particularly for Harabin who was running third in the polls.

                  
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The United States, in coordination with the European Union and Canada, Friday slapped new sanctions on more than a dozen officials and businesses in response to Russia’s “continued aggression in Ukraine.”

Six Russian officials, six defense firms and two energy and construction firms were targeted, either over the seizure of Ukrainian vessels in the Kerch Straight, or for their activities in Russian-annexed Crimea or separatist eastern Ukraine, a U.S. Treasury statement said.

“The United States and our transatlantic partners will not allow Russia’s continued aggression against Ukraine to go unchecked,” Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin was quoted as saying.

The U.S. sanctions freeze all property and interests in property belonging to the designated individuals and entities, and prohibit U.S. persons from transacting with them.

Four of the individuals are border guard or coast guard officials, singled out for their role in a November 25, 2018 naval confrontation, in which Russian ships fired on and seized three Ukrainian vessels in the narrow Kerch Strait the two countries share.

The four were targeted jointly with the EU and Canada according to the State Department.

Twenty-four Ukrainian crew members were detained in the naval incident.

“We call upon Russia to immediately return to Ukraine the seized vessels and detained crewmembers, and keep the Kerch Strait and the Sea of Azov open to ships transiting to and from Ukrainian ports,” added State Department spokesman Robert Palladino in a statement.

“We also call on Russia to respect Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders, including its territorial waters.”

The United States additionally imposed sanctions on two Ukrainian separatists — Aleksey Naydenko and Vladimir Vysotsky — involved in organizing November elections in the breakaway east, which Washington says were a “sham.”

The six defense firms were targeted over their operations in Russian-annexed Crimea, where the United States says several “misappropriated Ukrainian state assets to provide services to the Russian military.”

Among them are Russian shipbuilding giant Zelenodolsk, the hydroacoustic equipment producer Okeanpribor, a diesel engine supplier to the Russian military, Zvezda, and an electronic parts supplier to the military, Fiolent.
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Turkey’s unemployment rate has hit a near-10-year high, bringing more bad economic news for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of critical local elections.

According to figures released Friday, Turkey’s jobless rate surged to 13.5 percent, the highest since 2010. The number of unemployed is a record 4.3 million.

The unemployment figures are just the latest economic bad news with soaring inflation and the country in recession.

Erdogan is leading his AK Party campaign to maintain control of most of Turkey’s cities. However, with a slew of bad economic news, the March 31 polls are now being hotly contested.

With the passing of constitutional reforms, that centralized power in the hands of the presidency in 2017, the control of Turkey’s main cities is one of the few remaining sources of political power and patronage outside Erdogan’s control.

Erdogan is campaigning hard, seeking to draw heavily on his own popularity. In the past, the Turkish president used to make economic prosperity the centerpiece of his campaign strategy. Seventeen years of nearly unbroken growth is widely acknowledged as a critical factor for his political success.

However, Erdogan is largely sidestepping the economy, angrily dismissing what he characterizes as calls for assistance. “Don’t expect anything from us. We gave all that we could. Moreover, don’t provoke this rally,” Erdogan reprimanded an audience demanding jobs in the provincial city of Sivas.

Instead, the Turkish president is looking to highlight other achievements. Tuesday, Erdogan opened a new urban rail link in Istanbul, promising crowds an end to the city’s chronic traffic problems.

“This line will by itself carry the same number of passengers who are transported with 100,000 vehicles,” he declared to cheering supporters.“ Istanbul’s 10 districts will have the opportunity to use this line. It will importantly relieve the Istanbul traffic,” he added.

Istanbul is Erdogan’s home, and his political powerbase, ever since he won the mayorship back in 1994, which was the springboard to him going on to dominate Turkish politics.

‘Stagflation’

Erdogan has never lost an election, a success he uses to silence critics who accuse him of authoritarianism. “Winning the elections constitute the unique sole source of legitimacy for this regime. So therefore it’s very important for the regime, “said political scientist Cengiz Aktar.

“But this (election) is definitely a challenge (to Erdogan)” he added. “Turkey is in stagflation, it’s a recession with inflation and this is why the regime is so nervous.”

Advertisements for Erdogan’s AK Party saturate the airwaves, listing its achievements. With mainstream media in the iron grip of Erdogan’s supporters, watching TV, it is easy to forget that other parties are contesting the polls.

