It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, June 18, 2023
MESSAGE ON THE INTERNATIONAL DAY FOR COUNTERING HATE SPEECH UN Photo 18 Jun2023
Hate speech is often aimed at vulnerable groups, reinforcing discrimination, stigma and marginalization. Minorities, women, refugees, migrants, and people of diverse sexual orientation and gender identity are frequent targets. Social media platforms can amplify and spread hate speech at lightning speed.
Misguided and ambiguous responses to hate speech – including blanket bans and internet shutdowns – may also violate human rights by restricting freedom of speech and expression. They may even silence some of those best placed to counter hateful narratives: human rights defenders and journalists.
But we are far from powerless in the face of hate speech. We can and must raise awareness about its dangers, and work to prevent and end it in all its forms.
The United Nations Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech is our comprehensive framework for tackling the causes and impacts of hate speech, in line with international human rights standards.
Our offices and teams around the world are confronting hate speech by implementing local action plans, based on this strategy.
Education initiatives, positive speech campaigns, research to understand and address root causes, and efforts to promote inclusion and equal rights all have an important role. Religious, community and business leaders can all play their part.
The United Nations is consulting governments, technology companies and others on a voluntary Code of Conduct for information integrity on digital platforms, aimed at reducing the spread of mis- and disinformation and hate speech, while protecting freedom of expression.
As we mark the International Day for Countering Hate Speech, let us renew our efforts to prevent and end this toxic and destructive phenomenon, while promoting inclusive, just and peaceful communities and societies and protecting the rights and dignity of all.
Key ASEAN Members Skip Thai-Hosted Myanmar Talks amid Criticism
June 18, 2023 Reuters Thailand's Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai attends the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Bangkok, Nov. 19, 2022. Thailand's caretaker government hosted the foreign minister of Myanmar's ruling junta at informal regional peace talks in Pattaya, June 18, 2023.
BANGKOK —
Thailand's caretaker government hosted the foreign minister of Myanmar's ruling junta at informal regional peace talks on Sunday, as key Southeast Asian counterparts stayed away from the meeting that has drawn sharp criticism.
Only Cambodia has so far officially confirmed it intended to attend the talks.
Myanmar's generals have been barred for nearly two years from senior-level meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for failing to honor an agreement to start talks with opponents linked to the ousted civilian government that had been led by now-jailed Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.
But Thailand, whose prime minister himself first took power in a military coup, invited Myanmar's junta-appointed Foreign Minister Than Swe to the talks along with other foreign ministers in the 10-member ASEAN bloc, two sources with knowledge of the meeting told Reuters.
Myanmar's junta spokesman could not be reached for comment on Sunday.
Thailand's foreign ministry was tight-lipped about exactly who was attending the two-day gathering in the resort town of Pattaya, for which outgoing Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai sent invitation letters just four days before its start.
Don told the local news outlet Matichon on Sunday the unofficial initiative was meant to complement, not replace, ASEAN-led efforts and members were free to attend or not.
“The current situation has changed a lot. There is now more fighting within Myanmar," he was quoted as saying. "Myanmar also has a roadmap leading to elections... These things have given us the need to continue our interactions with Myanmar."
Myanmar has been roiled by violence since a Feb. 1, 2021 coup, with the military battling on multiple fronts to try to crush an armed pro-democracy resistance movement formed in response to the crackdown. The junta says it is fighting terrorists who aim to destroy the country.
'Secretive initiative'
Critics of Thailand's initiative say it risks legitimizing Myanmar's military government and is inappropriate because it is outside the official ASEAN peace initiative, known as the "five-point consensus."
Others questioned why Thailand called the talks now, when it is expected to have a new government in August after the pro-military coalition was soundly beaten in May 16 elections by progressive and populist parties.
Cambodian Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn was to attend the meeting, his government said in a statement on Friday.
Other ASEAN members have declined Thailand's invitation, including this year's chair, Indonesia, as well Singapore, whose foreign minister, Vivian Balakrishnan, said on Friday "it would be premature to re-engage with the junta at a summit level or even at a foreign minister level."
Nantiwat Samart, secretary to the Thai minister of foreign affairs, defended the talks on Sunday, saying Myanmar should not be completely isolated or cut out from ASEAN, according to the Thai-language website of Nation TV.
Vietnam's government said its foreign minister would not attend "due to a prior engagement."
Malaysia also would not be attending, said two sources with knowledge of the matter. The Philippines, which did not respond to questions over the weekend, is seen as firmly in the camp of isolating Myanmar's generals.
Myanmar's opposition National Unity Government, made up of loyalists to Suu Kyi's ousted administration, condemned the Thai initiative.
"Inviting the illegitimate junta to this discussion will not contribute to the resolution of Myanmar's political crisis," it said in a statement on Saturday.
A group of 81 Myanmar activist groups released an open letter on Sunday condemning the "secretive initiative," saying it was in "blatant contradiction" with ASEAN's policy of excluding junta officials to high-level meetings.
"We demand the caretaker Thai government cancel this meeting immediat"We demand the caretaker Thai government cancel this meeting immediately," the letter said.
In Gabes, Tunisia’s artisanal fishers are watching fish die
Between encroachments by big trawlers, lethal pollution levels and a cost-of-living crisis, life is harder than ever.
