Friday, May 24, 2024

Decades of spying and repression: the anti-Palestinian origins of American Islamophobia


It’s often assumed that Islamophobia is the driving force behind US anti-Palestinian bigotry. In fact, it’s the other way around

Moustafa Bayoumi 
with illustrations by Mona Chalabi
THE GUARDIAN
Thu 23 May 2024 

One evening last Thanksgiving weekend, three 20-year-old Palestinian college students were strolling around Burlington, Vermont, when they were suddenly gunned down by a stranger. One of the victims, Hisham Awartani, is now paralyzed from the waist down. Since they were wearing keffiyehs and speaking Arabic and English, speculation ran high that the young men had been victims of an Islamophobic attack.

The BBC noted that the attack “comes as the US deals with a surge in Islamophobia and antisemitism since the start of the Israel-Gaza war”. Vermont’s Middlebury College described the shooting as evidence of “a marked increase in Islamophobic acts on American campuses and beyond”. A White House statement mentioned how “far too many people live with the fear that they could be targeted and attacked based on their beliefs or who they are”.

But that’s not how Elizabeth Price, the mother of Awartani, seemed to understand the attack. She told WNYC radio that she had raised three children in the West Bank, where children routinely encounter Israeli state and settler violence, and she never believed Hisham would be targeted in the US. In the US, she said, she thought he “would be somewhere safe … I had not realized that to be Palestinian is to be unsafe and I understand that now, that you can’t, as a Palestinian, if you are proud and open as a Palestinian, protect yourself.” For Price, Hisham was a victim not primarily of Islamophobia but of anti-Palestinian violence.



We hear a lot of talk these days about Islamophobia, anti-Arab racism, and anti-Palestinian bigotry, usually in that order. But which actually came first?

In the United States, Islamophobia is commonly seen as the motor that drives anti-Arab racism, a subset of which is anti-Palestinian bigotry. And yet, American history doesn’t quite abide by this order. In fact, it’s the opposite.

In US history, anti-Palestinian bigotry, expressed primarily through repressive practices of the US government, almost always came first. This anti-Palestinianism then manifested into a generalized anti-Arab racism, which only later – especially after 9/11 – morphed into the more widespread Islamophobia that we recognize today. Understanding this history can not only help explain the complex ways that both anti-Palestinianism and Islamophobia operate in the United States but can also point to what is missed when anti-Palestinian bigotry is subsumed into the frame of Islamophobia.
Conflated histories


Islamophobia, the fear and hatred of Islam and Muslims, is obviously not synonymous with Islam, which existed in the United States even before American independence. There is plenty of evidence that many of the enslaved Africans brought to colonial America and exploited for their labor were Muslim, even if communities of Muslims among them did not survive in any large-scale fashion. The peculiar institution of chattel slavery worked hard to stamp out any previous belief system and replace it with the slaveholder’s Christianity.

In the early decades of the 20th century, new religious movements among African Americans – such as the Moorish Science Temple and the Nation of Islam – bloomed, borrowing Islamic iconography and ideas to develop their own communities. Then, in 1964 and after splitting from the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X performed his hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, and became el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz, arguably the world’s most famous American Sunni Muslim.
After 1967, Arabs in the US captured the paranoid eyes of the federal government

(It’s worth noting that Malcolm X used to use the analogy of the Jewish diaspora and the state of Israel as a model for cultivating pan-Africanism among African Americans. “We don’t want to move over here physically,” Malcolm wrote in an African magazine, as noted by Louis DeCaro, one of his biographers. “What we want is to have a cultural and psychological migration [to Africa], like the Jews have migrated to Israel philosophically and culturally.” But then Brother Malcolm toured the world, internationalizing the cause of equality for African Americans. One mostly forgotten leg of this 1964 tour was a brief stop Malcolm made in then Egyptian-controlled Gaza. After visiting the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza, Malcolm stopped using the Israel analogy and began employing the example of the Chinese diaspora instead.)


Because Muslims can be of any race and Palestinians are a multi-faith Arab society, with significant numbers of Christians, we can easily end up conflating histories and struggles when talking about Palestinians, Arabs and Islam. Until 1965, there weren’t many non-African American Muslims in the US. Most of the Arab immigrants were Christians. And immigration to the US from outside northern Europe had trickled to a near standstill. The reason was the Johnson-Reed Act, the 1924 immigration law that excluded Asians from immigrating to the country and introduced strict quotas for the rest of the world (2% of the number of foreign-born persons of any nationality residing in the US, according to the 1890 census). This law also deliberately sought to limit the numbers of Italian Catholics and eastern European Jews entering.

The numbers of Arabs immigrating to the US declined significantly over these years, though some continued to arrive via other paths. About 2,000 Palestinian families were admitted as refugees following passage of the Refugee Relief Act of 1953, and another 985 followed suit in the late 50s and early 60s. US policy at this point thought of Palestinians as a refugee problem, not as a people deserving self-determination. Meanwhile, Arabs were trying hard to settle here. The so-called racial prerequisite cases, which until 1952 basically allowed only white immigrants to naturalize as citizens, saw challenges from Arabs, who were seen by immigration courts as white (1909), then non-white (1914), then white (1915), then non-white (1942), then white (1944).


Much changed in the 1960s, including US immigration policy. In 1965, the US dropped the quota system in favor of skills-based immigration and family reunification. The original planners of the 1965 act believed family reunification would keep immigration from Europe flowing and thus keep the country white. As post-second world war Europe prospered, European immigration to the US declined, but immigration from the global south grew rapidly. This included increasing numbers from the Arab region. Many of them were students, both Muslim and Christian, and they began organizing for Palestine, especially after the 1967 war.
Decades of crackdowns


Edward Said seems like a prophet: 20 years on, ‘there’s hunger for his narrative’

After 1967, with the numbers of Arabs in the United States growing and with Arab activists now challenging the American consensus on the region, Arabs in the US captured the paranoid eyes of the federal government. (African American Muslims were already under surveillance, more out of the anti-Black beliefs held by the government than Islamophobia.) It is this history, of anti-Palestinianism after 1967, that is often overlooked.

