Ex-UN expert says China, Russia sabotaging North Korea sanctions investigations

Eric Penton-Voak says Beijing and Moscow have diluted UN Panel of Experts report, months after being forced to step down

Anton Sokolin August 4, 2023

Former coordinator of the U.N. Panel of Experts Eric Penton-Voak at a press conference on Aug. 4, 2023 | Image: NK News

The former head of the U.N. Panel of Experts overseeing North Korea sanctions chastised Russia and China on Friday for obstructing the panel’s work and sabotaging its investigations.

Eric Penton-Voak, a former British diplomat with 30 years of service, served as coordinator of the panel tasked with monitoring the DPRK sanctions regime from May 2021 to April 2023. He was forced to vacate his post due to the disagreement over his role between representatives of the P3 members (the U.S., U.K. and France) and China and Russia.

“Two colleagues on the panel act consistently in the interests of their own countries, and they misuse the principle of consensus in order to prevent the panel from reaching the conclusions it really should as an independent organization,” Penton-Voak said in a press briefing hosted by NK Pro, confirming that he was referring to panel members from Russia and China.

The panel currently consists of eight members: one from each of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, as well as from South Korea, Japan and Singapore.

“They are obviously influenced in this by the views of their own capital cities and can’t possibly allow the panel to say anything that would not be acceptable” in Beijing or Moscow, Penton-Voak said.

Speaking about the panel’s upcoming report on DPRK sanctions, the former U.N. expert said the document “is seriously diluted and doesn’t say what it could and should” due to the opposition of two of the panel members.

While Penton-Voak said the report includes “a wealth of detail” on entities and individuals in breach of U.N. sanctions, he underscored that the document fails to “make strategic conclusions” that are the basis for giving recommendations to U.N. member states. 

He said that the panel’s “effectiveness is enormously reduced,” as the expert group is unable to reach those strategic conclusions that it “could and should be reaching.” 

“It is the strategic issues it should be discussing or simply [the fact] that these sanctions are not implemented by major states.”

He also said that the recent visit of the Russian and Chinese delegations to North Korea to participate in massive military celebrations “speaks volumes about the future of the sanctions regime.”

“I think to have two representatives of two permanent members of the Security Council applauding the Hwasong-17, a strategic weapon that was created entirely in breach of sanctions — it says it all.”

DPRK ARMS FOR RUSSIA

In January, the U.S. presented satellite imagery of a train that it said carried arms from North Korea to Russia, after previously accusing the DPRK of providing arms for Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The contents of the containers, however, have remained unverified to date.

The panel included this imagery in its latest report released in March, but this triggered a backlash from Moscow and Beijing. Soon after, they voiced strong opposition to Penton-Voak’s role as the panel’s coordinator, putting its operations in question.

Penton-Voak acknowledged that the panel “has not found any evidence” of North Korea supplying weapons to Russia, but he said this “doesn’t mean that it’s not happening.”

“Were Russia to be purchasing DPRK weapons, that would be an egregious breach of sanctions,” the expert said, stating that “the arms embargo is fundamental to the sanctions regime.”

According to Penton-Voak, even in the absence of clear-cut evidence of the suspected transfer of arms, “some of the story about the export of weapons appears to be true.”

Asked about the panel’s decision to present the unconfirmed evidence in the report, he said that “it would have been wrong for the panel not to have included what it had found,” stating that “it was an extremely important and widely reported story.”

The Financial Times reported last week that Ukrainian forces confirmed that they are using North Korean rockets, which Kyiv suggested had been seized from a ship by a third country or captured by Ukraine. 

CHINA-DPRK SANCTIONED TRADE

Penton-Voak also raised concern about China’s behavior as it appears to continue to defy U.N. sanctions restricting trade with North Korea.

NK Pro has found that Beijing supplied over $350,000 worth of sanctioned goods to Pyongyang in possible violation of U.N. resolutions in the first half of 2023. China has justified such shipments in the past by arguing that it does not consider certain goods subject to sanctions.

Penton-Voak said that China’s acts “definitely undermine the U.N. mandate and its efforts to investigate sanctions evasions.” Moreover, Beijing’s equivocal stance on the DPRK sanctions regime “does call into question the whole U.N. system,” he noted.

“The sanctions on the DPRK were unanimously agreed, and if member states decide that they changed their mind, they need to say so, rather than pretending to be implementing when they are really not.”

“The point about sanctions is that they’re an alternative to war — they’re actually a pretty good thing,” he said, adding that “sanctions need to be implemented to be effective.”

Edited by Bryan Betts

Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon fell 66% in July

An agent of the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA) inspects a tree extracted from the Amazon rainforest, in a sawmill during an operation to combat deforestation, in Placas, Para State, Brazil on Jan 20.
PHOTO: Reuters

PUBLISHED ONAUGUST 04, 2023 

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SAO PAULO/BRASILIA - Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon fell in July to its lowest level for the month since 2017, preliminary government figures showed on Thursday (Aug 3), boosting President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's stature on environmental policy ahead of a summit of rainforest nations.

