Monkeypox could help prepare for the next pandemic

Gwynne Dyer

Jul 26 2022

ROGER HARRIS/GETTY IMAGES
The first case of monkeypox in New Zealand was announced on Saturday. (File photo)

Gwynne Dyer is a UK-based Canadian journalist and seasoned commentator on international affairs.

OPINION: Monkeypox is very unpleasant and it spreads very fast, but it’s not a real killer: 16,000 cases in 75 countries in just a couple of months is impressive, but there have been only five deaths.

Yet the World Health Organisation (WHO) has just declared monkeypox a global health emergency, which is a big deal. The only other infectious diseases in that category are Covid-19, which has already killed 6.4 million people, and polio (which is trying to make a comeback).

Targeting monkeypox seems disproportionate, but there’s a reason.

“Covid-19 is broadly viewed as being a ‘once in a lifetime’ or ‘once in a century’ pandemic. Modelling work based on historical data shows that this is not necessarily the case,” reported the epidemiological start-up Metabiota last year. That’s because “the frequency of ‘spill-over’ infectious diseases like Covid is steadily increasing.”

READ MORE:
* What is the Marburg virus and why must we contain it?
* Monkeypox is the latest declared global health emergency - here's what to know

It’s increasing because quick-killer pandemic diseases only started thriving in human societies when we began living together in large numbers. Lethal viruses and bacteria probably always ‘spilled over’ into human populations from time to time, but if they infected little hunter-gatherer groups of 50 or 100 people they just died out along with the victims.

The natural home of those diseases were birds and animals that lived in big flocks and herds: lots of potential victims to sustain the transmission. But when human beings started living in big civilisations and domesticated some of those animals, the pandemic diseases happily transferred across and thrived amongst us too.

For most of the history of civilisation, successful transfers didn’t happen all that often: big new killer pandemics only came along every five hundred years or so. However, now that there are eight billion people and millions criss-cross the planet every day, the disease vectors have more opportunities to spread and they move much faster.

At the moment, according to Metabiota’s calculations, it’s even odds that we will have another new pandemic on the scale of Covid-19 in the next 25 years. More precisely, they estimate the probability of another global pandemic as deadly as Covid to be between 2.5-3.3% each year.

It could even arrive next year.

Monkeypox is not that disease. Despite its rapid spread to so many countries, it is transmitted mainly between men who have sex with men. There is an existing, fully effective vaccine for it (the same one that eradicated smallpox, which no longer exists in the wild). And hardly anybody dies from it.

So WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus had some explaining to do when he broke a stalemate at his emergency committee and decreed that monkeypox is a global emergency.

FABRICE COFFRINI/KEYSTONE VIA AP
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has faced criticism for declaring monkeypox a global emergency at a time when the world is still dealing with the Covid pandemic.

He explained that it was to speed up research on “the new modes of transmission that have allowed it to spread”, and to press countries to use vaccines and other measures to limit the numbers infected.

These are all sensible things to do, but they really don’t justify declaring a global health emergency.

What he carefully avoided saying is that he really intends it as a reminder of our peril and a spur to action. The whole pandemic response system needs an exercise that incorporates all the lessons learned from our stumbling response to Covid, and monkeypox provides an excuse to do it.

Ghebreyesus is manipulating the system in a well-meant attempt to persuade the world to build better systems for containing dangerous emergent diseases in general, and he may come under serious fire for doing so.

But you can see his point, because we haven’t learned enough from our harrowing experience with Covid.

The vaccines were developed faster than in any previous pandemic, and two-thirds of the world’s population has been fully vaccinated in about sixteen months, but the rate of immunity in the poorest countries is abysmal.

That leaves reservoirs of high infection that serve as breeding grounds for new variants of the virus, some of which may be able to evade the vaccines. This is an issue of distribution and organisation, not a medical issue, and doing it on a smaller scale for monkeypox could improve the system for the next time something truly dangerous appears.

The same goes for the initial phases of detection and containment, which were badly bungled with Covid. There will be much worse pandemics coming down the road in the future – WILL BE, not ‘may be’ – and the world needs to be better prepared.

Just spending one-hundredth of what the world spent on fighting Covid to improve global readiness for dealing with the next pandemic – building local vaccine production facilities, regional labs with good analytical capabilities, and stronger reporting networks – could spare us another two years of the misery and loss we had with this pandemic.

If that’s Ghebreyesus’s real goal with this monkeypox business, it’s all right with me.

Gwynne Dyer’s new book is The Shortest History of War.

Palestinian lawyers hold rare protest against Abbas’s ‘rule by decree’

AFP 26 Jul, 2022

RAMALLAH, (Palestinian Territories): Hundreds of Palestinian lawyers held a rare street protest Monday against what they described as the Palestinian Authority’s “rule by decree”, condemning president Mahmud Abbas for governing without a parliament.

The Palestinian Legislative Council — created under the Oslo Peace Accords with Israel — has been inactive since 2007, meaning Abbas has led without a functioning parliament for nearly all of his tenure as president. But a new leadership at the Palestinian Bar Association has sought to pressure the PA.

The association’s president, Suheil Ashour, told AFP at the protest that his body would stand firm against legislation delivered by presidential decree that curbed Palestinian “rights and freedoms”.

“Our demand is either to stop their implementation now or to cancel” a raft of restrictive laws, said Ashour, who pushed for reforms when he was elected association president earlier this year. The draft Palestinian constitution allows for presidential decrees “if necessary”, in cases where the PLC cannot act, but lawyers said Abbas has gone too far.

Riot police prevented the demonstrators, clad in their black robes, from marching to the nearby office of prime minister Mohammad Shtayyeh.

Farhan Abu Aisha, a protester, accused Abbas of making decisions “under the cover of darkness”.

After Gaza war, lawyer builds Palestinian case files

“The legislative authority is absent in Palestine, and the judicial authority is completely marginalised,” he said. Abbas was elected Palestinian president in 2005, following the death of iconic leader Yasser Arafat.

