WTO’s IP waiver for Covid-19 vaccines faces structural headwinds

Public funding is leading the Covid-19 vaccine research and development, and therefore there is no justification for IP, says the writer. File picture: Timothy Bernard/African News Agency(ANA)

By Ashraf Patel 

The Biden administration in the US signalling its intention to support a Covid intellectual property (IP) waiver was welcomed, alas, besides being a case of a ‘“too little, too late”.

Since the early days of the pandemic, progressive international organisations such MSF (Doctors Without Borders) and the Third World Network (TWN), have strongly supported the TRIPS (The Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) waiver proposal on grounds that it would accelerate efforts by developing countries to collectively fight the Covid-19 through creating requisite capacities for manufacturing the vital personal protective equipments including face masks, therapeutics, and vaccine

They argue correctly that the most practical way to ensure the availability of enough vaccines to meet the demand is through scaling up production. The IP protection acts as a legal barrier to technology transfer and thus prevents the dissemination of technology. Public funding is leading the Covid-19 vaccine research and development, and therefore there is no justification for IP.

In the week that President Joe Biden made the announcement and the G7 Summit commitment, World Bank president David Malpass immediately poured cold water on it, saying the World Bank would not support the IP waiver as it would crowd out innovation and research and development investment of the pharmaceutical sector.

However, what big pharmaceuticals won’t tell the public is that none of the countries supporting the IP system spoke about the tens of billions of dollars of public funds provided to pharmaceutical companies Astra, Sanofi, Moderna, J&J, that continue to sell medicines and vaccines at prices which are beyond the reach of people in developing countries.

By contrast, emerging powers such as China and Russia have made available Covid vaccines to developing nations within a public good framework.

The high point of developing world solidarity was the G77 group during the World Trade Organization Doha Development phase in the early 2000s. Most of the leading developing world nations, including China, India, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico, cohered around a moral and developmental agenda, especially agriculture, TRIPS and trade barrier matters.

Sadly, the G77 has divided and nations such as Chile and Ecuador are being incorporated into powerful northern blocs and trapped into corporatist bilateral  investment treaties

Ironically, Brazil, which started the global movement against patents in the late 1990s under the leadership of former Brazilian foreign minister Celso Amorim, is today the new member of an initiative (Quire) for supporting the structure of the international patent system.

Another powerful and influential actor in global public health is the Gates Foundation. While couched in the narrative of “charity and philanthropy”, the Gates Foundation approach in capturing global public health discourse is a cause for concern.

In a critical review of the foundation, public health journalists Malpani, Baker and Yanni (2021) observed that during the pandemic, it has spent or committed to spending hundreds of millions of dollars on the development and procurement of Covid-19 medical technologies, partnering with global health agencies and pharmaceutical corporations to accelerate the development and deployment of technologies.

They contend that this provides the foundation with counter-vailing power in “prioritising pharma monopolies of technology and intellectual property (IP) and secretive, technocratic, and top-down approaches that mostly exclude LMICS from decision making as well as avoiding public scrutiny”.

And in terms of health products, its traps most countries into a system that primarily benefits pharmaceutical corporations and high-income countries’ governments, which can subsidise these corporations with billions of dollars in upfront subsidies and paying high prices for treatments and vaccines.

The core argument of Developing South nations is an appeal for WTO members to work together to ensure that intellectual property rights such as patents, industrial designs and copyright do not hinder access to vaccines. In addition, many countries, especially developing countries, may face institutional and legal difficulties when using flexibilities available in TRIPS.

However, while South Africa and India’s stance is brave, it is essentially contradictory – as political elites and health regulators decisions’ have seen their Covid-19 vaccine roll-out dependent on global pharmaceuticals.

This contradiction seems lost on those who have gone head over heels in prioritising big pharma’s market-driven roll-out – and in the case of South Africa, with disastrous mistakes relating to Astra and J&J roll-outs.

Meanwhile, the post-Covid recovery challenges in South Africa and Africa faces further structural economic and social headwinds such as new macro-economic debt crisis in most of Africa, 4IR and the displacement of labour, resource conflicts around oil, gas and water and a myriad socio-economic crises that will require decisive leadership commitment to sustainable and alternative economic development pathways.

What is clear is that the developing world, especially South Africa’s approach – with a begging bowl mentality to the G7 and northern capitals, is unlikely to yield any substantial developmental outcomes. Again, alternative economic and political paradigms are urgently required.

* Ashraf Patel is a digital development specialist, and associated with the Institute for Global Dialogue.

** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of IOL and Independent Media.

Expat pill couriers: Lifeline in medicine-starved Lebanon

Issued on: 11/07/2021 - 

Lebanese pharmacies have staged a nationwide strike to protest the severe shortage of medicine Anwar AMRO AFP

Beirut (AFP)

Barely two hours after Lydia landed from Marseille in France, friends and relatives flocked to her apartment to collect drugs that have vanished from Lebanese pharmacies because of crippling shortages.

They started knocking on her door as early as 7:30 am -- before she even had a chance to unpack two suitcases and a backpack stuffed with medicine she had purchased from France for more than $1,000.

"I didn't even have a chance to sleep, but I understand because there's nothing worse than running out of medicine," especially if you have a chronic illness, the woman in her sixties said from her home in Baabdat, north of Beirut.

Lydia, like many other Lebanese expats, has become a courier for family and friends grappling with a raft of shortages due to what the World Bank has termed one of the world's worst financial crises since the 1850s.

As pharmacies run out of hundreds of medicines, including over-the-counter pain killers, the suitcase of a Lebanese expat, once teeming with gifts and duty-free purchases, now resembles a portable pharmacy.

"I brought everything: antibiotics, medicine for hypertension, cholesterol, diabetes, Parkinson's and cancer as well as many antidepressants," Lydia told AFP.

Her parents also recently flew in from Marseille carrying medicine for 12 people in four large suitcases, she said.

The expat deliveries, Lydia said, remind her of Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war.

"The crisis has revived wartime reflexes, especially a sense of social solidarity," Lydia said.

But "what is happening today is unprecedented and surreal," she added. "We have never seen such shortages in medicine or fuel... We have never felt this suffocated."#photo1

- Shopping in Cyprus -

Lebanon's foreign currency reserves are fast depleting and the cash-strapped state has started to gradually reduce subsidies on key imports including fuel and flour.

Medicine importers say hundreds of drugs have disappeared from the market, as the central bank owes suppliers abroad millions of dollars and they can no longer open new lines of credit.

For its part, the government accuses importers of hoarding medicine with the aim of selling it at a higher price once medicine subsidies are reduced by the state and drugs become more expensive.

For the Lebanese people, the shortages have triggered a worldwide drug hunt. As for pharmacies, they staged a nationwide strike Friday protesting the lack of supplies.

In the neighbouring island of Cyprus, pharmacists can now spot Lebanese customers scouring for supplies to take back home.

Tracy Najjar made a trip to Cyprus last month with her husband Paul to temporarily escape Lebanon's crisis, but also to stock up on medical supplies.

"The pharmacist immediately guessed we were Lebanese," she said.#photo2

"He told us that another Lebanese couple had come in two days earlier to buy a ton of drugs," she added.

Tracy, who lost her three-year-old daughter Alexandra in the Beirut port blast that killed more than 200 people last summer, said she bought some of the most basic supplies.

They included eye drops, powdered milk, antidepressants and drugs for high blood pressure.

Apart from family and friends, beneficiaries often include strangers who reach out over social media, now a key platform for buying and exchanging medicine.

- Certain death -

President Michel Aoun this month pledged to continue subsidising medication and medical supplies selected by the health ministry on a priority basis.

The central bank has for months urged the health ministry to identify priority drugs, but a list has yet to be finalised.

The central bank said last week it would earmark $400 million to support key products including medicine and flour.

The head of the medicine importers' syndicate said the bank had promised it $50 million a month in subsidies for medicine -- just half of importers' current bills for that period.

Expecting shortages only to worsen, Ahmad, a 58-year-old parking attendant, warned that the situation is turning deadly.

The 58-year-old father of three suffers from high blood pressure and diabetes but can't find the pills prescribed by his doctors.#photo3

"I can not even find the generics," he said.

He tried to do without for a few weeks but his blood pressure quickly climbed.

He reached out to a cousin in Istanbul and a friend in the United Arab Emirates to secure the medication, at a cost much higher than the subsidised prices he would have paid if available in Lebanon.

"We either die because we can't find medicine or we die because we have run out of money after spending it all on drugs brought in from abroad," he said.

"Either way, they are killing us," he added, referring to Lebanon's under-fire political class.

© 2021 AFP

Colorado ranchers face not just drought but rising social pressures



Issued on: 11/07/2021

Cattle rancher Janie VanWinkle, seen standing near a reservoir on her Colorado ranch during a record-hot summer, says drought is only one problem facing fellow ranchers Patrick T. FALLON AFP/File

Grand Junction (United States) (AFP)

"The grass should be up to here," Janie VanWinkle says, holding a hand next to her knee above the scant growth on her ranch in Colorado, which -- just as in 2020, and 2018 -- is again being hit by devastating drought.