Pollution from the nearby industrial zone has resulted in about 3km of coastline where nothing lives or grows
Gabes, Tunisia – It takes about 15 minutes for the first police officer to turn up. No reason is given.
The frustration on Lakhdar Mahmoud’s face is unmistakable. The traditional, artisan fisher had been up since 3am to report the encroachment of large industrial fishing boats on waters earmarked for small fishing boats from near Gabes in southern Tunisia, without any response.
No police officer turned out for that. It took seeing him talking to a journalist to prompt an official response.
IDs are checked. Conversations continue on the long, desolate beach outside the small suburb of Ghannouch, where fishers in small boats have been setting sail for as long as anyone here can remember.
For centuries, small wooden boats have been heading out from Ghannouch into the Gulf of Gabes to catch whatever fish they can. Now, the waters in the Gulf are said to be among the most toxic in the Mediterranean, outstripping those of Gaza, Syria and Libya.
Increased competition for dying fish
Pollution from the 22 hulking industrial plants, left unchecked for decades, has destroyed the sea and rendered the land toxic. Studies cited by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) show decreases in fish resources and a corresponding loss in marine biodiversity across the Gulf as a result of the pollution.
Lakhdar Mahmoud was frustrated that nobody came when he reported on fishing encroachment [Simon Speakman Cordall/Al Jazeera]
Seagrass, or Posidonia, the cornerstone for much of the sea life within the Mediterranean, has been all but destroyed.
“There are no fish anymore, it’s all dead,” Sassi Alaya, another artisan fisher, says in broken English. He points to the clouds of brown and red mud that roil and roll below the crashing waves
"Look,” he says, “The pollution. You can see it.”
Lakhdar picks up on the theme, saying that more than an hour in the contaminated water is enough to develop cancer.
The louage, or shared taxi, route from the central city of Sfax to the plastic-strewn wastes around Gabes tells a story of its own.
Hugging the coastline of the Gulf, the acrid smell of burning refuse regularly fills the cab, vying with the stench of chemicals and phosphate to give some indication of what daily life must be like for the region’s inhabitants as industrialisation and poverty conspire to kill them by incremental degrees.
A 2018 study by the European Commission, the most recent available, confirmed that 95 percent of the air pollution in Gabes can be traced back to the state-owned Tunisian Chemical Group. Those pollutants include fine particles, sulfur oxide, ammonia and fluoride, all of which have been proven to have direct consequences for human health.
Under the surface of the Mediterranean, clouds of brown and red mud roil
Simon Speakman Cordall/Al Jazeera]
According to local scientists, pollution from the nearby industrial zone, allied to climate change, has resulted in about 3km (nearly 2 miles) of coastline where nothing lives or grows, so toxic that cancers, premature births and bronchial disorders are said to be commonplace.
Soon, the police are back and in greater numbers. Paperwork is checked again, radio calls to unknown offices are made and a discussion ensues on what type of photography is and is not permitted under the terms of a Tunisian press pass.
Away from the crackle of radios, Sassi and Lakhdar tell the translator they don’t know how long their small traditional fishing boats and way of fishing will remain financially viable in Gabes. The pressures upon them are already intense.
Allied to environmental pressures are the massive trawlers who poach with apparent impunity in waters earmarked for small fishers, and the rising cost of living means that, while the cost of every journey rises, the financial return their catch brings remains fixed.
Ignoring Gabes
There is some cause for hope. Within the wastes of the gulf, local artisan fishers, such as Sassi and Lakhdar have built an artificial reef from palm leaves.
Despite the small size (1sq km or 0.6sq miles) of this project, Mehdi Aissi, a marine programme manager with the WWF who partnered with the area’s fishers on it, said early results were positive. “Cuttlefish were back in the area after a long period of disappearance,” he said.
‘I just like to fish,’ Sassi Alaya says. ‘I just like the sea’ [Simon Speakman Cordall/Al Jazeera]
Nevertheless, an incredible amount of work remains.
“Around 22,000 cubic metres [5.8 million gallons] of polluted water are ejected into the Gulf every day,” marine biologist Mohammed Salah told Al Jazeera. Not only is that water loaded with phosphogypsum – waste from the manufacture of fertilisers – that destroys marine life, starves the sea of oxygen and leads to algae blooms but it is also loaded with heavy metals and toxins that endanger human life and destroy marine habitat.
“That’s an incredible level of discharge, but it’s also drawing water from a vital aquifer during a period of national drought,” Salah said.
It didn’t have to be this way. The chronic impact of Gabes’s industrial zone has been known since it was established in the 1970s. Successive governments promised to take action, but none have.
The closest the government came was during the early years of the revolution when everything seemed possible. A time, Salah described, when international funds were made available to have the entire industrial zone moved inland and reconstructed with modern materials.
However, the impetus for what would have been a landmark project, like so much else in Tunisia’s post-revolutionary history, was left to fizzle to nothing.
“The initiative was lost in test studies, paperwork and social projects to make the lives of people within the area better, rather than remove the cause for their ill health,” Salah said.