Hamas Islamists, bitter rivals of Abbas’s secular Fatah movement, swept to victory in the 2006 Palestinian legislative elections.

Fallout from that vote helped spark a split in Palestinian governance, with Fatah retaining control of the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Hamas running Gaza since 2007.

According to estimates by Palestinian legal experts, Abbas has issued some 400 presidential decrees while in office.

He officially dissolved the PLC in 2018 and moves to hold new elections have faced pushback.

Abbas had set dates for presidential and legislative elections to be held last year across the Palestinian territories, with Hamas’s participation, but cancelled the polls citing Israel’s refusal to allow voting in annexed east Jerusalem.

Public demonstrations against Abbas and the PA have been on the rise in the West Bank, notably following the death in Palestinian custody of activist and Abbas critic Nizar Banat last year. The top Palestinian prosecutor has accused 14 security force members of beating Banat to death.

Lawmakers urge Biden to seek Muslim attorney’s release

Anwar Iqbal Published July 26, 2022 - 

WASHINGTON: Five US lawmakers — two senators and three members of the US House of Representatives — have pressed President Joe Biden to raise Asim Ghafoor’s detention with the highest levels of the UAE government and advocate for his fair and humane treatment.

Asim Ghafoor, a Virginia resident, is a US-born Muslim of South Asian origin. He is also a board member of an Arab advocacy group called Dawn — Democracy for the Arab World Now.

Senators Mark R. Warner and Tim Kaine and Representatives Jennifer Wexton, Don Beyer and Gerry Connolly wrote in their letter that Mr Ghafoor was “tried in absentia, detained without notice of his conviction, and sentenced to prison on to-date unsubstantiated charges by United Arab Emirates (UAE) authorities.”

Mr Ghafoor was a close personal friend of The Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi who was murdered at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2018. He also served as Mr Khashoggi’s legal counsel.

Mr Ghafoor was detained by the UAE authorities on July 14 this year while transiting Dubai International Airport, and was sentenced to three years in prison on July 16. He was transiting through Dubai to attend a wedding in Turkey when arrested.

“The UAE’s decision to detain Mr Ghafoor — without notice or opportunity to seek legal counsel — represents a gross violation of his due process rights,” the lawmakers wrote.

Mr Ghafoor became popular in the American Muslim community after 9/11, when he represented many Muslims and Arabs facing deportation and detention on various charges. From 1997 to 2000, he served as Legislative Assistant to Congressman Ciro D. Rodriguez, a Texas Democrat.

Last week, US authorities rejected UAE’s claim that they had sought the lawyer’s arrest on previous charges of tax evasion and money laundering. State Department spokesperson Ned Price said at a news briefing earlier this week that the US did not seek Mr Ghafoor’s arrest and has conveyed to the UAE its expectation that he “be afforded a fair and transparent legal process and that he be treated humanely”.

Mr Ghafoor’s attorney, Faisal Gill, told The Washington Post that his client had not heard anything about his conviction in the UAE before his arrest and had yet to see any documentation for the government’s charges. Mr Ghafoor was not facing any criminal charges in the United States, Mr Gill said.

Published in Dawn, July 26th, 2022

 THANKS TO OBAMA

‘I Never Had To Look Up’ Before: Top U.S. Special Ops General On Drone Threat

The drone threat is rapidly growing and targeting supply chains and crafting new international norms could be just as important as shooting them down.

BYJOSEPH TREVITHICK
JUL 25, 2022 7:55 PM
THE WAR ZONE

U.S. Army Gen. Richard Clarke, head of U.S. Special Operations Command speaks the 2022 Aspen Security Forum. 

Insets show examples of existing drone threats. Aspen Institute capture / Iranian state media capture / US Army
FranticGoat




The head of U.S. Special Operations Command, U.S. Army Gen. Richard Clarke, recently highlighted the threat that various tiers of unmanned aircraft pose to U.S. forces deployed overseas, as well as to military and other targets abroad and within the United States. He further underscored that these dangers are only likely to grow and diversify as time goes on. Clarke added that finding ways to "defeat" hostile drones before they're ever launched, including finding ways to restrict access to key supply chains and build international consensus about the risks of proliferation and other issues, will be just as important as developing systems to actually knock them out of the sky.


Clarke offered his perspective on the ever-growing drone threat and how to respond to it last Friday at the annual Aspen Security Forum, hosted by the Aspen Institute think tank. The general spoke alongside Sen. Joni Ernst, an Iowa Republican who is currently her party's ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee's Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities, and Rep. Jason Crow, a Colorado Democrat who sits on the House Committee on Armed Services and the House Intelligence Committee.


Clarke, Ernst, and Crow talked about challenges and opportunities in relation to other threats, such as chemical and biological weapons, cyber and information warfare, and food insecurity, as well. You can watch the full video of the panel discussion below.

“First, as we think about this problem, I’ve been in the Army for 38 years, and in my entire time in the Army on battlefields in Iraq, in Afghanistan, Syria, I never had to look up," Gen. Clarke said by way of introducing the threat posed by unmanned aircraft. "I never had to look up because the U.S. always maintained air superiority and our forces were protected because we had air cover. But now with everything from quadcopters – they’re very small – up to very large unmanned aerial vehicles [UAV], we won’t always have that luxury."


“The cost of entry into this, particular for some of the small unmanned aerial systems, is very, very low," he added. "I think that this is something that’s gotta continue to go up in terms of our priority for the protection, not just of our forces that are forward today – that’s the current problem – but what’s gonna come home to roost. Some of these technologies could be used by our adversaries on our near abroad or even into our homeland.”


Clarke's remarks echo comments from other senior U.S. military and other government officials in recent years, particularly with regard to the growing threats low-tier drones now pose to American troops even in relatively small conflicts against non-state actors. What he said here also reflects how an increasingly diverse set of actors, including militant and organized criminal groups, as well as various state and state-sponsored entities, are employing these capabilities outside of traditional battlefields for intelligence gathering purposes and direct attacks.