Shortly after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, Arabs and Arab Americans organizing for Palestine became subject to warrantless government surveillance. The Arabs being spied upon, however, didn’t know they were subject to surveillance until after 1972, the year the Lebanese American attorney (and legendary activist for Palestinian rights) Abdeen Jabara sued the federal government after suspecting he had been targeted. Jabara, who was then the president of the Association of American Arab University Graduates, discovered that the National Security Agency had been keeping tabs on his political activity since 1967, including the organizations he belonged to, his foreign and domestic travel, summaries of his public speeches, and more. The NSA had tapped his phone and transcribed more than 40 different conversations, including with his clients, and exchanged information about him with at least three foreign governments.


The FBI also included Arabs in America in Cointelpro, a now notorious FBI program that sought to destroy largely Black and leftwing organizations that the government considered subversive. And in 1972, the Nixon administration began “Operation Boulder”. The government proudly announced this program, which screened the visa status of anyone with an Arabic surname, and it led to harassment and intimidation of Arab communities around the USA. FBI agents would even leave their calling cards with the letters F-B-I written out in Arabic with Palestinians and other Arabs in the country.


Over 150,000 people were put through Operation Boulder’s wringer. It wasn’t the only way the government sought to pressure Arabs in the country. In the middle of the Watergate scandal, the FBI also authorized an illegal burglary of the Arab Information Center in Dallas to gather information against Arab activists on Palestine in the US. All these efforts – the spying, persecution and coercion of a community for exercising its political opinions – never netted a single case of terrorism or espionage.

Various other forms of government repression against Arabs organizing for Palestine persisted throughout the late 60s onward, as did harassment and violence by private citizens and organizations. In 1969, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) sent spies disguised as reporters to the annual convention of the Organization of Arab Students of the US and Canada, held at Ohio State University. Their report, which now sounds oddly contemporary, reads, in part:


The political activity of the Arab students in the United States will increase significantly in the coming school year. They are beginning to display a much greater understanding of how to present their arguments to the various levels of the American public (church groups, new left, lower middle class, etc); and any successes are certain to increase their confidence and, hence, their activity. The situation, however, is by no means hopeless if the proper action is taken immediately. One thing is certain, the threat on the campuses and in the churches can no longer be ignored but must be confronted directly. Otherwise, we will lose by default because the Arabs are making rapid gains in several areas.

The ADL continued spying on Palestine-solidarity and other leftwing organizations, as well as far-right groups, at least through the 1990s.

In 1985, a series of linked bombings targeted the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), which advocated prominently for Palestine. The organization’s Boston office was bombed, injuring two people, and later that year, Alex Odeh, the west coast director, was killed when a pipe bomb exploded as he opened the door to his office. Two suspects in Odeh’s assassination, associated with the Kahanist Jewish Defense League, fled to Israel, where they have since lived openly in West Bank settlements. One of them, Andy Green (who now goes by Baruch Ben-Yosef), has also been identified as a lead civilian organizer of recent protests blocking humanitarian aid shipments into Gaza.



In 1987, seven Palestinians and one Kenyan were arrested in Los Angeles. The LA Eight, as they came to be known, were detained explicitly for their political opinions. The FBI had been spying on them for years, even renting an apartment next door to one couple and drilling a hole in their bedroom wall to peek in on their lives. As the group was distributing literature of the Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the government dusted off a McCarthy-era law to show that the LA Eight were guilty of promoting “the doctrines of World communism” and thus subject to deportation. The case would end only in 2007, when a federal judge dismissed all remaining charges and called the case “an embarrassment to the rule of law”.

While lawyers for the LA Eight were crafting their defense, someone leaked a document to them that showed how the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) had drawn up plans for large-scale registration and possible incarceration of up to 5,000 Arabs and Iranians in Oakdale, Louisiana, in the case of a terrorist attack on US soil or at the request of the executive branch. The document, titled Alien Terrorists and Undesirables: A Contingency Plan, revealed that the land was already prepared with water, sewer, gas and electric hook-ups, that tents and cots were ready, and that the local “community is receptive” to the prison camp. The congressman Norman Mineta, who at six years old had been forced into an incarceration camp as a Japanese American in 1942, was livid when he learned about the scheme, and he introduced it into the congressional record to expose the plan and make sure it was never implemented.
Almost no one talked about Muslim Americans before 9/11. Then everyone did

The contingency plan illustrated how surveillance had expanded beyond those involved in Palestinian advocacy, and American cultural suspicions followed suite. The oil embargo of 1973-74 and the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-81 increased animosity against and stereotyping of Arabs, Iranians and Muslims in the country. “I don’t want the banks selling my country to the Arabs,” Howard Beale screams in the 1975 film Network. There were times when these federal programs of surveillance and repression of Arabs were reactions to brazen acts of terrorism, such as the Munich attack in 1972 by Palestinian militants. But these programs of state surveillance and repression were more often used to curtail the speech of Arab Americans and to cement US policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Then came the September 11 attacks. After 9/11, everyone – immigrant and citizen, activist and spectator – became vulnerable. And a new category of suspicion fully entered the national imagination: the Muslim American.


The anti-Muslim focus of “war on terror” policies “was built on a pre-existing foundation of hostility to the Palestinian liberation movement”, as a recent report by the Center for Constitutional Rights and Palestine Legal explained.
View image in fullscreen

After September 11, existing programs that targeted Palestinians and Arabs were retooled and expanded, and the category of the Muslim American was made. In doing so, Muslim Americans were not just racialized after 9/11; they were basically invented. The term scarcely existed in the popular imagination before 2001. A Nexis database search of “Muslim American” in news sources from 1 January 1986 to 10 September 2001 finds a scant 437 mentions. Since September 11, there have been more than 10,000, the database’s upper limit.

In short, almost no one talked about Muslim Americans before 9/11. Then everyone did, all the way to Trump and his Muslim ban.
Why do we gloss over the root of the problem?

