Chicago Sues Trump Administration Over Threat to Sanctuary Cities

This morning, the city of Chicago filed a lawsuit against Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Trump Administration over the threats to withhold funding to so-called sanctuary cities. This comes two weeks after the Department of Justice said it would stop certain grant funding to cities unless they provide immigration officers with unlimited access to local jails. Cities will also need to give the DOJ 48 hours notice before releasing people from jail who are wanted for immigration violations. But now Chicago is pushing back. “Chicago will not let our police officers become political pawns in a debate. Chicago will not let our residents have their fundamental rights isolated and violated,” said Mayor Rahm Emanuel in a press conference yesterday.

The Trump Administration cited Chicago’s high murder rate as a justification to withhold grants to the city. “It’s especially tragic that the mayor is less concerned with that staggering figure than he is spending time and taxpayer money protecting criminal aliens and putting Chicago’s law enforcement at greater risk,” a spokeswoman for the DOJ said.

“Chicago will not be blackmailed into changing our values, and we are and will remain a welcoming city” https://t.co/Cf6M6pkjtS

— NBC Los Angeles (@NBCLA) August 7, 2017

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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In mid-April, protesters in the Indian-controlled part of Kashmir clashed with Indian soldiers, leaving at least eight dead and more than 200 injured. This came in the wake of elections held in Kashmir that saw only 7 percent turnout, the lowest in 27 years. That record was quickly broken in a re-scheduled election in which only 2 percent of people voted. These are just the latest developments in the conflict over Kashmir between India and Pakistan, which has lasted decades. This conflict is compounded by a number of other issues, such as both countries’ nuclear power status and the involvement of China. Read on to find out more about the Kashmir conflict, its impact on India-Pakistan relations, and how it may eventually be resolved.

Background: A Look at Kashmir

The region of Kashmir has been disputed territory between India and Pakistan since 1947, following British rule and the partition of British India. India, which borders the region to the south, controls the south and southeastern parts called Jammu and Kashmir. Pakistan controls the northern and western parts (and since 1962, China has controlled the northeastern portion). The Indian and Pakistani zones are separated by the Line of Control.

Despite being controlled by India, which is predominantly Hindu, half of Jammu and the entirety of Kashmir are majority Muslim areas. Both religions have long roots in the region, with Hinduism dating back to the area’s early history and Islam coming in the 14th century via Muslim conquerors. The area was also intermittently ruled by Afghan Warlords and Sikh princes.

The video below describes how the borders formed over time:

The Conflict

Although Hindus and Muslims had coexisted relatively peacefully for centuries, conflict quickly gripped the area following independence. The origin of the conflict can be traced back to the choice of the Maharaja Hari Singh of Kashmir. At the point of independence, the Maharaja hoped to remain independent, however, he was ultimately forced to choose between joining either India or Pakistan thanks to an armed revolt within the region. Despite ruling over a majority Muslim area, the Hindu Maharajah decided to side with India.

The Maharajah’s decision allowed India to justify sending troops into the region. Originally it was supposed to be a temporary move, with the ultimate goal of holding a local vote to decide who would be in charge. The conflict continued and in 1948 the United Nations got involved at India’s request. The U.N. Security Council passed a resolution calling on Pakistan to withdraw its forces from Jammu and Kashmir while allowing India to maintain a small military presence. Pakistan refused and the vote that was supposed to determine the fate of Kashmir never took place. But in 1951, elections did proceed in the Indian-controlled portions of Kashmir and Jammu.

Fighting picked up again in the 1960s and 70s, but the first conflict was between China and India in 1962. Chinese forces quickly defeated Indian troops and took control over the region they dubbed Askai Chin. Their territories were separated by the Actual Line of Control, which is different from the similarly named line between Indian and Pakistani Kashmir.

India and Pakistan re-engaged in heavy fighting in 1965 and 1971, following years of unrest in the region. In 1971 the Indian army decisively defeated their Pakistani antagonists. This led to the Simla Agreement that called on both parties to solve matters peacefully and clearly designated the Line of Control. However, in reality, this did not stop the violence. The continuing conflict was carried out by insurgency groups from Pakistan, who flooded into Indian Kashmir to fight against its occupation. There was also the Kargil War of 1999 that nearly led to a nuclear conflict.

Peace Process

The peace process in Kashmir has been ongoing nearly as long as the conflict. There were the ceasefires in 1948 and 1971, however, neither fully stopped the fighting and were largely ineffective. During the 1999 Kargil War and during a period between 2001 and 2002 there were also fears that renewed conflict between India and Pakistan would lead to a nuclear confrontation. Luckily, due to international interference primarily by the United States, the crisis was averted.

More recently, progress was made in what is known as the “composite dialogue,” which began in 2004. This dialogue ultimately ended with the Mumbai bombing in 2008. However, the goals accomplished during the talks, such as a ceasefire at the line of control and passage across the line of control, endured.

Despite this progress, the region once more experienced a surge in violence following the 2008 attack. After a couple years, relations began to improve and in 2012, the President of Pakistan met with the Indian Prime Minister to hold the first high-level talks in nearly eight years. But hope for progress was quickly dashed after India’s decision to execute both the last remaining Mumbai attacker, as well as a Kashmiri convicted in a 2001 attempted bombing of India’s parliament, led to renewed violence.

Line of Control

This situation may also have been exacerbated by the construction of a border fence beginning in 2003. While the numbers suggest the fence has been successful in reducing infiltration by potential militants, it also has its drawbacks. The fence may simply be diverting them to other areas and it is expensive to maintain, as large portions have to be rebuilt after each winter.

Further controversy arose after there were rumors that India planned to build a more solid wall in 2015. Specifically, in 2015, Pakistani officials went to the United Nations and claimed India was planning a 10-meter high, 135-foot wide wall along the entire 197-kilometer border in an effort to make the Line of Control the permanent border in Kashmir (Pakistan does not view the Line of Control as a legitimate border). India denied the claim and the wall never materialized.

India has also installed something known as a “laser wall” in Jammu within Kashmir and along other parts of its border with Pakistan. This technology is able to detect movement and is useful in places where the topography makes it hard to build a physical fence.

Current Situation

The current situation continues to be unstable in light of the recent disputes detailed above. This includes the election chaos from April and protests in May after a militant commander was killed by Indian security forces. There have also been repeated episodes of violence along the Line of Control, along with violence in both countries’ territories. The two sides are also quarreling over the status of an alleged Indian spy whose fate is being decided by the International Court of Justice.

The Region’s Future

Given the persistent conflict, what is the most likely outcome for this region? An article from the BBC details seven possibilities, ranging from variations of India and Pakistan taking over all or part of the region to Kashmir achieving independence. However, for any of these scenarios to take place, one side would need to give up territory, which has become unlikely amid renewed tension.

China, meanwhile, might also have a major role to play in the region’s future. China, whose own claim to Kashmir already played out in a successful war against India, recently signed a $500 million deal with Pakistan. This is just part of a much larger $57 billion deal between the two countries to create a China-Pakistan Economic Corridor in part of China’s even larger One Belt, One Road Initiative. The plan includes rail lines that would run directly through the contested territory. In response, India refused to even send an official delegation to a recent summit in Beijing.

Conclusion

The conflict over Kashmir between India and Pakistan, and China to a much smaller degree, has dragged on for decades and cost tens of thousands of lives. Both sides have legitimate claims to the region. For India, it is simply enforcing the decision of the Maharajah dating back to the 1940s. For Pakistan, it is about incorporating a majority Muslim region into a Muslim nation. Both nations also have significant issues with their adversary’s position–India claims Pakistan seized the areas under its control illegally, while Pakistan states that the Maharajah’s original decision was made under duress and is therefore invalid.

Regardless of the reasoning, the combined populations of India and Pakistan are more than one-fifth of the world’s total, and both countries possess nuclear weapons. Thus, it is imperative that the two sides negotiate some sort of a deal or even agree to a third option where Kashmir is independent. Reaching that agreement has proved elusive and with the involvement of other countries, like China, it may prove even more challenging. The situation in Kashmir is reminiscent of the deadlock between Israel and Palestine and unfortunately shows just as few signs of being remedied in the near future.

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Few cities have caused as many headaches as Jerusalem. On Thursday, President Donald Trump continued in the tradition of his predecessors in keeping the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel’s metropolis on the Mediterranean, rather than moving it to Jerusalem, Israel’s proclaimed undivided capital. In the wake of Trump’s announcement, social media has seemingly come to a consensus: Trump broke a campaign promise. Sure, he did. But like everything else involving Jerusalem, it’s not that simple.

Status of the Holy City

When the United Nations officially recognized the State of Israel in 1947, it also sought to designate Jerusalem “corpus separatum,” or an international protectorate, apart from the Arab and Jewish states being created between the Jordan River to the east and the Mediterranean to the west. That did not happen. Instead, after Israel officially declared itself a sovereign nation in May 1948, an attack was launched–Arab armies assaulted Israel, which eventually won the war.

But Jerusalem, which saw heavy fighting in the war, was split: Jordan captured the eastern half, which contains Judaism’s holiest sites (as well as Islamic and Christian holy sites), while Israel held onto the western half. Jordan governed the Holy City for nearly two decades. Under Jordanian rule, Jews were not allowed to visit their holiest site, the Western Wall. Jewish synagogues and cemeteries were destroyed or deconstructed. In the 1948-49 war, Jordan also captured the West Bank.

The Six-Day War in 1967 changed the status of Jerusalem, and shifted the conversation for decades to come. Israel captured a number of land parcels during the war: the Gaza Strip from Egypt; the Golan Heights from Syria; and the West Bank and east Jerusalem from Jordan. Soon after, Israel annexed the Golan Heights and east Jerusalem, moves that the international community did not–and still does not–recognize. Since then, all of Jerusalem–save the Temple Mount, a holy site for all Abrahamic faiths, which remains in Jordan’s hands–has belonged to Israel, which deems the city its undivided, eternal capital.

The U.S. Embassy

The U.S., like all other countries, has kept its embassy in Tel Aviv for decades. Israel has urged U.S. presidents to move the embassy to Jerusalem, home to Israel’s parliament, Supreme Court, and numerous cultural and business institutions. In 1995, the Clinton Administration signed a bill that set a clear path for the embassy move.

The Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995 found that the U.S. “maintains its embassy in the functioning capital of every country except in the case of our democratic friend and strategic ally, the State of Israel.” The bill continued: “The United States conducts official meetings and other business in the city of Jerusalem in de facto recognition of its status as the capital of Israel.”

The bill dictated that the U.S. move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem by May 31, 1999. However, it also allowed presidents to waive the move, if it “is necessary to protect the national security interests of the United States.” Like Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, Trump made a campaign promise to move the embassy. But on Thursday, despite his firm insistence he would buck the trend and actually go ahead with the move, Trump decided to renew the waiver, which will last for six months.

Despite delaying the embassy move, a White House statement said, “no one should consider this step to be in any way a retreat from the President’s strong support for Israel and for the United States-Israel alliance.” It continued: “President Trump made this decision to maximize the chances of successfully negotiating a deal between Israel and the Palestinians, fulfilling his solemn obligation to defend America’s national security interests.” The White House said “the question is not if that move happens, but only when.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed disappointment, but reiterated the U.S.-Israel partnership. A statement from his office said: “Though Israel is disappointed that the embassy will not move at this time, we appreciate today’s expression of President Trump’s friendship to Israel and his commitment to moving the embassy in the future.”

To Dan Shapiro, the U.S. ambassador to Israel from 2011 to 2017, Trump made the right decision:

1. Trump was right to issue the Jerusalem embassy waiver today. But I hope it’s the last waiver, allowing the move later this year.

— Dan Shapiro (@DanielBShapiro) June 1, 2017

He said Trump has leverage in the peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, and a hasty move could have squandered trust. Shapiro said that once all sides, including Sunni Arab countries like Saudi Arabia and Jordan, are on the same page, then the embassy move would be prudent:

6. Then establish the embassy in W Jerusalem. Shatter Pal myth that Israel has no Jerusalem claims & treat Jerusalem as the capital it is.

— Dan Shapiro (@DanielBShapiro) June 1, 2017

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Trump to Keep U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv: What You Need to Know appeared first on Law Street.

Welcome to RantCrush Top 5, where we take you through today’s top five controversial stories in the world of law and policy. Who’s ranting and raving right now? Check it out below:

White House Criticized for Promoting Mar-a-Lago

In a blog post from April 4, the U.S. State Department promoted Mar-a-Lago as “Trump’s Florida estate,” and claimed that by visiting “this ‘winter White House,’ Trump is belatedly fulfilling the dream of Mar-a-Lago’s original owner and designer.” After Trump was elected president, the Florida resort doubled its membership fee to $200,000. The blog post received renewed attention on Monday after it was featured on the website of the U.S. embassy in London, as well as several other U.S. embassies. Oregon Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden asked on Twitter why taxpayer money is “promoting the president’s private country club.” President Obama’s chief ethics attorney, Norman Eisen, called it “exploitation” and said that this behavior needs to be stopped. Eisen is also part of a group of attorneys who have already sued Trump for an alleged violation of the emoluments clause, which states that a president can’t accept gifts or payments from foreign states without approval from Congress.

Yes, I am curious @StateDept. Why are taxpayer $$ promoting the President’s private country club? pic.twitter.com/IlPhUlvMwa

— Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) April 24, 2017

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post RantCrush Top 5: April 25, 2017 appeared first on Law Street.

In February, the United Nations declared a famine in South Sudan and estimated that 100,000 people faced immediate risk of starvation. This was the first declared famine in six years; the last was in Somalia in 2011. While South Sudan has long been struggling, the question is, how did an oil-rich state and one that had finally gained independence from Sudan after years of fighting, suddenly find itself in this situation? Read on to learn more about the nation’s tumultuous history, the aftermath of its independence, and where it stands today.

The History of Sudan

Sudan emerged as an extension of Egyptian society in 1500 B.C. and shared many of Egypt’s customs after the decline of ancient Egypt. Critical to the current conflict, Christianity was introduced to Sudan beginning in the 4th century, followed closely by Islam. For the next several centuries, the country fell under the sway of various Muslim or Egyptian rulers until it finally became a province of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century. Not long after, control of Sudan passed to the British after fierce fighting between Britain and local religious leaders.

Ultimately, British machine guns and artillery won out and Sudan was eventually brought to heel under a combined British-Egyptian rule. For approximately the first fifty years of the 20th century, the two sides continued this arrangement, with occasional conflict, as Egypt wanted to rule both Egypt and Sudan as one united country. These protests were ignored and ultimately, after Egyptian consent, Sudan became an independent country in 1956.

The Emergence of South Sudan

In 2011, 99 percent of voters in a referendum decided that the 10 southern-most states of Sudan should break away and become South Sudan. While the final decision ended with a clean break, getting to that point was an arduous process. In fact, the referendum followed on the heels of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, an agreement that finally ended a civil war that had lasted for several decades. In total, more than 1.5 million people died in the war and another 4 million were displaced because of the war.

The Civil War started in 1955, before what would become Sudan had even gained independence, when army officers from the south of Sudan mutinied. The officers rose up out of fear that once control of Sudan had passed from Egypt and Great Britain that the Muslim majority in the north, the new government, would impose Islamic Law on the country and promote an Arab identity. The initial conflict ended in 1972 with the Addis Ababa Agreement that granted the south limited autonomy. However, the government reneged on its agreement in 1983 leading to another outbreak in fighting that lasted until 2005. The specific issue was the government in the north’s decision to place Sudan under Sharia Law. While the country was approximately 70 percent Muslim, the other 30 percent was composed of Christians and those who followed traditional indigenous religions. In addition to the religious divide, there is also an ethnic divide between Arabs in the north and black Africans in the south.

In addition to the ethnic conflict that started much of the fighting, a major issue preventing peace was how to divide the country’s oil. Although the south has most of the oil reserves, the north had the pipelines and the port to the Red Sea. In the 2005 agreement, the two sides decided to divide profits equally, however, that arrangement ended in 2011 with South Sudan’s independence. Furthermore, while the 2005 agreement paved the way for southern independence it left many conflicts unresolved. The video below looks at Sudan’s modern history and why it has been plagued by conflict.

The Aftermath

Following the implementation of the peace deal in 2005, South Sudan went through a six-year period of autonomy before it voted for independence in 2011. The initial decision for independence was greeted with enthusiasm due to the promise of a large supply of oil and an end to decades of fighting. However, the agreement also left key elements undecided. Notably, it failed to decisively divide up oil resources evenly and did not extinguish ethnic tensions.

The oil issue grew out of the fact that the new South Sudan had most of the oil, while Sudan had most of the transporting and refining capabilities. This issue also bled into the ethnic conflict as some of the disparate groups were armed by Sudan in an effort to weaken South Sudan from the inside, sparking sudden conflicts. These clashes, especially the one between the two largest ethnic groups, led by the president and vice president, sparked yet another outbreak of civil war, this time within South Sudan. Additionally, there remains conflict between South Sudan and Sudan in various border regions. One of the contested areas, Abyei, was not able to participate in the original 2011 referendum vote, leaving questions about its status in the conflict. Many of these border regions also have considerable amounts of oil.

The following video looks at South Sudan at independence and many of the issues that have plagued it since:

South Sudan’s Civil War

A civil war within South Sudan, following its independence, came about in December 2013. At that time the president of South Sudan, Salva Kiir, and the vice president, Riek Machar, were engaged in political infighting. Ultimately, Machar was removed from his role as vice president and fled the country.

What started as a political dispute quickly divided the country along ethnic lines. The Dinka, one of the two largest ethnic groups in South Sudan, supported the president, while the Nuer, the other major ethnic group, supported the ousted vice president. As the ethnic conflict escalated, human rights violations ranging from rape to murder have been documented. Because of the violence, many farmers have been unable to tend their fields and grow their crops, which has led to the food disaster that is now considered a famine.

As many as 100,000 people are in jeopardy of starving because of this famine. In addition, another 5.5 million could face food shortages as soon as July. Making the situation even more difficult, annual inflation has risen to 425 percent, making it nearly impossible to buy food. Aid agencies, which have been making up for most of the shortfall, face significant obstacles as the conflict escalates. More than 80 aid workers have already been killed in the conflict. The situation has gotten so bad that people in the affected areas are hiding and foraging in swamps by day and then tending to their crops, at risk of animal attack, by night while the soldiers sleep.

South Sudan Today

To counter the ongoing turmoil, the international community has tried to intervene. The United Nations Security Council has authorized over 13,000 peacekeepers to be stationed in the country and given them the power to use force to protect civilians. These efforts though, have been continuously undetermined by the fluid situation on the ground, with all sides, including the government, involved in the violence. The international community has taken other steps as well, such as sanctions leveled by the United States on the leaders of both sides of the conflict.

To avoid further sanctions, President Kiir agreed to a peace deal with former vice president and rebel-Leader Machar in August 2015 with the support of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development. As part of this agreement, Machar returned to his old position in April of 2016. However, the deal quickly unraveled with both sides violating the agreement causing Machar to flee once again, plunging the country back into war.

With the ongoing conflict and with tens of thousands of displaced people unable to return home, the situation in South Sudan has become increasingly bleak. As of April, the South Sudanese refugee camp in Uganda, Bidi Bidi, has eclipsed Kenya’s Dadaab camp as the world’s largest, with over 270,000 South Sudanese living there. Moreover, the mass exodus shows no signs of ending soon. In other war-torn areas such as Syria, outward migration has effectively slowed, but in South Sudan, the number has gone up dramatically. South Sudan’s refugee crisis is currently the fastest growing one in the world, although it is not the largest in terms of total numbers.

This refugee flow is only likely to continue with yet another outbreak of violence between the government and the main insurgent force flaring up in mid-April. This comes in the wake of more aid workers being displaced and unable to offer desperately needed assistance to the local population.

Conclusion

South Sudan had to overcome approximately a half-century of conflict just to become a nation. In the process, more than a million people have died and millions more were displaced. Upon its independence, the future looked bright for the new nation. It was home to a large supply of oil and it appeared to have finally put its destructive conflicts behind it.

However, appearances were not what they seemed. Conflicts erupted externally in the form of border disputes with Sudan and internally among the nation’s many ethnic groups. The country’s two largest ethnic groups took opposing sides in a political dispute between the president and vice president that once more plunged the nation into a civil war. The consequences of this conflict have been devastating, with any hope of economic success dashed and even the provision of the most basic means of survival thrown into doubt.

Despite being the youngest nation on earth, South Sudan already finds itself at a critical crossroads. Its government is locked in an internal struggle, thousands of U.N. troops are already on the ground, and millions of its citizens sit in refugee camps ringing its borders. To be successful, the country’s path seems clear: reconcile the various ethnic groups, make lasting peace with Sudan, and let people get back to their lives. Finding a way to make these things happen, however, will be a much more difficult process.

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Turmoil in South Sudan, the World’s Newest Nation appeared first on Law Street.

The Associated Press has reviewed 12 years of United Nations aid missions and found that peacekeepers have repeatedly sexually abused children, in some cases as young as 12 years old. While allegations to this effect have been known for a while, new reports show the issue is significantly more prevalent than previously believed. AP found almost 2,000 cases of alleged sexual abuse by peacekeepers and other UN personnel around the world. And even though more than 300 cases involve children, it’s difficult to prosecute these crimes.

Legally, the UN can’t do anything, as it doesn’t have jurisdiction over individual peacekeepers. It’s up to each country to punish its own troops, and it seems no one has an interest in doing that. AP reached out to 23 countries whose nationals are accused of sexual abuse, and few answered. The names of the accused were also classified, making it impossible to find out whether there was any punishment. A review of UN reports also showed a number of inconsistencies.

In Haiti, 134 peacekeepers from Sri Lanka sexually abused at least nine children between 2004 and 2007 in exchange for food, juice, or small amounts of money. Some of them were forced to have sex with the men several times a day for years. Eventually, 114 of the peacekeepers were sent home, but not one of them was arrested. UN workers are protected by diplomatic immunity and besides, their home countries often don’t want to make their bad behavior public.

.@AP finds U.N. peacekeepers ran child sex ring in Haiti. https://t.co/vauMSkYKv4 pic.twitter.com/poLAvSTutC

— The Associated Press (@AP) April 12, 2017

Antonio Guterres, who took over as UN Secretary General in January, announced in March the organization’s new guidelines for dealing with sexual abuse. “Certainly no person serving with the United Nations in any capacity should be associated with such vile and vicious crimes,” he said. He noted that gender equality is fundamental to tackling sexual crimes and said that promoting equality for all UN workers can help fight abuse of women. But for many, these promises are just hollow words. Similar efforts have been rolled out before to no avail.

As it’s difficult to punish the men guilty of these crimes, many have wondered whether the UN is doing more harm than good. When Nepalese aid workers brought cholera to Haiti, around 10,000 people died. Haitian lawyer Mario Joseph tried to get compensation for the victims from the UN and is now trying to get child support for the women that were left pregnant by UN workers and are living in poverty. “Imagine if the U.N. was going to the United States and raping children and bringing cholera. Human rights aren’t just for rich white people,” he said.

.@AP Despite this the UN is unable to punish those peacekeepers – it must leave that to “the countries that contribute the troops”. Unbelievable

— Peter Yeung (@ptr_yeung) April 12, 2017

A Haitian woman said she was 16 when she was raped at gunpoint by a Brazilian peacekeeper three years ago. In 2011, four Uruguayan peacekeepers filmed their gang rape of a teenager–the only response Uruguayan officials gave at the time was that it was a prank and not rape. In 2012, three Pakistani peacekeepers raped a mentally disabled 13-year-old boy and later abducted him to prevent him from talking to UN investigators. The list of victims goes on and on.

As long as there is no accountability for the member states of the United Nations and no international consensus on how to deal with these issues, it’s tough to imagine a solution. But Guterres is correct in pointing out that education about gender equality is vital. Many of the alleged abusers came from countries that are notorious for gender inequality. The most recent abusers came from Bangladesh, Brazil, Jordan, Nigeria, Pakistan, Uruguay, and Sri Lanka, according to UN data.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post UN Peacekeepers Allegedly Sexually Abused Children, Never Saw Consequences appeared first on Law Street.

On Monday, the United Nations formally declared a famine in parts of South Sudan, saying that the civil war and the collapse of the economy have left 100,000 people facing starvation. As many as a million more are on the verge of it. Now the UN urges the international community to act fast, as the number of people at the brink of starvation will rise to an estimated 5.5 million in July, which is the peak lean season.

“Famine has become a tragic reality in parts of South Sudan and our worst fears have been realised. Many families have exhausted every means they have to survive,” said Serge Tissot, a representative for The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in South Sudan. He added that most of the affected families are farmers who had their land and agriculture disrupted by the armed conflicts. People have had to rely on what little food they can find.

Famine has been declared today in parts of #SouthSudan. 100k facing starvation, almost 5m urgently need aid https://t.co/0TxKfgqfar pic.twitter.com/jJcT0of89x

— UNICEF (@UNICEF) February 20, 2017

This is the first declared famine since 2011 in Somalia, when more than a quarter of a million people are believed to have succumbed to starvation between October 2010 and April 2012. Expectations were high that South Sudan, the world’s youngest country that gained independence from Sudan in 2011, was going to prosper because of ample oil in the area. But the new country is also home to over 60 different ethnic groups and the conflicts didn’t end with their independence.

#Famine hits parts of #SouthSudan: 100,000 ppl facing starvation. 5 mln ppl need food, #ag & nutrition assistance https://t.co/IQGSr0YI2K pic.twitter.com/e5HmsqlRrA

— FAO Newsroom (@FAOnews) February 20, 2017

Malnutrition is a public health emergency in South Sudan and armed fighting, displacement, and poor access to health services have aggravated the situation. According to UNICEF, more than a million children are already malnourished and many will die unless they get immediate help. And to make matters worse, the crisis could have been prevented: “This famine is man-made,” said Joyce Luma, Country Director at World Food Programme, WFP. She added:

WFP and the entire humanitarian community have been trying with all our might to avoid this catastrophe, mounting a humanitarian response of a scale that quite frankly would have seemed impossible three years ago. But we have also warned that there is only so much that humanitarian assistance can achieve in the absence of meaningful peace and security, both for relief workers and the crisis-affected people they serve.

Another contributing factor to the severity of the situation is serious inflation and a devaluation of the currency by 800 percent in the past year, resulting in food prices rising ten-fold. It has also been reported that President Salva Kiir’s government has been blocking humanitarian aid to certain areas.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post UN Declares Man-Made Famine in South Sudan appeared first on Law Street.

Late Monday, Israel’s Parliament passed a law to retroactively legalize settlements on about 2,000 acres of Palestinian-owned land in the West Bank. Passed with a vote of 60-52, the bill is widely expected to be struck down by Israel’s Supreme Court; the attorney general also recently said he would refuse to enforce the law. The vote reflects the growing influence of the settler movement in Israeli politics, and a new political reality for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who previously opposed retroactive legalization of settlements.

Under the law, a few thousand housing units in 16 different settlements would be deemed legal. Palestinian landowners would be compensated for the land, but would not be able to reclaim it. Some settlements in Israel, because they are located on private Palestinian land, are considered illegal by the Israeli government, as well as the international community, which condemns all Israeli settlements. In fact, last month, the United Nations passed a highly contentious resolution that called settlements a “flagrant violation” of international law.