"We do see this as a growing problem, because if you look at the availability of inexpensive drones, you find that the violent extremist organizations that we battle around the globe have easy access to this technology," Sen. Ernst said separately. "They don’t need to develop anything. All they need to do is hop on Amazon and they can buy a $300 drone that can be used against an adversary. And so, it is a real concern.

Unmanned aerial threats, of course, aren't simply limited to modified commercial and other lower-end systems. “When Russia is running out of them for Ukraine, and they’re going to Iran to go buy more, should cause us all a bit of concern, because you can see how valuable that they can be in the future fight," Gen. Clarke used as an example. The U.S. government recently disclosed that it had intelligence indicating that the Russian government was looking to acquire hundreds of unspecified drones from Iran to support its ongoing war in Ukraine, as you can read more about here.

"As we look to the future, we know that the Chinese, the Russians, and others are putting a lot of money into what we call swarm technology," Sen. Ernst added. "So, it’s not just the one-offs that are being purchased on the internet, but now we have near-peer adversaries that are developing swarm technology where they can use 100 to 200 different drones – highly evolved drones – that can attack our service members on the battlefield, perhaps disrupt a Superbowl game, whatever it might happen to be.”

Ernst's mention of a scenario involving an adversary disrupting a Superbowl game further highlights how these potential threats, from state and non-state actors alike, could expand beyond a typical military context.

For additional context about how these threats are not only real, but evolving, just in the past few years, The War Zone has been the first to report on a number of concerning incidents. These include worrisome drone flights over sensitive U.S. military installations on Guam and the Palo Verde Nuclear Power Plant in Arizona, as well as how the U.S. Navy assessed that the Hong Kong-flagged cargo ship Bass Strait was likely the source of at least some of the drones that repeatedly harassed U.S. Navy warships off the coast of southern California in 2019.

Just last year, details also emerged about an incident that U.S. officials assessed to likely be the first ever instance of a drone being used in an attempted attack on domestic power grid infrastructure, as you can read more about here.

"So, we do have to focus not only on the drone technology, but then anti-drone technology," Ernst said.

However, SOCOM head Gen. Clarke said the discussion had to move beyond just talking "about the defeat of the UAS [unmanned aerial systems] or the UAVs after they’ve already launched." This was in response to a question from the moderator of the panel at Aspen, NBC News' Courtney Kube, about so-called "left-of-launch" options, that is to say options beyond an immediate physical reaction of some kind, for neutralizing or mitigating the threat posed by unmanned aircraft.


"I think there are opportunities for our government, for our intel agencies, and our Department of Defense" when it comes to "how do we stop those drones before they even launch," Clarke said. He specifically talked about how deep intelligence about these threats, including the supply chains that support them, as well as international "norms of behavior" around drone use could be ways of addressing these issues before the danger becomes imminent.


While Clarke did not provide detailed examples of how these "left-of-launch" options might be implemented, there are very relevant real-world examples, some of which have become hot topics of public discussion just recently. In terms of supply chains, and the value of industrial intelligence, one need not look any further than the general's mention of Russia potentially buying Iranian drones. Russian officials sourcing unmanned aircraft of any kind from Iran highlights, in part, the inability of its own industrial base to produce even lower-tier types in any real quantity. Crippling international sanctions have further limited Russia's own ability to produce various kinds of unmanned aircraft, among other military hardware, because of the heavy reliance of those systems on foreign-made electronics and other components, something you can read more about in detail here.

Finding ways to further limit or otherwise control the access America's adversaries may have to relevant technologies and supply chains could certainly offer additional ways to address these threats. This could potentially extend to new U.S. government rules and restrictions on the sale and/or purchase of various unmanned aerial systems, especially through online marketplaces.


However, for those kinds of restrictions to be at all effective, there would need to be at least a certain amount of international consensus. That speaks to Clarke's comments on how the U.S. government could seek to address these threats on some level through the establishment of new norms around drone use on and off the battlefield.


During the panel talk at Aspen, Rep. Crow from Colorado made separate, but related remarks about how in his opinion discussions about the threats that drones pose will increasingly have to address adjacent moral and ethical issues, especially in regards to the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning.


"We have some really big unanswered questions, too, that we have to have some public debate about. And that’s just not the technology and investment, but we have to have a discussion around what is the role of AI going to be. Because we have discussions as a democracy, and we would take into consideration the moral and ethical implications of drones in ways that some of our adversaries do not," Crow said. "We have to think about whether or not humans will remain in the kill chain, because some of our adversaries have decided that they will not, and that the targeting will be done much quicker, and without people making those decisions."




It is important to remember that International consensus building is often fraught with pitfalls and is never a guarantee against bad actors acting badly. At the same time, broader buy-in on the part of the international community can lay useful foundations for collective responses, whether they be sanctions or something else, in a crisis.


It is clear from Clarke's comments at Aspen that meeting the very real challenges that drones pose on and off the battlefield through interventions in supply chains, new norms, and other novel avenues are all parts of a broad, multifaceted approach, and that no one single course of action will address all of the issues by itself.


There's also no doubt that systems to actually bring down hostile drones, through kinetic or non-kinetic means, will still be important parts of the equation. Sen. Ernst and Rep. Crow both highlighted the need for general reforms in how the U.S. government develops and acquires military and other technologies in order to defend against these threats.

“I don’t think we are ever doing enough, frankly, given some of the investments by China in particular in this area," Crow said. "Our adversaries are using COTS stuff – commercial-off-the-shelf – they’re using very inexpensive... systems, and they recognize that the technological evolution of any system is 18 to 24 months, as opposed to 10 to 15 years, like it used to be."


