Month: April 2019

Foreign ministers from the Group of Seven advanced economies were wrapping up a two-day meeting in the French seaside resort of Dinard on Saturday where they hope to seal joint commitments on a range of global challenges and lay the groundwork for August’s G-7 summit in Biarritz.

Diplomats from G-7 countries, which include the U.S., France, Canada, Japan, Germany, Italy and the U.K., walked side-by-side against the rocky Atlantic coast backdrop and in the fresh Brittany air to project a united front before a working lunch. They hope to agree on a joint statement on the fight against trafficking drugs, arms and migrants in Africa’s troubled Sahel region, fighting cybercrime and stopping sexual violence against women in conflict zones, especially in Africa.

But U.S. officials said that points of discord will also be discussed at the talks led by the host, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian. U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan said that Washington will use the G-7 forum to galvanize support for Venezuela’s opposition leader, Juan Guaido, who the U.S. has backed to lead the country into a “democratic transformation from the failed regime” of President Nicolas Maduro.

Guaido has embarked on an international campaign to topple the socialist administration of Venezuela’s president amid deepening unrest in the country, which has been plagued by nearly a month of power outages.

Washington seems to be at odds with Italy over its stance on the crisis-hit South American country, being the sole G-7 member state to not back Guaido.

The U.S. and Canada have pursued a pro-active stance on widening support for Guaido, according to French officials.  But there has already been widespread alarm after Guaido was stripped of immunity by Maduro loyalists earlier this week.

“With Juan Guaido being stripped of his immunity … we don’t want the situation to escalate,” German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said in Dinard on Saturday.

“We are still of the opinion that free elections should take place during which Venezuelans can decide themselves who will lead the country,” he added.

Italy has also irked EU and U.S. allies by becoming the first G-7 member to sign up to a contentious Chinese plan to build a Silk Road-style global trade network, the trillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative.

 
…

In a bid to increase renewable energy use in Europe, the European Commission adopted a new regulatory framework in June 2018. With the EU Renewable Energy Directive (RED II) the European Union applied new criteria March 13 for crops used for the production of biofuels: They must be sustainable and not cause deforestation through indirect land use change.

According to the EU, palm oil has been associated with the highest level of deforestation of any crop from 2008 to 2015, thereby deeming one of Indonesia’s biggest export commodities unsustainable. 

As a result the EU will begin a gradual reduction of palm oil imports from Indonesia in January 2024.

The chairman of the Indonesian Palm Oil Association, Joko Supriyono, questions the criteria set by the EU for palm oil.

“They mentioned ILUC (Indirect Land Use Change) and palm oil has high ILUC-risk. From our point of view, their methodology to determine that is unclear. We believe the regulation is discriminatory,” he told VOA last week.

​Bring the issue to WTO

The Indonesian government agrees with the association’s concern. The Indonesian Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Darmin Nasution, says that the regulation will have a negative impact for the export of crude palm oil (CPO) from Indonesia to the EU.

“This is a discriminatory act, if they want to test it, let’s test (the regulation) together. We will bring this to the WTO. So it’s clear, whether their action is fair or this is simply protectionism that’s concealed with different accusations,” he said in a statement.

The EU is Indonesia’s second biggest export market for CPO after India. Data from the Indonesian Palm Oil Association recorded 4.78 million tons of CPO exported to the EU last year. Supriyono said for biofuel purposes alone, the country exported around 800,000 tons in 2018.

Although Indonesian market share in the EU is quite large, Supriyono says it is not about how much palm oil Indonesia sends to Europe. 

“Our biggest concern is because the European market has become a reference for other countries. We are worried of the effect after, because the EU bans our palm oil, then other countries will follow suit. It’s the negative image,” he explained.

The EU has a two-month comment period during which the European Parliament and the European Council can express an objection to the new directive. Supriyono said the Indonesian government will file a complaint to the WTO if the regulation is passed and published at the Official Journal of the European Union.

In a statement, the EU said that their doors will always be open for a frank discussion with the Indonesian government and other stakeholders.

“We also expect that the establishment of a joint working group between the EU and relevant ASEAN Member States to address issues relating to palm oil will serve as another avenue for discussion,” the EU said.

​Indonesia has few bargaining chips

Luhut Binsar Panjaitan, the Indonesian coordinating minister of maritime affairs, says Indonesia must be firm. The Indonesian government is threatening to boycott products from the EU in retaliation for the palm oil restrictions.