Satellite data from Brazilian space research agency INPE indicated that 500 square kilometres of rainforest were cleared in the month, a 66 per cent drop from the same period a year ago.

In the first seven months of the year, deforestation has fallen a cumulative 42.5 per cent from the same period of 2022, INPE's preliminary data showed.

Sequential drops in June and July are especially promising, as monthly data on Amazon deforestation often spikes this time of year, when the weather turns drier.

"We are seeing the deforestation growth curve invert," Environment Ministry secretary Joao Paulo Capobianco told reporters in Brasilia.

The fresh figures come as Lula gathers next week with leaders of Amazonian countries for a summit in northern Brazil to discuss ways to protect the world's largest rainforest.

Lula said on Wednesday the summit would seek to draw up a common policy for the first time to protect the region, which will include dealing with security along the borders and asking private businesses to help with the reforestation of 30 million hectares of degraded land.

The leftist leader took office in January promising to end deforestation by 2030 after destruction surged under his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, who slashed environmental protection efforts.

Experts praised the reduction in deforestation in the early months of the Lula administration, while calling for continued vigilance in the coming months, when fires and clear-cutting often peak in the region.

"It's a very significant drop for a drier month," said WWF-Brasil manager Mariana Napolitano.

"That shows us that the emergency measures that were taken, especially command and control ones, have been working. But deforestation remains at high levels, and to zero it by 2030 more structural measures will be needed."

ALSO READ: Indonesia cites deforestation decline from stricter controls

Bosnian Genocide commemoration in Tuzla: ‘We don’t harbor hatred, but we will never forget’

Cultivating a culture of memory encourages forgiveness and continual remembrance

Written byBalkan Diskurs

Posted 4 August 2023 

Announcement of the 2023 Bosnian genocide commemoration events — reading the names of 8372 persons killed in Srebrenica — on a street in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Photo by the Students’ Council of the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Tuzla, used with permission.

This article by Ramo Tučić was originally published on Balkan Diskurs, a project of the Post-Conflict Research Center (PCRC). An edited version has been republished by Global Voices under a content sharing agreement.

Every June and July, the Srebrenica genocide is commemorated in Tuzla, where many survivors came after the fall of Srebrenica in July 1995. This  year the annual commemoration featured demonstrations demanding justice and emphasizing the importance of remembrance, a commemorative march, a recitation of the names of the genocide victims, and various other cultural activities and events. The message of the commemoration is clear: “We don’t hate, but we will never forget.”

Nura Begović, president of the Women of Srebrenica Association, lost 18 members of her immediate family in the genocide. The process of locating and identifying the remains of her relatives brought renewed pain, but also relief. Her loved ones who were killed in the genocide have all been laid to rest in the Srebrenica Memorial Center Cemetery in Potočari, with the exception of her aunt, whose remains have not yet been found. Many of her relatives’ remains were found only in part, with the remains of her brother being the least complete.

“Not knowing where the remains of your loved ones are hurts the most. But when you find the remains, only then do you see the true extent of the crime. Only then do you understand what they did to your loved ones,” Begović said.

Regarding the 28th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide, she says that the persistence of genocide denial is very painful. “You lose everyone in the genocide and then someone says the genocide never happened. It’s very painful and it hurts. It’s like I had never had anyone,” she said.

On the 11th of every month, the Women of Srebrenica hold a demonstration in Tuzla to ensure the genocide is never forgotten as well as to demand justice. “We demand that those who did this be punished, that they are held accountable. Not everyone is guilty. The perpetrators have names,” Begović said, highlighting the importance of finding and identifying perpetrators. She emphasized that they don’t harbor hatred toward anyone, but they will never forget what happened. “When they deny genocide, they also deny the existence of our loved ones. Who took them from us?” she asked.

Amina Hodžić. Photo source: private archive, used with permission.

The students of the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Tuzla also commemorate the genocide. For the third year in a row, the Student Council is organizing a public reading of the names of the genocide victims in Tuzla’s Sloboda Square. “With this, we want to encourage deeper reflection on everything that happened and thus by the reading, to give a voice to each of the victims and make them visible in that way,” said Amina Hodžić, President of the Assembly of the Student Council of the Philosophy Faculty at the University of Tuzla.

This is all done with the aim of cultivating a culture of memory. However, the biggest challenge is that on the other side, there is a different memory culture in which war criminals are celebrated.

“It is devastating that young people cultivate and nurture this culture. Things like this and this action must serve as an inspiration to us and show what is right and what is true and just, because the world depends on us,” concluded Hodžić.

The culture of memory surrounding the Srebrenica genocide is nurtured through a variety of activities, especially in the cultural sphere. One such activity is Days of Remembrance of the Srebrenica Genocide, an event which the Bosnian Cultural Center of Tuzla Canton (BKC TK) is organizing for the second consecutive year.

Reading for Srebrenica by the students of the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Tuzla. Photo: The Students’ Council of the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Tuzla, used with permission.

