Lessons learned in Burkina Faso can contribute to a new decade of forest restoration

In 2018, the West African nation decided to restore 5 million hectares of degraded land by 2030. New research shows what works - and what doesn't - when restoration coincides with degraded landscapes, pressure on natural resources and climate change

INTERNATIONAL CENTER FOR TROPICAL AGRICULTURE 

Research News(CIAT)

 

IMAGE: BASIN FOR WATER CAPTURE, STONE BUNDS, ZAI PITS. view more 

CREDIT: ALLIANCE OF BIOVERSITY AND CIAT/B.VINCETI

Forest landscape restoration is attaining new global momentum this year under the Decade of Ecosystem Restoration (2021-2030), an initiative launched by the United Nations. Burkina Faso, in West Africa, is one country that already has a head start in forest landscape restoration, and offers valuable lessons. An assessment of achievements there and in other countries with a history of landscape restoration is critical to informing a new wave of projects aiming for more ambitious targets that are being developed thanks to renewed global interest and political will to improve the environment.

Burkina Faso has been fighting with desertification and climate change, and has seen a progressive degradation of its forested landscapes due to the expansion of agriculture. In 2018, the country planned to restore 5 million hectares of degraded land by 2030, as part of the pan-African initiative AFR100. However, the country is facing many challenges amid growing pressures on natural resources, extreme degradation processes, and changing climatic conditions. So far, restoration initiatives have only partly succeeded due to various constraints and have mainly targeted small areas when compared to the scale of landscape degradation that has happened.

In 2019, researchers at the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT interviewed managers of 39 active restoration initiatives in Burkina Faso to understand bottlenecks and opportunities for scaling up ongoing efforts. The initiatives examined were concentrated in the Sahelian and northern part of the Sudanian region, where most degraded lands are located. The majority of these initiatives were less than 3 years old and all aimed at bringing back tree cover in the landscape, among other objectives. They reported their findings in "Sustainability" in December.

Initiatives combined objectives that spanned from recovering ecological functions of the ecosystems, increasing resilience of local communities to climate change and enhancing productivity in agro-sylvo-pastoral systems, in alignment with national policies that promote both livelihood improvement and ecosystems conservation. Most restoration initiatives had a strong involvement of local NGOs and associations, directly engaged in managing activities on the ground, while the funding was primarily provided through multilateral or bilateral international co-operation projects.

Assisted natural regeneration, an approach well-adapted to landscapes in which old tree stumps are sufficiently present and the soil seed bank is not totally depleted, was found to be commonly used to foster tree development. It favors regrowth from existing tree stumps, through their management and protection from disturbance. It is the most cost-efficient approach and have proved to be successful for restoring vast areas in other West African countries.

Other practices, although very labor-intensive, are commonly adopted, as they are indispensable to cultivate in extreme environments where water is scarce and soil fertility limited. These consist in the creation of stone bunds, half-moons, Vallerani trenches and zaï, which are pits filled with seed and manure. Shrubs and grass were often commonly planted along with trees, as they play a role in conserving soils, creating favorable microclimates, stabilizing moisture levels, and providing forage for animals, thereby creating a benefit from the early stage of restoration activities.

CAPTION

Compost basin, half-moons in the background.

CREDIT

Alliance of Bioversity and CIAT/B.Vinceti

Tree planting was implemented by the majority of the restoration initiatives, as natural regeneration alone is not sufficient to sustain the recovery of a tree cover in most contexts. Half of the restoration initiatives sourced at least part of their planting materials from the National Tree Seed Center, a government-run seed conservation and production research center. The center offers seeds of a large range of native species and ensures that collection practices follow best standards, guided by genetic considerations about the origin of the planting material. However, a significant number of initiatives relied exclusively on self-collected, locally procured seed, harvested from sources potentially depauperated and from a limited number of individuals available, raising concerns about quality of the planting material, its growth performance, and capacity to survive in the face of changing climatic conditions.

Participatory approaches to involve local communities were generally adopted across the initiatives examined and capacity building activities were a common denominator, however, the role of local communities in decision-making seemed still limited. Women especially tend to be excluded and have very limited land-access rights.

Despite all the critical aspects identified, the increasing number of restoration initiatives, the diversity of approaches used by local actors to overcome constraints and the support from the government are all encouraging aspects. The renewed interest of international donors in supporting the Great Green Wall for the Sahel and Sahara Initiative (GGW), an African-led initiative, involving 11 countries, to fight land degradation, desertification and drought will provide an ideal framework to achieve multiple objectives, scaling up efforts to restore degraded land, creating job opportunities, and strengthening resilience of rural communities.

