Myanmar Thanks Bangladesh: A New Height For Ties Between Countries? – OpEd

 January 5, 2023  Eurasia Review 

By Jubeda Chowdhury

Myanamr’s army chief Min Aung Hlaing expressed special thanks to Bangladesh in his address to the countrymen on the occasion of Myanmar’s Independence Day.

This information was found in the report of Qatar-based media Al-Jazeera. According to the report, Min Aung Hlaing gave special thanks to some countries including Bangladesh and India. He thanked these countries for advancing positive relations despite various adversities.

Myanmar is celebrating its 75th Independence Day on Wednesday (January 4). On this day in 1948, the country got independence from Britain. Army chief Min Aung Hlaing’s speech was aired on Myanmar’s state television channel on the occasion of Independence Day.

In the speech, Min Aung Hlaing criticized some countries for interfering in his country’s affairs. On the contrary, he thanked China, India, Thailand, Laos and Bangladesh for promoting cooperative relations for a long time.

As a next-door and friendly neighbour, Bangladesh has been committed to developing an amicable relationship with Myanmar, the ministry said.

On the occasion of the diamond jubilee of the independence of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, the people of Bangladesh extended warm greetings and felicitations to the people of Myanmar and wish them inclusive peace and prosperity.

January 13, 2022, marked the 50 years of bilateral ties between Myanmar and Bangladesh. Myanmar recognized Bangladesh as a sovereign state on January 13, 1972. But there weren’t any seminars, discussions, statements, reciprocation, felicitations between the two neighbors to mark the special day. There were many ups and downs between the tow neighbors over 50 years. But Myanmar-Bangladesh needs to strengthen ties for ensuring the greater interest of the two regions such as South Asia and Southeast Asia.

When Bangladesh celebrated its glorious journey of 50 years, many countries in the world felicitated Bangladesh. Even Pakistan PM Imran Khan has felicitated Bangladesh marking the 50 years of Bangladesh’s independence. But it’s a matter of sorrow that its neighbour, Myanmar didn’t congratulate Bangladesh. Even both countries’ respective embassies remained silent on the issue. Why this is? Because the relations between Bangladesh and Myanmar are strained now. But this strained tie must be smoothed for ensuring greater regional interest. 

However, the relationship between Myanmar-Bangladesh has never been smooth and has gone through frequent ups and downs over the last 50 years on a number of issues. Despite having many possibilities, the two countries have not been able to build a real relationship with each other. The people from both sides are deprived of enjoying neighborly advantages for these stained relations. 

The improved ties between the two neighbors can ensure some common regional advantages. Geographically, Myanmar is located in the eastern part of Bangladesh with a 271 km border. To its southeast, it is at least 150 km wide, due to its hilly terrain and dense forest cover. Strategically, Myanmar enjoys a distinct position between the two Asian giants, China and India. The same position applies to Bangladesh. Naturally, both Bangladesh and Myanmar enjoy important strategic positions in South Asia and Southeast Asia. Basically, Myanmar and Bangladesh both can be used as a gateway between South Asia and Southeast Asia. 

Myanmar can use Bangladesh as a transportation route to reach the markets of Bhutan, Nepal, North East India easily.  Bangladesh and Myanmar share some regional common platforms such as the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Co-operation (BIMSTEC), an organization made up of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Thailand which seeks strategic and economic development. If Bangladesh and Myanmar improve their relations with each other, their dependence on China and India could be reduced and could increase trade with other countries in Southeast Asia and South Asia.

Bangladesh can be used as an important hub to connect ASEAN and SAARC. Myanmar too, as an ASEAN member, can access the SAARC free-trade bloc through Bangladesh if the Myanmar-Bangladesh ties can be improved. 

In the case of bilateral relations, there were two issues that caused some annoyance between them. The first was the demarcation of the sea-boundary between them. It is a matter of satisfaction that the matter was settled peacefully by the 1982 International Tribunal of the Sea Convention in March 2012. As Myanmar and Bangladesh, both share the Bay of Bengal area and 271km long border, Myanmar and Bangladesh both can take part in tackling nontraditional security threats in the Bay of Bengal such as tackling piracy, illegal drug dealing, human trafficking, environmental degradation, countering terrorists in the region. 