“The program consists of three book promotions and an exhibition of the judicial verdicts. At the end of the program, on July 10th, there is a symbolic march called ‘Peaceful March for Srebrenica 8,372,’ where the citizens of Tuzla take a symbolic 8,372 step march from the BKC TK to the Square of Srebrenica Genocide Victims,” explained Nedim Ćudić, an expert associate for public relations of the public institution BKC TK.

All of these events seek to cultivate a culture of memory and encourage forgiveness as well as continual remembrance. There is no hatred, but only hope that the remains of the missing will be found and buried, in order to give the surviving relatives of victims a place to pray and remember their loved ones. Throughout the year, and on July 11 especially, Begović repeats this prayer for Srebrenica:

We pray to almighty God. May grievance become hope. May revenge become justice. May mothers’ tears become prayers. May Srebrenica never happen again.

MONOPOLY IS CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M 

French oil giant among nine firms in Morocco anti-trust probe

An investigation into nine fuel retail firms - including a subsidiary of TotalEnergies - will be launched in Morocco.

The New Arab Staff & Agencies
04 August, 2023

Market leader Afriquia is owned by Prime Minister Aziz Akhannouch, giving the affair a political edge [Getty]
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Morocco's Competition Council announced Thursday that it is poised to launch an investigation into the business practices of nine fuel retail firms, including a subsidiary of French oil giant TotalEnergies.

Ever since Morocco abandoned state subsidies on fuel in 2015, allegations of market rigging have multiplied as motorists have seen pump prices rise across the board with little, if any, variation between retailers.

"Prosecutors consider they have sufficient evidence to prove the existence of anti-competitive practices by the accused parties," the council said.

TotalEnergies Marketing Maroc confirmed it had been notified of the upcoming investigation.

The company, which is listed on the Moroccan bourse, said it was "cooperating fully with the Competition Council's investigators and preparing the appropriate elements for its response".

The case dates back to February 2020 when the top three fuel retailers - TotalEnergies Marketing Maroc, Shell distributor Vivo Energy and Afriquia - were fined after the Competition Council ruled they had colluded on pricing.

Market leader Afriquia is owned by Prime Minister Aziz Akhannouch, giving the affair a political edge.

Berber ritual survives millennia

Tuareg flock to Algerian desert oasis for ancient festival

In a riot of colour, music and dance, thousands of Tuareg have flocked to the Sebeiba festival that marks the end of an ancient tribal feud and which once a year transforms an oasis town deep in the Algerian Sahara

The Tuareg are a semi-nomadic people of Berber descent who practice Islam and whose traditional desert homeland stretches across parts of Algeria, Libya, Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso. The annual Sebeiba festival, held in Djanet, 1,500 kilometres southeast of Algiers, dates back over 3,000 years and is held to coincide with the Shia Muslim Ashura commemoration.

During the 10-day event, male dancers, dressed as warriors and wielding swords, perform to the singing and drumbeat of women who are adorned with glittering jewellery and henna tattoos. The men parade their weapons and "then stand in a ritual circle rattling their swords continuously as the women sing traditional songs to the rhythm of the tambourine," says the UN cultural organisation.

Annual event: the Sebeiba festival, held in Djanet, 1,500 kilometres southeast of Algiers, dates back over 3,000 years and is held to coincide with the Shiite Muslim Ashura commemoration. During the 10-day event, male dancers, dressed as warriors and wielding swords, perform to the singing and drumbeat of women who are adorned with glittering jewellery and henna tattoos

The festival marks the time, three millennia ago, when two Tuareg tribes, El Mihane and Zelouaz, put an end to a war between them. Oral tradition says their conflict ended when both sides learned of the death of the Egyptian pharaoh who – as in the biblical story – perished in the Red Sea while pursuing Moses and the fleeing Israelites. "Our ancestors kept the date of the day the pharaoh drowned in the sea and celebrated the death of the pharaoh," said local elder Elias Ali, 73.

In Djanet, a town of some 15,000 people, locals had been busy preparing long before the festival kicked off. One participant, 64-year-old Hassan Echeikh, said that "during rehearsals, children learn to dance, and everyone can let off steam".

In 2014 UNESCO added the Sebeiba ritual and ceremonies to its List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. It also noted the role of local craftspeople who make the uniforms, weapons, jewellery and musical instruments for the ceremonies.

Rituals and ceremonies on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage List: in Djanet, a town of some 15,000 people, locals had been busy preparing long before the festival kicked off. One participant, 64-year-old Hassan Echeikh, said that "during rehearsals, children learn to dance, and everyone can let off steam"

Sebeiba is "an important marker of cultural identity for Tuareg people living in the Algerian Sahara," said the UNESCO listing.

© 2023 AFP

The festival marks the time, three millennia ago, when two Tuareg tribes, the El Mihane and Zelouaz, put an end to a war between them.

Oral tradition says their conflict ended when both sides learned of the death of the Egyptian pharaoh who – as in the biblical story – perished in the Red Sea while pursuing Moses and the fleeing Israelites.