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Community banks a key resource for small businesses when crises arise

Relationship lending and a simplified organizational structure allow community banks to be a better source for Paycheck Protection Program funding to small businesses

UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA

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IMAGE: UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA RESEARCHERS CHRISTOPHER JAMES AND JING LU view more 

CREDIT: UF WARRINGTON COLLEGE OF BUSINESS

The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, a stimulus package introduced by the Biden Administration, recently received Congress' approval. The stimulus package, like its two predecessors aimed at providing relief for individuals and businesses hindered by the COVID-19 pandemic, includes another round of funding for the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).

The American Rescue Plan includes $7.25 billion for PPP loans as well as a number of changes to make it easier for the smallest of businesses to gain access to the funding. With billions on the table for struggling small businesses, new research from the University of Florida Warrington College of Business finds that community banks are a critical source for helping these businesses keep their workforce employed during the pandemic through PPP loan access.

"Smaller community banks have traditionally been an important source of funding for small businesses," said Christopher James, William H. Dial/SunTrust Eminent Scholar and research author. "Community banks tend to be relationship lend­ers, characterized by local ownership, local control and local decision making. Relationship lenders had strong incentives to make PPP loans in order to preserve small business relationships in the face of the massive economic downturn caused the pandemic."

In their research, James, Warrington Ph.D. student Jing Lu and Georgetown University Ph.D. student Yangfan Sun, find that community banks were able to respond faster to PPP loan requests from small businesses as compared to larger banks. They also find that community banks made more PPP loans per dollar of deposits than larger banks, particularly during the early stages of the pandemic.

"Community banks tend to specialize in lending based on close personal ties between the loan officer and the small business customer," James said. "This type of lending requires providing branch managers with greater decision rights in making lending decisions. As a result, lenders at community banks were able to respond faster when the PPP was introduced."

Consistent with community bank focus on small business lending and their faster implementation of PPP lending, the authors find significantly more PPP loans per small business in counties where community banks had higher market shares. More important, the authors find that higher levels of PPP lending are associated with significantly fewer small business bankruptcies.

"The goal of PPP was to mitigate the adverse impact of the pandemic on small businesses," James said. "The significantly lower rate of bankruptcies among small businesses in areas with higher levels of PPP lending suggests that the PPP provided real benefits to small businesses."

Overall, James, Lu and Sun's research finds that community banks are an important source for small businesses when crises, like the COVID-19 pandemic, arise and business owners need to secure help quickly to continue paying their employees.

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Tweens and TV: UCLA's 50-year survey reveals the values kids learn from popular shows

Values have changed from decade to decade, often reflecting shifts in the broader culture

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - LOS ANGELES

Research News 

IMAGE: UCLA'S CHART TRACKING THE RANKING OF TV VALUES OVER EACH DECADE, FROM 1967 TO 2017. view more 

CREDIT: UCLA CENTER FOR SCHOLARS AND STORYTELLERS

How important is fame? What about self-acceptance? Benevolence? The messages children between the ages of 8 and 12 glean from TV play a significant role in their development, influencing attitudes and behaviors as they grow into their teenage years and beyond, UCLA psychologists say.

Now, a new report by UCLA's Center for Scholars and Storytellers assesses the values emphasized by television programs popular with tweens over each decade from 1967 to 2017, charting how 16 values have waxed and waned in importance during that 50-year span.

Among the key findings is that fame, after nearly 40 years of ranking near the bottom (it was 15th in 1967, 1987 and 1997), rose to become the No. 1 value in 2007, then dropped to sixth in importance in 2017.

Achievement -- being very successful -- was ranked first in 2017, with self-acceptance, image, popularity and being part of a community rounding out the top five.

The report, "The Rise and Fall of Fame: Tracking the Landscape of Values Portrayed on Television from 1967 to 2017" (PDF), evaluated two programs per decade (and four in 2017), from "The Andy Griffith Show" in 1967 and "Happy Days" in 1977 to "American Idol" and "Hannah Montana" in 2007 and "America's Got Talent" and "Girl Meets World" in 2017.

Like fame, values such as community feeling and benevolence have also seen dramatic rises and falls over the past half-century, with their rankings typically echoing changes in the larger culture, the researchers found.

Being part of community, for instance, which ranked No. 1 in 1967, 1977 and 1997 (and No. 2 in 1987), plummeted to the 11th spot in 2007 -- 10 spots below fame -- before rising again to fifth in 2017. Likewise, being kind and helping others, the No. 2 value in 1967 and 1997, fell to the 12th spot in 2007. It is now ranked eighth.

"I believe that television reflects the culture, and this half-century of data shows that American culture has changed drastically," said report author Yalda Uhls, founder and executive director of the Center for Scholars and Storytellers and an adjunct assistant professor of psychology. "Media plays an important role as young people are developing a concept of the social world outside of their immediate environment."

The concepts children develop can also vary widely based on what types of programs they're watching, according to the authors, who found a stark divergence between the values conveyed in reality shows -- first evaluated in 2007 -- and those of scripted fictional shows.