Reactions to the passing of the bill exemplify the increasingly polarized climate of Israeli politics, especially as it concerns the settler movement. “Today Israel decreed that developing settlement in Judea and Samaria is an Israeli interest,” said Bezalel Smotrich, a right-wing lawmaker, referring to the biblical names of the West Bank. “From here we move on to expanding Israeli sovereignty and continuing to build and develop settlements across the land.”

Much of the ethos behind the settler movement is tied to the Jewish claim to the land of Israel including, most notably, the West Bank (or Judea and Samaria). Israel captured the Palestinian territories–the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem–from Jordan and Egypt after it won the 1967 Six-Day War. For 50 years, settlements have remained a flashpoint in Israeli-Palestinian relations, and in Israel’s broader relationship with the international community.

But many Israelis oppose settlements, and support a two-state solution with the Palestinians. Parliament members on the left and the center (and even many on the right) condemn settlements, and see them as an impediment to peace. Yair Lapid, head of the Yesh Atid party, and a leading contender to succeed Netanyahu, called the law “unjust.” He added: “They are passing a law which endangers our soldiers, will undermine our international standing and undermine us as a country of law and order.”

As of a few months ago, Netanyahu opposed passage of the law. But things have changed very quickly. For one, President Donald Trump’s election victory signaled a less harsh U.S. stance on settlements than Netanyahu experienced with President Barack Obama. Trump also appointed David Friedman, a pro-settlement lawyer who has donated millions of dollars to the settler movement, as his ambassador to Israel.

Netanyahu’s ambivalence on Monday’s vote also reflects his precarious position with the settler movement, and in his broader political standing. Netanyahu is currently being investigated on corruption charges, and is under constant pressure from lawmakers to his right to support the settlers.

Last week, 40 settler families were evacuated by Israeli police from the settlement of Amona. The Supreme Court ruled the Amona outpost was illegal, as it was built on private Palestinian land. After the evacuation, Netanyahu swiftly approved the construction of a new settlement, something that has not been done in over 25 years.

Trump said approving new settlements “may not be helpful” to peace, a noticeably milder critique than those from past U.S. administrations. Trump is meeting with Netanyahu in Washington D.C. on February 15, and a clearer picture of the current U.S. stance on settlements should emerge soon after. Meanwhile, Netanyahu has other things to worry about: the same day the settlement bill passed, rockets were fired from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip into Israel.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The United Nations recently passed a resolution regarding Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian lands. The most significant takeaways from this development are that the United States allowed the U.N. resolution to be passed and the specific language included in the resolution. This is particularly true when coupled with the language used by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to criticize the United States and President Barack Obama after the resolution’s passage. Read on to find out what exactly the resolution means for Palestine, Israel, and the United States as well as the history of the conflict that led to the resolution in the first place.

The Resolution

So what does this resolution do and why has it made the leadership of Israel so upset? The U.N. resolution declares that Israeli settlements are a violation of international law and calls for an immediate end to all settlement activities. The actual determination in the resolution is nothing new, in fact, it has been the view of the international community for some time. What is new is that the Obama administration allowed it to pass without vetoing it as well as the emerging context surrounding the dispute–many are now starting to doubt whether the long sought after two-state solution is still a viable option.

After the resolution was passed, Palestinian leaders indicated that they would use the resolution to support their case against Israel in international courts, a move strongly opposed by Israel. While the condemning language and the reaction of Palestinian leaders are significant, they pale in comparison to accusations leveled by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu against President Obama. Netanyahu has effectively accused Obama and his administration of plotting against Israel and even crafting the resolution in the first place, which the Obama Administration denies.

The resolution that did pass is not actually binding; while it may condemn Israel’s actions it cannot forcibly stop them. Additionally, President Donald Trump has already vowed to veto any resolution that would actually force Israel to cease and desist settlement activities. The video below looks at the U.N. resolution:

The History of the Conflict

The origins of the conflict between the two sides go back to the 19th century. Initially, the territory in question was part of the Ottoman Empire. However, during World War I, when it was clear that the Ottomans would lose, Britain and France created their own plan for the region following the war with something known as the Sykes-Picot Agreement. This agreement effectively carved up Arab lands in the Middle East between France and the U.K., which went against earlier promises for an Arab state following the end of the war.

In 1917, the U.K. issued the Balfour Declaration, in which it announced its support of establishing a Jewish homeland in Palestine. British responsibility for creating an Israeli homeland was reaffirmed by the Palestinian Mandate in 1921, which gave it control over former Ottoman lands along the terms agreed upon in Sykes-Picot. However, neither the mandate nor the earlier Balfour Declaration mentioned anything about creating a Palestinian homeland, despite the wishes of the Palestinian population.

This resentment, coupled with earlier broken promises to create an independent Arab state and the continuing and increasing Jewish migration, led to persistent conflict. In the 1930s Jewish militias helped the British put down the Arab uprising hoping to rekindle support for their independent state. Instead, they were betrayed again by yet another British agreement known as the White Paper of 1939, which would limit further Jewish migration, even as the Holocaust occurred in Europe.

After World War II the British ended its mandate in the area, transferring the land and the problems that went with it to the United Nations. The U.N. then attempted a two-state partition that instead led to more fighting and eventually the first Arab-Israeli War, which ended with an armistice in 1949. Per the terms of the agreement, Israel took control of 77 percent of the original mandate, Jordan received control over the West Bank and East Jerusalem and Egypt acquired the Gaza Strip, Palestinians did not control any territory following the fighting. This also led to a mass exodus of Palestinians and a huge refugee problem that continues to this day. The biggest flare of violence between Israel and its neighbors after this, until 1967, was a joint British-French-Israeli effort to take back the Suez Canal after it had been nationalized in 1956.

While the root of the general conflict can clearly be traced back further, the root of the modern conflict can trace its most direct route to the 1967 war, known most commonly as the 6-Day War. After a series of Palestinian attacks from surrounding countries and Israeli retaliation, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq started mobilizing their militaries. However, Israel then took a surprise early offensive, decimating much of its adversaries’ air force and went on to capture a dominant victory. As a result of the victory, Israel won and occupied the Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip, West Bank, all of Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights. In the process of the war, hundreds of thousands more refugees were forced to leave their homes and more than a million Palestinians fell under the direct rule of Israel.

Another conflict emerged in 1973 when Egypt launched a surprise attack on Israel. The attack prompted the United States to step in and seek a diplomatic resolution. After several years, Israel and Egypt signed a peace treaty that included the return of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt.

However, since 1967, there has been an almost unstoppable pace of settlement in occupied territories by Israeli settlers. As of 2013, there were over 200 settlements and outposts of Israeli settlers in lands occupied since the end of the 6-Day War, namely in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. These settlements, even the outposts that the Israeli government considers illegal, are encouraged and supported by the government through subsidies and tax breaks on housing, education, and opening new businesses.

Apart from incentives, Israeli settlers also enjoy many other advantages over their Palestinian neighbors in the occupied territories. One is a separate legal system that greatly benefits settlers over Palestinian natives who instead are governed by military law. Another is access to resources such as water, transportation, and electricity, which settlers get from the Israeli government. The settlements have led to perpetual conflict, despite numerous efforts at peace. The following video gives a good description of the roots of the conflict:

The United States, Israel, Palestine and the History of Peace Talks

Since the end of the 6-Day War, there have been several efforts aimed at achieving peace between Israel and Palestine and establishing some framework in which both peoples can have states of their own. This started with two other U.N. resolutions, namely 242 and 338, which put an end to the 1973 War and also called for Israel to withdraw from the territories it occupied. Building off of the 1973 War were the Camp David Accords, which led to Israel withdrawing from the Sinai Peninsula and Egypt recognizing it as a state. But these talks did not involve the Palestinians.

The Madrid Conference in 1991 was aimed at similar goals, namely ensuring recognition of the state of Israel. Ultimately, it led to peace between Israel and Jordan, but none of the other combatants. While the Palestinians were represented at the Madrid Conference, the first deal to actually incorporate them was the Oslo Accords in 1993. In exchange for promising to incrementally withdraw Israeli troops from Gaza and the West Bank, the Palestinian Liberation Organization, or PLO, would acknowledge Israel’s right to exist. Opposition groups in Palestine and settler groups in Israel opposed the deal, which led to violence. The agreement was never fully implemented.

Probably the closest the two sides ever came to lasting peace was the second Camp David Accords in 2000 when both sides offered land swaps, however, they were not quite enough to entice the other to agree to a peace resolution. A last ditch effort in Taba in 2001 and an Arab Initiative in 2002 both also failed. In 2003 President Bush submitted his road map to peace and became the first president to call for an independent Palestinian state. Unfortunately, another set of negotiations, the Geneva Accords of 2003, attempted to fix the same problem from another direction. Both attempts were unsuccessful. Two more rounds of talks in 2007 and 2010 seemed close to reaching deals at times but both ultimately fell short as well.

This history led President Barack Obama to seek some positive action before his term ended. Without having to worry about reelection, he allowed the recent resolution to pass. While his actions are not unprecedented, they are still controversial. Other resolutions have been passed regarding Israeli-Palestinian relations, but this was the most recent one to condemn settlements since 1980. Additionally, while Obama is not the first U.S. president to allow a resolution related to this conflict to pass without a veto, it is the first time in his presidency. The accompanying video looks at the peace process as it currently stands and the remaining inherent trouble:

Moving Forward

While the resolution is non-binding, it is not entirely toothless. What it does is create a template for future negotiations and potentially other resolutions that would be binding. While a January 15 International Peace Conference seemed to offer a forum to draft that kind of resolution, no such progress was made. Instead, the focus was mainly on reopening dialogue between the two parties and reiterating support for past ideas, such as a two-state solution and the return of land occupied by Israel to Palestine.

Aside from creating guidelines, the recent U.N. resolution also eliminated many of the legal arguments Israel could have used to justify settlements. The resolution may also lead to subsequent efforts to apply sanctions on Israeli goods made in the occupied territories or force Israel to go to the International Criminal Court.

President Trump has already denounced the resolution and promised to repeal it. However, that seems unlikely as he would have to introduce a new resolution and, like the current one, get it through the Security Council without a single veto, which is unlikely. However, Trump and the Israelis can cut funding to the United Nations, which would be significant, as the U.S. supplies 22 percent of the organization’s budget. Israel can also go after the nations who voted for the resolution, summoning ambassadors from countries that supported the resolution.The U.S. embassy, notably, was not among those targeted by Israel.

In the meantime, the settlements continue to be built and expand further into Palestinian occupied lands. There are now 600,000 Jewish Israelis living in either East Jerusalem or the West Bank where once there were none. In other words, nearly 10 percent of the country’s Jewish population lives beyond the borders established in 1967 and in territory recognized as Palestinian.

As a result, Palestinians view these settlements as an unjust seizing of the land that they would receive if a two-state solution ever came to fruition. The Israelis view these settlements as a necessary buffer and feel justified through scripture. They also contend that since Jordan, which once laid claim to these areas of land, is no longer interested in the lands, there is no sovereign power who has control over them. However, even Israel will not go so far as to claim the disputed lands in the West Bank as part of its own sovereign territory. Any solution to the problem will likely have to include land swaps, among other things, something that Israel has shown it is not totally against, such as when it abandoned a settlement in the Gaza Strip in 2005.

Conclusion

The issues in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process are not going to be resolved by one U.N. resolution. However, that was never the point as the resolution was non-binding. The idea behind the resolution was to create some type of momentum for negotiations–or possibly block the momentum of efforts that many believe run against the interests of a peace settlement. In this circumstance, the onus was put on Israel, as the international community sought to make a strong statement on settlement building.

The likelihood of reaching an actual deal depends on more than just these two countries. While the rest of the Security Council, and the world in general, have an interest, the United States has played a key role in many past peace attempts. This U.N. resolution then could signal an important step forward if all sides involved are willing to look past politics and are serious about achieving some sort of two-state solution. However, it appears unlikely that the incoming president will take the same line on Israeli settlement building, which could cause many to question the negotiation process given that most view settlements as an important obstacle to a lasting resolution.

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Hashtag of the day: #FreeMelania has taken off on Twitter after a video clip from the inauguration started circling the internet. It shows First Lady Melania Trump smiling at her husband, but changing her expression completely the moment he turns away–what’s going on there? Now read on for some newsworthy rants!

Welcome to RantCrush Top 5, where we take you through today’s top five controversial stories in the world of law and policy. Who’s ranting and raving right now? Check it out below:

The U.S. is Now a “Flawed Democracy”

For the first time ever, the United States has slipped down on the Economist Intelligence Unit’s (EIU) ranking of democracies worldwide. The U.S. used to be considered a “full democracy” but is now labeled a “flawed democracy,” the same designation as countries like Singapore, India, and Italy. The index considers categories like the electoral process, pluralism, civil liberties, functioning of the government, and political participation. The threshold for being a “complete democracy” is 8.0 points. The U.S. fell from 8.05 in 2015 to 7.98 in 2016. According to the scale, we have an underdeveloped political culture, low political participation, and weak governance.

We know what you’re thinking, but it’s not all President Donald Trump’s fault—the U.S. has been slipping down this slope for years, according to the EIU. Mainly, this is because the public’s trust in the government has hit historic lows.

Leader of free world no longer a democracy, no matter how you look at it (Trump not reason but doesn’t help)https://t.co/atJDRvlJSl

— Danny Quah (@DannyQuah) January 25, 2017

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is in the spotlight this week after U.S. prosecutors accused his brother and nephew of conspiring to bribe a government official while he was at the UN. Ban Ki Sang and his son Joo Hyun Bahn allegedly orchestrated a $500,000 bribe to a Middle Eastern official for the purchase of the Landmark 72 skyscraper in Vietnam.

According to the allegations, the initial payment was meant to be followed by a secondary bribe of $2 million after the sale. The identity and nationality of the official the two attempted to bribe has not been disclosed, but the middleman in the deal has been identified as U.S. businessman Malcolm Harris, who apparently took the first bribe but spent it himself rather than passing it along to the official. Harris is currently at large but Bahn and his associate Sang Woo were arrested for violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits bribing foreign officials.  Bahn, who was slated to serve as an adjunct professor at NYU, has been stripped of his position but has been let out on bail and will remain within the U.S. for a federal trial.

Ban Ki-moon has publicly stated that he is “perplexed and embarrassed” by the bribery accusations but even if he distances himself from his relatives, the charges against them may still destroy his chances of becoming South Korea’s president. In the wake of President Park Geun-hye’s impeachment the South Korean electorate will be hyper sensitive to any scandal or implication of corruption among the candidates running to fill the presidential seat.  It still remains to be seen if the president’s impeachment will be upheld by the constitutional court, but in the court of public opinion, Park Geun-hye has already been transformed into a monster.

Voters will be looking for an inspirational and trustworthy leader to provide them with a presidential campaign reminiscent of President Barack Obama’s messages of hope and change in 2008. Ban Ki-moon has an unparalleled record of public service and a wealth of experience, but the investigation into his family could very easily become the central story of his campaign.  In the same way that Republican candidates made Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server during her time as secretary of state central to their campaigns, Ban Ki-moon’s opponents may seize on this scandal in an attempt to impugn his character (despite the fact that he was not named in the indictment or charged in any way).

Ban Ki-moon seems like the obvious choice for the South Korean presidency, but he may face strong competition from Moon Jae-in, a social liberal who has called for large-scale corporate reform and an increased dialogue with North Korea, especially regarding their nuclear program. Lee Jae-myung, mayor of the city of Seongnam, who like Moon Jae-in is a member of the liberal Minjoo Party, has also been tapped to run. The bribery scandal may fade into the background as Ban Ki-moon picks up steam and rests on his already sky-high approval rankings, but if we learned anything from 2016, it was that elections are far less predictable that we like to think.

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

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It seems like an unlikely new friendship has formed in Washington. On Thursday, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham apologized to Texas Senator Ted Cruz for joking in February that it would be okay to kill Cruz on the Senate floor. The two senators have not been seemingly on the friendliest terms since last year when they both ran for the Republican presidential nomination. But when they appeared side by side in a segment on MSNBC on Thursday, it was a remarkably amiable atmosphere and both men were even giggly. “Love is everywhere,” Graham said. “I want to apologize to Ted for saying he should be killed on the Senate floor.” At least we’re not on the Senate floor now,” replied Cruz.

Also, @SenTedCruz and I spoke with @MSNBCMorningJoe about our legislation to cut off funding to the UN. WATCH: https://t.co/HhcTZBHA2H

— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) January 13, 2017

But this new friendship is not just for fun. They joined forces because they are on the same page about a new bill that would halt American funding for the United Nations. This comes after the United Nations Security Council voted 14-0 on the proposal to condemn Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east part of Jerusalem. The U.S. abstained from voting, and immediately faced backlash from both Republicans and Democrats.

On MSNBC, Graham said that 22 percent of the money funding the UN comes from American taxpayers, and that it’s not a good idea for Americans to invest in an organization that works against the only democracy in the Middle East. “This was John Kerry and Obama taking a slap at Israel,” Graham said. He added that the UN has become increasingly anti-Semitic, and that they will stop any money from going to the organization until “this is fixed.” Cruz called Obama’s move “profoundly anti-Israel.”

Republicans filed the bill on Thursday, and if passed it will stop all U.S. funding to the U.N. unless or until the resolution is reversed. Ted Cruz said that this move was the only way to get the U.N.’s attention.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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As the new year begins, it’s safe to say that 2016 was a trying time for the International Criminal Court (ICC). The United Nations-inspired program established by the Rome Statute of 1998 stands as the world’s only tribunal capable of prosecuting individuals at the international level. Formed to investigate and prosecute war-related crimes, the 124-member committee is now three members short, and its legacy is at stake. Various signatories in Africa have recently resigned (and more are expected to do so) due to continuous accusations of the court disproportionately targeting Africans and representing the interests of western imperialism. Now with fewer members (and therefore fewer outlets to pursue cases) the independent judicial body’s ability to indict foreign dignitaries for orchestrating violent campaigns may dwindle as Uganda, South Africa, and Burundi are facilitating a “coordinated revolt” to undermine ICC operations.

The International Criminal Court’s Unique Origins

The formation of the ICC resulted from the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court–a United Nations initiative that was adopted on July 17, 1998 and took effect on July 1, 2002 after the 60th member state ratified it. For five weeks, U.N. members deliberated in the Italian capital about establishing a fixed international tribunal. After several compromises were made, the treaty passed with a vote of 120 to 7, with 21 countries abstaining. From the beginning, the mandate aimed to indict political officials for wartime atrocities, diminish impunity, and ensure that restorative justice is accomplished when national governments are unequipped to reach their own verdict (which is generally the case in times of crisis). Separate from the United Nations, the permanent, autonomous court provides an all-encompassing index on how to legally handle cases of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and crimes of aggression. A limited scope of retribution was granted, meaning that only crimes occurring after the court’s 2002 inception are open for investigation.

Although the Yugoslavian and Rwandan wars were occurring during these preliminary negotiations (and therefore representing a dire impetus for action), the idea of a permanent world court was 50 years in the making. According to the International Policy Digest, the vision of a supranational judiciary gained momentum toward the end of World War II after the Axis Powers were defeated and their wrongdoings were exposed. Following the Nuremberg Trials against Nazi Germany in 1945 and 1946, the U.N. General Assembly passed the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948. This was the first step in defining genocide, which is considered to be “the most heinous international crime” and one of the three original crimes that would fall under the ICC’s jurisdiction.

How Does the ICC Function?

The ICC, which is located in The Hague, Netherlands, can only intervene when states are “unable” or “unwilling” to prosecute criminals themselves. The Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) for the ICC receives referrals of “situations” where court action may be needed. This stipulation means that the ICC can only intervene when national criminal justice systems fail to prosecute a war crime themselves. By signing the treaty, member states, therefore, consent to the ICC’s jurisdiction and allow the judiciary to pursue investigations if warranted. Therefore, countries that didn’t sign the peace agreement, like the United States, cannot be issued warrants.

Instead of relying on juries, the ICC delivers verdicts through judges–all of whom must be citizens of an ICC member state. Within the tribunal there are 18 judges serving in three divisions: the Pre-Trial Division, Trial Division, and Appeals Division. Perhaps the most vital department is the Pre-Trial Chamber, given that it is responsible for issuing arrest warrants and confirming indictments that are initiated through the U.N. Security Council or the Assembly of States Parties. But this vital department allegedly has a slow response rate, sometimes taking months to respond to arrest warrants.

Ever-present Challenges and Critiques of the ICC

As the world’s only official international war crime tribunal, the ICC has a lot at stake. The agreement that created it may have made history, but the court also faces a lot of systematic challenges. When the ICC was formally introduced in 2002, certain skeptics believed that the institution would become too powerful and prompt the formation of a one-world government. Originally, countries like the United States and Israel were dissuaded from signing the treaty out of fear of potential prosecution, and that some “new mega-criminal law” would result in tyrannical practices. However, today the ICC is viewed as far from tyrannical (or effective for that matter) due to its “procedural and substantive deficiencies.” Throughout its short existence, the court has opened 10 investigations and publicly indicted 39 people. These relatively low numbers signify three main challenges of the ICC.

At the forefront is the issue of credibility. When Thomas Lubanga Dyilo of the Democratic Republic of the Congo was found guilty on March 14, 2012 for recruiting child soldiers (becoming the first person to be convicted by the ICC), the court had already existed for 10 years and spent an estimated billion euros. Although the verdict set a new precedent for international law, the amount of time required to set the milestone didn’t seem like an efficient use of time or money to some. Trials need to be carried out more efficiently for this situation to improve, which could be difficult considering how the ICC prefers live testimony, which inevitably elongates the trial process. Legitimacy is another indelible challenge for the ICC. Only two members of the U.N. Security Council are official judicial members, which certainly complicates the referral process. Although the U.N. Security Council has tried to refer the Syrian conflict to the ICC (despite Syria not being a member of the Rome Statute) both China and Russia (non-ICC members) have rejected such initiatives–major powers can veto court efforts even when there is proof of atrocities taking place.

The implementation of the ICC can be tricky, considering that the court relies heavily on other nation’s police forces to make arrests and transfer indicted people to The Hague. This requires vast cooperation among State Parties. A common critique is that the court relies too much on international governments to implement court mandates without much direct supervision or guidance. The consequences are straightforward: no arrests and no trials.

Finally, the third issue involves unrealistic expectations and the extent to which the treaty is a “persistent object of faith.” The treaty inherently relies on the free and voluntary consent of member nations, providing them with every right to withdraw if desired. Moreover, this has resulted in certain countries being ambivalent towards the ICC (particularly the United States during the Clinton and Bush administrations), which ultimately diminishes the court’s overall credibility.

Lately, the most critical commentary of the ICC involves how it may be an “instrument of modern colonialism” due to the extent in which the judicial body primarily affects African officials. Throughout the existence of the ICC, every indicted person has been African, which “implies unfair selectivity at best, and smacks of neocolonialism at worst.” Since the ICC began 18 years ago, nine out of the 10 investigated cases have involved African nations, which has led to accusations of bias. With fewer member states to help expedite this process, the ICC would have a more limited scope for prospective investigations. Fewer African members would make the ICC “a shell of its former self.” Not only does this undermine the legitimacy of the organization, but makes its operations seem dysfunctional.

African Case Studies

Following in the footsteps of Burundi and South Africa, the tiny West African country of Gambia became the latest member to withdraw from the ICC this past October. Together, these nations have chastised the multinational tribunal for its alleged “anti-African bias” and ignorance toward wrongdoings from Western powers. Burundi was the first constituent to “file for divorce” from the ICC. At the time, the country was being investigated for possible war crimes during the recent outbursts of political violence. Civil unrest transpired after the incumbent president, Pierre Nkurunziza, declared he would be running for a third term.

Once considered as a “continental heavyweight” and avid supporter of the ICC in the 1990s, South Africa disappointed the ICC after failing to arrest Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir in June of 2015, who is wanted by the ICC for orchestrating wartime atrocities in Darfur. Despite a South African court order to arrest al-Bashir, the Sudanese head of state still managed to attend an African Union summit in Johannesburg and leave Pretoria unscathed. Even though Sudan is not a member of the ICC, the U.N. Security Council successfully referred the Darfur conflict to officials in The Hague. South Africa and the ICC clashed over the impunity afforded to current heads of state. Although the ICC has brought current presidents to stand trial, this practice is something that South Africa strongly disapproves of.

Peeved by the continual investigations into African affairs, the Gambian President Yahya Jammeh urged the ICC to divert its attention from Africa and instead probe further into the E.U.’s wrongdoings in today’s ongoing immigration crisis. In a public statement, Jammeh suggested that European countries be tried for the deaths of African migrants on the Mediterranean Sea.

“This action is warranted by the fact that the ICC, despite being called the International Criminal Court, is in fact an International Caucasian Court for the persecution and humiliation of people of color, especially Africans,” said Sheriff Bojang, who serves as Gambia’s information minister.

Conclusion

If more African states revoke their ICC membership, then the court’s stability will remain unclear, considering that 34 of the original 124 member states are from the continent. The ICC could very well lose its credentials if a mass exodus of African nations ensues. Attention is currently fixated on Kenya, which many fear may be the next African country to abandon the tribunal. Three years ago, the African Union pressured the ICC not to persecute incumbent heads of states. Such a proposal was made while Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta and his colleague, William Ruto, were expected to stand trial for the ethnic violence stemming from the contentious 2007 elections. Kenyatta became the first head of state to be tried by ICC, but the charges were dropped due to insufficient evidence.

“These challenges are best addressed not by diminishing support for the court, but by strengthening it from within,” said U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in a statement. “Deterring future atrocities, delivering justice for victims, and defending the rules of war across the globe are far too important priorities to risk a retreat from the age of accountability that we have worked so hard to build and solidify.”

In hopes of gaining more clout on the international stage, it would be advantageous for the ICC to appeal to non-members, such as the United States, Russia, and China. Without support from the mightiest of global contenders, the court remains a fledgling U.N. project that lacks the global support it needs to properly function. Considering that 57 additional members have signed the treaty since its creation, further recruitment is possible. Lastly, to restore trust among members, the court must demonstrate that it has clear standards and motivations in convicting war criminals outside of Africa.

Jacob Atkins

Jacob Atkins is a freelance blogger and contributor for Law Street Media. After studying print journalism and international relations at American University, Jacob now resides in Madrid where he is teaching English, pursuing multimedia reporting projects and covering global news. Contact Jacob at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

http://jacobson.pressfolios.com/

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In a lengthy and detailed speech on Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry defended the U.S.’s decision to abstain from a vote condemning Israeli settlements in the West Bank and advocated for a two-state solution as the path to peace in the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Kerry affirmed the Obama administration’s commitment to Israel, describing the relationship as a friendship but declaring that friends “need to tell each other the hard truths.” He then went on to assert that the U.S. did indeed vote in accordance with its values, declaring that a vote against the settlements would jeopardize a two-state solution, which he described as the “only way to ensure Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state.”

The speech comes in the wake of a wave of criticism from President-elect Donald Trump and the dismay of pro-Israel advocates who called upon the U.S. to veto the U.N. resolution. The U.N. resolution declared the settlements a violation of international law, and were not vetoed by any of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council.

Simply the announcement of Kerry’s planned speech was enough to draw ire from many public figures, who believed the U.N. vote showed a disloyalty to the U.S.-Israeli relationship.