Islamophobia is unquestionably a major problem besetting the United States and beyond. It can often feel like Muslim lives have been so devalued that we barely register the almost 1 million people, mostly Muslims, who have been killed in direct violence in the US-led war on terror, let alone the 35,000 mostly Muslim Palestinians in Gaza. This disposability of Muslim lives illustrates the anti-Muslim racism behind much Islamophobia. In the United States, Muslims remain vulnerable to vigilante violence and their safety and wellbeing are still under threat, as is also true for Arabs and Palestinians.

But why are the anti-Palestinian origins of American Islamophobia glossed over? Could it be that, by thinking of Islamophobia primarily as a problem of religious acceptance, we shift the focus to religious tolerance, rather than reckoning with what the US might owe Palestine? There’s a long tradition of overcoming religious intolerance in this country, and this way Islamophobia becomes legible almost as the yin to antisemitism’s yang. Meanwhile, the hard work of reckoning with what the US might owe Palestine is deftly avoided. After all, it’s a lot easier to get your member of Congress to recognize the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr than to recognize Palestine.

Significantly, the young Muslim Americans and Jewish Americans who are at the center of today’s protest movements are placing Palestinian rights back in the struggle to defeat Islamophobia. Why? Clearly not because of any scriptural kinship to Palestine, contemporary identity politics or antisemitism. The reason seems much more fundamental: freedom. These young people recognize that to free the US from its anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish prejudices requires freeing the Palestinian people from their oppression. This is not a position just for the moment – it’s a lesson about overcoming oppression worldwide.

Alarm as German climate activists charged with ‘forming a criminal organisation’




Action against Letzte Generation could have ‘immense chilling effect’ on climate protest, campaigners say



Damien Gay
THE GUARDIAN
Thu 23 May 2024 

Five members of Letzte Generation, Germany’s equivalent to Just Stop Oil, have been charged with “forming a criminal organisation”, a move civil rights campaigners say could in effect criminalise future support for the climate campaign.

Mirjam Herrmann, 27, Henning Jeschke, 22, Edmund Schulz, 60, Lukas Popp, 25, and Jakob Beyer, 30, were charged under section 129 of the German criminal code. It is believed to be the first time the law has been applied to a non-violent protest group.

According to prosecutors in the state of Brandenburg, the charges relate to more than a dozen “attacks” against oil refineries, the Berlin-Brandenburg airport and the Museum Barberini, in Potsdam, between April 2022 and May 2023.

The incidents include protests in which supporters of the group attempted to switch off oil pumping stations leading to the refinery, blocked airport runways and threw mashed potatoes at an oil painting by Monet.

Prosecutors said the charges applied to a subgroup of Letzte Generation, a Germany-wide campaign that has led to thousands of arrests in the past two years.

“There is sufficient suspicion that the five accused agreed with other members of this subgroup to commit crimes together over a long period of time,” they said. “The association of people was not only intended to last for a longer period of time, but also served to pursue an overarching common interest.”

The activists say all their protests were open, accountable and non-violent, and contested the use of such a draconian law against them.

“This is the first time in German history that a climate protest group that uses measures of peaceful civil disobedience is charged as a criminal organisation,” Herrman said.

“This charge is especially dangerous for democracy and the right to peaceful protest because the charge turns the constitutional right of protest, freedom of speech and political assembly into a crime simply because some laws were broken in course of civil disobedient protest.

“This charge is meant for mafia and organised crime. This charge criminalises every act of support towards the group Letzte Generation. This creates an immense chilling effect on all climate protests in Germany.”

The charges, brought by the public prosecutor’s office in the town of Neuruppin, come after a two-year investigation into the activities of Letzte Generation, involving dawn raids on supporters’ homes, wiretaps on their phones and even seizing the organisation’s website.

According to Amnesty International Germany, a guilty verdict for even one of the defendants could turn Letzte Generation into a proscribed organisation by criminalising any activity that promotes it or its purposes, whether financially, logistically, politically, legally or in the media.

“With the indictment, the criminalisation of climate protest in Germany reaches a new level of escalation,” Paula Zimmermann, an expert on freedom of expression and freedom of assembly at Amnesty International Germany, said.

“Paragraph 129 of the German criminal code is to combat organised crime. Its application to non-violent protest criminalises civic engagement and thus restricts democratic freedoms.

“Delegitimising and intimidating unpopular protest using criminal law is contrary to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, as enshrined in human rights and the German constitution.

“We are very concerned about this development and call on the criminal justice system to respect freedom of expression and assembly in its decisions.”

Prosecutors in Munich and Flensburg are carrying out similar investigations into members of Letzte Generation, the newspaper Der Spiegel reported.



Norway sued over deep-sea mining plans

WWF says the government has breached the law ‘without adequately assessing the consequences’



Karen McVeigh
THE GUARDIAN
Thu 23 May 2024 

One of the world’s biggest environmental groups is suing the Norwegian government for opening up its seabed for deep-sea mining, claiming that Norway has failed to properly investigate the consequences of this move.

WWF-Norway says the government’s decision has breached Norwegian law, goes against the counsel of its own advisers, and sets a “dangerous precedent”.

“We believe the government is violating Norwegian law by now opening up for a new and potentially destructive industry without adequately assessing the consequences,” said Karoline Andaur, the CEO of WWF-Norway. “It will set a dangerous precedent if we allow the government to ignore its own rules, override all environmental advice, and manage our common natural resources blindly.”

In January, Norway became the first country in the world to give the go-ahead to commercial deep-sea mining after parliamentary approval. This was despite warnings from scientists of “catastrophic” consequences for marine life, and growing opposition from the EU and the UK, which support a temporary ban on environmental grounds.

The proposal, which relates to Norwegian waters in the sensitive Arctic region, will expose an area of 280,000 sq km – larger than Britain. Mining the deep sea involves the extraction of metals and minerals from the seabed and is being pursued because of their use in the transition to green energy, particularly electric car batteries.

