Countries agree to overhaul WHO funding

The World Health Organization has agreed to overhaul the UN health agency's funding model (AFP/Fabrice COFFRINI) (Fabrice COFFRINI)

Robin MILLARD
Tue, May 24, 2022

Shaken by the pandemic, the World Health Organization's member states agreed Tuesday to overhaul how they fund the UN health agency, giving it much more money to spend on its own priorities.

The budget revamp is aimed at strengthening the organisation and making it more agile when responding to global health crises.

The change will give the WHO a more stable income stream and control over a much bigger portion of the funding flowing through its Geneva headquarters.

"This is a historic moment," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said as the resolution was adopted at the World Health Assembly, the annual gathering of the organisation's member states which serves as its decision-making body.

He said it would transform how the WHO is funded, and how it works.

"It will give us a predictable and sustainable funding platform from which to deliver long-term programming in countries," he said.

Member states currently channel most of their cash into short-term health projects of their own choosing, which can fluctuate.

But countries will now transition towards giving half of their WHO contributions as straightforward membership fees instead, giving the organisation more flexibility.

Tedros, who was re-elected earlier Tuesday, has made overhauling the agency's finances a key plank of his leadership.

He had warned countries that it was "now or never", after the Covid-19 crisis exposed the shortcomings of the existing set-up.

"The pandemic has demonstrated why the world needs WHO, but also why the world needs a stronger, empowered and sustainably financed WHO," Tedros told the assembly.

- Room for manoeuvre -

The WHO gets its money from its 194 member states and non-governmental organisations.

Nations' membership fees -- "assessed contributions" calculated according to wealth and population -- account for less than one-fifth of the WHO's funding.

Most of it currently comes via "voluntary contributions" from member states and donors, which go towards outcomes specified by them.

The WHO therefore has limited leeway to respond to crises like Covid-19, the war in Ukraine and other health emergencies.

The membership fee portion will rise to 50 percent by the 2030-2031 budget cycle at the latest.

In return, the WHO will be expected to implement reforms, including towards more transparency on its financing and hiring.

Changing the funding model will help the WHO implement its priorities "more effectively and efficiently", Tedros said Tuesday.

Rather than spending time scrambling to find money, "You're telling us to focus on the programmes, and the funding will be taken care of."

"You are ensuring the stability of our organisation."

The approved two-year programme budget for 2022-2023 is $6.12 billion. The total is up five percent from the $5.84 billion of the 2020-2021 budget.

According to the latest figures, assessed contributions account for only $957 million, while specified voluntary contributions make up $3.7 billion, highlighting the imbalance Tedros wants to correct.

Now assessed contributions are set to go up by 20 percent in the next budget alone, to roughly $1.2 billion.

The biggest assessed contribution membership fees currently are from the United States ($219 million), China ($115 million), Japan ($82 million), Germany ($58 million) and Britain ($44 million).

- Huge discrepancy -

The new proposals were put forward by a working group tasked with finding a long-term solution for the WHO's finances.

Chairman Bjoern Kuemmel said the group found a "huge discrepancy" between what member states expected the WHO to do and how they funded the organisation.

He called the decision "groundbreaking" as it would ensure that the WHO "adequately equipped and able to be the leading coordinating authority on global health".

"This is not about new money, this is about better money, truly enabling WHO to do what member states expect WHO to do," he told reporters afterwards.

"Members are ready to walk the talk.

"These recommendations will make WHO fit for purpose in being the leading organisation in pandemic preparedness and response."

rjm/nl/pvh

Turkish minister aims to boost Palestinian economy in rare West Bank trip

Turkish FM Mevlut Cavusoglu (L) shakes hands with Palestinian FM Riad Al-Malki, in the West Bank town of Ramallah, Tuesday, May 24, 2022. (AP)

Updated 24 May 2022

Turkey signed nine new pacts with the embattled Palestinian Authority

Cavusoglu will meet Israeli officials on Wednesday, the latest step in a diplomatic thaw between Ankara and the Jewish state


RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: Turkey’s top diplomat announced Tuesday a raft of new agreements to bolster the struggling Palestinian economy, during the first high-level Turkish visit to the Israeli-occupied West Bank in 15 years.

During Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu’s trip to Ramallah, Turkey signed nine new pacts with the embattled Palestinian Authority, ranging from agriculture to education and trade.

Cavusoglu will meet Israeli officials on Wednesday, the latest step in a diplomatic thaw between Ankara and the Jewish state. He will also make a private visit to the Al-Asqa mosque compound in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem.

Alongside his Palestinian counterpart Riyad Al-Maliki, Cavusoglu pledged to push ahead with plans for the construction of an industrial zone in the Palestinian territories.
“The necessary order has been given; there is no luxury for evading and delaying this project,” he said, also setting a $2 billion annual bilateral trade target and pledging more scholarships with Palestinians to study in Turkey.

The World Bank warned this month that the Palestinian economy was in a “precarious” state, with the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority — a major West Bank employer — only paying partial wages since November.

Maliki described Cavusoglu’s visit as “historic” and reflecting the “special relationship between the two countries.”

Turkey has long been a vocal supporter of the Palestinian cause, but visits to the West Bank had been obstructed by a 15-year diplomatic rupture between Ankara and Israel.
Israel and Turkey proclaimed a new era in relations following President Isaac Herzog’s visit to Ankara and Istanbul in March.

Cavusoglu’s Ramallah visit came as fresh violence rocked the West Bank flashpoint of Jenin.

Israel’s army said a shootout erupted between troops and Palestinians during the latest in a series of operations in the Jenin area, with a man suspected of “terrorist activity” arrested.

Three Palestinians were wounded, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

Billionaires promote CO2-removing schemes to protect climate

Billions of tonnes of CO2 must be sucked from the air and oceans to avoid catastrophic climate change (AFP/Hussein FALEH)

Charlotte DURAND
Tue, May 24, 2022, 8:34 AM·4 min read

The boss of NetZero still can't believe his start-up has won a million-dollar prize from Elon Musk to improve ways of sucking climate-heating carbon dioxide (CO2) from the air.

"That'll fund a year of R&D (research and development)... or two-thirds of a factory," Axel Reinaud told AFP.

The XPrize Carbon Removal competition, set up by the billionaire Tesla boss, is a response to the scary conclusion reached by the world's top climate scientists.

However quickly the world slashes man-made greenhouse gas emissions, it will still need to extract CO2 from the air and oceans to avoid climate catastrophe, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in April.

Today, CO2 removal is a necessary weapon in the battle to stop global heating accelerating beyond a point of no return.

Technology to do so exists but remains prohibitively expensive. It also needs to be ramped up significantly to make a dent in the 40 billion tonnes of CO2 the world emits each year.

So private-sector giants are stepping in to kick-start research, as they did with vaccines and the first aeroplanes.

The $100-million (93-million-euro) XPrize initiative is a bid to foster low-cost solutions for sucking up huge quantities of CO2 every year and stocking it for ever.

The top prize will be announced in 2025.

NetZero has already scooped up one of the 15 early-stage awards for an astute economic model.

It burns farm waste, which contains CO2, and turns it into "biochar", a kind of "carbon dust" used to enrich the soil.

The heat generated by burning is captured to generate renewable electricity, which is sold to the grid.

In all, NetZero says it can remove a tonne of CO2 for just a few dozen dollars.

In North America, companies like Alphabet, Meta, McKinsey, Shopify and Stripe have agreed to invest $925 million in fostering carbon removal schemes between now and 2030.

The First Movers Coalition, an alliance of some 50 firms from sectors where emissions are hard to reduce such as aviation, shipping and cement, has also committed to financing carbon removal technology.

- Tried and tested method -

Today, research on removing carbon from the atmosphere is conspicuous by its near-absence.

The process is "extremely difficult to manage", French science historian Amy Dahan told AFP. "Musk's idea is to give this field of research a higher profile," she explained.

This is a tried and tested method.

In the 1920s the Orteig prize, which promised $25,000 to the first aviator to fly non-stop from New York to Paris, spurred developments that changed the history of aviation.

