Obama’s Big Talk on ISIS and Putin Isn’t Matched By His Actions | US Orders More Troops to Iraq, but No Overhaul of Strategy | "While the pope has deplored the loss of life in Ukraine and called for all sides to respect the cease-fire, he has not publicly placed any blame on Russia in an apparent bid to not upset Vatican relations with the Orthodox Church and in hopes of engaging Russia’s help to confront the persecution of Christians in the Middle East. Hackett, the U.S. ambassador, noted that Putin had spoken about the plight of Christians and that that was clearly an area of concern for the Vatican. “I’d like to see if he’s got a proposal,” he said of Putin." - Pope Urges Putin to Commit to 'Sincere, Great Effort' for Ukraine Peace | Can Pope Francis Work a Vladimir Putin Miracle? | Islamic State Sells Captured Teen Girls Like 'Packs Of Cigarettes' | IS growing in numbers, money | ‘Russian hackers’ cripple Bundestag computer network | The Times
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Obama’s Big Talk on ISIS and Putin Isn’t Matched By His Actions
Obama’s cyber silence leaves US unprepared by Margot Grubert
"On Wednesday, the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, Kenneth Hackett, said the U.S. would like to see the Vatican increase its concern about what is happening in Ukraine during the pope’s meeting with Putin.
“We think they could say something more about concern of territorial integrity, those types of issues,” Hackett told reporters. “It does seem that Russia is supporting the insurgents. And it does seem that there are Russian troops inside Ukraine. This is a very serious situation.”
...
While the pope has deplored the loss of life in Ukraine and called for all sides to respect the cease-fire, he has not publicly placed any blame on Russia in an apparent bid to not upset Vatican relations with the Orthodox Church and in hopes of engaging Russia’s help to confront the persecution of Christians in the Middle East.
Hackett, the U.S. ambassador, noted that Putin had spoken about the plight of Christians and that that was clearly an area of concern for the Vatican.
“I’d like to see if he’s got a proposal,” he said of Putin."
Pope Urges Putin to Commit to 'Sincere, Great Effort' for Ukraine Peace
Can Pope Francis Work a Vladimir Putin Miracle?
Are Ukraine and the U.S. Allies or Not? by tkargman
On his first day back to work, Biden joined the president for a private lunch at the White House and held a meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniv Yatsenyuk.
Vice President Joe Biden Returns to White House For First Time Since Son's Death
The Caliphate - As ISIS Brutalizes Women, a Pathetic Feminist Silence by Phyllis Chesler
Democrats and Europeans forget what NATO meansby Natalie Goodnow
Christopher Hale is executive director at Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good and the co-founder of Millennial.
In light of Pope Francis and Vladimir Putin meeting Wednesday at the Vatican, it’s useful to recall the first meeting between the two in November 2013. The scariest photo of Pope Francis was taken at that meeting. Staring at the Russian president from across his desk, the pope’s demeanor suggested he wasn’t afraid of the former KGB officer who has had an iron-fisted rule over the nation for a better part of a generation. Photos speak a thousand words, but in this case, perhaps it was a bit deceptive.
John Allen wrote Tuesday:
Judging solely on the basis of personality, Pope Francis and Russian President Vladimir Putin may seem an odd geopolitical couple. Francis is a man of compassion and peace, while Putin is quite possibly the single world leader you most wouldn’t want to run into in a dark alley. Yet when Francis and Putin meet on Wednesday in the Vatican, it will bring together two figures who’ve forged an improbably strong partnership.
This partnership was originally formed in September 2013 when both Francis and Putin called on the U.S. to not take military action in Syria. Francis and Putin used two very different means to communicate their messages: Francis held a worldwide prayer vigil for peace, while Putin penned a somewhat audacious editorial in The New York Times in which he cited Pope Francis’s objection as a reason for the U.S. to not get involved in the region.
Russia-sponsored media have suggested such partnerships make Putin and Francis champions of similar values—which is clearly overstated. But Francis’s working relationship with Putin isn’t without concern. Some have criticized the pope for being too soft on Putin, particularly after Russia invaded the Crimea region in Ukraine last year. In fact, some of the pope’s strongest critics are bishops in the region.
Yet a little more than two years into his tenure, I still think Pope Francis is the best politician in the world. Twice in his relatively short papacy he’s made significant foreign policy progress.
In June 2014, Francis convened an unprecedented Vatican meeting between then-Israeli President Shimon Peres and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to discuss a new way forward between the warring nations. Just a few months earlier, a frustrated Secretary of State John Kerry said his efforts to do the same had failed.
And last December, Francis helped usher in a new era of peace and dialogue between U.S. and Cuba. During President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address, he credited the pope for his crucial role in the process. Just last month, Cuban President Raul Castro said that if Francis keeps going in the same direction, he might even pray again and consider a return to the Catholic Church.
If Francis can help make progress with Putin in resolving the crisis in Ukraine, the pope will have achieved a diplomatic triple crown.
TIME Ideas hosts the world's leading voices, providing commentary and expertise on the most compelling events in news, society, and culture. We welcome outside contributions. To submit a piece, email <a href="mailto:ideas@time.com">ideas@time.com</a>.
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The U.S. is dispatching around 450 additional military instructors to help Iraq’s government recapture Ramadi and Mosul, adding to the approximately 3,500 US military personnel already on the ground. The move seized headlines, but it’s far from a game-changer in the war against ISIS.
Obama’s decision should come as no surprise. The past few weeks have seen increasingly dire headlines about the radical terror group’s advances in the region. With the fall of Palmyra, ISIS now controls over 50% of Syria’s landmass, on top of its gains in Iraq, which includes the recent invasion of Ramadi. Obama is taking a calculated risk in sending trainers, but a small one. More military instructors will not be enough to defeat ISIS, and Obama knows it. But it just might be enough to change the narrative.
Defeating ISIS would require thousands of ground troops to actually lead the fighting—and that’s just the kind of commitment Obama is keen to avoid. The President needs to show the American people that he is sticking with the Iraqi army, giving it a little more time and a little more resources.
Some Republican presidential candidates, especially Marco Rubio and Lindsey Graham, are pushing for a sustained engagement in the Middle East to root out ISIS. But following two costly and open-ended wars in the region, that option is not popular with the American people.
And it’s not only Americans who are hesitant to put their troops in harm’s way. The West as a whole is growing more risk-averse. A Pew study released today shows more than half of all Germans, Italians and French would oppose using military force in response to any Russian aggression against NATO allies—despite the fact that the NATO treaty requires member nations to treat an armed attack against NATO country as an attack against them all. Just getting the Europeans to accept an additional six months of sanctions on Russia has been a serious slog, even with Putin consistently escalating hostilities in Ukraine.
Aversion is the name of the game these days. Obama talks a big game about ISIS and how it must be destroyed, just like he talks big about how Russia must leave Ukraine. But he carefully avoids mentioning who exactly will defeat ISIS or drive Russia out of Ukraine. It looks like Obama is doing just enough to drag out these difficult challenges—and hand them over to the next President.
Christopher Hale is executive director at Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good and the co-founder of Millennial.
The pope can use his partnership with Putin to take a lead in foreign affairs
In light of Pope Francis and Vladimir Putin meeting Wednesday at the Vatican, it’s useful to recall the first meeting between the two in November 2013. The scariest photo of Pope Francis was taken at that meeting. Staring at the Russian president from across his desk, the pope’s demeanor suggested he wasn’t afraid of the former KGB officer who has had an iron-fisted rule over the nation for a better part of a generation. Photos speak a thousand words, but in this case, perhaps it was a bit deceptive.
John Allen wrote Tuesday:
Judging solely on the basis of personality, Pope Francis and Russian President Vladimir Putin may seem an odd geopolitical couple. Francis is a man of compassion and peace, while Putin is quite possibly the single world leader you most wouldn’t want to run into in a dark alley. Yet when Francis and Putin meet on Wednesday in the Vatican, it will bring together two figures who’ve forged an improbably strong partnership.
This partnership was originally formed in September 2013 when both Francis and Putin called on the U.S. to not take military action in Syria. Francis and Putin used two very different means to communicate their messages: Francis held a worldwide prayer vigil for peace, while Putin penned a somewhat audacious editorial in The New York Times in which he cited Pope Francis’s objection as a reason for the U.S. to not get involved in the region.
Russia-sponsored media have suggested such partnerships make Putin and Francis champions of similar values—which is clearly overstated. But Francis’s working relationship with Putin isn’t without concern. Some have criticized the pope for being too soft on Putin, particularly after Russia invaded the Crimea region in Ukraine last year. In fact, some of the pope’s strongest critics are bishops in the region.
Yet a little more than two years into his tenure, I still think Pope Francis is the best politician in the world. Twice in his relatively short papacy he’s made significant foreign policy progress.