These are all issues that The War Zone has been highlighting for years in discussions about very real threats posed by all kinds of different drones and the proliferation of those capabilities, along with sounding the alarm about how the U.S. military and other branches of the government have long lagged behind the technology in developing comprehensive responses to these issues. Beyond all this, it's important to note that now, especially at the lower end of drone threats, various key technologies are now basic consumer goods or are otherwise readily available commercially. This in turn could present hurdles to the kind of left-of-launch options that Clarke advocated for at Aspen last week.


What is increasingly indisputable, as Clarke, Ernst, and Crow all made clear during the panel talk at Aspen, is that drones of various kinds present an array of very real threats to a host of vastly different targets, military and otherwise, and that outside-the-box thinking will be necessary to address them in their totality.

 

GM’s South Korea Unit Resumes Production At Two Factories

July 25, 2022

SEOUL (Reuters) – General Motors Co’s South Korea unit has resumed production at its two factories in the country this week following a production halt that lasted about two weeks over procurement issues, an official at GM Korea told Reuters on Tuesday.

The U.S. automaker’s Korea unit had suspended production of all vehicles at its Changwon and No. 2 Bupyeong plants since mid-July after a local supplier, which demanded a price hike for its products, refused to supply auto parts.

South Korea’s ERAE AMS, which makes parts for automakers including Volkswagen AG, Hyundai Motor Co and BYD, refused to supply parts, demanding a price increase for parts supplied to GM Korea’s factories.

GM Korea did not have a comment and ERAE AMS was not available for comment when contacted by Reuters.

GM Korea’s Changwon and No. 2 Bupyeong plants have a combined annual production capacity of about 70,000 vehicles, accounting for about 30% of GM Korea’s total annual production capacity last year, data from the Korea Automobile Manufacturers Association showed.

Production at No. 1 Bupyeong plant, which makes the Trailblazer sport-utility vehicle (SUV), has not been affected, according to GM Korea.

HEIRS OF THE SECOND INTERNATIONAL

Hegel on the Hudson: Why the End of the End of History spells trouble for the United Nations

By Michael Bröning - 26 July 2022
GLOBAL GOVERNANCE


Michael Bröning argues that it is increasingly unclear how the United Nation's global governance ambitions can be squared with the fragmenting political reality.

Figuratively speaking, every shell fired at Ukraine explodes twice. Once in the villages and towns of the Donbas and once at the heart of the rules-based international order. While the military outcome of the war remains difficult to predict and its impact on the global order is ultimately dependent on the relative success (or failure) of Russia’s aggression, the consequences for the United Nations are already plain to see: The UN’s future is likely to be one of increasing dysfunctionality and an ever-widening gap between rhetoric and realpolitik.
How Many Divisions does the UN have?

While it always remained doubtful whether the world organization would play a decisive role in stopping the war, at least some meaningful contribution appeared at first plausible.

The Security Council met in all-night emergency sessions; the General Assembly even re-activated a “Uniting for Peace” formula not used in 40 years becoming a forum for the widespread condemnation of Russian aggression. For a short moment at least, the UN captured the diplomatic voice of the world.

As the war grinds into its fourth violent month, however, even the busiest corridors in New York cannot conceal the harsh reality that the United Nations’ ability to act in response to great power confrontation is and has always been limited. How many divisions does the UN have? Once again, it seems, far too many.

A long overdue visit of the Secretary General to Ukraine brought about little more than an additional round of shelling. And while UN-agencies on the ground have engaged in life-saving humanitarian assistance, the few political contacts to speak of have taken place under the aegis of the Turkish autocrat Erdogan and the government of Israel. It is rather telling that the absence of the Good Offices of the UN Secretary General from the short list of diplomatic initiatives has barely raised an eyebrow.

In response and frustration, some activist voices (encouraged by Kyiv) have openly called for altering Russia's status at the UN, taking aim at the country’s position on the Security Council or – most recently – at the Russian role in the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Against the backdrop of Russia’s exit from the Council of Europe, its suspension from the Human Rights Council and (Russian) talk of leaving the WTO and the WHO, such drastic notions are gaining more traction than otherwise would be expected.

As history recalls, even the hapless League of Nations managed to expel the Soviet Union after its aggression against Finland in 1939.

But as understandable as such considerations may be, they are unrealistic– at least when speaking about the Security Council. As a permanent member, Russia must agree to any fundamental change. Therefore, attempts to radically alter the rules of the game are as improbable today as they have been for decades.

Modest and more technical attempts at change – as the recently adopted Liechtenstein Initiative to force an automatic General Assembly debate whenever a veto is used in the Security Council – are and remain possible. However, they have the distinct disadvantage of being mostly cosmetic.

It is often lamented that the UN – contrary to the fictional German Baron of Lies Karl Friedrich von Münchhausen – remains incapable of pulling itself out of the swamp by its own hair. Proponents of drastic change, however, should be careful what they wish for.

Since its inception, the Security Council and the veto served to prevent a direct confrontation among the world’s largest powers. Against this backdrop, it seems doubtful that a UN largely cleansed of authoritarian member states would be in a better position to do so. Would punishing Russia not necessitate similar actions of moral purification regarding North Korea, Iran, or Saudi-Arabia? This, however, would give rise to the question of the purpose of a global organization that is global in name only.
The Future? Just like the past – only worse

At this point, a realistic scenario for the future of the United Nations seems to be a return to structural blockades analogue to the decades of Cold War. Thus, the future could look a lot like the past – only worse and more dire as overlapping global crises inevitably require global attention.

In practice, this is likely to translate into sporadic cooperation on questions of common concerns and attempts to use the UN as a court of world opinion.

While some of this may sound eerily familiar, the actual balance of cooperation and dysfunctionality will ultimately depend on whether Russia will play a disruptive role outside of Ukraine and on the stance China will take in this constellation.

Consequences will be anything but abstract. On the operational level, a list of peacekeeping operations and diplomatic missions in conflict hotspots from Libya to Syria, and Iran to North Korea depend on this question.

More optimistic UN-watchers rightly point out that in the last decade – as during the Cold War – the UN has regularly succeeded in cooperating on individual issues despite existing tensions.