More recently, Microsoft founder Bill Gates's promise of finance has done much to accelerate vaccine research since 2010.

But the $100 million for R&D into carbon capture and storage "is in another league altogether", Dahan said.

The US-based Climate Foundation has also received a significant boost from the XPrize.

It uses seaweed to absorb carbon from surface ocean waters. When the algae decompose, they sink to the ocean depths, taking the trapped carbon with them.

The prize money will help it grow its first hectare of seaweed platform, founder Brian Von Herzen told AFP.

He is conscious, though, that such philanthropic incentives are a drop in the ocean.

"Such prizes, including carbon purchases made by Stripe and Microsoft, are important but insufficient first steps to building out a robust carbon removal ecosystem," he said.

"We have to start scaling up these solutions right now. In fact, we're already late," NetZero's Reinaud added.

"We should have started 20 years ago. We're behind on all climate issues."

- A drop in the ocean -

The vital goal is to remove billions of tonnes of CO2 every year -- before 2050 -- to prevent the average temperature of the planet rising more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.

This is critical to avoid large and irreversible changes to the climate.

At present, the world is only removing "microscopic" quantities of CO2, Reinaud said.

Instead, we need to build "something as huge as the oil industry in just 30 years", which requires investments equivalent to "several percentage points of GDP" rather than the current "peanuts".

Dahan agreed. Billionaires would do better to stop greenwashing and change their carbon-spewing business models, she said.

"Of course, we need them to take part in this effort," she said, but what we really need are binding government policies and international agreements.

Despite the $3.5 billion the US government has pledged to invest in carbon removal, "governments aren't grabbing this problem by the horns", she said.

cdu/ico/spi/gil/imm

THE REALITY IS THAT CCS IS NOT GREEN NOR CLEAN IT IS GOING TO BE USED TO FRACK OLD DRY WELLS

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-myth-of-carbon-capture-and-storage.html

ALSO SEE https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=CCS

Zimbabwe rallies allies to push for legal ivory trade

QUIT BURNING POACHED IVORY

FLOOD THE MARKET WITH IT 

DRIVE THE PRICE DOWN


In much of Africa, poaching and habitat loss have seen elephant numbers decline 

(AFP/LUIS TATO)

Tue, May 24, 2022

Zimbabwe will this week press a drive to legalise the ivory trade, inviting officials from 15 nations to meet in a national park that's a beacon of success in protecting elephants.

Hwange National Park is overflowing with elephants, which now routinely wander outside the boundaries to feed, sometimes running into deadly conflicts with people living in the surrounds.

Zimbabwe and its neighbours in southern Africa have seen their elephant herds thrive in recent years and are now home to about 70 percent of the continent's elephants.

That's a markedly different story than in the rest of Africa, where poaching and habitat loss have seen numbers declining.

Zimbabwe, by contrast, is home to 100,000 elephants -- nearly double the number that conservationists say the country's parks can support.

Elephants require vast areas for feeding. Even Hwange, a park nearly half the size of Belgium, isn't big enough to support its population.

Zimbabwe and other countries with large herds say they're left protecting vast stockpiles of ivory they can't sell to raise funds for either conservation work or to support communities affected by the growing elephant numbers.

"These are pertinent issues that are difficult to address in a balanced manner," Tourism and Environment Minister Mangaliso Ndhlovu said in a statement.

Zimbabwe last week urged European ambassadors to allow a one-off sale of $600 million worth of elephant ivory, kept in a warehouse outside central Harare.

International trade in ivory and elephants has been banned since 1989 under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). One-off sales were allowed in 1999 and 2008, despite fierce opposition.

Countries in southern Africa say the ban prevents them even from supporting each other's conservation efforts, for example, by moving elephants from Zimbabwe to countries that want to repopulate.

The conference brings together countries likely to support a legalisation move, including China and Japan, where ivory is highly prized.

Kenya and Tanzania, which fear legalisation will encourage more poaching, were not invited. But the island nations of Seychelles and Madagascar, which have no elephants, are attending.