The second is on the Rohingya refugee issue. Between August and November 2017, it was reported that a military operation in Myanmar had forced more than 700,000 Rohingya to cross the border into neighboring Bangladesh.

The Bangladesh government has faced the Rohingya crisis many times. In 1978, an anti-insurgency operation by the then military government of Myanmar in Rakhine State resulted in a massive brutal crackdown, with some 300,000 Rohingya crossing the border into Bangladesh. This is again in 1991-92, the second wave of more than 250,000 Rohingyas fled to Bangladesh to escape the ongoing military repression. The two countries have resolved the issue peacefully through bilateral talks. But current 2017 Rohingya crisis needs a fruitful sustainable solution between Myanmar and Bangladesh to bolster the ties. Definitely, Bangladesh and Myanmar should find a durable Closer Bangladesh-Myanmar ties have great economic potential – but the Rohingya issue must be resolved. Enhanced bilateral ties between Bangladesh and Myanmar could contribute to the growth of trade and investment relations with ASEAN and BIMSTEC countries.

There are other routes to bilateral cooperation. Myanmar is rich in natural resources such as tin, zinc, copper, tungsten, coal, marble, limestone, natural gas, hydropower, etc. Myanmar could thus be a major source of energy for Bangladesh to ensure its energy security.

Myanmar is also a major supplier of natural wood to the world. While it has traditionally eyed foreign investment in the oil and gas sector, the country has recently shifted its focus to attracting production-based investment. The country is well ahead in power generation following a good investment in hydropower generation. The tourism industry is also a promising sector of the country. Religious tourism can be a source of potential. There are many Buddhists Biharis in Bangladesh. 

A number of important Buddhist archeological sites have already been uncovered in different parts of Bangladesh. Bangladesh is believed to be a rich repository of South Asian Buddhist heritage. In order to draw the world’s attention to the rich Buddhist heritage in Bangladesh, the Government organized an international event in collaboration with World Tourism Organization in October 2015.

There are a number of magnificent modern-era Buddhist temples in Bangladesh. The Golden Temple at a hilltop in the Bandarban district is probably the most charming Buddhist temple in Bangladesh. Gigantic Buddha status in Dhaka, Chittagong, and other parts of Bangladesh are special attractions for devotees and tourists. There are also a number of Buddhist learning centers and pilgrimage spots in Bangladesh.

This area of archaeological sites refers to Paharpur in Naogaon, Mahasthangarh in Bagura, Mainamati in Comilla, and Bikrampur in Dhaka district. Each of these sites has unique qualities as part of history. Some archaeological sites are important for both Hindu and Buddhist investigation because religious sculptures of each can be found. Thus, Myanmar and Bangladesh can exchange religious tourism. 

Through the import of gas and electricity, Bangladesh can obtain its future energy security. The two countries can jointly explore oil and gas fields in the Bay of Bengal. Bangladesh can also contribute to the development of Myanmar’s infrastructure.

The proposed construction of the Asian Highway, funded by the Asian Development Bank, can increase land connectivity between the two countries and increase trade in products such as fertilizers, plastics, cement, furniture, etc. Bangladesh is on the way to the completion of its railway project Dohazari-Cox’s Bazar railway line. The line will run from Dohazari in Chattogram to Cox’s Bazar (one of the most popular tourist destinations in the country).  This line can be extended to North East India, Nepal, and Bhutan. If this line can be extended to China-South East Asia via Bangladesh’s Ghundhum- Myanmar as part of the proposed Trans Asian Railway Network Asian Highway Network, the whole region can definitely benefit.  Myanmar should take such an initiative to join the Trans Asian Railroad. 

Myanmar, which at present does have sophisticated manufacturing, can import electronics and pharmaceutical products that are readily produced from Bangladesh and benefit from the technology transfer.

However, the two countries can also increase agricultural production through joint ventures. Apart from adopting joint investment projects, Bangladesh can increase imports of various agricultural products including pulses, spices, fish, and rice.  Enhanced bilateral ties between Bangladesh and Myanmar could contribute to the growth of trade and investment relations with ASEAN and BIMSTEC countries. This will create an opening to solve the Rohingya problem and stop militant activities.

