English LCCC Newsbulletin For
Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For August 26/2020
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
#elias_bejjani_news
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Bible Quotations For today
And if
you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what
is your own?
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according
to Saint Luke 16/09-12: “I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of
dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal
homes. ‘Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and
whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you
have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the
true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who
will give you what is your own?”
Titles For The Latest English LCCC
Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on
August 25-26/2021
Ministry of Health: 1593 new infections, 5 deaths
US worried about potential collapse in
Lebanon, Hezbollah’s missile technology
A senior administration official said the US was prepared to brief Israel’s PM
on its approach to the Lebanon-Israel maritime border dispute.
Rahi, Shea tackle necessity of forming government and working to enact reforms
President signs decrees on monitoring energy resources, urgent social aids to
public servants
Aoun, Majzoub broach educational situation
Miqati Reportedly Postpones Baabda Visit at Paris Request
Reports: Miqati Urged to Postpone Line-Up Submission
Judge Aoun Issues Search Warrant against Salameh
INL and FBI Provide Counter Public Corruption Training for ISF Members and
Judges
Clashes Erupt at Gas Stations in South and North
Geagea says sole solution lies in liberating prices immediately, endorsing
ration card
Hospital Owners’ Syndicate: Reserve sufficient for two days, patients’ lives at
risk
FPM reiterates denial of any intervention by Bassil in government formation
process
National Council for Scientific Research-Lebanon (CNRS-L) deploys first anchored
marine laboratory buoy in Lebanese sea
Municipalities and Unions of Municipalities in Lebanon propose new development
projects responding to urgent needs in their communities
Lebanon raids discover hoarded fuel, medicine and baby formula/Najat Houssari/Arab
News/August 25/2021
No end in sight: Lebanon’s government crisis rages on as country on its knees/Geiege
Azar/Arab News/August 25/2021
Let them stop us if they dare' – Why Hezbollah is bringing Iranian fuel to
Lebanon/Radwan Mortada/The Cradle/August 25/2021
On m'accuse souvent de m'attaquer dernièrement à la révolution./Jean-Marie
Kassab/August 25/2021
Titles For The Latest English LCCC
Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 25-26/2021
Israel claims Iran launched drone strike on tanker
Israel’s new leader to present Iran plan in first White House visit
Israel Warns to Act if Needed 'to Prevent a Nuclear Iran'
Afghan Resistance Leader Vows 'No Surrender'
China Describes "Effective" Talks with Taliban
Brazil detains two French travelers for perching atop iconic statue
Dubai Confirms Arrest Of Italian Drug Lord
Algeria-Morocco crisis: Paris calls for “dialogue” in the interest of regional
“stability”
Attacker kills three police and security guard near French embassy in Tanzania
Iran's parliament approves President Raisi's government: AFP
High blood pressure doubled globally in 30 years, study shows
Oil Spill from Power Station Spreads along Syria's Coast
Morocco rejects Algeria’s decision to sever ties as ‘completely unjustifiable’
Saudi-Russian defence agreement reflects Riyadh’s diversification drive
Cyprus to revoke passports of Turkish Cypriot officials
Titles For The Latest The Latest LCCC
English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on
August 25-26/2021
Act Now to Save and Learn the Lessons of the Afghan War/Anthony H.
Cordesman/CSIS/August 25/2021
How American Weapons Find Their Way to International Criminal Organizations/Emanuele
Ottolenghi/The Dispatch-FDD/August 25/2021
Afghanistan's Christians are turning off phones and going into hiding/Kelsey
Zorzi/The Hill/August 25/2021Azerbaijani support underpins Turkey’s ambitions in
South Caucasus/The Arab Weekly/August 25/2021
A trial in Sweden raises uncomfortable questions about Iranian regime’s past/Ann
Torknkvist/Arab News/August 25/2021
How Taliban 2.0 turned into a lethal force/Mohamed Chebaro/Arab News/August
25/2021
Taliban drug trade hints at a way to protect Afghan culture/Rym Tina Ghazal/Arab
News/August 25/2021
The Latest English LCCC Lebanese &
Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on August 25-26/2021
Ministry of Health: 1593 new infections, 5 deaths
NNA/August 25/2021
The Ministry of Public Health announced 1,593 new coronavirus infection cases,
raising the cumulative number of confirmed cases to 595,522.
Five deaths have been recorded.
US worried about potential collapse in Lebanon,
Hezbollah’s missile technology
A senior administration official said the US was prepared to brief Israel’s PM
on its approach to the Lebanon-Israel maritime border dispute.
Joseph Haboush, Al Arabiya English/25 August ,2021
The US will share its mutual concern with Israel over Iran-backed Hezbollah’s
precision-guided missile technology, a senior Biden administration official said
Tuesday. “There is a discussion to be had in terms of our mutual concerns,
security concerns, about what’s going on in Lebanon. Of course, the Israelis are
quite concerned in terms of the precision-guided missile technology transfer
piece to Hezbollah, and we’re quite concerned about that,” the US official told
Al Arabiya English during a phone briefing with reporters.But the US will also
discuss the “real potential for state collapse if the Lebanese political elites
do not get their act together and form a new government,” the US official said.
Lebanon has been without a fully functioning government for over a year since
Hassan Diab’s government resigned following last year’s blast at the Port of
Beirut. Poverty has reached unprecedented levels, shortages of medicines and
fuel have sparked violence, and the local currency has plummeted by 90 percent.
The international community has offered to provide badly needed financial aid,
but it has demanded a new government and reforms to combat corruption and the
waste of public funds. Potential offshore fields of natural gas are one way
Lebanon has hoped to begin climbing out of its economic and financial crisis.
Some of the largest potential reserves lie in disputed waters along Lebanon’s
southern maritime border with Israel. The US has tried to mediate a solution for
decades. A breakthrough in the yearslong dispute appeared in the works after the
Trump administration facilitated the first talks between the sides at the UN
headquarters in southern Lebanon last year. Indirect talks have since stalled,
and Hezbollah has blamed the US. But the US is ready to resume its diplomatic
efforts. “I would just say that, I mean, we'll be ready to brief the [Israeli]
prime minister and his team on sort of our approach on that maritime issue,” the
US official said. A second US official, also on the call, said the crisis in
Lebanon and the formation of a new government was making it difficult to discuss
the maritime border dispute. “But we’re hopeful that a new Lebanese government
can be formed and that we can pick that up again because it’s very important to
us,” the second US official said.
The US ambassador to Lebanon, Dorothy Shea, brushed off Hezbollah’s allegations
during an interview with Al Arabiya English last week. “I think there is an
interest on both sides to try to give it another go,” she said, adding that
Washington was exploring with both sides whether it makes sense to resume “some
form of talks.” Shea said she believed the next round of talks would not be in
south Lebanon “until we get more of a sense of agreement about what they’re
negotiating over.” The diplomat also revealed to Al Arabiya English that talks
were held last week among US officials about “some creative ideas that we might
be able to bring to the table” as mediators. Pushing back against Hezbollah’s
claims that the US was blocking efforts to solve the maritime dispute, Shea
said: “The last I checked, the United States offered its services as a mediator
and facilitator as a goodwill gesture. We’re not being compensated for that … so
we wouldn’t be doing that if we wanted it to fail or if we were just serving the
interests of one party, which we were also accused of.”“But ultimately, the
parties need to regroup a little bit because they had reached the point of
disconnect about what they were even negotiating over,” she said.
Rahi, Shea tackle necessity of forming government
and working to enact reforms
NNA/August 25/2021
The Maronite Patriarch, Cardinal Mar Bechara Boutros Al-Rahi, received at the
Summer Patriarchal Residence in Diman the US Ambassador to Lebanon, Dorothy
Shea, accompanied by Counselor Ethan Lynch.During the meeting, they discussed
the overall developments on the Lebanese arena, especially the necessity of
forming a government and working on enacting the necessary reforms. The
discussions tackled “the various developments in the local arena, especially the
issue of the government’s formation and the efforts to achieve the necessary
reforms that Lebanon needs,” al-Jadeed TV said.Shea and al-Rahi also stressed
the need to “form the government as soon as possible, because the Lebanese
people can no longer withstand further economic and social pressures.”At the end
of the visit, the patriarch presented a cedar implant to the ambassador
President signs decrees on monitoring energy
resources, urgent social aids to public servants
NNA /August 25/2021
President Michel Aoun signed Wednesday a decree hereby tasking the military and
security forces, as well as municipal police, with the monitoring of energy
resources and the organization of their distribution until mid-September. Aoun
signed another decree hereby granting the Ministry of Finance a treasury advance
of LBP 600 billion to be cashed to all public servants in the form of urgent
social assistance.
Aoun, Majzoub broach educational situation
NNA/August 25/2021
President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, on Wednesday broached the
country’s educational situation amid the many difficulties facing the start of
the school year. Majzoub also briefed the president on the five-year plan set by
the ministry of education till the year 2025.
Miqati Reportedly Postpones Baabda Visit at Paris
Request
Naharnet/August 25/2021
Prime Minister-designate Najib Miqati on Wednesday postponed a visit to the
Baabda Palace to Thursday, al-Jadeed TV said. “The postponement of Miqati’s
visit to Baabda today came after French interventions that requested some time
to resolve some obstacles,” the TV network added. Lebanese journalist Simon Abi
Fadel meanwhile told al-Jadeed that Paris had communicated Monday with Miqati to
“urge him not to allocate the energy portfolio to the Free Patriotic Movement.”
Reports: Miqati Urged to Postpone Line-Up Submission
Naharnet/August 25/2021
Prime Minister-designate Najib Miqati “had made up his mind and was intending to
present a new cabinet line-up to President Michel Aoun” on Tuesday, according to
media sources. The sources told al-Liwaa newspaper, in remarks published
Wednesday, that “local parties including Hizbullah have contacted Miqati to
convince him to give more time for solving the conflicts and finding common
ground with Aoun,” before deciding on the line-up. The sources added that “a
remarkable French drive was meanwhile urging Miqati to intensify consultations
and give a few additional days before making a final decision concerning the
line-up.”At the same time French diplomats are “encouraging Miqati to continue
his mission,” according to the sources.
Judge Aoun Issues Search Warrant against Salameh
Naharnet/August 25/2021
Judge Ghada Aoun issued on Wednesday a search warrant for Central Bank Governor
Riad Salameh in the case against the Mecattaf firm and the SGBL bank, TV
networks said. The search warrant was issued after Riad Salameh refrained from
attending several sessions in the case of the illegal money transfers of the
beforementioned company and bank.“I did my job,” Aoun said, urging the security
agencies to act.
INL and FBI Provide Counter Public Corruption
Training for ISF Members and Judges
Naharnet/August 25/2021
In collaboration with the FBI, the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of
International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) at the U.S. Embassy in
Beirut has conducted a training on countering public corruption at the Internal
Security Forces (ISF) academy in Aramoun, the Embassy said on Wednesday.
"Twenty-four ISF members and four judges were able to complete the training and
benefit from the knowledge of the FBI experts," the Embassy added in a
statement."Since 2007, the U.S. Government, through INL funding, has invested
approximately $197 million in training and equipment for the ISF that has helped
to professionalize and modernize Lebanon’s police forces, increase the country’s
security and stability, and promote the rule of law," the statement said.
Clashes Erupt at Gas Stations in South and North
Naharnet/August 25/2021
A group of young men on Wednesday attacked a gas station in the southern town of
Msayleh and assaulted its owner and his three sons, al-Jadeed TV reported. They
“attacked the owner and his sons with batons and sharp objects, fired gunshots
in the air and tried to smash and torch the station, leaving several people
injured,” the TV network said. The owner had appeared on al-Jadeed earlier in
the day and accused “extortion gangs” of imposing their control over his gas
station. Citizens stranded at the gas station meanwhile urged security forces to
intervene to contain the situation. Elsewhere, a dispute at a gas station in the
northern region of al-Beddawi escalated into a fistfight and gunfire. An
altercation at another Beddawi gas station also erupted into gunfire. The
reports blamed the clashes on disputes between citizens and the workers of the
two gas stations due to the major vehicles congestion that the two stations
witnessed. The two incidents sparked panic among citizens as an army force
arrived at the two stations and worked on containing the situation.
Geagea says sole solution lies in liberating prices
immediately, endorsing ration card
NNA/August 25/2021
Lebanese Forces Party leader, Samir Geagea, on Wednesday said via his Twitter
account: “All the wasteful acts that the current authority pillars are carrying
out on the issue of fuel, medicines and other commodoties, will not lead to any
result,” stressing that the only solution lies in the immediate liberation of
prices and the endorsement of the ration card.
Hospital Owners’ Syndicate: Reserve sufficient for
two days, patients’ lives at risk
NNA/August 25/2021
The Syndicate of Hospital Owners in Lebanon on Wednesday issued the following
statement: “The diesel crisis is impacting the work of hospitals after the
Syndicate had been informed that diesel had run out in Tripoli and Zahrani
facilities, and very limited quantities remain with private importing companies.
Most hospitals’ reserves will only last for two days, and some for one day, and
as such we are facing an imminent danger that directly threatens the lives of
patients.”
FPM reiterates denial of any intervention by Bassil
in government formation process
NNA/August 25/2021
The Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) on Wednesday reiterated in a statement its
utter denial of any sort of interference by MP Gebran Bassil in the ongoing
cabinet formation negotiations. The statement also affirmed that Bassil was only
playing the role of a facilitator to help reach an agreement over a cabinet
lineup.