- Dangerous signal -

A collection of 50 anti-ivory trade organisations issued a statement warning that opening the ivory market would decimate the African herd, which in some regions is near extinction.

"The conference is sending a dangerous signal to poachers and criminal syndicates that elephants are mere commodities, and that ivory trade could be resumed heightening the threat to the species," they said.

But growing elephant herds pose real dangers to nearby communities.

Zimbabwe says 60 people have been killed by elephants so far this year, compared with 72 in all of last year.

"Governments of elephant range states are faced with social and political pressures on why elephants are prioritised over their own life and livelihoods," Ndhlovu said.

str-gs/bp

'Government of shame': French minister accused of rape, sparking calls for protest

Issued on: 24/05/2022 - 

01:47French Minister Damien Abad arrives for the first weekly cabinet meeting of new Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne on May 23, 2022. © Ludovic Marin, AFP

Text by: FRANCE 24
Video by: Yinka OYETADE

A French NGO has called for protests Tuesday against what it called a “government of shame” after a newly appointed government minister was accused of rape and sexual assault by two women. Damien Abad, France’s new minister of social services, the elderly and the disabled, becomes the latest government minister to be facing sexual assault allegations.

The controversy over Damien Abad is a major headache for French President Emmanuel Macron and his new prime minister, Élisabeth Borne, as they try to build and maintain political momentum ahead of June parliamentary elections.

Abad on Monday denied allegations published over the weekend that he raped two woman more than a decade ago.

"I contest the accusations against me with the greatest firmness,” he said, adding: “I have never raped a single woman in my life."

Facing calls to step down, Abad has refused. "Should an innocent man resign? I don't think so," he told reporters in his constituency of Ain in eastern France.

Abad’s appointment as minister for social services and people with disabilities in a cabinet reshuffle announced Friday was seen as a major coup for Macron, as the 42-year-old Abad had defected from the conservative Les Républicains opposition party.

But the next day, the Mediapart investigative news site reported that a watchdog group created by members of France's #MeToo movement – the Observatory of Sexist and Sexual violence in Politics (Observatoire des violences sexistes et sexuelles) – had informed prosecutors that two women had claimed that Abad raped them in 2010 and 2011. The group had also informed Macron's party, the report said.

For Madeline Da Silva of the Observatory, which called for protests Tuesday, Damien Abad simply "cannot remain a minister".

'People knew, but preferred to look away'

One of Abad's accusers told Mediapart that she blacked out after accepting a glass of champagne and woke up in her underwear and in pain with Abad in a hotel room in 2010. She believes she may have been drugged.

She did not file an official complaint but prosecutors are looking into the case following a report filed by the Observatory.

The other woman, named only as Margaux, said that her sexual encounter with Abad in 2011 began as consensual but she accuses him of having then forced anal sex upon her.

The report said she informed the police in 2012 but had declined to make a formal complaint. Her subsequent claim in 2017 was dismissed by prosecutors.

"I'm relieved that it's come out, because I knocked on quite a few doors so that someone would do something after the case was dismissed, as I thought it was unfair," Margaux told AFP on Sunday.

"A lot of people knew, but some preferred to look away rather than ask more questions," she added.

In 2012, Abad became the first disabled person to be elected to France's lower-house National Assembly and was the leader of Les Républicains party MPs until he joined Macron's government last week.

In an earlier statement denying the allegations, Abad said his disability meant he was incapable of committing the crimes of which he is accused.

Abad has arthrogryposis, a rare condition that affects the joints, which he said means sexual relations can only occur with the help of a partner.

The government's new spokeswoman, Olivia Grégoire, said Monday that Macron and his government had been aware of the allegations when Abad was appointed but said the judicial process must run its course.

"The government supports those who, following assault or harassment, have the immense courage to speak out," Grégoire told reporters. To her knowledge, "no other procedure against Damien Abad is in the works", she said.

But several politicians on the left did not hesitate in calling for his resignation.

"If I were prime minister, I would tell Damien Abad: 'I have no particular reason to believe the women are lying ... While we wait for a decision from the judicial system, I wish for you not to be part of this government'," Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure told France Inter radio.