If the past is a reliable guide – so the argument goes – such a compartmentalizing approach remains possible and would suggest the continuation of cooperation on overarching goals, certain peacekeeping operations, and perhaps even a modest diplomatic role for the UN in managing second-rate conflicts. While all of this seems possible; it is unclear whether this will be likely in a world where relations between Security Council members border on active military confrontation. After all, successful compartmentalizing at the UN has historically been more of an exception than a rule.

As a consequence, unless a grand bargain brings Russia back into the global community, the UN will have to relegate itself to a role as the world's emergency response team, waiting for the powers that be to grant (or refuse) access to scenes of humanitarian disasters.

In the process of carving out a meaningful future role for the UN beyond humanitarianism, leading voices from within the organization have recently suggested new responsibilities. In a world seemingly ridden with ubiquitous “misinformation” such ideas have included suggestions for the UN to embrace a role as international arbiter of truth. In this vision, the UN’s focus would shift from the prevention of wars to the arbiter of info-wars.

UN-Secretary General Guterres has personally and repeatedly warned of an “epidemic of misinformation”. While encouraging social media users to check the source of sharable information as recently promoted by a prominent UN-campaign is a step forward, there are reasons to curb the enthusiastic enlisting of the organization in the comprehensive struggle against misinformation.

Data and facts – including the scientific consensus – are often more multi-facetted and less monolithic than intergovernmental boards or official communiqués can allow for. And this is not to mention the problem that establishing the UN as an adjudicator of objectivity seems almost blissfully ignorant of the scandalous positions taken by an organization that is inherently incapable of insolating itself from political contestation.
Global Governance and the End of History

While one could argue that the emerging “UN-lite” is not too different from the one originally envisioned in the UN-Charter, it certainly differs from the role the UN has played since the end of the Cold War.

US-political scientist Francis Fukuyama’s “End of History”, inspired by Hegelian notions of dialectic progress, was after all not an end for the United Nations, but a beginning. In the 1990s, it seemed that rational progress was not only possible but also ideologically inevitable. For the UN there was finally light at the end of the tunnel.

It is no coincidence that the United Nations' most comprehensive engagement with global challenges such as climate change and poverty took shape in the period immediately after the end of the Cold War.

In June 1992, the Rio Summit adopted the first comprehensive action plan for sustainable development. In 2000, the Millennium Declaration proclaimed eight development goals as a common guideline for global action. Finally, in 2015, under the aegis of the UN, the global community agreed on the “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”: 17 development goals and an impressive 169 sub-goals – from groundwater protection to the primary education of school children – were launched to steer the actions of the global community onto one common path.

Ever since the formulation of this impressive agenda, the UN’s focus on global governance has only further increased and today encompasses virtually every aspect of the complex net of overlaying global – and regional – challenges – at least in rhetoric.

Many progressives consider the 2030 agenda an almost self-evident global expression of enlightened reason. And given that the SDGs were unanimously adopted by all 193 UN member states, they certainly do carry moral and strategic weight. This, however, does not separate them from historical contingency.

Viewing political projects such as the 2030 agenda as virtuously disconnected from power-structures and the conditions that brought them into existence is a rather ahistorical reading of how global standards are being set. And even more concerningly, such a perspective does not prepare advocates of the agenda for the struggles that lie ahead.

For despite the universalist language and its determination to look ahead, the 2030 development agenda is surely also a political manifestation of the unique unipolar moment of the past. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, the political momentum was strong enough to put these aspirations on paper. But will this momentum be sufficient at the End of the End of history?

The current drastic global disruptions have clearly stifled calls to action. While the Corona pandemic certainly hampered the possibility of achieving these goals, the war makes the implementation even more unlikely. Countries will cut development spending and increase defense budgets, as they grapple with their own economic uncertainties. And irrespective of public pronouncements, precious and limited political capital is likely to be diverted from long-term development questions to acute economic and military crisis management – last but not least regarding the emerging food crisis.

Despite this, and perhaps inevitably, the UN-leadership and its ideological resonance board have remained committed to – or trapped in – the organization’s bold rhetoric.

Last year, Secretary General Guterres presented an 85-page vision of the UN’s future. Under the programmatic title Our Common Agenda, the document invokes the idea of cooperation “as a global family”. The vision calls for a “global immunization plan”, “bold steps to address climate degradation”, a “new social contract between governments and their citizens”, the “transformation of education, skills development and lifelong learning”, a “multi-stakeholder dialogue on outer space”, and a “global digital compact” – to name but a few of the far-reaching goals.

To further promote this agenda, Guterres recently announced the establishment of a “High level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism”. This new board is charged with elaborating further ideas for global governance "from climate protection to sustainable development, the international financial architecture to the interests of future generations".

Obviously, ambitious goals are legitimate and, in many ways, the discrepancy between the normative framework of the UN’s founding documents and the real world is as old as the organization itself. But it is increasingly unclear how global governance ambitions can be squared with the fragmenting political reality and without losing the UN in the ever-widening gap between ambition and reality.

The United Nations were founded to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war. In the words of its second Secretary-General – proudly displayed on the walls of the Secretariat in New York to this day – it “was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell”.

Today, as the world is faced with escalating tensions and violence not seen in decades, responses from within the UN circle largely around reflexes to stay the course.

History has returned to the battlefields of the Donbas. But one may be forgiven to think that the End of History lingers on in the more enthusiastic strongholds of Western multilateralism. Between the Hudson and the East River of New York, it seems, Hegel is still very much alive.



Michael Bröning is the Executive Director of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) New York Office. Michael holds a Doctorate in Economics and Social Sciences and a MA in history. He has taught Political Science at the Freie Universität in Berlin and was a John F. Kennedy Memorial Fellow at Harvard University. He is the founding editor of Internationale Politik und Gesellschaft, a tri-lingual political magazine, serves on the basic value commission of Germany’s Social Democratic Party, and is the author, most recently, of Vom Ende der Freiheit (Dietz, 2021).