Values in reality TV vs. fictional programs

The most popular tween reality shows in 2017, based on Nielsen ratings, were "America's Got Talent" and "American Ninja Warrior," while the top two scripted shows were "Thundermans" and "Girl Meets World." In the scripted shows, the top values conveyed were self-acceptance, benevolence and being part of a community. In contrast, the top values conveyed in reality shows were fame, image and self-centeredness.

Reality shows, created for a broad audience and watched frequently by tweens, often highlight competition and the importance of being No. 1 and include bullying, cheating and a winning-at-all-costs value system, the authors note.

"If tweens watch, admire and identify with people who mostly care about fame and winning, these values may become even more important in our culture," said the report's lead author, Agnes Varghese, a fellow of the center and a UC Riverside graduate student. "Reality television shows continued to reflect the same trend we saw in 2007, with self-focused values such as fame ranking highest."

The authors recommend that parents help children understand that reality shows do not depict the experience of the average person and that fictional shows do not adequately depict the hard work and struggles associated with achieving fame.

TV values and the rise of social media

Uhls believes the explosive growth and popularity of social media platforms such as Facebook, launched in 2004, and YouTube, launched in 2005, may have influenced television content creators in the first decade of the 2000s to make fame-focused tween shows. Other research has shown that social media growth was accompanied by a rise in narcissism and a decrease in empathy among college students in the U.S., she notes.

"I don't think this is a coincidence," said Uhls, who was formerly a movie studio executive. "The growth of social media gives children access to an audience beyond the school grounds."

By 2017, the social media landscape had expanded to include platforms like Snapchat and Instagram, and the access they provided to an ever-widening audience made popularity seem more easily attainable. For that reason, Uhls believes, achieving fame may have become less desirable and unique. In addition, the severe recession of 2007-09 may have shifted the culture away from self-focused values such as fame and getting rich.

Research conducted by UCLA distinguished professor of psychology Patricia Greenfield and colleagues has shown that society tends to become more community-focused in times of collective distress, Uhls noted.

Because children, particularly in their tween years, are forming a belief system that integrates the many messages about desirable future aspirations they receive from parents, school, peers and media, it is crucial to understand the role television plays in promoting values -- both positive and negative, the researchers say.

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The report draws on research, both published and unpublished, by Uhls, Greenfield and former UCLA graduate students Jill Giardino and Caroline Fung.

THIRD WORLD USA

Blight may increase public health risk from mosquito-borne diseases

LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

Louisiana State University researchers recently published findings that blight leads to an increased abundance of disease-carrying mosquitoes. The researchers investigated the presence of several mosquito species in two adjacent but socio-economically contrasting neighborhoods in Baton Rouge: the historic Garden District, a high-income neighborhood, and the Old South neighborhood, a low-income area. They found significantly higher adult and larvae abundance of the Asian tiger mosquito (a carrier of Zika and dengue) and higher mosquito habitat availability--particularly discarded tires--in the Old South neighborhood. This indicates that environmental conditions in the low-income neighborhood were most ideal for this mosquito to breed and proliferate.

"These two neighborhoods are very similar in terms of vegetation cover, human population and density of households. One of the main differences is blight. One neighborhood has a lot of blight in the form of abandoned residences, empty lots and mismanaged waste, and the other neighborhood does not. It was the perfect set of conditions for addressing this question," said Rebeca de Jesús Crespo, lead author and an assistant professor in LSU's College of the Coast & Environment.

In recent years, the Old South neighborhood has been the focus of revitalization plans by multiple stakeholder groups. The researchers recommended that these blight reduction efforts continue for the benefit of public health.

"This is an area at high risk of these mosquito-borne diseases," said Madison Harrison, co-author of the publication. "All that it takes for these diseases to spread is for the right vector to be infected with the pathogen and to bite humans at the right point of incubation of said pathogen."

So far, Zika and dengue are not currently present in the state. However, Louisiana's climate is ideal for these diseases to spread once introduced.

According to de Jesús Crespo, Harrison was an invaluable addition to the team. Currently, she is a public health master's student at LSU Health New Orleans.

"In the College of the Coast & Environment, for almost every project that we do, we are integrated and interdisciplinary. We take a broad approach to doing research that is important for solving problems in real time. For this project, it was important to me to include Madison from LSU Health Sciences as well as community stakeholders who could provide their expertise and unique perspectives," de Jesús Crespo said.

The researchers examined the prevalence of two container-breeding species of mosquitoes that are known to spread disease, the Asian tiger mosquito and the southern house mosquito (a carrier of West Nile virus). They inspected potential larvae habitats (such as discarded tires, discarded Styrofoam cups and snack bags, plant pots and water baths) in publicly accessible locations and calculated the percentage of those that contained larvae. Additionally, they placed adult mosquito traps around the perimeter of some private homes with the permission from the homeowner, in an abandoned house and in an empty lot with trash accumulation in the higher income neighborhood.

