Young Diplomats

Things are not going well for Riyad, accused of killing Jamal Khashoggi, an exiled columnist in Turkey. YoungDiplomats gathered you quick information you need to know about this diplomatic issue.

The facts : Jamal Khashoggi is a columnist who wrote a lot on the new leader of Saudi Arabia, Mohamed Bin Salman. His columns were published in The Washington Post but he used to live in Saudi Arabia before exiling. He came to Istanbul in order live there because of the threats he feared in Saudi Arabia. He disappeared on second of October while coming into the Consulate of Saudi Arabia in Istanbul. Turkey accuses the Saudi government of killing this man. Obviously, Saudi Arabia denied.

Interpretation and analyzes : YoungDiplomats always does his best to provide readers with a geopolitical perspectives on topics. From a geopolitical perspective, this affair is not a big deal. When it comes to struggle power between nations, the life of one man in the Middle-East fewly matters. The fact that Donald Trump doesn’t question an arm deal with Riyad following this event is a perfect illustration on how little is the life of one man in international relations. Global medias do talk about that but YoungDiplomats is eager to take a step back on this event.

Although this kind of event doesn’t matter from a global perspective, it can weaken the diplomatic ties between Saudi Arabia and Turkey. A diplomatic alliance is a complex assembly of parts, which one being more or less fragile. For example, Saudi Arabia and Turkey are at the odds concerning the recent diplomatic crisis within the Gulf Cooperation Council (http://www.young-diplomats.com/qatar-crisis-cause-implications-risks/). This event has to be understood through that lens. Consequently, such an event might raise some troubles in terms of internal security for the Turkish government. If the Saudis did murder Khashoggi it means that they have the abilities and the logistical ways to eliminate opponents on the Turkish soil.

The Aquarius is a real political and humanitarian issues in Europe and beyond. Here’s are short information on this ship that you need to know to understand this complex affair!

• This boat is a humanitarian ship which has a mission of saving lives in the Mediterranean sea.
• Since the beginning of operations of the Aquarius in February 2016, 29.500 migrants have been rescued in a little more than 200 rescue operations, according to the association.
• So far, this ship has flown the flag of the Panama. This country recently revoked the ship’s flag. This event is paramount because the Aquarius can become a pirate ship.
• This ship has become a hot topic between several European countries, namely France, Spain and Italy.
• The association SOS Méditerranée pays for the functioning of the Ship. A day would cost 11.000 euros and the ship exists thanks to donations.

A few weeks ago, the Hebrew State wanted to force the leaders of the Gaza Strip to sign a peace agreement. Israel wanted to avoid a two front war (with Gaza as well as with its enemies in the North). Indeed, the Israeli government fears a war with Iran, which is not a weak enemy (read our military comparison http://www.young-diplomats.com/iran-vs-israel-who-would-win/). Beyond that, the Jewish state found a much more dangerous enemy: Russia. The objective of our approach is to understand the challenges of the recent delivery of S-300 missiles to Syria.

State-of-the-art technology

These S-300 missiles (ground-to-air missiles) are a godsend for Syria. This country had an archaic and weak air defense system. These weapons are equipped with a detection system covering a diameter of 300 kilometers. In addition, they are fast projectiles that can easily reach mach 6.5. They therefore have an incomparable speed with the precedent Syrian defense system.

Why does Russia deliver these weapons to the Syrians?

On 17 September, while targeting an Israeli aircraft bombing strategic targets, the Syrian anti-aircraft system accidentally destroyed a plane. This event costed the lives of 15 Russian soldiers. Moscow and Damascus directly blamed the Israel Defense Forces, which they said used the Russian plane as cover. Following this unfortunate event, Russia decided to contribute to the modernisation of Syria’s anti-aircraft system. But this immediate explanation should not mask other underlying reasons. First, if Russia delivers such technologies to an ally, its relations with this one are strong and sustainable. When a country supplies weapons to an ally, it also delivers a service, composed of engineers and trainers. This delivery strengthens relations between Syria and Russia. In addition, Moscow can now test these weapons under real combat conditions, which will lead to technical and logistical improvements. Of course, such deliveries also allow Russia to continue its strategic installation on Syrian and, in extenso, Middle Eastern soil.