In June 2014, Francis convened an unprecedented Vatican meeting between then-Israeli President Shimon Peres and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to discuss a new way forward between the warring nations. Just a few months earlier, a frustrated Secretary of State John Kerry said his efforts to do the same had failed.
And last December, Francis helped usher in a new era of peace and dialogue between U.S. and Cuba. During President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address, he credited the pope for his crucial role in the process. Just last month, Cuban President Raul Castro said that if Francis keeps going in the same direction, he might even pray again and consider a return to the Catholic Church.
If Francis can help make progress with Putin in resolving the crisis in Ukraine, the pope will have achieved a diplomatic triple crown.
TIME Ideas hosts the world's leading voices, providing commentary and expertise on the most compelling events in news, society, and culture. We welcome outside contributions. To submit a piece, email <a href="mailto:ideas@time.com">ideas@time.com</a>.
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· · · ·
WASHINGTON The next round of Iran nuclear negotiations will be "pretty tough," a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday ahead of new talks including top diplomats from the seven countries involved.
Iran and six major powers reached a framework nuclear deal on April 2 in Lausanne, Switzerland, and are seeking to strike a final agreement by June 30 under which Iran would restrain its nuclear program in exchange for relief from economic sanctions.
"As we expected after Lausanne, the next portion of this process will be pretty tough because we will be getting down to the details," the official told reporters as negotiators from the seven prepared to converge on Vienna for a new round.
The United States, which is negotiating along with Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia, suspects Iran is trying to develop a nuclear weapons capability. Iran denies that, saying its program is for peaceful uses like making medical isotopes.
Among the key issues yet to be resolved are the sequencing of any sanctions relief for Iran as well as the monitoring and verification measures to ensure Iran is not secretly violating any agreement that might be reached.
The U.S. official said the sides were having “detailed discussions” about access to Iran’s military sites.
"We know there will not be an agreement until we can resolve that the IAEA will be able to verify whatever way is appropriate, whatever is necessary for this agreement, and that will include having managed access to a variety of sites and places in order to get this deal done," the official said.
On Tuesday, the European Union said its political director, Helga Schmid, and negotiators Abbas Araqchi and Majid Takht-Ravanchi from Iran would meet in Vienna on Wednesday and would be joined later in the week by the other negotiators.
"Everyone in the room is focused on June 30. It doesn’t help any of us to delay difficult decisions," the U.S. official said.
By David Morgan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. auto safety regulators said on Wednesday that they are looking into a possible seventh death linked to defective Takata air bag inflators, a Louisiana woman who died after her 2005 Honda Civic hit a utility pole in the early hours of April 5.
A lawsuit filed on Monday in U.S. District Court by the family of the victim, 22-year-old Kylan Rae Langlinais, claims the car's Takata driver-side air bag exploded on impact, sending shards of metal into the passenger compartment and severing the woman's carotid artery. She died four days later.
The lawsuit names Honda Motor Co Ltd and Takata Corp as defendants.
It surfaced just weeks after federal auto safety regulators announced the recall of millions of defective Takata air bag inflators linked to six other deaths and hundreds of injuries worldwide.
"We are aware of the crash and we are gathering information from the manufacturer and from the attorneys representing the victim's family," said Gordon Trowbridge, a spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
A Takata spokesman declined to comment.
Honda said in a statement that it was also trying to gather more information: "The crash may have resulted in the rupture of the Takata driver front airbag inflator. Honda is now in communication with representatives of the family."
The recall involves driver-side and passenger-side air bag inflators in vehicles made by 11 automakers. But all the deaths have occurred in cars manufactured by Honda, Takata's top customer.
(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Christian Plumb)
Teenage girls abducted by Islamic State fighters in Iraq and Syria are being sold in slave markets "for as little as a pack of cigarettes," the UN envoy on sexual violence has said.
Zainab Bangura visited Iraq and Syria in April and has since been working on an action plan to address the horrific sexual violence against an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 girls enslaved by the militant group.
Abducting girls has become a key part of the IS strategy to recruit foreign fighters, who have been traveling to Iraq and Syria in record numbers over the past 18 months.
"This is how they attract young men -- 'We have women waiting for you, virgins that you can marry,'" she told AFP. " The foreign fighters are the backbone of the fighting."
"They kidnap and abduct women when they take areas so they have -- I don't want to call it a fresh supply -- but they have new girls," she said.
Girls are sold for "as little as a pack of cigarettes," or for several hundred dollars, up to $1,000, she said.
Bangura's account of how girls are captured and sold at auction in a series of recent interviews with news organizations is chilling.
After attacking a village, IS splits women from men and executes boys and men aged 14 and over. The women and mothers are separated, she says.
Girls are stripped naked, tested for virginity, and examined for breast size and prettiness. The youngest, and those considered the prettiest, virgins fetch higher prices and are sent to Raqqa, the IS stronghold.
Under the militant's hierarchy, sheikhs get first choice, then emirs, then fighters.
They often take three or four girls each and keep them for a month or so, until they grow tired of a girl. Then she goes back to market.
At slave auctions, buyers haggle fiercely, she says, driving down prices by disparaging girls as flat-chested or unattractive.
"We heard about one girl who was traded 22 times, and another -- who had escaped -- told us that the sheikh who had captured her wrote his name on the back of her hand to show that she was his 'property,'" Bangura said.
Many of the sex slaves are Yazidis, a persecuted minority sect that the IS considers to be apostate "devil worshippers," in part because of the Yazidis' ancient connection to the region's pre-Islamic past.
The treatment of Yazidi women, in particular, has been marked by contempt and savagery, Bangura says.
"They commit rape, sexual slavery, forced prostitution, and other acts of extreme brutality," she says. "We heard one case of a 20-year-old girl who was burned alive because she refused to perform an extreme sex act."
With reporting by AFP, Washington Post, and Chicago Tribune
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Putin Visits Pope Francis at The Vatican 1:16
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VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis urged Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday to commit himself to a "sincere and great effort" to achieve peace in Ukraine, the Vatican said.
The two met for about 50 minutes and agreed on the need to recreate a climate of dialogue in Ukraine, the Vatican added, and to implement a peace deal designed to end fighting between Ukrainian government forces and pro-Russian separatist rebels.
Putin met the pope after holding talks with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in Milan where the Italian leader showed little sign of breaking ranks over European Union sanctions on Russia in response to Moscow's role in the Ukraine crisis.
Moscow, which annexed Ukraine's Crimea region last year, has dismissed Western accusations that it is arming the separatists in eastern Ukraine and sending its own soldiers to join the fight.
The Vatican said the pope told Putin that it was essential to resolve the "grave humanitarian situation" in Ukraine, allow aid into conflict areas, and work for "progressive detente in the region".
During a picture-taking session after their private talks in the Vatican, Francis spoke of the need for a "peace that overcomes all wars" and "solidarity among peoples."
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The U.S. military likes to say that when it comes to war, the enemy gets a vote. President Obama made that clear Wednesday as he continued to retool his strategy to “degrade and destroy” the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria. The biggest tweak to U.S. policy was his decision to boost the 3,180 U.S. trainers and advisers in Iraq by as many as 450 additional troops.
The White House has made it clear U.S. troops will be limited to advising and training Iraqi forces and will not be sent into combat against ISIS. “To improve the capabilities and effectiveness of partners on the ground, the President authorized the deployment of up to 450 additional U.S. military personnel to train, advise, and assist Iraqi Security Forces at Taqaddum military base in eastern Anbar province,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said in a statement. But some on Capitol Hill were not impressed by Obama’s reinforcements. Rep. Mike Turner, R-Ohio, a senior member of the armed services committee, called them a “knee-jerk reaction” to recent poor showings by the Iraqi army, rather than a “long-term strategy.”
In many ways, this assignment is déjà vu for the U.S. military. They were ordered into Iraq in the wake of the U.S.-mandated dissolution of the Iraqi army following the 2003 invasion, and told to build a new one from scratch. After all U.S. forces left in 2011, the Iraqi army basically fell apart because of the cronyism and corruption that took place under Nouri al-Malaki, Iraq’s prime minister from 2006 to 2014. Over the past several months they’ve begun anew, training more than 9,000 Iraqi troops, with 3,000 more in the pipeline.
Those sectarian splits caused by Malaki’s government sapped the Iraqi forces “will to fight” to save Ramadi from being overrun by ISIS last month, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said. While training can give troops the skills needed to prevail on the battlefield, training can’t teach will. Nonetheless, U.S. troops who trained Iraqi forces the first time around say Iraqi forces, given decent leadership, are good fighters. They’ve shared their experiences with Army interviewers. The resulting oral histories offer guidance to those U.S. trainers in, or soon headed for, Iraq.
In the initial rebuilding of the Iraqi army, many units suffered from a Saddam Hussein hangover, where the traditional top-down and centralized command structure stifled innovation and initiative. While the passage of time has eased that problem, Iraqi forces remain hampered by their inability to support their forward forces with the intelligence and logistical support that makes for an effective fighting force. That’s less critical for their ISIS foes, whose terror tactics sow fear across wide swaths of Iraq with only hit-and-run attacks.