They found that the adult population of the southern house mosquito was fairly diffuse, but the lower income neighborhood had significantly higher numbers of Asian tiger mosquito (adults and larvae) and higher numbers of total mosquito larvae. This shows that the presence of discarded container habitats due to neglect provides more breeding grounds for disease-carrying mosquitoes, disproportionately affecting low-income groups.

"I think everybody can agree that urban blight is a problem we need to solve here in Baton Rouge. Mosquito risk is one of those factors that could impact human health and that adds another level of importance with that," de Jesús Crespo said.

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Additional collaborators on this project include Rachel Rogers, a graduate student in the LSU Department of Environmental Sciences, and Randy Vaeth from East Baton Rouge Parish Mosquito Abatement and Roden

An ancient Maya ambassador's bones show a life of privilege and hardship

Ajpach' Waal forged an alliance between two dynasties but died in obscurity

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - RIVERSIDE

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IMAGE: TEETH WITH DENTAL INLAYS FROM A NONROYAL ELITE MAYAN TOMB. view more 

CREDIT: KENICHIRO TSUKAMOTO

An important Maya man buried nearly 1,300 years ago led a privileged yet difficult life. The man, a diplomat named Ajpach' Waal, suffered malnutrition or illness as a child, but as an adult he helped negotiate an alliance between two powerful dynasties that ultimately failed. The ensuing political instability left him in reduced economic circumstances, and he probably died in relative obscurity.

During excavations at El Palmar, a small plaza compound in Mexico near the borders of Belize and Guatemala, archaeologists led by Kenichiro Tsukamoto, an assistant professor of anthropology at UC Riverside, discovered a hieroglyph-adorned stairway leading up to a ceremonial platform. When deciphered, the hieroglyphs revealed that in June, 726 CE, Ajpach' Waal traveled and met the king of Copán, 350 miles away in Honduras, to forge an alliance with the king of Calakmul, near El Palmar.

The findings, published in the journal Latin American Antiquity, shed light on the role communities peripheral to major centers played in cementing connections between royal families during the Late Classic period (600-800 CE), and the ways they might suffer when something shattered those alliances.

The inscriptions identified Ajpach' Waal as a "lakam," or standard-bearer, an ambassador that carried a banner as they walked on diplomatic missions between cities. He inherited this lofty position through his father's lineage, and his mother also came from an elite family. Ajpach' Waal must have considered this his crowning achievement because the hieroglyphs indicate he was not given the platform by El Palmar's ruler, but had it built it for himself a few months after the mission in September, 726 CE. The platform served as a sort of theatrical stage where spectacular rituals were performed for an audience, with only influential people able to build their own.

Beneath the floor of a temple next to the platform, Tsukamoto discovered the undisturbed burial of a male skeleton in a small chamber. Though interred in a location that suggested ownership of the platform and temple, unlike other elite Maya burials, only two colorfully decorated clay pots -- no jewelry or other grave goods -- had accompanied this individual into the underworld.

In the new paper, Tsukamoto and Jessica I. Cerezo-Roma?n, an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Oklahoma, study the bones of the person buried in this puzzling tomb to tell his story.

"His life is not like we expected based on the hieroglyphics," Tsukamoto said. "Many people say that the elite enjoyed their lives, but the story is usually more complex."

The man was between 35 and 50 years old when he died. Several dating methods, including radiocarbon, stratigraphy, and ceramic typology, suggest the burial occurred around 726, when the stairway was constructed. The high status of the individual combined with proximity to the stairway lead the authors to believe that this was probably Ajpach' Waal himself, or possibly his father.

All his upper front teeth, from right canine to left, had been drilled to hold decorative implants of pyrite and jade, which was valuable and highly regulated. Maya living in geographic areas associated with ruling elites underwent this painful procedure during puberty as a rite of passage to mark their inclusion within a high office or social group. Ajpach' Waal might have received such implants when he inherited his father's title.

The skull had been mildly flattened in back from prolonged contact with something flat during infancy, which the Maya believed made a person more attractive. Because the front of the cranium was not preserved, the archaeologists could not tell if the forehead had been similarly flattened, a beautification practice limited to royalty.

Other aspects of the bones belied the privilege displayed by the dental and cranial modifications. Some of his arm bones had healed periostitis, caused by bacterial infections, trauma, scurvy, or rickets, which would have made his arm ache until the condition improved. Both sides of the skull had slightly porous, spongy areas known as porotic hyperostosis, caused by childhood nutritional deficiencies or illnesses. The condition is relatively common in burials throughout the Maya world, suggesting Ajpach' Waal's high status couldn't shield him from malnutrition and disease.

A healed fracture on his right tibia, or shinbone, resembles fractures seen in modern athletes who play contact sports such as football, rugby, or soccer. This could indicate he played some of the ballgames depicted on the stairway, strengthening the case that this was Ajpach' Waal.