Green politician Sandrine Rousseau also called for Abad to go. "We need to send a loud message to women that their voices count," Rousseau told RTL radio.
A troubling series

Abad is not the first of Macron's ministers to be facing sexual assault allegations.

Macron's decision to appoint hardline Gérald Darmanin as interior minister in 2020 – although he had been accused of rape, sexual harassment and abuse of power – drew heavy criticism and sparked protests. Darmanin was accused of raping a woman who sought his help in having her criminal record expunged in 2009. The rape investigation was dropped in 2018 but judges ordered it reopened the following year. The inquiry was eventually closed without charges being filed.

Macron's justice minister, Éric Dupond-Moretti, has repeatedly come under fire for his antiquated remarks about women. Dupond-Moretti has acknowledged that "predatory men" exist but hastened to add that so do women "who are attracted to power". He cited the hypothetical example of an ambitious "starlette" who decides to sleep with a man to get ahead, referring to it as a "couch promotion".

Other remarks from Dupond-Moretti have also sparked controversy, including his belief that “some women regret not being whistled at”. He has bemoaned a certain "social hysteria", noting that actions that once would have been considered minor are now taken more seriously. "What was once considered rakish is now a crime," he once lamented.

The path forward has already proven rocky for Macron's party, particularly after the Élysée Palace announced that gender parity issues would be a priority of the president's second mandate.

Jérôme Peyrat, a parliamentary candidate from Macron's Renaissance party, was forced to withdraw this week after controversy over his 2020 domestic violence conviction began threatening the party's chances in upcoming June elections. A robust defence of Peyrat by party leader Stanislas Guerini only added fuel to fire, sparking outrage from left-leaning candidates and prompting the daily Libération to ask why the party would have considered fielding Peyrat as a candidate in the first place.

Kerry warns against letting Ukraine war thwart climate efforts

Issued on: 24/05/2022 - 

US climate envoy John Kerry and Chinese counterpart Xie Zhenhua met in Davos 

Fabrice COFFRINI AFP

Davos (Switzerland) (AFP) – US climate envoy John Kerry warned Tuesday against using the energy crisis stemming from Russia's invasion of Ukraine as an excuse to build up more fossil fuel infrastructure.

Kerry made the plea at the World Economic Forum of global business and political leaders in the Swiss ski village of Davos, where the climate crisis is among the top concerns.

"We should not allow a false narrative to be created that what has happened in Ukraine somehow obviates the need to continue forward and to accelerate even what we are trying to do to address the crisis of the climate," Kerry said.

"No one should believe that the crisis of Ukraine is an excuse to suddenly build out the old kind of infrastructure that we had," he told a news conference.

Moscow's invasion of Ukraine has sent energy prices soaring over supply concerns as Russia is among the world's top producers of oil, natural gas and coal.

The European Union is aiming to cut Russian gas imports by two-thirds this year, and the bloc is debating whether to impose an oil embargo on the country.

The EU fears that Russia could seize on the bloc's dependence on its gas supplies to hold countries hostage over their opposition to the Ukraine war.

Kerry later told a panel discussion that the war had fuelled the argument that it "means you're going to drill a lot more and pump a lot more" to meet Europe's gas needs.

While Europe needs to find alternative gas supplies, it can be done in ways that do not require massive new infrastructure, including by investing in renewable technologies and tapping shale gas, Kerry said.

"We can meet... the crisis of Ukraine and the energy crisis of Europe and still deal, as we must, with the climate crisis," he said.

Kerry appeared on the panel alongside China's climate envoy, Xie Zhenhua, who warned that the world is "facing greater challenge than before."

"Here we would like to urge all countries to work together to overcome the challenges in front of us," Xie said. "We have to turn our pledges into concrete action."
'Wrong direction'

The United States and China -- the world's two top economies and biggest polluters -- unveiled a joint pact on the sidelines of the Glasgow climate summit last year to accelerate action against greenhouse gas emissions.

The US has said it plans to be carbon neutral by 2050, while China has set a net-zero target for 2060 with coal consumption to peak at 2030.