U.S. officers who trained Iraqi troops the first time around learned they had to adjust their expectations. “As Americans, we tend to look at things through American goggles, but when you’re over there you have to take off those American goggles and put on the Iraqi goggles,” Army Major Dave Karsen explained following his 2006 training tour. “Once you do that it was like, `Oh, you guys are doing fine by Iraqi standards.’ Put those American goggles back on and it’s like, `You guys are 50 years in the weeds. You guys are operating at a 1918 U.S. capability compared to now.’ It’s just a totally different mindset.”
The key lesson for U.S. trainers was that Iraqi troops are trainable. “When an IED event happened, their first reaction early on was what is referred to as the ‘Iraq death blossom,’ where everybody starts shooting in every direction,” Major Matt Schreiber said of his training stint. “That poses a lot of problems for a number of reasons.” But the Iraqis shaped up with training: “If an IED blew up or detonated, despite the damage and the casualties it caused, we were confident that our Iraq army soldiers would respond they way that they were trained.”
“My personal experience with the Iraqis under fire is that they are very brave and they’re not afraid to fight,” Major William Taylor said. “You tend to find that they’re willing to take risks and do things that American soldiers would never do.” He recalled Iraqi soldiers who found an improvised explosive device and watching one of them “poking the IED with a stick.” Such bravery—or foolhardiness—could be wasted without good leadership. But, he added, “when they had good leaders, they would fight very hard.”
Iraqi leadership often left something to be desired. One brigade commander “would conduct an operation if he could get the local media or the national media to come down and videotape him,” Major Mark Fisher said. But he canceled two operations “at the last minute … because the media told him that they could not make it out today, which is a poor reason for canceling an operation.”
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WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama ordered the deployment of up to 450 more American troops to Iraq on Wednesday in an effort to reverse major battlefield losses to the Islamic State, an escalation but not a significant shift in the struggling U.S. strategy to defeat the extremist group.
The U.S. forces will open a fifth training site in the country, this one dedicated specifically to helping the Iraqi Army integrate Sunni tribes into the fight, an element seen as a crucial to driving the Islamic State out of the Sunni-majority areas of western Iraq.
The immediate objective is to win back the key city of Ramadi, which was seized by extremists last month.
The U.S. is insistent that Americans will not have a combat role. But in the deployment of American forces and the equipping of Iraqi troops, the U.S. must make sure "that we can be nimble because clearly this is a very nimble enemy," Deputy National Security Adviser Benjamin Rhodes told reporters.
The plan is not a change in the U.S. strategy, the administration says, but addresses a need to get Sunnis more involved in the fight. Some local citizens in Sunni-majority areas fear an invasion and reprisals from Iran-backed Shiite militia even more than domination by the Islamic State, underscoring a need for any military campaign there to be led by local fighters.
But the Shiite-led Iraqi government's record in recruiting Sunni tribesman has been mixed at best, slowing efforts to regain Ramadi and Fallujah, a nearby city that Islamic State militants have held for more than a year. Iraqi leaders fear that Sunni fighters, once armed, could turn against the government, and they have deployed most U.S.-trained Iraqi troops in defensive formations around Baghdad, the capital.
Obama this week lamented that the U.S. lacks a "complete strategy" for defeating the Islamic State, and officials pointed to a glaring lack of recruits among Sunnis. Wednesday's announcement of a new training site at al-Taqaddum, a desert air base that was a U.S. military hub during the 2003-2011 war, is designed to fix that. The additional troops will include advisers, trainers, logisticians and security personnel.
But the changes don't go nearly far enough for critics of the administration's approach. They have pressed for military coordinators and advisers closer to the front lines to augment the U.S. airstrike campaign.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Wednesday that sending several hundred military advisers to Iraq "is a step in the right direction," but he criticized Obama for not having "an overarching strategy." Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the Republican chairman of the Armed Services Committee, was harsher in his assessment: "This is incremental-ism at its best or worst, depending on how you describe it."
Wednesday's careful escalation illustrated Obama's reluctance to plunge the U.S. too deeply into the fighting and his opposition to reintroducing U.S. soldiers into a war he had vowed to bring to an end.
Still, even some Democrats were concerned with the steps announced.
"Absent significant reform, we can help the Iraqi forces win battles, but they will not stay won," said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the House Intelligence Committee's top Democrat. He took issue with Obama expanding the U.S. role in Iraq while the war still lacks congressional authorization, and he said it was up to Abadi's government to give Sunnis a greater voice in the running of their country.
There now are nearly 3,100 U.S. troops in Iraq involved in training, advising, security and other support. In addition to bombing missions, the U.S. is conducting aerial reconnaissance and intelligence-gathering missions against Islamic State forces, while counting on Iraqi troops to do the fighting on the ground. Counterterrorism efforts in Syria, where the Islamic State has a greater foothold, are much less far along.
In Syria, an American fighting with Kurdish forces against the Islamic State group was killed in battle, authorities said Wednesday. With no connection to the U.S. military, he was probably the first American to die fighting alongside the Kurds against the extremists.
Keith Broomfield of Massachusetts died June 3 in a battle in a village near the border town of Kobani, said Nasser Haji, an official with a group of Kurdish fighters known as the YPG. Broomfield had joined the YPG on Feb. 24 under the nom de guerre Gelhat Raman, Haji said.
State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke confirmed Bloomfield's death.
The fight against the Islamic State group has attracted dozens of Westerners, including a number of Iraq war veterans who have made their way back to the Middle East to join Kurdish fighters, who have had the most success.
As for the fresh U.S. military troops, Obama's decision amounts to an acknowledgment by the administration that it has not been swift enough to respond to Iraqi military limitations and Islamic State inroads.
"We have seen shortfalls in elements of Iraqi capacity," Rhodes said. "I think the Iraqi government itself recognizes that. Part of the question that we're trying to answer here is how do we have a better ability to move quicker when we see those shortfalls."
Brett McGurk, the U.S. deputy special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter the Islamic State, said al-Taqaddum's strategic location and the coordination of Iraqi units and tribal fighters will "greatly improve our ability to turn around airstrikes at a pretty fast clip."
The mission there will be more about advising Iraqi forces on operations against the Islamic State militants in Anbar than about providing individual troop training, said Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman.
The expanded effort also will include delivering U.S. equipment and arms directly to al-Taqaddum, under the authority of the government in Baghdad. Thus it will not represent a change in the U.S. policy of providing arms only through the central government, a source of frustration for some Sunni tribal leaders who say they've been kept away from the best equipment.
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Associated Press writers Robert Burns, Deb Riechmann and Nedra Pickler contributed to this article.
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(VATICAN CITY) — Pope Francis met privately with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Vatican on Wednesday, using the talks to call for a sincere effort aimed at bringing peace to Ukraine.
Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi said their talks concentrated on the Ukraine conflict and the Middle East, where the Holy See is worried about the fate of the Christian minority.
Putin earlier Wednesday met Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in Milan and arrived an hour late to the meeting at the Vatican — his second with Francis since he became pope in 2013.
Lombardi said Francis stressed the need “to commit oneself in a sincere and great effort to bring” peace to Ukraine, through dialogue and implementation of the Minsk accords.
Francis also urged access for humanitarian aid.
The United States, using diplomatic channels, had encouraged the Vatican to use the private papal audience as an occasion to join the West in condemning Moscow’s actions in Ukraine.
On Wednesday, the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, Kenneth Hackett, said the U.S. would like to see the Vatican increase its concern about what is happening in Ukraine during the pope’s meeting with Putin.
“We think they could say something more about concern of territorial integrity, those types of issues,” Hackett told reporters. “It does seem that Russia is supporting the insurgents. And it does seem that there are Russian troops inside Ukraine. This is a very serious situation.”
Earlier Wednesday, however, Putin won lavish praise from Renzi as a crucial player in international anti-terrorism efforts, as Renzi sought the Russian president’s help in ending the conflict in Libya that has fueled the Mediterranean migrant crisis.
Renzi greeted Putin as Russia’s “dear” president and didn’t voice any criticism against the country’s actions in Ukraine, saying simply that they both agreed there must be full implementation of the Minsk peace accord.
Renzi met Putin after a tour of Russia’s pavilion at Milan’s Expo.
At a brief Russian-Italian news conference in Milan, Putin stressed the price Italian businesses are paying for the economic sanctions lodged by the European Union against Russia, which annexed Crimea from Ukraine during the conflict.
Putin noted how several infrastructure projects, won in bidding by Italian companies, were stalled because of sanctions against some Russian financial institutions. Likewise, sanctions forced the cancellation of some contracts in the military sphere, costing 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) in earnings for Italian companies, Putin said.
The leaders of the world’s industrialized democracies for a second year in a row refused to let Putin join their G-7 summit, which ended earlier this week. They said sanctions against Russia won’t be lifted until Moscow fully implements its part of the Ukraine peace accord, and could be increased if needed.