Basically, the Rakhine region of Myanmar can be used as a trade hub between Bangladesh and Myanmar. The agro-products in Rakhine need a viable market. Bangladesh can be a big market for the goods that are produced in Rakhine. On the other hand, Bangladesh has vast and tremendous experience in garments and production of agricultural sectors. Myanmar can exchange Bangladeshi expertise to benefit. Myanmar’s products (Known as Burmese products are very popular in Bangladesh), Myanmar and Bangladesh can set up some border hats (border market) between Bangladesh and Myanmar to boost up the trade. India and Bangladesh are benefitting from such kinds of border hats at the border. Thus, strengthening people-to-people contact, bolstering public diplomacy between the two sides can mend the strained ties between two neighbors. 

Myanmar's military junta leader, General Min Aung Hlaing. Photo Credit: Mil.ru

 

How Economies And Financial Systems Can Better Gauge Climate Risks – Analysis

 

January 5, 2023  Eurasia Review 

By Tobias Adrian, Vikram Haksar and Ivo Krznar

When it comes to the devastating impact of climate change, most people think of the harm inflicted on lives and livelihoods. Yet the effects of more frequent and extreme weather are just as consequential for the health of financial systems.

The physical impacts of climate-related shocks, such as hurricane damage to power grids, affect financial institutions and how they make decisions. So do the risks of transition to a low-carbon economy. Think of the costs of new carbon taxes or new laws that require phase-outs of fossil fuels before greener replacements are available.

To make well-informed decisions about future operations, banks, insurers, and others in the financial sector need tools to manage climate risks in their operations and balance sheets. At the same time, as financial supervisors monitor the resilience of the system, they need tools to adequately assess and supervise these risks.

Financial risk analysis

With the right tools, financial sector authorities can start to assess climate risks as a crucial input to gauging how to manage them with the right policies.

This is where the IMF comes in. The Fund’s Financial Sector Assessment Program already regularly examines the resilience of banks and other institutions, including with stress tests to better gauge systemic risks. These procedures are being retooled to incorporate climate risk analysis to better gauge financial stability risks from climate change.

Risk analysis typically entails development of scenario-based stress tests for assessing bank solvency. The process incorporates adverse macroeconomic scenarios specifically designed for the tests—including elements like economic contraction, rising unemployment, exchange-rate shocks, and falling asset prices.

These scenarios are then used as inputs when looking at relationships between these macro drivers and risk factors, such as credit risk and interest income, to estimate impacts on bank income and capital. Bank resilience is then assessed based on whether capital levels fall below regulatory thresholds.

Beyond the standard approach

Unlike conventional stress testing, climate risk analysis, at this stage, doesn’t focus on quantifying possible capital needs of financial institutions relative to the regulatory thresholds. Instead, the IMF approach focuses on measuring and raising awareness of risks. This reflects new challenges, including the complexities of modeling climate risk and its economic impacts over very long horizons and major data gaps.

While the consequences of climate change will play out over decades, risks that could arise in the next three to five years are considered in typical stress testing exercises. The incidence and impact of extreme events is rising and there is sizable uncertainty over policies. All these can potentially have large effects on the value of companies, and thus banks, as markets price in the effects of longer-term risks on business prospects.

The first step in the IMF’s climate risk analysis is to assess which hazards are the most relevant for a country. Where climate risks are important, the bank solvency stress testing framework incorporates the physical and transition risk.

This often starts with temperature and emissions scenarios based on figures from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and adapted by the Network for Greening the Financial System, a coalition of central banks working on climate change.

Climate scenarios then map emissions and temperature scenarios to physical risks, like extreme weather, and transition risks, such as future carbon taxes. These scenarios point to the trade-offs between physical and transition risk—the more orderly the transition, the lesser the increase in temperatures and the occurrence of physical climate risk.

Data and projections

The overall assessment of bank stability involves measuring how physical or transition risks impact the economy and bank capital. Physical risks are localized and require new approaches to understanding where storms and floods may strike. The analysis uses new data and projections of the likelihood and impact of different hazards on physical assets like buildings or infrastructure, and economic activity, such as extreme heat that reduces working hours. This approach was applied to consider risks to banks from typhoons in the2021 Philippines FSAP.