Photo by Ahmed akachaFacebookTwitterShare

BURMA BLASTED

Executed activists' families left to grieve as international community puts pressure on Myanmar

Phyo Zeya Thaw's family says the junta is refusing to return his body.

(AP)

In the wake of Myanmar's execution of four democracy advocates accused of aiding "terror acts", the men's families have been left without answers about their loved ones' deaths — or even their bodies.

Key points:

Families of the executed men say the junta will not return their loved ones' bodies

Some relatives were able to speak with the men but were not told of their impending execution

The UN and international community have condemned Myanmar for the executions

Sentenced to death in secretive trials in January and April, the four men were accused of helping a civilian resistance movement that has fought the military since last year's coup and bloody crackdown on nationwide protests.

Among those executed were democracy campaigner Kyaw Min Yu, better known as Jimmy, and former politician and hip hop artist Phyo Zeyar Thaw, an ally of ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi with close ties to Australia. The two others executed were Hla Myo Aung and Aung Thura Zaw.

State media reported the country's first executions in over three decades had been carried out, saying "the punishment has been conducted", but did not say when, or by what method. However, previous executions in Myanmar have been by hanging.

Families of the executed men were denied the opportunity to retrieve their loved ones' bodies, Thazin Nyunt Aung, the wife of Phyo Zeya Thaw, said, comparing it to murderers covering up their crimes.

"This is killing and hiding bodies away," she said.

"They disrespected both Myanmar people and the international community."

Nilar Thein, Kyaw Min Yu's wife, said she would not hold a funeral without a body.

"We all have to be brave, determined and strong," she posted on Facebook.

Social media videos show people have been protesting in the wake of the junta's executions.

(Reuters: Lu Nge Khit)

The men were held in Yangon's Insein prison, where families visited last Friday, according to a person with knowledge of the events, who said prison officials allowed only one relative to speak to the detainees via video call.

"I asked then, 'Why didn't you tell me or my son that it was our last meeting?'" Khin Win May, the mother of Phyo Zeya Thaw, told BBC Burmese.

The junta made no mention of the executions on its nightly television news bulletin on Monday.
International condemnation, possible sanctions

While a spokesperson for the junta last month defended the death sentences as justified and said capital punishment was used in many countries, the executions drew widespread international criticism.

United Nations secretary-general Antonio Guterres strongly condemned the executions and called for the immediate release of all arbitrarily detained prisoners.

"Including President Win Myint and State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi," a deputy UN spokesperson said.

The US says it will work with regional allies to hold the military accountable.

It called for a cessation of violence and the release of political detainees.

"The United States condemns in the strongest terms the Burmese military regime's heinous execution of pro-democracy activists and elected leaders," a White House spokesperson said.

Washington is considering further measures against the junta, according to a US State Department spokesperson who added "all options" were on the table.

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, sent a letter to junta chief Min Aung Hlaing last month appealing to him not to carry out the executions.

Meanwhile, France condemned the executions and called for dialogue among all parties, while Japan's Foreign Minister said the executions would further isolate Myanmar.

China's foreign ministry urged all parties in Myanmar to resolve conflicts within its constitutional framework.

Myanmar has been in chaos since the coup, with the military, which has ruled the former British colony for five of the past six decades, engaged in battles on multiple fronts with newly formed militia groups.

The Assistance Association of Political Prisoners says more than 2,100 people have been killed by security forces since the coup. The junta says that figure is exaggerated.

The true picture of violence has been hard to assess, as clashes have spread to more remote areas where ethnic minority insurgent groups are also fighting the military. Close to a million people have been displaced by post-coup unrest.

ABC/wires

Myanmar junta puts four democracy activists to death in first executions in decades

By Erin Handley with wires

Former rapper turned politician Phyo Zeya Thaw, pictured in 2012, has been executed in Myanmar.(Reuters: Soe Zeya Tun )

Myanmar's military junta has executed four democracy activists accused of helping carry out "terror acts", the South-East Asian nation's first executions in decades.

Key points:

In the first executions in more than 30 years, four people have been put to death in Myanmar

The junta seized control after ousting the government in a coup last year
One of the men executed has received political training in Australia and has close ties here

Among those executed was former hip-hop artist and ousted MP Phyo Zeya Thaw, who has close ties to Australia and whose death has sent a ripple of shock through the diaspora community here.

Thazin Nyunt Aung, the wife of Phyo Zeyar Thaw, said she had not been told of her husband's execution.

Prominent democracy figure Kyaw Min Yu, better known as Jimmy, was also executed. The other two men put to death were Hla Myo Aung and Aung Thura Zaw, the Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper said.

Sentenced to death in closed-door trials in January and April, the four men had been accused of helping militias fight the army that seized power in a coup last year and unleashed a bloody crackdown on its opponents.

Kyaw Min Yu, known as Jimmy, pictured in 2012, was among those executed.

(AFP: Soe Than Win)

Kyaw Min Yu, 53, and Phyo Zeya Thaw, a 41-year-old ally of ousted Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi, lost their appeals against the sentences in June.

The four had been charged under the counter-terrorism law and the penal code, and the punishment was carried out according to prison procedure, the paper said, without elaborating.

Previous executions in Myanmar have been by hanging.

Sydney-based activist Sophia Sarkis said Phyo Zeya Thaw was a close friend and he came to Australia for a charity event she organised in 2019.

"I didn't know that would be the last time I was going to see him," she told the ABC.

Sophia Sarkis says her friend will be remembered as a role model. (Supplied)

She said while he was a famous rapper in Myanmar, he chose to get into politics because he believed in justice.

She said the charges were unfounded and he had been used as a scapegoat, and she knew many in Myanmar "who are living in fear of who is going to be next".

Phyo Zeya Thaw embraces the daughter of Sophia Sarkis.

(Supplied: Sophia Sarkis)

She said his life was cut short and he was a role model for the younger generation whose legacy will live on.