‘I just like the sea’
No one can argue that Gabes exists in isolation. Any undertaking to either dredge the sea bed free from the layers upon layers of phosphogypsum that coat its surface or relocate the industrial zone itself would come at an eye-watering cost for a country struggling for economic survival.
A potential bailout from the International Monetary Fund remains an ever-distant possibility, while the conditions for much of close to a billion euros ($1.1m) in aid mooted by the European Union remain uncertain. In the meantime, state-subsidised foods are in short supply, while prices rise and incomes shrink. Looming over all is the chance of a default on Tunisia’s international loans, which led to the rating agency, Fitch, downgrading the country to CCC- in early June, judging the chances of a default as high
The investment needed to ameliorate the decades of damage done to the Gulf just isn’t a priority for a government battling for survival.
Sassi and Lakhdar said they don’t know how long their traditional fishing boats and way of fishing will remain financially viable in Gabes [Simon Speakman Cordall/Al Jazeera]
Across the country, unemployment, an ingrained source of social unrest, sits at around 16 percent. In Gabes, that figure increases to 25 percent. Every job counts and the desolation that would be left in the wake of any attempt to relocate the industrial estate would herald a catastrophe of an equal, if fundamentally different, magnitude.
The police are back on the beach, ironically helping shape the story they appear to be attempting to suppress. Now seems as good a time as any to cut our losses and retreat.
Sat in a cafe nearby, Sassi recalls his decision to quit a successful career in business to join his father in fishing off Gabes.
“I just like to fish,” he says. “It’s a passion that’s inherited.”
He sighs, pausing for a moment to find the right words in English, “I just like the sea.”
SINGAPORE ‘I want to have a purpose beyond just working’: Foreign domestic worker on gaining more skills
Ms Sharon Prospero decided to become more productive by attending workshops on financial literacy, community emergency preparedness and digital literacy. ST PHOTO: SHINTARO TAY
SINGAPORE - Ms Sharon Prospero, a domestic helper from the Philippines, used to spend her days off catching up with her friends in Singapore. Recently, she has become more productive.
Within the first six months of 2023, Ms Prospero, 34, attended workshops on financial literacy by Aidha, an organisation that caters to migrant domestic workers and lower-income Singaporean women, the Community Emergency Preparedness Programme held by the Singapore Civil Defence Force and sessions on digital literacy with DBS Bank.
She said the financial sessions have been especially useful, as it teaches her not only to be smarter with her money, but also to watch out for phishing scams that have been on the rise.
She was among foreign domestic workers (FDW) who attended the seventh annual National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) May Day Domestic Employees Celebration at the Devan Nair Institute for Employment and Employability in Jurong East on Sunday.
The multi-talented Ms Prospero also performed a song for the about 1,000-strong audience.
She started volunteering with the Centre for Domestic Employees (CDE) a year ago, and has been encouraging more FDWs to upskill themselves with the programmes available at the centre, including those in the realm of current digital literacy and language.
She told The Straits Times on Sunday: “I want to have a purpose beyond just working here. I also want to help other FDWs to gain more skills.”
With the blessings of her employer, Ms Prospero, who has been working in Singapore for four years, often spends her Sundays attending events or sessions organised by CDE.
“I believe in the saying that we should never stop learning. Attending such sessions can help enhance my abilities and my thinking skills,” she said.
The mother of two children, aged 12 and 14, also said keeping herself busy helps her to cope with being away from her family.
The event was attended by Minister of State for Manpower Gan Siow Huang, along with embassy representatives from Sri Lanka, Indonesia, India, Cambodia and the Philippines.
Ms Gan said: “Many employers have told me that they are very grateful to the domestic employees for staying through, especially during the Covid-19 period, despite the challenges.”
Minister of State for Manpower Gan Siow Huang (centre) interacting with domestic workers at the NTUC May Day Domestic Employees Celebration 2023 on June 18.
ST PHOTO: SHINTARO TAY
The annual event, organised by NTUC and CDE to recognise the contributions of the FDWs in Singapore, was also live-streamed to nearly 2,000 people.
Ms Gan said the CDE will continue to expand the current outreach programmes available, which include those that Ms Prospero has already attended. One area that the agency is already working on is to identify partners to pilot essential caregiver training.
She said: “CDE also organises recreational and social activities for domestic workers to have a place to socialise and play on their rest days.”
The multi-talented Ms Prospero also performed a song for the about 1,000-strong audience.
ST PHOTO: SHINTARO TAY
The centre will also look to offer customised language training by the third quarter of 2023, according to Ms Lynn Koi, its executive director.
In May, the CDE, in partnership with the Ministry of Manpower, opened its third CDEConnect centre in Woodlands. The other two centres are located in Pasir Panjang and Tampines.
These centres help to reach out to FDWs to ensure they are adjusting to Singapore, and also to mediate issues with their employers when necessary.
Jaws-dropping speculations: Shark attack in Egypt sparks conspiracy theory
Controversy erupts as a rare shark attack in Egypt's Red Sea prompts speculation of a conspiracy targeting tourism
Are sharks deliberately targeting Egyptian tourism? One journalist thinks so
[Getty Images]
A deadly but rare shark attack is causing a media frenzy in Egypt. Some commentators even suggested a 'conspiracy' is behind the spike in such incidents.