Russia accuses Ukraine of failing to launch political dialogue with the rebellious east and of keeping its economic blockade of areas controlled by pro-Russian rebels. Kiev, the United States, NATO and European leaders have blamed Moscow for supplying rebels with manpower, training and weapons. Russia denies the claims.
Both Putin and Renzi spoke confidently of moving forward after the eventual full implementation of the Minsk peace accords.
Renzi praised Russia for being “in the front row in facing the global threats we are all facing.”
Citing Russia’s role as a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, he said Italy “needs Russia’s help on the Libyan question.” Renzi didn’t give specifics on what he hoped Russia might do on Libya.
People-smugglers have been flourishing in Libya amid the confusion, violence and chaos that followed the demise of Moammar Gadhafi’s dictatorship in 2011. Rival Libyan governments and tribal and militia fighting so far have combined to thwart Italy’s calls for reconciliation and pacification in Libya as a way to combat the smuggling.
While the pope has deplored the loss of life in Ukraine and called for all sides to respect the cease-fire, he has not publicly placed any blame on Russia in an apparent bid to not upset Vatican relations with the Orthodox Church and in hopes of engaging Russia’s help to confront the persecution of Christians in the Middle East.
Hackett, the U.S. ambassador, noted that Putin had spoken about the plight of Christians and that that was clearly an area of concern for the Vatican.
“I’d like to see if he’s got a proposal,” he said of Putin.
A cease-fire agreement for Ukraine has been shaky. The heaviest fighting in months broke out in recent days between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian forces.
After meeting with the pope, Putin was expected to spend time later Wednesday with his old friend, ex-Premier Silvio Berlusconi.
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(This story has been corrected to show Hackett spoke Wednesday, not Tuesday.)
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Winfield reported from Rome. Vladimir Isachenkov contributed from Moscow and Frances D’Emilio contributed from Rome.
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· · · ·
A group of liberal clergy and union leaders headed to the Vatican this week to lobby for Pope Francis to address race relations, income inequality and immigration reform, among other issues, in his upcoming trip to the United States.
During the four-day trip, the group of 14 met with representatives from a host of Catholic organizations, including two key cardinals who work on social justice issues.
Organized by the U.S. faith-based grassroots group PICO and the Service Employees International Union, the trip’s main goal was to get Pope Francis to highlight some liberal causes during his September visit.
“God cares about poor, low-wage workers. God cares about immigrants. God cares deeply about racial justice,” Bishop Dwayne Royster of the Living Water United Church of Christ in Philadelphia, one of Francis’ three major stops, told TIME. “So it’s very important that the faith community continue to lift up a moral voice and also a mirror to those in power.”
An advocate of the “Fight for 15” movement, Royster hoped to get the Pope’s attention on labor relations in his home city. When Francis arrives, Royster noted, “he will come into an airport where we support poverty wages and people are working in an oppressive environment.”
Participants on the trip also took to social media, tweeting images from the Vatican with captions such as “#TellthePope,” “BlackLivesMatter,” and “IBelieveWeWillWin.”
Overall, the people on the trip said their goal was to advocate for the marginalized.
A former undocumented immigrant from California, Father Jesus Nieto-Ruiz went on the trip to push for Pope Francis to back President Obama’s recent executive actions allowing undocumented immigrants to avoid deportation.
“The Pope and his advisors should listen to the real stories that we have picked up from people who are struggling in this society of exclusion,” he said. People who have been here for many years, 25 or 30 years, and are now facing deportation because they don’t have documentation—they suffer in the shadows. And that’s not human.”
For PICO, the trip was also part of an ongoing “Year of Encounter” campaign to tie together various liberal causes, such as universal health care, a path to citizenship and police brutality, into a broader mission.
It succeeded in one respect, with Cardinal Peter Turkson from the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace inviting PICO to send a delegation in July to the Bolivian Assembly, where Pope Francis will speak during a Latin American tour.
For clergy members on the trip, the issues are both political and moral.
“The Gospel is political,” said Nieto-Ruiz. “We cannot distinguish and say, ‘Okay, the Gospel must explain theocracy,’ and then let the politicians run our lives with no principles whatsoever. Pope Francis is really incarnating for us the meaning of the Gospel. He’s inviting us to get involved in politics, even when politics is dirty.”
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The U.S. is dispatching around 450 additional military instructors to help Iraq’s government recapture Ramadi and Mosul, adding to the approximately 3,500 US military personnel already on the ground. The move seized headlines, but it’s far from a game-changer in the war against ISIS.
Obama’s decision should come as no surprise. The past few weeks have seen increasingly dire headlines about the radical terror group’s advances in the region. With the fall of Palmyra, ISIS now controls over 50% of Syria’s landmass, on top of its gains in Iraq, which includes the recent invasion of Ramadi. Obama is taking a calculated risk in sending trainers, but a small one. More military instructors will not be enough to defeat ISIS, and Obama knows it. But it just might be enough to change the narrative.
Defeating ISIS would require thousands of ground troops to actually lead the fighting—and that’s just the kind of commitment Obama is keen to avoid. The President needs to show the American people that he is sticking with the Iraqi army, giving it a little more time and a little more resources.
Some Republican presidential candidates, especially Marco Rubio and Lindsey Graham, are pushing for a sustained engagement in the Middle East to root out ISIS. But following two costly and open-ended wars in the region, that option is not popular with the American people.
And it’s not only Americans who are hesitant to put their troops in harm’s way. The West as a whole is growing more risk-averse. A Pew study released today shows more than half of all Germans, Italians and French would oppose using military force in response to any Russian aggression against NATO allies—despite the fact that the NATO treaty requires member nations to treat an armed attack against NATO country as an attack against them all. Just getting the Europeans to accept an additional six months of sanctions on Russia has been a serious slog, even with Putin consistently escalating hostilities in Ukraine.
Aversion is the name of the game these days. Obama talks a big game about ISIS and how it must be destroyed, just like he talks big about how Russia must leave Ukraine. But he carefully avoids mentioning who exactly will defeat ISIS or drive Russia out of Ukraine. It looks like Obama is doing just enough to drag out these difficult challenges—and hand them over to the next President.
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Russian hackers were accused yesterday of being behind a damaging cyberattack on the German parliament that could require a complete overhaul of computer equipment, costing millions of euros.
The invasion of the main Bundestag system was spotted a month ago but investigators have now admitted that the trojan program has not been closed down properly and may still be stealing private data.
A trail appears to lead to an “eastern intelligence community”, Der Spiegel magazine reported yesterday, leading experts to suggest that
Fighters of the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State carry their weapons during a parade at the Syrian town of Tell Abyad, near the border with Turkey, Jan. 2, 2014. (photo by REUTERS/Yaser Al-Khodor)
Author: Ash Gallagher Posted June 8, 2015
The Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for the attacks against Shiites in Qatif and Damman, Saudi Arabia, on May 22 and 29, respectively. To date, some 35 armed militant groups are thought to have pledged allegiance to IS around the world, including Ansar al-Sharia in Libya, al-Mourabitoun in Mali and Boko Haram in Nigeria. With more than 25,000 foreign fighters having flocked to Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen, according to UN calculations, gauging IS’ strength has sparked debate among analysts and world powers.
Summary⎙ Print
The Islamic State is gaining in influence while those opposing it search in vain for ways to counter the extremist organization.
Iraqi military strategist Hisham al-Hashimi told Al-Monitor, “It is not hard for IS to be present in these countries, because, in the case of Saudi Arabia, for example, they go there for the hajj.” He added, “IS is good at branding itself,” asserting that its use of social media is unprecedented.
Martin Ewi, senior researcher for the Institute for Security Studies in South Africa, told Al-Monitor, “The flight of youth to join IS is a global phenomenon. It’s not limited to the Arab world.” He also noted IS sympathizers who choose to stay in their home countries, stating, “IS will support lone-wolf kinds of attacks. Many of these attacks have happened with people who have not had direct contact with IS.” Ewi explained that the group’s influence has benefited from al-Qaeda’s ideology and practices. He remarked that thanks to al-Qaeda's system, “Lone-wolf attacks are the future of terrorism.” Such isolated operations are forcing world leaders to focus on domestic security in addition to fighting IS in Iraq.
Saudi media analyst Jamal Khashoggi told Al-Monitor by phone, “The Ministry of Interior announced the names of 16 individuals who are suspects for assisting in recent attacks.” He said the government is offering nearly $2 million to anyone who provides information resulting in the arrest of those involved. Khashoggi said, “The public is very angry. It is not gaining IS any popularity [here].” He also admitted, however, “We have a problem in Saudi Arabia.”
Hashimi predicts that events in Saudi Arabia will develop in the coming months to reveal IS' strategic pattern. He said, “[IS] starts by targeting minorities, then security forces, then foreigners and journalists, then the princes and king of Saudi Arabia, for example.”