Policies to support transition to a lower carbon world seek to shift resources from brown to green sectors, impacting the prospects for the brown sectors. For the purposes of analyzing how this impacts the financial sector, we assess the impact of carbon taxes (as a proxy for the wide set of policies to foster transition) on individual economic sectors and, where possible, directly on firms’ balance sheets and therefore to banks.

We also assess what happens if investors reassess the value of businesses because of the effect of unforeseen changes in policies on long term earnings. Such an outcome, sometimes referred to as a climate Minsky moment, could lead to increases in credit risk today, affecting bank capital. This was discussed in this year’s United Kingdom FSAPwhich gauged how firm valuations, and thus credit risk, could be suddenly affected by climate change.

Enhancing the policy framework

At this early stage, climate risk analysis can help raise awareness around the prudent management of climate risks and incentivize banks in improving their frameworks. At the same time, it will help to inform supervisors about the potential magnitude of climate-related risks in their jurisdictions and better understand transmission channels to the financial system.

Currently, several supervisors and central banks use climate stress tests to measure the exposures to related risks. This helps to understand the challenges to banks’ business models, the implications for the provision of financial services, and desired policy responses. Ultimately, climate risk analysis will help financial institutions disclose and manage related risks.—This article reflects research by Pierpaolo Grippa, Marco Gross, Sujan Lamichhane, Caterina Lepore, Fabian Lipinsky, Hiroko Oura and Apostolos Panagiotopoulos.

*About the authors:

• Tobias Adrian is the Financial Counsellor and Director of the IMF’s Monetary and Capital Markets Department. He leads the IMF’s work on financial sector surveillance and capacity building, monetary and macroprudential policies, financial regulation, debt management, and capital markets.
• Vikram Haksar is an Assistant Director in the IMF’s Monetary and Capital Markets Department. He currently leads work on the IMF’s Financial Sector Assessment Program that conducts in-depth reviews in countries around the world on policies for assessing and addressing financial stability risk. He is also leading work on the impact of climate change on financial stability and represents the Fund on climate risk scenarios at the Network for Greening the Financial System coalition of central banks.
• Ivo Krznar is a Deputy Division Chief in the IMF’s Monetary and Capital Markets Department and a Mission Chief for the Uruguay FSAP. 

Source: This article was published by IMF Blog

 

Taliban And Deteriorating Women Rights – OpEd

 January 5, 2023  Eurasia Review  0 Comments

By Jehangir Khan Mehsud

The return of the Taliban government in August 2021 did not bode well for the females in Afghanistan. During the Afghan peace deal, the Taliban promised to ensure women’s rights in Kabul to garner international recognition. However, soon after their complete take-over of the Afghan territory, they started curtailing the fundamental rights of women one by one. Initially, girls were prohibited from attending secondary schools.

Currently, university education has been altogether suspended for girls on the illogical pretext of ensuring the safety of women. It implies that women have no right to education and are not considered an integral part of Afghanistan. Hence, Afghanistan has become a forbidden place for girls. The so-called patronage of Islam- Taliban- failed to be the epitome of Islamic values which truly believes in gender equality and girls’ right to education. If women are kept deprived of their right to education, Kabul would succumb to the age of darkness where women were not treated as a human being.

The agony of Afghan women does not end here. Women who aspire to serve their nation as doctors and teachers can no longer see their future anywhere during the incumbent Taliban government. A medical student Sahira Wafa, while giving an interview to a news channel cried out louder over the nefarious act of the Taliban regime. She said, ‘’ Taliban has banned us from everything. University was our last hope. Hence, it has been also closed.’’ The crackdown of the Taliban on girls’ education broke out a massive protest where girls gathered and sought their basic human rights. The international media and all other Muslim countries have strictly condemned the inhumane treatment of women in Afghanistan. However, all such condemnations fall on deaf ears of the Taliban.  Universities are completely shut down. Girls are in a state of despair and sorrow. They are not even allowed to speak up against the atrocities being inflicted on them.