What are the consequences for Israel?

This new technology poses a threat to Israel, which will have to act with much greater caution when it enters Syrian and Lebanese airspace.

Nevertheless, Israel will continue its strikes to prevent Iran from establishing itself in Syria. The stakes are too high and its security is too threatened. Against Iran, Tzahal chiefs put into practice a simple defensive precept, enacted by Sun Tzu more than 2400 years ago in the Art of War: “In war, do not expect that the enemy will not come. Be able to counter it”.

On September 3rd 2018, China hosted the seventh Forum on China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). 53 African states took part in the event, eSwatini (ex-Swaziland) being the only country missing. This connection with the African continent is the next step in China’s leader Xi Jinping ambitious programme named the New Silk Road.

It implies the reinforcement of Chinese commercial connections with the rest of the world. Therefore the country has been massively investing in the development of industry and infrastructures in Africa for five years. African countries saw it as a true blessing and a great opportunity. But the soaring debt is more and more worrying for these countries that struggle to develop.

As an example Djibouti’s public debt rose from 50 percent to 85 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in only two years. The hundreds of billions of dollars invested by China are suspected to be exclusively addressed to China’s own development, regardless any political or social improvements on the African soil. Once again, the FOCAC resulted in China’s commitment to invest $60 billion throughout the continent. Africa’s dependence on China is being more and more obvious.

The case of Zambia is the most serious of them all. After an encouraging start in the early 2000s the fall in copper prices in 2011 coincided with a serious economic decline for Zambia. Since then the country is going further into debt. However the current situation shows a deeper issue than the actual dependence of African countries on foreign investment. Zambia is also characterised by bad governance and high levels of corruption. Much of the money Zambia borrowed was either stolen or wasted in irrelevant measures. As Jean-Louis Billon, former Ivory Coast’s Minister of Trade affirms it, the problem is not about the debt itself but how to use it. The biggest challenge is to create a solid governance with an efficient tax system and more thorough public finance. Mr Billon’s main point is that China is too easily seen as the perfect scapegoat, while a lot of progress is still to be made in African politics themselves.

The paradoxical aspect of this Chinese business plan is that its main partners are the potential leaders of Africa. Leaders such as Muhammadu Buhari in Nigeria, Cyril Ramaphosa in South Africa, Alassane Ouattara in Ivory Coast or Denis Sassou-Nguesso in the Congo are privileged actors in Xi Jinping’s relations with Africa. While these countries are supposed to take the lead of African growth and pave the way to development of the continent, they remain under the heavy influence of Chinese investors. South Africa, which has recently entered into recession, is moving ever further away from its status of regional power. Some might say corruption and poverty issues are just too high for Africa to ever achieve its social and economic take off. But major countries like Nigeria or Botswana should stimulate their neighbours. Instead, the Moroccan BMCE Bank of Africa just signed a new partnership with the China Africa Business Council to help Chinese investors with their business strategies in the continent.

At the moment Mr Jinping himself is the only one who is fully satisfied by the New Road of Silk. On the one hand the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is trying to give warnings about the looming debt crisis in most of African states. Chinese investments are benefitting to the African development in the short term, but could be devastating in the future.

On the other hand public opinion in China does not support this external policy, far from it. Despite its tremendous efforts to economically rule over the world China is still facing major issues within its borders. Huge inequalities divide the country between the rural West side and the developed and urbanised East side. No less than 500 million inhabitants still lack a proper access to electricity, water and public services. Investing $60 billion can appear as a surprising measure as this amount represents more than the poorest Chinese provinces Tibet and Qinghai’s GDPs combined. Mr Jinping is focused on China’s influence around the world, but the public opinion does not care at all about it.

It is clear that China is not the only partner of the African countries. China’s investment only represents a share of their debt. But this share is rising and it could lead to serious issues of development in the future. In short Africa must find the way to say no to China. Chinese influence is not necessarily a bad thing for this continent. But the situation is slowly moving to a fierce Chinese imperialism over Africa. International cooperation will be beneficial as long as the African states keep their sovereignty safe and keep their interests in mind. Is is the only way to get to a win-win situation that is currently not likely to happen.