Noting a source of IS' strength, Ewi said that IS' “ideological model is powerful.” He believes it is currently sufficient for IS to induce dedication among younger people and encourage smaller militant factions to align with the group. Hashimi added, “Their force comes from expansion.” In this regard, money has been a driving force behind IS' influential reach and contributes to its staying power.
Hashimi said that IS has distributed up to $6 million a month to groups like Boko Haram and Ansar al-Sharia. In September 2014, the United States began bombing oil installations held by IS, but the group still proved capable of making up to $2 million a week from the occupied facilities.
In June 2014, Iraqi intelligence forces arrested Abu Hajjar, who oversaw IS' finances. According to Hajjar, who was interviewed by Hashimi, before September 2014 the group was exporting “$2 billion in international investments” to Libya, Indonesia, Nigeria, South Africa and Yemen, money that is now being spread among external allied IS branches.
“The increasing number of groups pledging allegiance to IS, I think, is worrisome in Africa,” said Ewi. He said of Boko Haram and groups like it, “The decision to join or to pledge allegiance is actually strategic.” For the smaller armed groups, financial support is crucially important and can help guarantee their survival.
“When Boko Haram joined al-Qaeda, they received money,” Ewi explained. “They also used to receive training. They received strategic support. We’ve seen Boko Haram militants fighting in Iraq. So that means their alliance is very deep.” Ewi added, “They give up their autonomy when they join forces with IS' leadership … They may maintain some structure, tools or ideology, but they give up the command of their group.”
The war against IS is also worrisome in Lebanon, a country often forgotten but on the front lines of the Syrian crisis. Khashoggi said, “Lebanon is connected to Syria. If things go bad in Syria, it will go bad in Lebanon. It has already spilled over.” He puts much of the blame on Hezbollah, which, Khashoggi contends, “has dragged Lebanon more and more into this sectarian war.” In April, shipments of weapons for the Lebanese army began arriving through an arms deal between Saudi Arabia and France worth nearly $3 billion. Riyadh has also urged the Lebanese to elect a president as soon as possible, to help ensure the stability of the country. Lebanese politicians have gone a year without naming a successor to Michel Suleiman, whose term ended in May 2014.
As IS spreads its tentacles globally, some wonder how it can be defeated. Hashimi believes that if IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi falls in Iraq, the armed factions from Africa and elsewhere will simply return to their activities in their own countries. Ewi sees things differently, asserting, “If the groups are committed, when the leadership of the current [IS] organization is removed, these groups can easily reorganize themselves.” He also believes that the countries challenging the armed rebel groups will “weaken” IS' reach in Africa, but he is uncertain of whether they can defeat them.
Khashoggi stated, “I think what will help [defeat] IS the most is for them to be countered by other Islamist fighters, and that has been happening in Syria.” Khashoggi believes some of these forces are moderate factions that can defeat IS while refraining from becoming another version of the extremist group.
According to Ewi, the South African government is providing support to the South African Islamic Center to help educate and reach out to Muslim communities to counter the spread of extremist ideologies, such as that adopted by IS. In Europe and the United States as well, government officials are concerned about defending their domestic soil and educating the public.
As world powers mull over cultural and military strategies against religious extremism, their focus does not appear to be on eradicating the source of the Islamic State's increasing financial expansion.
Read More: <a href="http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/islamic-state-expand-influence-africa-iraq-syria.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/islamic-state-expand-influence-africa-iraq-syria.html</a>
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An Islamic State fighter walks near a black flag belonging to the Islamic State as a Turkish army vehicle takes position near the Syrian town of Kobani, as pictured from the Turkish-Syrian border near the southeastern town of Suruc, Sanliurfa province, Oct. 7, 2014. (photo by REUTERS/Umit Bektas)
Author: Metin Gurcan Posted June 8, 2015
Pro-Islamic State (IS) groups have issued their first online periodical in Turkish. Believed to be designed by veteran IS digital experts at Al-Hayat Media Center, which is known for its highly professional work, the periodical launched its first edition last week, titled "Konstantiniyye" — referring to Constantinople, Istanbul’s name before its conquest by the Ottoman army.
Summary⎙ Print
Pro-Islamic State groups ramp up their propaganda in Turkey and issue their first online periodical.
The 46-page periodical includes symbolically relevant visual material that offers important clues to IS’ strategic vision of Turkey.
The main theme of the first issue is the conquest of Konstantiniyye, as it coincides with the anniversary of the conquest of Istanbul on May 29, 1453. The unsigned lead editorial explains that the periodical is published because of a “lack of access for Turkish people, especially Muslims, to news, articles and videos that are published in the Islamic State.”
The first article is about the city's conquest. The article states that although the city was conquered by Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II on May 29, 1453, Konstantiniyye was not really conquered; it has to be conquered again, this time by the "armies of Islam." The article begins with the Prophet Muhammad extolling the importance of Istanbul. The strategic vision of IS for Istanbul is inspired by the hadiths (the prophet’s sayings), especially the one that predicts that the Islamic armies will first engage the Romans in a major war at Aleppo, close to the Day of Judgment; following that war they will go to Konstantiniyye to conquer it "without arms."
The article ends by stating, “As you will understand from these hadiths, this city now called Istanbul will be conquered without weapons and without bloodshed — only with chants of 'God is great.' The new army of the caliphate, rebuilt as ordained by the prophet, with God’s blessing, will thus capture the city.”
The articles in this first issue, in general, do not advocate violence against Turkey. This may be interpreted as IS refraining from declaring Turkey as an enemy, at least for the time being. It is not clear whether this attitude reflects their opinion of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).
Why such a careful attitude toward Turkey? The answer to this question can be found in another article, titled "Immigration." The message in that article implies that IS does not see Turkey as a battlefield but as a rich source of human resources. All Muslims of Turkey, in particular those in the fields of engineering, health care, education and the military, are invited to emigrate to the Islamic State. Hence, it becomes clear that capturing and holding on to territory is important in the strategic narrative of IS.
A poem that promises the conquest of Istanbul with chants of God’s greatness is seen as a way of praising the glory of the Ottomans, making one wonder whether there is some strategic reason behind it and whether IS is trying to assume the label of "protector of the Sunni world," againstIranian expansionism. If so, then it would mean a radical shift in the strategic vision of IS. The ambition to take over the role of the Ottoman Empire by challenging the nearby enemy of Iran and Shiite expansionism, and the distant enemy of the West and its values, suggest that IS has global aspirations.
It is possible to interpret the article titled "Who is an Apostate?” as a discreet threat to political decision-makers in Turkey, particularly the AKP elites. The basic message to the AKP in this article is that "if you don’t mess with us, we will not mess with you as long as you don’t become apostates." IS here openly warns the AKP that if it takes action against IS, those involved will be declared apostates and their legitimacy will be questioned in front of the Sunni world.
The article "Democracy on Fire," accompanied by a photo of coffins of US soldiers wrapped in US flags, without a doubt reflects IS' perception of democracy as the worst enemy. The article explains, "Democracy can never be compatible with Islam. These are two different religions. No other religion and ideology is compatible with Islam. You cannot add a qualifier to a Muslim. There cannot be a democratic Muslim, communist Muslim, socialist Muslim, Jewish Muslim or Buddhist Muslim. This calls for the Islamic world and Turkey to fight against democracy.” The article is perceived as a reaction to the Kurdish radical Islamist Huda-Par (Free Cause Party). Pro-IS thinkers in Turkey are thus saying the recent elections are not legitimate in their eyes while trying to attract the Huda-Par voters to its ranks.
However, the IS periodical does not include any distinctly anti-Kurdish articles and visual material, apart from challenging Huda-Par. This indicates that radical Islamist Kurds in Turkey constitute for IS a major source of manpower, and that IS is focused on attracting Islamist Kurdish youths.
The article "After Blowing Up the White House, We Want Paris” is a collection of stiff messages to Europe and the United States. After stating that the Kobani resistance of the Kurds succeeded with the efforts of the coalition forces under US leadership, the article resorts to sarcasm: "Congratulations, Pentagon. May the Crusaders enjoy the rubble at Kobani … If you are dreaming of Mosul, Tikrit, Shengal and a piece of a forest in Nigeria we will make your life miserable and blow up your White House, Big Ben and Eiffel Tower.”
From this first online periodical in Turkish, one can conclude — at least for the time being — that IS does not see Turkey as a battlefield, and that Turkey will not be conquered with weapons. Hence, IS is expected to continue to appeal primarily to the hearts and minds of Kurdish youths. The publication also makes it clear — with its message, “We are the soldiers of the mission declared by the prophet" — that there is strong emphasis on Aleppo and the prophet’s visions.