"Here we are again," she says, wearing a checkered shirt and a persistent smile that belies her ranch's woes at a time when record high temperatures have been scorching much of the US West.

"The soil moisture is just completely depleted, you can dig down four feet and there's no moisture in the dirt. So that's the cumulative effect that makes it tougher than previous droughts."


But the drought is only one of many challenges facing ranchers, not only in Mesa County where she lives, but across the West.

"The drought's right here in your face, you never get away from that," she says. "So it feels like we are always under attack, whether it's 'fake' meat, wolves, animal rights, environmental issues -- you name it."

Colorado provides a case study of the modern tensions between cities and the countryside, between the metropolis of Denver -- a haven for digital start-ups and progressive movements -- and sparsely inhabited regions where ranchers spend hours on horseback checking on their grazing herds.

Janie VanWinkle, her husband Howard, and their son Dean own about 450 head of cattle, after selling 70 last fall in expectation of the coming drought, and 35 in June as their hay stock began to run low.

They are constantly juggling between buying more feed as its price rises, and selling more cattle.

While the survival of the ranch is not immediately threatened, this will be a bad year: Janie VanWinkle estimates that her cattle will weigh 100 to 120 pounds (45 to 55 kilograms) less than usual when they are sold to feedlots in the fall.

- 'Emotional cost' -

Looking ahead, the most likely scenario "is that these drier conditions will be the norm," said Russ Schumacher, a professor of atmospheric science at Colorado State University.#photo1

"It will take years of above normal precipitation -- not just one year -- to get out of these conditions," he added.

The higher temperatures brought on by climate change are magnifying the consequences of low rain- and snowfall, Schumacher said.

When her son came home from college, Janie VanWinkle recalled, "Dean was like, 'You guys need to be irrigating!'

"But we are! We have been!" she said. "It’s just not doing anything, because it's been so hot."

She worries about what the future holds for her son -- the fifth generation of ranchers in the family -- not just because of the drought but because of an increasing tangle of societal pressures.

In March, Colorado's Democratic governor urged people to observe a day without meat; the state voted in 2020 to reintroduce wolves, which prey on cattle; and real-estate developers and tourism promoters keep buying up prime ranchland.

An NGO that campaigns against animal cruelty recently sought to organize a statewide referendum that would have banned artificial insemination and the slaughter of cattle less than five years old (instead of the more typical age of less than two years).

"All of these things come together and it does create a huge emotional toll on our ranchers and our livestock producers. It's brutal," said VanWinkle, who was the previous president of the Colorado Cattlemen's Association.

In the long run, "social perception is going to change things more than drought," she said. "It's sometimes just totally overwhelming."

- 'Biggest upcyclers' -

Dean VanWinkle, who recently completed his college studies in animal science, remains convinced that the cattle-ranching industry can adapt and survive -- even flourish -- while respecting the environment.#photo2

"Cattle are the biggest upcyclers, really, that there is," he said, referring to their ability to transform hay into protein.

"Ultimately," he added, "cattle themselves are pretty much climate neutral."

That claim is widely disputed. Worldwide, cattle are responsible for 14.5 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions behind climate change, according to the United Nations.

The rate in the United States is lower, however -- four percent, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

The American industry boasts that it produces as much meat now as in 1977, but with herds that are 33 percent smaller, owing to progress in genetics and nutrition.

"The producers are extremely adaptive," said Kim Stackhouse-Lawson, who heads a sustainable livestock initiative at Colorado State University in collaboration with the industry.

Among possible developments, she mentioned breeds better adapted to different climates, new technologies like drones or computer-linked "necklaces" to guide cattle, and diversification by ranchers into eco-tourism or hunting expeditions.

"I believe that the future is bright," said Brackett Pollard, who wears two hats, as a rancher and a banker.

"We've learned through the pandemic, where prices were exceptionally high, that people are willing to pay a lot for our product," said Pollard, who raises several hundred head of cattle at his ranch near the town of Rifle.

© 2021 AFP

Walking with Myanmar's anti-junta fighters


Issued on: 11/07/2021 - 

Members of Myanmar's Karenni People Defense Force (KPDF) take part in military training at their camp near Demoso in Kayah state STR AFP

Kayah State (Myanmar) (AFP)

In their camp hidden in the forested hills of Kayah state near the Thai border, Myanmar anti-junta volunteers practice firing their homemade weapons, do physical training, and play guitar in between skirmishes with the military.