"He lives in our hearts forever and we will remember him as a hero," she said.

"He will be remembered as a young and free spirit, a loving and caring person, and brave — very brave. I am so proud to know him."

Myanmar's state media reported the executions on Monday and junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun later confirmed the executions to the Voice of Myanmar. Neither gave details of timing.

"My heart goes out to their families, friends and loved ones and indeed all the people in Myanmar who are victims of the junta's escalating atrocities," the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, Tom Andrews, said in a statement.
Former rapper had political training in Australia

Phyo Zeya Thaw's connection to Australia stretches back to 2012, according to Peter Yates, a policy adviser to the Minister for International Development in the former Labor government.


After his election but before he was sworn in, he was brought to Australia on AusAid funds for a political advisers' course, and he met then-prime minister Julia Gillard during the trip.


"Australia has supported this really important democracy activist who has now been executed," he said.

"It's symbolic of the situation in Myanmar at the moment, where not only are the extrajudicial killings going on by the junta, but obviously now, judicial killings going on too," he said, adding the military had crushed a decade of hope for a democratic future.

Peter Yates says Phyo Zeya Thaw was a hardworking MP who received training in Australia.(Supplied: Peter Yates)

He added Australia could do more to support Myanmar's people, including sanctions, which have been flagged as a possibility by Foreign Minister Penny Wong.

In a statement on Tuesday, Senator Wong said Australia opposed the death penalty in all circumstances and called on the regime in Myanmar to cease violence and release all those who were unjustly detained.

"Australia is appalled by the execution of four pro-democracy activists in Myanmar and strongly condemns the actions of the Myanmar military regime," she said.

"Sanctions against members of Myanmar's military regime are under active consideration.

"We extend sincere condolences to the families and loved ones of those who have lost their lives since the coup."

Professor Sean Turnell, pictured with his wife Ha Vu, 

faces trial under the Official Secrets Act.(Supplied)

Australia has imposed no new sanctions on Myanmar's military generals since the coup, despite steps from the US, the UK and Canada.

The new government has been repeatedly urged to take a stronger stance due to the ongoing detention of Australian economist Sean Turnell. Senator Wong has previously said Professor Turnell is Australia's top priority.

Mr Yates said Phyo Zeya Thaw had also met with Barack Obama and was a hard-working MP for his constituents in Nay Pyi Taw.

"It's definitely shocking. I think we'd all hoped that the death sentence was a political act by the junta, rather than something they were going to follow through with … [I'm] so deeply saddened and shocked by this horrible decision," he said.

Invoices reveal Australian embassy spent $750,000 on military-linked hotel

Official documents reveal an Australian embassy spent $750,000 at a luxury hotel built on land owned and leased by Myanmar's military junta, with activists saying taxpayer dollars should not have been used.

Myanmar's National Unity Government (NUG), a shadow administration outlawed by the ruling military junta, condemned the executions.

"This is the signal and trigger to international community," NUG's Australian representative Dr Tun Aung Shwe.

"Under the military regime, there is no law … the Myanmar judicial system under military regime is just for show.

"Our commitment is getting stronger than before because of their sacrifice … They sacrificed their lives."
More than 2,000 extrajudicial killings since coup

The sentences drew international condemnation, with two UN experts calling them a "vile attempt at instilling fear" among the people.

The Assistance Association of Political Prisoners (AAPP) said Myanmar's last judicial executions were in the late 1980s.

Myanmar's military has been accused of human rights abuses.

(AP: Amnesty International)

A military spokesman did not immediately respond to telephone calls to seek comment.

Last month military spokesman Zaw Min Tun defended the death penalty, saying it was used in many countries.

"At least 50 innocent civilians, excluding security forces, died because of them," he told a televised news conference.

"How can you say this is not justice? Required actions are needed to be done in the required moments."

Many young people became guerilla fighters after the coup on February 1 last year.(Reuters)

Myanmar has been in chaos since last year's coup, with conflict spreading nationwide after the army crushed mostly peaceful protests in cities.

The AAPP says more than 2,100 people have been killed by the security forces since the coup, but the junta says the figure is exaggerated.

The true picture of violence has been hard to assess as clashes have spread to more remote areas where ethnic minority insurgent groups are also fighting the military.

The latest executions close off any chance of ending the unrest, said Myanmar analyst Richard Horsey, of the International CRISIS group.

"Any possibility of dialogue to end the crisis created by the coup has now been removed," Mr Horsey told Reuters.

"This is the regime demonstrating that it will do what it wants and listen to no one. It sees this as a demonstration of strength, but it may be a serious miscalculation."

Sophia Sarkis (right) says she was in shock after hearing her friend Phyo Zeya Thaw (second from right) had been executed. (Supplied: Sophia Sarkis)

Elaine Pearson, acting Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said the "junta's barbarity and callous disregard for human life aims to chill the anti-coup protest movement".

"The Myanmar junta's execution of four men was an act of utter cruelty," she said.

"These executions … followed grossly unjust and politically motivated military trials. This horrific news was compounded by the junta's failure to notify the men's families, who learned about the executions through the junta's media reports."

Amnesty International regional director Erwin van der Borght called for an immediate moratorium on executions.

"The international community must act immediately as more than 100 people are believed to be on death row after being convicted in similar proceedings," he said.

"For more than a year now, Myanmar's military authorities have engaged in extrajudicial killings, torture and a whole gamut of human rights violations. The military will only continue to trample on people's lives if they are not held accountable."

ABC/Reuters

Human rights advocates and members of the Myanmar shadow government condemned the execution of four Myanmar activists, the nation's first executions in decades.

 

In a World of Crises, Don’t Forget Myanmar

Hunter Marston And Lucas Myers

The Diplomat

The world is replete with crises ranging from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to China’s saber-rattling over Taiwan. With the U.S. economy still reeling from persistent inflation and new COVID-19 cases on the rise, American interest in distant conflicts in seemingly remote parts of the globe is waning.