After allowing this anti-Israel resolution to pass the UN, Secretary Kerry has no credibility to speak on Israeli-Palestinian peace.

— Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) December 28, 2016

We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect. They used to have a great friend in the U.S., but…….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2016

not anymore. The beginning of the end was the horrible Iran deal, and now this (U.N.)! Stay strong Israel, January 20th is fast approaching!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2016

Kerry said he felt “compelled” to respond in the wake of the backlash, stressing the U.S.’s continued support for Israel but taking a hard stance against the West Bank settlements. He also said that if Israel went down the one-state path, “it will never have true peace with the rest of the Arab world.” He outlined principles for negotiations between the two parties, declaring that both sides must be actively involved in the peace process in order for it to be effective.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the speech a “deep disappointment” during a news conference on Wednesday, saying that it “was almost as unbalanced as the anti-Israel resolution” passed by the U.N. last week. He also allegedly vowed to work with the Trump administration to repeal the U.N. resolution.

While it is unlikely that the speech could substantially change Israeli policies in the region, it sent a powerful statement that the Obama administration was standing by its vote at the U.N. despite opposition from Israel.

While the Trump administration has vowed to strengthen the alliance between the two countries further, Secretary Kerry’s speech has essentially cemented the Obama administration’s legacy as one with a tenuous relationship to Israel and Netanyahu: keeping amicable terms, but refusing to bend to its every demand.

Mariam Jaffery

Mariam was an Executive Assistant at Law Street Media and a native of Northern Virginia. She has a B.A. in International Affairs with a minor in Business Administration from George Washington University. Contact Mariam at mjaffery@lawstreetmedia.com.

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As recently as October, she expressed her distaste for President-elect Donald Trump, saying she would vote for him, but is “not a fan.” But on Wednesday, Trump announced Governor Nikki Haley (R-SC) will serve in his cabinet as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, succeeding President Obama’s appointee, Samantha Power. The daughter of immigrants from India’s Punjab region, Haley is the first Indian-American to serve in a presidential cabinet.

Though Haley, 44, and Trump often sparred during the primary season, the two will now be working together. In a statement on Wednesday morning, Trump said his new cabinet appointment has “a proven track record of bringing people together regardless of background or party affiliation to move critical policies forward for the betterment of her state and our country.” However, Haley has less of a track record in regard to foreign policy.

As U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., Haley will have a heavy influence in shaping and resolving international decrees and disputes. Though she has little foreign policy experience, Haley did travel abroad as governor several times to attract foreign businesses to her state.

Despite her lack of a deep resume in the foreign policy realm, and the vitriol she often expressed for Trump during the campaign, Haley cited a “sense of duty” in a statement on her new assignment. She added: “When the president believes you have a major contribution to make to the welfare of our nation, and to our nation’s standing in the world, that is a calling that is important to heed.”

Haley became the first female, and minority, governor of South Carolina when she was elected in 2010. She made national headlines in 2015, when she called on the statehouse to remove the Confederate flag from its premises after a white gunman killed nine people at a historic black church in Charleston and used the flag as a motif of his twisted ideology. The flag was removed.

Haley, whose birth name is Nimrata Randhawa (her parents sometimes called her “Nikki,” meaning “small one” in Hindi), and Trump consistently expressed mutual dislike during the primary campaign, in which Haley supported Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. During her Republican rebuttal to President Obama’s State of the Union address in January, Haley dismissed Trump’s fiery rhetoric.

“Some people think that you have to be the loudest voice in the room to make a difference,” she said. “That is just not true. Often, the best thing we can do is turn down the volume.” Trump responded by saying Haley is “very, very weak on illegal immigration.” All that is in the past now, apparently, and both Trump and Haley seem ready to move on from past barbs and into a new era of cooperation.

While awaiting the Senate’s confirmation of her appointment, Haley will continue serving out her second term as governor. Lt. Gov. Henry McMaster, an early Trump supporter, will take over as governor should Haley be confirmed.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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To Jews, the Temple Mount is home to the remains of two temples, both destroyed by occupying powers millennia ago. To Muslims, the Dome of the Rock is where Muhammad ascended to heaven. And to Christians, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is where Jesus was crucified and later resurrected.

On Wednesday, UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee passed a resolution to designate the area, walled off atop a hill in the Old City in east Jerusalem, as a world heritage site. But the language used–and omitted–in the resolution enraged Israel, the United States, and others in the international community who view the resolution’s mention of the site only by its Arabic name, al-Haram al-Sharif as offensive. The document also strongly condemns Israel’s role in the Israel-Palestine conflict.

The historical and cultural treasure chest is among the holiest sites in all three Abrahamic faiths: the holiest for Jews and Christians, and trailing just Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia, the third holiest for Muslims.

“What needs to be understood, and it will take time, is that this absurdity, which harms not only the historical truth and the truth of the present, but also harms in my opinion the U.N. itself,” said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Following the submission of the resolution a few weeks go, Israel severed its ties to UNESCO, and on Wednesday, Netanyahu declared he will recall Israel’s ambassador to UNESCO. Though 58 countries are members of the cultural body’s executive board, only 21 are part of its World Heritage Committee. Neither Israel, the United States, nor Palestine is a member of that committee. Ten members voted for the resolution, two voted against it, eight abstained, and one was absent.

Crystal Nix Hines, the U.S. representative of UNESCO, called the resolution “continuously one-sided and inflammatory,” with the potential of “damaging the credibility of UNESCO.”

The document is one-sided in more ways than simple semantics. For one, the resolution is titled “Occupied Palestine,” and was submitted by Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, and Sudan. The language throughout the document refers to Israel as the “occupying Power,” consistently highlighting the “deplorable” behavior of Israel in its conflict with Palestine, while ignoring any of Israel’s concerns.

The site sits in the contentious Old City of east Jerusalem, which Israel annexed in the 1967 Mideast War, although the international community does not recognize that move. Sitting on the hinge of the West Bank and Israel, both Palestine and Israel consider east Jerusalem their capital.

Irina Bokova, UNESCO’s director-general who was not directly involved in the drafting or passing of the contentious resolution, offered an all-inclusive statement on Wednesday. “Nowhere more than in Jerusalem do Jewish, Christian, and Muslim heritage and traditions share space and interweave to the point that they support each other,” she said, expressing hope that the world heritage designation could “bridge the divisions that harm the multi-faith character of the Old City.”

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The World Health Organization, one of the world’s leading voices on health policy, is making an interesting change. WHO is set to announce that “single” people who don’t have a child but want one are to be classified as “infertile”–which is defined as a disability. And that may sound strange, but it’s actually coming from a place of progressive good. By doing so, WHO is granting everyone the “right to reproduce” and this move will help heterosexual single men and women, as well as same-sex couples, get equal access to in vitro fertilization.

Dr David Adamson, one of the authors of the new standards, explained the motivation behind the language and policy change to the Telegraph, saying:

The definition of infertility is now written in such a way that it includes the rights of all individuals to have a family, and that includes single men, single women, gay men, gay women.

It puts a stake in the ground and says an individual’s got a right to  reproduce whether or not they have a partner. It’s a big change.

It fundamentally alters who should be included in this group and who should  have access to healthcare. It sets an international legal standard.  Countries are bound by it.

The rule will be sent out to every health minister next year–although it’s unclear at this point how it could actually substantively affect law or policy from country to country.

However, there are plenty of people who disagree with the new standards. One concern stems from pro-life activists, who worry that it’s an overreach. Josephine Quintavalle, from Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said:

This absurd nonsense is not simply re-defining infertility but completely sidelining the biological process and significance of natural intercourse between a man and a woman. How long before babies are created and grown on request completely in the lab?

There are also concerns from some doctors who work with in vitro fertilization that it’s creating a political matter out of a personal decision made by couples.

Concerns aside, it’s an interesting approach in the name of equality. And we don’t know how it will actually pan out, the rule will be sent out to every health minister next year–it’s unclear at this point how it could actually substantively affect law or policy from country to country. As for the U.S., a Department of Health spokesperson told the Telegraph that it would consider the change for the U.S., but nothing was guaranteed.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Every day, people all over the world are executed for a wide variety of crimes. Though in the west it is mostly used to punish serious crimes like murder, in some places you can be executed for who you sleep with, how you dress, or if you have a different opinion from your government. Some countries execute people who were underage at the time of committing a crime and some do it to the mentally ill. Monday, October 10 marks the World Day Against Death Penalty.

Some countries still use the death penalty for homosexuality.

Let’s stand with our LGBTQI friends on the 10th October for World Day Against the Death Penalty #NoDeathPenalty #LGBTQI pic.twitter.com/ZOabAGG9Iz

— Rainbow Amnesty (@AI_LGBTQI_NSW) October 6, 2016

Amnesty International is committed to abolishing the death penalty worldwide and presents some of the main arguments for why. The fact is that by sentencing someone to death, you are denying the person’s right to life–which was established in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Additionally, because mistakes do happen, there have been several cases when an innocent person has been executed. There is also no proof that the use of the death penalty reduces the crime rate in a country. It is a discriminatory practice; death sentences are more likely to to be given to someone from a religious or racial minority as well as the poor and those who cannot afford an expensive lawyer for a lengthy trial.

Lastly, the risk that it is used as a political tool to quiet dissent in countries with a deeply corrupt justice system is too big.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement on Monday:

Let us be clear: participation in peaceful protests and criticism of a government–whether in private, on the Internet, or in the media–are neither crimes nor terrorist acts. The threat or use of the death penalty in such cases is an egregious violation of human rights.

World Day Against the Death Penalty – AI calls on Indon authorities to end DP and review all DP cases https://t.co/MppoXbz5et pic.twitter.com/0Y5Otj7jc3

— Amnesty Int’l (@AIIndoTimor) October 10, 2016

The U.N. Secretary-General also pointed out that although many countries seem to believe the death penalty is an effective way to handle terrorism, by scaring off future assailants, it actually has the opposite effect. He said:

This is not true. Experience has shown that putting terrorists to death serves as propaganda for their movements by creating perceived martyrs and making their macabre recruiting campaigns more effective.

Many Twitter users expressed their opposition to the practice.

On the World Day Against Death Penalty,I hail all those who were executed by #Iran‘s regime in the battle for freedom #NoDeathPenalty

— Maryam Rajavi (@Maryam_Rajavi) October 10, 2016

Places like China and Iran frequently execute people who dare to stand up against the government or reveal unflattering depictions of what life is like there. According to the most recent numbers from Amnesty International, Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia account for almost 90 percent of all recorded executions in 2015. But this percentage does not include China, where thousands of people are believed to be executed each year, though data on executions is considered a state secret and is highly classified. The data also shows that last year saw the highest number of executions worldwide in 25 years.

Killing in the name of justice? Mapping death penalty https://t.co/z7eN42lrJk #NoDeathPenalty #WorldDayAgainstDeathPenalty @WCADP @amnesty pic.twitter.com/G9kP9IIQCG

— Benjamin Hennig (@geoviews) October 10, 2016

Salil Shetty, Amnesty International’s Secretary General said in a statement:

The rise in executions last year is profoundly disturbing. Not for the last 25 years have so many people been put to death by states around the world. In 2015 governments continued relentlessly to deprive people of their lives on the false premise that the death penalty would make us safer.

California has a particularly high number of prisoners on death row–prisoners who have been sentenced to death but not yet executed. Only 13 people have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in 1978, and nearly 750 remain on death row. In November, Californians will vote on two ballot initiatives that will change the state’s death penalty practice. Proposition 62 would repeal the death penalty entirely, and Proposition 66 would change the current system to speed up the appeals process to reduce the number of prisoners on death row. If both pass ,the initiative with the most “yes” votes will become law.

California, we’ve fallen far behind the times. It’s time to end the death penalty for good. RT if you agree. https://t.co/F3ZjwbrgfM pic.twitter.com/l5qpQ0CBXk

— Yes On 62 (@yeson62) October 9, 2016

According to Amnesty International, the United States has the fifth highest number of executions worldwide, following China, Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia. Last year, it was also the only country in the Americas to actually perform an execution. We share a place on a list of countries that are infamous for violating human rights, while our neighboring countries and Europe got rid of this practice many years ago. It makes you wonder, does the death penalty really have a place in the United States in the 21st century?

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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On Friday, in an interview with the Associated Press, Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations told of an episode that could prove to further the theory that Donald Trump has some sort of ties to the Kremlin. Vitaly Churkin, the ambassador, said that he lodged an aggressive complaint to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on September 13 about negative comments made by the U.N. human rights commissioner in April. Essentially, a top Russian diplomat went to bat for Trump.

During a speech in Cleveland in April, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights decried the “bigotry” of Trump, and the dangerous road his positions might pave: “Less than 150 miles away from where I speak, a front-running candidate to be president of this country declared, just a few months ago, his enthusiastic support for torture,” Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, the high commissioner, said, referencing Trump’s pro-waterboarding remarks in Ohio in November 2015.

Churkin told the AP that Zeid’s criticisms of several European politicians–particularly far-right ones who are stoking anti-immigrant fears–as well as Trump, were out of bounds. “Prince Zeid is overstepping his limits from time to time and we’re unhappy about it,” Churkin said. “He should stick to his file, which is important enough.”

Russia formally rebuking negative comments made about a U.S. politician is unusual enough, but given the fact that Moscow seems to have a stake in Trump defeating Hillary Clinton in November, Churkin’s actions are especially interesting.

Clinton’s senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan weighed in on the Kremlin’s latest favor for Trump: “This is not only strange – it’s scary,” he said. “A major party candidate for the presidency of the United States is being protected by the Kremlin. Wow.”

Trump’s relationship with Moscow has been questioned since he started praising Russian President Vladimir Putin. He suggested Russia hack whatever they could of Clinton’s deleted emails she sent from a private server while she was secretary of state. And he has also questioned NATO, a key check on the Kremlin’s power in Europe, hinting that the bloc could see less U.S. involvement if he were president.

While Russia steadfastly denies playing favorites in the election, it is hard to imagine a top Russian diplomat would defend any criticism of Clinton.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Emma Watson addressed the United Nations General Assembly this week to advocate for gender equality on college campuses around the world, putting emphasis on the need for universities to combat the vicious cycle of sexual assault.

Watson, an active feminist and United Nations Goodwill Ambassador, helped launch the HeForShe campaign in 2014. The movement initiated by UN Women enlists men to become active agents to fight the inequalities women face.

The British actress used her platform on Tuesday to introduce HeForShe’s IMPACT 10x10x10. The initiative convenes ten Heads of State, ten global CEOs, and ten University Presidents to fast-track gender equality in boardrooms, classrooms and world capitals. Watson asserted that higher-learning institutions can serve as catalysts for change.

“We believe that students should leave university believing in, striving for, and expecting societies of true equality…in every sense, and that universities have the power to be a vital catalyst for that change,” Watson said.

Check out our #HeForShe University #ParityReport putting spotlight on #genderequality in global universities: https://t.co/HQYFBysaIl#UNGApic.twitter.com/iK8wagwn1O

— UN Women (@UN_Women) September 20, 2016

Watson compared universities to small utopias that are able to enlist change in society. She stressed that safety is a right and not a privilege. A study conducted by the National Sexual Resource Center showed one in five women experience sexual assault on college campuses and more than 90 percent of victims do not report the assault.

Sexual assault victims who have come forward in recent history have discussed the difficulties presented in creating a case. From Stanford to the University of North Carolina–victims across the nation have united to prosecute their rapists and create an open dialogue. Watson said,

The university experience must tell women that their brainpower is valued, and not just that, but that they belong within the leadership of the university itself. And so importantly right now, the experience must make it clear that the safety of women, minorities, and anyone who may be vulnerable, is a right, not a privilege. A right that will be respected by a community that believes and supports survivors, and that recognizes that when one person’s safety is violated, everyone feels their own safety is violated.

The speech also touched on universities educating women on their value in society. The gender wage gap has proven a college degree is not an equalizer. The Center for American Progress’s analysis of data showed women earn less ten years after enrolling than men do six years after enrolling.

Across both public and private nonprofit four-year colleges, men’s earnings at the six-year mark are approximately $4,000 higher per year than women’s at 10 years.

“As we leave home for the first time to study at the places that we have worked so hard to get, we must not see or experience double standards. We need to see equal respect, leadership, and pay,” Watson said. “The university experience must tell women that their brain power is valued, and not just that, that they belong within the leadership of the university itself.”

Celebrities and the public praised Watson online for creating an inclusive platform.

Thank you @EmWatson and everyone at @HeforShe for the amazing work you’ve been doing over the past two years. Here’s to many more!

— Trevor Noah (@Trevornoah) September 21, 2016

The Brown University alumna and star of Disney’s “Beauty and The Beast” remake will take the next year off from acting in order to focus on her own personal development.

Watch Watson’s full speech below:

Bryan White

Bryan is an editorial intern at Law Street Media from Stratford, NJ. He is a sophomore at American University, pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Journalism. When he is not reading up on the news, you can find him curled up with an iced chai and a good book. Contact Bryan at BWhite@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Rising seas and warming temperatures. A nuclear-ambitious Iran. An erratic and dangerous North Korea. The unmooring and uneven tides of international trade. A global terrorism menace in the Islamic State; a global tragedy in the refugee crisis borne out of a warring Syria. These are some of the global challenges President Obama has faced during his tenure in the White House.

On Tuesday, in front of representatives from nearly every country on the planet, Obama delivered a speech defending his (at times controversial) diplomatic approach to foreign policy, and highlighting the global challenges that will transcend his years in office. Here are the highlights of Obama’s eighth and final speech at the U.N. General Assembly headquarters in New York:

Global Integration

In countries around the world, movements are bubbling that, along with other sentiments, center around the uncomfortable effects of globalization: Trump and Bernie Sanders, a one-time Democratic presidential hopeful, have earned scores of followers for ripping trade deals. Britain elected to leave the world’s largest trade market in the European Union with Brexit.

In his speech on Tuesday, Obama reflected on the genuinely disruptive and for the least advantaged, disturbing, trends of globalization, but also commented on why embracing its flow is vital for a prosperous future.

“The answer cannot be a simple rejection of global integration,” he said. “We should work together to make sure the benefits of global integration are broadly shared.” Obama, who delivered his remarks later than scheduled, said the world needs a “course-correction” in its trend toward greater integration. “Too often those trumpeting globalization have ignored inequality,” he said.

As he prepares to leave office in January, Obama continues to push his signature global trade deal–the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP–through Congress. It’s unlikely the 12-nation deal will pass Congress before year’s end.

Global Security

One day after a man was arrested for dropping bombs in New Jersey and Manhattan, Obama addressed the world’s prime exporter of terrorism: the Islamic State. Calling the group, commonly referred to as ISIS, a “mindless medieval menace,” Obama defended his diplomacy-heavy approach to confronting the group’s presence in Syria, a country whose five-year civil war has killed nearly 500,000 and displaced millions more.

“There is a military component” to fighting ISIS, he said, but “in a place like Syria, there is no ultimate military victory to be won.”

Obama’s speech came a day after an aid convoy headed toward Aleppo–Syria’s second largest and hardest hit city–was attacked by government-launched airstrikes. He largely restrained from addressing the crumbling cease-fire agreement in Syria, but did call on all nations to do more to accommodate the refugees that continue to spill out of that war-torn country.

“We have to follow through even when the politics are hard,” he said, adding the world must “do more to open our hearts to help refugees who are desperate for a home.” He implored his globe-spanning audience to “imagine what it would be like for our family, for our children, if the unspeakable happened to us.”

Global Warming

And of course Obama spent considerable time speaking on a key concern of his administration, and one of its proudest achievements: climate change, and the Paris climate accord.

Before Obama spoke, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, who also will be finished with his term in January, took the lectern and voiced the threats all countries must contend with: “The Earth assails us with rising seas, record heat and extreme storms. And danger defines the days of many,” he said.

A touchstone accomplishment of the Obama administration, the Paris climate accord calls on nearly every country–developed and developing alike–to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions in the decades to come. Combating climate change, Obama said on Tuesday, is “not only the right thing to do, it’s the smart thing to do.” He also warned of potential conflicts if climate change continues down its current path.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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In today’s “news that didn’t come from The Onion, but I had to double check” North Korea has banned sarcasm. Because that’s going to go real well.

Warning: there’s a lot more sarcasm ahead.

Specifically, sarcasm that mocks the authoritarian regime in the country or its leader, Kim Jong-Un, is forbidden. For example, North Korean citizens are no longer allowed to say “this is all America’s fault” when speaking about their woes, a phrase which is apparently equivalent to our snarky American expression “thanks Obama.”

See:

Another phrase that is no longer allowed is “A fool who cannot see the outside world”–which apparently pokes fun at North Korea’s fearless and not-at-all reactionary leader Kim Jong-un.

North Korean citizens were told about the new ban on sarcasm at large meetings held around the country, which sound like a fun time. According to Radio Free Asia, a nonprofit news organization that operates in the area:

‘One state security official personally organized a meeting to alert local residents to potential ‘hostile actions’ by internal rebellious elements,’ a source in Jagang province, which lies along the border with China, told RFA’s Korean Service this week.

‘The main point of the lecture was ‘Keep your mouths shut!’’ the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

You know, if you think about it, banning sarcasm actually makes a lot of sense. North Korea’s citizens are some of the most oppressed in the world and have severely limited freedoms when it comes to speech and the press. According to a UN report regarding the human rights violations in North Korea, the “gravity, scale and nature of these violations reveal a State that does not have any parallel in the contemporary world.” When there’s so little accountability, transparency, and decency, humor is apparently the only thing left to lose.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The number of suspected drug criminals that have been killed by police in the Philippines since President Rodrigo Duterte took office seven weeks ago is believed to be as high as 1,800 people, according to Philippine National Police Chief Ronald Dela Rosa. Local politicians, the United States, and the U.N. have started voicing concern about human rights violations as the country ramps up its fight against drugs. In response to recent criticism, Duterte lashed out at his critics and even suggested that the Philippines may leave the U.N. in the future.

At a Senate hearing on Monday, Dela Rosa said that police had killed 712 drug dealers and users since July 1. He also mentioned that they are investigating 1,067 other drug-related killings, but did not elaborate further. According to Reuters, two U.N. human rights experts recently urged the Philippines to stop the extrajudicial killings of suspected drug dealers that have escalated dramatically lately.

Late Sunday night, President Duterte held a press conference, in which he threatened to fire everyone in the government who had been appointed to his or her position by a previous president. At the press conference, he said the police did not carry out the extrajudicial killings. He also said, responding to critics at the U.N., “I will prove to the world that you are a very stupid expert.” In his speech, he asked people to not only think about how many drug dealers were killed but to also take into account how many innocent lives that are lost to drugs.

President Duterte even threatened to pull out of the U.N. saying, “I do not want to insult you. But maybe we’ll just have to decide to separate from the United Nations.” He went on to say that the Philippines might instead start a new international organization with China and several African nations.

Duterte continued to criticize the U.N. for not stopping the war in Syria:

You know, United Nations, if you can say one bad thing about me, I can give you 10 [about you]. I tell you, you are an inutile [useless]. Because if you are really true to your mandate, you could have stopped all these wars and killing.

The United States is normally a close ally to the Philippines but has expressed concerns similar to the United Nations in light of the recent deaths. The Philippines’ foreign minister, Perfecto Yasay, said on Monday that the President’s words had been no more than an expression of a strong disappointment with the U.N. “We are committed to the U.N. despite our numerous frustrations and disappointments with the international agency,” Yasay said. He added that Duterte has promised to respect human rights and that it is irresponsible for the U.N. to “jump to conclusions.”

But Senator Leila de Lima, a fierce critic of Duterte, is also concerned; she began a two-day inquiry on Monday, questioning police about the many killings. “I am disturbed that we have killings left and right as breakfast every morning,” she said. She also expressed her fear that the president’s war on drugs could be an excuse for law enforcement to kill with impunity.

On Sunday night, Duterte did not seem to worry about effects of his statements. When asked about his comments he said, “What is… repercussions? I don’t give a shit to them.”

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Philippine President Duterte Threatens to Leave U.N., Calling it Useless appeared first on Law Street.

For years, the United Nations has denied any wrongdoing in the cholera outbreak in Haiti that hit the island in October 2010. But after an independent report concluded the U.N. was responsible for the outbreak, the international aid organization on Thursday admitted, at least partially, to its role in bringing cholera to the small Caribbean nation, and promised a “significant new set of U.N. actions.”

The U.N. deployed 454 Nepalese troops to Haiti in 2004 as part of a peacekeeping mission. The troops were stationed at a base near the Meille River. Waste from the base was dumped into the river, and in October 2010, the first cases of cholera were detected. Nearly 10,000 people have since died, with close to 800,000 more, or seven percent of Haiti’s entire population, sickened.

Cholera “would not have broken out but for the actions of the United Nations,” Philip Alston, an NYU law professor, concluded in his independent report sent to the U.N. on August 8. His report pegged the reparations the U.N. owes to the Haitians who were affected by the outbreak at $40 billion. Alston’s report was one of a couple dozen from experts, whose conclusions must be accepted or rejected by the U.N. by the end of the week. The reports will be officially presented in September at the U.N. headquarters in New York.

And while the international aid body hasn’t explicitly accepted or rejected any of the special rapporteurs’–as the independent experts are called–findings, the U.N. secretary general’s deputy spokesman indicated positive steps are being taken. “Over the past year, the U.N. has become convinced that it needs to do much more regarding its own involvement in the initial outbreak and the suffering of those affected by cholera.” the spokesman wrote in an email to The New York Times.

In 2011, the families of 5,000 cholera victims petitioned the U.N. to remedy the cholera situation. The organization’s Office of Legal Affairs said the petitions were “not receivable.” The families decided to sue. But because the U.N. enjoys diplomatic immunity, virtually granting it impunity from potential legal action, it did not send any representatives to court. The case is currently pending in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York.

Mario Joseph, the Haitian human rights attorney who is representing the plaintiffs in that case, called the report, and the U.N.’s response, a “major victory for the thousands of Haitians who have been marching for justice.” Its response so far, besides denying any responsibility for unwittingly initiating the outbreak, is drafting a 10-year, $2.27 billion plan to support the cholera-affected communities, but the plan is severely underfunded at the moment. The U.N. seems on its way to acknowledging its responsibility to ease the epidemic, which is still sweeping through the tiny country. As of March, an average of 37 people perish from cholera each month in Haiti.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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In a move that frustrated the U.S. and has some questioning its adherence to international law, Russia began using a base in Iran to launch airstrikes against targets in Syria on Tuesday. Russia confirmed Wednesday that it launched additional strikes from Iran’s Shahid Nojeh Air Base in Hamedan Province for the second straight day. The U.S. State Department condemned Russia’s actions as “unfortunate, but not surprising,” and added it could be violating a U.N. Security Council (UNSC) resolution by utilizing an Iranian air base.

For roughly the past year, Russia has been supporting the Syrian government with airstrikes against the Islamic State, which continues to maintain a presence in the heavily fractured country. Critics say Russia is bolstering Bashar al-Assad, Syria’s president, in his quest to exterminate any rebel groups who oppose his rule by deliberately destroying hospitals in rebel-held regions. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed in Syria’s five-year civil war, and millions more have fled the country, seeking asylum in Europe and elsewhere.