Myanmar has been in turmoil since the military ousted Aung San Suu Kyi's elected government in February and launched a bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protests.

In some areas civilians have formed "defence forces" to combat the State Administration Council, as the junta dubs itself, often using hunting rifles or weapons manufactured at makeshift factories.


"I've been away from my family more than three months," one member of the defence force at the camp told AFP on condition of anonymity.#photo1

"I will return home after this revolution."

During that time the group of roughly 60 has fought around twenty skirmishes with the Myanmar military, or Tatmadaw, he said.

Communication is patchy in the country's eastern states, and AFP was unable to verify the number of clashes.

Since the coup, fighting between Myanmar's military and rebel groups in the east of the country has displaced an estimated 100,000 people, the UN said last month.

Locals in Kayah state have accused the military of using artillery shells that have landed in villages.#photo2

That has only hardened resolve to take up arms.

"We will never forget and forgive till the end of the world" reads a tattoo across the neck of one volunteer.

The wooden rifle of another has "Spring Revolution" carved into the butt and barrel in Burmese script.

In a mixture of combat camouflage and T-shirts, the volunteers go on patrol, navigating single track paths through the jagged hills.

They practice firing their motley assemblage of weapons at a makeshift firing range.

During downtime, one plays guitar on a bench while another resting inside a tent checks his weapon.#photo3

More than 890 people have been killed by the junta's security forces since February 1, according to a local monitoring group.

As well as the rise of local self-defence forces, analysts believe hundreds of anti-coup protesters from Myanmar's towns and cities have trekked into insurgent-held areas to receive military training.

The civilian fighters are often outnumbered and outgunned in clashes with Myanmar's military -- one of Southeast Asia's most battle-hardened and brutal.#photo4

But the volunteers are determined to fight on.

"If we all fight, we will win," one told AFP.

"I believe we can win."

© 2021 AFP

G-20 finance ministers back plan to stop use of tax havens

By DAVID McHUGH


1 of 14 PROTEST PHOTOS

Italian Policemen in riot gears clash with demonstrators during a protest against the G20 Economy and Finance ministers and Central bank governors' meeting in Venice, Italy, Saturday, July 10, 2021. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Top finance officials representing most of the world’s economy have backed a sweeping revision of international taxation that includes a 15% global minimum corporate levy to deter big companies from resorting to low-rate tax havens.

Finance ministers from the Group of 20 countries endorsed the plan at a meeting Saturday in Venice.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the proposal would end a “self-defeating international tax competition” in which countries have for years lowered their rates to attract companies. She said that had been “a race that nobody has won. What it has done instead is to deprive us of the resources we need to invest in our people, our workforces, our infrastructure.”

The next steps include more work on key details at the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and then a final decision at the Group of 20 meeting of presidents and prime ministers on Oct. 30-31 in Rome.

Implementation, expected as early as 2023, would depend on action at the national level. Countries would enact the minimum tax requirement into their own laws. Other parts could require a formal treaty. The draft proposal was approved July 1 in talks among more than 130 countries convened by the OECD.

Italy hosted the finance minister’s meeting in Venice because it holds the rotating chair of the G-20, which makes up more than 80% of the world economy. The event also attracted around 1,000 protesters under the banner “We Are The Tide,” an umbrella group of environmental and social justice activists, including opponents of large cruise ships and the hordes of tourists they bring to the lagoon city. A small group scuffled Saturday with police after breaking away from an approved demonstration area.

The U.S. already has a minimum tax on overseas earnings, but President Joe Biden has proposed roughly doubling the rate to 21%, which would more than comply with the proposed global minimum. Raising the rate is part of a broader proposal to fund Biden’s jobs and infrastructure plan by raising the domestic corporate tax rate to 28% from 21%.

Yellen said she was “very optimistic” that Biden’s infrastructure and tax legislation “will include what we need for the United States to come into compliance” with the minimum tax proposal.

Republicans in the Congress have expressed opposition to the measure. Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, the top Republican on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, has blasted the OECD deal, saying, “This is an economic surrender to China, Europe and the world that Congress will reject.”

The international tax proposal aims to deter the world’s biggest firms from using accounting and legal schemes to shift their profits to countries where little or no tax is due — and where the company may do little or no actual business. Under the minimum, companies that escape taxes abroad would pay them at home. That would eliminate incentives for using tax havens or for setting them up.