Diplomacy exists and is used for dialogue and negotiation whereas military exists to wage wars and use hard power. Sun Tzu, in his book The Art of War states that ‘’the supreme art of war’’ is hidden in the ability of subduing enemy without using force. Recently, military involvement in arrangements and activities that are diplomatic in their approach increased. Military resources and assets are used in bilateral and multilateral settings in order to reach positive outcomes for national security.

There are different reasons for engagement of certain countries with others. These range from ‘’capacity building’’ to ‘’conflict resolution’’.

For instance, NATO can be looked through the prism of transformative diplomacy, where its purpose is to democratize civilian-military relations in target countries. Activities within the sphere of military diplomacy include: the appointment of defence attachés, establishment of bilateral and multilateral contacts, signing defence cooperation agreements, providing contacts and exchanges of military personnel, sending equipment and other material aid, offering expertise and advice on military technical areas and defence management, training of foreign military personnel and participating in military exercises for training purposes.

The focus of military diplomacy

To get slightly more vivid image, the Versailles Peace Conference and the Congress of Vienna were both occasions where military diplomacy was used with respect to diplomatic negotiations. Generally, military diplomacy can be characterized by: actors, foreign policy objectives pursued and the nature of activities. It also tends to be interlinked with phenomena such as ‘’gunboat diplomacy’’ and ‘’coercive diplomacy.’’ Gunboat diplomacy represents the pursuit of foreign policy goals through actual use of military (naval) forces. Furthermore, the state might choose to send their boats and forces off the coast of another country to demonstrate its military power. This was something commonly used by Russia, when they sent their naval forces near coasts of NATO members and this became known as ‘’probing of NATO’’. In contrast to ‘’gunboat diplomacy’’, ‘’coercive diplomacy’’ uses all components of the armed forces, not only the naval forces. In the contemporary world, there are five basic functions of military diplomacy: gathering and analyzing information in the receiving state, promotion of cooperation between the states, organization of working visits and peaceful stay of the military units, support of business contracts for military equipment and representation of the state at official events.

This can be useful tool for pursuing national interest that is short of conflict. For instance, better relationship between Australia and Japan can be attributed to their cooperation on different UN missions in Iraq, Cambodia and East Timor. Military diplomacy can also be used to motivate political change. Myanmar was asked to improve its human rights record and to continue with democratic reforms in 2012. As a reward, it has been suggested that Myanmar could be invited to participate in US-led military exercises in Thailand or the US Navy’s Pacific Partnership program. Overall, military diplomacy in the Asia Pacific has turned into multilateral enterprise where countries try to build coalitions against their competitors and at the same time, enhance valuable partnerships with their allies.

Diplomats in uniforms

The attaché, as the counterpart of the ambassador, is a diplomat in uniform with full diplomatic status whose duty was once to observe and assess military developments in a foreign country, as well as to maintain a close relationship with the foreign military elite. This is one of the practices that remained unchanged ever since European diplomacy started to flourish in the 19th century. When sent overseas to pursue military diplomacy, military personnel become ‘’a diplomat in uniform’’ with the same privileges and rights as other embassy staff. They deliver defence cooperation programs, attend negotiations and meetings, support formal diplomatic mission, directly participate in interventions, evacuation programs and support disaster relief missions. Military attachés must know the host nation and the strategic environment. At the same time, they must observe military developments and conditions to report valuable information back to the host country. Without actionable information, decision makers cannot create conditions for successful security cooperation.

The partition of British Empire in the sub-continent resulted into two nations: India and Pakistan. The two nations witnessed the bloodshed on the both sides of the divide. Pakistan and India went into wars and brief conflicts in 1947-48, 1965, 1971 and 1999 over the major issue of Kashmir. Two countries launched formal peace processes in past with little success. Recently, change of shift has been observed in Pakistan, as newly appointed government in Pakistan has offered India with resumption of the peace talks on all major issues as a goodwill gesture.  In his maiden speech, PTI’s chairman after election said Pakistan is ready to take two steps forward if India takes one. Things have been changed in the foreign policies of Pakistan since election; as newly appointed government shows intention to review the China Pakistan Economic corridor (CPEC), normalization of ties with the United States, resumption of talks with India on all irritant issues, role of mediator between Saudi Arabia and Iran and aspiration for peace in Afghanistan. India in the start welcomed the dialogue process and vowed to work for the peace in the region. Later, India refused to start dialogue process in the region on the pretext of terrorism.