Russia said it’s using Iran’s air base strictly to refuel its jets. “In the case we’re discussing there has been no supply, sale or transfer of warplanes to Iran,” said Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister. Lavrov was responding to Mark Toner, the State Department spokesman who insinuated that Russia is breaching UNSC Resolution 2231, which prohibits the supply, sale, or transfer of combat aircraft to Iran without Security Council approval. “The Russian Air Force uses these warplanes with Iran’s approval in order to take part in the counter-terrorism operation,” Lavrov added.

A U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad said that Russia did alert U.S. forces of the move to launch jets from Iran, but that didn’t stop the U.S. from questioning the Kremlin’s use of an Iranian airbase as unlawful. On Wednesday, a spokesman for Russia’s Ministry of Defense, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, expressed Russia’s exasperation at suggestions that it’s breaching international law. “It’s hard to resist a recommendation for some State Department representatives to check their logic and knowledge of fundamental documents of international law,” he said, referencing Resolution 2231.

The clash underscores the knotted nature of alliances and adversaries that is crippling any semblance of peace in Syria. Russia is providing military support to the Syrian government, which is also backed by Iran. Those three nations, as well as the U.S. and its primary allies, have a common enemy: ISIS. Assad, the Syrian strongman who has exterminated large swaths of his citizenry, is also pitted against a collection of rebel groups who threaten his hold on power.

Emblematic of the violence that is tearing apart the country at the moment, Aleppo, one of Syria’s largest cities, saw seven civilians killed by rebel-launched airstrikes on Wednesday, according to Syria’s state-run news agency. Nine more were injured. Aleppo is split between the rebel-held east and the government-held west. It’s hospitals are being targeted by the Assad regime. Civilians are effectively trapped. On Wednesday, the United Nations warned of a “humanitarian catastrophe” in Aleppo should conditions remain the same or worsen.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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On Monday, the Associated Press revealed that South Sudanese troops went on a nearly four-hour violent rampage, where they raped foreign aid workers and killed a local journalist near the country’s capital of Juba. The worse part is, the nearby U.N. compound and the U.S. Embassy knew, but did nothing.

For three long years, Juba has been the center of a civil war between President Salva Kiir and the opposition forces led by Riek Machar. During the course of the war, both sides have often targeted civilians. But on July 11, soldiers celebrating a battle win in the capital attacked the Terrain hotel complex, which is a temporary home to many foreign aid workers, expats, and members of the Sudanese elite.

Residents of Terrain heard shouts and gunfire, while  between 80 and 100 men armed, drunk, and wearing the symbol of the President’s army broke into the hotel complex. Security guards at the hotel armed only with handguns didn’t stand a chance.

The soldiers began their rampage inside the complex by stealing phones, computers, and wallets. Then they beat up foreigners with their rifles–seemingly singling out Americans–and fired bullets close to people’s heads.

A man from the Philippines said the soldiers definitely had hatred for America, recalling one soldier saying: “You messed up this country. You’re helping the rebels. The people in the U.N., they’re helping the rebels.”

Three women interviewed by the AP said they were raped–one of them by 15 men. One of the women said security advisers from an aid organization had told them they would never be the target of an attack since they were foreigners. She claimed this exchange happened half an hour before they were assaulted.

Local journalist John Gatluak was killed for having the same tribal markings as Machar. A soldier shot him twice in the head and four more times in other parts of his body.

Many sent texts, emails and Facebook messages to people on the outside, pleading for help.

“All of us were contacting whoever we could contact. The U.N., the U.S. embassy, contacting the specific battalions in the U.N., contacting specific departments,” said the woman raped by 15 men.

But why didn’t the U.N. or the U.S. Embassy do anything to stop the attack? According to an internal timeline compiled by the U.N. that was obtained by the AP, a member of the U.N.’s Joint Operations Center in Juba first received word of the attack at 3:37 p.m, minutes after the breach of the compound.

Then over the course of the next hour, the timeline noted more U.N. staff members began receiving messages from inside Terrain. At 4:33 p.m., a Quick Reaction Force was informed; however it wasn’t until 6:52 p.m.–more than two hours after first the first message–that the U.N. Department of Safety and Security (DSS) declared it would not be sending a team.

Ethiopians from the U.N. mission were asked to send a Quick Reaction Force instead, but the emergency team took too long and the mission was abandoned. The U.N.’s Department of Safety and Security also asked Quick Reaction Forces from China and Nepal to intervene, but no one did.

“Everyone refused to go. Ethiopia, China, and Nepal. All refused to go,” said an American man who alerted U.N. staff of the attack after being released early from the compound.

According to the U.N. timeline, a patrol was supposed to go the following morning instead, but it “was cancelled due to priority.” When asked why no one responded, the U.N. said that it is investigating the matter.

But the U.N. isn’t the only organization facing blame. The U.S. Embassy was also asked for help, and reportedly never answered the American citizens trapped inside the hotel. The Embassy also did not respond to repeated requests for comment from AP.

The foreign aid workers in the field are there to help local civilians, but when they themselves become targets of attacks, the U.N. and their embassies should be the first ones to assist them. Instead, they were ignored when they begged for help.

Human Rights Watch is now calling for increased sanctions and an arms embargo on South Sudan.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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“So tell me what you want, what you really, really want. I wanna, (ha) I wanna, (ha) I wanna, (ha) I wanna, (ha)…..end violence against girls!” This may not be the way you remember Spice Girl’s debut hit single “Wannabe,” but thanks to a new viral campaign, it is now.

UN initiative The Global Goals released the video produced by Project Everyone on Tuesday as part of its #WhatIReallyWant campaign. Aside from ending violence against women, the video also contains signs explaining that women want equal pay for equal work, an end to child marriage, and quality education for all girls.

. @AsliJacqueline is a force of world changing girl power in our #WhatIReallyReallyWant video..

What do YOU want? pic.twitter.com/udvDUhkLYi

— The Global Goals (@TheGlobalGoals) July 6, 2016

According to the organization’s Facebook page,

The Spice Girls always have represented girl power — and this time their song “Wannabe” is being used to promote the Sustainable Development Goals, especially No. 5 Gender Equality.

As part of the #WhatIReallyWantCampaign, The Global Goals initiative is asking women to share a photo of themselves holding up sign with what “YOU really, really want” for girls and women. A host of women and girls have already begun uploading their own handcrafted signs to social media, including Posh Spice herself, Victoria Beckham. 

#WhatIReallyReallyWant is no more girls dying of HIV @TheGlobalGoals X vb pic.twitter.com/mFza6cHyBx

— Victoria Beckham (@victoriabeckham) July 5, 2016

Get involved. xxx #WhatIReallyReallyWant pic.twitter.com/kLzQ1wXCc7

— amanda abbington (@CHIMPSINSOCKS) July 5, 2016

Join the movement & tell our world leaders it’s #TimeforGirls. #whatireallyreallywant @TheGlobalGoals pic.twitter.com/q9865lCMTF

— Tanya Burr (@TanyaBurr) July 5, 2016

Many older women don’t get hired for interesting jobs because they’re not…what? Interesting? #WhatIReallyReallyWant pic.twitter.com/LyNJHnOPrI

— Heather McDougal (@wundergrrl) July 6, 2016

Your gender should not be the reason you can’t achieve goals or succeed @TheGlobalGoals #WhatIReallyReallyWant pic.twitter.com/vfPNGcgRiz

— Samantha Kingston (@K_Samantha1) July 5, 2016

This is #WhatIReallyReallyWant #TimeforGirls pic.twitter.com/6MBVbjmAbT

— ell ♡ tan (@tanburrbear) July 5, 2016

Equal Opportunities for all #WhatIReallyReallyWant #TWUK pic.twitter.com/0jjAJoyMkA

— L a u r a (@LauraHJenkins) July 5, 2016

“Every boy and every girl, Spice up your life”#WhatIReallyReallyWant #TimeforGirls @TheGlobalGoals @victoriabeckham pic.twitter.com/yWfgA3ZZF6

— Omri (@Omri_Rawrlan) July 5, 2016

Melanie C, a.k.a. Sporty Spice, said she felt “flattered and [honored]” by the video, and Emma Bunton, a.k.a. Baby Spice, also tweeted out the video.

MJ Delaney, who directed the film said,

This is about modern day girl power. The Spice Girls were about a group of different women joining together and being stronger through that bond. These differences are what we want to celebrate in this film, while showing there are some universal things that all girls, everywhere, really, really want.

Watch Project Everyone Remake:

Original Spice Girls’ “Wannabe” Music Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJLIiF15wjQ

Alexis Evans

Alexis Evans is an Assistant Editor at Law Street and a Buckeye State native. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and a minor in Business from Ohio University. Contact Alexis at aevans@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Coinciding with World Refugee Day, the United Nations refugee agency released a sobering report on Monday: by the end of 2015, 65.3 million people were forcibly displaced from their homes, the highest number since World War II.

Squatting in temporary, tattered tent camps within their own countries or abroad, wandering, or seeking asylum, 2015 saw 12.4 million people added to the overall tally. Over half of the world’s displaced peoples are children. Over half come from three countries where terrorism, civil war, and tyrannical governance have uprooted cities and towns from any semblance of normalcy: Syria, Afghanistan, and Somalia.

“We are facing the biggest refugee and displacement crisis of our time. Above all, this is not just a crisis of numbers; it is also a crisis of solidarity,” said U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. It is easy to get lost in incomprehensible figures. To put it in perspective: 65.3 million is nearly a fifth of America’s total population. If the displaced population were a country, it would be the 21st largest on the planet. Every minute, 24 people are displaced. That is 34,000 each day. One of every 113 people on earth is either seeking asylum, a refugee, or internally displaced.

According to the U.N., 21.3 million of the 65.3 million displaced people have been shuffled to a land outside their home country. Turkey is the most generous of host countries, with 2.5 million resettled refugees. Pakistan is second (1.6 million) and Lebanon third (1.1. million). Though it pledges more financial support, food assistance, and humanitarian aid than any other country, the United States resettled fewer than 70,000 refugees in 2015 and roughly 3,252,000 since 1975. President Obama, in a statement released Monday, urged America and the rest of the world to “do more:”

Protecting and assisting refugees is a part of our history as a Nation, and we will continue to alleviate the suffering of refugees abroad, and to welcome them here at home, because doing so reflects our American values and our noblest traditions as a Nation, enriches our society, and strengthens our collective security.

In September, during the U.N. General Assembly Summit in New York, Obama will host a meeting of world leaders to address the crisis, the Leaders’ Summit on Refugees. Filippo Grandi, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, which is the U.N. arm that issued the report on Monday, called on all able governments to address the causes of the tragic and disastrous crisis. “I hope that the message carried by those forcibly displaced reaches the leaderships: We need action, political action, to stop conflicts,” he said. “The message that they have carried is: ‘If you don’t solve problems, problems will come to you.’

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post U.N. Report: 1 in 113 People on Earth Are Displaced appeared first on Law Street.

Amid machine gunfire and plumes of smoke, the Iraqi military halted its push to retake the city of Fallujah from the grip of the Islamic State on Wednesday. The pause is due to a confluence of factors: to protect civilians still inside the city, and to weather a fierce Islamic State, or ISIS, counterattack.

The Fallujah offensive began on May 22. In the days since, the outskirts of the city have been pounded by American led airstrikes and Iraqi forces on the ground. The city proper, a dense urban sprawl with 50,000 civilians still trapped inside (20,000 of which are children, according to UNICEF), has yet to be directly attacked. The Iraqi army and American forces are reluctant to attack the city proper because of the deep roots ISIS has planted there during its two year occupation and the high risk of civilian casualties.

Deepening the dicey situation in Fallujah is the fact that sectarian divisions that have long been present in Iraq are heightened by the warring factions as well as the non-fighting citizens. ISIS is largely comprised of Sunnis, as are most civilians in Fallujah, and the Iraq military is dominated by Shiites. The two Islamic sects have been at the center of violent clashes in the country since its inception in 1920.

Despite the sluggish pace of the offensive, The Associated Press reported that Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi remains confident, noting the “remarkable advance” by his country’s forces against ISIS. “The main goal of the military operation now is to reduce civilian and army casualties,” he said.

Fallujah is the last city held by ISIS in western Iraq, though the group still controls Mosul, the country’s second-largest city to Baghdad, which is 40 miles east of Fallujah. Preparations for an offensive there are currently being made, with a full-scale attack expected sometime next year.

According to the United Nations, 3,700 people have already fled Fallujah for nearby cities that are not about to be shelled. Still a massive concern for the Iraqi army, the U.S. air force, and international aid groups is the thousands of children still within the city.

A statement by UNICEF–the U.N.’s child rights arm–expressed hope that both sides will recognize the danger this conflict poses to the children in Fallujah and elsewhere in Iraq:

“Children face the risk of forced recruitment into the fighting, strict procedures for security screening and separation from their families. Children who are recruited see their lives and futures jeopardized as they are forced to carry and use arms, fighting in an adult war.”

It added, “According to reports, food and medicine are running out and clean water is in short supply.”

A total of 867 people were killed in Iraq in May. Over half of those were civilian deaths.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post In Fallujah, Offensive Stalls As Civilian Lives Are Threatened appeared first on Law Street.

Responding to “immense security challenges,” the Kenyan government announced in an official statement on Friday that it will no longer be able to host the over half a million people living in the country’s two refugee camps and dispersed throughout its cities.

“The Government of Kenya has been forced by circumstances to reconsider the whole issue of hosting refugees and the process of repatriation… hosting of refugees has come to an end,” Kenya’s National Police Service issued in a Twitter post on Friday.

As of March 2015, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), Kenya’s two official camps–Dadaab in the east and Kakuma in the northwest–housed 584, 989 refugees. Fleeing civil war, political persecution, and drought in places like Somalia (where 72 percent of refugees hail from), South Sudan (16 percent) and Ethiopia (5 percent), some of the refugees have created a home for themselves in Kenya’s camps, especially the oldest and largest one in Dadaab, near the country’s arid eastern border with Somalia. Over a quarter million people have established lives in Dadaab, most of whom were displaced by war in Somalia when they were children and have since made a home in the “tent city.”

The Kenyan government has been pushing to close the camps for a few years. Last April, the government voiced intentions of shutting down the Dadaab camp, citing security concerns. And though the UNHCR, which runs the camp, agreed to assist Somalian refugees (which comprise the vast majority of Dadaab’s displaced peoples) who volunteered to return home, the organization opposed forced repatriation.

The sprawl of the displaced: One of Dadaab’s five camps. Over a quarter of a million refugees, namely Somalians, call this home. [Image courtesy of United Nations Photo]

Last spring’s announcement followed an attack at Garissa University, where a group of gunmen loyal to al-Shabaab, an al Qaeda linked, Somali-based terrorist group, shot and killed 147 students. Kenya has been mired in a conflict with the Islamic terrorist group for nearly a decade. Al-Shabaab has been committing acts of terror on Kenyan soil for years, killing soldiers and civilians alike, and it is the primary security threat the government referred to in its decision to close the refugee camps.

Following the Garissa attacks, the government alleged al-Shabaab had infiltrated Dadaab and used it to plot and launch attacks. In March, Kenyan newspaper The Star reported an al-Shabaab gun smuggler was caught at Dadaab, with not much more concrete evidence to support the government’s claims.

But the latest announcement seemingly came out of nowhere, following no mass casualty event or obvious security concern.

“I think it’s legitimate to believe that Kenya is issuing the threat as a means to leverage more resources from international donors,” said Mark Yarnell, Senior Advocate at Refugees International in an interview with Law Street Media.

Refugees from the nations that surround it seek a life free from war, drought and political persecution in Kenya. [Image courtesy of greenravine via Flickr]

Pointing out that Kenya’s security concerns certainly are real and legitimate, Yarnell, who has spent time in the field in East and Central Africa, predicted the latest threat by the Kenyan government is meant to extract more resources from the international community to deal with its conflict with al-Shabaab, more as a leverage tool than a step toward abolishing camps and rounding up refugees “at the barrel of a gun.”

“[The camps] are quite entrenched in the country, with their own market systems and infrastructure,” he said, likening the demolition of the two camps to essentially wiping out two cities. “You have people who were born in the camp and kids of people who were born in the camp and all they know is Dadaab or Kakuma.”

He pointed to a recent communiqué from the African Union on the Dadaab camp as the validation the Kenyan government needs to show the rest of the world it is in solidarity with a larger institution to do something in regards to the camps and maintaining Kenya’s security. In the communiqué, the AU Peace and Security Council acknowledged the “legitimate security concerns” facing Kenya, the threat of Dadaab to the security of Kenya, and the need to accelerate the process of repatriating Somali refugees who volunteer to do so.

It also called on international partners, “particularly the United Nations” to “extend necessary financial, logistical and technical support” to the Somalian government, and “to increase funding to Somalia, Kenya, UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies.”

If the Kenyan government follows through with its latest proclamation, hundreds of thousands of refugees will suffer, wandering, with nowhere to settle but the homes they were forced to abandon. Some left those homes decades ago.

That’s not to say Kenya’s refugee camps are perfect, permanent homes. Flooding, disease and malnutrition have wrecked havoc on Dadaab in the past, and according to UNHCR, there were eleven epidemics reported in 2012 alone.

Despite the imperfect conditions of Dadaab and Kakuma, UNHCR expressed “profound concern” over the latest announcement from the Kenyan government in an official statement released on Monday:

In today’s global context of some 60 million people forcibly displaced, it is more important than ever that international asylum obligations prevail and are properly supported. In light of this, and because of the potentially devastating consequences for hundreds of thousands of people that premature ending of refugee hosting would have, UNHCR is calling on the Government of Kenya to reconsider its decision and to avoid taking any action that might be at odds with its international obligations towards people needing sanctuary from danger and persecution. 

Under the leadership of President Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenya would be breaking international law if it went forward with these plans, for which there are various legal statutes assuring the protection of refugees by the host nation. The primary right afforded to refugees worldwide is a promise of non-refoulement, or return to a place where their life and freedoms would be threatened.

“It would be such an egregious violation of basic refugee rights and their own constitution,” Yarnell said.

Alec Siegel

Alec Siegel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. When he’s not working at Law Street he’s either cooking a mediocre tofu dish or enjoying a run in the woods. His passions include: gooey chocolate chips, black coffee, mountains, the Animal Kingdom in general, and John Lennon. Baklava is his achilles heel. Contact Alec at ASiegel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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While this doesn’t necessarily imply that there’s any sort of legal obligation of involvement when the word “genocide” is used, it makes a more compelling argument for the U.S. to take stronger action against ISIS. And even though the international law can be very ambiguous, Secretary Kerry said in today’s statement that “we must hold the perpetrators accountable. And we must find the resources to help those harmed by these atrocities be able to survive on their ancestral land.” To add to that even further, it’s also pretty rare for the U.S. to make such a declaration: the last time the U.S. officially declared genocide was over a decade ago, in 2004, when then-Secretary of State Colin Powell used it to refer to the atrocities in Darfur.

So while it’s still not completely clear to what extent this affects our current foreign policy toward ISIS, it could mean a significant international effort to take action against the group, and shows that we definitely aren’t walking away from this conflict any time soon.

Mariam Jaffery

Mariam was an Executive Assistant at Law Street Media and a native of Northern Virginia. She has a B.A. in International Affairs with a minor in Business Administration from George Washington University. Contact Mariam at mjaffery@lawstreetmedia.com.

The post Kerry Says ISIS “Responsible for Genocide”: What Does That Mean? appeared first on Law Street.

At the end of last year, the United Nations launched a working group to discuss the “arbitrary detention” of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Assange has been living in London’s Ecuadorian embassy since 2012, after his 2010 arrest in London, where he was brought in on charges regarding sexual assault and molestation in Sweden.

Both of the women who reported these assaults have remained anonymous in the press, but police have revealed that both incidents took place in August 2010. One of the charges was dropped in 2015, but the other still stands today. In a controversial move that alienated him from several political allies, the Ecuadorian ambassador granted Assange political asylum on the grounds that Ecuador has historically protected those who are vulnerable. Assange was concerned that if he was deported to Sweden, he might then be deported to the United States, where his involvement with Wikileaks could lead to him being tried for treason–and, according to Assange and his supporters, could face the death penalty. In July 2015, Assange requested asylum in France but his request was denied by Francois Hollande. For a series of several months, British police forces did guard the Ecuadorian embassy but they never made overt threats or attempts to forcibly remove Assange from his place of refuge.

The Guardian ran a poll this week to gauge popular opinion on the United Nation’s ruling that Julian Assange has been arbitrarily detained–66 percent of Britons polled felt that the UN had made the wrong call. British politicians also fell into this camp–Prime Minister David Cameron said that the only person detaining Assange was “himself” and Secretary of State Philip Hammond rejected the UN decision via Twitter.

The UN may have handed down a ruling from on high, but British law enforcement still has agency over how to proceed with Assange. Assange has called the UN’s decision a victory that is legally binding, but the overwhelmingly negative response from British officials has led Assange to remain within the Ecuadorian embassy for the time being.  Swedish officials have supported the British decision to reject the UN ruling, leaving Assange essentially in the exact same position he was before the UN working group was formed. The UN has claimed that he should be allowed to walk free of the embassy and is even entitled to compensation but it did not specify how and when the UK and Sweden should go about dropping the charges against him and ensuring his reintegration into society.

The UN has effectively asked two governments to abandon a sexual assault case for no better reason than that the defendant is living a life of relative discomfort. Neither of these governments have tortured or committed any form of violence against Assange, they simply want to bring him in for questioning and put him on trial if necessary. Assange’s ruling should not be considered a landmark case because it is not one that will apply to any other situation. If any other criminal sought refuge within an embassy for several years, he would still be asked to undergo questioning and trial after leaving his place of asylum. Assange may have the satisfaction of a UN stamp of approval but the ruling likely has no leg to stand on in a legal setting.

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

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On Saturday, 195 countries managed to reach an unprecedented climate change agreement that intends to unite the international community around the goal of reducing emissions and preventing the most severe consequences of global warming. But despite the agreement, much work remains to be done to meet previously established targets. So was this agreement a success and will it solve climate change?

The short answer to that questions is yes and no–the agreement was in some ways a success, but it won’t solve climate change by itself. Evaluating climate change progress is particularly difficult because there are multiple ways to measure success. Committing all countries to the goal of limiting climate change is a massive step forward that should not be understated, but if you ask climate scientists, it is becoming increasingly unlikely that the world will be able to meet its intent to limit global temperatures to 2°C (3.6°F), above pre-industrial levels.

Let’s first look at what the agreement will require and where some gray areas remain. The legally-binding portion of the agreement mandates that all countries must submit plans to reduce their emissions, consistently monitor their progress, and then regularly report reductions to the international community. The agreement outlines a plan for regular international meetings at which additional measures will be discussed. While that step, by itself, is significant, the agreement has no binding mechanism to compel countries to meet their own standards. Moreover, based on the 185 plans that were submitted before the Paris conference, global warming will most likely continue past the agreed upon goal of 2°C.

If we proceed according to each country’s emissions plans, formally referred to as the intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs), temperatures will rise an estimated 3.5°C, but due to uncertainty in predictions, it could be as much as 4.6°C (Take a look at this graphic from the Climate Interactive for a visual representation). Because counties must track and update their emissions progress, countries could conceivably change their targets to become much more ambitious, making the 2°C goal attainable. But doing so would take a massive amount of political will and would need to happen sooner rather than later. The Climate Interactive refers to that as the “Ratchet Success” scenario. Check out this explanation to see what that would actually entail.

It is appropriate to question whether 2°C is a reasonable goal, as it was created somewhat arbitrarily. But the available evidence suggests that once the earth warms to that point significant changes will occur. Vox’s Brad Plumer has a pretty succinct breakdown:

Critics grumbled that the 2°C limit seemed arbitrary or overly simplistic. But scientists were soon compiling evidence that the risks of global warming became fairly daunting somewhere above the 2°C threshold: rapid sea-level rise, the risk of crop failure, the collapse of coral reefs. And policymakers loved the idea of a simple, easily digestible target. So it stuck.

While the 2°C threshold marks a certain point of no return for some climate-related consequences, scientists argue that significant effects will likely come before the earth warms that much. Generally, predicting the exact temperature at which changes will occur is difficult because rising temperatures could actually accelerate warming even further. Some manifestations of climate change, like permafrost melting, could actually speed up warming, which can be difficult for models to account for. Most models give a range for the potential consequences of warming, but even those may be revised upwards.

While it’s clear that in order to meet the U.N.’s target of 2°C much more needs to be done, that does not render the recent Paris agreement useless. The mere fact that nearly every major country has committed to reducing global warming is a significant achievement. This is particularly true when you look at the history of these talks and how they have failed in the past.

There have been several monumental steps that made the recent Paris deal possible in the first place. An agreement between the two largest CO2 emitters, the United States and China, bridged some of the disagreement between developed and developing countries. China recently announced a plan to let its emissions peak by 2030 and began working on a cap and trade system to do so. The Obama administration created a stringent Clean Power Plan, which aims to reduce electricity sector emissions by 32 percent from 2005 levels by the year 2030, as well as a 26 percent reduction in all emissions before 2025. Moreover, the fact that 185 countries managed to commit concrete plans to reduce their emissions is a remarkable a show of international commitment.

Despite recent progress, there are several key obstacles that remain in the way of a meaningful solution, arguably the most notable of which is the U.S. Congress. While negotiators were working in Paris to hash out a deal, the Republican-led Congress sought to dispel any optimism that might come from the deal. Earlier this month, the Republican party held a, notably symbolic, vote to block President Obama’s clean energy plan. Afer the Paris agreement was reached, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said,

Before his international partners pop the champagne, they should remember that this is an unattainable deal based on a domestic energy plan that is likely illegal, that half the states have sued to halt, and that Congress has already voted to reject.

While the stark disagreement between Republicans and the rest of the world on climate change hasn’t stopped all U.S. attempts to reduce emissions, a comprehensive strategy will need support from Congress. President Obama has largely managed to pursue his clean energy agenda through executive action, but when he leaves office the next president could easily reverse his progress. Another key part of the Paris agreement is the goal to provide $100 billion in climate-related aid to developing countries, yet U.S. funding for that must be approved by Congress. It’s true that the most important parts of the Paris agreement are not legally binding–there is no way to punish a country that does not meet its emissions plan–but that is largely a result of political reality.

So yes, the Paris agreement was a success in the sense that it marks a historic commitment to fight global climate change. The United Nations received climate reductions plans from 185 countries, which will continue to be revised and monitored in an effort to mitigate the negative effects of global warming. But at the same time, it is becoming increasingly clear that we will not meet our established goal to limit warming to 2°C. More to the point, there are several significant barriers to enacting the legislation needed to reduce emissions and transition to clean energy. Perhaps the Paris agreement is accurately a starting point, and if the international community is able to build momentum going forward, pressure could help force necessary change.

Read more: The Paris Climate Change Conference: What Should We Expect?

Kevin Rizzo

Kevin Rizzo is the Crime in America Editor at Law Street Media. An Ohio Native, the George Washington University graduate is a founding member of the company. Contact Kevin at krizzo@LawStreetMedia.com.

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A large international study conducted by the British think tank and policy institute Chatham House has determined that taxing meat wouldn’t cause as much of an uproar as previously believed. The motivations of such a tax would be that it would promote healthier eating, as well as serve as an attempt to combat climate change.