“There are a lot of European Union products that we need. With our 55 million people in the middle class and 269 million people of the total population, the market is huge,” he said adding that the palm industry plays a significant role in the Indonesian economy.

Nevertheless, Enny Sri Hartati, the director of Institute for Development of Economics and Finance (INDEF), says the issue will not be solved by threats. She believes that the right way to dismiss any accusations about Indonesian palm oil is by proving them wrong.

“Use supporting data, to counter the accusation. For example, the industry players have obtained the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certificate. Fighting it with retaliation will not benefit anyone. Even if Indonesia boycotts products, will the accusation stop?” she told VOA.

Hartati mentions that the issue with the EU directive is only biofuel, while the uses of derivatives of palm oil are very diverse, including in the pharmaceutical, cosmetics and food industries.

“Our limitation all this while is we can’t develop the diversification of palm oil. Our market is only the traditional market for CPO. And that makes our bargaining position weak,” she added. She believes that the government must create policies to give more incentives for the industry to diversify.

Ongoing CEPA negotiation

Indonesia and the EU are currently negotiating the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), a process that began in July 2016. The seventh round of negotiations took place in Brussels last March. Supriyono said the latest development on palm oil will impact the CEPA discussion.

“We are talking about an industry that has a significant contribution for Indonesia. Because of palm oil, our trade with Europe is a surplus. This becomes a consideration for our government, that the trade negotiation should be able to increase our export,” he said. Supriyono said the palm oil discussion is one of the reasons why the conclusion of the trade agreement has been delayed for the past two years.
…

A new survey shows that less than half of Americans support the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, an alliance originally designed to provide collective security against the Soviet Union, but now focused on Russia and non-state actors such as the Taliban and the Islamic State group.

The YouGov survey, released to commemorate the 70th anniversary of NATO, found that only 44 percent of Americans support the United States’ place in the agreement. That was down 3 percentage points from when the survey was conducted in 2017.

The poll also surveyed other NATO countries and found that support for the alliance had decreased significantly in the past two years among key European allies. Support for NATO dropped in Britain from 73 percent to 59 percent, in Germany from 68 percent to 54 percent, and in France from 54 percent to 39 percent.

YouGov said there is a generational divide in the United States over support for NATO, with 56 percent of the Baby Boomer generation, who grew up at the beginning of the Cold War, believing that the treaty continues to serve an important role in defending Western nations. Only 35 percent of Millennials and 33 percent of Generation X members support U.S. participation in the alliance.

There is also a political divide, according to the survey, with 60 percent of Democrats in the United States agreeing the alliance serves an important role, while only 38 percent of Republicans believe the same.

YouGov contacted more than 1,200 U.S. adults for the survey, which was conducted online, as well as more than 1,000 adults in several European countries.

NATO was formed to be an alliance of Western nations that would balance the military power of the Soviet Union and its allies in Eastern Europe. After the former Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, some experts questioned what part the alliance would play in international security, but the return of Russian assertiveness under President Vladimir Putin has partly changed that.

NATO has expanded to include countries that were once part of the Soviet bloc, and has also added countries that are further away, such as Turkey and Greece.

U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized the group, saying many NATO members do not spend enough on defense to fully meet their commitments under the agreement.
…

Chancellor Angela Merkel has received former U.S. President Barack Obama at her office in Berlin for a meeting characterized by German officials as a routine private encounter with a former international peer.

Obama could be seen waving as he left the chancellery alongside Merkel Friday. Merkel’s spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said she has met repeatedly with ex-heads of state and government “with whom she worked together closely and well for a time.”

He said the meeting has no implications for current German-U.S. relations. Asked whether it was a signal to President Donald Trump, with whom Germany has a sometimes-complicated relationship, Seibert replied: “I would firmly reject that impression.”

Merkel and Obama have already met in Berlin since the former president left office, participating in a discussion at a May 2017 conference.
…

Albania will learn in June whether the European Union will move forward with accession talks to admit the Balkan nation as a member. Albania will also hold local elections in June — possibly without the main opposition party taking part. As these two events draw near, political instability is mounting. Sabina Castelfranco has more from Tirana.
…

European Council President Donald Tusk wants Britain to have until next April to come up with a viable plan for its exit from from the European Union. 

EU leaders would have to approve the extension which gives Britain the option of leaving the group earlier if parliament approves an exit deal. 

British Prime Minister Theresa May is set to write Tusk a letter Friday formally requesting another extension, until June 30. 

Britain was originally due to leave the bloc by March 29, but May got approval from the EU for a short extension to give her government more time to find a solution parliament could support.