Long before he died, the individual had lost many teeth on the left side of his lower jaw due to gum disease and might have had a painful abscess on his lower right premolar, all of which would have restricted his diet to soft foods. One inlaid tooth had thickened near the root in response to the injury of drilling and could have ached.

He also developed arthritis in his hands, right elbow, left knee, left ankle, and feet as he aged, which would have caused stiffness and pain, especially in the morning. Tsukamoto and Cerezo-Roma?n suggest that his arthritis might have been caused by carrying a banner on a pole for long distances over rugged terrain and walking and up and down stairways. He would have also been required to kneel on the platforms of Maya rulers.

As if these maladies weren't enough, fate conspired to change Ajpach' Waal's fortunes.

"The ruler of a subordinate dynasty decapitated Copán's king 10 years after his alliance with Calakmul, which was also defeated by a rival dynasty around the same time," Tsukamoto said. "We see the political and economic instability that followed both these events in the sparse burial and in one of the inlaid teeth."

The archaeologists determined that the inlay in Ajpach' Waal's right canine tooth had fallen out and was not replaced before his death because dental plaque had hardened into calculus in the cavity. The hole, easily visible when the man smiled or spoke, would have been an embarrassing, public admission of hardship or El Palmar's reduced significance. This also would have made him a less useful emissary if he still occupied the role.

Though people continued living at El Palmar for some time after Ajpach' Waal's death, it was eventually abandoned and reclaimed by the jungle.

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The paper, "The Life Course of a Standard-Bearer: A Nonroyal Elite Burial at the Maya Archaeological Site of El Palmar, Mexico," is available here.

SYRIA'S 10 YEARS OF WAR
After a decade of war, Assad’s presidency is intact but under tutelage

Issued on: 15/03/2021 - 

Russian President Vladimir Putin with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad

 at the Bocharov Ruchei residence in Sochi, Russia, in November 2017. 

© Mikhail Klimentyev, AP

Text by: Marc DAOU


Syrian President Bashar al-Assad may be accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but he has managed to save his regime at the cost of Syria’s destruction, thanks to his Russian and Iranian allies. However after 10 years of war, is he really the master of Syria?

In the spring of 2011, the discourse on Middle East desks in Western capitals was dominated by speculations on how long Syrian President Bashar al-Assad would last in power. The prevailing view was that it would be a matter of weeks, months perhaps, before the strongman of Syria was ousted, like his Tunisian and Egyptian counterparts, by protests sweeping the Arab world.

But a decade after the first demonstrations against his regime broke out, Assad is still in power in a country in physical ruins, economically on its knees and with a populace traumatised by an endless conflict. The Syrian war has cost several hundreds of thousand lives, displaced millions and plunged more than 80 percent of the population into poverty, according to the UN.

A decade after Syria's uprising, refugees face uncertain future

02:00After a decade of war, Assad’s presidency is intact but under tutelage (france24.com) 


Saved by the interventions of his Russian and Iranian allies – with whom he must now deal with in his own country – the Syrian president has regained military control of large parts of Syria, even if violent clashes and the presence of jihadists are still a reality in certain areas.

Assad may be accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but there appears to be nothing to prevent the 55-year-old leader, who inherited the presidency following his father’s death in 2000, from winning yet another presidential election, this one scheduled for the summer.

A president indebted to the Russians and Iranians

"He’s still in power and we do not see what are the alternatives that could be opposed to him, especially from the West’s point of view. As for his Russian and Iranian allies, they have no reason to replace him. So yes, he won his bet to save his regime," explained Fabrice Balanche, a Syria expert at the University of Lyon 2, in an interview with FRANCE 24.

"Unlike [Tunisia’s] Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, [Egypt’s] Hosni Mubarak or [Libya’s] Colonel Gaddafi, who were all swept away by the Arab revolts, Bashar al-Assad has remained in power by making his population pay a high price. We can say he’s under the tutelage of his Russian and Iranian protectors, but the fact remains that he is indeed the Syrian president, it’s not Vladimir Putin, it’s Bashar al-Assad," noted Antoine Mariotti, FRANCE 24’s Middle East correspondent and author of the book, "La Honte de l'Occident: Les Coulisses du fiasco syrien" [The Shame of the West: Behind the Scenes of the Syrian Fiasco], which was published in France last week.

But Ziad Majed – a professor at the American University of Paris and a co-author of “Dans la tête de Bachar al-Assad" ["In the head of Bashar al-Assad"] – believes that Assad is no longer master of his destiny, nor of the Syrian conflict and its resolution.

"Even if the departure of the Syrian president is no longer demanded by any foreign actor in the conflict, and this issue is no longer a priority since the Russian intervention has secured the regime, Moscow and Tehran have made it clear to Bashar al-Assad that they are his only hope of staying in power,” explained Majed. “And this reality could weaken him if ever – and this is far from being the case today – serious negotiations were to begin to find a solution with a political transition.”