Chatham House’s study surveyed 12 different nations and also conducted focus groups in the U.S., U.K., Brazil, and China. They were attempting to determine how people would react to government policies like higher taxes on meat, as well as cutting subsidies to livestock farmers and introducing more vegetarian meals in public institutions like schools. While they discovered there would be a backlash to these policies in many scenarios–people love their meat–it will most likely be short-lived as long as the rationale for the policies was strong.

This is an important finding, as steps to reduce global consumption of meat may need to be taken soon. The production of livestock is responsible for 15 percent of global emissions–more than the world’s cars, trains, planes, and ships combined. It’s going to get worse, too, as global meat consumption is expected to rise roughly 76 percent over the next 35 years. When countries become richer, they’re more likely to consume more meat. And countries that already consume a lot of meat aren’t really doing so safely. Developed countries eat on average, twice as much meat than what’s considered healthy. Americans are also big offenders–we on average eat roughly three times as much meat as what’s considered healthy. But because of that love of meat, it has traditionally been viewed as a bad move politically to create meat taxes or make it more expensive in any way.

But Chatham House’s research stands in contrast to that hypothesis. Chatham House lead author Laura Wellesley said:

The idea that interventions like this are too politically sensitive and too difficult to implement is unjustified. Our focus groups show people expect governments to lead action on issues that are for the global good. Our research indicates any backlash to unpopular policies would likely be short-lived as long as the rationale for action was strong.

When discussing the possibility of a meat tax, a consistent comparison that’s being made is the evolution of taxation on cigarettes. Once commonplace higher taxes on cigarettes as well as public service campaigns helped decrease the amount of smokers.

While it’s doubtful that we’ll all be taxed on our meat anytime soon, it may be something that’s brought up at the UN Climate Change conference in Paris next week. So, if you’re big meat fan, this may be something to keep an eye on.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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At the end of November, UN delegates will gather in Paris for the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP) and engage in the annual Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Nearly two decades after the Kyoto Conference and 10 years since the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol, the United Nations is still struggling to create a legally binding solution to climate change. As Paris looms, there’s a sense of cautious optimism that this conference may finally promote the action to avert the climate change threat on the horizon. Read on to find out about the major events of the conferences over the last 18 years and the impacts they have made.

What can we expect from this year’s Climate Change Conference?

Why Climate Change Matters to World Leaders

Scientific consensus has concluded that the human production of greenhouse gasses (GHGs) beginning with the industrial revolution have impacted, and are continuing to impact, the global environment. GHGs include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, sulfur hexafluoride, hydrofluorocarbons, and perfluorocarbons.

A 1995 report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that “the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.” In 1997, the Kyoto Conference produced the Kyoto Protocol, which attempted to establish caps on industrialized nations’ carbon emissions. Most European countries agreed to the legally binding treaty, but the U.S. Senate failed to ratify it. In 2001, the Bush administration formally rejected the Kyoto Protocol.

Climate change currently holds a prominent place in the U.S. Intelligence Community’s annual Worldwide Threat Assessment. Global climate change threatens strategic resources, habitable coastal regions, food supplies, promotes the spread of infectious diseases, leads to more extreme weather events, and exacerbates humanitarian crises. The generally accepted figure for average global temperature rise in the last century is 0.8 degrees Celsius and the projected rise in the next century will be an additional 1.2 degrees. However, many scientists fear the temperature rise could be more severe, projecting as much as a 4 degrees Celsius rise from pre-industrial levels by 2100.

Such an increase would reduce the amount of habitable land available, cripple agriculture, and lead to major flooding in coastal regions. Nations previously resistant to the idea of a severe climate change threat are coming around to engage in the international discussion.

History: Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Kyoto (1997)

After the 1995 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that the evidence supports the existence of human-influenced climate change, the United Nations sought to create a treaty to deal with the issue. In 1996, U.S. undersecretary for global affairs Timothy Wirth stated that the Clinton Administration accepted the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and called for legally binding targets for greenhouse gas reductions to be drafted. In 1997, the Conference of the Parties met again, this time adopting the Kyoto Protocol. The conference acknowledged that the majority of the burden to halt climate change fell on the industrialized Annex-I countries (developed countries like the United States, Japan, Russia, and most of Western Europe). Several developing (Annex-B) nations also accepted the stipulations of the Kyoto Protocol.

The Kyoto Protocol introduced mechanisms such as emissions trading, a global fund–to assist developing countries to minimize their emissions–and a monitoring system to measure emissions and ensure compliance. Nations that ratified the agreement had to independently find solutions to cut their emissions. However, the Protocol allowed for flexibility, acknowledging that the cost of reducing emissions varied among countries.

Enforcement of the Protocol was relatively weak, but still present. A nation failing to hit its initial emission reduction target would be required to increase its secondary target by 30 percent and would be barred from the emissions trading program.

Although President Clinton signed the agreement, the Senate refused to ratify the Protocol due to the exemption of countries like China and India, which the protocol classified as developing. Ultimately, the United States feared that the protocol would damage its economic competitiveness.

Bonn (2001)

Early in his presidency, George W. Bush rejected the Kyoto Protocol for the same reasons the 1998 Senate refused to ratify it. The United States also did not participate in the 2001 Climate Change Conference held in Bonn, Germany, choosing to observe.

The previous conference in the Hague in 2000 devolved rapidly into an argument over enforcement policies and political disagreements. The disagreement created between the United States and the European Union eventually caused the talks to be suspended and resumed at a later date. As a result, there were low expectations for the 2001 conference. One of the major remaining issues was the role of carbon sinks in net carbon reduction (championed by the United States) versus direct source reduction (preferred by the E.U.). With the U.S.’s withdrawal in 2001, many feared the Kyoto Protocol would collapse.

The Protocol could only be ratified if agreed upon by nations making up 55 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions from 1990. The United States was responsible for 35 percent of GHG emissions in 1990, so its withdrawal meant that countries such as Russia (17.4 percent) and Japan (8.5 percent) had strengthened negotiating positions. Without either of these two nations, the Protocol would likely collapse.

Despite the high stakes and low expectations, an agreement was reached. The Bonn agreement allowed for nations to use various mechanisms, such as carbon sinks, to achieve their target emissions reduction without necessarily reducing their GHG production. The agreement tackled forest and crop management which had proved significant to negotiation breakdowns at The Hague, allowing for countries to credit land allocations toward their GHG reduction, but included a hard cap to these credits. The success of the negotiations at Bonn set the Kyoto Protocol on the path to international ratification.

Nairobi (2006)

In 2005 in Montreal, Canada the Kyoto Protocol entered into force at the first annual Meeting of the Parties. The Protocol was extended beyond its initial 2012 expiration and set in motion plans to negotiate deeper cuts to GHG emissions. The optimism for the future of the Kyoto Protocol dimmed a little in Nairobi the following year. While certain steps were taken to include developing nations in the Protocol, the negotiations also faced criticism. Observers like BBC corrospondent Richard Black criticized many delegates for failing to effectively discuss cutting emissions for fear of economic costs and competitiveness. This has been a recurring criticism of the global effort to reduce GHG emissions.

In order for countries to pursue solutions based on national interests, they would need to see climate change mechanisms as opportunities to increase economic growth rather than costs. The concern is always that making money, rather than reducing emissions, is the priority for governments at these conferences. The Nairobi conference also raised questions as to whose climate problem the U.N. is solving. The responsibility to reduce emissions lies largely with the wealthy, developed nations while the impact is most strongly felt by poorer, less developed nations.

These concerns eventually led the international community to re-evaluate the Kyoto Protocol and begin new negotiations on emissions cuts, suggesting global emissions would need to see a 50 percent cut in the near future. Work on technology transfer to developing countries was extended but only on a limited basis.

Copenhagen (2009)

Prior to the 2009 Meeting of the Parties, most anticipated that an emissions reduction goal would be agreed upon, as the first commitment period to the Kyoto Protocol was to end in 2012. However, leading up to the conference, world leaders elected to put off the crafting process for a later date. Most of the major negotiations fell short and one of the few takeaways from the Copenhabgen conference was an external agreement between the U.S., China, South Africa, India, and Brazil. This conference is widely considered a failure by those preparing to attend the 2015 Paris Conference.

Because the five-nation agreement was external, it was not considered binding by the U.N. Although it calls for individual nations to track pollution-related goals and allocate funds for developing nations, the agreement failed to produce the long-term goals. Developing nations felt excluded, as did the E.U., while all parties felt the conference itself was sub-optimally organized and run.

Durban (2011)

The Durban conference set in motion the events leading up to the Paris conference of this year. It was agreed that a legally binding deal would be ratified by all countries in 2015 to take effect in 2020. Additionally, the framework for the Green Climate Fund (GFC), which had been established the previous year, was adopted. The GCF would assist poorer countries adapt to the climate change challenges. The president of the conference declared the Durban Meeting of the Parties a success, though scientists warned that more drastic action was needed to avert the 2 degrees Celsius increase predicted for 2050.

What to Expect from Paris

So far, 148 out of 196 countries have met the U.N. deadline to submit emissions reduction plans leading up to the Paris conference. The U.N. argues that if more countries submit these plans, it is more likely that the conference will result in a strong global treaty. India’s plan drew attention by stating that the country would require 2.5 trillion USD to meet its emissions goals. While it is unclear how much of that money India intends to draw from foreign investments, it is clear that it will have to be a significant amount.

As more plans are submitted, temperature predictions have been established and updated. At present, the current projection for global temperature rise is 2.7 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels–an improvement from the earlier projection of 3.1 degrees Celsius.

The IPCC has also elected a new chairman for the first time in 13 years. Hoesung Lee of South Korea will chair the Paris conference. While it is still very early, many have approved of the selection, suggesting he could serve as a link in negotiations between the developed and developing countries.

The Paris conference will be tasked with ratifying a legally binding treaty much like the one produced at Bonn in 2001. While almost all of the U.N. member nations have accepted the reality of human-influenced climate change, there will likely be intense debate over how net emissions ought to be reduced. As always, the weight of economic and competitive costs will weigh on the minds of delegates from developed countries while delegates from developing countries will continue to press for climate change adaptation funds. There is currently a very real sense from the global community that something must be done and a cautious sense of optimism that something will be.

Conclusion

The history of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change is long and messy. While most agree on the necessity for global emissions reduction, there are numerous disagreements over how to do so and who is primarily responsible. Most agree that the primary blame for climate change lies with the developed nations, but there are questions regarding how much these nations should help those that are currently developing. The role of emissions sinks has been contested before and may come up again in Paris. Meanwhile, India, China, and the United States will play major roles in determining the success of the Paris conference, and the ultimate effectiveness of any agreement reached. While the UNFCCC has been successful in reducing global emissions over the last 10 years, there is still much more work to do, and only time will tell if the nations of the world are up to the challenge.

Resources

Primary

UNFCCC: Durban Climate Change Conference

UNFCCC: The Green Climate Fund

UNFCCC: Provisional Agenda for the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties

The White House: President Barrack Obama at UN Climate Change Summit

The White House: President Barrack Obama’s Climate Change Plan 2015

105th Congress: Byrd-Hagel Resolution

Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency: Trends in Global CO2 Emissions 2014 Report

Senate Armed Services Committee: Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community

IPCC: Climate Change 1995 The Science of Climate Change

UNFCCC: The Kyoto Protocol

Additional

BBC: Climate Talks a Tricky Business

NYTimes: Many Goals Remain Unmet in 5 Nations’ Climate Deal

NYTimes: Leaders will Delay Deal on Climate Change

The Guardian: Durban Deal will not Avert Catastrophic Climate Change, says Scientists

Hoesung Lee: The Risk of No Action

BBC: UN Battle Looms over Finance as Nations Submit Climate Plans

BBC: Paris Climate Summit: Don’t Mention Copenhagen

BBC: Why did Copenhagen Fail to Deliver a Climate Deal?

Matthew Vespa: Climate Change 2001: Kyoto at Bonn and Marrakech

Ehsan Masood: United States Backs Climate Panel Findings

BBC: Kyoto: Why Did the US Pull Out?

TedxTalks: Climate Change is Simple: David Roberts

TedxTalks: The Reality of Climate Change: David Puttnam

Samuel Whitesell

Samuel Whitesell is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill having studied History and Peace, War, and Defense. His interests cover international policy, diplomacy, and politics, along with some entertainment/sports. He also writes fiction on the side. Contact Samuel at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Despite passionate and zealous opposition in the Republican-controlled Congress, the Iran deal, negotiated by the P5+1 nations (U.S, China, Russia, France, United Kingdom, and Germany), has survived and will begin to be implemented by the Obama administration. President Obama, having already secured enough Democratic votes in the Senate to sustain what was considered a prospective resolution of disapproval, also managed to garner enough votes to constitute a viable filibuster, which effectively removed the need of a presidential veto. Although the nuclear deal with Iran is perceived by many as being President Obama’s most significant foreign policy achievement, the opposition and debate surrounding the deal has not been toned down but instead magnified as the 2016 presidential candidates have made this deal a key area of debate and discord.

Since the next man or woman to occupy the Oval Office will directly decide whether to comply and continue implementation or derail it, the fate of the deal in the United States is not yet secure in the long term. Arguments for and against the Iran nuclear deal will continue to permeate politics and media from now until election day, and beyond. Read on to learn about the major arguments against the Iran deal and their counter-points–arguments that we’ll be sure to see continued as we move toward 2016.

Iranian Theocracy and Extremism

Argument Against the Deal

For those who oppose the deal, perhaps the biggest objection to entering into this agreement with Iran is the despotic nature of Iran’s regime. Critics of the deal believe that such a regime cannot be dealt with through traditional diplomatic channels. They argue that a country without a democratic grounding, mainly run by religious and ideological extremists who have vowed to destroy the United States and its allies, namely Israel, cannot be trusted and that any agreement is annulled by virtue of the extremism and radicalism of the regime.

Proponents of this view have argued that as a requisite for any deal, the U.S should demand certain concessions that alter the fundamental makeup of the regime. These concessions include the recognition of the right of Israel to exist as a state, or perhaps a change in the perennial “Great Satan” chants, which occur occasionally in Iran and disparage America. Former New York Mayor and presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani agrees with this position, arguing,

You can’t negotiate with a man who is calling for the destruction of the state of Israel, death to Americans…the only thing they understand, because they are insane, really, is the exercise of power.

Ruhollah Khomeini, the first supreme leader of Iran, and a symbol of Iranian theocracy and anti-Americanism.

Counter Argument

The counter argument to this position, which has been put forth by supporters of the deal, is tri-faceted. First, they argue that it is unrealistic and overly demanding to expect Iran to suddenly and abruptly change such core aspects of its government. Anti-Americanism, and to a lesser extent anti-semitism, are political norms in Iran which have been guiding principles since the Islamic revolution in 1979 and have continuously shaped the evolution of the regime. Therefore, such demands would be completely unpalatable for a political elite in Iran.

Secondly, they point out that despotic regimes with interests in direct conflict with our own should not be precluded from diplomatic relations with the U.S for those reasons alone. The U.S has in the past negotiated with the communist Soviet Union, for example, and achieved detente and the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Yet, the Soviet Union was arguably far more tyrannical, anti-American, and actually posed an existential threat to the U.S. Why should the U.S resist negotiating with Iran because of its political make up, if it did negotiate with the USSR?  

Lastly, they argue that these core complaints are in some senses non-threatening and toothless anyways, as Iran is more of a rational state actor than we give it credit for, and that its ideological fervor is subordinated by a recognition of its weakness relative to the United States. Iran surely understands that any attack on Israel or the U.S would provoke a military response that would depose its government and do irreparable harm to the country. Some argue that self preservation is not beyond Iran, and the chants of death to America are perhaps nothing more than political posturing.

Sanction Relief and Economics

Argument Against the Deal 

Another major criticism of the Iran nuclear deal is a natural extension of the previous criticism. Critics argue that if Iran is a theocratic despotic regime then we should expect the money that will flood into Iran upon sanction relief to be allocated to causes that are against our interests and the interests of our allies in the middle east, such as Israel.

Indeed, Iran, according to the U.S State Department, is one of only three countries in the world to sponsor terrorism and clearly pursues destabilizing efforts in the Middle East. According to a 2010 report released by the Pentagon Iran allocates between $100-200 million dollars a year to funding Hezbollah, a subversive terrorist militia based mainly in Lebanon which has caused many problems for the U.S and Israel.

All parties also agree, including the administration, that a sizable amount of the money received through sanctions relief could be channeled towards these terroristic, destabilizing pursuits. If all recognize this is true, then why should we consent to releasing this money to Iran, when we know they will use it to hurt us and some of our closest allies? Presidential contender Senator Ted Cruz argues this quite emphatically, by suggesting the Obama administration will become the world’s number one sponsor of terrorism:

Counter Argument

The counter argument to this objection is also multi-faceted. First, supporters of the deal point out that irrespective of U.S decision making, Iran will get a significant amount of money through sanction relief from the rest of the international community. The rest of the P5+1  will relieve sanctions regardless of what the U.S. does. These countries have have said so publicly to American leaders and as Michael Birnbaum from the Washington Post points out, the global community has already sent delegations. Birnbaum writes,

Congress is still deciding whether to approve the landmark nuclear deal with Iran, but European political and business leaders aren’t waiting for the outcome. Germany got in on the action first, with a government jet touching down at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Airport just five days after the deal was signed. Since then, a representative from every major European power has visited or announced plans to do so.

The global community will not follow suit with American unilateralism when it comes to this Iran deal, and so Iran will receive sanction relief either way, some of which will most likely be channeled to its destabilizing activities. Indeed, in the scenario of an American rejection of the deal, Iran will still receive the influx of money.

A second point that serves to rebut the previous objection is that the current president of Iran, Hassan Rouhani, was elected on a largely domestic economic platform. Therefore it would be unrealistic for the most moderate Iranian president in recent times to simply ignore his promises of economic reform, and not appropriate a good portion of the money coming in to domestic economic causes. President Obama expressed this point clearly in an interview with NPR when he stated the following in reference to the funds:

Their economy has been severely weakened. It would slowly and gradually improve. But a lot of that would have to be devoted to improving the lives of the people inside of Iran.

The final portion of the counter argument touted by supporters has to do with a recent historical juxtaposition of President George H. W. Bush and his son, President George W. Bush. President George H.W Bush conducted what many perceive as being one of the more successful military operations in U.S history: the Gulf War. The Gulf War was a multilateral effort through the United Nations and other great powers which successfully protected the sovereignty of Kuwait against Iraqi expansionism and belligerence under Saddam Hussein. The global community through almost universal consensus defended Kuwait from Iraq, defeating the Iraqi army.

A decade or so later, his son President George W. Bush, took a different approach to Iraq and unilaterally and in defiance to the U.N invaded and deposed the Iraqi regime and Hussein, orchestrating what many consider to be one of the least advisable, and catastrophic foreign policy initiatives since the Vietnam War. With that history in mind, those who disagree with unilaterally subverting the global community when it comes to Iran see that choice as a potential repeat of the mistake of Bush 43. America may not be able to act alone anymore. 

Conclusion

Regardless of which position is taken, the conversation regarding the deal is noteworthy and intriguing in and of itself. There has been little diplomatic or meaningful contact between Iran and the United States since the Islamic revolution, and Iran radically and indelibly pronounced its seemingly permanent departure and defiance to the United States, Europe, and Western civilization. Regardless of what transpires between now and November 2016, when the next president will either uphold or dismantle the agreement,  the United States and the global community are entering a definitive juncture in which a new relationship is forming. 

Resources

Primary

U.S. Department of State: State Sponsors of Terrorism

Additional

Federation of American Scientists: Unclassified Report on Military Power of Iran

NY Daily News: Diplomacy With Iran is Doomed Because Terrorists ‘Only Understand the Exercise of Power,’ says Rudy Giuliani

NPR: Transcript: President Obama’s Full NPR Interview On Iran Nuclear Deal

Washington Post: These European Leaders and Businesses are Rushing to Do Deals with Iran

Bloomberg Business: Iran Gives Weapons to Re-Arm Hezbollah, Pentagon Says

Haaretz: Republicans Continue to Push Against Iran Nuclear Deal Despite Setbacks

PBS Frontline: The Structure of Power in Iran

John Phillips

John Phillips studied political science at the George Washington University. His interest are vast, but pertain mostly to politics, both international and domestic, philosophy, and law. Contact John at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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In January 2011, South Sudan became the newest member of the international community following an overwhelming referendum in favor of secession from Sudan. Despite initial turbulence with its northern neighbor, by the middle of 2013 South Sudan looked ready to transform its wealth of natural resources into prosperity and stability. Then in December 2013, Vice President Riek Machar was forced to flee the capital of Juba following an alleged coup against President Salva Kiir. The violence has since spilled out across the country, killing an estimated 50,000 and displacing nearly two million more. The violence is highlighted by civilian massacres, ethnic violence, and other atrocities, despite seven failed peace attempts. While a recent peace agreement has at least temporarily stopped the violence, many challenges remain for the country. Read on to learn about what is going on in South Sudan’s civil war and the international peace process accompanying it.

A Brief History of South Sudan (1955-2011)

The history of what is today South Sudan is a long and bloody one, going back as far back as the second half of the 20th century. In 1955, the first Sudanese civil war broke out between the predominantly Muslim-Arab north and the largely Christian-African south. After 17 years of conflict, the fighting was halted in 1972 and the South Sudan Autonomous Region (SSAR) was formed.

Peace lasted until 1983, a couple years after oil was discovered in the south. The war resumed, or depending on who you ask, the Second Sudanese Civil War began. For several years, the North began wearing away at the agreement that created the SSAR. The second conflict emerged after Sudan assumed control of oil-rich land in the South while also imposing a strict version of sharia law. In 1991, in the middle of its conflict with the north, a South Sudan rebel group led by Riek Machar split from the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA). Other groups split from the SPLA, often along ethnic lines, but Machar’s was the most prominent. In total, the second civil war killed nearly two million and displaced another four million between 1983 and 2005.

The conflict was negotiated to a settlement in 2005 by the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a regional group. The settlement included provisions for a referendum on South Sudanese independence to be held in 2011.

The Referendum (January 2011)

In January 2011, the people of the South Sudan Autonomous Region, including refugees and ex-patriots in other countries, voted with 99 percent in favor of secession from the Republic of Sudan. A government was formed with Salva Kiir appointed as the president (representing the majority Dinka population) and Riek Machar as vice president (representing the Nuer population). Resource revenue–largely from the oil reserves located predominantly in South Sudan–were to be split between the Republic of Sudan (North) and South Sudan.

In July 2011, South Sudan was recognized by the international community as an independent state. Despite tension between both countries, direct conflict never broke out. The relatively orderly division of Sudan was hailed as a breakthrough in international conflict resolution.

The Recent Conflict (December 2013-August 2015)

In December of 2013, President Salva Kiir claimed that a coup had occurred from within the royal guard orchestrated by Vice President Riek Machar. Machar, who to this day denies that any coup attempt was made, fled the capital before he could be captured, going to the Upper Nile region to be with the Nuer people. He then waged an increasingly chaotic and violent struggle against Kiir’s government.

Efforts to control the violence faced significant challenges. In January 2014, U.N. peacekeepers were directed to not engage with either side of the conflict, only to protect UNMISS compounds and NGOs. Chief of Public Affairs at the U.N.’s Department of Peacekeeping Operations Kieran Dwyer best summarized the difficulties the peacekeeping and humanitarian groups were having in South Sudan saying, “It’s 11 million people across a country the size of France. How could we promise that we could protect everyone all of the time against everybody?”

The ethnic nature of the conflict has led to civilian massacres and revenge killings, which often perpetuate each other. The fighting, when combined with the climate, has led to starvation among groups of civilians. Additionally, the loose control that both Machar and Kiir exhibited over the groups under them has led to a general lack of organization and chaos. Because Machar represents all the rebel forces for the purposes of negotiation his control has been limited–there were rebel war chiefs and combatants who only had a distant allegiance to him and may have been fighting for different reasons. As a result of the chaos, there have been numerous reports of human rights violations and potential war crimes.

The following video by The VICE Report paints a picture of rebel life near the front lines of this conflict. The video does contain images that are graphic in nature, so viewer discretion is advised.

According to Laia Balcells, a political science professor at Duke University, if two sides of a conflict are close to each other in regards to power, civilian atrocities are more likely to be committed. Additionally, her research on violence against civilians in civil wars suggests that initial instances of violence correlate strongly to future instances of civilian violence. Given the relative parity demonstrated between Machar’s forces and Kiir’s throughout the conflict, the patterns Balcells predict seem to apply. That is to say, South Sudan finds itself in a vicious cycle of violence against non-combatants.

Agreements and Breakdowns

In January 2014, the two sides agreed to a ceasefire negotiated by IGAD. The agreement was initially hailed by the international community, including praise from the UN and the United States. But the deal quickly fell apart within a day of coming into effect as rebels accused the government of continuing the violence. Six additional ceasefires had come into effect only to be violated within days of being signed.

Some experts see these failed cease fires as a sign that the conflict will be prolonged. For example, Barbara Walter, a political science professor at University of California San Diego, hypothesized that civil wars are more likely to re-emerge when they are ended by partition or compromise rather than with a decisive victory for one side. Additionally, shorter wars are more likely to see renewed conflict than longer wars (with longer wars being defined as longer than 4 years). However, crucial to the peace process is that rebel opportunity costs must be increased to deter reenlistment. Opportunity costs in civil wars are often defined roughly by quality of life statistics (e.g. infant mortality rate, quality of education, national/regional GDP, etc.).

In South Sudan, we see a relatively short war combined with repeated peace processes, which attempt to create a compromise between Machar and Kiir. With neither side disarmed and both sides less than happy, war could likely return after each negotiation. This problem, coupled with a population that faces lower and lower opportunity costs to join the rebellion creates a very challenging situation for South Sudan.

The Current Ceasefire (August 2015) and the International Peace Process

In August 2015, both Kiir and Machar signed a new peace deal that includes the demilitarization of major settlements, including the capital Juba. Additionally, the deal calls for Machar to be reinstated as Vice President. While Kiir and Machar seem to be doing their best to uphold the agreement, there already have been accusations of violation of the peace agreement. Even as he was signing the deal, Kiir expressed doubts over the language of the agreement and reservations, which he set aside to avoid sanctions. It should be noted that while the peace is fragile and teetering on a razor’s edge, it is holding.

As recently as September, the U.N. Security Council has attempted to coerce the two sides into upholding the peace with sanctions targeting key figures in the conflict. However, Russia and Angola have blocked these sanctions. Recent efforts include the July sanctioning of six generals, three from each side. However, human rights groups have criticized these sanctions for not effectively targeting higher ranking officials, arguing that the sanctioned individuals had very few assets outside of South Sudan that could be seized.

There are a few possible explanations for a lack of international involvement in this conflict. Stephen Gent, a professor of political science at the University of North Carolina, hypothesized that the international community often suffers from a collective action problem when it comes to intervention. When outside groups have shared beliefs about what should be done to intervene, there’s an incentive to “free ride,” and hope another country is willing to bear the cost of intervention. Gent’s models also predict a lack of international intervention in the case of humanitarian crises (e.g. South Sudan, Darfur).