 From the very start, The Afghan Taliban has discouraged freedom of speech for all and sundry, particularly females. Women are being restricted from peaceful protest. Their voices are silenced. They are threatened and beaten. It can be manifested in the viral video on social media where Afghan Taliban could be seen using water cannons on women protesting for their right to education. The Taliban government has left no stone unturned to confine women in four walls and bar them from every walk of life. Despite the Taliban’s brutal attempts, the Afghan women showed great resistance and continued to seek their international human rights.

 Moreover, Afghanistan is no more a pro-women state. The domestic and international non-state organizations were ordered to suspend the Afghan women for not properly wearing their scarves. Hence, women are barred from pursuing their rights to employment. In these hard times, the few financially independent women will fall below the poverty line. Their miseries would compound in no time. It will not be exaggerated to say that Afghanistan is not a safe state for women. Their rights are not religiously or socially decided, rather the Taliban have to decide the fate of women

The life of women is becoming miserable day by day. A woman in Afghanistan is not allowed to go outside without a man. She has no right to entertainment or recreational activities. Her abode is defined to be only inside the four walls of the home. It is hence not far that one day, a woman will not be allowed to live in Afghanistan. The crackdown against women will revive the twenty years old rule of the Taliban in which women were confined to their homes.

After the analysis of the dire status of women rights in Afghanistan, the major stakeholders of fundamental rights must strongly condemn the brutal attempts of the Taliban government against women. Muslim states such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye, etc. should stand in solidarity with Afghan women and arrange a dialogue with the Afghan Taliban regarding ensuring women rights. A dialogue will help convince the Taliban to stay true to their promise made during the Afghan peace deal. Moreover, Afghan women must be morally supported. Their right to education must not be compromised at any cost.

In a nutshell, no country can progress by ignoring half of the female population. Afghanistan cannot become stable and economically prosperous by depriving girls of their basic human rights. The right to education is Afghan girls’ universally accepted right. Therefore, the Taliban government must not fight against women’s education and other rights. Rather, the fight against the Taliban should be against terrorism, poverty, and other social evils. Afghan women are equal citizens of the Afghan territory. Therefore, the Taliban must recognize women’s rights and such an environment should be created for women where they can feel secure and protected. Let the Afghan woman breathe freely and live her life as per her religiously and universally accepted human rights.

Jehangir Khan Mehsud, the writer is a graduate of economics and political science from Forman Christian College University, Lahore.

Women in Afghanistan market. Photo by Staff Sgt. Russell Lee Klika, US Army National Guard, Wikimedia Commons.

 

THE LIBERTARIAN VIEW

Globalization, Not Globalism: Free Trade Versus Destructive Statist Ideology – OpEd

 January 5, 2023  

By MISES

By Connor O’Keeffe*

After the 2008 financial crisis, calls rang out across establishment publications and the executive offices of Wall Street that we were witnessing the death of globalization. The calls grew louder and more numerous after Brexit, the election of Donald Trump, the pandemic, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Yet the data appears to dispute this narrative. Global trade hit a record $28.5 trillion last year with projections to grow in 2023. The pace, however, is expected to slow. The reason for this is less a problem with globalization itself and more the historic setbacks that globalism has faced.

Before continuing, it is important to define some terms. Globalization occurs when societies around the world begin to interact and integrate economically and politically. The intercontinental trade experienced during the Age of Sail and via the Silk Road are early examples of globalization. Globalization really took off after World War II and received a recent boost with the widespread adoption of the internet. Importantly, globalization in common discourse includes both the voluntary economic activities between peoples of different nations and the involuntary geopolitical activities of governments.

In contrast, Ian Bremmer defines globalism as an ideology that calls for top-down trade liberalization and global integration backed by a unipolar power. Statists believe that market exchange between people is literally impossible without government; only when a group claims a legal monopoly on violence and then builds infrastructure, provides security, documents property titles, and serves as the final arbiter of disputes can a market come into existence. Globalism is the application of this perspective to international trade. Globalists believe that top-down global governance enforced and secured by a unipolar superpower enables globalization.

But, like statists on a more local scale, the globalist view is logically and historically flawed. Global trade was well underway before the first major attempt at global governance, the League of Nations, in 1919. The league’s stated aim was to ensure peace and justice for all nations of the world through collective security. Falling apart at the outset of World War II, it failed miserably. But globalism as an ideology found its footing after the war. Europe was devastated. This left the US and the USSR as the only two countries with the ability to exert power globally.