According to official Turkish figures, during the campaign, the state broadcaster TRT, devoted 53 hours to the ruling AKP in contrast to seven hours for other parties. The pro-Kurdish HDP, Turkey’s second main opposition, received only two minutes.

However, according to opinion polls, the economic discontent is the main issue of concern with voters, with unemployment second. The same poll points to the main opposition CHP securing many of Turkey’s cities, including the capital, Ankara. While Istanbul is the economic powerhouse of the country, the AKP lead has been whittled down to within the margin of error.

Istanbul CHP candidate Ekrem Imamoglu, a local Istanbul suburban mayor, was little known. However, his touring food market places across the city focusing on rising discontent over inflation, appears to striking chord among many.

“I don’t understand the prices. One day you come, there is this price and the next day another price,” said an exasperated trader.

“Believe me, I can’t understand how these prices come about,” he added. “The sales are affected. The prices are all shot to pieces. How come it doesn’t affect us. Prices are all in pieces.”

Old loyalties

Small-time traders traditionally are a vital constituent of support of the ruling AKP. However, in the market place, there are still many people who remain loyal to Erdogan.

“I haven’t personally been affected that much (by inflation) but I am of course concerned about the effect of it on other people and this makes me sad. Of course, I want the prices to be lower,” said a woman wearing a religious headscarf. “But the president is working to reduce prices, and, God willing, he will continue to succeed.”

Turkey’s large conservative, religious population is the foundation of Erdogan’s electoral support. Until now they have remained mostly loyal.

Under Erdogan’s rule as prime minister and now president, he introduced many reforms, lifting restrictions under Turkey’s secular constitution, preventing head-scarved women from going to university and working for the state. A dominant, prosperous religious middle class also flourished under his rule.

The AKP, with its deep financial pockets and the resources of the Turkish State at its disposal along with control of mainstream media, still has considerable advantages over its opponents. However analysts point out, Erdogan’s AKP is facing growing anger in the country over rising prices and unemployment.

 
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Poland’s Catholic Church authorities revealed Thursday they have recorded cases of 382 clergymen who have abused 625 victims under the age of 18 since 1990.

The figure includes 198 priests and friars who abused minors under 15 years old and 184 clergy who abused victims between 15 and 18, according to Wojciech Sadlon, head of the church’s Institute of Statistics.

In both confirmed and unconfirmed cases, there were 345 victims under age 15 and 280 victims between 15 to 18. The crimes occurred from 1990 through June of last year, Sadlon told a news conference. More than 58 percent of the victims were male.

Archbishop Wojciech Polak, the primate of Poland, expressed “pain, shame and the sense of guilt that such situations took place.”

Authorities said in 25 percent of the cases before church courts, the clergymen were defrocked and in 52 percent of the cases they had their duties limited and were banned from working with children. Acquittals amounted to 10 percent of the cases and 13 percent of the cases were discontinued.

Church leaders said the cases call for a change in the way that vocational seminaries educate clergymen.  

The figures were released following a three-day session of Poland’s Episcopate in Warsaw that discussed abuse and ways of protecting children. The news came just weeks after Pope Francis convened church leaders from around the world to the Vatican, where they discussed how to stop sex abuse by clergy. 

Church leaders in predominantly Catholic Poland have previously admitted they knew that some priests had abused minors in Poland but did not reveal how many.

Compensation for victims

A private foundation supporting victims of abuse has given Francis a list of more than 90 court verdicts concerning priests in Poland and over 300 cases of alleged abuse. The “Have No Fear” foundation on Thursday criticized the Episcopate’s revelation, saying it lacked words of apology or any mention about compensation for victims.

Despite the millions in compensation paid out to victims by Catholic authorities in other countries, Polish church leaders argue that the church as an institution has no obligation to compensate victims because the crimes were committed by individual persons.

Last month, a statue of a prominent Solidarity-era priest was torn down at night in the northern city of Gdansk amid allegations that the late Rev. Henryk Jankowski, respected for his pro-democracy activity in the 1980s, abused minors. It was later officially removed from the Rev. Jankowski Square, which was also renamed.