National Council for Scientific Research-Lebanon (CNRS-L)
deploys first anchored marine laboratory buoy in Lebanese sea
NNA/August 25/2021
Experts of the National Centre for Marine Sciences of the National Council for
Scientific Research – Lebanon (NCMS-CNRSL), the team working on the CANA-CNRS
Research Vessel, in very close cooperation with the International Union for
Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and with logistical support from the Lebanese
Naval Forces, deployed the first anchored off-shore marine laboratory buoy
(Smart Buoy) in Lebanon on August 14, 2021. Funded by the Royal Norwegian
Embassy in Beirut, through the Coastal Ecosystem Resilience project of IUCN ROWA;
the buoy will enable, for the first time in the country, to monitor real-time
oceanographic data and scale up marine conservation efforts in Lebanon. Located
1.4 km offshore Beirut, the buoy is equipped with sensors providing information
on multiple sea water parameters, such as temperature and salinity, turbidity,
pH, CO2, dissolved oxygen and chlorophyll levels. It also features a full
weather station, and an immersed instrument for measurements of currents and
waves, collecting continuously essential data over time. The scientific
management of the buoy is ensured by the CNRS-L and its scientific team.
The unit can serve as an early warning monitor of coastal environmental events
such as sea level rise, sudden shifts in sea surface temperature, and tsunamis.
Moreover, the smart buoy contributes to monitoring the impact of climate change
trends such as fossil pollution, the increase of CO2 levels in air and sea, sea
water acidification. Their direct impact on fisheries, biodiversity, coastal
environments and coastal communities is subsequently evaluated. The data
collected will support CNRS-L collaborative marine projects and foster
cooperation with donor institutions, especially IUCN, the Norwegian Embassy and
other international partners through expanding the network, the number of buoys
deployed facing major coastal cities in the country, and supporting projects for
the protection and sustainability of the Mediterranean Basin. The data will also
be relayed to decision makers to help in better policy planning and strengthen
cooperation within relevant scientific networks. Investment in innovation and
support of the knowledge economy of Lebanon need to be maintained and
strengthened, not despite of, - but especially in light of the current crises
the country is facing. The unit will bring important knowledge to understand the
hydrodynamics and other parameters directly affecting the marine ecosystem in
Lebanon and contribute to the preservation of the marine environment as an
essential element in the sustainable development of the country.
Municipalities and Unions of Municipalities in Lebanon
propose new development projects responding to urgent needs in their communities
NNA/August 25/2021
In an effort to support their communities, representatives of municipalities and
Unions of Municipalities presented proposals and sought funding for local
economic development and basic service projects, that they developed as part of
an activity launched by the Municipal Empowerment and Resilience Project (MERP).
MERP is a joint initiative implemented by the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat)
and funded through the European Union (EU). Municipalities and Unions of
Municipalities representatives from the Urban Community Al-Fayhaa, the
Federation of Municipalities of the Northern and Coastal Matn and the Union of
Tyre Municipalities, presented their proposals to development partners, funding
agencies, as well as to their communities and the wider public through a live
broadcast. In the development of the proposals, the 17 municipalities and two
unions collaborated with youth and civil society and participated in extensive
online training and coaching sessions on proposal development, organized by the
Renée Mouawad Foundation, the implementing partner for this activity. This
approach led to the development of technical skills necessary to develop strong
proposals for future projects that could attract external funding. "While a key
objective of MERP is to implement basic service and local economic development
projects that benefit communities, such as projects that focus on solar farms or
the establishment of agricultural markets, we do this by empowering
municipalities and provide them with the capacity and tools needed to support
their communities, not only now but also in the future. Our approach shows that
with a little support, municipalities and unions are very capable to develop
high quality proposals for projects that support their communities and that they
are highly committed to do so." said Marija De Wijn, MERP's Chief Technical
Advisor."Today was an important opportunity for the 19 municipalities and unions
of municipalities to present proposals for basic services and local economic
development, in order to secure funding under the Municipal Empowerment and
Resilience Project (MERP) as well as through other donors" said Gianandrea
Villa, Local Governance Officer at the EU Delegation in Lebanon. As a next step,
MERP will support the development and implementation of eight municipal projects
and two unions projects by 2022. Additionally, MERP aims to support non selected
projects to secure support through other funding partners through the Municipal
Fair.
Lebanon raids discover hoarded fuel,
medicine and baby formula
Najat Houssari/Arab News/August 25/2021
BEIRUT: Raids carried out by Lebanon security forces discovered millions of
liters of subsidized fuel hidden in underground tanks to be sold later on the
black market at new prices. Some of the tanks were merely covered by sand.
“Monopolized” medicine and baby formula were seized, too.
News of the hoarding has only added to the anger of Lebanese citizens, who have
been suffering through exhausting fuel and medicine shortages for months. Long
queues outside gas stations and empty shelves at pharmacies are common across
the country.
The largest quantities of hidden subsidized fuel were found in Hawsh Al-Omara in
Zahle, Bekaa, where more than 1.5 million liters of gasoline were seized. Scenes
of Caretaker Health Minister Hamad Hassan raiding depots in the south of Lebanon
and the Shouf area that contained medicine missing from pharmacies have also
left citizens fuming. The depots contained medicine that could treat patients
with coronavirus (COVID-19), blood pressure, and respiratory problems.
Antibiotics and thousands of infant formulas — all subsidized at the official
rate ($1=1,500 LBP) — were also discovered. “The raids are based on an
electronic tracking system of ‘monopolized’ medicine,” Hassan said. “The system
is very precise and accurate.”The raid operation revealed a partnership between
Hussein Fneish, brother of Hezbollah minister Mohammed Fneish, and Issam Ahmed
Khalifa, of the NewPharm Company in Lebanon.
However, the timing of Hassan’s raids were criticized. Lebanon’s Central Bank
has not opened credit lines for imports for three months as laws were put in
place to prohibit free imports.“These security campaigns and raids should have
been carried out earlier,” Issam Araji, head of the Health Parliamentary
Committee, told Arab News. “Medicine and fuel should have never been hoarded.
Following these raids, Lebanon seemed like a floating city in a sea of gasoline
and diesel. The dangerous part is that the fuel was being stored in residential
neighborhoods.”
Araji, who is also a cardiologist, said he had warned authorities about the
hoarding of medicine for more than a year.
“But they insisted that people were storing the medicine in their houses,” Araji
said. “People cannot afford their daily bread, how would they be able to store
all of the medicine? I think that the health minister has finally decided to
take action because he received information about companies hiding and storing
the medicine. These campaigns will all be in vain unless offenders are punished
to deter others.” Although the country has started to unload ships of imported
fuel and distribute it to gas stations, queues outside the filling stations did
not get any shorter on Wednesday. Most drivers parked throughout the night and
slept in their cars, hoping to fill up their vehicles in the morning. Adnan
Naccouzi, 69, suffered a stroke while waiting in a long queue for gas in the hot
weather and without drinking water. He has been recovering inside the intensive
care unit at a Beirut hospital for the past 24 hours.
Authorities have said fuel will be sold according to new prices, amid a gradual
reduction of fuel subsidies.As of Wednesday, a 20-liter canister of gasoline was
sold for 133,000 Lebanese pounds ($88) and the same canister of diesel for
99,000 pounds. The cost of transportation has automatically increased, where the
fare rose to 20,000 pounds for each passenger; more than double the price of the
previous day.
Despite the public calls to arrest monopolists and put them in prison, hoarding
is classified by the Lebanese penal code as a misdemeanor and sanctioned either
by a fine or up to six months in prison.Meanwhile, Judge Ghada Aoun issued a
search and investigation warrant against Lebanon’s Central Bank Gov. Riad
Salameh. This comes five days after setting a date for an investigation session
— that he did not attend — over accusations of money laundering and money
transfers abroad. Lebanon’s State Prosecutor Ghassan Oueidat in April dismissed
Judge Aoun from the case. But she has insisted on proceeding with her
investigations and broke into a money exchange company with the help of
activists from the Free Patriotic Movement. In other developments, the country’s
caretaker premier Hassan Diab will not appear before Judge Tarek Bitar, who is
investigating last year’s Beirut blast. Diab was supposed to be questioned as a
defendant in the case on Thursday, but has insisted that he should be questioned
by the Supreme Council for the Trial of Presidents and Ministers. Judge Fadi
Sawan, the investigating judge who preceded Bitar, listened to Diab’s testimony
in his capacity as a witness more than a year ago. In that testimony, Diab
acknowledged the presence of the ammonium nitrate that was illegally stored at
the port and explained why he changed his mind about visiting the site just days
before the explosion.
No end in sight: Lebanon’s government crisis rages on as country on its knees
Geiege Azar/Arab News/August 25/2021
DUBAI: More than 12 months since Lebanon’s cabinet resigned and with the country
teetering on the brink of collapse, politicians look unlikely to form a
much-needed government any time soon, sources warn. Despite one of the world’s
largest-ever non-nuclear explosions killing more than 200 people, soaring
hyperinflation, food insecurity and crippling fuel shortages, leaders have
continued to dig their heels in while two designated prime ministers have come
and gone. Najib Mikati, a billionaire businessman and former PM, is the latest
to take on the mantle, promising a swift formation of a government within a
month when he was appointed on Jul. 26. “I gave my proposals, President Michel
Aoun approved most of them and he made some remarks which are acceptable. God
willing, we will be able to form a government soon,” Mikati said two days later.
A month has passed, and Mikati is facing the same fate as his two predecessors —
Mustapha Adib and Saad Hariri — who both failed to come to terms with Aoun.
Mikati is set to meet with the president on Thursday afternoon, with sources
noting that both men are far from coming to terms on a government. “I
believe Mikati will be forced to step down at some point like the others,”
Mustapha Allouche, the Future Movement’s vice president, the party formed by
Hariri’s late father, told Arab News. According to Lebanon’s sectarian
power-sharing model, the president, a Maronite Christian, and the prime
minister-designate, a Sunni Muslim, must both agree on a cabinet lineup in
unison that is split equally between Christians and Muslims. “What is happening
now is merely a continuation of what has transpired over the past 12 months,
with each political bloc maneuvering based on its own calculations,” Rosana Bou
Monsef, a political analyst and veteran columnist for Lebanese daily An-Nahar,
told Arab News.
At the core of the issue, she said, is the president’s Free Patriotic Movement
trying to secure favorable terms in the upcoming government, which could stay in
power until after Aoun leaves office next year.
Lebanon is set to hold parliamentary elections in May, which given the turbulent
political landscape and security situation, could be delayed. This would pave
the way for the upcoming government to stay in place, take key decisions moving
forward and exert pressure on political opponents.
“It is becoming increasingly clear that the problem doesn’t lie with who will
head the government but with the president’s group’s unwillingness to form a
government except on its terms,” Bou Monsef said. After nine months of grueling
negotiations and a number of public spats with the president, Hariri stepped
down in mid-July, saying “God help Lebanon” as he left the presidential palace.
Hariri had accused the president of blocking the formation of a cabinet in which
the FPM, the party he founded and currently headed by his son-in-law MP Gebran
Bassil, lacks veto power. Eddy Maalouf, an FPM parliamentarian, denied the
accusations, telling Arab News that the deadlock stems from Hariri and Mikati’s
attempts to encroach on the constitution and name several Christian ministers.
“They must afford the president’s bloc the same rights afforded to the other
parties,” he said. Further complicating matters is Hezbollah Secretary-General
Hassan Nasrallah’s announcement on Aug. 19 that the party had secured fuel
shipments from Iran. Amid typical governmental absenteeism, the
Iranian-backed Hezbollah has seemingly taken matters into its own hands, vowing
that fuel tankers would set sail to Lebanon from the sanction-ridden country. If
Hezbollah follows through with its promise and the tankers actually do dock in
Lebanon, it would open up the Lebanese state to the possibility of sanctions
from the US, which has vowed to punish anyone that deals with Tehran. “The
Iranian fuel has put Mikati in an extremely tough position as his government
program was based on cooperating with the international community and Gulf
countries to secure financial assistance for Lebanon,” Bou Monsef told Arab
News. This was echoed by Maalouf, who maintained that Mikati is “hesitating in
moving forward with the formation of the government in light of this
development.” The possibility of Mikati stepping down is now gaining traction,
Bou Monsef noted, “despite the international community urging him to move
forward with negotiations.”Mikati’s resignation would have a ripple effect
across Lebanon’s political landscape, Allouche said. “If Mikati steps down,
we’ll have to reconsider our calculations,” Allouche said when responding to a
question on whether Hariri’s Future Movement bloc would resign from parliament.
Sami Fatfat, a Future Movement MP, held out hope that a government would be
formed but assured his party is “looking into different options, including mass
resignations” if Mikati steps down.
“The next couple of days will be decisive,” he noted, as Lebanon braces for the
potential arrival of the first shipment of Iranian fuel coupled with the end of
Mikati’s one-month deadline.
Let them stop us if they dare' – Why Hezbollah is bringing Iranian fuel to
Lebanon
Radwan Mortada/The Cradle/August 25/2021
As Lebanon's economic crisis deepens amidst an effective US embargo, Hezbollah
begins to supply the Lebanese population.