Peace between Pakistan and India is imperative for the stabilization of South Asia and the economic prosperity of the region. Pakistan is among the adversely affected countries of the world. Pakistan is experiencing insurgency within the state and its borders are porous and insecure, especially western borders. There is a substantial drop in terrorism in Pakistan; terrorism is now at its lowest level since 2006, because of the army’s Zarb-e-Azb operation which has removed militant safe havens in the North Waziristan region. Since 2000, the TTP has been responsible for at least 4,500 deaths, which account for over half of all deaths attributable to known militant groups. Non state actors remained a serious threat and challenge since long.

In the meanwhile, India never missed a chance to blame Pakistan harboring and training terrorism on its soil. Calling off the dialogue process on the pretext of terrorism, being sponsored by Pakistan on its soil, is long standing legacy of Indian government. Trust deficit remained a critical factor in dialogue impasse between two countries. Trust deficit can overcome possible only through dialogue — dialogue is currently the most civilized and humane way to resolve conflicts.

Pakistan shows intention to work closely with India and all its neighbours for the ease of strained relations. Pakistan’s new administration openly invited the Indian government to negotiate on the long standing issues like Kashmir, Sir Creek, Siachen, and Water Issues. The abrupt cancellation of the foreign ministers New York meeting is an indication that India wishes to keep trust deficit between the two countries. Any engagement with Pakistan now would constrain this option. Some Indian analysts are convinced that Modi’s major diversion will be the intensification of tensions with Pakistan.

The BJP government’s failure to deliver on its tall promises of jobs and prosperity has eroded Modi’s popularity dramatically. The BJP is trying to divert attention from their failures by a continuous circus of arrests, assassinations, lynching, bomb attacks, false flag attacks, riots etc. New Delhi may even consider an actual ‘surgical strike’ across the LoC or the international border, as the Indian army chief has already threatened Pakistan. This would be a high-risk operation, militarily and politically. The action may not remain ‘limited’ if Pakistan retaliates forcefully and the ‘surgical strike’ escalates into a general conflict with the ever-present nuclear dimension. Politically, if an Indian incursion is visibly defeated by Pakistan, it could lead to the BJP’s defeat at the polls.

Despite its desire for regional cooperation, the new Pakistani government cannot afford to ignore the brewing threat from India. It should be clear to the US and others that any Indian military adventurism will lead to Pakistani retaliation not only on the eastern front but also against Indian-sponsored terrorist sites in Afghanistan. This would lead both countries into major conflict and all the means to secure peace in south Asia especially in Afghanistan would be disturbed.

For both countries it is imperative to adopt a tool of negotiation to resolve all the issues. Change the policy of blaming each other for terrorism rather work closely to eradicate menace from the region. Cancellation of dialogue on the political expediency will only benefit political elite. In order to change the fortune of the region both countries need to adopt economic diplomacy and improve trade relations. This will benefit region in general and Pakistan and India in specific.

What a difference a week makes concerning far right. Seven days ago, Workers’ Party candidate Fernando Haddad’s steep ascending trend gave pundits reason to believe that he would finish the first round ahead of frontrunner Jair Bolsonaro. On Sunday, a poll by MDA/CNT showed Mr. Haddad statistically tied with Mr. Bolsonaro. “I forecast that [Haddad] will finish the first round with 35 percent of valid votes,” said political scientist Alberto Carlos Almeida on Twitter. Far right can really get the power in the weeks to come…

Now, Mr. Haddad faces the possibility of the election not even reaching the runoff stage, as Mr. Bolsonaro makes a push for a first-round win. He currently stands at 39 percent of valid votes (discounting spoiled ballots), against the Workers’ Party’s 25 percent. While climbing 11 points in two days seems a lot, there is clearly a wave of support in favor of the far-right candidate.