A ‘pillar’ with limited sovereignty

The Syrian president though appears to be satisfied with his limited sovereignty over his own country. “He knows how much he owes the Russians and the Iranians," said Mariotti. “Without their political, diplomatic and especially military support, it’s not certain that he would still be in power today.”

Assad has no choice but to accept the current situation because he needs his allies to protect him on the international stage as well as domestically, to complete the reconquest of Syria. “In the East, they know how to be extremely patient, and Bashar al-Assad is playing it safe in order to remain indispensable in their eyes," explained Mariotti. “Finally, what Moscow and Tehran want is the stability of the country, and as long as he is able to ensure this, the current configuration will remain unchanged, because he is the pillar on which everything rests.”


Syrian youth still paying high price for decade of war

01:39 After a decade of war, Assad’s presidency is intact but under tutelage (france24.com)


While Syrian territory is under the influence of several foreign actors in the conflict such as Russia, Iran and Turkey, which directly or through their allies control parts of the country, Assad's real power appears to have weakened.

"To understand who controls what in Syria," Balanche explained, it’s critical to look at control of the borders, because they are a marker of sovereignty and a projection of regional power. “Today, the Syrian army directly controls only 15 percent of the country's borders, basically the stretch that separates Syria from Jordan and a small part of the border in northern Lebanon."

“This is extremely revealing of the reality of Bashar al-Assad's power, because if he were strong and had a choice, he would not let the Lebanese Hezbollah, the pro-Iranian Shiite militias and Russia control the rest of the borders, instead of the Syrian army,” said Balanche. "Even when it comes to the airspace, Damascus does not control anything since Israeli planes can bomb targets in Syria at any time, and normally the Syrian sky is supposed to be protected by Russia.”

For Majed, "the regime no longer has a say in a country fragmented and occupied by foreign forces because it no longer manages anything except its prison system and internal politics in the areas it controls. This is all that’s left of the sovereignty of the Syrian state since it is neither master of its defence, nor of its diplomacy, which is modelled on those of its Russian and Iranian protectors”.

Russia treats Syria the way Syria treated Lebanon

Majed, a Franco-Lebanese political scientist, compares the reality of Assad's power today to that of Lebanese authorities during the 1976-2005 Syrian occupation of neighbouring Lebanon.

"Ironically, he is treated by the Russians in the same way that they treated and humiliated Lebanese puppet presidents and politicians during the occupation, since he is at the mercy of Vladimir Putin, who can slap him on the wrist or summon him to Moscow whenever he wants," said Majed. The Russians, like the Iranians, prefer to have a weakened leader under their control in order to make him even more dependent on their support, he noted.

>> Syria’s impotent opposition consistently fails to provide any threat to Assad

Balanche agrees that the situation can be compared with that of occupied Lebanon "in the sense that Syria has become an Iranian-Russian protectorate, and that Moscow is in a position to impose its will on the Syrian president, who is its servant”. But Balanche also notes that when Putin summons the Syrian leader to Moscow, “he does not seek to humiliate Bashar al-Assad, while the Lebanese leaders were more ostensibly mandated to Damascus”.

In this asymmetrical relationship, he continues, the Syrian president is not really in a position to say no to the Russians and is sometimes forced to make concessions. "However, he still retains a certain nuisance power to stand up to Moscow, reminding them, for example, that he remains indispensable for delivering information gathered by his intelligence services, which are crucial for the security of Russian troops in Syria,” Balanche explained.

Assad "knows that the Iranians and the Russians are obliged to put up with him, since he himself has prevented the emergence of any potential competitor, and he uses this to balance his relations with his two protectors to hang on for a while," said Mariotti. "No one within the regime can stand up against him and he will succeed himself in the presidential election, and the Russians know this very well."

The Syrian president has the freedom to get closer to the Iranians when the Russians are too demanding and vice versa, and when there are rifts, confirms Balanche. "He knows how to manoeuvre between these two protectors that are a bit trapped in Syria, where they are obliged to stay after having invested a lot. This, while respecting the red lines that have surely been set for him, is his situation," he explained.

Who’s afraid of Biden?

In such a context, it remains to be seen whether the arrival of Joe Biden in the White House can revive the issue of a political transition in Syria since his predecessor, Donald Trump, had completely lost interest in the issue.

"When the Syrian regime was in the most difficulty, it was Barack Obama who was in power in the US and Joe Biden was his vice president,” recalled Mariotti. “Bashar al-Assad understood that he had little to fear, even after large scale chemical attacks. So, he should not be particularly terrified by the return of the Democrats to office. Joe Biden does not really wanting to start a tug-of-war with Moscow over an opposition that almost no longer exists.”