The Glasgow summit resulted in nearly 200 nations pledging to speed up the fight against rising temperatures, though the agreement was criticised by activists as falling short of what is needed to save the planet.

Scientists say capping global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius requires a 45-percent drop in emissions by 2030 and carbon neutrality by mid-century.

Noting that emissions rose six percent last year and coal use jumped nine percent, Kerry said: "Wrong direction folks, (and) that's before Ukraine."

© 2022 AFP

Danish Jehovah's Witness released after 5 years in Russian jail


Dennis Christensen escorted in to hear the court's verdict in February 2019

 (AFP/Mladen ANTONOV) (Mladen ANTONOV)


Tue, May 24, 2022

Dennis Christensen, a Danish Jehovah's Witness, was released from Russian jail on Tuesday and will have to leave the country, the US-based Christian evangelical movement said.

In the first such conviction since Russia outlawed the religious movement in 2017, Christensen was sentenced to six years in prison in 2019.

His case has drawn worldwide condemnation.

"Dennis Christensen has been released from prison. For his faith, he spent a total of 5 years behind bars," the movement said in a statement Tuesday.

Christensen must leave Russia overnight n the night of May 24-25, the statement said.

About 130 people gathered in front of a penal colony in the town of Lgov in the region of Kursk in central Russia to greet Christensen but members of Russia's migration service took him to Moscow, the religious movement said.

Christensen -- who is married to a Russian -- was arrested during a prayer meeting in the southern Russian city of Oryol in 2017.

Russia brands the US evangelical Christian movement, which was set up in the late 19th century and preaches non-violence, as a totalitarian sect and in 2017 designated it an extremist organisation and ordered its dissolution in the country.

bur/pvh

Haiti's colonial debt burden sparks debate -- but official silence

Amélie BARON
Tue, 24 May 2022

Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince -- the country was forced to pay France back after it gained independence (AFP/Ricardo ARDUENGO) (Ricardo ARDUENGO)

A newspaper expose has reignited debate over the ongoing legacy of debts that Haiti was forced to pay to former colonial ruler France in the 19th century -- but the country's elites are surprisingly keen to bury the issue.

After months of poring over archives, The New York Times estimated that debt payments starting in 1825 cost poverty-stricken Haiti between $21 billion and $115 billion -- or as much as eight times its GDP in 2020.

In Haiti, the figures have added fresh fuel to a fierce debate that stands in stark contrast to the silence from authorities in the capital Port-au-Prince and the political opposition.

"Haitian politicians have the unfortunate tendency to work only in the present," Haitian historian Pierre Buteau told AFP.

"Men and women in politics are only interested in the fight to gain power."

Haitian leaders' reluctance to speak out about the country having to pay France back after it gained independence also partly stems from a pattern of Western intervention in Haiti in the recent past.

In 2003, then president Jean-Bertrand Aristide made the debt issue a rallying cry, and estimated that France took in more than $21 billion from Haiti.

But, facing a military insurrection and a popular revolt alleging human rights violations, Aristide was overthrown in 2004, under strong pressure from the United States, France and Canada.

Questioned nearly 20 years later by The New York Times, the French ambassador at the time, Thierry Burkard, admitted that Aristide's removal was "probably a bit about" his call for reparations from France.

When it declared independence in 1804, Haiti became the world's first black-ruled republic and an outcast in an era dominated by countries that engaged in slavery.

It had to pay France for the freedom of its citizens who had been slaves -- and was pitched into impossibly heavy repayments, rapid defaults and toxic loans from France.

"The way in which over the course of 150 years Haiti had to pay France for having wanted to be free... compromised Haiti's very insertion on the international scene," French economist Thomas Piketty said in 2019 as he promoted his book "Capital and Ideology" in which he tackled how Haiti incurred colossal debt.

- 'Shine a light on this past' -

The payments to France not only denied Haiti critically needed resources -- they also helped build up France itself.

The Times showed that in the late 19th century a bank called CIC repatriated money from the new Haitian national bank that came from loans that were supposed to help Haiti pay off its debt.