The chokehold on Lebanon has grown even tighter, thanks to the embargo imposed
against it by the United States and its Arab allies in the Persian Gulf. This
comes at the lowest point of Lebanon’s two-year-old economic crisis, a
catastrophe the World Bank calls the worst the world has seen since 1850. The
country’s sudden-but-deliberate fuel shortage, vital to essential daily activity
and life-saving medical services, has accelerated this alarm. Today, bread is in
shortage and hospitals are sending out distress calls, civilians are camping in
front of petrol stations, and water has all but disappeared from supermarket
shelves.
With general government inaction and the failure of Lebanon’s political parties
to form a new government, Hezbollah has forged ahead with its plan to import
fuel from Iran. A few weeks ago, Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan
Nasrallah had paved the way by saying that if the government does nothing to
resolve the fuel crisis, “Hezbollah will make arrangements with Iran, buy
gasoline and diesel vessels, bring them to Beirut Port, and let the government
[if it can] prohibit their delivery to the Lebanese people.” In a later speech,
he added: “The brothers in Hezbollah are currently in Iran to complete the
gasoline and diesel deal, and we will deliver them soon, either by land or by
sea.
Last week, Nasrallah announced the news of imminent oil imports from Iran,
warning the world not to interfere with the fuel tanker that set sail from the
Iranian coast towards Lebanon.
A Lebanese expert in oil and gas governance in the MENA region, Laury Haytayan,
estimates that it will take 15 days for the Iranian gasoline tanker departing
from the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas to reach Lebanon. Haytayan says
the ship will pass the Strait of Hormuz, then Bab al-Mandab, and sail through
the Red Sea into the Suez Canal before heading to Lebanon. Likewise, a maritime
expert speaking on condition of anonymity suggested another route the Iranian
oil tanker could take: the Cape Route near South Africa, northwards and through
the Strait of Gibraltar, crossing Cypriot and Greek shores to reach the
Mediterranean coast. This route, he noted, would take the ship 45 days to
arrive.
Lebanon’s Minister of Energy Raymond Ghajar says that he has not received a
request to allow Iranian oil into the country, and notes that Nasrallah “chose
his words correctly when he said that the ship sailed from Iran to the
Mediterranean Sea, and not Lebanese territorial waters,” which opens the
possibility that the ship will not dock in Lebanese ports. It is altogether
possible, therefore, that the ship will head towards the Syrian coast to unload
at the Baniyas refinery, and then be transported by land to Lebanon.
As soon as Nasrallah first announced his offer to provide fuel for Lebanon,
former Prime Minister Saad Hariri and Lebanese Forces Party Executive Chairman
Samir Geagea – both of whom are affiliated with Saudi Arabia – denounced the
move, accusing the Hezbollah leader of pushing Lebanon into a war between two
axes. Previously, neither of them had said a word about the suffering of
Lebanese patients in hospitals or their humiliatingly long waits at gas
stations. Moreover, neither took the initiative to appeal to their Saudi patrons
to assist Lebanon. If anything, both were painfully aware that Saudi Arabia was
covertly obstructing the formation of a Lebanese government.
An Iraqi source, who took part in the Iran–Saudi negotiations organized by Prime
Minister Mustafa Kadhimi, revealed to The Cradle that when the Iranian delegate
mentioned the issue of Lebanon during the negotiations, the Saudi delegate
quickly interrupted: “Lebanon is not a priority for us. We don’t want to discuss
Lebanon now.”
Hezbollah, however, has been clear in its message that the aim of importing
Iranian oil is not to cause a clash, but simply to provide essential fuel for
the Lebanese population. Before Nasrallah announced the first shipment,
Hezbollah staff gathered information from hospitals and bakeries to work out
their monthly fuel requirements. Zahrani power plant manager Ziad al-Zain tells
The Cradle that Lebanon needs about 10 million liters of diesel a day for its
electricity needs, and that the Zahrani plant accounts for 15 percent of
gasoline consumption in the entire country.
Sources informed of Hezbollah’s internal discussions during the past few weeks
reveal that the deliberations focused on whether to import the oil by sea or by
land, and to investigate both options and consequences.
According to the sources, a specialized committee, supervised directly by
Nasrallah, was set up to conduct research and identify a solution for the fuel
crisis. Three recommendations were provided.
Initially, the committee proposed that the work should be carried out by the
Lebanese government, with the government formulating the oil contracts.
Hezbollah went so far as to negotiate the use of the Lebanese lira to pay for
the imported oil, but the government did not respond to this proposal. The
second recommendation was to pressure Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh to
continue opening credit lines for fuel subsidies, especially as the financial
crisis was just beginning to unfold.
The third recommendation was to work within the existing margins of the Ministry
of Energy — for example, through the communications that led Lebanon’s General
Security Director Abbas Ibrahim to contact Iraq for oil, before those talks also
fizzled over internal legislative obstacles. Despite Iraq’s responsiveness to
quickly provide Lebanon with fuel, it is the Lebanese side that has delayed the
process. The hurdle, it seems, was in submitting the Iraq oil proposal to
parliament’s Committee of Legislation and Consultation for consideration, where
it quickly disappeared into a black hole.
Amin Nasser, director of the Iraqi Media Network in Lebanon and the Levant, who
accompanied the Lebanese delegation to Iraq alongside Abbas Ibrahim and Energy
Minister Ghajar, says the delays have been entirely caused by Lebanese internal
political obstruction. Nasser, however, also disclosed that there was a decision
to override the obstructions and issue a tender, and suggests that Iraqi oil
will arrive in Lebanon on 3 September, although this has yet to be confirmed.
Another informed Iraqi source told The Cradle: “There were no obstacles on the
Iraqi side, as Baghdad’s offer was made without conditions. However, there was
one last-minute condition set by Iraq’s Minister of Finance, Dr. Abdul-Amir
Allawi, head of the Iraqi negotiating team, related to the need to place tender
announcements for companies interested in refining Iraqi oil through an official
online platform linked to the Lebanese Ministry of Energy. And if a company is
chosen, we must be informed of the name, address and details of this company,
which will deal directly with the Iraq’s Oil Marketing Company, SOMO.”The Iraqi source points out that subsequently, “no Lebanese or foreign companies
were publicly announced through any official website or online platform linked
to the Ministry of Energy, and no mechanisms were put in place to choose
companies, nor tenders, nor who won them. The only thing mentioned was that
there were five unidentified competing companies, which Iraq has no knowledge
of, and were not placed on the platform.”
As for the Iraqi fuel arriving within the first few days of September, that
flimsy expectation likely relates to Lebanese Minister Ghajar informing Iraq
that he has completed administrative and technical procedures, including
overland shipping, and that boat shipments were scheduled to sail in the next
two days.
“So far, we have received no direct answers from the Lebanese side,” The
Cradle’s Baghdad source says, adding that the Iraqi side remains silent so as
not to exacerbate the Lebanese problem. “Iraq says we have offered oil
unconditionally, and Lebanon must take action to clear its goods. In the case
that it cannot do so, then we can help by shipping one million tons at the
expense of the Iraqi government,” the source explains.
It was this kind of dead-end, accountability-lacking negotiations that prompted
Hezbollah to knock on Iran’s door for fuel. According to sources close to the
Lebanese resistance group, Hezbollah’s plan is to buy fuel from Iran with
payment facilities and under contracts signed between the two parties. These
sources say the first shipment of diesel oil will be a gift from the Iranian
people to the Lebanese people. However, Iranian news reports have said that a
group of Shia businessmen assumed the cost for the first oil tanker.
Within hours of Nasrallah’s bold 19 August speech, Lebanese President Michel
Aoun received a phone call from Washington’s Beirut Ambassador Dorothy Shea,
informing him of the US administration’s decision to help Lebanon receive
Egyptian gas and electricity from Jordan via Syria. This
Egyptian-Jordanian-Syrian proposal is not new. IMF Executive Director Mahmoud
Mohieldin, in an earlier visit to Lebanon, assured officials that Jordan is able
to obtain US approval to exempt Egyptian gas from the Caesar Act (a piece of US
domestic legislation crafted to punish any party that does business with or
through Syria), allowing its transfer through Jordan and Syria to Lebanon
without being subject to US sanctions.
Hezbollah’s first reaction to the US ambassador’s “offer” was a public lashing
by Hezbollah MP Hassan Fadlallah: “Instead of being ashamed of herself, and
hiding the shame of her administration from [events] in Kabul airport to the
siege of Beirut, the US ambassador is trying to justify American aggression
against Lebanon, exposing, by her usual shamelessness, the responsibility her
administration bears in the suffering of the Lebanese people when she admitted
to her ability to bring funding from the World Bank to transfer electricity from
Jordan via Syria, which is besieged by the American-imposed Caesar Act.”
Fadlallah also said that “preventing access to electricity via Syria is an
American decision, which was only revised because of the fuel ship arriving from
the Islamic Republic. This also means that when the United States decides to
lift its hand from its preventative decisions, the pain of the Lebanese people
could [easily] be alleviated.” He added that “the timing of the US ambassador’s
announcement is an explicit condemnation of its own administration, which has
been prohibiting any foreign assistance to the Lebanese people, including
transferring their own money from Syrian banks, and providing Lebanon with
life-saving products, a matter that only requires it to signal its approval. All
the while, it has been protecting its corrupt allies and threatening to impose
sanctions against those who compromise [American] influence within state
institutions.”
Nasrallah announced in his 22 August speech that the fleet of Iranian fuel ships
has effectively begun, and that a second Iranian ship will set sail toward
Lebanon in a matter of days. The Hezbollah chief spoke about Lebanese
businessmen who would pay for the fuel, revealing that they were ready for this
sacrifice, even if they were placed on the US sanctions list. The aim behind
this action, Nasrallah said, is to alleviate the suffering of the people, and
that the fuel will be for all Lebanese and all residents of Lebanon. He did,
however, prioritize hospitals, pharmaceutical factories, and bakeries.
As for US Ambassador Dorothy Shea and her “promises,” this was nothing more than
“selling illusions” to the Lebanese people, Nasrallah parried. Her words, he
said, “confirm that her country is responsible for preventing electricity and
fuel from [entering] Lebanon, and that the Americans and Saudis have sought to
ignite a civil war in Lebanon over the past years, but had clearly failed to do
so.”
Sayyed Nasrallah also said that importing gas from Egypt and electricity from
Jordan requires negotiations with Syria, something that the Lebanese state could
have formally requested itself from the Syrian state had it not been under an
economic embargo imposed on it by the US.
On m'accuse souvent de m'attaquer dernièrement à la révolution.
Jean-Marie Kassab/August 25/2021
presque autant que je le fais vis à vis de l'occupant.
C'est entièrement vrai.
Je le fais dans le but de secouer la révolution pour la faire sortir des chemins
empruntés jusque là et qui n'ont abouti strictement à aucun changement
souhaitable pendant que le pays sombre irrevésiblement dans la misère totale et
deviendra bientôt une province iranienne.
Si je ménage relativement ouvertement l'occupant iranien c'est parce que je gére
mon énergie et mon effort pour faire de l'utile.
De tte façon ni Nasrallah ni Aoun ni Berry ne liront mes missives ou surtout les
tweets des révolutionnaires de notre côté. A peine si l'un des sous fiffres
rattachés aux services de sécurités du hezb les lira, et en guise de rapport
écrira "rien à signaler" chef et se hatera d'aller diner chez lui, un sourire
aux lèvres.
Lokman Slim ne fut tué que lorsqu' il franchit une barrière et le cap des
paroles et entreprit une action qui dérangea...
Mesdames et messieurs de la thawra je ne vous laisserai tranquilles que lorsque
vous agirez de sortr que le sous fiffre iranien fasse un long rapport inquiétant
et n' aie auncun appétit pour diner.
C 'est alors que je me tairai et vous applaudirai .
The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous
Reports And News published on August 25-26/2021
Israel claims Iran launched drone
strike on tanker
AP/August 2021
JERUSALEM: Israel’s defense minister on Wednesday accused Iran of launching a
deadly drone strike on an oil tanker last month from its territory and
reiterated that Israel would act alone if needed to stop Iran from obtaining
nuclear weapons. Benny Gantz spoke as Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was
visiting Washington to discuss Iran with Biden administration officials during
his first state visit in Washington. The Mercer Street, an oil tanker that was
sailing in the Arabian Sea off Oman, was struck by a drone aircraft on July 29.
The attack killed two, a British national and a Romanian. The tanker is managed
by a firm owned by an Israeli billionaire. The US, Britain and Israel have all
blamed Iran for the drone strike on the Mercer Street, but no country has yet
offered evidence or intelligence to support their claims. Iran has denied any
wrongdoing. “Our assessment is that the UAV employed in the Mercer Street attack
was launched from Iranian territory and approved by Iranian leadership,” Gantz
told foreign diplomats in a briefing. His remarks were released by his office.
Gantz, a former Israeli army chief, has previously warned that Israel is
prepared to take military action against Iran and called for international
action to halt Iranian aggression. The two countries have been locked in a
shadow war for years, which in recent months has taken a higher profile after a
long string of attacks on merchant vessels. The attacks began after
then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew in 2018 from the nuclear deal
between Iran and world powers, which saw Iran limit its enrichment of uranium in
exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.President Joe Biden has said he’s
willing to rejoin the accord, but talks over salvaging the deal have stalled in
Vienna. Gantz doubled down on those threats on Wednesday, saying that Israel
“has the means to act and will not hesitate to do so — I do not rule out the
possibility that Israel will have to take action in the future in order to
prevent a nuclear Iran.”