From 2000-2018, U.S. companies booked half of all foreign profits in seven low-tax jurisdictions: Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Singapore and Switzerland.

A second part of the tax plan is to permit countries to tax a portion of the profits of companies that earn profits without a physical presence, such as through online retailing or digital advertising. That part arose after France, followed by other countries, imposed a digital service tax on U.S. tech giants such as Amazon and Google. The U.S. government regards those national taxes as unfair trade practices and is holding out the threat of retaliation against those countries’ imports into the U.S. through higher import taxes.

Under the tax deal, those countries would have to drop or refrain from national taxes in favor of a single global approach, in theory ending the trade disputes with the U.S. U.S. tech companies would then face only the one tax regime, instead of a multitude of different national digital taxes.

___

McHugh reported from Frankfurt, Germany.

Yellen: Compete on economic strengths, not low tax rates

By DAVID McHUGH  today

1 of 9

United States Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen speaks arrives to attend a press conference at a G20 Economy and Finance ministers and Central bank governors' meeting in Venice, Italy, Sunday, July 11, 2021. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Sunday that deterring the use of tax havens will let countries compete on economic fundamentals — instead of by offering ever-lower tax rates that deprive governments of money for infrastructure and education.

Yellen spoke after finance ministers from the Group of 20 major economies endorsed a global minimum corporate tax of at least 15%, a measure aimed at putting a floor under tax rates and discouraging companies from using low-rate countries as tax havens.

“This deal will end the race to the bottom,” she said at a news conference after the end of the meeting in Venice.

“Instead of asking the question: ‘Who can offer the lowest tax rate?,’ it will allow all of our countries to compete on the basis of economic fundamentals – on the skill of our workforces, our capacity to innovate, and the strength of our legal and economic institutions.”

“And this deal will give our nations the ability to raise the necessary funding for important public goods like infrastructure, R&D, and education.”

The global minimum proposal faces political and technical hurdles before it would take effect. Details are to be ironed out in coming weeks at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris, followed by a final endorsement by presidents and prime ministers of the Group of 20 at an Oct. 30-31 meeting in Rome.

Countries would then need to legislate the rate into their own laws. The idea is for headquarters countries to tax their companies’ foreign earnings at home if those earnings go untaxed in low-rate countries. That would remove the reason for using complex accounting schemes to move profits to subsidiaries in low-tax nations where the companies may do little or no actual business.

The U.S. already has such a tax on overseas profits, but the rate is below the 15% minimum. Congressional Republicans have expressed opposition to President Joe Biden’s proposal to raise the rate on overseas corporate profits to 21% to help pay for infrastructure and investments in clean energy. The Democratic president has only a narrow majority in Congress.

Three European Union countries that took part in talks over the minimum tax have refused to endorse the proposal. Ireland, Hungary and Estonia could obstruct adoption in Europe, where tax matters at the EU level require unanimity. Ireland, whose low tax rates are part of its pro-business economic model, has said its 12.5% headline rate is a fair rate.

The tax proposal would also give countries the right to tax part of the profits of big global companies that earn money in their jurisdiction but have no physical presence. Examples would include online retailing and digital advertising.

Some countries, led by France, have already started imposing such taxes on U.S. tech companies such as Google and Amazon. The U.S. considers such taxes to be unfair trade practices and has threatened retaliation through tariffs on imported goods. Under the tax deal, countries would drop those taxes in favor of a single global approach.

Yellen: US regulators to assess risk posed by climate change

By MARTIN CRUTSINGER

1 of 2

United States Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen arrives to attend a press conference at a G20 Economy, Finance ministers and Central bank governors' meeting in Venice, Italy, Sunday, July 11, 2021. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says she will lead an effort by top U.S. regulators to assess the potential risk that climate change poses to America’s financial system, part of a wide-ranging initiative launched by the Biden administration.

Yellen says the regulatory review, which will be done by the Financial Stability Oversight Council, will examine whether banks and other lending institutions are properly assessing the risks to financial stability. She chairs the committee, which includes Treasury, the Federal Reserve, the Securities and Exchange Commission and other financial regulators.

“The current financial system is not producing reliable disclosures,” Yellen said in remarks prepared for the Venice International Conference on Climate and released in Washington.

As part of President Joe Biden’s whole-of-government approach, Yellen said, the council will examine what should be done to improve current regulations on climate-related financial disclosures.

The council was created by Congress in 2010 to improve regulatory coordination in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.