Cat Stevens aka Yusuf turns 75

One man, two lives

He's arguably one of the greatest singer-songwriters in the history of rock and pop. Yet that was something he himself chose to ignore for the longest time. At the age of 75, Cat Stevens, who for years went by the name Yusuf Islam, is at peace with himself and the world. By Christoph Meyer

Dinner jacket, frilly shirt and a Beatles haircut: when the singer-songwriter Yusuf, who has begun calling himself Cat Stevens again, thinks back to his appearance on the German TV music programme "Beat-Club" in 1967, he confesses to being amazed by the "unbelievable" self-confidence of his younger self. Live on camera, he belted out his hit song "Matthew and Son" from among the audience without the slightest hint of nervousness.

"I was almost a completely different person," says the Brit, who turned 75 on 21 July, in an interview with the Deutsche Presse-Agentur about his younger self.

"Cat", as he would later call himself, was born Steven Demetre Georgiou in London in 1948 and grew up in the West End. His parents, a Greek Cypriot and a Swede, ran a restaurant in the nightlife district of the British capital. He taught himself to play the guitar. His first success came in 1966 with "I Love My Dog". But his real breakthrough was "Matthew and Son", which reached number two in the British charts and catapulted him into pop star Olympus.

He also found success writing songs for other artists. U.S. soul singer P.P. Arnold landed a hit with "The First Cut Is The Deepest", while the Tremeloes had their international breakthrough with his song "Here Comes My Baby".

Seventies pop legend: Cat Stevens' soft voice and gentle songs captivated the flower power peace movement right up to the 1980s. Songs like "Peace Train" fitted right into the era. "My Lady D'Arbanville" and "Father and Son" became legendary. Cat Stevens' songs for the soundtrack of the cult film "Harold and Maude" were also unforgettable

The pop star's existential crisis

Cat Stevens was forced to interrupt his career at the end of the 1960s owing to a near-fatal bout of tuberculosis. The time spent in hospital, he later recalled, triggered a process of reflection on the meaning of life. What followed was an extraordinarily creative period, from which songs like "Father and Son", "Peace Train", "If You Want To Sing Out", "Moonshadow" and "Morning Has Broken" emerged.

Stevens was now an international superstar. Yet the search for meaning continued: like George Harrison and other contemporaries, he hoped for spiritual inspiration in the East. But while the ex-Beatle, who died in 2001, found his salvation in Hinduism, Stevens would eventually find it in Islam.

After another near-death experience – almost drowning while swimming in Malibu, California – Stevens turned his back on the glittering world of rock and pop stardom at the end of the 1970s. The smiling, handsome boy with the black curls was replaced by a serious-looking man with a long beard, who sometimes appeared in a turban and other traditional Islamic garments during interviews, now a rarity.

From now on, his name would be Yusuf Islam. It seemed that the singer Cat Stevens, whom millions had learned to love through his music and his light-hearted appearance, no longer existed.

Retreat from show business: following his existential crisis and conversion to Islam, Yusuf Islam dedicated his time to studying the Koran. He married within the Islamic community and became a family man. In London, he founded an Islamic school and various aid projects, aimed principally at trying to solve the problem of world hunger. He gave the impression that his pop music days were well and truly over

Yusuf Islam dedicated his time to studying the Koran. He married within the Islamic community and became a family man. In London, he founded an Islamic school and various aid projects, aimed principally at trying to solve the problem of world hunger. He gave the impression that his pop music days were well and truly over.

Controversial statements

Many fans were stunned, hoping he would have a change of heart, but he persisted along his chosen path. He took the name Yusuf, the Arabic version of Joseph, claiming he often felt misunderstood, like the figure from the Koran and the Old Testament who is thrown into a well by his jealous brothers and sold into slavery in Egypt. He has promised to reveal more about this in his autobiography, due to be published next year.

Retreating into the piety of Islam also impacted his musical legacy. When, at the end of the 1980s, he got carried away into making controversial statements during the dispute over the book "The Satanic Verses", seemingly approving the fatwa imposed on British-Indian author Salman Rushdie by the Iranian revolutionary leader Ayatollah Khomeini, he was boycotted by U.S. radio stations.

In 2004, he was even refused entry to the USA. A plane in which he was travelling from London to Washington D.C. was initially diverted. Islam had to return to Great Britain. Following the attacks of 11 September 2001, the U.S. authorities had grown suspicious.

 

Another turnaround came in 2006. For the first time in 25 years, he released a pop album, following a slow return to music – albeit in adherence with strict Islamic rules – since the 1990s. Yusuf Islam was once again seeking the limelight.

But the resurrection of Cat Stevens still took time. In 2014, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. "It took a long time for them to remember me," he says in retrospect, not without a hint of bitterness. In 2017, he released another record, this time under the name of Cat Stevens. The surname Islam was no longer in evidence. Now he's just Yusuf/Cat Stevens.

He freely admits that it has taken until his most recently released album, "King of a Land", to achieve the perfect harmony between pious elderly gent and singer-songwriter, as attractive as he is brilliant. "This record is the epitome of the fusion between Yusuf and Cat Stevens," he adds.