Pope’s comments
Meanwhile, Israel’s top Jewish religious authorities have told the Vatican they
are concerned about comments that Pope Francis made about their books of sacred
law and have asked for a clarification.
In a letter, Rabbi Rasson Arousi, chair of the Commission of the Chief Rabbinate
of Israel for Dialogue with the Holy See, said the comments appeared to suggest
Jewish law was obsolete. Vatican authorities said they were studying the letter
and were considering a response. Rabbi Arousi wrote a day after the pope spoke
about the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, during a general
audience on Aug. 11. The Torah contains hundreds of commandments, or mitzvot,
for Jews to follow in their everyday lives. The measure of adherence to the wide
array of guidelines differs between Orthodox Jews and Reformed Jews. At the
audience, the pope, who was reflecting on what St. Paul said about the Torah in
the New Testament, said: “The law (Torah) however does not give life. “It does
not offer the fulfilment of the promise because it is not capable of being able
to fulfil it ... Those who seek life need to look to the promise and to its
fulfilment in Christ.”
Israel’s new leader to present Iran plan in first White House visit
Reuters/August 25/2021
JERUSALEM/WASHINGTON: New Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett plans to push
for a new Iran strategy during his first White House visit. He is saying he will
urge US President Joe Biden not to revive the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran.
Biden’s aides hope the talks will set a positive tone for his relationship with
Bennett, a far-right politician and high-tech millionaire who ended Benjamin
Netanyahu’s record 12-year run as prime minister in June. This would stand in
sharp contrast to years of tensions between the conservative Netanyahu, who was
close to former President Donald Trump, and the last Democratic administration
led by Barack Obama with Biden as his vice president. The visit gives the US
administration an opportunity to demonstrate business as usual with its closest
Middle East ally while it contends with the chaotic situation in Afghanistan,
Biden’s biggest foreign policy crisis since taking office.
The talks will be relatively low-key. The two leaders are expected to speak
briefly to a small pool of reporters during their Oval Office talks but will not
hold a joint news conference. Bennett is less dramatic but publicly just as
adamant as Netanyahu in pledging not to allow Iran, which Israel views as an
existential threat, to build a nuclear weapon, telling a cabinet meeting on
Sunday the situation was at a critical point. “Iran is advancing rapidly with
uranium enrichment and has already significantly shortened the time it would
take to accumulate the material required for a single nuclear bomb,” he said.
Bennett said he would tell Biden: “This is the time to stop the Iranians, not to
give them a lifeline in the form of re-entering an expired nuclear deal.”A US
official said Bennett’s expected entreaties for the Biden administration to drop
its efforts to revive the agreement are not likely to bear fruit.
To Israeli acclaim, Trump in 2018 withdrew the United States from the deal
between six world powers and Iran. He deemed it too advantageous for Tehran and
reimposed US sanctions.In a report seen last week by Reuters, the International
Atomic Energy Agency said Iran had accelerated uranium enrichment to near
weapons-grade.
Iran has consistently denied seeking a bomb, but the enrichment raised tensions
with the West as both sides seek to resume talks on reviving their deal to curb
Tehran’s nuclear activities in return for the lifting of sanctions. Bennett told
his cabinet he would present Biden with “an orderly plan that we have formulated
in the past two months to curb the Iranians, both in the nuclear sphere and
vis-à-vis regional aggression.” He gave no further details. Asked on Monday
about any new Iran strategy proposal from Bennett, US State Department spokesman
Ned Price said: “I will leave it to the Israeli prime minister to describe to
the American president any thoughts that the Israeli government may have when it
comes to Iran.”
Bennett, 49, is the son of American immigrants to Israel. A former head of
Israel’s main West Bank settlers council, he heads an unlikely coalition of
left-wing, right-wing, centrist and Arab parties. With consensus on Palestinian
statehood virtually impossible within the diverse Israeli government, Biden and
his aides are not expected to press Bennett for any major concessions toward the
Palestinians in his first foreign visit. But even with little sign of US
pressure to resume peace negotiations with the Palestinians that collapsed in
2014, Israel faces concern from Washington over its settlement activity in areas
it captured in the 1967 Middle East war. The Biden administration has already
made clear it opposes further expansion of Jewish settlements on occupied land
Palestinians seek for a state. Most countries consider such settlements illegal.
Israel disputes this. So far, Bennett, who has advocated annexation of parts of
the West Bank, has moved cautiously on the settlement issue.
Scheduled approval last week of 2,200 new settler homes, along with 800 houses
for Palestinians, was postponed, apparently to avoid dissonance with Washington
ahead of his visit.But rising tensions and violence along the Israel-Gaza
border, three months after an 11-day war between Israeli forces and Palestinian
militants, could cast a shadow over Bennett’s trip. The trial is connected to
the mass execution in July and August 1988 of political prisoners who were
members or sympathizers of the armed leftwing group Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK).
The defense has also pointed out that none of the witnesses have identified
Noury as a member of the actual “death commission” tribunal, meaning he had no
formal decision-making or sentencing powers. They deny Noury even worked at the
prison. While such arguments carry weight in a court of law, the families of
Noury’s alleged victims are in no doubt about his moral guilt. “He might have
been a low-level operator,” Gobadi said. “But he was an integral part of the
ruthless regime in Iran.”
Although only one individual is standing trial, the families of the victims of
the secret executions understand the symbolic value of a successful prosecution
and the possible knock-on effects. “What is unusual about this trial is that
it’s most importantly an indictment of the entire Iranian regime, and that’s a
huge problem for them,” Lewis, the plaintiffs’ lawyer, told Arab News. While
Kristina Lindhoff Carleson, the lead prosecutor in the case, has ruled that
there is sufficient evidence to charge Noury with only 100 killings, the sight
of even one suspect being led into a courtroom in handcuffs is unprecedented.
During a court appearance last week, Noury complained that the protesters’
chants and slogans were “insulting,” forcing the judge to ask police to request
the crowd outside to quieten down. (Photo by Ann Tornkvist) “This milestone
trial in Sweden comes after decades of persistence by Iranian families and
victims of the 1988 mass executions,” Balkees Jarrah, associate international
justice director at Human Rights Watch (HRW), said in a statement. “This case
moves victims closer to justice for the crimes committed more than 30 years
ago.”
The trial is only possible in Sweden because the Nordic country recognizes
universal jurisdiction over certain serious crimes such as mass murder, allowing
for investigation and prosecution regardless of where the crimes were committed.
HRW has said that universal jurisdiction cases are important for ensuring that
those who committed atrocities are held accountable. It says the process
provides justice to victims who have nowhere else to turn, and that it deters
future crimes by ensuring that countries do not become safe havens for rights
abusers.
“Universal jurisdiction laws are a key tool against impunity for heinous crimes,
especially when no other viable justice option exists,” Jarrah said. Members of
the Swedish-Iranian community have told local media how proud they are to see
authorities in their adopted home bring one of their tormentors to justice.
A verdict is expected in April 2022.
Israel Warns to Act if Needed 'to Prevent a Nuclear
Iran'
Associated Press/August 25/2021
Israel's defense minister on Wednesday accused Iran of launching a deadly drone
strike on an oil tanker last month from its territory and reiterated that Israel
would act alone if needed to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. Benny
Gantz spoke as Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was visiting Washington to
discuss Iran with Biden administration officials during his first state visit in
Washington. The Mercer Street, an oil tanker that was sailing in the Arabian Sea
off Oman, was struck by a drone aircraft on July 29. The attack killed two, a
British national and a Romanian. The tanker is managed by a firm owned by an
Israeli billionaire. The United States, Britain and Israel have all blamed Iran
for the drone strike on the Mercer Street, but no country has yet offered
evidence or intelligence to support their claims. Iran has denied any
wrongdoing. "Our assessment is that the UAV employed in the Mercer Street attack
was launched from Iranian territory and approved by Iranian leadership," Gantz
told foreign diplomats in a briefing. His remarks were released by his office.
Gantz, a former Israeli army chief, has previously warned that Israel is
prepared to take military action against Iran and called for international
action to halt Iranian aggression. The two countries have been locked in a
shadow war for years, which in recent months has taken a higher profile after a
long string of attacks on merchant vessels. The attacks began after
then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew in 2018 from the nuclear deal
between Iran and world powers, which saw Iran limit its enrichment of uranium in
exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions. President Joe Biden has said
he's willing to rejoin the accord, but talks over salvaging the deal have
stalled in Vienna. Israel contends its regional archrival Iran seeks nuclear
weapons, while Tehran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.
Gantz doubled down on those threats on Wednesday, saying that Israel "has the
means to act and will not hesitate to do so – I do not rule out the possibility
that Israel will have to take action in the future in order to prevent a nuclear
Iran."
Afghan Resistance Leader Vows 'No Surrender'
AFP/August 25/2021
The leader of a resistance movement to the Taliban has vowed to never surrender
but is open to negotiations with the new rulers of Afghanistan, according to an
interview published by Paris Match on Wednesday. Ahmad Massoud, the son of
legendary Afghan rebel commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, has retreated to his native
Panjshir valley north of Kabul along with former vice-president Amrullah Saleh.
"I would prefer to die than to surrender," Massoud told French philosopher
Bernard-Henri Levy in his first interview since the Taliban took over Kabul.
"I'm the son of Ahmad Chah Massoud. Surrender is not a word in my
vocabulary."Massoud claimed that "thousands" of men were joining his National
Resistance Front in Panjshir valley, which was never captured by invading Soviet
forces in 1979 or the Taliban during their first period in power from 1996-2001.
"I cannot forget the historic mistake made by those I was asking for weapons
just eight days ago in Kabul," Massoud said, according to a transcript of the
interview published in French. "They refused. And these weapons -- artillery,
helicopters, American-made tanks -- are today in the hands of the Taliban," he
said. Massoud added that he was open to talking to the Taliban and he laid out
the outlines of a possible agreement. "We can talk. In all wars, there are
talks. And my father always spoke with his enemies," he said.
China Describes "Effective" Talks with Taliban
Naharnet/August 25/2021
China says it has established an "open and effective communication and
consultation with the Afghan Taliban," following a meeting between
representatives of the group and Beijing's ambassador to Kabul. Chinese Foreign
Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin gave no details about the Tuesday meeting
between the deputy head of the Taliban's political office, Abdul Salam Hanafi
and Ambassador Wang Yu. But he said China considered Kabul to be an "important
platform and channel for both sides to discuss important matters of all
kinds."China hosted a delegation led by senior Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani
Baradar for talks last month, prior to the group's lightning sweep to power in
Kabul. China has kept its embassy in the city open and says it has no plans for
a wholesale evacuation of its citizens in Afghanistan, while relentlessly
criticizing the U.S. over the chaotic scenes at Kabul airport.
"We have always respected Afghanistan's sovereign independence and territorial
integrity, pursued a policy of non-interference in Afghanistan's internal
affairs and adhered to a policy of friendship toward the entire Afghan people,"
Wang told reporters at a daily briefing Wednesday in Beijing.
"China respects the Afghan people's independent decision on their own future and
destiny, supports the implementation of the Afghan-led and Afghan-owned
principle, and stands ready to continue to develop good-neighborly relations of
friendship and cooperation with Afghanistan and play a constructive role in the
peace and reconstruction of the country," Wang said.
MORE ON AFGHANISTAN:
— Taliban insist on airlift deadline amid new report of abuses
— Biden decides to stick with Aug. 31 final pullout from Kabul
— G-7 grapples with Afghanistan, an afterthought not long ago
— UN rights chief warns of abuses amid Taliban's Afghan blitz
— Taliban takeover prompts fears of a resurgent al-Qaida
Find more AP coverage at
https://apnews.com/hub/afghanistan
HERE'S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:
VILNIUS, Lithuania — A plane carrying the first group of Afghan interpreters who
had worked with Lithuanian forces in Afghanistan has touched down in the Baltic
country. The Defense Ministry said Wednesday that a total of 50 people were
flown from Kabul via Warsaw, Poland.
They are the first of 115 interpreters who worked with Lithuanian forces in
Afghanistan from 2005 to 2013, and Lithuania plans to bring all of them out of
the country. The second group is expected to land in Vilnius later in the day.
Meanwhile in Norway, two planes from Afghanistan with a total of 278 passengers
landed in Oslo, Norwegian news agency NTB reported.
LONDON — Britain's foreign minister says he can't give a precise timeline about
the end of U.K. evacuation flights from Afghanistan, but the mission will be
over by Aug. 31. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said "it's clear that the troops
will be withdrawn by the end of the month."U.S. President Joe Biden has rejected
pressure from Britain and other allies to extend the evacuation operation,
saying it will end on Aug. 31. There are almost 6,000 American troops at the
airport helping people flee the Taliban, along with smaller military contingents
from other countries. Raab said the British military will need time before the
deadline to withdraw its people and equipment, but "we will make the maximum use
of all the time we have left."He said British forces have airlifted 9,000
British citizens and at-risk Afghans from Kabul airport since the Taliban took
the Afghan capital on Aug. 15.