Meanwhile, the IGAD has attempted to reestablish its influence in negotiating a settlement by bringing in the African Union, United Nations, European Union, and others. The thought has been to present a united international front against the conflict. However, it has failed to gain effective backing given the international community’s general disillusionment with South Sudan.

Conclusion: Is There Hope for South Sudan?

Although South Sudan has managed to initiate a peace agreement, a lot of questions remain for the country. Thre have been several recent ceasefires and all have eventually collapsed. Furthermore, Salva Kiir’s reluctance to sign the agreement is certainly not a good indicator. Given the nature of the agreement and the country’s history, violence may quickly return. If that happens, increasing numbers of individuals will likely be displaced and in danger of starvation. Without centralized command on either side, peace talks will likely continue to fail and the currently negotiated truce appears unlikely to hold without significant intervention from the international community. Barring direct international, military intervention the relative parity between the rebel and government forces could lead to continued civilian massacres.

Resources

BBC: South Sudan Backs Independence – Results

Inter Press Service: U.N. Peacekeepers Overwhelmed in South Sudan

Al Jazeera: South Sudan: Birth of a new Country

CNN: South Sudan, Rebels Reach Cease-Fire after Weeks of Fighting

New York Times: South Sudanese Rebels Accuse Government of Ignoring Day-Old Cease-Fire

Relief Web: 50,000 and not Counting: South Sudan’s War Dead

Voice of America: Russia, Angola Delay UN South Sudan Sanctions

Foreign Policy: South Sudan’s Peace Deal Never Stood a Chance

Sudan Tribune: UNMISS Condemns Violation of South Sudan Peace Agreement

Defense News: US Warns South Sudan Warring Parties on Ceasefire

Enough Project: Sudan: Independence through Civil Wars, 1956-2005

United Nations Security Council: Resolution 2155 (2014)

International Crisis Group: South Sudan: Keeping Faith with the IGAD Peace Process

Stephen E. Gent: Strange Bedfellows: The Strategic Dynamics of Major Power Military Interventions

Laia Balcells: Rivalry and Revenge: Violence Against Civilians in Conventional Civil Wars

Barbara F. Walter: Does Conflict Beget Conflict? Explaining Recurring Civil War

VICE: Saving South Sudan

Samuel Whitesell

Samuel Whitesell is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill having studied History and Peace, War, and Defense. His interests cover international policy, diplomacy, and politics, along with some entertainment/sports. He also writes fiction on the side. Contact Samuel at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post South Sudan’s Continuing Pattern of Reneged Peace Deals appeared first on Law Street.

Praised as a “tremendous step forward” toward meaningful penal reform, the Mandela Rules provide a framework for what is and is not permissible in terms of detention conditions in prisons across the globe. With 10 million people in prisons worldwide, it’s easy to assume that there is a high demand for the humane treatment of prisoners. However, while the Mandela Rules have been commended for their progressive revisions of the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (SMRs) that have been in place since 1955, there is still no guarantee that prisons, domestically or internationally, will improve.

For a document that is supposed to provide governments the guidelines necessary to ensure that basic rights are afforded to prisoners, the Mandela Rules fail to provide incentives to abide by them or a method of accountability for prisons that break them. Furthermore, the lack of widespread discussion on the new rules is shocking, and perhaps telling of the low level of importance that both the public and politicians place on reforming the criminal justice system. Just like under the previous SMRs that the Mandela Rules revised, prisons will continue to cut corners, mistreat prisoners, and break this agreement unless there is more legal pressure and incentives to treat inmates with dignity.

The SMRs have since 1955 acted as the universally acknowledged minimum standards for the detention of prisoners and for the development of correctional laws, policies, and practices. On May 22^nd of this year, however, the United Nations Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice (the Crime Commission) passed a resolution approving the revised standards, named the Mandela Rules after the late South African President Nelson Mandela who was imprisoned for 27 years. These changes were prompted after a review of the SMRs in place concluded that advancements in human rights discourse since 1955 left the SMRs out of date. The Crime Commission identified nine areas for revision, agreeing that the new standards should reflect advances in technology and society.

Rules on health care, LGBT rights, and solitary confinement are the key modifications in the Mandela Rules, but a prison that does not want to be held accountable for treating inmates with dignity can easily dismantle almost all of the updates. One of the most acclaimed aspects of the new rules is that indefinite or prolonged solitary confinement is prohibited. Solitary is defined as confinement of a prisoner for 22 hours or more a day, and prolonged solitary is defined as confinement for fifteen consecutive days. So solitary confinement for fifteen consecutive days is not allowed, but what about fifteen days in confinement, one day out of confinement, and fifteen more days within? The new Rules have so many loopholes and almost no accountability for the “advances” they claim to make in the treatment of prisoners.

The Rules emphasize that prisoners should be protected from torture and inhumane or degrading treatment and punishment. The United Nations will adopt these Rules later this year, though nothing but the potential for an internationally-backed slap on the wrist will prevent prisons from operating under standard minimums. If anything, the Mandela Rules simply say, “Look, we know prisons are bad, and prisoners are being tortured around the world. There’s not much we care to do about that, but here’s some advice that you should follow if you want.”

Yes, state and federal prisons do have their own separate laws in place regarding the treatment of prisoners, but are those laws abided by? The answer, especially in the United States, is a resounding “No.” Even though prison guards are expected to keep inmates safe, there were more than 5.8 million violent crimes self-reported by inmates in 2012. Four percent of the prison population reports being sexually victimized while in prison in the past year, and over half of the incidents involved a prison guard or other staff member. Even though health care is supposed to be afforded to prisoners, 1,300 lawsuits have been filed in the past ten years in Illinois alone against the state because health care in Illinois prisons is so poor that it constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. These are only a few examples of failures of concrete laws that have been breeched, and continue to be broken, in prisons across the country. If the initial SMRs were never fully realized in prisons across the world, what hope do we have that the Mandela Rules, which raise the standards that were never even abided by in the first place, will actually be implemented?

Several sponsors of the new SMRs note the importance of civil society in the success of the Mandela Rules. The American Civil Liberties Union’s David Fathi said, “The Rules are only as good as their implementation.” Fathi expressed that both the public and decision makers must be aware of the rules and see them as a national priority in order for the Mandela Rules to be effective. But what if we live in a society in which the public does not see the humane treatment of prisoners as a national priority? And what if we live in a society in which private groups are swaying lawmakers to extend prison sentences and to create harsher punishments? While the Mandela Rules do offer a sort of cheat sheet for evaluating a state’s prison performance, they do not do anything about the public apathy towards the inhumane treatment of prisoners and they do not erase the negative stigmas that pro-prison lobby groups and lawmakers have instilled in the minds of millions. None of the 2016 U.S. presidential candidates have mentioned the Mandela Rules in their campaigns or expressed a plan to ensure that they are implemented in our prisons. If civil society has a critical role to play in the humane treatment of prisoners, and the current campaign rhetoric by governmental leaders is any indication of what civil society cares about, the outlook for prison progress looks bleak.

How do we ensure that these minimum rules will be followed? While the Mandela Rules do call for a more humane treatment of prisoners, and require a more accepting environment and safer prison standards, which is certainly wonderful, they should not be praised as a revolutionary feat. What would be revolutionary is if the United States and other countries would actually adopt these rules in practice rather than merely going through the motions.

Emily Dalgo

Emily Dalgo is a member of the American University Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow during the Summer of 2015. Contact Emily at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Prisons Won’t Get Better Just Because We’ve Signed Another Document appeared first on Law Street.

Hillary Clinton might have some explaining to do before she can claim the top spot in the Democratic primary. Any pro-Hillary voters who prioritize moral plans for American foreign policy should probably look into the candidate’s past in Haiti. The Pulitzer Center hosted journalist Jonathan M. Katz on Monday night for a discussion about the Clintons’ influence and rather infamous legacy in Haiti and I was fortunate enough to be able to attend. It’s surprising how little the failures and destruction of Bill and Hillary Clinton’s presence in Haiti have been brought up so far. Hopefully by 2016 this topic will be making headlines.

First, some background on the topic: on January 12, 2010, the deadliest natural disaster ever recorded in the hemisphere, a magnitude-7.0 earthquake, devastated Haiti’s southern peninsula and killed 100,000 to 316,000 people. Former President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton led the Haitian reconstruction effort and vowed to help the country “build back better,” so that if another disaster struck, Haiti would be able to respond more quickly and with more efficiency. Hillary described their efforts as a “road test” that would reveal “new approaches to development that could be applied more broadly around the world.”

The Clinton Foundation alone has directed $36 million to Haiti since 2010. Another $55 million has been spent through the Clinton-Bush Haiti Fund, and an additional $500 million has been made in commitments through the Clinton Global Initiative’s Haiti Action Network. But what does Haiti have to show for all of these investments? Not much, according to Katz. “Haiti and its people are not in a better position now from when the earthquake struck,” he said. The hundreds of millions of dollars and the years of reconstruction efforts have yielded negligible results. For a project so expansive, Hillary has kept relatively quiet about Haiti thus far in her campaign. Her spokesman declined to comment on how Haiti has shaped her foreign policy, saying Hillary would address that “when the time comes to do so.”

Hillary’s big plan for how she would “rebuild” Haiti in the wake of desolation was characteristically American: through business. With big corporate plans on the horizon, Bill and Hillary became exceedingly familiar faces in Haiti leading up to the 2011 presidential elections. It’s not surprising that the candidate who vowed to make Haiti “open for business” was ultimately the victor. Former Haitian pop star Michel Martelly eventually won the race, after Hillary salvaged his candidacy when he was eliminated as the number 3 candidate by convincing the parties to accept him back into the race. Katz said that this vote was fraudulent. Martelly, a businessman and strong proponent of foreign investment in Haiti, was “attractive” to the State Department, Katz noted. He very much had a “Clinton view of Haiti and a Clinton view of the world.”

That’s how Caracol Industrial Park, a 600-acre garment factory geared toward making clothes for export to the U.S., was born in 2012. Bill lobbied the U.S. Congress to eliminate tariffs on textiles sewn in Haiti, and the couple pledged that through Caracol Park, Haitian-based producers would have comparative advantages that would balance the country’s low productivity, provide the U.S. with cheap textiles, and put money in Haitians’ pockets. The State Department promised that the park would create 60,000 jobs within five years of its opening, and Bill declared that 100,000 jobs would be created “in short order.” But Caracol currently employs just 5,479 people full time. “The entire concept of building the Haitian economy through these low-wage jobs is kind of faulty,” Katz stated on Monday. Furthermore, working conditions in the park are decent, but far from what should be considered acceptable.

Not only did Caracol miss the mark on job creation, but it also took jobs away from indigenous farmers. Caracol was built on fertile farmland, which Haiti doesn’t have much of to begin with. According to Katz, Haitian farmers feel that they have been taken advantage of, their land taken away from them, and that they have not been compensated fairly. Hundreds of families have been forced off the land to make room for Caracol. The Clintons led the aggressive push to make garment factories to better Haiti’s economy, but what it really created was wealth for foreign companies. This trend was echoed when the Clintons helped launch a Marriott hotel in the capital, which has really only benefited wealthy foreigners and the Haitian elite.

Mark D’Sa, Senior Advisor for Industrial Development in Haiti at the U.S. Department of State, said that many of the Clintons’ promises remain unfulfilled and many more projects are “half-baked.” Haiti remains the most economically depressed country on the continent. If Hillary wins in 2016, U.S. policy geared toward Haiti will undoubtedly expand, meaning even more money will be funneled to the Caribbean nation to fund the Clintons’ projects, for better or for worse. According to Katz, the truth is that we don’t actually know how much money has been thrown into the Caribbean country to “rebuild” it, and that with economic growth stalling and the country’s politics heading for a shutdown, internal strife seems imminent.

The introduction of accountability for the foreign aid industry is the most important change that can be made, according to Katz. Humanitarian aid does nothing positive or productive if there are not institutions in place, managed by individuals who actually live in these countries, to oversee that aid is serving rather than hurting the people it is supposed to “help.” Hillary Clinton’s efforts in Haiti have fueled political corruption, destroyed arable farmland, and have forced hundreds of families to leave their homes and their jobs to make room for a factory that has not given even a fraction of the amount to Haiti as it has taken. If the introduction of accountability is the way to go, then we first need to start talking. So Hillary, what do you have to say about Haiti?

Emily Dalgo

Emily Dalgo is a member of the American University Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow during the Summer of 2015. Contact Emily at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Why U.S. Foreign Policy Isn’t Ready for Hillary appeared first on Law Street.

A shocking Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) report recently obtained by the Associated Press revealed that United Nations (U.N.) peacekeepers in Haiti had “transactional sex” with hundreds of poor local women. According to the report, a third of the alleged sexual abuses reported involved individuals younger than 18. OIOS’s in-depth analysis and a history of past U.N. misconduct demonstrate a pressing need to reevaluate current peacekeeping policy.

Earlier this year, reports surfaced that between December 2013 and June 2014 French peacekeeping soldiers made local children in the Central African Republic (CAR) commit sex acts as entertainment. However, this was hardly the first reported incident of sexual misconduct.

In 1999, former U.N. International Police Force monitor Kathryn Bolkovac reported that U.N. officials were involved in the Bosnian sex trafficking industry. “[Bolkovac] discovered numerous individuals in the Bosnian and U.N. police (which was made up of some 1,800 officers from 45 countries) who were not only using trafficked prostitutes but were on the traffickers’ pay-roll,” the Telegraph reported.

A few years prior, a 1994 study authored by former First Lady of Mozambique Graça Machel found that the arrival of peacekeeping troops actually correlated with a “rapid rise” in child prostitution in six out of 12 country studies on sexual exploitation of children in situations of armed conflict.

It is clear that there has been systematic sexual abuse of local women by U.N. peacekeepers for quite some time now. Nevertheless, U.N. peacekeepers rarely get convicted for their atrocities. U.N. personnel are protected by diplomatic immunity, meaning they can’t be prosecuted in their mission country. Compounding the issue is that home governments have little incentive to publicize their troops’ bad behavior.

Some efforts to rectify the situation have already taken place. In response to Bolkovac’s revelations, the U.N. established a conduct and discipline unit in 2007. Susan Malcorra, who heads the unit, told the Telegraph that the U.N. can waive immunity whenever necessary. The U.N. regularly kicks officials off their missions and hands the investigation and punishment over to the member state, she said. On the U.N. Conduct and Discipline Unit’s website, Secretary Ban Ki-moon asserts that the organization is taking this problem seriously, writing:

Let me be clear: the United Nations, and I personally, are profoundly committed to a zero-tolerance policy against sexual exploitation or abuse by our own personnel. This means zero complacency. When we receive credible allegations, we ensure that they are looked into fully. It means zero impunity.

The recent report on abuses in Haiti did not find issue with U.N. policy. Rather, it found issue with “significant underreporting,” characterizing assistance to victims as “severely deficient.” To remedy the situation, the U.N. needs to increase oversight. One option is to require at least one member of the conduct and discipline unit, whose sole job would be to evaluate the conduct of U.N. officials, to be present at each peacekeeping site at all times.

Maintaining integrity is imperative. The unit must screen its employees rigorously to ensure that they are not the same officials who are causing problems and regularly rotate employees to different peacekeeping sites to minimize the possibility of collusion with peacekeepers. Periodic assessments of both peacekeeping officials and conduct and disipline unit employees is a must.

As human rights activist Gita Saghal asserts, “the issue with the U.N. is that peacekeeping operations unfortunately seem to be doing the same thing that other militaries do. Even the guardians have to be guarded.” Perhaps then the organization meant to uphold human rights will stop doing the exact opposite.

Hyunjae Ham

Hyunjae Ham is a member of the University of Maryland Class of 2015 and a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Hyunjae at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post United Nations Peacekeepers Aiding Sex Traffickers? appeared first on Law Street.

Mental illness is something that the American justice system has been dealing with for decades; particularly how to handle suspects suffering from it, how to determine who is mentally ill, and what are the best practices for apprehending, sentencing, and holding those people.

Mental illnesses are defined medically as “disorders that affect your mood, thinking, and behavior. Examples of mental illness include depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorders, and addictive behaviors.” There’s no easy way to define a mental illness, and certain diseases don’t affect everyone in the same ways. That ambiguity is where many problems stem from–how should police deal with those who have mental illnesses?

Accusations of Police Brutality Against the Mentally Ill

The United Nations

The United States had to stand before the United Nations in Geneva last week to defend its human rights record. While this is a routine endeavor, it is still something that reflects badly upon the country and its leaders. There were a lot of topics to cover, but the most prevalent was police brutality. A staggering 120 countries were there to offer recommendations, making it one of the best-attended hearings in the history of the UN, and each country was given 65 seconds to speak. Countries from every corner of the globe stressed that police brutality and discrimination has to end. One of the main things that the discussions centered upon was the way that police officers treat mentally ill suspects.

Human Rights Watch Report

That wasn’t the end of the criticism over the way that the United States treats people with mental illnesses in the justice system. Also last week, Human Rights Watch produced a report that chronicled the daily lives of mentally ill inmates in America’s prisons, showing that the issues in the justice system extend far beyond police brutality. The report, coming in at a staggering 127 pages, is packed with stories of neglect, abuse, improper medical care, corporal punishment, and unnecessary solitary confinement.

Some of the stories reported were particularly troubling. There is one incident about a man with schizophrenia who lunged for a police officer. As punishment, they strapped him to a chair, put a mask over his face, and sprayed pepper spray directly into his face under the mask. There are stories of many inmates who were found dead or unconscious laying in pools of their own urine, vomit, blood, and feces.

One of the most harrowing stories is what happened to 50-year-old Darren Rainey, who, according to the report, had a “diagnosis of schizophrenia, [and] was housed in the inpatient mental health unit at Florida’s Dade Correctional Institution while serving two years on a cocaine charge.” His mental health caused him, at times, to smear feces on himself. The correctional officers would then have to transport him to the showers and help him clean up. The report alleges that the officers took Rainey to a broken shower that could be turned to scalding. He could not control the water nor leave the shower as the police closed the door. He stayed in the scalding shower for nearly two hours. When the police finally opened the door, they found him unresponsive and without a pulse. When they moved him, it was discovered that “he had burns over 90 percent of his body, and his skin was hot/warm to the touch and slipped off when touched.” There has not yet been a medical report on his death and the police investigation is ongoing.

The Treatment Advocacy Center estimates that there are about 360,000 prisoners in 5,100 American jails and prisons with serious mental illnesses–particularly schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and severe depression. That statistic has caused many people to wonder what exactly are the “rules” that the police have to follow when dealing with the mentally ill?

Should the mentally ill even be incarcerated?

There have been many discussions about exactly what rights a person with a mental illness has when he is arrested. Of course, there should be differences depending on the type and severity of the mental illness. But as a general rule, most protocols haven’t been broken up that way–instead, there are blanket policies for everyone, and they often deal more with procedures that need to be followed after the arrest. There are many allegations that the police act too harshly when dealing with suspects who have mental illnesses.

Some states have taken their own unique approaches. California, for example, has thoroughly questioned whether or not the Americans with Disabilities Act protects mentally ill suspects from being arrested and brought into the traditional justice system. That notion stems from a situation where a mentally ill woman, Theresa Sheehan, was shot five times after she waved a knife at police officers–police officers who knew she was mentally ill, as she had a history of mental breaks and was in a halfway house. The case was recently investigated by the United States Supreme Court.

In light of that case, Ron Honberg, Director of Policy and Legal Affairs at the National Alliance for Mental Illness (NAMI), said that law enforcement officers “have become first responders to people in psychiatric crisis,” but that “oftentimes, their traditional academy training doesn’t really teach police how to respond to such crisis.”

The Supreme Court found that the police were “immune” in the Sheehan case, stating:

A federal district court sided with the police, ruling that it would be unreasonable to ask officers trying to detain a violent, mentally disabled person to comply with the ADA before protecting themselves and others. But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said a jury should decide whether it was reasonable for the officers to use less confrontational tactics.

Testing and Treatment

So what are the policies once someone who may have a mental illness is actually arrested? If the police arrest someone whom they suspect is mentally ill, they are supposed to have them checked out by a mental health professional, which will typically result in a 24-to-72-hour stay in a mental health facility.

Family members of the mentally ill person can also ask for a police transport to the hospital if that was not an option during the arrest. This is sometimes called a “5150 hold.”

Certain states have stipulations against arrests of the mentally ill. A New York State guide for lawyers explains:

Under Criminal Procedure Law section 730, a judge who has reason to believe that a criminal defendant may be ‘incapacitated’ must order that the defendant undergo a psychiatric examination. ‘Incapacitated’ in this context means that because of mental disease or defect, the defendant is unable to understand the proceedings against him or assist in his own defense. A ‘730 exam,’ as such exams are referred to, can be requested by a defense attorney or an assistant district attorney, or may be ordered upon the judge’s own initiative.

Other states have similar stipulations. Denver has seen 11 deaths in 2015 after police have been called to the site of a mental breakdown–including one where a veteran was wielding scissors. The state is looking at its training and laws, but also considering on-site questions and tests.

The Supreme Court of Michigan recently ruled in a case against police that they used force against a mentally ill inmate:

That the evidence provided by plaintiff, indicating that the police were inadequately trained in dealing with the mentally ill and using impact projectiles, is sufficient to survive summary judgment. Plaintiff’s expert, retired Captain Van Blaircom, who is former chief of police for the City of Bellevue, Washington, testified that the Defendant officers should have known that the manner in which they approached the decedent would escalate the confrontation. According to Van Blaircom, the officer’s treatment of the situation, combined with their statements that a mentally ill person should be treated as any other person, regardless of the situation, indicates that the police department’s training dealing with the mentally ill falls well below the reasonable standard of contemporary care.

Conclusion

Overall, there seems to be some movement toward reform for police brutality against the mentally ill, but there is still a lot of ground to be covered, and covered quickly before anyone else dies. Procedures need to be enacted to ensure that officers deal fairly and effectively with suspects who are dealing with a mental illness. It is only through developing those policies that we can ensure all Americans are treated humanely.

Resources

ABC News: High Court: Police Immune Over Arrest of Mentally Ill Woman

Human Rights Watch: Callous and Cruel

Guardian: Police Shooting of Mentally Ill Woman Reaches US Supreme Court

Mayo Clinic: Mental Illness

Public Agency Training Council: Dealing With the Mentally Ill and Emotionally Disturbed in the Use of Force Context

Urban Institute: The Processing and Treatment of Mentally Ill Persons in the Criminal Justice System

Urban Justice Center’s Mental Health Project: How to Help

Aljazeera America: US Cited for Police Violence, Racism in Scathing UN Review on Human Rights

Coloradoan: Supreme Court to Rule on Arrests of Mentally Ill

Mother Jones: There Are Ten Times More Mentally Ill People Behind Bars Than in State Hospitals

National Alliance on Mental Illness: A Guide to Mental Illness and the Criminal Justice System

National Institute of Corrections: Mental Illness in Corrections

Schizophrenia: How to Help a Mentally Ill Family Member Who Has Been Arrested

Treatment Advocacy Center: More Mentally Ill Persons Are in Jails and Prisons Than Hospitals: A Survey of the States

LA Times: L.A. Police Accused of Excessive Force in Arrest of Mentally Ill Man

Mental Illness Policy Org: Criminalization of Individuals with Severe Psychiatric Disorders

Noel Diem

Law Street contributor Noel Diem is an editor and aspiring author based in Reading, Pennsylvania. She is an alum of Albright College where she studied English and Secondary Education. In her spare time she enjoys traveling, theater, fashion, and literature. Contact Noel at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The United States found itself facing criticism from the international community in regards to concerns about its human rights record this week. The criticisms were levied during the U.S.’s second universal periodic review in front of the United Nations’ Human Rights Council. Listed among the concerns that other nations presented about the U.S.’s human rights record included the American failure to shut down the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay and the prevalence of sexual violence against Native American women. But one of the biggest focal points of the criticism was the culture of police violence and militarization, particularly against young black men, in the United States.

This is no surprise–during the recent flurry of media activity over the protests in Baltimore after the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of the Baltimore police, I came across a Washington Post article that posited “How Western media would cover Baltimore if it happened somewhere else.” While the writer of that piece, Karen Attiah, certainly wasn’t the only one I saw pose that question, I found her take particularly compelling, as she wrote it from the point of view of another nation’s media outlet. Take this passage for example:

Black Americans, a minority ethnic group, are killed by state security forces at a rate higher than the white majority population. Young, black American males are 21 times more likely to be shot by police than white American males.

Sounds pretty bad when it’s phrased like that, doesn’t it?

The point is that if we, as Americans, saw coverage of the racial discrimination and police conduct in this country the way that we see coverage of human rights abuses in other nations, we would be appalled and outraged. Therefore, it was no surprise to me that we received some criticism at the United Nations review.

At the same time, it also didn’t surprise me that the response that many Americans had to the criticism has been less than graceful. The main complaints appear to be twofold–some are upset that we even allowed ourselves to be reviewed by the UNHRC, calling it “farcical.” In a very similar vein, there are complaints that during the United States’ presentation in front of the council, the Obama administration even admitted to having to work on some of the aforementioned issues. There was also anger over which nations criticized us, countries including Iran, Cuba, Pakistan, and Russia. Critics of the review have been very quick to point out that those nations have very long histories of horrible human rights abuses themselves.

That’s completely true. Human rights abuses in Iran, Cuba, Pakistan, and Russia, among many other nations, are apparent, horrendous, and deserve high levels of criticism and attention. But I don’t quite get how that fact invalidates concerns about human rights abuses in the United States. Two wrongs don’t make a right–just because another nation is committing a wrong, our wrong isn’t suddenly rendered right.

Moreover, what happened to being a good example? How can we demand that other nations be accountable for their human rights abuses when we can’t even talk about ours in an open forum with humility and respect? It’s not easy to admit that there’s a problem in this country when it comes to racism and police violence. But criticizing other countries for pointing it out certainly won’t do anything to fix it. Instead, we need to work together as a nation to combat these systemic problems, and become the very role model we purport to be.

—

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post United Nations Criticizes U.S. Over These Human Rights Issues appeared first on Law Street.

Since 1949, China and Taiwan have been considered by various parties either part of a single nation or two distinct countries. In this confusing existing dynamic, Washington has often acted as a go between. The United States has mainly balanced the two actors by maintaining its military dominance and deterring Beijing, while simultaneously boosting Taipei’s defense capabilities. Read on to learn about the history between China and Taiwan, the conflict that separates them, the United States’ role, and the current status.

Origin of the Conflict

It all started with two political parties and one civil war.

Chiang Kai-Shek was the leader of the Kuomintang (KMT) party of Chinese Nationalists. In 1927, he led an exploration to the north of China in the hope of dismantling the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The nationalist KMT almost defeated the CCP altogether, but ten years later Japan, desiring more power leading up to World War II, derailed KMT forces and completely disrupted the Chinese civil war. Japan was fighting both the KMT and the CCP, but the KMT took harder hits.

Upon Japan’s loss in WWII, the United States forced Japan to surrender Chinese land back to the KMT, including the island Japan had taken over. It was called Fermosa, and is the land that later became Taiwan.

Even with the support of the U.S. post-World War II, the KMT had suffered too many casualties against Japan. Using grassroots support, rising leader Mao Zedong strengthened communist ideologies, recruited soldiers from the countryside, and formed the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Eventually with the rallied forces, the CCP took the KMT capital of Nanjing. Finally KMT leadership fled to Taiwan in 1949 and founded the Republic of China (ROC), or Taiwan.