At the legendary Glastonbury Festival this July, he played to a crowd of 100,000 in the English county of Somerset wearing a white T-shirt, trainers and tinted glasses. Even the youngest were able to sing along word for word to many of his songs. "Thank you for this beautiful moment," he called to the crowd.

He is clearly enjoying being Cat Stevens again – at least for the time being.

© dpa 2023

The last Syrian

Dreaming of freedom

In his debut novel – "Le dernier Syrien" – Syrian journalist and author Omar Youssef Souleimane looks back on the protest movement of 2011, a time when many in Syria hoped for societal change and democratic structures. Volker Kaminski read the German-language version of the book for Qantara.dep

It is March 2011: a "tsunami of rage" has swept over large parts of the Arab world. In Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Syria, young people have taken to the streets of the country's major cities, demonstrating and challenging the regime. Youssef, an alter ego of the author, has joined them in Damascus and is protesting against the Assad regime.

Youssef – a student in the Syrian capital – is no fanatic. He is an educated young man who allows himself to be carried along by the general turmoil. At the same time, he is careful enough to move his home to the smaller city of Homs when the civil war breaks out. Since then, he has been commuting between the two cities, secretly meeting with the members of a group of activists.

We get to know some of them in the novel. Josephine, for example, the founder of the group known as "Daou", took her name out of admiration for Josephine Baker. No one knows her real name. She is the beating heart of the group. For Josephine, it is only natural to open up her home to the members of the group, giving them a place to meet and sleep.

Omar Youssef Souleimane, born in 1987 in al-Kutaifa near Damascus, grew up in Saudi Arabia. He worked as a journalist in Syria until 2010. When the civil war broke out, he fled via Jordan to France, where he was granted political asylum in 2012. Today he lives as a writer in Paris. Omar Youssef Souleimane has published several award-winning volumes of poetry as well as the autobiographical story "Le petit terroriste" (Engl. The Little Terrorist, 2018). "Le dernier Syrien" is his first novel

Chalil is a particularly active member of the group whose courage sometimes flips into foolhardiness. He seems convinced that the regime can be overcome. He believes that the revolution will win and imagines "soldiers deserting and building up a new army to support the revolution".

Even though he moves into what he assumes is a safe flat on the outskirts of Damascus, the secret service still finds and arrests him.

The desire for personal freedom too

Josephine is much more realistic. She is better at assessing the situation. "The Islamists hate us because we are laicists, the regime hates us because we are rebels, and the politicians hate us because we are honest," she says.

"They call us traitors, infidels, heretics because they don't yet know what it means to be free."

This desire for freedom relates not only to political reforms, but also to the choice of sexual partner, such as the love between two men, who can only meet up from time to time and otherwise send each other e-mails.

The passages about Mohammad and Youssef (who also has a close relationship with Josephine) are some of the most emotionally touching parts of the novel.

Mohammad runs a clothes shop in Damascus and is married, but his marriage is just a sham to keep his parents happy.

Youssef is his only passion. He burns with longing for him, sometimes coming perilously close to abandoning all caution for his sake. At times, the reader fears that their love affair could be discovered by state or Islamist forces, which would lead to severe punishment and prison.

Overall, the political tone of the novel creates a certain distance to the protagonists, which means the reader never really gets to know them as individuals. The exception to this rule are the passages about the relationship between Mohammad and Youssef.

A bridge to democracy?

Interesting details are scattered throughout. We learn, for instance, that when Youssef was a boy, he loved to dress up in his mother's and sisters' clothes and have his photograph taken.

Mohammad, on the other hand, doesn't like people who wear sunglasses: "He doesn't know what they are looking at or what their feelings or intentions are. The glasses give him the feeling that he is dealing with a ghost." Such casual observations lighten up the predominantly sober, matter-of-fact atmosphere of the text and give the reader an insight into the protagonists' feelings.

About halfway through the novel, events take a dramatic turn: one of the friends is shot by the police on the street for no apparent reason. As the story progresses, it becomes increasingly clear that the secret police are closing in on the activists. Arrests are made, and people are tortured in prison – scenes that are described openly in the novel.

It is March 2011: a "tsunami of rage" has swept over large parts of the Arab world. In Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Syria, young people have taken to the streets of the country's major cities, demonstrating and challenging the regime. Youssef, an alter ego of the author, has joined them in Damascus and is protesting against the Assad regime

The atmosphere among the protagonists grows increasingly dark. The hope for their movement is fading fast, and they fear that they will be arrested at any time: "They are rounding us up, one after the other, like rabbits, and they won't stop until they have every last one of us!"

In this situation, it is particularly important not to despair and to focus on the positive, as Mohammad does when he sees an elderly couple treating each other with tenderness: "People like them restore my faith in the future. We are alive, despite the ruins that surround us."

This is a dark, yet exciting novel that refuses to relinquish the desperate hope that the current generation will be "a bridge" that the next generation can cross "to get to (…) democracy".