So, if he is assured of staying in power, can Assad hope for an international rehabilitation? Last week for instance, the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates said tough US sanctions on Damascus were blocking Syria’s reconstruction and undermining regional reconciliation that could bring an end to 10 years of war.

Speaking alongside Russia’s visiting foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, in Dubai on March 9, Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan said the wider US sanctions imposed under the 2019 Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act were making it “difficult” to achieve Arab objectives, including Syria’s restoration to the Arab League. Syria was suspended from the pan-Arab organisation in late 2011 due to Assad’s ferocious crackdown on protesters, and several Gulf powers who backed Syrian rebel movements had been betting on Assad’s quick fall.

"In terms of rehabilitation, he is lucid and guesses that he does not have much hope regarding the West, because this would require the regime to make concessions that it cannot make in terms of human rights and a political transition,” noted Balanche.

“But Bashar al-Assad can renew ties with Arab countries that seem less closed to this idea than the Europeans and Americans,” he explained, adding, "Damascus is especially looking towards Russia and China, which, in its eyes, embodies an alternative model to the Western one and with which Syria can deal economically without the question of human rights dominating the table."

This article is a translation of the original in French.

NGOs file landmark legal case against 

Russian mercenaries in Syria over torture


Issued on: 15/03/2021

This file photo taken on March 1, 2018 shows a member of the Russian military police standing guard between the portraits of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, right, and Russian President Vladimir Putin, hanging outside a guard-post at the Wafideen checkpoint on the outskirts of Damascus. © Louai Beshara, AFP (file photo)

Text by: NEWS WIRES

Three campaign groups announced on Monday a landmark legal case in Moscow against Russian mercenary group Wagner over the torture of a detainee in Syria, aiming to hold to account a murky fighting force with Kremlin links.

The legal push against private military contractor Wagner Group follows a wave of torture-related cases in Europe against Syrian regime officials a decade into a punishing war whose tide was turned by Moscow’s military intervention in 2015.

Three prominent advocacy groups from France, Russia and Syria filed the criminal complaint against alleged members of the contractor outfit over the 2017 beheading of a man believed to have deserted from the Syrian army.

Wagner has been linked to a powerful ally of President Vladimir Putin, Yevgeny Prigozhin and the case probing potential “war crimes” is unlikely to lead to any convictions.

Prigozhin, 59, who has been hit with US sanctions for meddling in the US presidential election in 2016, denies any association with Wagner

‘Wave of impunity’

But the proceedings represent a rare attempt to bring Wagner out into the open, several years after reports of their deployment in conflicts across the Middle East and Africa first emerged.

“This complaint is important because we aren’t just dealing with a single crime. This is a whole wave of impunity,” Alexander Cherkasov, a senior member of Memorial—one of the groups bringing the claim—told AFP.

“People who escape punishment after carrying out crimes like this are given the opportunity to repeat them in places like Chechnya, eastern Ukraine and Syria. In the end they come back to Russia and walk on the streets among us.”

Although private military companies are illegal in Russia, Wagner has in recent years played an increasingly important role in buttressing and realising the Kremlin’s ambitions abroad, observers say.

Members of the group were reportedly dispatched alongside Russian war planes and ground troops following Moscow’s intervention in the Syrian war in September 2015 on the side of President Bashar al-Assad’s army.

Moscow has never confirmed reports of Wagner mercenaries but on Monday said that since its operation launched in Syria 112 Russian troops had died in combat operations.

Wagner’s presence there was forced into the spotlight in 2018 when independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta reported that several Russian-speaking men who executed and mutilated a detainee on video in the eastern Homs province were Wagner fighters.

The complaint brought Monday on behalf of the victim’s family aims to force Moscow to bring criminal proceedings against the alleged members of the private contractor group, in what NGOs say is the first case of its kind.

In a statement, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Memorial and the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression said they had filed evidence that clearly links at least one defendant to Wagner.

‘Moral responsibility’

“The Russian government must assume its legal and moral responsibilities for the violations committed by its army, including the private entities involved in external military operations under its command, such as the Wagner Group,” said Mazen Darwish, director general and founder of the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression.

Ilya Novikov, one of the Syrian family’s lawyers, said Russia is obliged under its constitution to investigate crimes carried out by Russian nationals abroad.

But, he added, “the Investigative Committee has not, to date, initiated any investigation of the crime in question”.

The Kremlin said Monday it was aware of the complaint but that it was “an issue for the Investigative Committee, not the presidential administration”.

It follows dozens of other cases brought in Germany, Austria, Sweden and Norway against officials in Assad’s regime by around 100 refugees, backed by the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), a Berlin-based group.

Across Europe, activists are joining forces with police and UN investigators in collecting testimonies, sifting through tens of thousands of photos, videos and files of one of the best documented conflicts in history.

European officials have also taken note of Wagner’s role in conflicts beyond Syria, slapping sanctions on Prigozhin last year for destabilising Libya.