MOSCOW -- Russia is preparing to evacuate more than 500 people on four military
planes from Afghanistan — its first airlift operation since evacuations from
Kabul began. The Defense Ministry said Wednesday that it will airlift the
nationals of Russia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine
from Kabul.Teams of medical workers will be present on each plane, the ministry
said, should any of the evacuees require medical attention.The evacuations will
be carried out upon orders of Russian President Vladimir Putin, the ministry
noted.
KAMPALA, Uganda — Uganda's government says 51 people evacuated from Afghanistan
have arrived in the East African country at the request of the United States.
Authorities said in a statement that the group, transported to Uganda in a
chartered flight, arrived early Wednesday. That statement said they included
men, women and children. No more details were given on the identities of the
evacuees. Ugandan officials said last week the country will shelter up to 2,000
people fleeing the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan. They said the Afghans
would be brought to Uganda in small groups in a temporary arrangement before
they are relocated elsewhere.Uganda has long been a security ally of the U.S.,
especially on security matters in the region.
CANBERRA, Australia — Australia says it has helped evacuate 955 people in five
flights from Kabul's airport overnight as the danger in Afghanistan increased.
Defense Minister Peter Dutton on Wednesday thanked U.S., British and New Zealand
defense forces for their help in evacuating 2,650 people including Afghan
nationals from the airport since Wednesday last week. Tuesday was Australia's
most successful day in evacuating people including Afghans who had worked for
the Australian government. "There is more work to be done but, of course, we
know the security threats on the ground continue to increase," Dutton told
Parliament. The government would take the advice of the Australian Defense Force
Chief Gen. Angus Campbell "as to how long it is possible for us to stay in
country to keep our own people safe and help those that have helped us," Dutton
added. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison declined to comment on reports
that up to 1,200 Afghans with Australian visas had been turned away from the
airport.Dutton said Australia has resettled 8,500 Afghans who helped Australia
in the past five years.
SEOUL, South Korea __ Seoul says about 380 people evacuated from Afghanistan
will arrive in South Korea aboard military planes on Thursday. Choi Jongmoon,
second vice foreign minister, told a briefing Wednesday that the Afghans are
those who had worked for South Korea-run facilities in Afghanistan including its
embassy or their family members. Choi says the government has decided to bring
them to South Korea in consideration of "an ethical responsibility for our
(Afghan) colleagues" and a responsibility as a member of the international
community.
He says the Afghans will be sent to a government-run temporary accommodation
facility upon their arrival in South Korea on Thursday.
Brazil detains two French travelers for perching atop
iconic statue
AFP/August 25/2021
Brazilian authorities have detained two French men for watching the sun rise
over Rio de Janeiro from the top of the iconic Christ the Redeemer statue while
the monument was closed, one of the travelers told AFP. Clement Dumais, 28, and
Paul Roux-dit-Buisson, 27, entered the site of the 38-meter (125-foot) monument
Sunday night and stayed there after the statue was closed for the day. The two
men snuck inside before dawn, climbed a long spiral staircase and came out
through a hatch on one of the arms to enjoy the view of the city and Guanabara
Bay. The statue's outstretched arms span 28 meters. The adventure ended when one
of the security guards at the site noticed the men. "We were standing on the
arms and the head and a security officer saw us," Roux-dit-Buisson told AFP. The
two men were detained on Monday and released after posting 10,000 reais ($1,900)
in bail. The two will now have to appear before a judge. Tourism police in Rio
de Janeiro declined to comment, saying they were looking into the incident.
Hailing from Paris, the two men have staged similar feats at iconic
architectural sites in Dubai, New York, and Paris and documented their
adventures on social media. Police have confiscated all the photos and videos
the men made while on top of the Rio statue, but the travelers say they have no
regrets. "The view was nice. Few people get a chance to see that," Roux-dit-Buisson
said. "We were able to get inside the skin of Christ." The Christ the Redeemer
statue, which will mark its 90th anniversary in October, was recently renovated
with the help of professional climbers, who worked above the void in harnesses.
In 1991 and in 2010, the statue was vandalized with graffiti. Along with the
Sugarloaf Mountain, the iconic statue, located at the top of Corcovado Hill, is
the most visited site in the tourist capital of Brazil, with nearly two million
visits a year.
Dubai Confirms Arrest Of Italian Drug Lord
AFP/August 25/2021
Dubai authorities on Wednesday confirmed they have arrested one of Italy's most
wanted international drug barons and his right-hand man, after years on the
run.Raffaele Imperiale, considered to be one of Italy's most dangerous
fugitives, was a top operative from the Naples organised crime world.
Algeria-Morocco crisis: Paris calls for “dialogue” in the
interest of regional “stability”
AFP/August 25/2021
Paris on Wednesday called on Algeria, which broke off diplomatic relations with
Morocco the day before, and its great neighboring rival to return to a logic of
“dialogue“in the interest of”stabilityau Maghreb. “France naturally remains
committed to deepening ties and dialogue between the countries of the region, in
order to consolidate their stability and prosperity.“, said the deputy spokesman
of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a statement.
Attacker kills three police and security guard near French
embassy in Tanzania
NNA/August 25/2021
An attacker wielding an assault rifle was shot dead after killing three police
and an employee of a private security company near the French embassy in the
Tanzanian capital Dar es Salaam on Wednesday, President Samia Suluhu Hassan
said. Hassan said on Twitter that the attacker had been "neutralised" and "calm
has returned". "I send my condolences to the police service and the families of
three policemen, and one officer of the SGA security company, who lost their
lives after an armed person attacked them in the Salenda area of Dar es Salaam,"
Hassan said in a tweet. Police gave no immediate details on the motive or target
of the attacker. Video footage posted online, which could not immediately be
verified, showed the gates of the French embassy in Dar es Salaam, a man outside
of the gate, and the sounds of gunfire crackling.
Iran's parliament approves President Raisi's government:
AFP
AFP/August 25/2021
Iran's parliament on Wednesday approved almost all President Ebrahim Raisi's
cabinet choices in an open session, enabling him to form a government after he
was inaugurated earlier this month.Lawmakers approved one-by-one 18 out of 19
candidates chosen by Raisi for the ministerial posts, rejecting only the pick
for the education portfolio, thus requiring the president to make another choice
for that post.
High blood pressure doubled globally in 30 years, study
shows
AFP/August 25/2021
The number of people living with high blood pressure more than doubled since
1990, according to a major study published on Wednesday that found half of all
sufferers -- about 720 million people -- went untreated in 2019. Hypertension is
directly linked to more than 8.5 million deaths each year, and is the leading
risk factor for stroke, heart and liver disease. To find out how rates of
hypertension have developed globally over the past 30 years, an international
team from Non-Communicable Disease Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC) analysed
data from more than 1,200 national studies covering nearly every country in the
world. They used modelling to estimate high blood pressure rates across
populations, as well as the number of people taking medication for the
condition. The analysis found that in 2019 there were 626 million women and 652
million men living with hypertension. This represented roughly double the
estimated 331 million women and 317 million men with the condition in 1990. The
analysis found that 41 percent of women and 51 percent of men with high blood
pressure were unaware of their condition, meaning hundreds of millions of people
were missing out on effective treatment. "Despite medical and pharmacological
advances over decades, global progress in hypertension management has been slow,
and the vast majority of people with hypertension remain untreated," said Majid
Ezzati from Imperial College London and senior study author.
Oil Spill from Power Station Spreads along Syria's Coast
Associated Press/August 25/2021
A massive oil spill caused by leakage from a power plant inside one of Syria's
oil refineries is spreading along the coast of the Mediterranean country,
Syria's state news agency said and satellite photos showed Wednesday. SANA said
the spill reached the coastal town of Jableh, about 20 kilometers (12 miles)
north of the refinery in the town of Baniyas, adding that Syria's environment
department and the municipality of the coastal province of Latakia have placed
all concerned departments on alert. It said work is underway to clean the coast
in the rocky areas. A day earlier, Syria's government said that maintenance
teams at Baniyas Thermal Station had brought a fuel leakage from one of the
tanks under control. Satellite images from Planet Labs Inc. on Wednesday showed
what appeared to be a massive oil spill stretching out over 25.5 square
kilometers. An image from Monday showed no sign of the slick, suggesting
whatever happened to cause the spill happened later. The head of the Electricity
Workers Syndicate at Tartous Workers Union, Dawoud Darwish, blamed cracks in one
of the fuel tanks at the thermal station. He pointed out that the tank was
filled with 15,000 tons of fuel. Syria's oil resources are mostly outside of
government controlled areas but its two refineries are under government control
and operating. This makes Damascus reliant on Iran for fuel, but U.S. Treasury
sanctions have hindered the supply network, which spans Syria, Iran and Russia.
There has been a series of mysterious attacks on vessels in Mideast waters,
including off Syria's coast, for over a year. They have come amid rising
tensions in the region between Iran, Israel and the United States. In May,
Syria's foreign minister blamed Israel for mysterious attacks targeting oil
tankers heading to Syria, saying they violate international law and will not go
unpunished.
Morocco rejects Algeria’s decision to sever ties as ‘completely unjustifiable’
The Arab Weekly/August 25/2021
ALGIERS--Morocco has rejected Algeria’s decision to sever ties with the kingdom
as “completely unjustifiable” but pledged to continue acting as “a loyal partner
of the Algerian people.”“Algeria has decided to cut diplomatic relations with
the kingdom of Morocco from today,” Algeria’s Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra
announced during a press conference in Algiers, Tuesday, citing “hostile
actions” by Rabat as the reason of the decision. In response, the Moroccan
ministry of foreign affairs said, “it regrets this completely unjustified but
expected decision, in view of the logic of escalation noted in recent weeks, as
well as its impact on the Algerian people.”It also rejected “the fallacious,
even absurd, pretexts underlying” the move. Maghreb analysts described Algeria’s
severing of diplomatic relations with Morocco as a reflection of its refusal to
accept regional changes and its insistence on squandering opportunities for
cooperation and better relations with Morocco, despite the many overtures from
King Mohammed VI. Late last month, Morocco’s king deplored the tensions between
the two countries and invited Algeria’s President Abdelmadjid Tebboune “to make
wisdom prevail” and “to work in unison for the development of relations” between
the two countries. The analysts accused Algeria of choosing escalation following
the decision of the US to recognise Moroccan sovereignty over the Western
Sahara, with the latest ratcheting being the unsubstantiated accusations that
Morocco was behind the forest fires in the Kabyle region.
Algeria’s fires, which broke out on August 9 amid a blistering heatwave, burned
tens of thousands of hectares of trees and killed at least 90 people, including
more than 30 soldiers, further stoking tensions. The Algerian authorities found
themselves in a tough predicament at home as they faced mounting criticism over
their failure to prepare for the blazes, though Tebboune declared that most of
the fires were of “criminal” origin. Forest fires have broken out in more than
one Mediterranean country, as Turkey, Greece, Lebanon and Tunisia all suffered
from the same disasters, which is likely linked to climate change. Ramtane
Lamamra reiterated the Algerian presidency’s accusation of “Rabat’s involvement
in the recent wave of fires that the country has experienced and in the horrific
crime that killed the young volunteer, Jamal Ibn Ismail.”
He also accused Rabat of “embracing the two terrorist organisations, the Kabyle
Independence Movement (MAC) and the Rachad Movement,” which Algiers alleges were
behind the fires. “The Moroccan provocation reached its climax when a Moroccan
delegate to the United Nations demanded the independence of the people of the
Kabylie region,” Lamamra said, adding that Algeria waited for the Moroccan
leadership to provide it with an explanation on the issue if (that) was an
isolated act or an official position.” However, he said, “the silence of Morocco
since the middle of last July has suggested that the aforementioned endeavour is
a Moroccan position.”Last month, Algeria recalled its ambassador to Rabat for
consultations over allegations that Morocco’s envoy to the United Nations, Omar
Hilale, voiced support for self-determination in Kabylie. Some analysts link the
Algerian response to Morocco’s mounting diplomatic and political successes in
recent years, the latest of which was the recognition by the United States and a
number of Gulf countries of its sovereignty over the Western Sahara. “The
Algerian move falls within a natural context adopted by the regime in Algiers,
which believes that escalation with Morocco can help it overcome its deep
internal crisis,” Lebanese political analyst Khairallah Khairallah said.
Khairallah added that the Algerian decision meant “the rejection of Morocco’s
outstretched hand” and was evidence of “the bankruptcy of a regime that does not
know that its first problem is with its people and not with Morocco.”Ramtane
Lamamra also said that the final decision over the contract related to the
Algerian gas pipeline transiting Morocco to Spain is subject to international
arbitration and agreements and that Sonatrach, which owns the pipeline, is the
decision-maker over the renewal or termination of the contract in the near
future.There were conflicting accounts in the two capitals over the fate of the
agreement concluded between the two countries on the gas pipeline, which expires
at the end of this year. Algeria’s foreign minister also accused Morocco of
leading “a media war … against Algeria, its people and its leaders”. He accused
Morocco’s government of “responsibility for repeated crises” and behaviour that
has “led to conflict instead of integration” in North Africa. But Lamamra also
said consular assistance to citizens of both countries would not be affected.
The Moroccan foreign ministry has pledged that the kingdom “will remain a
credible and loyal partner for the Algerian people and will continue to act,
with wisdom and responsibility, for the development of healthy and fruitful
inter-Maghreb relations.”