Volker Kaminski

© Qantara.de 2023

Translated from the German by Aingeal Flanagan

Omar Yousef Souleimane, "Le dernier Syrien", published in French by Editions Flammarion; available in German translation ("Der letzter Syrer") from Lenos.

Migrants and Germany's gig economy

"ReWolt" against Wolt

The "ReWolt" campaign waged since the spring by migrant delivery couriers against gig economy giant Wolt in Berlin came to a head this week, with three claimants, who have accused the company of wage theft, getting their day in court. By Minerwa Tahir

Workers united will never be defeated!

What do we want? Workers’ wages! When do we want them? Now!

Such slogans echoed loud on the square in front of Zentrum Kreuzberg at U Kottbusser Tor on 19 June 2023 as 50 Wolt workers – many with a migrant background – and sympathisers took to the streets to protest against non-payment of wages, as well as the absence of paid sick leave, occupational safety and other labour rights provisions.

Their 10-metre-long banner read "Wolt owes us money and rights", followed by the logo of the campaign, called "ReWolt" – a play on the company's name and the word 'revolt'. Some of their placards read "Sick Leave for All" and "Stop Wage Theft". Revolutionary songs in different languages were played and slogans shouted against Wolt and wage theft.

Delivery riders' struggles are nothing new in Berlin. Gorillas and Lieferando are well-known cases where workers have managed to form works councils. Neither are these struggles limited to Berlin or Europe. Workers from China and Korea to India, Brazil and Azerbaijan are similarly engaged.

 

The Wolt Workers Collective in Berlin had called the protest. The recent movement in Germany began when a "fleet" – a term used to describe workers hired by delivery companies through subcontractors – of 120 migrant workers were denied payment for several months.

According to the workers, they had been hired by Wolt through a subcontractor who goes by the name of Ali, is supposedly Pakistani and runs a mobile phone accessories shop in Neukolln called Mobile World. Most workers are students and of South Asian origin.

At the first protest in April, workers cycled their way from U Karl Marx Strasse to the Wolt headquarters in Friedrichshain, where they had intended to deliver a charter of demands to Wolt management. The management however refused to come out of their offices and receive the charter. When protest leader Muhammad tried to put the charter in the company's letterbox, he was told Wolt did not have one.

What began as a campaign of unpaid fleet employees being denied wages has evolved into a collective struggle, which now also involves employees directly hired by Wolt. Their demands include payment of wages, occupational safety, workers' compensation, an end to the subcontracting system and paid sick leave.

Couriers denied wages

"I am a migrant student from Pakistan and struggle to live here," said Muhammad. "My wife and I work odd jobs to make ends meet. Wolt has stolen three months of my wages and I am not alone. We are many migrant students facing the same situation. Most students are even afraid of protesting because they are migrants. I went to the Wolt store eight times to claim my wages. Ali repeatedly denied and finally said that he has not been paid by Wolt to pay our wages. When we have delivered orders on time, the least we deserve is to be paid."




Strength in solidarity: what began as a campaign of unpaid fleet employees being denied wages has evolved into a collective struggle, also involving employees directly hired by Wolt. Their ongoing demands include payment of wages, occupational safety, workers' compensation, an end to the subcontracting system and paid sick leave. Ultimately, of the 120 potential claimants, only three are pursuing a legal settlement

His colleague, Shiwani, who is from India and has also been denied wages, said that she is a student in Berlin and it is already difficult to cope with the challenges of high rent and tuition fees. She joined Wolt as a rider in December.

"It was freezing weather, but we would go door to door to deliver food," she said. "We would get severe pain in our hands because the weather was so cold. All the while, Wolt management sat in their heated offices. They get money to heat their offices due to our hard work, but then they deprive us of our meagre wages. We deserve to be paid! And we deserve at least a minimum wage per hour. This per-order payment system must be abolished!"

Many Wolt riders report that they are paid per order and not per hour.

Another rider of Indian background, Abhay, said that when he came to Germany, he heard about how workers’ rights were protected here. "When I joined Wolt, it was a roller coaster ride," he said. He said that they worked eight to ten hours in December and January, thinking that they might be paid to be able to afford their university fees and other expenses.

"What do I get after this work? Wolt denied to pay me. I thought they will pay me next month," Abhay continued. "But I have not been paid for November, December and January. Wolt has even denied before that we are their workers. We have everything to prove that we worked for Wolt. We want to be paid."

Joey, a Gorillas rider, read out a speech on behalf of a directly employed Wolt worker who did not want to be identified: "All subcontracted workers should be directly hired immediately and they should be given equal labour rights. Same rights for same work!" They also made a separate speech to express solidarity.

An issue for Germany's entire working class: questions of structural abuse of migrant workers were brought up by German workers as well. Martin, a member of IG Metall (the largest industrial union in Germany and Europe), said at the protest that even though his union belongs to a different trade, it is important that workers see themselves as waging a struggle together

Victims of structural racism

They situated migrant workers' extreme form of exploitation in Germany within the larger context of the structural racism that migrant workers face in Europe. They talked about the recent drowning of the Pakistani, Syrian and other workers in the Mediterranean and condemned European apathy towards them.