A tweet by prominent Egyptian TV journalist Hala Sarhan on last week's attack seemed to suggest there was a plot targeting tourism in Egypt, one of the country’s key sources of national income.
In a now-deleted tweet, she wrote: “I have been thinking…why it [the shark] came to us in the first place? A shark only lives in the deepest, dark depths. How could it move all this distance in water considered shallow to its [natural] environment [?]".
The attack claimed the life of a Russian tourist in the Egyptian Red Sea resort city of Hurghada on 9 June.
"It was said dead sheep were thrown into the water [from a ship] and were followed by the shark. [Let’s] think for a while of who could benefit from this…..It seems the shark has been sent deliberately to afflict…a source of foreign currency that has recently flourished," Sarhan added in the tweet.
The tweet in question, which Sarhan removed shortly afterwards, outraged Saudi social media users who considered it directed against their homeland, which sits across the Red Sea from Egypt.
Sarhan, who currently runs the Saudi Rotana Production Studios at Rotana Media Group, denied the accusations, defending herself in another post and saying she never meant the Gulf country, close to the Egyptian regime of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi.
Once dubbed the “Oprah Winfrey of the Middle East,” Sarhan is not new to controversy. In 2007, she hosted a number of women on her show back then, entitled “Hala Show,” broadcast on Rotana Network, to describe working as sex workers in Egypt while being protected by policemen.
She was later accused of hiring those women as actors to allegedly attract more viewership, which prompted her to flee Egypt to the British capital London. Sarhan returned four years later.
Shark attacks have been relatively rare in Egypt's Red Sea coastal region in recent years. In 2022, a shark attack killed an Austrian woman swimming near the resort of Hurghada. In 2020, a young Ukrainian boy lost an arm and an Egyptian tour guide a leg in a shark attack. In 2010, a spate of shark attacks killed one European tourist and maimed several others off Sharm el-Sheikh on the Sinai Peninsula, across the Red Sea from Hurghada.
Climate change and overdevelopment of the Red Sea coast have been blamed recently for a small spike in shark attacks.
Egypt's Red Sea resorts, including Hurghada and Sharm el-Sheikh, are some of the country's major beach destinations and are popular with European tourists. Divers are drawn by the steep drop-offs of coral reefs just offshore that offer a rich and colourful sea life.
Authorities have in recent years sought to revive the vital tourism sector, battered by years of instability and, more recently, the coronavirus pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
Killer Shark Mummy? Egyptian scientists preserve shark that allegedly killed Russian tourist in Hurghada
Egyptian scientists are taxidermising the tiger shark blamed for a fatal attack on a Russian at the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.
Tiger sharks are just one of the many species of predatory sharks that swim in the Red Sea's clear waters [Getty]
The tiger shark allegedly responsible for the mauling to death of a Russian man in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Hurghada will be preserved and displayed in a museum.
Media reports claimed that the killer shark was being "mummified".
Specialists from Egypt’s National Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries (NIOF) decided that the specimen was worthy of display after they conducted an autopsy on the fish.
The tiger shark was female, pregnant and almost 11 feet long, the autopsy revealed. Contrary to initial reports, it is unknown whether the shark contained human remains.
The shark was caught as part of a retaliatory hunt, one that has been criticised by experts. There is no way of establishing whether the shark being taxidermised is the same animal that fatally attacked the Russian tourist – or indeed if the killer shark has even been caught.
The fishermen claim to have caught the shark at the scene of the attack near the Elysees Dream Beach Hotel and dragged it to shore. However, this cannot be verified. One video even showed an Egyptian fisherman punching a dead shark on the deck of a boat.
Footage then emerged of a team of specialists from NIOF preparing the tiger shark for taxidermy, not for mummification initial reports suggested.
The attack has caused concern about the safety of tourists along Egypt’s Red Sea coast, resulting in the temporary closure of a 60km stretch of beaches from El Gouma to Soma Bay.
The highly publicised capture of the shark claimed to be behind the tourist's death has led to the reopening of the beaches and has served to alleviate fears among tourists and locals.
Shark attacks in Egypt are on the rise, with experts believing it could be the result of overfishing and the irresponsible expansion of tourists resorts along the Red Sea coast, where shark diving is a hugely profitable endeavour.
In July last year, two women were killed in shark attacks south of Hurghada. In 2020, a shark attacked a 12-year-old Ukrainian boy, who lost an arm and an Egyptian tour guide in Sharm El Sheikh, who lost his leg.
Previously, in 2010, a spate of shark attacks killed one tourist and maimed several others at the same location.
The New Arab reached out to the Egypt's National Institute for Oceanography and Fisheries but received no reply at the time of publication.
Iran's Raisi pokes Washington's eye from Latin America
Analysis: The Iranian president's tour of Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua is designed to show that Tehran has strategic ties in the US's 'backyard' and that its influence is not limited to the Middle East.
On 11 June, President Ebrahim Raisi kicked off his first Latin America tour since coming to office. His three stops will be in Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba. The left-wing governments of these countries share Iran’s desire to challenge US hegemony in the Western Hemisphere and the Middle East.