Poland’s Catholic church has the support of the country’s conservative government and enjoys special respect in the nation due to its role in preserving Poland’s national identity during World War II and under decades of communist rule.
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A Spanish human rights activist quoted survivors Thursday saying that 45 migrants have died trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Spain.

Helena Maleno, who runs a Tangiers-based non-governmental organization, said she based her figure on accounts from seven female survivors. They told her a pregnant woman was among the dead.

A Moroccan official said he couldn’t confirm the report. He said he was aware of 21 migrants who were rescued by the Royal Marines after their rubber dinghy floundered.

He said he knew of only one body being recovered Thursday, a day after the boat went adrift as it crossed the Mediterranean.

The official, who had information about the incident, wasn’t authorized to discuss it and asked to remain anonymous. He said the migrants, all sub-Saharans, were in a critical state when pulled from the water north of Nador.
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Northern Ireland’s Public Prosecution Service has announced there is enough evidence to charge one British soldier with murder for the so-called Bloody Sunday killings in Northern Ireland nearly 50 years ago.

Bloody Sunday is the nickname given to an incident that took place during a civil rights march on Jan. 30, 1972. On that day, 13 people were shot and killed as they fled police or tried to help those who were wounded. A 14th shooting victim died months later.

British authorities announced Thursday that a soldier known only as Soldier F will be prosecuted for the murders of protesters James Wray and William McKinney. Soldier F will also face charges for the attempted murders of Patrick O’Donnell, Joseph Friel, Joe Mahon and Michael Quinn.

The director of the Public Prosecution Service, Stephen Herron, said there was not enough evidence admissible in criminal proceedings to charge the other soldiers with the shootings. But the PPS has announced it will begin considering perjury charges against them.

“I am mindful that it has been a long road for the families to reach this point and today will be another extremely difficult day for them,” Herron said. “As prosecutors, we are required to be wholly objective in our approach.”

John Kelly, a representative for the families of the victims, told reporters and onlookers, “There’s a terrible disappointment at the outcome. … The full cost of Bloody Sunday cannot be measured just in those who died that day.”

After Thursday’s announcement, British Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson promised the government’s full support to Soldier F, including paying his legal costs. He also promised that the government will pass a new package of safeguards to protect members of the armed forces from unfair treatment.

“Our serving and former personnel cannot live in constant fear of prosecution,” he said.

The families of the victims of Bloody Sunday have hoped for years to have those who fired the fatal shots held accountable for the deaths. 

The original investigation in 1972 concluded by clearing the soldiers and British authorities of blame, accepting the explanation that they shot at armed men.

A second investigation in 1998 concluded that the soldiers had given false testimony and that none of the shooting victims were armed or posed a threat to the soldiers. With that, British authorities began a murder investigation.

At the close of the second investigation in 2010, then-Prime Minister David Cameron made a public apology for the shootings, saying the shootings were “unjustified and unjustifiable.”
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Three days of voting in Britain’s parliament culminates Thursday with lawmakers deciding whether to ask the European Union for a delay in Britain’s exit from the bloc.

The House of Commons overwhelmingly voted against Prime Minister Theresa May’s negotiated terms for Brexit on Tuesday, and it followed that with another vote Wednesday rejecting the possibility of leaving the EU on March 29 with no deal in place.

If Thursday’s extension measure passes, it would need further approval from the other EU members in order to go forward.

EU officials have repeatedly said they would need proper justification to agree to pushing back the deadline. And after Wednesday’s vote they said that while it is one thing for the British government to reject a so-called no-deal exit, at some point they would have to figure out the alternative, a deal they could actually pass.

The EU also prefers any extension be limited, finishing before its own elections in late May. If the process is still ongoing, Britain would take part even though it wants to remove itself from the EU.

May brought what she said was an improved deal to parliament for Tuesday’s vote, one that sought to remove concerns about the border between Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland. Opponents want to make sure Britain is not locked into a long-term customs agreement that subjects the country to EU trade rules.

May hinted Wednesday that she could try for a third time to get lawmakers to approve the deal that negotiators from Britain and the EU worked on for two years.

The Wednesday vote rejecting a no-deal exit does not carry legal weight, only political force, meaning it is still possible that without an extension and without an agreement during the next two weeks, Brexit could proceed with no divorce terms in place.
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Estonia’s president called for continued unity among democratic allies in the face of Russian aggression on Wednesday and expressed a wish for even greater U.S. involvement in the Baltics.