WWF-Norway said that the assessment by the Norwegian energy ministry, which underpins the government’s decision to go ahead with deep-sea mining, fails to meet the minimum requirements of the Seabed Minerals Act and has no legal basis.

The Norwegian Environment Agency, which advises the government, has also said the impact assessment does not provide a sufficient scientific or legal basis for deep-sea mining.


Deep-sea mining: why is interest growing and what are the risks?


Commenting on the lawsuit, Astrid BergmÃ¥l, the secretary of state at the Ministry of Energy, said: “We believe that a thorough process has been carried out with broad involvement, and that the applicable requirements have been followed. I note that WWF wants to try the case in court, and they have the right to do so. At this time, we have no further comment on the lawsuit.”

Last year, a Norwegian study said it had found a “substantial” amount of metals and minerals on its seabed.

In February, the European parliament expressed concern over Norway’s decision to open areas of the Arctic for deep-sea mining and called on member states to support a moratorium, including at the International Seabed Authority. The authority is expected to meet later this year, to ratify rules on mining in international waters.

So far, 25 countries, including France, Germany, Spain, Palau, Mexico and Sweden, have asked for a pause, moratorium or ban on mineral extraction of the seabed.
It’s an open secret: the UAE is fuelling Sudan’s war – and there’ll be no peace until we call it out

The Emirates is arming and supporti
ng one side in the conflict, but UK and US officials have shied from confronting it


THE GUARDIAN
Fri 24 May 2024 

The war in Sudan has become one of the worst ongoing humanitarian crises in the world. In a little over a year of fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), there have been 6.8 million people internally displaced, 2 million fleeing the country, and 24.8 million, almost half the population, in dire need of humanitarian assistance.

The United Arab Emirates is the foreign player most invested in the war. In fact, without its direct and all-around supp]ort, t]]]]he RSF would not have been able to wage war to the same extent.

Sudan is key to the UAE’s strategy in Africa and the Middle East, aimed at achieving political and economic hegemony while curbing democratic aspirations. Since 2015, it has sourced fighters from both factions to join its conflict in Yemen. It is the primary importer of Sudan’s gold and has multibillion-dollar plans to develop ports along Sudan’s Red Sea coast. By supporting the RSF in Sudan, it has undermined the democratic transition that followed the 2019 ouster of Omar al-Bashir, Sudan’s dictator for 30 years.

Upon the outbreak of war, it reportedly established logistical operations to send weapons to the RSF through its networks in Libya, Chad, Central African Republic, South Sudan, Uganda and the Haftar and Wagner militias. It has reportedly disguised armament and supplies as humanitarian aid. In addition, RSF business, finance, logistics and PR operations are carried out from the UAE. Injured fighters are reportedly airlifted to be treated in an Abu Dhabi military hospital. And Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (Hemedti), the RSF commander, is said to have visited a few African countries on board an Emirati airplane belonging to a company owned by an Emirati royal and adviser to the president.

A UN report in January found the accusations of UAE military support to RSF credible. The UAE has denied this support, but many US lawmakers have publicly called it out. US and British officials have been more cautious, tending to focus on the “negative roles” of external actors or partners that support the RSF.

Nonetheless, the UAE has been bullish in rejecting the accusations, explicit or not. Last April, it furiously cancelled ministerial meetings with the UK because it did not leap to its defence at a UN meeting about Sudan.


What caused the civil war in Sudan and how has it become one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises?

Meanwhile, famine, diseases and fighting are closing in on civilians. Furthermore, the so-called international community has done little to stop it, with only 12% of the $2.7bn aid sought for Sudan having been raised. The pattern of targeting civilians, torching villages, and committing mass murders and sexual violence has been witnessed in all the areas that came under RSF control. Human Rights Watch suggested RSF has committed genocide, crimes against humanity, widespread war crimes and ethnic cleansing. SAF has committed its share of war crimes, bombing civilians indiscriminately, and arresting, torturing and killing civilians too. The US officially determined that both the SAF and RSF have committed war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing.


Fighting for control of El Fasher, the last SAF stronghold in the western region of Darfur, escalated last week. Hundreds of thousands of people had taken refuge there after fleeing the atrocities committed by RSF in other parts of Darfur, an area twice the size of the UK. The battle for El Fasher may have significant implications for the region. A win for the RSF gives it effective control over most states to the west of the Nile River, which represents more than half the area, population and resources of Sudan.

Peace prospects are dim. The most recognised effort to achieve peace can be seen in the Jeddah platform: multiple rounds of talks organised by the US and Saudi Arabia, which began shortly after the war broke out. However, the SAF and RSF have consistently failed to honour the commitments set out in the May 2023 declaration to ensure civilians are protected and international humanitarian law is respected. Nor have they honoured several agreements for ceasefire, facilitation of the delivery of humanitarian assistance, or confidence-building measures, such as vacating civilian houses occupied by RSF combatants.

Tom Perriello, the US special envoy for Sudan, proposes reviving the Jeddah platform, focusing on building and aligning political will in the region to compel a peace deal, and enlisting the efforts of key African and Arab leaders in the talks.


Sudan had largest number of people facing extreme food shortages in 2023, UN report shows


However, Sudan has a history of prolonged wars and endless peace talks, and Jeddah risks becoming another entry in its list of “too many agreements dishonoured” unless the international community pivots away from its failed model of pressuring for peace deals that reproduce violence and authoritarianism. The generals of both the SAF and RSF must be held accountable for their numerous crimes against the Sudanese people, and should not be rewarded again by allowing them to be part of any arrangement sought to end the war.

Most crucially, the international community must confront the UAE’s detrimental role in the conflict, which it has carried out with impunity, leveraging its alliances with both the west and Russia. If not, Sudan risks descending into a state of perpetual war.

Husam Mahjoub is co-founder of Sudan Bukra, an independent nonprofit Sudanese TV channel
THE LAST COLONY VIVA INDEPENDENCE
 
‘Not our president’: after Macron’s visit, New Caledonia’s Kanak demand their own futur


Mathurin Derel in Nouméa and Ben Doherty
Fri 24 May 2024
THE GUARDIAN 

“I don’t know why our fate is being discussed by people who don’t even live here.”