In many ways, this tour is highly symbolic. One of the aims of Raisi and the Islamic Republic is to send a strong message to the US: Iran has friends in its ‘backyard’, and they are willing to defy Washington.
“Raisi wants to show that his administration has strategic ties in the US’s southern hemisphere and that Tehran’s axis of resistance is not limited to the Middle East,” explained Dr Sanam Vakil, deputy director of the Middle East North Africa program at Chatham House, in an interview with The New Arab.
“For Raisi personally the trip gives him a few more stamps in his little-used passport and offers him an opportunity to show some foreign policy influence inside the ever competitive and divided Iranian system.”
Iran’s relationships with anti-hegemonic actors in Latin America should be analysed within the context of South-South solidarity. As Iran and certain Latin American countries share a history of struggling with US sanctions and Washington’s interference in their internal affairs, they have much common cause in terms of pushing for a more multipolar and less West-centric world order.
"Raisi wants to show that his administration has strategic ties in the US's southern hemisphere and that Tehran's axis of resistance is not limited to the Middle East"
Tehran’s ties with Caracas, Managua, and Havana are not new. During Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s presidency (2005-13), the Islamic Republic put energy into its ties with Latin America’s left-wing governments. Ahmadinejad held meetings with Bolivia’s Evo Morales, Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Cuba’s Fidel and Raul Castro, Ecuador’s Rafael Correa, Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez.
Iran became much less focused on Latin America when Hassan Rouhani was in office (2013-21). But now Raisi’s administration is taking steps to put energy back into Tehran’s Latin America foreign policy.
“This is a continuation of a policy begun under the Ahmadinejad administration to show the US that if it insists on keeping a large military presence in the Persian Gulf, Iran can also play in the US backyard,” said Barbara Slavin, a distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center in Washington and a lecturer in international affairs at George Washington University, in an interview with TNA.
“We have seen a pattern in Iranian foreign policy in which hardline elements seek to prove that Iran can prosper without relations with the United States, by investing in political and economic relations with states in the Global South,” Dr Trita Parsi, the executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told TNA.
“The Ahmadinejad government invested heavily in Latin America, while the Rouhani government focused primarily on the [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)], the US, and Europe. Iran under Raisi [is] shifting back to a strategy centred on non-Western countries.” RELATED
Scoring rhetorical points and poking the US in its eyes in the company of countries in the Western Hemisphere is one of the key motivations behind Raisi’s Latin America tour.
“Such performances are also a way for the Islamic Republic to try to promote the narrative, at home and abroad, that it is not isolated, and that its resistance policies have support all over the world,” Dr Thomas Juneau, an associate professor at the University of Ottawa’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, said in a TNA interview.
Venezuela
Caracas is likely the most important leg of Raisi’s tour. Of these three Latin American nations, Iran’s ties to Venezuela are the most substantive. Iranian-Venezuelan cooperation is across multiple domains, including energy, agriculture, education, health, science, technology, mining, petrochemicals, tourism, shipping, and culture.
While in Caracas on 12 June, the Iranian president said that his visit to Caracas is aimed at boosting bilateral trade from $3 billion to $20 billion. During his visit, Iran and Venezuela announced 25 new deals between the two countries. Raisi told the press that the Islamic Republic and Venezuela share “common interests, common visions, and common enemies” while declaring that “the relationship between Iran and Venezuela is not a normal diplomatic relationship, but a strategic relationship”.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro asserted that “Iran is playing a starring role as one of the most important emerging powers in the new world” and that the two nations together will be “invincible”.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi attend the Venezuela - Iran Joint Commission in Caracas, Venezuela on 12 June 2023. [Getty]
When looking at the history of warm relations between Tehran and Caracas, a good starting point is 1960. That year Iran and Venezuela became two of OPEC’s five Founding Fathers. Fast forward to the 21st century and during the years in which Ahmadinejad and Chavez were in office, there was a lot of solidarity in the bilateral relationship.
When Ahmadinejad made his fourth visit to the South American country in June 2009, Chavez hailed him as a “gladiator of anti-imperialist struggles” and condemned Israel as “the murderous arm of the Yankee empire”.
The relationship has gone beyond warm words and strong rhetoric. During Ahmadinejad’s presidency, institutions such as Venezuela Banco Internacional de Desarrollo and the Banco Binacional Irani-Venezolano enabled the Iranians to make investments in Venezuela, which gave Iran a foothold in the Southern American country’s banking system.
Tehran and Venezuela have entered energy deals with the Iranians repairing refineries and other energy facilities in Venezuela. The two countries have done oil swaps. There have also been direct flights between Caracas and Tehran. Last year, Maduro met with Iran’s supreme leader in Tehran and the two countries signed a 20-year cooperation plan.
A 2010 Pentagon report claimed that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) was deepening its influence in Venezuela, though Chavez denied the validity of that report. Also, last year, the Israeli Defence Minister accused Iran of sending armed drones to the South American country.
Regarding the true nature of military ties between Tehran and Caracas, what constitutes fact versus fiction is not always clear. Most of the hype about Venezuela’s ties to Iran’s military and Hezbollah comes from anti-Iran neo-conservative hawks in the US and right-wing Venezuelans who lobby Washington to take a tougher stance against Caracas.