33 years after Iraq chemical attack, survivors still seeking justice

A chemical attack ordered on the Kurdish town of Halabja under Saddam Hussein regime killed thousands 

SAFIN HAMED AFP

Halabja (Iraq) (AFP)



Hawker Saber is one of the survivors of the chemical attack Saddam Hussein ordered on the Kurdish town of Halabja 33 years ago but he needs a respirator to stay alive.

Saber, who is hooked to the machine for more than 20 hours a day, was just three at the time but he still has terrible memories of March 16, 1988.

On that day, for five hours, Iraq's air force rained down a deadly cocktail of chemical weapons, including mustard gas, on Halabja in the mountains of northeastern Iraq, according to experts.

In retribution for Kurdish peshmerga fighters backing Iran in its eight-year war with Iraq, around 5,000 Iraqi Kurds, the majority women and children, were killed in the largest ever chemical weapons attack on civilians.

The attack still haunts Halabja as its residents, now estimated at around 200,000, still fight for justice, care for the ill and hunt for missing relatives.

"There are still 486 people who are seriously ill from the chemical attack in Halabja," Loqman Abdelqader, president of an association for victims of the attack, told AFP.

"They have respiratory difficulties and eyesight problems," said Abdelqader, who himself lost six family members in the massacre.

"Neither the federal authorities nor the Iraqi Kurdish authorities have set up a care programme to help them," he added.

- 'None have kept their word' -

Up until the start of the coronavirus pandemic, it was Iran that each year took on the care of several patients, but always on a piecemeal basis.

Halabja families are also still trying to find children that went missing amid the chaos of the attack, with many having been sheltered and treated in Iran, just 10 kilometres (6 miles) away.

"142 children are still missing", said Ayad Arass, who heads the local child protection commission.

Halabja resident Swiba Mohammed, 60, believed for a time that justice would be served.

She even went in 2006 to Baghdad to testify against Saddam's cousin and henchman, Ali Hassan al-Majid -- an infamous general better known as "Chemical Ali".

Majid was hanged four years later for ordering the attack, which he said was carried out to protect Iraq against its powerful neighbour Iran.

But his death brought little respite to Mohammed, who lost five of her children in the massacre, as well as her sight.

"For years, officials have been promising to send me abroad to have surgery so I can finally again see the faces of my surviving children," she told AFP.

"But not one of them kept their word," she said between sobs.

- European accomplices? -

Saddam, overthrown in 2003 after a US-led invasion, was hanged in 2006, sentenced to death for the massacre of 148 Shiite Muslims -- who make up the majority in Iraq but faced repression under the Sunni dictator's regime.

His death put an end to proceedings against him for "genocide" over the deaths of 180,000 Kurds -- including those killed in Halabja -- during the ruthless 1987-1988 "Anfal" campaign.

Unable to convict Saddam, the residents of Halabja are now trying to force his accomplices out of the woodwork.

On March 13, 2018, a total of 5,500 relatives of victims sued 25 European companies and individuals, including Iraqis, who they say aided Saddam's regime in developing its chemical weapons stockpile, one of their lawyers, Ayad Ismail, said.

"There have already been eight hearings and the next one is set for June," Ismail told AFP, adding that "summons will be sent to companies cited that have asked to see the evidence".

But for Abdelqader, time is running out.

Since the fall of Saddam, he said "116 survivors of the attack have died", and their living testimony of the massacre with them.

© 2021 AFP

Kurdish rebellion of 1983 | Military Wiki | Fandom (wikia.org)

Halabja chemical attack - Wikipedia

Halabja chemical attack | Military Wiki | Fandom (wikia.org)

1991: The South Iraq and Kurdistan uprisings 

The history of the uprisings in Southern Iraq and Kurdistan in 1990-91 which involved large numbers

Ten Days that shook Iraq
The Gulf War was not ended by the military victory of America and the Allies. It was ended by the mass desertion and mutiny of thousands of Iraqi soldiers. So overwhelming was the refusal to fight for the Iraqi state on the part of its conscripted army that, contrary to all predictions, not one Allied soldier was killed by hostile fire in the final ground offensive to recapture Kuwait. Indeed the sheer scale of this mutiny is perhaps unprecedented in modern military history.

But these mutinous troops did not simply flee back to Iraq. On their return many of them turned their guns against the Iraqi state, sparking a simultaneous uprising in both Southern Iraq and in Kurdistan to the North. Only the central region of Iraq surrounding Baghdad remained firmly in the state's hands in the weeks following the end of the war.

From the very start the Western media has grossly misrepresented these uprisings. The uprising in the South, centred on Basra, was portrayed as a Shia Muslim revolt. The insurrection in the North was reported as an exclusively Kurdish Nationalist uprising which demanded little more than an autonomous Kurdish region within Iraq.

The truth is that the uprisings in both the North and South of Iraq were working class insurrections.