For the first time, we see how closely IS is monitoring the changes in political Islam in Turkey, and how it is looking for a place for itself in that transformation. There is no doubt that Turkish Islamism represented by the AKP has been tarnished with corruption allegations. IS appears to be fusing its ideology with Islamism and Ottomanism in Turkey to create a new radical Islamist school of thought there that could motivate the Islamist masses already disengaged from socio-economic life and democracy closer to IS.
That IS has a long-term strategic vision for Turkey is the most important message the periodical is sending. It emphasizes the popular-centric approach aimed at winning the hearts and minds of Turks, instead of armed violence and terror; hence the call to conquer Istanbul not with weapons but with Islamist spiritual action.
Read More: <a href="http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/turkey-syria-isis-goes-on-line-magazine.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/turkey-syria-isis-goes-on-line-magazine.html</a>
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Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X Yazigi delivers a speech at a ceremony to pray for peace, during a Christmas mass at Al-Maryamyeh Church in Damascus, Dec. 25, 2013. (photo by REUTERS/SANA/Handout via Reuters)
Author: Jean Aziz Posted June 9, 2015
BEIRUT — Lebanon has been witnessing activities by the Catholic and Orthodox churches. As the papal envoy to Lebanon, Cardinal Dominique Mamberti, was meeting with Lebanese officials and politicians during his visit to Beirut on May 29, preparations were ongoing for the annual meeting of Eastern patriarchs in Damascus on June 8, at the invitation of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X Yazigi.
Summary⎙ Print
The Eastern patriarchs met in Damascus on June 8 to discuss the Christians’ situation in the region, following coordinating efforts between Lebanese Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Rai and the Vatican, and Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X Yazigi and Moscow.
There doesn’t seem to be any direct link between the two events, but the same issues were discussed at both. The meeting of the Eastern patriarchs was held at the seat of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in the Christian neighborhood of Bab Tuma (Thomas' Gate) in the heart of Damascus. (This neighborhood owes its name to Saint Thomas, one of the 12 apostles, who passed by Damascus.) The agenda of this ecclesial meeting included the situation of Christians in the region, the challenges they face and the future of the Christian minorities in Syria and Lebanon.
Remarkably, the patriarchs unanimously accepted the invitation despite the political situation and the dangerous security conditions on the road between Beirut and Damascus.
Gregory III Laham, the patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, told Al-Monitor that five patriarchs and a large number of bishops and church officials accepted the invitation of Yazigi. In addition to Yazigi and Laham, the other patriarchs included Syriac Orthodox Patriarch Ignatius Ephrem II, Syriac Catholic Patriarch Ignatius Ephrem Joseph III Younan and Bechara al-Rai, the Maronite patriarch of Antioch and head of the Maronite Church in Lebanon.
According to Laham, the patriarchs promptly accepted the invitation for the annual meeting in Damascus, since the seats of three of them — Laham, Yazigi and Ephrem — are located in the Syrian capital.
Laham said that in light of the dangerous situation afflicting the entire region, the church leaders regularly discuss ways to meet the challenges that Christians in the region face, especially the current immigration of Syria’s Christians — the main reason for Yazigi to call for this year's meeting to be held in Damascus.
However, this event also has political aspects. The patriarchs’ presence in Damascus at this particular time may be seen by the Syrian regime’s opponents as support for the Syrian government by the Eastern churches. Therefore, the church leaders were careful in handling this issue, especially in light of past experiences. On Feb. 9, 2013, Yazigi was enthroned at the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Damascus, in the presence of Rai and many other patriarchs. At that time, Lebanese politicians opposing the Syrian regime raised their objection to Rai’s presence at the ceremony in Damascus, considering it a step that could be exploited by the Syrian regime in the political arena and the media.
On Sept. 11, 2014, several Eastern patriarchs attended a conference in Washington on protecting the Christians of the Levant. On the sidelines of this conference, the patriarchs met with US President Barack Obama. The meeting’s agenda caused an uproar in Beirut, because the patriarchs and bishops had told Obama that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad provided protection to the Christians in Syria, in light of the extremism emerging among his opponents. At that time, it was reported thatObama assured the church leaders that he was aware of this, which led Assad's opponents to direct their criticism back to the heads of the Eastern Church.
These past experiences seemed to linger in the minds of the participants of this year's annual meeting. Various ecclesial sources said that the meeting and Rai's visit to Damascus this time would not have a political impact, as no meeting was held with any Syrian officials and the visit was purely for church-related purposes.
Laham said that the meeting’s agenda focused on the Christians’ situation and church-related matters in the region, and did not tackle political issues. However, this does not mean that the meeting was limited to ecclesial affairs, as the Eastern Christians are facing challenges on many levels.
Laham asked, “How do we safeguard our presence? How do we preserve our role? How do we handle the immigration of our Christian children from the countries in the region?” He said that the church leaders in Damascus will try to reach common ground to confront these dangers, to develop joint plans of action to preserve the Christian presence in their countries and to ensure their coexistence with non-Christians.
However, the political aspect of the meeting in Damascus seems to be clear despite Laham’s assertions. Yazigi’s invitation of the Eastern patriarchs to Damascus falls within the scope of coordination between his church and Moscow, and Rai’s visit to the Syrian capital was made possible through coordination efforts between him and the Vatican. Hence, the meeting in Damascus can be seen as an attempt to find another source of protection for the Christians of the region.
However, providing protection to the Christians from extremists is a challenge. The meeting in Damascus coincided with the first anniversary of the displacement of Christians from Mosul, the Ninevah plains and several villages in Iraq, following the invasion of the Islamic State.
Read More: <a href="http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/eastern-church-meeting-damascus-syria-moscow-vatican.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/eastern-church-meeting-damascus-syria-moscow-vatican.html</a>
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Although many details of the massive cyberattack against US government personnel records are still not public, its strategic implications are plain. Washington remains unprepared in cyberspace, floundering and unable to articulate its intentions and capabilities on this new battlefield.
China is the likely culprit, and its cyberwarfare — added to its near-belligerent behavior in the South and East China seas, its expanding military assets and its use of economic clout for political ends — is part of a deeply troubling pattern. Unfortunately, President Obama’s response is also apparently part of a pattern of sustained inaction.
The Pentagon may be working hard to develop offensive and defensive countermeasures, but the administration has done precious little to articulate what America’s strategy should be in response to these challenges. The president’s policy silence is chilling and inexcusable.
To be sure, silence before or after a particular clandestine operation is often necessary to protect operational methods and information sources. For example, Washington did not take direct credit — indeed did not confirm or deny — its probable role in temporarily taking down Pyongyang’s Internet after North Korea hacked into Sony Pictures six months ago.
But protecting clandestine methods and sources is one thing; Obama’s policy silence is another. Americans understand how important information technology is, and society’s increasingly computerized complexity and interdependence. But they require leadership to understand how seriously we could be hurt if our IT infrastructure is compromised.
In China’s case, based on a long history amply documented by the Pentagon, the People’s Liberation Army is almost certainly the perpetrator of the federal hacking, which means, to state the obvious, that Beijing sees penetrating US government computers as a military capability.
Washington remains unprepared in cyberspace, floundering and unable to articulate its intentions and capabilities on this new battlefield.
Right now, our enemies are faced mostly with rhetoric — mere hand-wringing — not clear deterrence. This vacuum must be replaced by a stated strategy, and quickly. Fortunately, once Washington concludes to its satisfaction that Beijing conducted the recent attack, the response can include building blocks for a more comprehensive cyberwarfare strategy.
First, America must create structures of deterrence. Starting now, America’s cyber response should be disproportionate. The justification for such a response is all too clear: Without it we are facing repeated cycles of cyber incursions.
To persuade Beijing and others to desist, they must believe their conduct will result in costs that are unacceptable and unsustainable. Mere tit-for-tat responses indicate an inability or unwillingness to react more strongly and may simply tempt aggressors into more ambitious operations.
The White House considered the sanctions it ordered in response to North Korea “proportional,” but compared with the decades-old US sanctions regime against the Pyongyang government, the incremental new sanctions were trivial. Nor does Obama’s April 1 executive order authorizing sanctions against other cyberattackers augur anything beyond the North Korean example.
Second, US retaliation must include political and economic measures beyond the cyber realm. The latest hack was motivated by something more than theoretical curiosity about how to penetrate foreign computer networks. China might intend to use the government personnel files for blackmail, or to understand our security clearance methods so as to better conceal its own covert agents. Accordingly, Washington’s response must go well beyond simply inflicting pain on China’s computer networks.
Beijing’s ambassador, and other Chinese diplomats in America (especially anyone connected with Chinese intelligence), should be declared persona non grata and sent home. Travel restrictions should be imposed on those remaining, and on personnel at Beijing’s United Nations mission. All military-to-military programs should be terminated or suspended indefinitely.
Economically, the US must retaliate strongly against entities that support or are controlled by the PLA, especially those related to computers and communications. The latest attack exposes a related US vulnerability: the extent to which our cyber infrastructure derives from components manufactured in China. That supply chain must now come under scrutiny, with greater reliance, for example, on companies that keep their production facilities elsewhere.