Both groups frequently exaggerate the security threat to the US posed by the Iran-Venezuela relationship. As Slavin explained, “[Iranian-Venezuelan] military cooperation is mostly token”.
Nicaragua
Iran’s relationship with Nicaragua’s left-wing government strengthened significantly in the 2000s. During that decade, Iran and Nicaragua reopened their embassies following the withdrawal of their ambassadors in 1990. Ahmadinejad came to Nicaragua in January 2007 and toured the country’s shantytowns with Ortega. “We have to give each other a hand,” said the Iranian president when addressing Tehran-Managua relations. “We have common interests, common enemies and common goals.”
Two months later, Iran and Venezuela promised Nicaragua a $350 million investment in a deepwater seaport near Monkey Point on the country’s Atlantic coast along with highways, rails, and pipelines. Although the Iranians did not end up delivering, the plans showcased the extent to which Tehran sought more publicised ties with Managua.
"Iran under Raisi [is] shifting back to a strategy centred on non-Western countries"
“In our Iranian brothers we have a people, a government, a president willing to join with the Nicaraguan people in the great battle against poverty,” said Ortega during Ahmadinejad’s January 2007 visit to Nicaragua.
In September of that year, Nicaragua’s chief diplomat went to Iran and met with his Iranian, Cuban, and Syrian counterparts. That trip came three months after Ortega paid his first visit to Iran, from where he called for the establishment of a new global order to replace capitalism and imperialism.
Raisi’s visit to Nicaragua this week, which will be the first by an Iranian president since Ahmadinejad came to the country in 2007, will build on a visit paid to the impoverished Central American country by a high-level delegation led by Iran’s minister of petroleum, Javad Owji, in May 2022, and another by Iran’s foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian earlier this year.
Last year, Owji’s delegation signed a host of agreements with the Nicaraguan government across many domains from agriculture to oil, technology transfers to trade, and livestock to construction. One of the agreements entails the Iranians providing Nicaragua with technical support for the expansion of a refinery in the country. The two sides signed three memoranda of understanding and their discussions addressed ways to make their bilateral circumvent US sanctions.
The Ahmadinejad government invested heavily in Latin America. [Getty]
During that visit, Ortega expressed gratitude to the Islamic Republic for being in solidarity with “a country like Nicaragua, a small people in its territory, which has been invaded since the Spanish colonizers to the Yankee expansionists”.
When Tehran’s top diplomat was in Nicaragua in February 2023, just before going off to Venezuela, he met with Ortega, blasted Washington’s sanctions on Tehran, and paid a visit to a Nicaraguan oil refinery.
Notwithstanding political tensions between Washington and Managua, Nicaragua’s economy remains dependent on US markets for its exports. What remains to be seen is how much Iran and the Central American country can bolster their trade links. Cuba
The Islamic Republic’s relationship with Cuba goes back to 1979 when Castro’s government embraced the Islamic revolution. Although Havana and Baghdad’s close ties required Castro to calibrate his island nation’s relationship with Tehran amid the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88), the end of that conflict enabled Cuba and Iran to grow closer.
Both belonging to the Non-Aligned Movement, Iran and Cuba have shared anti-imperialist attitudes, which have created much warmth in their bilateral relationship with the two countries frequently standing up for the other in international fora.
During Mohammad Khatami’s presidency, Tehran provided the island nation with an annual credit line of €20 million, which increased to €200 million under Ahmadinejad.
"Over the years, there has been consistent exaggeration in some circles in the US, especially those holding more hawkish views, about Iran's presence and influence in Latin America"
In 2001, Castro paid his first visit to Iran. While in Tehran, the Cuban leader received an honorary degree from Tarbiat Modares University. “As you have witnessed, the Islamic Revolution has always sided with Cuba in its conflict with the United States, since we believe that your struggle is a just one,” said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during Castro’s visit.
“The secret of the resistance of our revolution against the pressure exerted on us by the global arrogance [the US] is the strong belief of our people, who adhere to Islam, and its principles and values.”
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the Finlay Institute of Vaccines in Havana and the Pasteur Institute of Iran jointly developed the Soberana-2 vaccine (known in Iran as the Pasteurcovac), which was reportedly 91.2 percent effective. Iranian authorities gave the jab emergency-use approval and, according to Cuban state-run media, Iran quickly became the first country aside from Cuba to produce the Soberana-2 vaccine on a serious scale.
Last month, a Cuban delegation came to Iran, resulting in the two countries signing 13 agreements in the domains of agriculture, banking, biotechnology, healthcare, sports, and trade.
Iran clearly shares many geopolitical interests with Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba. There is much ideational synergy between these four countries. Yet, the reality is that Iran remains a heavily sanctioned country facing major economic problems at home. Therefore, some experts doubt that Iran’s economic ties with these three Latin American countries will expand much as an outcome of Raisi’s tour.
“Even during [Ahmadinejad’s] presidency, when there was a lot of emphasis on expanding relations with Latin American countries and many economic agreements were concluded, some of them were not implemented,” Dr Javad Heiran-Nia, the director of the Persian Gulf Studies Group at the Center for Scientific Research and Middle East Strategic Studies in Iran, told TNA.