With the KMT off the mainland, Mao Zedong declared the People’s Republic of China (PRC), naming Beijing the capital. Still led by Chiang Kai Shek, the KMT declared Taipei its capital, but still held its claim to mainland China.

The Taiwan Strait Crises and Major Developments

In 1955 when the first Taiwan Strait Crisis took place, the United States sent troops to the strait because it was against the mainland Chinese communist regime taking over Taiwan.

The U.S respected the ROC because of its similarities with the U.S. political regime. At the time, ROC was represented at the United Nations and had a permanent seat on the Security Council. It was during this time that Congress agreed the U.S should provide Taiwan defense and support if Taiwan-China relations ever erupted violently.

But tensions remained high between Taiwain and mainland China. The two groups even came to an arrangement in which they would bomb each other’s garrisons on alternate dates. This continued for 20 years until the United States assisted in creating more normalized relations.

In 1971, the PRC procured the “China” seat at the United Nations through rallied power, replacing Taiwan. The United States declared that it “acknowledges that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China,” in what is known as the Shanghai Communiqué of 1972. In the communiqué, finding language that both mainland China and the U.S. could accept was crucial to establishing diplomatic relations. The United States agreed that it would henceforth have only “unofficial” relations with Taiwan.

This left the United States with a problem–many believed that the U.S., as the guarantor of peace in Asia, had a moral obligation to provide some protection to Taiwan. To remedy this, Congress in March 1979 passed the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA). The TRA declared that it is U.S. policy “to maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people of Taiwan.” The TRA also mandated that the United States would sell Taiwan defense items “in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.”

In a subsequent 1982 communiqué, the United States said it intended “gradually to reduce its sale of arms to Taiwan.” The Reagan Administration conveyed to Taiwan “The Six Assurances.” The six assurances were that the United States,

1. Had not set a date for ending arms sales to Taiwan;
2. Had not agreed to consult with Beijing prior to making arms sales to Taiwan;
3. Would not play a mediation role between Taipei and Beijing;
4. Had not agreed to revise the Taiwan Relations Act;
5. Had not altered its position regarding sovereignty of Taiwan; and,
6. Would not exert pressure on Taiwan to negotiate with the PRC.

Washington continues to sell arms to Taiwan over strenuous Chinese objections, and both Washington and Beijing continue to plan for the possibility that they could one day find themselves involved in a military confrontation over Taiwan’s fate.

Current Status of the Conflict

China has repeatedly threatened to invade Taiwan if the island declares independence, encouraging Taiwan to keep improving its forces and conducting regular military drills. To simulate a Chinese air attack, Taiwan’s navy launched its premier surface-to-air missile from the deck of a warship very recently, its first test of the weapon in six years, destroying a drone.

Another point of contention comes from the fact that Taiwan wants a larger role in international organizations exclusively held for nations. Since Taiwan is not its own nation, compromises have sometimes been made to include Taiwanese leaders. Taiwan wants a bigger U.N. role–it lost its seat when the body recognized China in 1971. China was opposed to the U.S. idea that Taiwan be invited to the International Civil Aviation Organization Assembly as an observer; and suggested that Taiwan participate as a guest. That was a great example of a compromise, and a move toward peace.

Currently, China is setting up an organization with a similar format to the World Bank, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. Taiwan requested membership, but the Chinese government will only allow membership under a different name–Chinese Taipei. This is another perfect example of the redundancy and tedious diplomatic ties between China and Taiwan.

Society and Culture in Taiwan 

One of the major changes affecting the balance between China and Taiwan has been the empowerment of the Taiwanese identity. Previously, Taiwanese people considered themselves both Taiwanese and Chinese, but people are starting to exclusively claim Taiwanese as their ethnicity. This is a problem for China, because that means fewer people are in support of Taiwan’s relationship with the mainland. Although many policymakers propose a joint or unified government between mainland China and Taiwan, this is threatened by the development of the Taiwanese identity.

Prospects for Future

America’s sale of arms to Taiwan often triggers a cyclical reaction: Washington and Beijing consistently fight back and forth over these sales before business returns to normal. This approach has worked reasonably well for more than 30 years, despite the occasional flare up in the strait, and has created an expectation that it will continue to be followed. However, there are some concerns about the sustainability of this relationship. China is steadily building up its military, and soon the U.S. may have a harder time matching the sophistication of weapons it sells to Taiwan. China’s ability to retaliate against the United States for arms sales to Taiwan is increasing. So, things may change soon, but for now the status quo appears to be holding relatively strong.

Conclusion

Ultimately the United States’ main interest in the Chinese-Taiwanese relationship appears to be peacekeeping, not peacemaking. In the present dynamic, Washington is a stabilizer, emboldening cross-strait interchange, warning both sides that it will counter any unilateral actions that may risk peace, and deterring Beijing by providing its military predominance, while supporting Taiwan’s security forces. In this complicated three-party relationship, none of that seems likely to change anytime soon.

Resources

Primary

Congressional Research Service: China/Taiwan: Evolution of the “One China” Policy—Key Statements from Washington, Beijing, and Taipei

Congressional Research Service: Democratic Reforms in Taiwan: Issues For Congress

Congressional Research Service: U.S.-Taiwan Relationship: Overview of Policy Issues

Additional

Carnegie Endowment For Peace: China, Taiwan, U.S.: Status Quo Challenged

George Washington University: Balancing Acts: The U.S. Rebalance and Asia-Pacific Stability

Council on Foreign Relations: If Taiwan Declares Independence and China Reacts With Force, on Whom Should the U.S. Lean Harder, China or Taiwan?

BBC News: Taiwan Rejected From China-Led Asia Bank ‘Due to Name’

Brookings Institution: Thoughts on the Taiwan Relations Act 

CSIS: Taiwan’s Quest for Greater Participation in the International Community

Jasmine Shelton

Jasmine Shelton is an American University Alumna, Alabamian at heart, and Washington D.C. city girl for now. She loves hiking, second-hand clothes, and flying far away. Contact Jasmine at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Another day, another Uber controversy. It seems like the popular ride-sharing app will never see the end of its legal struggles. Some of the buzz is positive–Uber recently announced that it’s expanding and beefing up safety features. However, other recent headlines about the company cannot be considered anything but incredibly negative. For example, yet another rape accusation has come to light. Overall, as Uber continues to grow, so do safety concerns, and seemingly, safety features.

Read More: Uber Will Have a Rough Ride in 2015

A Philadelphia woman has come forward with allegations that she was raped by her Uber driver on February 6, and then essentially held captive in the car while he drove around for two hours following the assault. While she evidently brought the claims to the police, Uber claims that it didn’t learn about it until much later. A rep for the company told Philadelphia Magazine, who broke the story:

Our thoughts and prayers are with our rider. Upon learning of the incident, we immediately reached out to the Philadelphia Police Department to assist in their investigation and support their efforts in any way we can. As the investigation continues, the driver’s access to the Uber platform has been suspended.

New controversies for Uber aren’t just popping up here in the states. Two Uber drivers in Ottawa, Canada, recently pleaded guilty to operating unlicensed taxis. There have also been very high profile sexual assault allegations in France and India.

It’s in response to all of these developments, as well as others like them in the past and potential for more in the future, that Uber is launching new programs and initiatives focusing on safety. The additions to Uber’s safety measures will include things like incident response teams to investigate anything that may happen over the course of an Uber ride, and further review of things like quality assurance. The company will also expand its work with law enforcement, including in India where there will be a button programmed into the Uber app allowing riders to directly call law enforcement.

While some of these features seem promising, Uber still sometimes struggles to follow through, as evidenced by the United Nations Women’s partnership debacle from a few weeks back.

Read More: Uber’s New hiring Initiative: Trying to Win Back Women

Uber and UN Women announced a plan to work together to create jobs for female drivers and released a jointly signed letter on Uber’s website. However, after some backlash and safety concerns, UN Women pulled out of the agreement. Some of that backlash included a statement from the International Transport Workers Federation, which stated:

The creation of one million precarious, informal jobs will not contribute to women’s economic empowerment and represents exactly the type of structural inequality within the labor market that the women’s movement has been fighting for decades. Uber’s practices are defined by an aggressive informalization of an industry that was already deregulated three decades ago

It’s clear that Uber wants to make changes, but it’s certainly struggled to do so in the past. Perhaps it’s a side effect of being a young company that experienced a lot of growth very quickly, or just inherent to the nature of a business as informal as ridesharing. Either way, Uber needs to reform–and let’s hope that it sticks this time.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Uber Adds More Safety Features, But Will They Be Enough? appeared first on Law Street.

The disasters involving the cruise ship Costa Concordia in 2012 and the ferries Norman Atlantic and Sewol in 2014 all have one thing in common: they were recent sea disasters in which lives were lost. While the Costa Concordia and the Sewol disasters were caused by human error and the Norman Atlantic is still under review, there is one question that’s looked at very closely anytime a disaster happens on the high seas: was the ship in full compliance with the  Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS)? Read on to learn a basic understanding of SOLAS, what led to its creation, and what else exists in terms of safety for cruise passengers.

What is SOLAS?

SOLAS is a comprehensive set of rules that guide all cruise ships, cargo ships, oil tankers, and even the small boats that sit in marinas around the world. This document, which has been used for more than 100 years in a few different versions, has been generally regarded as the most important of all international treaties concerning the safety of merchant ships; however, SOLAS in its current state is actually a fairly recent product, given that it just entered into force in 1980.

What existed before SOLAS?

Before SOLAS was conceived, nations had rulemaking bodies pertaining to the high seas, though each nation operated independently of others. One of the better known lawmaking bodies was the British Board of Trade. It maintained standards for British shipping with legal updates until the last decade of the nineteenth century. While the technology had improved and the ships had gotten larger, no updating of the rules was undertaken until SOLAS.

The Ill fated R.M.S. Titanic. Image courtesy of Cliff via Flickr

Why the Change?

The main factor in the change to SOLAS was the disaster in which Royal Mail Steamer (RMS) Titanic sank. To explain why it turned into such a disaster, it’s important to know that the British used a very complex set of rules to determine how many lifeboats a ship needed. This formula is as follows: any ship over 10,000 tons must carry 16 lifeboats with a capacity of 5,500 cubic feet of space plus enough rafts and floats to equal 75 percent of the lifeboat capacity. This was based on the assumption that a human being needed ten feet of cubic space.

Now let’s apply this formula to the Titanic. The Titanic weighed in at a massive 46,000 tons, putting her well over the 10,000 ton mark. This meant that to be certified, she needed at least 16 lifeboats. The Titanic was equipped with 16 lifeboats able to carry 65 people each, meaning that she could carry a total of 1,040 people. Titanic’s owner, the White Star Line, showed that they had done better than minimum requirements by adding four collapsible boats, each able to hold 47 people. That gave the Titanic enough space to rescue 1,178 people.

Now let’s take a look at Titanic’s total passenger number. About 700 people survived the sinking, while roughly 1,500 died. That makes a grand total of approximately 2,200 passengers and crew, meaning that even if the rescue boats were filled to capacity, people were going to die. The only way they could have been saved was if another ship was close enough to the Titanic that she could perform a rescue attempt.

That led to the second problem behind the Titanic’s sinking. According to various reports from survivors, they could make out the lights of a ship on the horizon, and data tells us that was correct. That ship was the liner Californian, and she suffered two misfortunes. The first was that her officers misread Titanic’s visual calls and the second was that at 11:30pm, ten minutes before the Titanic hit the iceberg, the Californian’s only wireless operator, shut down the ship’s wireless communications device and went to bed. This meant that the Californian had no clue what was going on with other ships outside of where officers could see from the ship’s bridge.

SOLAS’ Inception

SOLAS was created as a response to issues from the Titanic disaster. The deaths of more than 1,500 passengers and crew raised many questions about the safety standards that were in force at that time. To answer those questions, delegates from Europe and America met to create worldwide standards. The work of these delegates led to the adoption of the first SOLAS convention on January 20, 1914, although it never entered into force due to World War I.

A second edition came out in 1933 in response to a number of ships that were catching on fire. The results lead to some 60 articles on ship construction, lifesaving equipment, fire prevention, and fire fighting, wireless telegraphy equipment, navigation aids, and rules to prevent collisions.

The third, fourth, and current fifth editions were made in response to changes in the shipping industry. The third edition was designed to update the 1933 convention, which had been overtaken by technical developments. The fourth edition was another update, though it also represented a change in leadership. Up until that point, Great Britain had been taking the leading role in the conventions. After this point the creation of SOLAS and all other international sea-related law was put under control of the United Nations through an agency called the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

The current SOLAS regulations were introduced into force in 1980; however, due to the voting process that was implemented with the law, these regulations are more flexible to changes in shipping than any of the previous conventions. It is also predicted that these regulations will not be replaced by newer standards anytime soon, due to a process known as Tacit Acceptance Procedure (TAP).

How does TAP work?

In short TAP works in the following manner: an amendment shall enter into force on a specified date unless, before that date, objections to the amendment are received from an agreed number of parties. To explain this, here is a hypothetical situation. An amendment has been passed using knowledge learned from the Costa Concordia disaster, stating that cruise ships should not get within 70 feet of any shoreline that is not a port, unless in an emergency situation. The member states of the IMO have a designated period of time to state any objections that they have. IMO currently has 170 member nations and a number needed to stop a motion is agreed upon by the member nations. For this example we will say that only 40 need to state an objection in that amount of time. If that number is reached, the amendment does not pass. If only 30 have issues, the amendment becomes law.

So, who do shipping companies answer to?

Despite the IMO making the rules, they have no direct control over the implementation of them. That role falls on the shoulders of the member governments. Most governments do take this role very seriously and do their best to keep their own companies in line; however, there is another method to keeping another nations’ members in check. Member governments can also put pressure on each other by inspecting foreign ships that visit their ports to ensure that they meet IMO standards. If they do not they can be detained until repairs are carried out. This will cost a company more money than if they do it right in the first place.

Is SOLAS the highest standard in the ship industry?

No, the main objective of the SOLAS Convention is to specify minimum standards for the construction, equipment, and operation of ships; member nations are encouraged to go above and beyond these regulations. Though a prime example is not in service today, there is one example from history that illustrates this point. That ship is the ocean liner S.S. United States, pictured below. Entering into Trans-Atlantic service in 1952, the United States, which was formerly owned by the United States Lines, was built to a high standard of fire proofing, which has yet to be surpassed by any ship. Her designer, William Francis Gibbs, was paranoid about the United States catching on fire due to having witnessed or read about several fires on other ships throughout the course of his life. As a result, the United States was made from materials that would not burn and carried no products made from wood except for a fireproof piano and the breadbox, which was far higher a standard than the SOLAS convention laws in place at the time.

The S.S. United States. Image courtesy of Stewart Clamen via Flickr.

Are there other documents that ships have to follow in addition to SOLAS?

The short answer is yes, because in addition to IMO requirements, every ship operates under the maritime laws of a specific country, referred to as the ship’s flag state. For example, the United States does have other documents that American-owned shipping companies are required to follow and are enforced by the United States Coast Guard. The most recent act is the Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act of 2010. This added several new passenger rights laws that help in cases of theft and rape on board ship. The laws, however, do not give any directions for what to do in the event of a ship disaster. Some European  nations, such as the Netherlands, on the other hand, follow the code of laws laid out in Lloyd’s Register. Despite the differences the unique law sets are designed to work with each other to help further safety on board for passengers and crew.

So, what happened to the recent boat disasters?

Costa Concordia

The Costa Concordia was a cruise ship that ran aground on an undersea hazard after sailing too close to the coast of Giglio Island near Italy, causing a gash in her hull and the ship to tip over. The Costa Concordia herself did not suffer from any SOLAS violations, other than the debatable issue of crew training; however, what is clear is that this disaster, which claimed 32 lives, was due to human error on the part of her captain. The video below explains how the Costa Concordia was wrecked.

Sewol

The Sewol was a South Korean Ferry that capsized and sank, taking the lives of 300 people with it. This disaster could have been prevented if the Sewol had not undergone an illegal redesign and was not carrying significantly more cargo than it was designed to accommodate. In addition, the Sewol’s owner skimped on safety features to save money.

Conclusion

SOLAS is a set of laws to help to keep people safe on ships. Through international cooperation these laws are kept up to date and nations are tasked with making sure that everyone is kept safe while traveling on the high seas. While disasters can still happen under these laws–often due to human error–SOLAS seeks to help ensure that there will never be another Titanic disaster situation.

Resources

Primary

IMO: SOLAS

IMO: History of SOLAS

IMO: List of Conventions

US Congress: Cruise Vessel Safety and Security Act of 2010

UN: International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea 

Additional

David Allen Butler: Unsinkable

Titanic Facts: Titanic Lifeboats 

SS United States: Conservancy

Daily Mail: Titanic Needed 50% More Lifeboats

Chris Schultz

Chris Schultz is a Midwestern country boy who is a graduate of Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa and holds a bachelors degree in History. He is interested in learning about the various ocean liners that have sailed the world’s waters along with a variety of other topics. Contact Chris at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Safety on the High Seas: Who Makes the Rules? appeared first on Law Street.

There were a lot of big news stories this year, from the Olympics in early 2014 to the ongoing Sony hack. Read on to learn about the top 15 news stories of 2014.

1. The Winter Olympics: $how Me the $ochi

Image courtesy of Atos via Flickr

The 2014 Olympics were hosted in Sochi, Russia, this winter, and the entire event was marked by controversy after controversy. The Russians were chosen to host the Olympics because of an impressive, expensive bid to the International Olympic Committee (IOC). However, the chaos of the 2014 Games left many wondering whether or not cash should be the deciding factor in the selection process.

2. Malaysian Airplane Crash: Who’s Liable?

Image courtesy of abdallahh via Flickr

In March, the world watched as a Malaysian Airlines flight disappeared, and many families were left devastated. It was a horrifying tragedy, but many were wondering who was to blame for the catastrophe, or more appropriately, who was liable? Given that much is still unknown about the crash, the legal questions are far from being answered.

3. Punishing Donald Sterling Is About to Get a Lot Harder

Image courtesy of Michael via Flickr

Clippers owner Donald Sterling came under fire after an audio recording of him making racist statements came to light. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver levied a notable punishment against Donald Sterling. However, given the unprecedented level of punishment, there were significant legal concerns.

4. An Open Letter to Shailene Woodley: What Every Not-a-Feminist Needs to Hear 

Image courtesy of Red Carpet Report on Mingle Media Tv

One of the most talked about stars of 2014 was Shailene Woodley–she starred in films such as Divergent and The Fault in Our Stars. However, she also made headlines for a less flattering reason–for saying that she wasn’t a feminist. Unfortunately, she had the definition of feminism wrong.

Answer Emma Watson’s Call for Gender Equality

Image courtesy of EyesonFire89 via Flickr

However, another movie starlet, Emma Watson of Harry Potter fame, gave an amazing speech this year about the importance of feminism and equality. Unlike Woodley, her definition of feminism was spot-on, and she made a great appeal.

5. SCOTUS Steps Up Amid Execution Controversy

Image courtesy of [Ken Piorkowski via Flickr]

6. Trigger Warnings Creep Off the Web and Into the Classroom

Image courtesy of OpenClips via Pixabay

Trigger warnings are a common sight on websites, in order to alert readers to content they may find troubling. However, trigger warnings started to make their way off the internet and possibly onto college syllabi. That change has led to concerns that trigger warnings may end up creating optional content in college courses.

7. The Dark Side of the World Cup: Corruption, Bribery, and Civil Unrest

Image courtesy of Amil Delic via Flickr

This summer, the world watched as the 2014 World Cup took place in Brazil. But, much like the 2014 Olympic Games, the World Cup had problems with corruption, lack of organization, and bribing scandals. Not only was the World Cup an interesting look into the the politics of Brazil, but it says a lot about what may happen at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

Oh, and that guy who bit another player: The People vs. Luis Suarez

Image courtesy of [George via Flickr]

8. The Senate Torture Report: Government Infighting Over Release

Image courtesy of Justin Norman via Flickr

The Senate torture report was finally released a few weeks ago, but there was a lot of infighting prior to the release. Major players included the U.S. Senate, particularly the Senate Intelligence Committee, the CIA, and the White House.

9. We Should All be Upset About What’s Going on in Ferguson: Here’s Why

Image courtesy of Elvert Barnes via Flickr

In early August, a young man named Michael Brown was killed in Ferguson, Missouri, by Officer Darren Wilson. The following weeks led to protests over a few different topics, including police militarization, racial profiling, and First Amendment issues.

10. Ebola and America’s Fears

Image courtesy of CDC Global via Flickr

This year, Ebola has killed thousands in Western Africa, particularly in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea. Globalization and international travel led to a case making it to the United States, sparking fear around the nation.

11. Strikes Against ISIS in Syria: Shaky Ground for Obama Administration

Image courtesy of Official US Navy Page via Flickr

The U.S. has been waging war against ISIS since it emerged in Syria and Iraq. Early this fall, the U.S. and some Middle Eastern allies bombed ISIS. Like any international action, the U.S. needed to be able to legally justify their actions, but that may be easier said than done.

12. The Washington Redskins: What’s Next in the Name Debate?

Image courtesy of Keith Allison via Flickr

The Washington D.C. NFL team is called the “Redskins,” a name that has received ire for its offensive origin. Journalists have begun to refer to the team by almost any other name, and this summer the US Patent office cancelled the team’s trademark. Whether or not the name will ever be changed remains to be seen.

13. The CIA: How to Get Away With Torture

Image courtesy of takomabibelot via Flickr

That Senate Intelligence torture report was finally released, and it was a disturbing revelation into the practices of the CIA. However, despite the fact that torture is illegal internationally, it’s doubtful that the U.S. will ever see any legal ramifications.

14. Australian Hostage Situation Ends: A Community Stands Together

Image courtesy of Corey Leopold via Flickr

Earlier this month, there was a horrifying hostage situation in Sydney, Australia. But the aftermath was heartening, as Australians banded together to show the world that the actions of one mad man does not justify discrimination on a wide scale.

Australians School the World on How To Not Be Racist

Image courtesy of Chris Beckett via Flickr

Here’s a further look into the amazing Australian compassion after the Sydney hostage situation. The hashtag #IllRideWithYou was created, in order to provide support for the Australian Muslim community. Citizens of Sydney offered company to Australian Muslims who needed to travel on public transportation without fear of discrimination.

15. Disturbing New Developments in the Continuing Sony Hacking Scandal

Image courtesy of The City Project via Flickr

One of the biggest stories of the end of 2014 was the Sony Hacking scandal, when a hacking group called the Guardians of Peace (GOP) made its way into Sony’s computer system. The story escalated quickly, as the hacking group demanded that a movie called The Interview not be released, or drastic action would be taken.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post ICYMI: Top 15 Top News Stories of 2014 appeared first on Law Street.

People starving or going hungry seems like something out of the past in the United States. After all, aren’t we always telling ourselves how we are the wealthiest and greatest nation on the planet? Although those are certainly debatable points, we are definitely one of the fattest at least, right? Well while the United States is home to immense wealth, happiness, and large waist lines, hunger is still a very real problem here. In fact, one in six people in this country faces hunger every day. That number increases to one in five for children, one in three if the child is black or Latino. The point is that even in the United States, the lone remaining superpower, hunger is still a major issue. Furthermore, if it is a problem here then it is likely a problem everywhere. The question then, is how to solve the crisis? How do we make it, to quote Gone From the Wind, so that, we “never go hungry again?”

Why is there a food shortage?

Production

In looking for the culprit for hunger, naturally it seems wise to look for the root of the problem. However, while it may seem like a no-brainer that hunger is caused by a shortage of food or lack of production, this is actually false. In fact today we already produce enough food to feed everyone on the planet and the amount of food being produced each year actually outpaces population growth as well. Although it is as of yet unclear whether production can keep up with growth indefinitely, right now the amount of food is not the major issue concerning hunger. If the amount of food isn’t the issue, then what is it?

Cost

The answer to that question is several-fold. First as always, cost plays a major role. After all nothing in life is free, especially not lunch. Truthfully though it is not so much a matter of cost as it is a matter of poverty. In fact when it comes to hunger, poverty is inextricably intertwined. Poverty is akin to a disease that weakens the immune system and cost is what is then allowed to spread. While there is clearly enough food to feed the world’s population, it is not equally and appropriately distributed because many groups throughout the world simply cannot afford it.

Along this same vein is the cost of production. While this is certainly less of a problem in the United States with its advanced transportation structure the simple act of harvesting food and transporting it to a market for sale can price out needy people in other regions of the globe.

As a result this can lead to hunger. It can also cause malnutrition, as those unable to afford healthy–or any–food turn to cheaper and less nutritious substitutes. This can further serve as a catch 22 of sorts, as the inferior food makes a person weaker and less healthy and thus less able to find an occupation that could provide nutritious food that would then lead to better health.

Waste

Another major problem is the amount of food wasted. According to the World Food Program, every year one-third of the food that is produced is never consumed and is instead wasted. In addition along with the wasted food are all the wasted resources such as fertilizers and water that go into food production. Thus while enough food is produced to feed seven billion people, it is unlikely there is enough to feed those same seven billion and throw away another third.  The video below provides a more detailed breakdown on yearly waste.

Regional Instability

While waste may be a less apparent reason for hunger, perhaps the most obvious is conflict. Indeed in areas of prolonged and expansive war, hunger is a very serious problem. Not only does the physical destruction from battle destroy valuable farmland, the conflict also forces people off their lands and often into other areas that are already struggling to feed their own people. A real-time example of this is what is currently going on in Syria. With refugees trying to flee the conflict, the means to adequately feed the ever-growing displaced population are fewer and fewer to come by.

Climate Change

Along with cost, waste, and conflict is another growing concern related to hunger–the impact of climate change. According to Worldwatch Institute, climate change could affect many of the agricultural areas that can least afford it such as South and Central Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Middle East. While it may improve the conditions for other needy areas such as East Asia and Latin America, this still greatly increases the chances of malnutrition for the world’s poor. Furthermore it also puts the question of adequate production further into doubt. According to the study, by 2050 there will actually be less food being produced than in 2000. This is especially concerning in that the population by 2050 is expected to grow from approximately seven billion today to nine billion then.  The video below details the dangers of climate change on food production.

Ways to Fix the Problem

Although hunger is an age-old problem and new challenges are rising that exacerbate it, there is still room for hope. That hope comes in the forms of a number of programs aimed at addressing the root causes of hunger and its resulting side effects.

At the grassroots level are programs such as the one initiated by the organization Stop Hunger Now. The approach of this organization is two-fold: first is the actual feeding of hungry children around the world via healthy food packets that are high in nutrition and can improve development, and second are programs aimed at combating poverty, one of the major causes of hunger globally. This includes teaching skills to break the cycle of poverty and educating people on better health practices, which reduces the risk of malnutrition.

Along with private programs are government efforts. In the immediate are programs that address hunger directly, such as those that assist in buying food like SNAP, also commonly known as food stamps. In 2013, one in five households was on food stamps–an all-time high. To help feed all these people the government spent approximately $80 billion in 2013.