The 52-year-old Indigenous Kanak – who gave his name as Mike – spoke from a roadblock just north of New Caledonia’s capital, in the hours before France’s president arrived in the Pacific territory that has been paralysed by violent protests.



‘We will fight until Kanaky is free’: how New Caledonia caught fire


The demonstrations began on 13 May sparked by voting reforms proposed by the French parliament. Looting, arson and clashes have left six people dead, hundreds injured and widespread damage. The unrest comes amid underlying concerns over inequality and longstanding efforts in New Caledonia to secure independence.

The voice of local Kanaks “is not being listened to”, Mike said.

Macron’s rushed visit was, even in the words of his own advisers, “double or quits … a bet”.

But while he sought meetings across the political divide and acknowledged that inequalities had widened, his language, too, was revealing.

“The return of republican order,” he said pointedly, “is the priority.”

He left New Caledonia after 18 hours on the ground, promising that the reforms that would give voting rights to tens of thousands of non-Indigenous residents would not be pushed through by force, but the situation would be reviewed again within a month.

On the roadblocks, protesters say a delay is not enough, and that the reforms should be withdrawn.
View image in fullscreenEmmanuel Macron arrives at the central police station in Noumea. Photograph: Marin Ludovic/ABACA/REX/Shutterstock


“The statements of president Macron are disappointing,” said a 51-year-old Kanak on Friday, from a roadblock.

“We are exactly at the same point. He continues to let the situation deteriorate without making a strong gesture to calm things down.”

“The solution won’t come from the state, it will come from the Caledonians,” activist Jean-Pierre Xowie, a member of pro-independence FLNKS, told French television from New Caledonia ahead of the presidential visit.

Macron said security forces would remain as long as necessary. But FLNKS spokesperson Jimmy Naouna insisted the presence of French security forces – more than 3,000 are now on the ground, mostly in and around Noumea – was inflaming the situation.

“You can’t keep sending in troops just to quell the protests, because that is just going to lead to more protests,” he told the ABC’s Pacific Beat.

“By deploying the army, what are we doing here? This is not a war-torn country. We are not terrorists, as they say” said Joseph, an activist posted at a checkpoint in Dumbéa, north of Nouméa.
View image in fullscreenProtesters wave Kanak flags at a roadblock in Noumea. Photograph: MMIIAS/ABACA/REX/Shutterstock

Naouna said New Caledonia’s current conflagration was a “political situation so there needs to be a political solution”.

But on the barricades that have shot up around the territory, blocking major roads and infrastructure, activists make clear that there are economic and social aspects to these protests too; anger at the state among Kanaks is not confined to the voting reform issue.
Young people say ‘they are ready to die’


Lélé, a 41-year-old activist, unaffiliated with a political party, is extremely active on social media, showing the world what is happening in New Caledonia.

“The Kanak are not being recognised for their true worth, they want a fair redistribution of wealth. What we ask of Macron is to recognise the legitimacy of the Kanak,” said Lélé.

While many Kanak do not condone the recent violence, just as many understand the anger of disillusioned youth.

“We hear young people saying they are ready to die at the checkpoints … That shows how deeply they are affected in their dignity,” said Djamil, who is married to a Kanak woman and sympathises with the independence movement.

“Macron is stuck in his opinions. He hasn’t really taken the true measure of what is happening … He made a big mistake by letting the country get bogged down.”
View image in fullscreenA patrol by gendarmes on Thursday secures the route taken by president Macron. Photograph: Chabaud Gill/ABACA/REX/Shutterstock

At immediate issue for France’s president was the proposed electoral reform bill, but the island territory is marked by deep disparities; the poverty rate among indigenous Kanaks, the largest community, is 32.5%, compared to 9% among non-Kanaks, according to the 2019 census.


Those disparities are even clearer within education and employment statistics. Only 8% of Kanaks hold a university degree and 46% hold no high school diploma. Meanwhile, 54% people of European background are university educated, with that proportion falling to 24% among people of mixed-heritage, the 2019 census shows.

Apparently referring to past efforts at widening opportunity, Macron said on Thursday that “rebalancing has not reduced economic and social inequalities, they have even grown”.

The broader impasse remains New Caledonia’s contested independence process.

Referendums between 2018 and 2021 saw a majority of voters choose to have New Caledonia remain part of France, instead of backing independence. The pro-independence movement rejected the results of the last referendum, held in 2021, which they had boycotted on the grounds that it was held at the height of the coronavirus pandemic. The movement had called on Kanaks not to participate in the vote, arguing that Covid had made pro-independence campaigning impossible, as entire villages observed customary mourning rites.

The three referendums were held under the Noumea accord struck with France in 1998, and the third referendum, in 2021, arguably brought that process to its conclusion. A previous referendum on independence, in 1987, had also failed.



Under the 1998 accord, new arrivals to New Caledonia were barred from enrolling to vote, in order to maximise Kanaks’ voting power. With the referendums concluded, the French government has moved to finally grant the vote to overseas-born, long-term residents voting rights.

Still, many Kanak people in New Caledonia continue to push for independence.
Drone footage of New Caledonia capital shows damaged buildings as Macron arrives – video

“Macron is welcome, but he is not our president,” said Axel, 21, who defines himself as a child of Kanaky, the name given to New Caledonia by the independence activists.

Protesters will finish the fight of 30 years ago, said Axel, referring to a period of violent unrest in the territory.

“Those who respect the Kanak people can live in peace with us,” the 51-year-old Kanak protester said on Friday.

“As long as there is no independence, there will be no security.”

With agencies



How is the violent unrest in New Caledonia impacting global nickel prices?