Saudi-Russian defence agreement reflects Riyadh’s
diversification drive
The Arab Weekly/August 25/2021
MOSCOW--Saudi Arabia and Russia took a further step towards developing their
military cooperation by signing a defence deal on Monday. The deal came at a
time when diversification of international partners is of increasing importance
to the kingdom in light of the growing disengagement from the region of Riyadh’s
historic ally, the United States and Washington’s retreat from its commitments
towards its traditional partners. The agreement was signed on the sidelines of a
meeting in Moscow between Saudi Deputy Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman
and Russian Defence Minister Sergey Shoygu. “I signed an agreement with the
Russian Deputy Minister of Defence Colonel General Alexander Fomin between the
Kingdom and the Russian Federation aimed at developing joint military
cooperation between the two countries,” tweeted Prince Khalid. Prince Khalid and
Shoygu had met earlier to “explore ways to strengthen the military and defence
cooperation” between Riyadh and Moscow. “We discussed our common endeavour to
preserve stability and security in the region and reviewed shared challenges
facing our countries,” Prince Khalid wrote in another tweet. According to
followers of Saudi affairs, the kingdom’s move towards Russia and other world
powers, at this particular juncture, along with the signing of the defence
agreement, carry a clear message to the US that other powers are ready to fill
the void created by Washington’s Middle East retreat and that the relationship
with Saudi Arabia is not to be taken for granted. Riyadh has been a leading
customer of the US defence industry. It is considered the largest importer of
American weapons with almost a quarter of total US arms exports going to Saudi
Arabia, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. The
Saudi Deputy Defence Minister’s Moscow visit came as part of his trip to the
International Military-Technical Forum “Army 2021”. During the meeting with
Shoygu, Prince Khalid talked of the kingdom’s readiness to “continue to
strengthen the historically-developed relations between our two countries,”
adding, according to the Russian Sputnik agency, “I am confident that in the
future we will continue to develop and strengthen these relations and achieve
the aspirations of our peoples.” This, he said, would have a beneficial impact
on “stability and security.”According to the Saudi Deputy Defence Minister, the
existing cooperation between his country and Russia “will contribute to
formulating a joint response to all modern challenges that we will undertake to
meet together,” noting that “the existing challenges will require greater
cooperation and effort on our part.”The Army 21 forum is held from August 22 to
28 in the city of Kubinka, on the outskirts of the Russian capital, Moscow.
Saudi Arabia and Russia are major partners in the oil sector and together during
last year’s market turmoil and price collapse, played a decisive role in
restoring balance to markets and adjusting prices,. In the light of the Saudi
foreign policy aimed at diversifying Riyadh’s partners, the kingdom’s relations
with Russia have seen qualitative leaps in recent years culminating in King
Salman bin Abdulaziz’s first visit to Moscow in the fall of 2017. Saudi Arabia’s
determination to widen it international relationships seem stronger today than
ever, after the US policy shifts signalled by President Joe Biden. The US
administration fuelled Arab Gulf concerns with its move to accommodate Iran and
its failure to heed Saudi concerns, as demonstrated a few months ago by the
decision to withdraw military equipment, including Patriot missile batteries,
from the kingdom and other countries in the region. The US move was announced
while the kingdom faced the threat of ballistic missiles and drones that Iran
supplies to its Houthi proxies in Yemen. Military and defence experts say that
the decision to withdraw the Patriot batteries may have motivated the Saudis to
search for Russian alternatives.
Saudi and Russian sources had previously revealed in February 2018 that
“advanced” negotiations were underway to sell the kingdom Russian S-400 air
defence systems.
Cyprus to revoke passports of Turkish Cypriot officials
The Arab Weekly/August 25/2021
NICOSIA--Cyprus said it would revoke passports issued to Turkish Cypriot
officials in the breakaway north of the island over their “hostile” actions.
Government spokesman Marios Pelekanos did not specify which officials were being
targeted, but said the decision was linked to Turkish and Turkish Cypriot plans
to open up the ghost town of Varosha. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and
Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar said last month they would reopen part of the
former resort, abandoned since Ankara’s 1974 invasion of the island. “The
cabinet decided to revoke, not renew or issue Republic of Cyprus passports to a
number of persons who either participate in the pseudo-state’s cabinet or are
members of the Varosha opening committee,” Pelekanos said Monday. The actions of
these officials “undermine the sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity
and security of the Republic of Cyprus,” he said. The present Cypriot
administration, which made billions selling passports to thousands of people
ranging from Russian oligarchs and a Malaysian fugitive to well-connected
Cambodians, said the actions of the Turkish Cypriots targeted undermined the
integrity of Cyprus. The official Cyprus News Agency said 14 passports would be
revoked, ten held by cabinet members and four by members of the Varosha
committee.
“Their specific hostile actions against the Republic of Cyprus promote the
implementation of Turkey’s plans to change the status of Varosha, contrary to
United Nations resolutions,” Pelekanos added. Turkish Cypriot authorities in
July announced a partial reopening of the beach suburb of Varosha for potential
resettlement, but it brought a strong rebuke from Greek Cypriots who regard it
as a land-grab. For decades, the area has been a Turkish military zone with no
settlement permitted. Turkish troops seized the northern third of Cyprus in 1974
in response to an aborted coup in Nicosia aiming at uniting the island with
Greece. The Republic of Cyprus, whose overwhelming majority is Greek Cypriot and
which has been a European Union member since 2004, has effective control over
the southern two-thirds of the island. Only Ankara recognises the breakaway
self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC). Turkish Cypriots are
eligible for a Republic of Cyprus identity card and passport, which allows them
free access to the EU. Media reports said that Tatar obtained a passport in 2000
but that he never used it and would happily return it. The EU has told Turkey to
reverse plans to open up Varosha. In July, the 27-nation bloc condemned
“Turkey’s unilateral steps and the unacceptable announcements”. It is estimated
that more than 100,000 Turkish Cypriots hold either a Republic of Cyprus ID card
or passport, as is their birthright based on the common state established with
Greek Cypriots in 1960.
The Communist AKEL, the main Greek Cypriot opposition party, said the passport
decision was for domestic consumption only and that authorities should focus on
initiatives to “arrest the partiVaroshationist designs of Turkey”. However,
Erato Kozakou Marcoullis, a former Cypriot foreign minister and long-time
diplomat, roundly condemned the Cypriot government’s move. He tweeted: “(A)
Short-sighted and impulsive policy! They are removing the only element of proof
that ‘officials’ of the Turkey-subordinate regime do recognise the Republic of
Cyprus.”Local media have reported that Tatar, a strong proponent of Turkish
Cypriot independence, obtained a Cypriot passport in 2000. He is the son of a
prominent technocrat who acted as an adviser in talks leading to the
establishment of the Republic of Cyprus in 1960 after independence from Britain.
The Latest LCCC English analysis &
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Act Now to Save and Learn the Lessons of the Afghan War
Anthony H. Cordesman/CSIS/August 25/2021
It will be all too easy to lurch from crisis to crisis in leading with the
collapse of Afghanistan and its aftermath. It will be all the more easy to fail
at preserving the data and institutions necessary to learn as much from that
collapse as possible. The U.S. made this mistake in dealing with its first
withdrawal from Iraq. It let the Special Inspector General for Iraq
Reconstruction (SIGIR) collapse, did not create any official independent body to
replace SIGIR to learn from the war, let much of the official open source data
disappear from the web, and never established a process for declassifying masses
of key data that would have helped analysts and historians learn the right
lessons with as much information as possible.
The U.S. made equally serious mistakes in learning from the first Gulf War. It
rushed out a report to Congress called the Conduct of The Persian Gulf War:
Final Report to Congress that grossly exaggerated the level of success in using
airpower, understated the problems in creating an effective coalition, did not
address the serious intelligence and policy mistakes that led to premature
conflict termination without the proper conditions, failed to address the legacy
and relevant lessons of the Iran-Iraq War, and failed to examine the
post-conflict costs of failing to have an effective plan for conflict
termination. Some excellent studies have since been written by outside analysts,
and separate efforts by bodies like the U.S. Air Force Studies and Analyses
Agency (AFSAA) have corrected many of the mistakes in the first official report,
but much of the data and facts have been lost.
The U.S. also largely failed to provide a timely analysis of the lessons of the
Vietnam War, although outside historians and analysts have since written some
excellent work, and the later volumes of the 33 volumes in the U.S. Army’s
official history of the Vietnam War did cover many key areas in depth. Jeffrey
J. Clarke’s Advice and Support: The Final Years, 1965-1973 should have been
required reading for every officer and official going to both Iraq and
Afghanistan, although it clearly suffered from a lack of full access to
sensitive data that never became public after the war.
The U.S. should not repeat these mistakes in the case of the Afghan War, and
this time it maintains a body capable with all of the expertise, objectivity,
and practical contacts it needs to do the job efficiently, handle sensitive and
classified data securely, and take a “whole of government” approach that will
ensure that there is a proper focus on both the civil and military lessons of
the conflict.
The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has already
addressed many of the lessons that should be learned from the war. It has
experienced experts that have already worked in the field, and it has shown it
can work well with both military personnel in the field and with think tanks in
Washington. Equally important, it has demonstrated that it really is
non-partisan in a Washington where partisanship is all too common and
campaigning for the 2022 mid-term election has already begun.
Furthermore, SIGAR has focused on the costs of war in terms of money and
casualties, not just policy and strategy in the broad sense. It has examined the
problems in train and assist efforts for the Afghan military as well the
problems in civil aid efforts and the impact of Afghan internal politics and
corruption. It has already worked with classified data on the growth of Taliban
forces down to the local level and on the full impact of the shifts and cuts in
U.S. and foreign military, civilian, and contractor personnel.
This is critical in handling the level of detail necessary to fully address the
practical lessons from the war. Outside experts have already issued at least two
important books on the war: Carter Malkasian’s The American War in Afghanistan:
A History and Craig Whitlock’s The Afghanistan Papers, and there are certain to
be many more. Some of the most important lessons, however, will address
individual areas of federal spending, the timing and reasons for shifts in
military civilian projects and personnel, the details of the changing train and
assist efforts, the need for managing the flow of aid and making it conditional,
and a long list of other areas where SIGAR has already shown that a detailed
analysis of lessons is necessary and where it often could not address the
details because the Afghan government insisted that key data would not be made
available.
Most importantly, SIGAR has also shown consistently that it has no partisan
edge, no political or ideological biases, and no institutional biases or
reluctance to discuss difficult decisions and bureaucratic failures. It is an
organization which – unlike so many study groups and commissions – has proven
its ability to be objective and deal with the uncertainty of so many aspects of
complex warfighting decision-making.
To succeed, however, SIGAR’s mandate has to be extended almost immediately,
along with its authority to collect key data, keep experienced personnel, and
have full access on an interagency level. Congress needs to change SIGAR’s
mandate, give it at least two more years to work through the lesson process, and
avoid pressing it for instant answers in the many areas where data need to be
verified and conflicting views need to be addressed.
Congress also needs to fully understand that the cost of learning the right
lessons from this war will be negligible compared to the cost of failing to
learn. Important as China and Russia may be, the U.S. will still face many more
struggles against terrorism, irregular warfare, and insurgencies. It will still
have to deal with a world where at least 20% of the countries are now fragile
states, and where the U.S. must find the right path to a real “whole of
government” approach and adequate contingency planning.
This commentary, entitled, Act Now to Save and Learn the Lessons of the Afghan
War, is available for download at
https://csis-website-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/210823_Cordesman_Save_Learn.pdf?fMCSm3V4Zxi9yABpIEdG5HAloDdLuxIl
*Anthony H. Cordesman holds the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy at the Center
for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. He has served as a
consultant on Afghanistan to the United States Department of Defense and the
United States Department of State.
Commentary is produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS),
a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy
issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take
specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions
expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the
author(s).
© 2021 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. All rights
reserved.
How American Weapons Find Their Way to International Criminal Organizations
Emanuele Ottolenghi/The Dispatch-FDD/August 25/2021
It’s a complex problem that won’t be solved by Mexico’s lawsuit against U.S.
manufacturers.
Earlier this month, the Mexican government filed an unprecedented lawsuit
against U.S. gun manufacturers. The claim: Manufacturers are negligent in their
sales and bear responsibility for the flow of weapons across the U.S.-Mexican
border. Those weapons, they say, arm the cartels and contribute to the
skyrocketing number of violent deaths—17,000 last year alone. Not surprisingly,
the manufacturers reject such claims. They say they strictly follow American
law. They argue that the porous nature of the border and the corruption of
officials on the Mexican side are the problem.
The manufacturers are right on both counts. But the flow of illicit weapons
south of the U.S. border is not Mexico’s fault alone. Guns in America are sold,
by and large, by the book. But organized crime elements have found ways to
purchase large quantities of weapons on the U.S. market legally through illicit
actors who take advantage of insufficient custom controls, corrupt border
officials, and freight companies that dispatch entire armories to Central and
South America for the benefit of criminal syndicates and violent gangs. This
happens despite a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last year banning straw
purchases—guns bought on others’ behalf.