There is obviously risk in any strong response to a cyberattack. But if America is unwilling to defend itself when the costs and risks are relatively low, there is no reason for Beijing and others to think it will do so when the potential consequences are far greater.
North Korea’s attack on Sony Pictures was a wake-up call. China’s apparent capture of US government personnel records is like being upended out of bed to the floor. What else is it going to take?
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Sometimes debt burdens become deeply burdensome. And if you’re the debtor, wouldn’t it be nice to find a way to avoid hard decisions by reneging on past agreements on repayment, that is, to change the rules after much of the game has been played? A bill before Congress, the “Puerto Rico Chapter 9 Uniformity Act of 2015” (H.R. 870), would allow Puerto Rico to do exactly that, which is why it should be defeated resoundingly.
Unless some sort of fraud was involved, ordinary bankruptcy by individuals and businesses cannot be criticized as a rule-changing exercise, as the lenders and creditors knew from the beginning that there was some likelihood that a given borrower might not be able to honor its commitments. That is what it means to say that the possibility of future bankruptcy increases the risks faced by creditors, and it is obvious that the agreed interest rate and other terms applied to the debts would reflect that reality.
Not so for those borrowers explicitly prohibited under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code from filing for debt relief under chapter 9 (municipal bankruptcy). The fact that they may not resort to bankruptcy means that their debts ostensibly are safer for creditors—they may not be repudiated—and it is that increased safety, among other factors, that allows them to borrow on terms and at interest rates more favorable than those available to other borrowers.
Puerto Rico’s borrowing needs over the not-distant future are substantial. Prepa will need to make large investments in equipment and infrastructure in order to satisfy new environmental requirements now being finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency, and to move away from the use of expensive oil.
That is the case with Puerto Rico, with respect to which legislation enacted by Congress in 1984 prevented it and its various municipal agencies and bureaus from using chapter 9. Accordingly, this has had the effect of reducing the interest rates that they have had to pay. And there is a broader benefit: It creates efficient incentives for public officials because they have political time horizons—the next election—shorter than the economic horizons shaping business decisions. Municipal bankruptcies would have adverse effects down the road, but those would be borne by future officeholders rather than those currently incurring too much debt. The prohibition on municipal bankruptcy imposes a useful constraint in the here and now.
Moreover, Puerto Rico and its various borrowing units have been granted a nationwide tax exemption for their bonds—a preference bestowed upon no U.S. state—thus reducing Puerto Rico borrowing costs even more. It is no accident, therefore, that Puerto Rico is the third-largest issuer of municipal bonds in the U.S., with debt now totaling about $73 billion, borne by a population of only 3.7 million. That is almost $20,000 per person.
And that brings us to the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, the island’s electric utility. It has enjoyed those favorable borrowing terms and has amassed almost $9 billion in debt. But Prepa also is woefully mismanaged, with about $1 billion in accounts receivable, most of which is owed by other units of Puerto Rico government. This is despite the fact that its basic electric rates have not increased in 25 years (other than for increased fuel costs).
So, proponents of H.R. 870 would allow Puerto Rico generally and Prepa in particular to use chapter 9 bankruptcy to repudiate much of its debt, thus changing in their favor the agreed terms applied to past borrowings. Voila! Electric rates would be reduced by about 4 cents per kWh, which is large or small depending on one’s point of view.
Sadly, there are no free lunches. This legislation would violate past lending agreements, with adverse effects on Puerto Rico’s future borrowing costs due to the obvious increase in perceived risks, both from the narrow threat of bankruptcy and from the larger increase in the likelihood that agreed contractual terms might not be treated as actual commitments.
And Puerto Rico’s borrowing needs over the not-distant future are substantial. Prepa will need to make large investments in equipment and infrastructure in order to satisfy new environmental requirements now being finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency, and to move away from the use of expensive oil. The Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Agency—the debt of which already is below investment grade—has investment needs over the next few years of well over $1 billion, of which about $400 million alone is needed to satisfy consent decrees with the EPA. And so on.
If Prepa’s commitments can be repudiated after the fact, why not those represented by other debts in the muni market? If enacted, H.R. 870 promises to increase borrowing costs for all municipal debt across the country, an outcome that would serve the interests of no one except borrowers with political incentives to acquire debts that cannot be sustained.
And it is not as if Prepa has no options. Rates can be increased; why is it, after all, that almost all other municipal (and investor-owned) utilities charge rates sufficient to pay their bills? A far more effective system for collecting receivables, emphatically including those owed by other units of government, can be implemented, and Prepa’s customers—above all, again, other government agencies—can be pressured much more effectively to pay their power bills.
Recent news reports on waste and bankruptcy in the electric power sector have focused heavily on the subsidized boondoggles prominent in the wind and solar sector, as represented by the Solyndra debacle. But it is not only renewables that can display such outcomes. Irresponsible behavior over time, designed to bestow economic benefits upon favored constituencies, can yield highly adverse outcomes in conventional generation as well, particularly as political pressures to mortgage the future prove irresistible. Adhering to the agreed rules of the game—the contractual arrangements under which resources are provided and debts are honored—is a crucial bulwark against the incentives of politicians and bureaucrats to weaken economic markets. The special favor for Puerto Rico that is H.R. 870 should not move forward.
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A nation’s flag, a national idea by AEIdeas Intern
“A yearly contemplation of our flag strengthens and purifies the national conscience,” declared President Calvin Coolidge. Echoing sentiments Woodrow Wilson expressed in his 1916 proclamation recommending the annual observance of “Flag Day,” Coolidge succinctly summed up the point for such a national holiday: “We see in [the flag] the great multitude of blessings, of rights and privileges that make up our country. But…we must remember that it is equally a symbol of our duties. Every glory that we associate with it is the result of duty done.”
Like Achilles’ famous shield depicting both war and peace in relation to the life of the city and the seasons, the American flag symbolizes the blessings and the duties germane to a self-governing nation dedicated to freedom and equality. The blessings are frequently invoked even if less well-understood by a populace safely ensconced in them, while flag-draped coffins of fallen soldiers constitute our most visceral reminders of the glory and the cost of “duty done.” But as successive presidents from Wilson onward have noted in relation to Flag Day, the upward-pointing stars combined with the red and white stripes primarily provoke us to contemplate the ongoing and current duties we carry as citizens, chief of which is respect for the rule of law.
“In whatever direction we may go we are always confronted with the inescapable conclusion that unless we observe the law we cannot be free,” noted Coolidge. Or, as that philosophical grandpappa of America John Locke put it, “…the end of law is not to abolish or restrain but to preserve and enlarge freedom…for where there is no law, there is no freedom. For liberty is to be free from restraint and violence from others, which cannot be, where there is no law.” In the American tradition, this observance of the law as a supreme principle is two-pronged: it means that laws when made must not designate winners and losers, applying unequally to different persons or groups of society; it also means that all alike, those in elected office, enjoying positions of economic power, and the common laboring inhabitant, must follow the prescriptions of the law. It’s equality before the law that enables people living in civil society equally to enjoy liberty, which in turn enables a shared peace.
But as the stories in our newspapers seem frequently to remind us, the rule of law is much less difficult to invoke than to practice. In part, this is because law relies upon the good will of human agents—and, to a degree, upon their devotion. Like the flag itself, it is fragile without both. Perhaps it is in recognition of this fact that our national anthem is actually an anthem to our flag.
American composer extraordinaire John Williams celebrated that link at any rate, when on the steps of the US Capitol last year he debuted a new arrangement of the Star-Spangled banner, marking the 200th anniversary of the American flag. With a nod to tradition, in signature style Williams’ brass salvo and measured drumbeat herald an ordered unity of human voices, which swell to the simple message: our flag is still here. Remember its glories; remember too, its requests.
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If the findings of a new Pew poll are to be taken seriously, one ought to think twice about buying that second vacation home in one of the Baltic states or the Polish countryside. According to Pew, although the public in eight sampled NATO nations largely blame Russia, Putin, and the Ukrainian separatists for the security crisis in Eastern Europe, only the United States and Canada register a majority who would support responding with military force were Russia to attack a NATO ally. Despite the solemn and perfectly clear treaty commitment, less than half of those polled in Germany, Italy, France, Spain, the UK, and, ironically, Poland, according to the poll, favor doing so!
However, before the US gives itself a pat on the back, it is also worth noting the partisan breakout of the poll results on this key question of defending another NATO ally. It turns out that the Democrats polled are more like Germans and Italians: only a minority (47%) agrees that an attack by Russia on a NATO ally should be met with military force. In contrast, 69% percent of Republicans polled would support living up to the treaty commitment.
Of course, to show how baffling and contradictory public opinion across the alliance has become—undoubtedly a refection in part of the lack of serious attention given NATO by national leaders over the past two decades—“a majority (57%) also supports Ukraine becoming a member of NATO,” even while less than a majority supports giving military aid to Kiev.