While the process dragged on, parliament sought its own path forward, but in a series of votes Monday lawmakers struck down four possible paths forward. The closest that came to passing was a proposal to have Britain withdraw from the EU, but remain in a customs union.

The latest deadline set by the European Union was April 12, but no withdrawal plans have been approved by British lawmakers. 

The delays mean Britain is beginning preparations to vote for it’s representatives to the European parliament on May 23.
…

Russia has made reaffirming its presence in the Arctic a top goal, revamping the military Arctic outpost of Severny Klever along the Arctic shipping route

Missile launchers ply icy roads and air defense systems point menacingly into the sky at this Arctic military outpost, a key vantage point for Russia to project its power over the resource-rich polar region.

The base, dubbed Severny Klever (Northern Clover) for its trefoil shape, is painted in the white, blue and red colors of the Russian national flag. It has been designed so soldiers can reach all of its sprawling facilities without venturing outdoors — a useful precaution in an area where temperatures often plunge to minus 50 Celsius (minus 58 Fahrenheit) during the winter, and even in the short Arctic summer are often freezing at night. 

It’s strategically located on Kotelny Island, between the Laptev Sea and the East Siberian Sea on the Arctic shipping route, and permanently houses up to 250 military personnel responsible for maintaining air and sea surveillance facilities and coastal defenses like anti-ship missiles.

The Russian base has enough supplies to remain fully autonomous for more than a year.

“Our task is to monitor the airspace and the northern sea route,” said base commander Lt. Col. Vladimir Pasechnik. “We have all we need for our service and comfortable living.”

Russia is not alone in trying to assert jurisdiction over parts of the Arctic, as shrinking polar ice opens fresh opportunities for resource exploration and new shipping lanes. The United States, Canada, Denmark and Norway are jostling for position, as well, and China also has shown an increasing interest in the polar region.

But while U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has seen the Arctic through the lens of security and economic competition with Russia and China, it has yet to demonstrate that the region is a significant priority in its overall foreign policy. The post of special U.S. representative for the Arctic has remained vacant since Trump assumed office.

Russia, however, has made reaffirming its presence in the Arctic a top goal, not the least because the region is believed to hold up to one-quarter of the Earth’s undiscovered oil and gas. Russian President Vladimir Putin has cited estimates that put the value of Arctic mineral riches at $30 trillion.

The move has alarmed Russia’s neighbors, analysts say.

“In Russia, the Northern sea route has been described as a bonanza with lots of potential of economic development,” said Flemming Splidsboel Hansen of the Danish Institute for International Studies. “And that’s why there is a need for military capacity in the area. It is likely meant as defensive, but it is being interpreted by the West as offensive.”

Kristian Soeby Kristensen, a researcher at Copenhagen University in Denmark, said the problem of Russian hegemony in the Arctic was most obvious to Norway.

“Norway is a small country, whose next-door neighbor is mighty Russia, which has placed the bulk of its military capacity right next to them,” Soeby Kristensen said. “Norway is extraordinarily worried.”

In 2015, Russia submitted to the United Nations a revised bid for vast territories in the Arctic. It claimed 1.2 million square kilometers (over 463,000 square miles) of Arctic sea shelf, extending more than 350 nautical miles (about 650 kilometers) from the shore.

As part of a multipronged effort to stake Russia’s claims on the Arctic region, the Kremlin has poured massive resources into modernizing Soviet-era installations there.

The military outpost on Kotelny Island fell into neglect after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, but a massive effort to build a new base began in 2014 and took several years. 

A group of reporters brought to the island by the Russian Defense Ministry on Wednesday were shown Bastion anti-ship missile launchers positioned for a drill near the shore and Pantsyr-S1 air defense systems firing shots at a practice target. 

The Russian military has kept Western media from visiting its Arctic facilities, so the trip offered a unique opportunity to watch the Russian expansion up close. 

A big radar dome looms on a hill overlooking the coast, underlining the base’s main mission of monitoring the strategic area.

In contrast with drab, Soviet-era facilities, the pristine new base features spacious living quarters, a gym and a sauna. Putin’s words about the importance of the Arctic for Russia dot the base’s walls and a symbolic border post sits in a hallway.

Soldiers at the base say they are proud of their mission despite the challenging Arctic environment.

“Proving to myself that I can do it raises my self-esteem,” said one of the soldiers, Sergei Belogov. “Weather is our enemy here, so we need to protect ourselves from it to serve the Motherland.”