Banking executives are concerned that the administration’s effort could lead to increased regulatory oversight that will drive up banks’ cost of doing business and lessen their ability to make loans.

Yellen said the United States also intended to enlist the support of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and other multilateral development banks to focus more resources on combating climate change. The World Bank and the regional development banks are leading sources of the loans used by poor nations for dams and other development projects.

“Developing countries are particularly vulnerable to climate change with poverty, food security and health outcomes impacted by extreme weather shocks,” Yellen said.

She said the administration is backing international efforts to mobilize $100 billion per year from a variety of public and private sources to support efforts by developing countries to combat climate change.

Yellen said she planned to convene a meeting of the heads of the international lending institutions to discuss ways to better align their efforts with the Paris climate agreement. The Trump administration pulled the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, but Biden reversed that decision after taking office this year.

Since taking over as Treasury secretary, Yellen has been one of the leading voices in the administration to boost government efforts to combat climate change.

The administration is also making a big push to include huge investments to slow global warming in the multitrillion-dollar infrastructure spending measures Biden is pushing Congress to approve. That effort has run into Republican opposition with various Biden climate initiatives striped out of a bipartisan infrastructure measure.

Environmentalists say a larger, Democratic-only package that is now being developed needs to meet Biden’s ambitious climate promises such as moving the country to carbon-free production of electricity and becoming a global leader in use of electric vehicles and the creation of millions of jobs in solar, wind and other clean-energy industries.

The Venice international conference on climate Sunday followed a meeting of finance officials from the Group of 20 major economies in Venice on Saturday. That group backed a sweeping revision of international taxation that includes a 15% global minimum tax on corporations to deter big companies from seeking out low-rate tax havens.

The measure is scheduled to be a key agenda item when Biden and other G-20 leaders meet for a summit in Rome on Oct. 30-31.

Boris Johnson’s £11.6bn climate fund to be swiped from aid budget

Exclusive: UN agreement says money should be ‘new’ – making UK stance like ‘a bailiff leaving a bunch of flowers’, prime minister told

Rob Merrick
Deputy Political Editor@Rob_Merrick

Boris Johnson’s promise of more than £11bn to help poorer countries adapt to the climate emergency will be paid for by even deeper cuts to the UK’s other overseas aid projects, The Independent has learned.

Failure to provide fresh funding leaves the prime minister’s claim to be leading the world on the environment in tatters ahead of hosting the Cop26 summit in the autumn, campaigners say.


It also breaks a United Nations-brokered agreement that the cash must be “new and additional”, they claim, with one likening it to “a bailiff leaving a bunch of flowers”.

The government has been criticised on all sides for its existing £4bn-a-year aid cuts, with a project in Malawi to help farmers adapt to climate change among the latest to have fallen victim. At least three similar schemes are expected to follow.

The World Health Organisation has already warned that “hundreds of thousands of people” will die from the cuts, amid fury that MPs have been denied the vote on the move they were promised.

Recommended
Boris Johnson must ‘turn rhetoric into action’ to tackle climate and nature crises, says top scientist

Government told to ‘stop dragging heels’ amid delay to net zero review


In Cornwall last month, the prime minister hailed his £11.6bn climate commitment to the developing world – spread over 5 years – and vowed to pester other countries to stump up cash before Cop26 in Glasgow.

“We, as the rich nations of the Earth, we need to build our credibility with those countries in asking them to make cuts in CO2,” he said- in relation to contributions to a hoped-for $100bn UN annual fund.

“Because this country, which started the Industrial Revolution, is responsible for a huge budget of carbon that’s already in the atmosphere.”

But the government has now quietly conceded that the entire £11.6bn – worth around £2.3bn each year, between 2021 and 2026 – will come from official development assistance (ODA), the aid budget.

Mr Johnson is already under fire for breaking a promise to give MPs a vote on the decision to slash aid spending from 0.7 to 0.5 per cent of national output, swiping £4bn a year from the pot.


Catherine Pettengell, UK director of the Climate Action Network, said the promise of “new and additional” resources for the flagship UN Climate Adaptation Fund was being broken.

“Reducing the aid budget, while at the same time drawing on it as the only source of climate finance, will inevitably harm the most vulnerable in society,” she said.

Tracy Carty, Oxfam’s senior climate adviser, said: “We welcome the UK’s commitment to climate finance, but when it’s coming from a declining aid budget it’s a bit like your bailiff leaving a bunch of flowers.”