But perhaps another poll finding can make sense of this: by a wide margin (68%), “most [non-US] NATO publics believe the United States would use military force to defend a fellow NATO country.” Typical “free-riding” by allies one might conclude—something Americans have long complained about. However, on the flip side, it’s also a reminder of how even publics that routinely dismiss American policies and statecraft as less enlightened than theirs know in their bones that the US and its military remain, in the words of former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, “the indispensable nation” when it comes global security.
Not a pretty picture for sure…either when it comes to allies abroad or Democrats at home.
A just-released Pew Research survey of eight major NATO members does not bode well for peace in Europe, as almost half of each country’s population would not support the use military force to defend an ally if it became engaged in serious military conflict with Russia.
While barely over half of those polled in the United States (56%) and Canada (53%) are for the use of military force in response to Russian aggression toward a NATO ally, less than half of respondents in the UK (49%), Poland (48%), Spain (48%), and France (47%) would support such a response. Italy and Germany are even less willing to fulfill their treaty obligations with levels of support sagging at 40% and 38% respectively.
These numbers are alarming because the scenario envisioned by the poll is a distinct possibility. If the conflict in Ukraine is not enough to stoke the patriotic mobilization that serves as the Putin regime’s only claim to legitimacy, the Russian president may decide to up the ante and start nibbling on the Baltics. Estonia and Latvia are especially inviting targets with 20-25% ethnic Russian populations.
The conventional wisdom is that he wouldn’t dare, because as NATO members, they are protected by the attack-on-one-is-an-attack-on-all Article V of the NATO Charter. But if the domestic political imperatives — Putin’s key motivator all along as he is well on the way to a presidency-for-life — are urgent enough, it is precisely the Baltic states’ status as NATO members that makes them attractive. Exposing NATO (and, first and foremost, the US, Putin’s perennial obsession) as a paper tiger will furnish the Russian dictator with an outburst of domestic allegiance, compared to which the “Crimea-is-ours” hysteria may seem like a soft whisper.
Given the purely symbolic level of NATO deployments in the Baltics, this poll and others (which Putin is likely to monitor almost as carefully as he does the Russian ones) may be making the temptation all the more irresistible.
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Egypt asked the U.S. ambassador in Cairo to account for the Obama administration's allowing Muslim Brotherhood officials to visit Washington for a private conference this weeksponsored by theCenter for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID).
Egypt sought the recent meeting with Ambassador Stephen Beecroft to show its displeasure with American policy toward the Brotherhood, which it labels a terrorist organization.
Delegation members include Amr Darrag, whose handling of drafting and ratifying Egypt's December 2012 constitution led to fears the Brotherhood aimed to impose a theocracy; and Wael Haddara, a Canadian Brotherhood member who served as an adviser to deposed President Mohamed Morsi.
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Oh, how the feminist movement has lost its way. And the deafening silence over ISIS's latest brutal crimes makes that all too clear.
Fifty years ago, American women launched a liberation campaign for freedom and equality. We achieved a revolution in the Western world and created a vision for girls and women everywhere.
Second-wave feminism was an ideologically diverse movement that pioneered society's understanding of how women were disadvantaged economically, reproductively, politically, physically, psychologically and sexually.
Feminists had one standard of universal human rights — we were not cultural relativists — and we called misogyny by its rightful name no matter where we found it.
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On April 2, the State Department released a “fact sheet” on the emerging nuclear agreement with Iran that included this pledge: “U.S. sanctions on Iran for terrorism, human rights abuses, and ballistic missiles will remain in place under the deal.”
Today the Associated Press is reporting: “The Obama administration may have to backtrack on its promise that it will suspend only nuclear-related economic sanctions on Iran as part of an emerging nuclear agreement.” The “may have to” could be puzzling to outsiders: Why does the administration have to do anything? The answer, of course, is because the president wants a deal concluded with Iran by June 30, no matter the details.
This requires some extremely creative reinterpretation of the April 2 fact sheet by State Department spinners who are now claiming that, on second thought, pretty much ALL sanctions are nuclear-related: “For example, they say measures designed to stop Iran from acquiring ballistic missiles are nuclear-related because they were imposed to push Iran into the negotiations. Also, they say sanctions that may appear non-nuclear are often undergirded by previous actions conceived as efforts to stop Iran’s nuclear program.” Clearly the current leaders of the State Department are graduates of the Bill Clinton School of Linguistics: “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.”
That the Obama administration is willing, nay eager, to concede points that were considered non-negotiable a mere two months ago should hardly be surprising. The entire history of the administration’s talks with Iran is the story of one American concession after another. As the Wall Street Journal noted, “Top Obama administration officials entered negotiations with Iran in September 2013 hoping to dismantle most of the country’s nuclear infrastructure,” but the Iranians wouldn’t agree to that. So “the goal of the talks shifted—away from dismantling structures and toward a more complex set of limitations designed to extend the time Iran would need to ‘break-out’ and make a dash toward a nuclear weapon.”
Even now, after all of the concessions the administration has made, some points of difference remain, at least in public; for example, on how quickly sanctions will be phased out and how much freedom Iran will need to grant to international inspectors. The Iranians are demanding an immediate lifting of sanctions while the Obama administration claims that it will be conditional based on compliance. The Iranians are also insisting on the right to deny inspectors access to their military sites while the Obama administration claims that the agreement will be enforced by the most intrusive inspections ever. Is there any doubt about how these disputes will be resolved? There is little doubt that, after the reported latest cave-in on non-nuclear sanctions, the administration will cave on those points, too, while obfuscating to deny that it has done so.
The post Obama Bending Over Backwards to Preserve Iran Nuclear Deal appeared first onCommentary Magazine.
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Inside the Obama administration's struggle to deal with ISIS and the deadly civil war in Syria.
The dramatic story of the fight over the CIA's controversial interrogation methods, widely criticized as torture.
FRONTLINE investigates the spread of dangerous pathogens in our poultry.
At this critical moment for the future of Ukrainian, European and U.S. interests in the region, the U.S.-Ukraine strategic partnership lacks both strategy and partnership.
This much is clear after meetings with Ukraine’s political leaders, journalists, academics, civil-society activists and volunteers active in the conflict zone during our recent trip across the beleaguered nation. Ukraine’s appeals for U.S. support have only grown louder and more desperate as renewed fighting flared around Donetsk in the past week.
Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has welcomed Russian president Putin in Milan, despite ongoing tensions with Western powers over Ukraine. Putin is also to meet Pope Francis and former Italian leader Berlusconi.
The Ebola Review, Part I by Laurie Garrett
The G-7 is gathering to tackle the
world’s biggest problems. It’s starting with Ebola -- and what the World Health Organization did wrong.
world’s biggest problems. It’s starting with Ebola -- and what the World Health Organization did wrong.
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The Ebola Review, Part II by Laurie Garrett
Germany's Angela Merkel is leading the G-7 charge to seriously reform the World Health Organization. But will her campaign actually lead to lasting change?
Construction usually pulls America out of a recession, but not this time.
Saakashvili riding into town
THE new governor of Odessa in southern Ukraine has many useful attributes. He once implemented a boldly successful anti-corruption campaign, sacking all the traffic police. That is valuable experience in a region that, even in a country as crooked as Ukraine, is renowned for graft. He speaks numerous languages, a plus in a polyglot maritime area. As an out-of-towner, he is not implicated in the oligarchic in-fighting that blights Odessa and much of Ukraine.
The oddity (and perhaps problem) is that the new governor, Mikheil Saakashvili, is not just any out-of-towner. He is a former president of Georgia, on the other side of the Black Sea—although, after leaving office in 2013, he faces allegations of abuse of office (which he denies) and cannot safely return. Mr Saakashvili led the “rose revolution” of 2003 and tried to steer Georgia towards membership of the European Union and NATO—a strategy that led Russia’s Vladimir Putin into a war with his small Caucasian neighbour in 2008. As with Ukraine after the orange revolution of 2004, Georgia’s fitful progress westward was hampered by the Kremlin’...
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'Iran has no interest in nuclear weapons due to edict by Khamenei' by By YASSER OKBI/ MAARIV HASHAVUA
The remarks were made by Brigadier General Hossein Salami during a defense conference at a Tehran university.
Ukrainian commander says captured drones are Russian - video by Christian Borys, Yura Melko
The commander of the Ukrainian Aerorozvidka unit, Natan Chazin, explains the the importance of a drone his unit shot down this month. Chazin explains that the recovery of the the Israeli-made drone, called the Searcher 2, lasted two days as Ukrainian troops battled to reach the wreckage, saying this is indicative of the aircraft's importance. The commander also adds that the drone is highly advanced and used by only a few countries across the world Continue reading...
PARIS (Reuters) - French investigators are looking at a possible Russian lead in an inquiry into a hacking attack on French public television station TV5Monde in April, a judicial source said.
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