“It seems that increasing economic and military cooperation is on the agenda during this tour. Whether all of them will be implemented is doubtful.”
Other experts have similar assessments. When asked what to expect from Raisi’s visits to these Latin American countries, Slavin responded, “A bunch of announcements about economic and other cooperation that will not amount to much in the future”.
Dr Juneau answered the same question by saying, “Promises of cooperation among anti-American actors, flashy rhetoric criticising American policies in Latin American and beyond, but in practice very few concrete deliverables”.
Kenneth Katzman, a Senior Fellow at the Soufan Center, told TNA, “You might see some announcements of Iran building some factories here and there. But, even if that’s accomplished, these are going to be very small facilities [which are] reasonably symbolic. It’s not going to develop the economies of any of these places”.
Some experts doubt that Iran's economic ties with these three Latin American countries will expand much as an outcome of Raisi's tour. [Getty]
The view from Washington
Even though Raisi’s Latin America tour will probably prove to be more about messaging, expressions of solidarity, and anti-US rhetoric, there are voices in Washington who have spent years raising alarm over Tehran’s clout in the Western Hemisphere.
Yet, in contrast to the last two Republican administrations - Bush 43 (2001-2009) and Trump (2017-21) - the Biden White House is not keen on making a huge fuss over Iranian inroads into Latin America.
“Over the years, there has been consistent exaggeration in some circles in the US, especially those holding more hawkish views, about Iran’s presence and influence in Latin America,” Dr Juneau told TNA. “In general, the Biden administration has not engaged in threat inflation about Iran as much as some of its predecessors. Ideally, its response to Raisi’s Latin American tour should be to mostly ignore it.”
Dr Parsi explained that “the Biden administration does not appear to buy into the hysteria among some Republicans who wildly inflate Iran's influence in Latin America and portray Tehran as a threat to US influence in the Western Hemisphere”.
Ultimately, it is important to avoid reading too much into Raisi’s Latin American tour. Although Iran does have influence in Latin America and Tehran’s relationships with a handful of anti-hegemonic actors in the region are brotherly, it would be inaccurate to interpret these visits and meetings as threatening the security of Western countries.
“You might see more announcements of Iranian investment,” Katzman told TNA. “You might see some oil swapping arrangements [with Venezuela and] possible announcements of upcoming ports visits by Iranian ships. Some of these may happen, but they’re not a threat to the US in any way. They are just purely symbolic acts of defiance.” Giorgio Cafiero is the CEO of Gulf State Analytics. Follow him on Twitter: @GiorgioCafiero
Israel's blockade of Gaza: Indefinitely caging Palestinians in a state of non-life
Analysis: Sixteen years of Israel's blockade of Gaza have shown that the policy has little to do with security and more to do with economic warfare, collective punishment, separation, and bargaining.
In 1995, the New York Times eagerly interviewed Palestinians in Gaza to highlight the freedoms the Oslo peace accords had brought them.
Instead of an optimistic feeling of joy and progress, "prison" was a common word Palestinians used to describe their confinement in the small densely populated enclave and inability to move to - or even visit - the occupied West Bank.
Israel’s closure of Gaza has been incrementally developed since at least the early 1990s. While Israel was making peace with the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) with one hand, in 1993 it was building a separation barrier around Gaza with the other.
Even when the White House had pressured Israel to open a safe passage between Gaza and the West Bank and a Palestinian airport in Gaza in 1998-1999, the Israeli government closed both down about a year later at the earliest possibility.
Years of fluctuating restrictions and closures led a prominent Israeli sociologist Baruch Kimmerling to conclude in 2003 that Israel has turned Gaza into “the world’s largest concentration camp ever”.
"Israel's closure of Gaza has been incrementally developed since at least the early 1990s. While Israel was making peace with the PLO with one hand, it was building a separation barrier around Gaza with the other"
Apartheid in action: A blockade before Hamas
When former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s unilateral “disengagement plan” came up in 2004, its stated goal was all about demography rather than security.
Sharon’s Deputy, Ehud Olmert, bluntly explained that a solution to the conflict and occupation is unlikely, which means Palestinians might eventually move towards “a struggle for one-man-one-vote,” and that would be “a much cleaner struggle, a much more popular struggle – and ultimately a much more powerful one”.
Hence, Olmert emphasised the need for addressing “the demographic issue with the utmost seriousness and resolve” by unilaterally cutting Gaza off from the equation.
Furthermore, Sharon’s top aide asserted that the Gaza disengagement primarily aimed to “freeze the peace process” and prevent “the establishment of a Palestinian state”. This made it necessary for Israel to isolate about half the occupied Palestinian population to prevent a one-state solution where Jews become a minority, and locking Gazans up in a cage became the solution.
In fact, the policy’s original name was the ‘Separation Plan’, but Sharon had to change the name because “separation sounded bad, particularly in English, because it evoked apartheid”. Olmert also made clear that the disengagement would allow Israel to strike Gaza’s population even harder.
Indeed, Israel retained full control over Gaza’s air, water, and ground spaces as well as telecommunications, electricity and the entry and exit of indispensable goods after the ‘withdrawal’.