And Preet Gill, the shadow international development secretary, condemned “empty greenwashing” that would hit “the world’s most vulnerable people and weaken their ability to take action on the climate crisis”.

The revelation that no new money will be made available comes after the government’s independent climate advisers warned the aid cuts are already “undermining” the climate finance pledge.

The Prosper (Promoting Sustainable Partnerships for Empowered Resilience) project in Malawi is working with farmers to “reduce the impact of climate shocks” through new agricultural practices, better irrigation and early warning systems.

But the £25m scheme, funded from the government’s Building Resilience and Adapting to Climate Change (BRACC) programme, has now been axed, despite being given an A** rating – forcing staff redundancies and the closure of four district offices.

“The cut has dealt a severe blow to our efforts to build the resilience of extremely poor communities in Malawi to adapt and cope with climate shocks such as droughts,” said Danny Harvey, executive director of the aid agency Concern Worldwide.

The world’s richest countries first committed to spending $100bn a year on a Climate Adaptation Fund to help poor nations adapt to global heating way back in 2009 – but only $79bn has been raised.

The UK is seen as being “somewhere in the middle” of the G7, behind France, Germany, Japan and Canada, but ahead of the US and Italy.

The fund recognises the “guilt” of industrialised nations – for centuries of carbon emissions – and is meant to help developing countries protect themselves against the devastating effects of global heating, while cutting their own emissions.

At Cancun in 2010, the Cop16 summit, rich countries promised funding would be “new and additional”, noting the “urgent and immediate needs of developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change”.

But the government has now revealed that the entire £11.6bn counts as ODA – meaning no extra funding will be brought forward.

Furthermore, only £1.4bn will be allocated to climate finance in 2021-22, raising fears that most of the spending will be left to the end of the five-year period.

But, in Cornwall, Mr Johnson suggested the UK had gone as far as it intends to, saying: “We are now asking other countries to make a change.

“We are going to be on everybody’s case between now and the summer, and on into the autumn, to get those commitments and to make sure that we get the world into the right place for Cop.”

The Foreign Office defended the arrangement on the grounds that the “international climate finance commitments are new and additional to any previous commitments” to the UN fund.

“While the seismic impact of the pandemic on the UK economy has forced us to take tough but necessary decisions, the UK aid budget this year will still be more than £10bn, making us one of the biggest donors in the G7,” a spokesperson said.

Philanthropists including Bill and Melinda Gates pledge £100m to cover part of UK foreign aid cut


Billionaires stepping in to partially restore the UK’s foreign aid budget has been described as ‘embarrassing’

Lamiat Sabin@LamiatSabin


The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is reported to be one of the world’s largest charities
(AP)

The government is under increasing pressure to reverse its multibillion-pound cut to foreign aid, after a group of charities and super-rich philanthropists pledged to help plug the gap with emergency funds.

Criticism of the government’s cut, which equates to a shortfall of £4 billion a year, came from Labour and the Archbishop of Canterbury.


It comes after a report revealed that the consortium of charities, which includes the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, will today pledge more than £100 million to a one-year plan to partially replace the cuts

The donation by the charities – including the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, the ELMA Foundation and Open Society Foundations – is to target projects tackling preventable diseases and offering family planning, according to The Sunday Times.

The UN’s family planning agency (UNFPA) is set to lose about 85 per cent of its funding from the UK, a cut of approximately £130m.

Prime minister Boris Johnson’s government had announced in November last year a reduction in foreign aid from 0.7 per cent of national income – which is enshrined in law – to 0.5 per cent.

The government said the financial impact of the Covid-19 pandemic had forced ministers to take “tough but necessary decisions”.

As a group of about 50 Tory MPs, including Mr Johnson’s predecessor Theresa May, continues to demand a Parliamentary vote on the government’s decision to slash the foreign aid budget

The emergency funding from the charities was welcomed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, who said it was “desperately needed”, but he called on the government to restore its commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of national income on foreign aid.

Labour’s shadow international development secretary Preet Kaur Gill said the philanthropists’ decision to step in had embarrassed the UK.

“This is a shameful moment for this Conservative government,” Ms Gill said in a statement.

“As low income countries continue to battle against the pandemic, this contribution to try and plug some of the gap left by the government’s slashing of life saving paid programmes is welcome, but it will only be able to prevent the very worst of the damage caused.

“The government’s decision to cut the aid budget, against the wishes of Parliament, has already cost lives and they must reverse it or put to a vote as soon as possible.”

A government spokesperson has said that the UK will “return to spending 0.7% of GNI [gross national income] on international development as soon as the fiscal situation allows.”