Two years ago, a joint international police operation nicknamed Patagonia
Express exposed and dismantled a fraudulent scheme to ship weapons to criminal
organizations in Argentina and Brazil. During the operation, U.S., Argentinian.
and Brazilian law enforcement arrested 25 people and seized thousands of
weapons. Among the arrested: an elderly couple from South Florida, who bought
weapons locally, disassembled them, and then sent their components to Argentina
in mislabeled shipments through the U.S. Postal Service.
Patagonia Express uncovered not only a scheme but also a method. A similar case
involved a small Paraguayan import company, Paco Internacional, currently being
prosecuted in Paraguay. In March 2016, local authorities inspected a container,
just arrived from Miami, that included merchandise labeled as electronics.
Inspectors found weapon parts instead. It took five years to mount a case
against the recipient of the weapons Paco was importing into Paraguay. Officials
today believe the buyer was a local businessman suspected of being involved in
organized crime. Paraguayan prosecution documents allege that he bought the
weapons online from U.S. suppliers and had them shipped to a Florida address.
The freight forwarder and its Florida-based counterpart did the rest.
In the Paco Internacional case, the online purchase of weapons underscores how
easy it can be for criminals to procure weapons in the U.S. if they have
accomplices. The U.S. sellers did not violate the law: They shipped their
products to a U.S. address. And given the small number of arms involved, the
case hardly seems worth highlighting as a problem here in the United States.
However, the role of local facilitators for criminal networks should not be
ignored. The Miami-based freight company that sent the weapons to Paco belonged
to a Brazilian national who was arrested in Brazil in 2017 for contraband. Paco
also traded with other South Florida-based companies implicated in a suspected
Hezbollah trade-based money laundering scheme that is today being prosecuted in
Miami. Indeed, organized crime often looks to U.S. based facilitators with an
eye toward circumventing the holes in our legal system.
Criminal syndicates find it easier (and possibly cheaper) to buy weapons legally
in the U.S. market because there are American intermediaries who are willing to
break the law by exporting them under false documentation. In other words, there
may be negligence and even corruption at the border, but there is also a
systemic problem here at home.
The volume and type of weapons seized over the years suggests that the Mexican
government is not entirely wrong to look at America as a source of weapons for
the cartels. However, it appears that the negligence alleged may be less with
manufacturers and more with gun stores. Similarly, blaming border control for
the problem may also fail to help. Intermediaries can circumvent the border
altogether with these schemes.
This does not absolve America from wrestling with the broader problem of
American weapons finding their way into the hands of international criminal
organizations, and the devastating long-term consequences for societies in the
southern hemisphere this trafficking begets. What happens there does not stay
there, either. Immigrants fleeing the violence south of our border continue to
pose policy challenges here.
Even if the Mexican legal complaint is dismissed, American policymakers must
independently take action to stem the illicit flow of deadly weapons to
transnational organized crime. This may require states to institute more
stringent controls on internet sales of weapons and other measures to reduce
straw purchases and ensure that buyers are not stockpiling weapons with a view
to illicit transfers, as the Patagonia Express case shows. It will also require
the federal government to strengthen monitoring of commercial shipments at ports
and postal shipments. The U.S. cannot solve the plague of public officials’
corruption south of its border. But it can make sure that criminals do not
exploit our constitutional freedoms to foment violence abroad.
*Emanuele Ottolenghi is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of
Democracies, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. Follow him on Twitter
@eottolenghi.
Afghanistan's Christians are turning off phones and going
into hiding
Kelsey Zorzi/The Hill/August 25/2021
With the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan, governments around the world are
frantically making plans to rescue as many at risk Afghans as they can. Germany,
which has vowed to evacuate as many as 10,000, and the United Kingdom are
currently coordinating with civil society partners to determine who is most in
need of rescue and how they can be located and evacuated.
India announced last week that it will prioritize evacuating Hindus and Sikhs,
two religious minorities that have already neared extinction in Afghanistan due
to the Taliban’s brutal rule 20 years ago.
Canada has expressed a willingness to grant visas to religious minorities whose
lives are presumed endangered under the Taliban. Among the country’s most
vulnerable minorities are Christians. But the Christian community is becoming
increasingly difficult to track down. And fears are growing that, for many, it’s
too late and there’s no way out.
Afghanistan’s Christians are estimated to number between 10,000 and 12,000. The
vast majority of them are converts from Islam to Christianity. For decades they
have largely practiced their faith underground, as conversion is considered a
crime punishable by death under Sharia Law.
Yet, since the Taliban’s fall in 2001, the Christian community has not only been
growing, it has become emboldened, in part because of the modicum of security
leant by the U.S. presence on the ground. In 2019, as the number of children
born to converts grew, dozens of Afghan Christians decided to include their
religious affiliation on their national identity cards so that future
generations wouldn’t have to hide their faith. Only about 30 Christians
successfully made this change before the Taliban’s takeover this week.
Now the United States’ highly criticized withdrawal has left Afghan Christians
with no choice but to join those who cooperated with the U.S. and Afghan
governments in attempting to hide. The memories of public executions, floggings
and amputations of Christians and other religious minorities under the Taliban’s
previous rule remain vivid. As the Taliban is reportedly already working to
track down the known Christians on its list, some local church leaders are
counseling their communities to stay inside their homes, even though they know
the best and perhaps only long-term hope is to somehow flee the country. Other
Christians are reportedly escaping to the hills in attempts to find safety.
Some Christians on the ground have expressed that, with the takeover of Kabul,
they expect to be killed, mafia-style. Although some reports say that the
Taliban is already conducting targeted killings of Christians and other
minorities found using public transportation, as well as executing anyone found
with Bible software installed on their cell phones.
Christians also fear for the safety of their children, with the Taliban already
publicizing plans to “eradicate the ignorance of irreligion” by taking
non-Muslim women and girls as sex slaves and forcing boys to serve as soldiers.
Without any clear plan from the United States to evacuate Afghans under special
threat, not to mention the remaining thousands of American citizens, Afghan
Christians and many other religious minority groups are stranded. They know the
Taliban is seeking them. Christians in hiding have already reported receiving
threatening letters or phone calls saying, “We know where you are and what you
are doing.” Without knowing how sophisticated the Taliban’s tracking
capabilities are, Christians are turning off their phones to avoid surveillance
and have started moving to undisclosed locations.
Further complicating any plans to rescue Afghanistan’s vulnerable minorities is
the fact that many of them are without passports. It is estimated by locals that
only 20-30 percent of the known Christian community have passports. Without
passports, it is currently unclear whether any foreign country would accept
them, were they able to get out.
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Several European government officials are currently discussing the possibility
of overlooking immigration documentation requirements for those individuals
whose identities and vulnerability status can be verified by civil society
groups. But until countries confirm and announce that they are willing to waive
passport and visa requirements, many Afghan Christians are unwilling to risk the
increasingly perilous journey through Taliban checkpoints to the airport. And,
currently, a passport and safe arrival at the airport aren’t even enough; the
few passport holding Christians who have reached the airport have not yet been
able to leave the country.
With phones off, many Christians will be difficult to contact or locate for
rescue, in the event that the American government finally takes direct action to
correct some of the worst fallout from its disastrous withdrawal. While the U.S.
and the international community must start doing everything in their power to
help the most vulnerable, time is quickly running out.
*Kelsey Zorzi is president of the U.N.’s NGO Committee on Freedom of Religion or
Belief and director of advocacy for global religious freedom for ADF
International. Her writings have appeared in several outlets including the Wall
Street Journal, Newsweek, and RealClear. Twitter: @KelseyZorzi.
Azerbaijani support underpins Turkey’s ambitions in South
Caucasus
The Arab Weekly/August 25/2021
Turkey is bolstering defence cooperation with Azerbaijan as it seeks to double
down on the military success of last year’s war between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
As skirmishes along the Armenian-Azerbaijan border increased in recent weeks,
there was even speculation that Turkey was on the brink of forging a joint
military force with Baku. Turkey helped Azerbaijan come out on top of the
six-week conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region and it wants to capitalise by
further boosting its influence in the South Caucasus.
Under president Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP),
Turkey has made no secret of its thirst for a grander role in swathes of the
Arab Middle East, Libya and the Eastern Mediterranean. But if it pushes too far
in the Caucasus, it risks antagonising Russia, which views the region as its own
historical backyard. Symbolised by the popular motto of “one nation, two
states,” Turkey and Azerbaijan have held a close bond since Baku declared
independence in 1991. The countries are predominantly Muslim, share ethnic and
cultural similarities and are linked by strong economic interests.
A chronic, shared concern between the two is thwarting the regional ambitions of
Armenia. Turkey and Armenia have no diplomatic relations and a history of
hostility that dates back a century.
Ties between Ankara and Baku grew deeper after Turkey threw its support behind
Azerbaijan during last year’s conflict. Ankara supplied Azeri forces with armed
Bayraktar TB2 drones that were used to devastating effect against Armenian
troops.
The war ended with a Russian-brokered deal in November and resulted in Baku’s
military victory over several cities and nearly 300 settlements and villages. At
least 5,000 soldiers and more than 140 civilians were killed in the fighting,
which also displaced tens of thousands of people. The outcome delivered a blow
to Armenia’s claims to the region that span nearly three decades.
In signs that tensions are far from over, there have been pockets of fighting
along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border over the past few weeks. On August 1, the
Azeri defence ministry said Armenian army elements targeted its positions and
Baku responded with retaliatory fire. In early August, at least three Armenian
troops died and two Azeri soldiers were wounded in clashes in Azerbaijan’s
Kalbajar district. All this may have fuelled reports in the Turkish media that a
joint Azerbaijan-Turkey force was imminent. The speculation was later rowed
back, after it turned out the source of the confusion was a poor translation of
a statement by Turkish parliament speaker Mustafa Sentop at the signing ceremony
of the Baku Declaration on July 28 between Turkey, Azerbaijan and Pakistan. But
the prospect of a joint army had seemed plausible given that military
cooperation between Ankara and Baku has steadily grown since the conflict.
Ankara is adamant that it cannot lose influence over the Nagorno-Karabakh
settlement and is looking to enhance its caretaker role in the South Caucasus.
In late June, the Turkish and Azeri militaries conducted joint drills in Baku
that involved military personnel, tanks and drones. Similar bilateral exercises
were held last year, made possible by a 2010 agreement that mandates cooperation
when either country faces aggression from a third state or group of states.
Turkey and Azerbaijan signed the Shusha Declaration in July, named after the
city in the Nagorno-Karabakh region that Azerbaijan now controls, affirming a
joint commitment to defence cooperation, stability and prosperity in the region.
A central concern lies with restructuring and modernising their armed forces.
Rumours that Turkey may be planning a military base in Azerbaijan are cause for
concern for Russia, which has its own base in Armenia. Moscow has deployed 2,000
peacekeepers to the region and wants to maintain a monopoly over the balance of
power there. On July 20, president Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan met Vladimir Putin
in Moscow for the second time this year to discuss the post-war peace agreement
and a way forward.
Russia is not the only one with an interest in how the Azerbaijan-Armenia
ceasefire deal plays out. Brussels seeks the revival of the Minsk Group under
the auspices of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, paving
the way for the US and France (as Minsk co-chairs) to take on a larger mediating
role. From their perspective, the conflict has not been resolved once and for
all. European Council President Charles Michel said in July during a visit to
Yerevan that “the status of Nagorno-Karabakh must also be addressed.” For years,
Azerbaijan expressed frustration with the stalled Minsk process and is not keen
to assign it any significant role in the border demarcation process with
Armenia. In recent years, Turkish foreign policy has prioritised the creation of
a medley of regional organisations, pacts and local summits as potential
counterweights to established Western multilateral organisations and powerhouses
like Russia and Iran. For example, the recent trilateral agreement with Pakistan
and Azerbaijan or reports earlier this year of reviving Turkey-Israel relations
through Azeri mediation. Turkey recently hinted at a new six-state platform to
support peace in the Caucasus that would include Turkey, Azerbaijan, Russia,
Iran, Georgia and Armenia. Turkey is keen to sign off on a success story in its
otherwise rancorous foreign policy-making and amid its domestic economic woes
and plummeting currency.
But against the backdrop of a burgeoning bilateral military pact between Ankara
and Baku, Russia and neighbouring states are hesitant to buy in to its rhetoric
on regional cooperation. Peripheral states have always managed their
relationship with Russia carefully, wary of the consequences of a misstep. While
Turkey tries to tinker with the regional balance of power, it is unclear just
how much it can achieve beyond its safe-bet alliance with Azerbaijan.
Syndication Bureau: www.syndicationbureau.com
*Burcu Ozcelik is a research fellow and affiliated lecturer at Cambridge
University.
A trial in Sweden raises uncomfortable questions about
Iranian regime’s past
Ann Torknkvist/Arab News/August 25/2021
STOCKHOLM: The Stockholm District Court’s thick stone walls could not keep out
the sounds of protest. Since the trial of Hamid Noury, 60, began on Aug. 10,
Swedish Iranians have gathered daily outside the century-old court building to
draw the world’s attention to his alleged crimes.
During a court appearance last week, Noury complained that the protesters’
chants and slogans were “insulting,” forcing the judge to ask police to request
the crowd outside to quieten down.
The trial is connected to the mass execution in July and August 1988 of
political prisoners who were members or sympathizers of the armed leftwing group
Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), also known as the People’s Mujahedin Organization of
Iran. As an alleged assistant to one of the special-tribunal prosecutors, Noury
is said to have been a key actor in the executions at Gohardasht prison, a
facility on the northern outskirts of Karaj, about 20 km west of the capital
Tehran.