Questions of structural abuse of migrant workers were brought up by German workers as well. Martin, a member of IG Metall (the largest industrial union in Germany and Europe), said at the protest that even though his union belongs to a different trade, it is important that workers see themselves as waging a struggle together.

He added that it was crucial workers demand solidarity, pursuing a common struggle with the trade unions in the same sector such as the NGG, Ver.di and others. After all, the struggle being waged was not only important for the sector, but also for the entire working class. "The more this precarious sector expands, the more it will undercut wages everywhere! This is why it is not just a question of solidarity, but rather a question of self-interest of every worker to support this struggle."

"If they are not prepared to pay the wages on time, if they are not prepared to pay wages sufficient for a living, then those companies should be expropriated without compensation. We need to make history out of a system which stands on exploitation, on racism, on war and oppression."

Expropriation is a topic that has been raised before on the streets of the German capital. In 2021, the Deutsche Wohnen Enteignen (Expropriate Deutsche Wohnen) referendum was successful, even though lawmakers have since failed to act on the will of the people, who voted in favour of expropriating the real estate company in light of the housing crisis.

Wolt Berlin | Demo and Strike 05.04.23 from Lieferando Workers Collective on Vimeo.

"We are no longer willing to finance the profits of the shareholders with our excessive rents!" reads their website. The profits of companies enjoying the privileges offered to the capitalist class through precarious gig economy work are now increasingly coming under scrutiny. Some German school students also attended the protest to express solidarity with the unpaid migrant workers.

At the end of the protest, Theater X performed a street theatre piece highlighting the plight of delivery workers. Director Nika said that she sees the ongoing struggle of the Wolt riders as part of the larger class struggle in Germany. "Their struggle inspires us all!"

Muhammad, Shiwani, Abhay and several others have filed cases against Wolt for wage theft. The date of their hearing, announced at the protest, was 27 July 2023. They urged all participants to be there to support them. "It was encouraging that so many people came to our protest and showed solidarity," Muhammad said after the end of the protest. "We will win."

Minerwa Tahir

© Qantara.de 2023

Minerwa Tahir is a doctoral research fellow with the Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient (LMO) in Berlin.

Israel shifts to the right

Neo-Zionism takes aim at liberal democracy

German-Israeli historian Tamar Amar-Dahl sheds light on the role of long-term Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel's ongoing shift to the right. Joseph Croitoru read the bookp

For more than two decades, Israel's political landscape has been inching further and further to the right. The fact that Benjamin Netanyahu's new government, his sixth, includes several right-wing extremist politicians as ministers can be seen as a logical consequence of this development.

The deeper reasons behind the ongoing shift were already addressed back in 2012 by the German-Israeli historian Tamar Amar-Dahl, a native of Israel who teaches at the FU Berlin, in her study "Zionist Israel and the Question of Palestine: Jewish Statehood and the History of the Middle East Conflict".

Her analysis of the Israeli point of view on the conflict was based on the concept of "civil militarism", an attitude that Israeli sociologist Baruch Kimmerling declared a central feature of the country's political culture back in in 1993.

According to Kimmerling, the fact that the government and its elites consistently rely on military options ultimately runs counter to the pursuit of a peaceful solution to the conflict with the Arabs.

For more than two decades, Israel's political landscape has been inching further and further to the right: the fact that Benjamin Netanyahu's new government, his sixth, includes several right-wing extremist politicians as ministers can be seen as a logical consequence of this development. In her new book, German-Israeli historian Tamar Amar-Dahl explores the deeper reasons behind this ongoing shift

Kimmerling's thesis quickly became popular in academic circles, even though the rapidly ensuing about-face in Israeli's Palestinian policy seemed to contradict it: the Oslo Peace Accords were concluded in 1993-95 by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin – a former general and war hero.

However, as Tamar Amar-Dahl now points out in her new book, "The Triumph of Neo-Zionism: Israel in the New Millennium" (currently available in German only: "Der Siegeszug des Neozionismus: Israel im neuen Millennium"), the heyday of "peace ideology" at that time would have been short-lived anyway.

This is because even Rabin and his fellow politician Shimon Peres were already under the sway of civil militarism, as evidenced by their refusal to green-light the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Their successors as well – whether Netanyahu of the right-wing Likud or Rabin's and Peres's party colleague Ehud Barak – deemed such a move to be out of the question, citing security concerns.

With regard to Barak's policies, Amar-Dahl repeats the claim, commonly heard in leftist circles in Israel, that during the peace negotiations at and shortly after the Camp David summit, he deliberately made the Palestinians an offer that was generous but that they would never have accepted.

The presumption is that Barak's true aim was to put an end to the peace process. The offer made it easy to blame Arafat when the peace talks broke down.