So began the fastest era of globalization in history. Trade exploded as people moved on from the war. The globalist project also got off the ground with the founding of the United Nations and the World Bank. Globalism was limited only by the ideological differences between the two superpowers. The USSR wanted to support revolutions while the US aimed for top-down trade liberalization—which drove the recent allies apart and plunged the world into the Cold War.

In the United States, the neoliberals and neoconservatives dominated the political mainstream through their shared mission to bring markets and democracy to the world at gunpoint and financed by US taxpayers. Fortunately for them, the rate at which their interventions at home and abroad were wrecking US society was slower than that of the Soviets. The abolition of prices and private property eventually led to the collapse of the USSR in the early 1990s. With its main adversary defeated, the United States had achieved one of the central tenets of globalism, unipolarity.\

From the outset, the US establishment gorged itself on its new globe-spanning influence. Through new international organizations like the World Trade Organization, “free trade” agreements were introduced. Some ran for hundreds of pages, yet all free trade really requires is an absence of policy. The United States sailed its navy around the world’s oceans promising to secure shipping lanes like a global highway patrolman. Through the promise of US military security and the bankrolling of international governance organizations, US taxpayers were forced to subsidize global trade.

As Murray Rothbard highlights in Man, Economy, and State with Power and Market, there is no such thing as international trade in a truly free market. Nations would still exist, but they would be pockets of culture instead of economic units. Any state restrictions on trade between people based on location are a violation of their liberty and a cost to society. Most free-market economists understand this and advocate against state restrictions accordingly. But subsidies to international trade are also antithetical to the free market. The proper free-market position is the complete absence of policy on both sides. No restrictions and no subsidies. Let people freely choose who they do business with. There should be no hand on either end of the scale.

Economic integration was far from the only focus of the US regime during its unipolar moment. Too many people had gained wealth, power, and status during the Cold War as part of the US war-making class. Despite the USSR’s total collapse, the last thing the United States wanted to do was declare victory and give up its privileged position. Instead, the United States scrambled to find a new enemy to justify the continuation of those privileges. Their eyes settled on the Middle East where they would, in time, launch eight unessential wars that killed any notion of a “rules-based international order.” US unipolarity proved Albert Jay Nock correct; governments are only as peaceful as they are weak.

This institutional desire for war would sow the seeds of destruction for the United States’ unipolar moment. As the United States eviscerated any notion that it stood for a rules-based order through its adventurism in the Middle East, tension was brewing in Eastern Europe and East Asia. To the doubtless joy of weapons companies and foreign policy elites, the Russian and Chinese governments were transformed back into the United States’ enemies.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February was a huge win for the US war machine, but it also represented an enormous step backward for globalism. The Russians seceded from the global order the United States had led for three decades. The West’s reaction, grounded in strict sanctions and forced economic divestment, deepened the rift in the global system.

What the future holds is anyone’s guess, but the globalist dream of a singular system of global governance is surely wrecked for the near future as the Russo-Chinese bloc breaks away. There will be pain because so many connections between nations are controlled by governments; however, a significant degree of globalization is still valued by the world’s consumers. The data contradicts any idea that globalization is reversing. It is only slowing as governments attempt to drag consumers along on their quest to divest from the other side.

Despite the claims that globalization is dead, international trade is alive and well. But the drive toward an interconnected world is slowing down as the ideology of globalism experiences its biggest setback in decades. The statist conflation of unipolar global governance and international trade explains where these claims are coming from and why they are flawed.

*About the author: Connor O’Keeffe is a writer and video producer at the Mises Institute. He has a masters in economics and a bachelors in geology.

Source: This article was published by the MISES Institute

MISES

The Mises Institute, founded in 1982, teaches the scholarship of Austrian economics, freedom, and peace. The liberal intellectual tradition of Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) and Murray N. Rothbard (1926-1995) guides us. Accordingly, the Mises Institute seeks a profound and radical shift in the intellectual climate: away from statism and toward a private property order. The Mises Institute encourages critical historical research, and stands against political correctness.