The prosecution says that Noury facilitated death sentences, sent prisoners to
execution and helped prosecutors gather prisoners’ names. He has denied all of
the charges while claiming that the sentences were justified because of a fatwa,
or religious ruling, by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s supreme leader at
the time. The fatwa, issued in 1988, targeted the MEK, which had been outlawed
by the Islamic regime in 1981 and held responsible for a series of anti-regime
attacks at the end of the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War. The MEK had been operating
since 1986 from Iraq, then ruled by Iran’s archfoe Saddam Hussein.
The families of the victims of the executions have waited three decades for
justice. Now, after a complex Swedish police investigation into the suspected
murders of political prisoners, they could soon find a measure of closure.
Survivors of the anti-MEK purge have testified that several inmates already had
the hangman’s noose around their necks when Noury led them down what was known
among prisoners as a “death corridor,” to await their hearing.
Noury is alleged to have read out the names of those who would face the
specially appointed tribunal, which had likewise been nicknamed “the death
commission.” Few renounced their allegiance to the MEK, so few ended up avoiding
the death penalty.
“It was a kangaroo court where the so-called trial took one to two minutes,”
Shahin Gobadi, a spokesman for the MEK-affiliated National Council of Resistance
of Iran, told Arab News while participating in a protest last week outside the
Stockholm District Court by exiled Iranians, former political prisoners and
families of victims of the secret executions. Gobadi added: “Noury served
pastries to the judges on the ‘death commission’ and to the prison guards to
celebrate a ‘good day’s work’.”
In one witness statement, Noury was described as “particularly cold-blooded”
compared with other officials involved in a veritable industrial production-line
killing system. Activists managed to lure Noury to Scandinavia with a bogus
offer of a luxury cruise, before tipping off local police about his scheduled
arrival. Since his arrest at Stockholm airport in November 2019, the case
against him has expanded.
Kenneth Lewis, representing several of the plaintiffs, told the court that
although 500 to 600 prisoners were known to have died at Gohardasht within the
space of a few weeks, this was merely one of several prisons where executions
were taking place.
A 2018 report by human rights monitor Amnesty International, “Blood-Soaked
Secrets: Why Iran’s 1988 prison massacres are ongoing crimes against humanity,”
places the death toll in regime jails at about 5,000.
In the wider crackdown, which was not reserved to the prisons, an estimated
30,000 Iranian dissidents are thought to have been killed. Lewis pointed out
that this toll far exceeds other well-known atrocities, including Srebrenica in
Bosnia.
“It is my belief, however, that the motive, not the numbers, define genocide,”
Lewis told the court in his opening statement. Indeed, Khomeini’s son and
right-hand man Ahmad Khomeini is alleged to have argued strongly in favor of the
fatwa at issue, saying it was time to “exterminate” the MEK in retaliation for
its anti-regime activities.“It is our view that these executions constitute
genocide because the fatwa was issued with the purpose of exterminating the (MEK)
based on the (regime’s) religious opinion,” Lewis said.
Ali Doustkam, who fled to Sweden in 1994 and has attended the protests in
Stockholm, says that the trauma of the 1988 fatwa persists despite the passage
of time. “The prisoners who were executed were discarded in mass graves. Their
families have not been able to bury them to this day,” Doustkam told Arab News.
According to him, suspected MEK members eliminated by the regime outside the
prison system were also treated with the same disrespect in death. Branded
enemies of God, they were denied the right to burial in communal cemeteries
among the devout. “Parents were forced to bury their children in their
backyard,” Doustkam said.In Gobadi’s view, the Iranian “government of mass
murderers” has not only avoided accountability for its actions, but has rewarded
its functionaries for their “ruthless savagery,” among them Iran’s new president
and former judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi, who Amnesty accuses of being a member
of the “death commission” behind the secret executions. Raisi has denied
involvement, but praised Khomeini’s “order” to carry out the purge.
“It is our ultimate wish that a conviction here leads to Noury and members of
the Iranian regime being tried for crimes against humanity at an international
tribunal,” Doustkam said. Noury’s defense team has contested the evidence
against their client, highlighting perceived inconsistencies and unverifiable
information in witness testimonies. They have also implied that groups on social
media have created echo chambers where inaccuracies have percolated over many
years, converting mere hearsay into supposed facts.
How Taliban 2.0 turned into a lethal force
Mohamed Chebaro/Arab News/August 25/2021
Step away from the dust and turmoil created by the hasty evacuation efforts at
Kabul airport and it appears that after 20 years in the shadows the Taliban are
in total command of Afghanistan’s destiny.
Ignore the emotionally driven news coverage justifying or questioning the wisdom
behind the US withdrawal, and we can see a smiling Taliban leadership happy to
stand by and watch, offering vague statements about a future Afghanistan for
all, under Shariah rule of course, and where the place of women will be
determined by the extremist interpretation of religious texts.
For an observer who has covered Afghanistan before and after 9/11, there can be
only one conclusion: Thank you, America, for arming the Taliban, and for making
terrorist groups around the world look on in envy as their fellow “mujahideen”
win the lottery.
According to some estimates, the US may have left more than $100 billion of
military hardware, including armored vehicles, light combat aircraft and a fleet
of helicopters, to the Taliban 2.0.
The talks in Doha that led to the withdrawal now look like a mere capitulation,
with only one vague guarantee that Afghanistan will no longer be a haven for
groups willing to attack the West. But why would these groups stay in
Afghanistan when other sanctuaries are available in countries such as Syria,
Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen, not to mention European and US suburbs that are able to
produce their own type of Islamist extremists.
Those in government, it seems, fail to see the impact this rushed withdrawal
will have on the West’s global standing. Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has
criticized the West’s loss of “strategic will,” claiming that Russia, China and
Iran will take advantage of the continued retreat.
Meanwhile, up to 80,000 Taliban fighters now can enjoy an armory fit for a
modern, lethally equipped fighting machine of 300,000 troops, which the US and
NATO had trained in the two decades before their surrender in a matter of days.
Even more alarmingly, these light drones, high-tech communication systems and
advanced weapons could also reach terror groups scattered around the globe.
Many claim now that they saw all this coming. But I recall many informal
discussions with military and civilian officials working in Afghanistan and
Western capitals who insisted they were rebuilding the Afghan political system
along a Western model of “one man one vote” and the rule of law. A lot of effort
was wasted transporting ballot boxes to remote villages instead of trying to
understand that the dynamic of authority and loyalty in that society works
differently.
Like Lebanon, the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and even Iraq, Afghanistan is a
country whose people are a mix of ethnic, linguistic, tribal, religious and
sectarian groups, all united by a competitive, yet conservative, outlook on
life. The West hoped that liberal democracy would replace age-old patriarchal
traditions, with tribal codes instead of police and laws. Despite faint hopes
that the neo-Taliban have become more mature operators, the early signs are not
encouraging.
The national Afghan army rebuilt by the US and NATO consisted of members of
various communities. Recruits and their local commanders must have noted that
their government was sidelined in the Doha talks and that national
reconciliation talks were going nowhere. These soldiers knew better than anyone
else that fighting the Taliban without the help of their foreign mentors would
be futile. Hence, the ground was set for them to lay down their weapons,
encouraged by Taliban propaganda that reached deep into towns and villages.
The national army’s collapse in Afghanistan is not new. The previous Afghan army
built by the former Soviet Union was routed by the mujahideen in the early
1990s. Today, though, the failure of the army and police force, as well as the
departure of President Ashraf Ghani, leaves the country facing the unknown.
Despite faint hopes that the neo-Taliban have become more mature operators, able
to preserve and build on what has been achieved over two decades of
foreign-assisted rule, the early signs are not encouraging. The rapid collapse
of the army and the West’s chaotic evacuation have only emboldened the
militants, which means it is business as usual for this vigilante group seeking
to uphold its vision of righteousness against evil. It will not be long before
the Taliban reinstate their old rules, and resort to torture and brutal
punishments, while truckloads of exported opium and now weapons ensure enough
income for their survival.
*Mohamed Chebaro is a British-Lebanese journalist with more than 25 years’
experience covering war, terrorism, defense, current affairs and diplomacy. He
is also a media consultant and trainer.
Taliban drug trade hints at a way to protect Afghan culture
Rym Tina Ghazal/Arab News/August 25/2021
“Intolerance: Be like the ocean.” Many may not know that those words — a call
for the acceptance of diversity — by the 13th-century poet Rumi may actually be
those of one of Afghanistan’s legendary figures.
Rumi has been claimed by Turkey, Iran and even parts of the Arab world, but he
is believed to have been born in 1207 in Balkh, north of what is present-day
Afghanistan. It will be interesting to see what the Taliban make of Rumi and
other totemic representatives of the cultures that once blossomed in the land
now called Afghanistan. And if their consideration is less than positive, what
can be done to protect the country’s historical patrimony?
For now, the signs do not augur well. Soon after swooping down on Kabul, the
Taliban announced they were a changed group that now wanted peace. They declared
an “amnesty” for all who previously worked against them, and said they were even
willing to work with “our sisters.” Shortly after that, they blew up a statue.
Did they destroy it because they believed statues promote idolatry or because it
depicted a man who was their enemy? It is impossible to say for certain. But it
is possible that the statue of Abdul Ali Mazari, a champion of Afghanistan’s
ethnic Hazara minority who was executed by the Taliban in 1995, ticked more than
one box. Of course, Mazari’s statue had no great cultural or artistic value. Its
destruction has made it more famous than it would ever have been otherwise. But
more interestingly, it stood in Bamiyan province. For it was in Bamiyan, in
2001, that the Taliban blew up two massive, 1,500-year-old statues of Buddha
carved into a mountainside. The destruction of the statues remains possibly the
biggest act of wanton destruction of culture in modern history. So, is the
demolition of the Mazari statue a sign of things to come? With the fight against
the “others” — the occupying foreign forces — now over, will the fight now turn
inward against the “others” in Afghanistan’s historic, religious and social
tableau?
Those “others” are plentiful in the country.
Afghanistan has a wealthy heritage and history, and a diversity of identities
that have been overshadowed by wars and conflicts. It was from Afghanistan that
Buddhism spread to China. Zoroastrianism, Christianity, Judaism and Hinduism
thrived in the land before — and after — the arrival of Islam in the 7th
century. As a major waystation on the age-old trade routes connecting India with
Iran and China, Afghanistan is filled with the remains of ancient cities,
monasteries and caravanserais that hosted famous travelers such as the
14th-century Moroccan Ibn Battuta and the 13th-century Venetian Marco Polo.
Ancient artifacts literally are strewn across its geography. About 80,000 of
these now are housed in the National Museum. The Taliban destroyed a number of
such relics in the museum the first time they came to power. But in February
this year, its leaders forbade selling artifacts. They told their followers to
“robustly protect, monitor and preserve” relics, halt illegal digs and safeguard
“all historic sites.”We shall have to see if that injunction holds. Will the
Taliban, for example, protect the historical heart of the city of Herat? It is
currently on a UNESCO heritage site tentative list. Herat was captured by
Alexander the Great in 330 B.C. during his campaign against the Achaemenids. It
later became a major outpost for the Hellenistic Seleucid empire.Then, there is
Balkh, which gave birth not only to Rumi but also Ibn Sina — better known in the
West as Avicenna — and the poet Ferdowsi, both from around the turn of the first
millennium. The name Balkh may be more familiar to those who frequent Western
museums as Bactria, the ancient civilization that dates back to the early third
millennium B.C. From the Seleucids to the Sassanians to many others, the history
of civilization is layered in the ground of Balkh and many other cities like it
across Afghanistan — sites such as Mes Aynak, home to a complex of at least
seven Buddhist monasteries and under which may be Bronze Age structures.
It is tempting to think that the Taliban have changed — after all, the rest of
the world certainly has. We want to believe that they will police adherence to
their injunction to do no harm to the country’s historical and cultural
heritage. The problem is, the militants are committed to keeping themselves pure
from the poison of modernity. The future has not caught up with them and likely
never will. And aside from their own version of an imagined past, the rest is
dust to them. It is tempting to think that the Taliban have changed — after all,
the rest of the world certainly has. But there may be a way out. The Taliban
frown on drug use. But they do not have a moral problem with other people using
it. In 2000, they banned poppy cultivation, much like they have banned trading
in historical artifacts today. That poppy ban, however, eventually evaporated.
Today, the Taliban control the world’s largest supply of illegal opiates —
accounting for 80 percent of the global opium and heroin market. A record
harvest in 2017 yielded sales the equivalent of 7 percent of Afghanistan’s gross
domestic product.
The intriguing question is whether the Taliban can be induced to protect the
heritage of Afghanistan if they were paid to do so. They may have no use and see
no value in a sculpture of a Bactrian woman, for example. But can they be
persuaded to keep it safe if it was a source of income? Can an international
trust fund be established for this? And maybe for the safekeeping of artifacts
outside Afghanistan? (Though, until when?) There are many questions, including
the moral one of privileging the safety of cultural items over the safety and
well-being of people. Yet, surely, it is still one that would be useful to have.
But the first question is, will the Taliban take part?
*Rym Tina Ghazal is editor of an arts and culture magazine, and a former war
correspondent. Copyright: Syndication Bureau