There are also government efforts on the global scale as well. One such program conducted by the United States is known as Feed the Future. How this program works is first the federal government selects a number of countries. The next step is the planning phase where the government then tailors programs for each country. Once the planning step is completed, a large investment is made aimed at empowering women, growing high-yield and diverse crops, creating an adequate infrastructure for moving the product once is has grown, and above all else providing an occupation that can help lift people out of poverty.  The video below explains the Feed the Future program in greater detail.

These programs and countless other similar programs are providing a means both to fight hunger at the present and the overall issues underlying it specifically poverty.

Conclusion

In 2000 the United Nations released a set of eight goals it wished to achieve by 2015 known as the Millennial Goals. Number one on the list, eradicate extreme poverty and hunger. This goal was very ambitious, even bordering on unrealistic. Thus by next year hunger and extreme poverty are not likely to be completely done away with.

Nonetheless, the rates of both are greatly reduced. Extreme poverty for example has been cut in half, which as has been alluded to, is essential to ending hunger. Reducing hunger directly has also met with great success, in 2012 and 2013 for instance, 173 million fewer people faced continuous hunger compared with 1990 to 1992. The number of children whose growth has been stunted by poor nutrition has also decreased markedly as well from 40 percent to 25 percent today.

Indeed significant gains have been made in the fight against hunger. While there is still no panacea to end it, all these steps and programs have made more than a dent. Continued efforts to address the main causes will only go further in reducing it; however, to ever completely eradicate it, seismic shifts need to be made in ending problems like inequality, war, and waste. Hunger therefore is not likely to ever be eradicated overnight, instead it will take a continued effort, one hungry mouth at a time.

Resources

Primary 

World Food Program: What Causes Hunger?

United Nations Development Program: Millennial Development Goals

Additional

Do Something: 11 Facts About Hunger in the United States

Freedom from Hunger: World Hunger Facts

Worldwatch Institute: Climate Change Will Worsen Hunger 

Guardian: World Food Day: 10 Myths About Hunger

CBS News; War and Hunger

Stop Hunger Now: Mission and History

CNS News: Record 20% of Households on Food Stamps in 2013

Feed the Future: Approach

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Hunger: An Intractable Problem With a Myriad of Causes appeared first on Law Street.

Recently the United Nations made a series of declarations regarding the validity of climate change, its causes, and necessary measures to mitigate it. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a very large “synthesis report,” a product of analyzing tens of thousands of scientific papers. The report covers all aspects, addressing atmosphere and emissions, oceans and sea level, air temperature, water cycle, and many other components of environmental systems. It goes over the changes to each over the last 150 years or so, and produces conclusions as to what induced those changes. Being that the report ultimately concludes that many of these concerns are products of human activity, it goes beyond being a summary of information and warnings, and provides many recommendations as to what needs to change and what measures ought to be taken to answer these warnings. These thoughts are more succinctly presented in the shorter summary for policymakers.

Among the conclusions therein, the most prevalent is probably the projections for changes in global temperature. If we continue on this course, by the end of the century the temperature could rise from 3.7-4.8 degrees Celsius from what it was before the Industrial Revolution. Since variation in global temperature of one or two degrees can result in radical and violent weather patterns, these numbers could presumably result in catastrophic changes to the climate and Earth. Deniers propose that these projections, and the evidence of rising temperatures in the past several centuries, might not necessarily be the result of human activity but rather an indication of general shifts in the Earth’s climatological patterns. For example, starting in the 1300s AD, many parts of the world–particularly in the Northern Hemisphere–experienced a Little Ice Age. Definite conclusions as to the causes of this phenomenon are still incomplete, but proposals range from general rises and falls within the Earth’s patterns to changes in solar or oceanic behavior.

During the Little Ice Age, temperatures dropped by about 1.5 degrees Celsius. The most notable consequence that resulted was major damage to agriculture and resulting famines. What kinds of consequences could there be for a temperature change of double that in the opposite direction as the IPCC proposes? The lesson that the Little Ice Age teaches us is that regardless of whether climate change is a result of human activity or not, it is clearly real and has dire consequences for human civilization if we are not prepared for it.

Supposing that it is in part due to human activity, the discussion on rising temperatures inevitably leads back to emissions and energy. The point of no return is a 2 degree Celsius increase, according to the report. After this point, damage to the climate and Earth could be irreversible. Governments and industries ought to set emissions standards so as to keep the rise in temperature from passing this marker; however, in order to do so we have less than forty years to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 70 percent, and even further by the end of the century. These are very imposing numbers, and many fear that the existing financial structures cannot accommodate these objectives and the necessary changes to be made. On the other hand some feel that we should be more motivated to pursue these goals, not just because of the impending disasters but because energy-efficient systems are financially advisable.

There are many arguments that the economic infrastructure for renewable energy is already in place, and pursuing those courses is not only environmentally friendly but financially advisable because it would pay for itself in a short amount of time. This report should provide the impetus for making a more wholehearted attempt at transitioning to a substantial degree to these other options.

Carbon emissions go hand in hand with rising temperatures. Courtesy of Kim Seng via Flickr.

It is generally accepted that the Dust Bowl was largely a result of environmentally unfriendly agricultural practices. Did we require over half a century to reach this consensus? This framework can be applied elsewhere, as we consider unnatural elements of “natural disasters.” Hurricane Katrina and Superstorm Sandy have often been named in this debate. A heat wave that hit Europe in 2003 claimed 70,000 lives. As the report suggests, time to act is running out. These concerns are not ones to be dealt with solely by governments and world leaders; the threats of climate change pervade the globe and affect all people. We can all improve the decisions we make and the ways we live our lives, and advocate more vocally for positive change.

Courtesy of Giphy.

Franklin R. Halprin

Franklin R. Halprin holds an MA in History & Environmental Politics from Rutgers University where he studied human-environmental relationships and settlement patterns in the nineteenth century Southwest. His research focuses on the influences of social and cultural factors on the development of environmental policy. Contact Frank at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The UN Validates Climate Change in New Report, Now It’s Up to Us appeared first on Law Street.

The Iranian government executed a woman on Saturday for murdering a man who she said attempted to sexually assault her. After several delays of her execution and despite condemnation from human rights organizations, the Iranian government went forward with hanging Reyhaneh Jabbari.

Jabbari, 26, admitted in 2009 to killing 47-year-old Dr. Morteza Abdolali Sarbandi in self-defense, claiming that he tried to rape her. Sarbandi was killed in 2007, when Jabbari met with him on the pretense that she, an interior designer, would evaluate his office for a renovation, the New York Times reported.

Under Iranian law, Jabbari technically should have been in the clear for killing Sarbandi. As a Slate article explains, the Iranian death penalty doesn’t have to apply in a murder case if the murder was in retaliation to another crime punishable by death, such as rape. Jabbari maintained that she killed Sarbandi after he attempted to rape her. However, the judges are given very broad discretion in interpreting the facts of the case – so broad, in this case, that Jabbari was found guilty.

Beyond the fact that Jabbari’s is technically innocent even if she killed Sarbandi, that shouldn’t even matter considering the circumstances of her admission. Jabbari admitted to the murder “under duress possibly amounting to torture,” U.N. human rights investigator Ahmed Shaheed said in a press release, adding that acts of sexual violence should always be fought, no matter what. Shaheed said that if Jabbari was telling the truth, she was attacked by the Iranian justice system in addition to her assault:

If her allegations are true, Ms. Jabbari may have been doubly victimized; first by her attacker, and then by the judicial system, which is supposed to protect victims of intended and actual sexual and physical assault.

An online petition in March bore more than 240,000 signatures urging Iran not to execute Jabbari. The government then delayed the execution from April until this month. As the new date approached, supporters of Jabbari took to Facebook and Twitter to get attention to stop the execution. The day before the execution,  Amnesty International wrote that Jabbari’s side story wasn’t fairly judged. “Her claims do not appear to have ever been properly investigated,” Amnesty wrote in a blog post.

Iran has one of the highest execution rates in the world. According to an August United Nations report, the country executed at least 852 people, including at least eight who were under the age of 18 at the time of their crimes, during the period from June 2013 to June 2014. The report says Iranians can face the death penalty for “adultery, recidivist alcohol use, drug possession and trafficking” plus “enmity against God,” which is viewed by the Iranian government as when “a person brandishes or points a weapon at members of the public to kill, frighten and coerce them.”

All this might leave some wondering how hard it is not to get executed in Iran. In the larger scheme of things – for the Iranian justice system, that is – Jabbari is just another number.

—

Zaid Shoorbajee (@ZBajee)

Featured Image courtesy of [The Pondering Moose via Flickr]

Zaid Shoorbajee

Zaid Shoorbajee is a an undergraduate student at The George Washington University majoring in journalism and economics. He is from the Washington, D.C. area and likes reading and writing about international affairs, politics, business and technology (especially when they intersect). Contact Zaid at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Reyhaneh Jabbari: Another Victim of Iran’s Harsh Death Penalty appeared first on Law Street.

Standing in the middle of a crushing crowd of people can be quite stressful, but this time it was worth it. The United Nations General Assembly spent the final week of September in session and one of the primary items of concern on its agenda is climate change and the environment, addressed in the form of the Climate Summit on Tuesday, September 23. On September 21, an astounding 400,000 people marched through the streets of Manhattan to vocalize the necessity of addressing climatic and environmental concerns.

In the largest environmental rally in history, activists began lining up earlier than 9:00am at designated locations from 59th street as high as 86th street. They organized under a variety of banners, from environmental organizations, scientists, private citizens, and more. It was under this final group that I started the march. It contained sub groups as well; there were community organizations, college students, and others. I am proud to note that a group representing my alma mater Rutgers University was among the most vocal in the area.

The March, at the steps of the Museum of Natural History. Courtesy of Franklin R. Halprin.

Reminiscent of how a car at the back of a long lineup will probably not make the light when it turns green because everybody hits the gas one at a time, my section of the four-mile long rally did not start marching until 45 minutes after the event was set to begin. It was very exciting once we did begin to move, and a surge of energy rolled through the crowd. However the density of the crowd meant that we moved like an inchworm; the line would stretch and we moved forward a little, but then compacted again and we stood in place for a bit. Eventually the line spread out and the walk became more consistent.

It was still quite slow going though, so eventually I exited the group and walked alongside on the sidewalk. As I was moving faster than the line, I was able to advance through the march and see all the different sections. There was no repetitiveness to the line’s appearance. Each group had its own chants and jingles, instrumental support, and occasional matching t-shirts. A migrant women’s workers rights group even performed a series of dances as they made their way down the street.

A section of the line, dedicated to protecting wildlife. Courtesy of Franklin R. Halprin.

At 12:58pm the march stopped dead in its tracks for a moment of silence in honor of those who have been lost to climate crises. The huge crowd, moving and making noise for an hour and a half, was still and silent with hands to the sky. It was a powerful moment. I’m not sure from which direction it came, but the moment of silence was ended by a wave of shouts that rolled through the entire length of the line. The ultimate call to action had been sounded, and the march resumed with great vigor and enthusiasm.

The moment of silence. Courtesy of Franklin R. Halprin.

Despite the motion and noise, music and megaphones, others took part in the call to action in different ways. Among the most striking was the Earth Vigil, a group sitting silent and meditative at the edge of Central Park. There are many ways for people of diverse backgrounds to express concerns over shared fates.

The Earth Vigil. Courtesy of Franklin R. Halprin.

It is this detail that really struck me throughout the march. The health of the environment and fate of the planet are issues that span every economic class, race, orientation, and geography. The sheer variety of people merging voices over a common cause speaks to the urgency of the challenges we face and the importance of addressing them effectively. Environmental activism has tended to be viewed as an activity of the middle and upper classes who have the wealth and leisure to dedicate their energies to this more abstract set of problems. The Climate March proved otherwise. Every level of society is aware, concerned, and willing to act. Furthermore, every level of society is affected by environmental woes; its consequences are real and tangible, not an abstract, theoretical, “out there” set of problems.

The rally in New York City was the most notable, but other cities throughout the world held their own rallies on this day and throughout the week as well. Twenty-six hundred events in over 150 countries, in fact. This further indicates the global awareness and importance of climate and environment. Before the event began, I had an interesting conversation with a Climate March surveyor of Nigerian origin. He explained how China has been buying up land there for agricultural and mining purposes, inflicting horrific environmental damage in the process. The locals there tend not to understand the consequences, and further are often excited about the Chinese presence in hopes of generating revenue and raising the standard of living. However, as the surveyor detailed, these activities are channeled to benefit the Chinese economy and industry only; locals are left no better off from it. He feels that this and other rallies around the world will help raise awareness of this, among many problems. The key is not just making a loud statement to global leaders, but spreading knowledge to all people.

We should come away from this event with great optimism. It demonstrated that more and more people are aware of these problems, and are willing to act in order to solve them. The people are not willing to continue down this path; society has reached a turning point and a new era of knowledge and responsibility is beginning. Whether that be on an individual, communal, national, or global level, the power to make change is growing.

—

Franklin R. Halprin (@FHalprin) holds an MA in History & Environmental Politics from Rutgers University where he studied human-environmental relationships and settlement patterns in the nineteenth century Southwest. His research focuses on the influences of social and cultural factors on the development of environmental policy. Contact Frank at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Franklin R. Halprin]

Franklin R. Halprin

Franklin R. Halprin holds an MA in History & Environmental Politics from Rutgers University where he studied human-environmental relationships and settlement patterns in the nineteenth century Southwest. His research focuses on the influences of social and cultural factors on the development of environmental policy. Contact Frank at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Climate Change Unites World Community Across All Spectrums appeared first on Law Street.

On Tuesday in a dramatic escalation of the many-sided conflict in Syria, the United States, along with a coalition of Middle Eastern states, showered ISIS strongholds with airstrikes and Tomahawk cruise missiles. Lawmakers, public officials, and pundits have traded arguments over whether the United States has any interest in intervening, whether ISIS poses any threat to United States, and whether the United States has any justification in getting involved in Syria’s three and half year long civil war. In support of the strikes that started on Tuesday, President Obama has invoked several international and domestic legal justifications. Like any justifications for war, however, they aren’t completely solid.

On Tuesday, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power answered the international justification question in a letter to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, saying that the United States has the right to carry out self-defense on behalf of Iraq.

Generally, a country can only use force in the territory of another sovereign country if it is authorized to do so by the U.N. Syria is a sovereign country, and Power’s letter to Secretary General Ban only informs him of the attacks, it doesn’t ask for his permission. However, force can be used against a sovereign country without permission if it’s for the sake of self-defense. The United States is arguing that, although Syria is a sovereign state, it isn’t doing anything to stop or weaken ISIS within its own borders, justifying the United States’ defense-based intervention.

President Obama also has to cover his bases for legal justification domestically. To that end, he told Congress on September 9th that he doesn’t need Congressional permission and that he has the authority to take action. This justification can be found in the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF). That resolution gave the President authority to:

Use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons.

The law is vague and has a wide enough breadth that it has been successfully used by the United States for continued military actions across the world.

The organizations targeted in the wording of the AUMF have generally been Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. While ISIS has its origins in Al-Qaeda and claimed to still be affiliated, Al-Qaeda officially cut ties with ISIS in February, prompting controversy over whether the president actually has the legal authority to target them without Congressional approval. But this week’s strikes didn’t target ISIS alone. The Pentagon announced that the attacks also targeted the Khorasan, a little-known terrorist group that does have connections with Al-Qaeda via Jabhat al-Nusra, another Al-Qaeda offshoot in Syria.

Additionally, an incredibly interesting facet of this conflict is that, despite the fact that Obama has previously said that he wanted to eventually repeal the AUMF, he is using it to justify strikes against ISIS. The Obama Administration’s choice of justifications has prompted questions over the president’s apparent change of heart about practicing restraint in counterterrorism. Historically, however, the expanded offensive isn’t so strange, as Obama has bombed half a dozen other countries in the Middle East and North Africa during his presidency.

Remember that just over a year ago, the United States was having the same debate about getting involved in Syria, except that Obama was then insisting that it was necessary to bomb Syrian President Assad, after his regime killed upwards of 1,400 people in a sarin gas attack. That plan was ditched at the last second when Russia made a deal with Syria to dispose of the country’s chemical weapons. But historically speaking, what Obama’s administration did on Tuesday really isn’t a departure from his foreign policy strategies.

Some Obama critics say that if Obama had gone through with those threats against Assad last year, the United States may not be in this mess with ISIS today. A common theory about how ISIS grew to be so powerful is that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad strategically watched idly by as it clashed other rebel groups, who were trying to oust him and create a democratic government, and took over large swaths of land. He even bombed the rebels as they gained ground against ISIS. He did this, some say, in order to have a legitimate claim to having a terrorist threat in Syria and lure in Western powers to help him, and not the rebels. As it turns out, Assad didn’t need to convince the West to join his side. They are, however, giving him a courteous “heads-up” about bombing his enemies.

While his administration has done its homework and technically managed to justify these new attacks on ISIS, Obama’s words and actions surrounding them don’t scream consistency, either. His backing out of the plan last year to strike Assad in Syria suggests that he may have only been talking about strikes to save face. It suggests that only when words like “Islamist” and “terrorist” are being thrown around is it necessary to take action. And using the AUMF to take those actions suggests that it’s acceptable for the president to change his position on that justification whenever it’s convenient.

Zaid Shoorbajee

Zaid Shoorbajee is a an undergraduate student at The George Washington University majoring in journalism and economics. He is from the Washington, D.C. area and likes reading and writing about international affairs, politics, business and technology (especially when they intersect). Contact Zaid at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Strikes Against ISIS in Syria: Shaky Ground for Obama Administration appeared first on Law Street.

On Sunday September 21, a recently appointed UN ambassador gave a speech on gender equality that received a standing ovation. That ambassador was Emma Watson, the 24-year-old woman most know for playing Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter films. Her topic was feminism and a campaign the UN is launching called “HeForShe,” which Watson will spearhead. You can watch the entire speech below.

Since Sunday, Watson’s speech has gone viral, garnering support both for her cause and for feminism itself. I was especially pleased to see one of my own Facebook friends share the video with the caption: “Worth the watch, for both men and women! Gave me a whole new perspective on the word ‘feminist’.”

Good! That was the point. Watson shares not only the true definition of feminism, but says that thinking of feminists as “man haters” needs to stop. She said that becoming a feminist should be “uncomplicated” and did not narrow her audience to just women. It was a brilliant speech, and completely deserved the standing ovation.

As is to be expected, what with the internet being the internet, she has also received negative feedback. Some users of 4Chan have created a website threatening to reveal sexually explicit pictures of Watson, claiming that they will somehow demean or demolish her feminist views. Rush Limbaugh (who I think should be taken off air immediately) said in his September 23 broadcast: “I know exactly what she’s talking about here, and it’s youth speaking, it’s youthful idealism speaking.  I mean, the truth is every man knows that women run things…That’s been the problem with feminism all along.  Feminism has sought to change basic human nature, and you can’t do that no matter what you do.”

Wow. Thanks for the vote of confidence, Rush!

Other anonymous critics on sites like Reddit, tumblr, and Imgur agree with Watson’s views on feminism but take issue with the name “HeForShe,” arguing that the preposition “for” implies that men will do all the work and women will sit idly by as males react to her call for action. Still others complain that Watson’s celebrity is giving her an unfair advantage on issues like gender equality; that someone less famous or less attractive should have been able to stand up there and give the speech to the same effect.

Each of these arguments stems, I think, from a place of fear. People don’t like change, and with Watson’s speech taking on the momentum it already has, gender equality has made an enormous leap forward. This is threatening to those who are so entrenched in their male-dominated world that they wouldn’t see it change for anything. To those people I say: too damn bad! Society has changed a thousand times over, and it certainly isn’t done.

Let’s address each of these critiques briefly, so I can point out where they have veered off from logic.

Just a few weeks ago, users of 4chan hacked the phones of female celebrities and leaked their nude photographs online. These same people are at it again, thinking that showing feminist, female celebrities as sexual creatures will somehow undermine their feminist message. The short answer is: it won’t. Just because a woman enjoys sex or flaunts her sexuality does not mean she can’t be a feminist. In fact, if a woman is so comfortable in her own skin that nude photos being leaked doesn’t even phase her, that’s a feminist I would hope people idolize.

As for Rush Limbaugh, he is a prime example of a man who sees his male-dominance being threatened and lashes out in any way possible. His claim that “Feminism has sought to change basic human nature” is bullshit. Human nature may be to blame for many of our baser instincts, like seeking out a mate or wanting to procreate, but one gender dominating the other actually comes — most often — from various religions. Ancient, pagan religions favor women above men, and religions like Christianity favor men. Over the years, society took those religious doctrines and accepted them as fact. Oh and losing the “man-hating” connotation that comes from the word “feminism” being “youthful idealism”? Wrong again, Rush. Feminism isn’t just for 24 year olds, and some of gender equality’s most prevalent spokespeople are decades older than Watson.

Next up, the problem with the name “HeForShe,” If you listen to Watson’s entire speech, you’ll hear her call on men AND women multiple times. She wants women to stop being afraid of calling themselves feminists, and for men to accept the title just as willingly. The name, to me, means that, since men are currently the dominant gender, men need to be a driving force behind changing that. It does not mean that women will sit idly by, it means that both genders will work together to achieve equality. As they should.

Finally, Watson’s celebrity makes me thankful she was the one to make that speech. In a perfect world, any man or woman could have made that speech and gotten the same response, but this is not a perfect world. I have said before that celebrities using their fame to support important causes should be admired, not shamed. Waton’s expansive fan base of both men and women made her the perfect person to make that speech, because those fans that truly respect her will hear it, believe it, and share it.

So, as a fan of Emma Watson and of gender equality, I intend to answer her call to action and continue supporting feminism. After you hear it, what will you do?

Morgan McMurray

Morgan McMurray is an editor and gender equality blogger based in Seattle, Washington. A 2013 graduate of Iowa State University, she has a Bachelor of Arts in English, Journalism, and International Studies. She spends her free time writing, reading, teaching dance classes, and binge-watching Netflix. Contact Morgan at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Answer Emma Watson’s Call for Gender Equality appeared first on Law Street.

For the first time in decades, the United Nations has declared four of the world’s humanitarian crises a “Level 3 Emergency,” the highest possible rating the organization can assign. The four on the list are Syria, South Sudan, Central African Republic, and Iraq; Iraq was just added to the list on August 14th. From the Islamic State beheading journalists, to the thousands dying from the Ebola virus in Western Africa, from the thousands of civilians fleeing towns in Iraq, to the million malnourished and displaced in South Sudan, as a world, we are collectively in crisis.

According to Nickolay Mladenov, special representative of the United Nations Secretary General, the “Level 3”  emergency designation facilitates “mobilization of additional resources in goods, funds and assets to ensure a more effective response to the humanitarian needs of populations affected by forced displacement.”

The Inter-Agency Standing Committee, a team of UN and other NGO humanitarians, is responsible for determining the level of crisis. Level 3 is given to countries experiencing civil unrest that causes the displacement or removal of thousands of people. Unlike natural disasters, conflicts put humanitarian workers in the crossfire, making relief efforts that much more difficult.

Iraq became a particular concern after the situation on Sinjar Mountain escalated and thousands of Yazidi families–a particular religious community in Iraq–were trapped on the mountain without water, nourishment or any form of sanitation as ISIS fighters surrounded them. Despite numerous Department of Defense airdrops over a week long period in August, 1.5 million Iraqis are in need of humanitarian help, according to USAID.

USAID estimates that 10.8 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance in Syria; 2.5 million in the Central African Republic, with 900,000 more displaced; and 1.1 million displaced in South Sudan. USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah said:

This is the first time in our agency’s history that we have been called on to manage four large-scale humanitarian responses at once— in addition to reaching other vulnerable populations worldwide and preparing communities ahead of natural disasters.

UNICEF, WFP, UNFPA, UNHCR, CARE USA, World Vision USA, Save the Children, Oxfam America and many other NGOs are currently operating in these four countries. Their contributions have saved thousands from death, and millions of individuals have been helped to get back on their feet. The U.S. government alone has sent more than $2.8 billion in assistance to these four countries; but the battle is nowhere close to being done.

To the 5,000 people who are suffering from the Ebola virus, I feel for you. To my sisters in India, who have no choice but to give contaminated water to their children, I feel for you. To the 5.5 million children affected by the crisis in Syria, I feel for you. To the families in Gaza whose houses have been destroyed, I feel for you. I know my empathy won’t bring your loved ones back, give you a new home, or calm the fear that you have to live with everyday. But I hope my words can reach and inspire my colleagues here in America. I hope my words will make people realize how mundane their issues are compared to those I’ve outlined above. I hope my words can bring us together collectively, so we can finally realize that it isn’t “us and them,” but simply “us.” We are Iraq. We are Syria. We are South Sudan. We are Central African Republic. If they are experiencing a crisis, we are experiencing a crisis. With countries like Gaza, Yemen and the Democratic Republic of Congo on the horizon of reaching a level 3 designation, humanitarian aid is needed now more than ever. We are collectively in crisis, but it doesn’t have to be that way.

Mic Drop

Trevor Smith

Trevor Smith is a homegrown DMVer studying Journalism and Graphic Design at American University. Upon graduating he has hopes to work for the US State Department so that he can travel, learn, and make money at the same time. Contact Trevor at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Collectively In Crisis: The Sad State of World Affairs appeared first on Law Street.

Drones: depending on whom you ask, drones are either the military instruments of the future, or the machines that will incite humanity’s destruction. But no matter how you feel about drones, unmanned aerial vehicles in various forms have been used in combat for years.

The United States may have to answer for their use of drones in the weeks to come. Two United Nations experts by the names of Christof Heyns and Ben Emmerson, have released large UN reports on the overall use of drones. The crux of these reports is a demand for greater transparency from countries who use drones—and for the United States to release more robust data on their use of drones.

According to the United Nations, 33 different drone strikes have been detected that have resulted in the death of civilians. According to the government of Pakistan, since 2004 there have been about 330 drone strikes in the northwest territory of Pakistan. These strikes have supposedly resulted in the deaths of 2200 people, 400 of which have been civilians. Emmerson has stated that in Yemen, up to 58 civilians may have been killed by drones.

In the United States, the CIA is inextricably linked to the use of drones. As a result, much of the information about US drone use is classified.  In his report, Emmerson slams this, stating that it creates, “an almost insurmountable obstacle to transparency.” Emmerson claims that the United States does not accurately self report the civilian casualties caused by drone strikes.

There are serious international law issues tied in with the killing of civilians. International law is a somewhat vague and grey field; although the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice, and various tribunals exist, international law still remains a very abstract idea.

At the risk of over-simplifying a very complicated topic, a brief discussion of international law on the topic of civilian killings can be had. This topic falls under the category of International Humanitarian Law, sometimes referred to by its Latin name jus in bello, used to regulate actions during war. The Geneva Convention amendment Protocol I specifically deals with protections afforded to countries involved in international armed conflicts. The Geneva Convention amendment Protocol I does contain protections for civilians, but the United States has not ratified it.

The United Nation’s implications that US actions may violate international law unfortunately fall on mostly deaf ears. The United States is not going to be brought before a tribunal or a court, at best the United Nations can condemn US drone actions, but there really isn’t any action they can take that will show any sort of teeth. The question of the future of drones and their applicability to conflict, will not be answered with these United Nations reports.

[The Guardian]

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Featured image courtesy of [Don McCullough via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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