Instead of opening Gaza to the world and making it into ‘Singapore’, Israel’s disengagement plan deliberately and openly sought to isolate the enclave, including cutting Gaza’s labour force from Israel and denying Gazans access to the West Bank.
This exacerbated an economic recession from Israel’s previous years-long restrictions that the World Bank called “among the worst in modern history”.
Israel has launched at least four large-scale military attacks on the Gaza Strip since 2009. [Getty]
The blockade: Putting Gaza on a diet, indefinitely
Israel’s blockade on Gaza is remembered to be a result of Hamas seizing power from the Palestinian Authority (PA) in June 2007. However, the ongoing closure of Gaza started more than a year before and the siege was officially announced three months after Hamas' takeover. The naval blockade wasn’t declared until 2009.
Israel’s preceding decade-long isolation and restrictions on Gaza, culminating with a destructive ‘disengagement’, dramatically rendered the PA dysfunctional and created a dire humanitarian situation.
This in turn helped Hamas significantly in the 2006 parliamentary elections, an outcome Israel immediately used to further besiege Gaza. “There is no question that the disengagement from Gaza strengthened the Hamas and weakened [the PA]” admitted the IDF former Chief of Staff, Moshe Ya’alon, in 2006.
"Palestinians are stuck in a permanent state of non-life, or as Gazans call it 'slow death'"
Following Hamas’ win, then PM Olmert closed Gaza’s commercial crossing, Karni, and imposed a series of sanctions on the PA including withholding its tax revenues, calling the PA “a terrorist authority”.
His top aide, Dov Weisglass, then explained “the idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger”.
Upon Hamas’ takeover in June, Israel sealed all of Gaza’s border crossings and reduced the fishing space from 20 to 6 nautical miles, but it wasn’t until September that the Israeli government declared Gaza a besieged “hostile entity” after the Islamic Jihad group fired projectiles on Israel.
It was never about Hamas
The blockade’s stated goal was “economic warfare” to collectively punish the population in order to turn them against Hamas and end the group’s rule. Israel even devised a calorie count of the bare minimum amount of imports needed to prevent Gazans from dying from hunger.
However, in 2008, it became clear Israel was starving, isolating, and immiserating Gazans with one hand while preventing Hamas’ collapse with the other. That year, PM Olmert admitted to transferring hundreds of millions of shekels every month to the Hamas government, mostly through currency exchanges for smuggled money.
In 2009, Olmert refrained from dealing a “knockout blow” to Hamas during Operation Cast Lead because Israel didn’t want to reoccupy Gaza or hand it back to the PA; a strategy PM Netanyahu later made explicit in 2019, saying “I won't give [Gaza] to [PA president] Abu Mazen”.
Over the years, Israel developed a solid transactional relationship with Hamas by which the latter polices the blockade and prevents attacks on Israel during times of ceasefire and in return Israel eases some of its restrictions on Gaza.
In 2012, this relationship prompted Haaretz’s editor-in-chief to write “Israel Killed Its Subcontractor in Gaza” in reference to the Qassam Brigades leader whose troops were ensuring calm for Israel.
The majority of Gaza's children have never known a life without Israel's blockade. [Getty]
All about separation and isolation
In 2009, Hamas’ control and Gaza’s blockade allowed Israel to make official one of its most controversial policies that violate the Oslo Accords into virtual obsolescence. By military order 1650, Israel declared any Gazan in the West Bank an “illegal alien” and an “infiltrator” subject to arrest, deportation, or imprisonment for up to seven years.
In 2019, Israel even started to allow Qatari cash to enter Gaza, which was intended to help needy families and provide aid, fuel, and government salaries.
Israel said it sought to stabilise Gaza, conditioned on maintaining calm, but the move had another dimension; to fuel the division and separation between Gaza and West Bank.
As PM Benjamin Netanyahu bragged “whoever is against a Palestinian state should be for” transferring the funds to Gaza to “keep Palestinians divided”.
This made clear that Hamas has been more of a pretext to justify Israel’s escalating collective punishment and isolation of Gaza rather than the actual reason for these extreme measures.
"Israel's siege has no clear endgame. There is no certain military objective or condition that, if achieved, would lead Israel to lift the blockade"
Netanyahu’s then Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman put it simply in 2018: “We allow them to keep their heads above water, but not beyond that”. His successor Benny Gantz boasted “We will not allow real and long-term development in the Gaza Strip”.
This means an average highly educated Gazan by the age of 35 has almost never been able to find a job, afford to fall in love and start a family, or put food on the table. In other words, Palestinians are stuck in a permanent state of non-life, or as Gazans call it “slow death”.
Israel deliberately exploits the misery it created in Gaza to push its people to emigrate and leave the territory. In 2019, Netanyahu admitted to even working actively to find countries to absorb Gazan immigrants.
What makes this more troubling is that Israel’s siege has no clear endgame. There is no certain military objective or condition that, if achieved, would lead Israel to lift the blockade. It is, rather, an indefinite instrument to maintain the status quo of inequality and oppression in the occupied Palestinian territories. Muhammad Shehada is a Palestinian writer and analyst from Gaza and the EU Affairs Manager at Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor. Follow him on Twitter: @muhammadshehad2