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On the fourth of October, four Russian agents have been arrested while trying to install spying technologies in the Hague. The agents were found near the headquarters of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

What were they doing here ?

Many Western countries argued that these agents were here to find information on the ongoing investigations concerning the Syrian regime and the Skripal case (http://www.young-diplomats.com/tackling-skripal-case-analysis/). They were settling many equipments allowing to infiltrate into the network of the OPCW. The head of Dutch counterintelligence named four alleged Russian GRU officers, noting that two of them had consecutive passport numbers, a potential red flag for intelligence agencies. Of course, the Kremlin denied and Vladimir Putin laughed at the reactions of the Western countries.

The importance of these information for Russia

Information is the real definition of power. But at the time of internet and social medias, information is everywhere and can sometimes be far from trustworthy. Consequently, intelligences from all over the world do their best to get involve in this new way of communication. Even if Russia denied, we could try to understand how much important were these information for Russia. In the Skripal case, the Russian government clearly doesn’t have the law on his side. By infiltrating the OPCW, the Kremlin could reach high valued information for this case. But on an other side, Russia could also infect the OPCW network on the long run. Such a coup would be great for the Kremlin because it could permanently get information on the different investigations of the OPCW.

Is Russia at the forefront of the cyberwar ? 

This question is hard to answer because many elements are up to intelligence services. It has to be said that Russia seems to be particularly involved in the pursuit for cyber information. In 2007, Estonia was targeted by a massive cyber attack which completely shutdown the network of the State. Hackers permanently were permanently striking at the government website and the State was far from ready. More than 10 years ago, the public opinions don’t have much more information on this paramount event in terms of cyber conflict.

According to a new report from the Igarapé Institution called “Citizen security in Latin America: Facts and Figures”, 33% of the world’s homicides occur in Latin American soil, although the region has just 8% of the world’s population. Worse still, just 4 countries in the region: Brazil (13%), Mexico (6%), Colombia (4%), and Venezuela (4%) represent account for 27% of these murders. In 2016, 17 of the 20 most homicidal countries and 47 of the 50 most homicidal cities on the planet were located in the region.

More than 2.5 million Latin Americans have been killed violently since 2000; most of them due to intentional homicide, according to the report. Furthermore, the homicide rate is 21 per 100,000, more than 3 times the global average.

These numbers are explained, according to the Institution, by the speedy urbanization of Latin American cities. As reported by the Economist, this growth causes “concentrated risk factors for lethal violence, [such] as inequality, unemployed young men, dislocated familiars, poor government services, easily available firearms (…)”. 

This could explain why half of these victims of murders are between the age of 15 and 29 and 26% of the murders have gang violence or organized crime as their mains causes.

Another explanation resides in the fact that authority is mostly absent in high-crime areas and, in some cases, even involved with organized crime. The direct consequence is that the direct consequence is that out of 20 reported crimes only 1 will get resolved in some parts of the region. Therefore just 19% of Venezuelans report being confident in the police in 2015, the lowest score in the world, compared to 32% in Syria.

There is also a strong link between teenage pregnancy, especially in situations of economic disadvantage, and national homicide rates with a 0.5 increase per 100,000 homicides.

The cost of this type of violence is equal to 3.5% of the GDP of a country, or a number ranging from 114.5 to 170.4 billion dollars a year.

Nevertheless, not everything is bad news. Some Latin Americans cities like Cali and Bogota have achieved effective interventions with the ban on carrying firearms.

Similarly, cities like Sao Pablo and Juarez have succeeded in declining their homicide rates by 70% with a comprehensive citizen security program. Moreover, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala registered an overall improvement on their homicide rates.

This report comes as a surprise, tough violence is not news in the region, the systematization and generalization in all of it is. The region should make an effort in various aspects of its politics, like integration and social aid, concentrating its attention on the marginalized groups, which are the one who are suffering the most. Also, the Latin American countries should learn about each other, as their problems seem to be very similar.

Source: https://igarape.org.br/en/citizen-security-in-latin-america-facts-and-figures/