US alarmed as Saudi lawsuits threaten to expose secrets


Issued on: 11/07/2021 - 

Former Saudi spymaster Saad Aljabri has alleged in a lawsuit that Saudi Crown Prince MBS has sent assassins to kill him in Canada where he lives in exile -

 Aljabri family/AFP/File


Riyadh (AFP)

Two lawsuits pitting Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler against a former intelligence czar threaten to expose highly sensitive US government secrets, prompting Washington to consider a rare judicial intervention, documents show.

The cases in US and Canadian courts centre on corruption allegations levelled by state-owned Saudi companies against Saad Aljabri, a former spymaster who long worked closely with American officials on covert counterterrorism operations.

That marks the latest twist in a long-running feud between Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and Aljabri.

Aljabri's patron, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef (MBN), is currently in Saudi detention after being deposed as heir to the throne in a 2017 palace coup.

The legal drama sheds light on Shakespearean rivalries in the top echelons of the Saudi royal family, but Washington fears that a bitter courtroom showdown risks exposing sensitive information related to its covert operations.

A rare US Justice Department filing in a Massachusetts court in April noted Aljabri's intention to "describe information concerning alleged national security activities".

"The (US) government is considering whether and how to participate in this action, including if necessary and applicable, through an assertion of appropriate governmental privileges," the filing said, without elaborating.

In a second filing a month later, the Justice Department asked the court for more time as national security matters require "'delicate' and 'complex' judgements by senior officials".

The filing said the government was prepared to "provide further information" to the court in secret.

Legal experts have said Washington could invoke the "state secrets privilege", which would allow it to resist a court-ordered disclosure of information deemed harmful to US national security.

The CIA declined to comment to AFP. The Justice Department, which experts say only rarely intervenes in civil lawsuits, did not respond to a request for comment.

- 'Vendetta' -

Last year, Aljabri alleged in another lawsuit that MBS sent "Tiger Squad" assassins to kill him in Canada, where he lives in exile, while detaining two of his children to pressure him to return home.

The feud took a new turn this March when state-run company Sakab Saudi Holding accused Aljabri of embezzling $3.47 billion while working at the Ministry of Interior under MBN. It urged the Massachusetts court to freeze his $29 million Boston property assets.

This came weeks after multiple state-owned companies sued Aljabri in Toronto on similar allegations. A Canadian court subsequently announced a worldwide freeze of Aljabri's assets.

While denying any financial wrongdoing, Aljabri's legal team says he is caught in the rivalry between MBS and MBN, who has not been publicly seen since his detention in March 2020.

State-run Sakab, which court filings say was established in 2008 by MBN, was part of a network of front companies to provide cover for clandestine security operations with the United States.

In order to prove his innocence, the court would need to probe Sakab's finances, including how they were used to "finance sensitive programs" operated in partnership with the CIA, the US National Security Agency and the US Defense Department, said a filing by Aljabri.

"Dr Saad would never expose covert counterterrorism projects that saved thousands of lives, including Americans," a source close to the former spymaster told AFP.

"Unfortunately, MBS's blind vendetta against Dr Saad has cornered him in a position where he is compelled to do so in order to defend himself in court."

- 'Endanger lives' -

While the Justice Department considers moves to prevent any disclosure of state secrets in Massachusetts, it remains unclear how it could do the same in the Ontario court, over which it has no direct sway.

The Aljabri source acknowledged any exposure could endanger "those who participated in (counterterrorism) operations, reveal sources and methods, and hinder... similar operations in the future".

A US lawyer representing MBS declined to comment on the litigation.

But a source close to the Saudi leadership repeated multi-billion dollar corruption allegations, while accusing Aljabri of "poisoning the Saudi-US relationship".

Several US officials who have worked alongside Aljabri have voiced support for him, with some acknowledging that he was privy to sensitive information.

"Dr Saad worked directly with at least the CIA, FBI, Department of Homeland Security, White House, Department of State, and Department of the Treasury," former CIA official Philip Mudd wrote in a US court affidavit.

"When the United States had actionable intelligence or tactical information, we gave it to Dr Saad."

In its April filing, the Justice Department said it anticipated engaging with both sides to understand their positions, suggesting it was keen for an out-of-court settlement.

"The more important thing for me is that MBS is holding Dr Saad's kids, essentially extorting Dr Saad," Daniel Hoffman, a former director of the CIA's Middle East division, told AFP.

"That's very much against the humanitarian values of the United States."

© 2021 AFP