Kersti Kaljulaid, on her second visit to the United States in less than a year, told an audience at the Brookings Institution that membership in the European Union and NATO have served to defend and enhance her country’s sovereignty.

With only 1.2 million people and located on the Baltic Sea near Russia, the former Soviet republic has been especially concerned about growing Russian assertiveness, particularly since its annexation of the Ukrainian region of Crimea and its military support for two breakaway regions in Georgia.

‘Direct involvement in Baltics’

The United States has responded with military exercises along NATO’s borders with Russia and a troop presence in Poland, actions acknowledged by Kaljulaid. While “America’s contribution to enhanced forward presence in Poland is appreciated, we would love to see more U.S. direct involvement in the Baltics as well,” she said.

Rachel Ellehuus, deputy director and senior fellow with the Europe Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), said Estonia and its Baltic neighbors have served as model members of NATO since being admitted to the defense alliance in 2004, but cannot defend themselves without help.

“Due to their small size, they need our and NATO’s help in procuring big-ticket capabilities,” Ellehuus said in an interview.

Quick US response appreciated

The former Pentagon official noted that the United States was the first country to send forces to the Baltics following Russia’s takeover of Crimea.

She said she would like to see “a persistent rotational presence of U.S. forces in the Baltics and possibly funding in the appropriations bill to support regional capability development in areas such as air and maritime surveillance.”

In an age of increasing attention devoted to big-power politics and competition, it is understood that small states like the Baltic countries cannot win a war against a power like Russia, but they can raise the cost of war for their potential adversaries.

“Their strategy is to increase resilience and hold the line until reinforcements, i.e., NATO, regional partners, can come to their aid,” said Ellehuus. She quoted her former boss at the Pentagon, Secretary of Defense James Mattis, saying that “even the bear knows to avoid the porcupine.”

In Ellehuus’s words: The Baltics can take steps “to make themselves as indigestible as possible,” even though they don’t have the capacity to win an all-out war against their giant neighbor to the east.

‘Follow-up plan’

In her speech on Wednesday, Kaljulaid said her country was prepared to “hold the line” against an initial assault but that the “follow-on plan” involving sufficient allied forces was not yet in place.

Her visit to Washington comes at a time when the Pentagon made it clear in the latest national defense budget proposal that it is focused on countering rising capacities from both Russia and China and ensuring that potential adversaries know there is “no path to victory” if they choose to fight the United States.
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A proposed permanent U.S. military base in Poland, nicknamed “Fort Trump,” is one step closer to becoming a reality. 

Negotiations on establishing the base are “ongoing this very week,” Kathryn Wheelbarger, the acting assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, told the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday. 

Wheelbarger’s comments came as John Rood, the undersecretary of defense for policy, met with his Polish counterpart to work out details of what Rood called a “generous offer” from Poland, according to defense officials.  

Warsaw has offered to contribute at least $2 billion to place permanent U.S. forces and assets in Poland, a NATO ally, in an attempt to deter any possible Russian aggression. NATO has expanded its presence near Russia’s borders to reassure its eastern members, a buildup Russia has described as a threat to its security. 

“We’ve come forward with, we think, a very serious, robust offer, and we’re working out some of the technicalities this very week,” Wheelbarger said. “We hope to have a very solid foundation to work from coming out of this meeting today.” 

She added that it would most likely take six months to a year for any base agreement to be finalized. 

Permanent base seen as ‘helpful’

The U.S. military would not need to start budgeting for the base for at least two or three years, according to Army Gen. Curtis “Mike” Scaparrotti, the head of U.S. European Command. 

Asked about making rotational U.S. forces permanent in Poland, Scaparrotti told lawmakers he’s “perfectly content with the large forces that we are rotating,” but a more permanent base would be “helpful.” 

Negotiations on the proposed base with Warsaw come amid reports that the Trump administration is considering a plan in which wealthy nations such as Germany, Japan and South Korea would be required to pay the full cost of U.S. soldiers deployed on their territory, plus 50 percent more for the privilege of American defense. 

Wheelbarger denied that the “cost plus 50” idea was being discussed for European allies, telling lawmakers, “My understanding is that rhetoric came from conversations from the Pacific; it’s not a conversation we’ve had in my portfolio at all.”
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