 Smoke rises during protests in Noumea, New Caledonia, on May 15, 2024. Global nickel prices have soared since deadly violence erupted in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia. (AP Photo/Nicolas Job, File)


Burnt cars are lined up after unrest in Noumea, New Caledonia, on May 15, 2024. Global nickel prices have soared since deadly violence erupted in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia. (AP Photo/Nicolas Job, File)


 A burnt car store is pictured in Noumea, New Caledonia, on May, 14, 2024. Global nickel prices have soared since deadly violence erupted in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia. (AP Photo/Cedric Jacquot, File)

 French gendarmes patrol the streets in Noumea, New Caledonia, on May, 16, 2024. Global nickel prices have soared since deadly violence erupted in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia. (AP Photo/Cedric Jacquot, File)

Residents stand in a blockade in Noumea, New Caledonia, on May, 15, 2024. Global nickel prices have soared since deadly violence erupted in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia. (AP Photo/Nicolas Job, File)

BY VICTORIA MILKO
May 22, 2024

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Global nickel prices have soared since deadly violence erupted in the French Pacific territory of New Caledonia last week.

The overseas territory, which has been under French rule for over 170 years, is a major global producer of the critical material that is needed to make electric vehicle batteries, solar panels, steel and other everyday items.

Here’s a closer look at the global importance of New Caledonia’s nickel industry and why social unrest in the territory has impacted prices.

WHY ARE THERE PROTESTS IN NEW CALEDONIA?

Riots erupted after French lawmakers approved changes to the French Constitution that would allow residents who have lived in New Caledonia for 10 years to vote in provincial elections.

Opponents fear the measure will benefit pro-France politicians in New Caledonia, where pro-independence Indigenous Kanaks have long pushed to be free of France.

Kanaks are seeking independence for the archipelago of 270,000 people, while many descendants of French and other non-Indigenous people who have settled on the island want to remain part of France.

On May 15, France declared a 12-day minimum state of emergency on the island . It rushed in 1,000 troops to reinforce security forces that lost control of some parts of the capital, Nouméa.

WHY DOES NEW CALEDONIA MATTER TO THE GLOBAL NICKEL MARKET?

New Caledonia holds between 20-30% of the world’s nickel reserves. It is a huge part of the archipelago’s economy, compromising up to 90% of its exports and employing around a quarter of its workforce.

The European Union has named nickel as a critical raw material, which means it is economically and strategically important for the European economy but is considered to have a high-risk associated with its supply.

“Some of the discussion around France wanting to maintain its control over New Caledonia is motivated by its hopes to secure the large nickel deposits there, perhaps with an eye to future electric vehicle production,” said Nicholas Ferns, a research fellow at Monash University in Australia.

The United States and EU members have worked to secure their own critical material supply chains to catch up with China, which controls or is invested in a large share of the world’s supplies.

In 2021, EV maker Tesla invested in the Goro nickel mine when it was sold to a local consortium majority owned by local stakeholders.

WHY HAVE GLOBAL NICKEL PRICES SOARED?

Concerns over disruptions of supplies from New Caledonia due to the unrest and sanctions on metals including nickel from Russia have pushed global prices above $20,000 per ton for the first time since September.

The price of nickel on the London Metal Exchange rose to $21,275 per metric ton as of Tuesday from $18,510 on May 8, heading straight up after the unrest began.

The jump in prices came at the same time the Paris-based International Energy Agency said in a report that there could be future supply shortages of critical materials— including nickel— driven by “rapid” EV demand growth, mine closures and slowing investment.

“The high price of nickel will have most profound all-round impacts on the consumer,” said Lawrence Loh, a professor of strategy and policy at the National University of Singapore Business School. “We expect a trickle-down effect on the price increases of many consumer items which will lead to broader inflationary pressures.”

HOW IS NICKEL RELATED TO THE VIOLENT UNREST?

Although sharp jumps in commodities prices are disruptive for industries, New Caledonia’s nickel industry was in trouble even before the political crisis due to a 45% drop in global nickel prices last year.

That slammed the nickel industry-reliant economy. New Caledonia’s mining industry is struggling to compete against Indonesia, the world’s largest nickel producer, due to decades of export restrictions and high energy costs that have made its nickel more expensive and less profitable to produce. “The nickel industry is inevitably intertwined with the independence debate in New Caledonia,” said Ferns. “A downturn in nickel prices in recent years has exacerbated the economic issues in New Caledonia, which can then be connected to some of the factors involved in the recent riots.”

The French government has pledged to help maintain the territory’s nickel industry operations with subsidies.
___

Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives support from several private foundations. See more about AP’s climate initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

VICTORIA MILKO
Milko is an Associated Press multimedia reporter covering the nexus of the energy transition, climate change and human rights across Asia-Pacific.
Pakistani poet was abducted because of human rights activism, says wife

Ahmad Farhad was pushed into vehicle hours after posting about threats from country’s spy agency, says Syeda Urooj Zainab


Shah Meer Baloch in Islamabad
THE GUARDIAN 
Fri 24 May 2024 

The wife of a Kashmiri poet and journalist who was abducted from outside his house last week has accused the country’s spy agency of responsibility, saying it acted because of his activism.

Ahmad Farhad was pushed into a vehicle in Islamabad after returning from a dinner in the early hours of Wednesday 15 May and driven away.


His wife, Syeda Urooj Zainab, said that hours before his abduction Farhad had posted on X about receiving threats from the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, using the euphemism “the company” to describe it.

“My husband has been abducted for writing and raising his voice against human rights violations across the country,” Zainab said. “He actively reported on the recent protests in his hometown in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. Farhad has been receiving threats from the company for a long time, he was asked to keep silent which he refused.”

Hours after his disappearance, Farhad’s family petitioned the Islamabad high court to investigate what had happened. On Monday a defence ministry official told the court that Farhad was not in the custody of the ISI. The court was unconvinced, however, and on Tuesday it ordered security forces to produce Farhad within four days and threatened to summon the prime minister in the event he was not released.

The powerful ISI has long been accused of enforced disappearances of activists, political workers and students.

Zainab said that two days after the alleged abduction, Farhad contacted her through WhatsApp and asked her to withdraw her petition in the court in return for his recovery. She said the duration of each call was not more than 30 seconds.