Military thinking quickly regained the upper hand

In the spirit of civil militarism, whose proponents see the Arabs as an eternal enemy, Israel then spun a version of events that cast Palestinian President Yasser Arafat as deliberate instigator of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in 2000 – a notion that has since been refuted by historians.

In the new millennium, military thinking then quickly regained the upper hand in Israel. The army responded with brute force to the Palestinian uprising, unleashing what the author refers to as a "war". For Amar-Dahl, the forced occupation of the Palestinian territories, which was only cemented further by the Israeli response to the Al-Aqsa Intifada, constitutes the continuation of that war to this day.

That peace was no longer an alternative for Israel from that time forward – under the right-wing Zionist governments of Ariel Sharon, Ehud Olmert and Netanyahu – is, however, incorrect with respect to Olmert.

Because, despite the detailed and solid chronicle of the conflict in those years that Amar-Dahl's book provides, it omits any reference to the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in Annapolis in 2007. Both parties were close to reaching an agreement at the time, but it ultimately failed to materialise when Olmert was forced to resign over a corruption scandal, leaving Mahmoud Abbas without a real partner in the dialogue.

Central figure in Israel's shift to the right: Justice Minister Yariv Levin. Back in 2020, after the passage of the controversial Nation-State Law of 2018, then Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin sent a letter to Supreme Court President Esther Hayut denying the court's authority to rule retroactively on the law passed by parliament - a prelude to Levin's current, hotly contested campaign in his capacity as justice minister in the new Netanyahu government to curtail the powers of chief justices

Jewish exclusivity more important than democracy

Amar-Dahl's observations on Israel's ideological shift to the right during Netanyahu's long term in office (2009–21) are revealing. In addition to the still strong factors of civil militarism and occupation – combined with a continuing "colonisation" of the Palestinian territories – "neo-Zionism" became increasingly dominant in Israeli policy during this period.

The term was coined by Israeli sociologist Uri Ram in 2005 and has been the subject of controversy ever since. Amar-Dahl introduces readers to this debate, but does not commit to a specific definition of the term.

The distinguishing features of neo-Zionism for her seem to be not only the right's increasingly uncompromising aspiration to achieving "Eretz Israel", a deliberately rather vague concept in territorial terms, but also the religious connotations of that concept. Neo-Zionist is hence notable for its increased tendency toward Jewish exclusivity, which has more and more gone against the grain of liberal democracy as it had long been understood by left-wing Zionists.

 The latter direction can be presumed based on a series of laws passed since 2011, culminating in the Nation-State Act of 2018. This act places the Jewish nature of the state above democracy, a concept that does not even appear in the text of the law, and reaffirms the claim to "Eretz Israel" as the homeland of the Jewish people.

Amar-Dahl vividly traces the fierce Israeli debate surrounding this law and also the charges launched against it before the Supreme Court. Mention is made as well of the attack by then Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin against Supreme Court President Esther Hayut.

Levin wrote Hayut a letter in 2020, a highly unusual act, in which he refused to accept the court's authority to rule retroactively on the Nation-State Act passed by parliament – a prelude to Levin's current, hotly contested campaign in his capacity as justice minister in the new Netanyahu government to curtail the powers of chief justices.

Protest march on a motorway outside Jerusalem: For months, Israelis have been protesting against the Netanyahu government's planned reform of the judiciary, because they see it as a threat to democracy in the country. On 24 July, a key element of the reform was passed. In the law, the Knesset removed the Supreme Court's ability to classify government decisions as "unreasonable" – and thus its ability to overrule them

Netanyahu's decisive role

With the adoption of an amendment to the Israeli Basic Law on the judiciary on 24 July of this year, the first step has now been taken to alter the jurisdiction of the courts. The new law prohibits all courts, including the Supreme Court, from overturning government decisions on grounds of unreasonableness.

Netanyahu's decisive role in the successive shift to the right is the subject of the last chapter of Amar-Dahl's book. For her, he is not only a "neo-Zionist" but is also "obsessed with power". In her brief biographical sketch, she draws on the picture painted of Netanyahu by his Israeli biographers.

The long-standing prime minister has not only taken advantage of crisis-ridden Israeli politics with its increasing divisions to style himself as the only capable unifier and leader, she asserts, but has even deliberately deepened the rifts between the camps.

According to the author, Netanyahu's success lies not least in his ability to make strategic use of the resentment of Sephardic-Oriental Jews toward the Ashkenazi establishment. She does not however provide any empirical evidence that he has succeeded in disempowering the "left-wing Zionist elites".

On the other hand, Amar-Dahl's diagnosis that Netanyahu has succeeded in pushing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict off the agenda of Israeli politics rings true. Nevertheless, this "historic contribution" by Benjamin Netanyahu to the rise of neo-Zionism seems to owe far more to the Israelis' acquiescence to the occupation than even critical observers of the conflict would care to admit.

Joseph Croitoru

© Qantara.de 2023

Translated from the German by Jennifer Taylor

Tamar Amar-Dahl: "Der Siegeszug des Neozionismus: Israel im neuen Millennium", published in German by Promedia, 222 pages