The money in turn helped Parisian banks to finance the construction of the Eiffel Tower.

The current parent company of CIC, Credit Mutuel, released a statement Monday in response to the Times investigation.

"As it is important to clarify all the components of the history of colonization, including in the 1870s, the bank will finance independent university research to shine a light on this past," Credit Mutuel said.

Reaction to the New York Times investigation was mixed, with some experts and academics accusing it of downplaying Aristide's crimes to emphasize the narrative that he was ousted for seeking for reparations from France.

US former diplomat Patrick Gaspard, whose parents were from Haiti, said it was "an inexplicable whitewashing on the internal violence and corruption in the Aristide era that can't just be explained away by pointing to France and the US."

In its articles, the Times also showed that Haiti's gold reserves were raided by American soldiers at the start of the 20th century.

"In the drowsy hours of a December afternoon, eight American Marines strolled into the headquarters of Haiti’s national bank and walked out with $500,000 in gold, packed in wooden boxes," the Times wrote.

This was prior to a full scale US invasion of Haiti by the US army, which occupied the country from 1915 to 1934.

The US retained direct control over Haiti's finances for more than a decade after US troops went back home.

Haiti today is mired by grinding poverty, murderous gangs who control large parts of the capital, and political chaos that included the assassination of the president last year.

amb/dax/dw/bgs

LEBENSRAUM

Population decline in Russia: ‘Putin has no other choice but to win’ in Ukraine

Cyrielle CABOT 

With a slumping birth rate, a death rate on the rise and immigration slowly falling, Russia is experiencing population decline. Despite having launched some of the most encouraging childbirth policies, Putin is now facing a “major problem for someone who believes population is synonymous with power”, says French demographer Laurent Chalard.

© Yuri Kadobnov, AFP

Russia’s population has been declining at a dizzying rate for the past 30 years. The demographic trend has been steadfast since 1991, when the Soviet Union fell and Russia counted 148.2 million inhabitants within its far-reaching borders. By 2021, that number had fallen to 146.1 million, according to Russian statistics agency Rosstat. What’s even more striking is that, according to demographic projections, the country’s population will continue to fall and reach between 130 and 140 million inhabitants by 2050.

“Russia is paying the cost of the 90s,” explains Alain Blum, a demographer at the National Institute for Demographic Studies (INED) in France. “When the Soviet Union fell, the country plunged into a serious demographic crisis. For the first time, Russia’s mortality rate significantly exceeded its birth rate, leading to a decline in its population.” By the early 2000s, Russia had a population of only 143 million.

“Today, people of childbearing age are those who were born during that period, and there simply aren’t enough of them to drive population growth,” the researcher explains. Especially given that Russia is also facing an increased mortality rate at the moment as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Childbirth policies and migration

But that’s not to say that President Vladimir Putin, who came to power in 2000, hasn’t made efforts to curb the trend. In addition to modernising hospitals and improving healthcare options, he also launched a major set of childbirth policies. “Russia has become one of the most encouraging countries in this regard,” Chalard, who specialises in population movements, points out.

“In recent years, the government has set up financial aid programmes for parents, family allowance systems, bonuses for large families…” Chalard goes on, “Not to mention very active propaganda around the issue. Putin himself regularly advocates for family values and calls on the population to have kids in his public speeches.”

At the same time, Putin has pursued a vast migration policy by opening Russian borders to immigrant workers who often come from Central Asia, facilitating naturalisation procedures for Russian speakers and giving out Russian passports to inhabitants of neighbouring countries. But these migratory movements were stopped dead in their tracks due to Covid-19.

‘Putin is obsessed’

“Putin is obsessed with this demographic issue,” says Chalard. “In his mind, the power of a country is linked to the size of its population. The larger the population, the more powerful the state.”

Following this mindset, Putin presented the demographic crisis as a “historic challenge” in January 2020, and assured his country that “Russia’s destiny and its historic prospects depend on how numerous we will be”.