Extreme cold and fierce winds often make it hard to venture outside, and even winterized vehicles may have trouble operating when temperatures plunge to extreme lows and even special lubricants freeze.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu reported to Putin in December that the military has rebuilt or expanded numerous facilities across the polar region, revamping runways and deploying air defense assets. He said renovation works were conducted on a long string of Arctic territories.

The expanded infrastructure has allowed the Russian military to restore full radar coverage of the nation’s 22,600-kilometer (14,000-mile) Arctic frontier and deploy fighter jets to protect its airspace.

The military also has undertaken a cleanup effort across the region, working to remove tens of thousands of tons of waste from the Arctic territories, most of it rusty fuel tanks left behind by the Soviet military.

The Russian soldiers share the island with polar bears, arctic foxes and wolves.

Officers said that, soon after the base opened, curious bears regularly prowled near its walls, sometimes even peering into its windows. On some occasions, soldiers had to use a truck to spook away a particularly curious bear wandering nearby.

Soldiers interviewed at the base said they marveled at the area’s wildlife and its majestic Arctic landscapes.

“The nature here is extremely beautiful,” said Navy Lt. Umar Erkenov, who came from southern Russia. “Meeting a polar bear is an experience that fills you with emotions. We have established friendly ties with them from the start. We don’t touch them, they don’t touch us.”

He said he’s missing his wife and daughter, whom he can only see during his leave period once a year, but is proud of his mission.

“Few people do their job under such conditions,” he said. “I feel proud that I’m here with my unit, doing my duty and protecting the Motherland.”
…

Some European countries could soon find themselves cut off from U.S. intelligence and other critical information if they continue to cultivate relationships with Chinese technology firms.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued the warning Thursday, following a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Washington.

“We’ve done our risk analysis,” Pompeo said. “We have now shared that with our NATO partners, with countries all around the world. We’ve made clear that if the risk exceeds the threshold for the United States, we simply won’t be able to share that information any longer.”

U.S. defense and intelligence officials have warned repeatedly in recent years of a growing threat that information shared over Chinese-built networks or Chinese-made devices could be stolen or copied and shared with the Chinese government.

More recently, concerns have focused on China’s Huawei and ZTE, which have been offering to build advanced, high-speed 5G for mobile devices across Europe.

A report issued earlier this week by the U.S. Defense Innovation Board, which advises the Pentagon, raised the possibility Huawei already is building so-called “backdoors,” or security vulnerabilities, into its software and products.

“Many of these seem to be related to requirements from the Chinese intelligence community pressuring companies to exfiltrate information about domestic users,” the report said, citing the example of Xiongmai, a Chinese security camera maker that was using Huawei code to allow unauthorized access to millions of cameras.

While some European countries have acknowledged U.S. concerns, the European Union has rejected calls for a blanket ban on Huawei, in particular.

NATO response

As for NATO, some officials, including Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, have called for more consultations and have suggested the need for a more nuanced response, given there are currently few alternatives in Europe to Huawei’s 5G technology.

“We’re just in the preliminary stages,” NATO analyst and consultant Benedetta Berti said earlier this week in Washington.

“We need to take stock of our critical vulnerabilities, of the impact of external investments on our critical infrastructure,” she said. “We will come to a common strategic understanding.”

U.S. urgency

But U.S. officials are pushing for greater urgency.

“It is as important for NATO as it is for us,” State Department Director of Policy Planning Kiron Skinner told reporters this week. “How European countries address China’s involvement across all of their sectors is central to American security,” he added.

“When a nation shows up and offers you goods that are well below market, one ought to ask what else is at play,” Pompeo said Thursday, calling the offers from Chinese technology companies “literally too good to be true.”

“There is undoubtedly the risk that NATO or the United States will not be able to share information in the same way it could if there were not Chinese systems inside of those networks, inside of those capabilities,” he said.
…

The United States is considering expanding sales of Lockheed Martin Corp made F-35 fighter jets to five new nations including Romania, Greece and Poland as European allies bulk up their defenses in the face of a strengthening Russia, a Pentagon official told Congress on Thursday.

In written testimony submitted to the U.S. House of Representatives and seen by Reuters, Vice Admiral Mathias Winter — the head of the Pentagon’s F-35 office — said that “future potential Foreign Military Sales customers include Singapore, Greece, Romania, Spain and Poland.”

News of the new customers coincides with U.S. tension with F-35 development partner Turkey over Ankara’s plans to buy a Russian missile defense system.

Foreign military sales like those of the F-35 are considered government-to-government deals where the Pentagon acts as an intermediary between the defense contractor and a foreign government.