However, the United States should not lose sight of the escalating humanitarian and political crisis in Myanmar. There are clear national and moral interests at stake.

Although the February 2021 coup d’état that overthrew the democratically elected civilian government in Myanmar served as the Biden administration’s first foreign policy crisis, it was soon subsumed by others. The withdrawal from Afghanistan last year and then Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year after the coup have dominated Washington policymakers’ attention.

Beyond targeted sanctions on the junta, the occasional diplomatic engagement, and humanitarian aid, Washington has provided relatively little material assistance to Myanmar’s resistance or the National Unity Government (NUG), which formed following the coup. Amid a widening civil war in Myanmar, the United States allocated $136 million in the Consolidated Appropriations Act for “assistance” to Myanmar, while the National Defense Authorization Act for 2022 called for Washington to “support and legitimize the National Unity Government… the Civil Disobedience Movement… and other entities promoting democracy.”

US: 'All Options on Table' to Punish Myanmar Junta Over Executions

July 25, 2022 
Nike Ching

People protest in the wake of executions, in Yangon, Myanmar, July 25, 2022 in this screen grab obtained from a social media video. (Lu Nge Khit/via Reuters)

WASHINGTON —

The United States on Monday condemned Myanmar's execution of political activists and elected officials and called on the military government to immediately end the violence.

U.S. officials said that "all options are on the table," including economic measures to cut off the military junta's revenues that it uses to commit the violence.

Myanmar state media said the Southeast Asian country executed four democracy activists it had accused of helping carry out "terror acts" against the government that seized power last year in a coup. The four had been sentenced to death in closed-door trials in January and April.

Those executed were democracy figure Kyaw Min Yu, better known as Ko Jimmy; former lawmaker and hip-hop artist Phyo Zeya Thaw, an ally of ousted Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi; and two others, Hla Myo Aung and Aung Thura Zaw.

"The United States condemns in the strongest terms the Burmese military regime's heinous execution of pro-democracy activists and elected leaders," the White House National Security Council said in a statement. Myanmar is also known as Burma.

The U.S. called on Myanmar's rulers to "release those they have unjustly detained and allow for a peaceful return to democracy in accordance with the wishes of the people of Burma."

At the State Department, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that "these reprehensible acts of violence further exemplify the regime's complete disregard for human rights and the rule of law."

Myanmar remains mired in civil unrest since a military coup toppled the country's civilian-led government in February 2021.

The junta has killed more than 2,100, displaced more than 700,000, and detained members of civil society and journalists since the coup, the State Department said.

"There can be no business as usual with this regime," State Department spokesperson Ned Price said during Monday's briefing.

"We urge all countries to ban the sale of military equipment to Burma, to refrain from lending the regime any degree of international credibility, and we call on ASEAN [Association of Southeast Asian Nations] to maintain its important precedents, only allowing Burmese nonpolitical representation at regional events."

In the U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations Chair Bob Menendez urged President Joe Biden's administration to step up actions against the junta after the executions over the weekend, which were the first such executions in Burma since 1988.

"The Biden administration must exercise the authorities that Congress has already granted it to impose additional targeted sanctions on the Naypyidaw regime—including on Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise," Menendez said.

China is among the major suppliers to the Myanmar military and has maintained close ties with the junta. In Beijing, Chinese officials refrained from condemning the Burmese military publicly.

"China always adheres to the principle of noninterference in other countries' internal affairs," said Zhao Lijian, China's Foreign Ministry spokesperson, during a Monday briefing.

"All parties and factions in Myanmar should properly handle their differences and conflicts within the framework of the constitution and laws," Zhao said.

This combination photo created on June 3, 2022 shows undated handout photographs released by Myanmar's Military Information Team of democracy activist Kyaw Min Yu, left, and former lawmaker Maung Kyaw, who also goes by the name Phyo Zeya Thaw.

The mother of Phyo Zeya Thaw told VOA Burmese that she had been able to meet her son virtually on Friday.

She said that prison authorities had refused to provide details about her son's execution, including the exact day and time of her son's death, which are critical in planning for traditional funeral rituals. Prison officials also told her there was no precedent in Insein Prison of returning bodies to families.

The executions appeared to be a direct rebuke of ASEAN members' appeals.

In a June letter to the junta, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, who chairs this year's ASEAN, had expressed deep concerns and asked junta chief Min Aung Hlaing not to carry out the executions.

Others, including Malaysian lawmaker Charles Santiago, chair of the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights, also weighed in.

"Not even the previous military regime, which ruled between 1988 and 2011, dared to carry out the death penalty against political prisoners," Santiago said.

The United Nations was among numerous critics of the executions.

"I am dismayed that despite appeals from across the world, the military conducted these executions with no regard for human rights," U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said. "This cruel and regressive step is an extension of the military's ongoing repressive campaign against its own people."

She added: "These executions—the first in Myanmar in decades—are cruel violations of the rights to life, liberty and security of a person and fair trial guarantees. For the military to widen its killing will only deepen its entanglement in the crisis it has itself created."

Myanmar's National Unity Government, a shadow administration outlawed by the ruling military junta, said it was "extremely saddened. ... The global community must punish their cruelty."

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi said, "This goes against our repeated calls for all detainees to be freed. It also will sharpen the feelings of the [Myanmar] people and worsen the conflict as well as deepening Myanmar's isolation from the international community. It is a matter of deep concern."

Richard Horsey, a senior adviser on Myanmar at the International Crisis Group, said, "Any possibility of dialogue to end the crisis created by the coup has now been removed. This is the regime demonstrating that it will do what it wants and listen to no one. It sees this as a demonstration of strength, but it may be a serious miscalculation."

Amnesty International Regional Director Erwin van der Borght said the "executions amount to arbitrary deprivation of lives and are another example of Myanmar's atrocious human rights record. … The international community must act immediately, as more than 100 people are believed to be on death row after being convicted in similar proceedings."

Margaret Besheer, VOA Burma and Reuters contributed to this report.