“I could hear that he was forced to talk and send messages. He asked me to withdraw my petition and he would return home on Saturday as he was away for some private business,” she said. Zainab submitted an application to withdraw the petition but Farhad did not return on Saturday.

Mohsin Akhtar Kayani, the judge hearing the case, said the government needed to change people’s perception of state institutions that are accused of abducting people.

Zainab said she hoped that Farhad would be reunited with his family on Friday after the court interfered.

Harris Khalique, another poet and civil society activist, said: “Abducting artists or poets is not just a disappointing act on part of the state, it is a sign of intellectual decline in society at large.”

 

What is the pandemic accord and why have negotiations been so difficult?

The accord – conceived during Covid to prevent and respond to pandemics – will top the agenda at the World Health Assembly



Global health leaders will gather in Geneva on 27 May at the annual World Health Assembly, where a new agreement for countries to work together to prepare for, prevent, and respond to pandemics – known as the “pandemic accord” – will top the agenda.

It was first proposed by world leaders in early 2021, with a promise to avoid the mistakes of the Covid-19 pandemic next time around.


The negotiating process, involving almost 200 countries, has proved challenging, and the plan has been subject to what the World Health Organization’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, called “a torrent of fake news, lies and conspiracy theories”.

Talks are likely to go down to the wire, and a finished text may not be ready by the assembly deadline. But those involved say this is an opportunity to make the world safer – and fairer – that humanity cannot afford to miss.
What is the idea behind the accord?

The Covid-19 pandemic had a devastating impact globally. About 7 million deaths have been attributed directly to the virus, but indirect deaths are thought to be at least double that. The disruption caused by the virus saw poverty and hunger increase. Health systems were no longer able to reliably provide the regular care people needed, and people living in poorer countries were often the hardest hit.

The promise of the accord was to make sure that the world was better prepared for, and protected from, future pandemics – with equitable access to the tools needed to stop potential pandemic outbreaks in their tracks, as well as vaccines and treatments.

Announcing the plans, world leaders said a treaty would be “our legacy that protects our children and grandchildren” and promised to “be guided by solidarity, fairness, transparency, inclusiveness and equity”.
Has it worked out that way?

Many campaigners have expressed disappointment as details of the negotiations have emerged. This month, Global Justice Now accused rich countries of “refusing to learn the lessons of the Covid-19 pandemic” and of blocking moves to take on the vested interests of big pharma companies.

Others have questioned the need for a treaty at all, suggesting that it will not necessarily solve the problems that appeared during the Covid pandemic, with countries likely to ignore any elements of a treaty they disagree with during an emergency.

Dr Precious Matsoso from South Africa, the co-chair of the intergovernmental negotiating body overseeing the talks, said that progress was being made and promised “a meaningful, lasting agreement”.

And there is a sense it needs to be seen through. Michel Kazatchkine, a former member of the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response, said: “It is worthwhile, because it is providing a foundation. It’s highly unlikely that it will answer all of the challenges that are on the plate – but I think a failure would be really terrible for the multilateral system, for the world of solidarity that we all want to see in the future, for WHO, for the United Nations system. So we need to work very hard until the last minute to get something.”
What stage are negotiations at?

This week, negotiators have been meeting nearly every day from 9am to 9pm in a bid to finish negotiations in time for the assembly.

It follows multiple negotiating sessions that have seen draft texts put forward and pulled apart. The latest publicly available draft suggests there has been agreement in many areas, including around the need for countries to “strengthen science, public health and pandemic literacy in the population”. It includes plans to establish a “conference of the parties (Cop)” to regularly review the agreement’s implementation, and promises of additional financial resources for lower-income countries.

But there are still areas with real sticking points, including the issue of “pathogen access and benefit sharing”. If poorer countries grant richer nations – and their big pharmaceutical companies – access to materials and information on pathogens that could become a pandemic, can those poorer countries be guaranteed access to any resulting vaccines and medicines? More recent drafts of the accord have suggested such a system could be agreed in principle, but details have been pushed back for later discussion.

It is not yet clear whether the accord will be a treaty – giving it greater force in international law – or a regulation.
Does the accord take away countries’ sovereignty?

The accord has been the subject of vast amounts of misinformation and disinformation, including false claims that the agreement would give the WHO the power to impose lockdowns, or require countries to give away a fifth of their vaccines.

A WHO spokesperson responded to recent similar claims by the UK’s Nigel Farage by saying such claims were “false and have never been requested nor proposed. This agreement will not, and cannot, grant sovereignty to WHO.”

But in many countries, the discussion has become politicised and concerns about sovereignty have hit mainstream politics. This month, the UK health minister, Andrew Stephenson, told the Commons that the current text was “not acceptable” to the UK government, stressing that “protecting our sovereignty is a British red line”. In New Zealand, too, negotiators have been told to prioritise sovereignty.

The draft text of the agreement reaffirms “the principle of the sovereignty of states in addressing public health matters” and recognises “the sovereign right of states over their biological resources”.

Five key points in proposed pandemic agreement

By  AFP
May 23, 2024

The equitable distribution of pandemic-related products such as vaccines has been at the heart of the pandemic agreement negotiations - Copyright AFP AHMAD AL-RUBAYE

Countries are trying to finalise a global agreement on how to prepare for and avert pandemics by Friday evening, after two years of negotiations triggered by the horrors of Covid-19.

Here are five key sections of the draft agreement being discussed by national negotiators at the World Health Organization’s headquarters in Geneva, according to a draft seen by AFP:

– Pathogen access, benefit sharing –

The core of the agreement is the proposed Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing System (PABS) — a new platform allowing the swift sharing of pathogen data with pharmaceutical companies, enabling them to quickly start working on pandemic-fighting products.

This has been the trickiest part to negotiate.

Developing countries have expressed concerns about handing over data if there is a risk they might be cut off from accessing the resultant vaccines, as was largely the case at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Under PABS, countries would commit to rapidly sharing data on emerging problematic pathogens, and that the vaccines and other benefits derived from accessing that information would be shared on a more equitable footing.