In the face of this, population decline is clearly a key motivator for Russia in its war against Ukraine, Chalard and Blum agree. Ukraine has a population of 44 million people who are mostly of Slavic descent from the former Soviet bloc. For Putin, the invasion is not only about capturing territory he believes belongs to Russia, but about gaining control over a population he wants to ‘integrate’ into the country.

In its latest population census, Moscow has included the 2.4 million inhabitants of the Donbas, parts of which were administered by pro-Russia separatists before the current invasion. For several weeks now, the Kremlin has also decided to refocus its efforts in the east of Ukraine with one objective in mind: organising local referendums on potential integration into Russia.

Consequences of the war in Ukraine

Seeing as the war in Ukraine doesn’t seem to be ending anytime soon, could this ambition to boost population growth backfire on Putin and, conversely, worsen the demographic crisis?

“If I take Ukrainian sources into account, Russia has sent 165,000 soldiers into Ukraine. That’s nothing compared to the total population, meaning deaths from the war will have a very small impact on Russian demography,” says Chalard. “Unless the situation turns into a global conflict and forces Russia to considerably increase its troop deployment.”

“On the other hand, this demographic anxiety could explain why Moscow is somewhat reluctant to send more soldiers to the front line. The government is well aware that limiting troop losses is important, especially young ones,” the demographer adds.

But the war could also catalyse another phenomenon: Russia’s brain drain. According to the Financial Times, some 150,000 people working in new technologies have fled the country. Many of them have settled in Israel or Turkey, countries stepping up their efforts to attract this wave of workers. “Once again, the impact on countrywide demographics will be limited since the phenomenon is quite marginal. On the other hand, from an economic point of view, this [trend] could have a significant impact in a context already troubled by sanctions,” Chalard explains.

No trust, no babies

Alexey Raksha, a Russian demographer living in Moscow, is already predicting a sharp drop in childbirth over the coming months as a reaction to the war in Ukraine, but above all to the economic crisis linked to the sanctions. “During economic crises, people are less inclined to have children, which is logical,” he explains. “Trust in the future plays a key role in a country’s birth rate.”

“The war will affect births from December,” Raksha predicts. “We’ll see the effects as early as 2023. It’s going to be a bad year for childbirth in Russia. And the following year won’t be much better,” he concludes. His predictions are supported by the latest statistics from Rosstat, which reported a 5 percent drop in births in the first quarter of 2022 compared to last year.

“I think that everything will depend on who wins the war,” adds Chalard. “If Russia wins, the resulting joy could lead to a boom in births. But losing and getting bogged down in an economic crisis will have the opposide effect,” he says. “What is certain is that Putin has his back against the wall. From a demographic point of view, he has no other choice but to win.”

This article has been translated from the original in French.

Premier League Approve Todd Boehly-Led Takeover of Chelsea
Nick Emms - 6h ago


The Premier League have approved the Todd Boehly-led consortium's takeover of Chelsea.

The American-Swiss party are now set to be officially unveiled as the new owners of Chelsea before the May 31 deadline.

This comes as the Premier League released a statement, confirming their takeover has now been approved.

The statement reads: "The Premier League Board has today (Tuesday) approved the proposed takeover of Chelsea Football Club by the Todd Boehly/Clearlake Consortium.

"The purchase remains subject to the Government issuing the required sale licence and the satisfactory completion of the final stages of the transaction.

"The Board has applied the Premier League’s Owners’ and Directors’ Test (OADT) to all prospective Directors, and undertaken the necessary due diligence.

"The members of the Consortium purchasing the club are affiliates of the Clearlake Capital Group, L.P., Todd Boehly, Hansjorg Wyss and Mark Walter.

"Chelsea FC will now work with the relevant Governments to secure the necessary licences to complete the takeover."


© Provided by Absolute Chelsea on FanNationIMAGO / PA Images

It remains to be seen as to when an official announcement will take place, with the UK Government now set to issue new licences for Chelsea to complete the takeover.

BBC News journalist Dan Roan has now reported that the takeover could be struck tonight, with final technical details being discussed.

The news will come as a much needed boost to Chelsea and Thomas Tuchel, who will now look to plan for the future ahead of the summer transfer window.