Other countries considering F-35

Other U.S. allies have been eyeing a purchase of the stealthy jet including Finland, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates.

Winter’s full written testimony, which will be made public as soon as Friday, said the United States would respond to all official requests for information about the jet.

Last year, Belgium was the first new customer for the F-35 in years, choosing it over the Eurofighter Typhoon to replace its aging F-16s in a 4 billion euro ($4.55 billion) deal.

Under President Donald Trump the United States has rolled out a “Buy American” plan that relaxed restrictions on sales and encouraged U.S. officials to take a bigger role in increasing business overseas for the U.S. weapons industry.

Three models of F-35 available

Lockheed, the jet’s prime contractor, is developing and building three models of the new warplanes for the U.S. military and 10 other countries that have signed up to buy the jets: Britain, Australia, Italy, Turkey, Norway, the Netherlands, Israel, Japan, South Korea and Belgium.

U.S. arms sales to foreign governments rose 13 percent to $192.3 billion in the year ending Sept. 30, the State Department said in November.

Lockheed delivered 91 F-35 fighter jets to the United States and its allies in calendar 2018.
…

To experience corruption in Ukraine, just go for a drive. The bone-crunching, bouncing ride over the countless potholes is a daily ritual for travelers across the country.

Campaigners say the local authorities’ failure to repair the winter road damage is just one symptom of the myriad corruption schemes that plague the country.

Tackling corruption is invariably among the issues Ukrainians cite as a top priority for the next president, as incumbent Petro Poroshenko and newcomer Volodymyr Zelenskiy face a final round runoff April 21.

​Anti-corruption law struck down

There are growing fears that government resolve is stalling, after Ukraine’s Constitutional Court in February struck down a law against officials enriching themselves. The U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch recently demanded the government get a grip on the problem.

High-level corruption poses an existential threat, says Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, executive director of Transparency International Ukraine.

“Schemes which are now existing in the sphere of national security or the energy sphere, it’s really dangerous for not only [government] effectiveness but also it’s dangerous for the existence of Ukraine, because we are a country now in war. And this corruption helps our enemy make us weaker,” Yurchyshyn said.

Poroshenko’s bid to win a second presidential term has been caught up in corruption allegations over military procurement. He denies involvement.

Yurchyshyn says Poroshenko shouldn’t be singled out. 

“When we see other candidates in the presidential campaign, for everyone we have several questions for his or their close affiliations with different corruption schemes,” he said.

Journalists, lawyers investigate

Many Ukrainians have had enough and are fighting back. The group BIHUS info consists of dozens of journalists and lawyers investigating corruption. Their results are put on YouTube, and they are not afraid to tackle some of the biggest scandals. One recent investigation looked into the funding of the Fatherland party, led by defeated presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko.

“Three residents of these two villages were among the party’s biggest contributors in 2018, donating more than $148,000 (4 million hryvnias),” according to reporter Maksym Opanasenko in a recent documentary on the BIHUS info YouTube channel. He then confronts one of the party donors as she is working at the checkout of a local village store. It is clear that she is not the real source of the money.

Such schemes use a typical formula, employing intermediaries to disguise financial transactions, says founder of the group Denys Bihus.

“A poor person is hired, and he or she then draws up financial documents for a silly amount of money. Then they pass the right to sign off on these documents to someone else, but formally, they remain the only one visible in [public] documents,” Bihus told VOA in a recent interview.

The Fatherland party denies accusations of corruption.

Bihus says they pass on evidence from their investigations to law enforcement agencies. 

“But the problem is that, though we can initiate a case, we cannot force them to investigate it effectively. This is especially true in those cases where top politicians are involved,” he said.

​Symbol of graft

Decades of graft can even be seen along the Kyiv skyline. Construction on the vast Podilsko-Voskresenskyi Bridge, a rail and road crossing over the Dnieper River, started 26 years ago. Work has been halted repeatedly over corruption scandals. It is still not complete.

Anti-corruption campaigners say fighting corruption in the system is not enough for in Ukraine, the system is corruption.
…

Tackling corruption is invariably among the issues Ukrainians cite as a top priority for the next president. Incumbent Petro Poroshenko and newcomer Volodymyr Zelenskiy face a final round runoff April 21. There are growing fears that government resolve is stalling after Ukraine’s Constitutional Court in February struck down a law against officials enriching themselves. The U.S. ambassador to Ukraine recently demanded the government get a grip on the problem. Henry Ridgwell reports from Kyiv.
…