But while the principle is widely supported, the detail is not.

Countries are debating whether PABS should involve pharmaceutical manufacturers giving 10 percent of their production to the WHO for free for global distribution — for example, to protect frontline health workers worldwide.

A further 10 percent could be given to the WHO at a not-for-profit price.

– Prevention and surveillance –

Under this section, countries would take steps to progressively strengthen their pandemic prevention and surveillance capacities.

Subject to resources, countries would develop, strengthen and implement comprehensive national pandemic prevention plans.

This would include things like routine immunisation, managing biological risks in labs, preventing antimicrobial resistance, and stopping transmission of diseases from animals to humans.

This section has largely been agreed upon by working groups, but is awaiting final sign-off.

Negotiators are also debating whether, or how, to broaden the scope of the agreement to include surveillance of animal and environmental health in the bid to spot pandemic threats.

But some worry this is stepping beyond the WHO’s remit.

– Financing –


Article 20 of the draft agreement deals with sustainable financing.

Some developing countries simply don’t have the resources to implement Western levels of pandemic preparedness and pathogen surveillance.

Developed nations meanwhile are reluctant to foot the bill for them without concrete commitments in return.

As the draft stands, countries would agree to maintain or increase domestic funding for pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.

They would also mobilise additional money to help developing countries implement the agreement, through grants and concessional loans.

– Supply chain and logistics –


In an attempt to smooth out the flaws exposed by Covid-19, a Global Supply Chain and Logistics Network would be set up for equitable, timely and affordable access to pandemic-related health products.

During pandemic emergencies, countries would prioritise sharing pandemic-related health products through the network so that they can be distributed equitably based on public health risk and need.

Each country would also be asked to avoid stockpiling pandemic-related health products that unnecessarily exceed the quantities needed.

Switzerland, for instance, destroyed more vaccines against the virus causing the Covid-19 pandemic than it ever administered during the crisis.

– Vaccine mandates, lockdowns, travel bans –

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has repeatedly warned of unprecedented misinformation and disinformation surrounding the pandemic agreement negotiations — notably over what the agreement would allow the WHO and its chief to do.

Amid accusations that the deal would enable the UN health agency to encroach on countries’ sovereignty over their health policies, the draft text specifies that “nothing” in the agreement should be interpreted as giving the WHO “any authority to direct, order, alter or otherwise prescribe” national or domestic laws, or impose other requirements such as banning travellers or imposing vaccination mandates.

Pandemic agreement talks come to the crunch


AFP
May 23, 2024


The talks are being held behind closed doors at the WHO's headquarters in Geneva - Copyright AFP Fabrice COFFRINI
Robin MILLARD

Countries trying to thrash out a global agreement on handling future pandemics are hoping to seal the deal Friday after weeks of creeping progress in exhausting talks.

Having ploughed past several previous deadlines, the hard stop of next week’s annual gathering of the World Health Organization’s 194 member states is now in clear sight.

Scarred by the devastation caused by Covid-19 — which killed millions, shredded economies and crippled health systems — WHO member countries have spent two years trying to hammer out binding commitments on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.

The bureau steering the talks must report back to the World Health Assembly — the WHO’s supreme decision-making body — regardless of whether or not they have a finalised text for the assembly to consider.

Amid arm-twisting, horse-trading and 3:00 am finishes in recent weeks, the talks have gathered momentum.

However, with much ground left to cover, breaking the remaining logjams by the end of Friday seems a long shot.

“The fact that we’re still making progress shows people are willing to push further. And there’s a sense that even if we can’t conclude, we will reach the World Health Assembly with something concise,” one ambassador in the talks told AFP.



– Gradually going green –



The talks are being held behind closed doors at the WHO’s headquarters in Geneva.

One source in the room said negotiators were optimistic, and could see the finishing line and a way to get there.

“The mood in the room: you see it, you feel it, people wanting to get onto the next thing,” the source said.

But civil society groups following the talks from outside the hall seemed less positive.

“They are negotiating, enthusiastically fighting for a speedy conclusion — but it’s not happening,” K. M. Gopakumar, senior researcher with the Third World Network, told AFP.

Giving the talks very little chance of successfully concluding on time, he said he thought countries would likely press for discussions to continue.

Others suggested countries might opt to present the assembly with a skeleton deal and show agreement in principle.

The assembly could then call for the process to pick up and carry on later in the year.

The rolling draft agreement is not being made public, but a version as it stood on Thursday, seen by AFP, showed large sections have been approved.

In recent days, growing chunks of text have been highlighted in yellow — meaning the wording has been agreed to in small working groups — and then ultimately highlighted in green once approved by all countries.

The 32-page draft contains 34 articles, with 12 fully green and 18 partially green. The four others are almost all in yellow.

Gopakumar said negotiators had this week “greened a few non-contentious areas”, but on “all issues which are contentious, there is no consensus”.



– One more heave –



The main disputes revolve around issues of access and equity: access to pathogens detected within countries, and access to pandemic-fighting products such as vaccines derived from that knowledge.

Other tricky topics are sustainable financing, pathogen surveillance, supply chains, and the equitable distribution of not only tests, treatments and jabs, but also the means to produce them.

Ellen ‘t Hoen, a lawyer with the Medicines Law and Policy NGO, lamented that proper negotiations over the text’s wording had only started within the final round of talks.

“Perhaps the ambition of doing this in two years was a bridge too far, the fastest-ever negotiated UN treaty,” she said.

Going into the final phase, Precious Matsoso, co-chairing the talks, acknowledged that “the more we move towards the assembly, the more complex it becomes”.

Co-chair Roland Drice added: “The attempt is to get as far as we can get.”

“Without compromises, it will not work.”

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus this week urged negotiators to give it “one last big push to get it over the line”.

He has also urged wavering countries not to block the consensus needed to clinch an agreement.

But on Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken dampened hopes of a deal, saying a conclusion this week seemed “very unlikely”.

Nonetheless, Washington was still working to ensure that “we’re better prepared for next time”, he said.