Tag: treaties and agreements

Kurdish People Fast Facts | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Here’s a look at Kurdish people. Kurds do not have an official homeland or country. Most reside within countries in the Middle East including northern Iraq, eastern Turkey, western Iran and small portions of northern Syria and Armenia.

Area: Roughly 74,000 sq mi

Population: approximately 25-30 million (some Kurds reside outside of Kurdistan)

Religion: Most are Sunni Muslims; some practice Sufism, a type of mystic Islam

Kurds have never achieved nation-state status, making Kurdistan a non-governmental region and one of the largest stateless nations in the world.

Portions of the region are recognized by two countries: Iran, where the province of Kordestan lies; and northern Iraq, site of the autonomous region known as Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) or Iraqi Kurdistan.

Kurds were mostly nomadic until the end of World War I and the breakup of the Ottoman Empire.

Kurds make up about 10% of the population in Syria, 19% of the population of Turkey, 15-20% of the population of Iraq and are one of the largest ethnic minorities in Iran.

The Peshmerga is a more than 100,000-strong national military force which protects Iraqi Kurdistan, and includes female fighters.

October 30, 1918 – (TURKEY) The Armistice of Mudros marks the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I.

November 3, 1918 – (IRAQ) With the discovery of oil in the Kurdish province of Mosul, British forces occupy the region.

August 10, 1920 – (TURKEY) The Treaty of Sèvres outlines the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, with Turkey renouncing rights over certain areas in Asia and North Africa. It calls for the recognition of new independent states, including an autonomous Kurdistan. It is never ratified.

July 24, 1923 – (TURKEY) The Allies and the former Ottoman Empire sign and ratify the Treaty of Lausanne, which recognizes Turkey as an independent nation. In the final treaty marking the conclusion of World War I, the Allies drop demands for an autonomous Turkish Kurdistan. The Kurdish region is eventually divided among several countries.

1923 – (IRAQ) Former Kurdish Governor Sheikh Mahmud Barzinji stages an uprising against British rule, declaring a Kurdish kingdom in Sulaimaniya in northern Iraq.

1924 – (IRAQ) British Forces retake Sulaimaniya.

1943-1945 – (IRAQ/IRAN) Mustafa Barzani leads an uprising, gaining control of areas of Erbil and Badinan. When the uprising is defeated, Barzani and his forces retreat to Kurdish areas in Iran and align with nationalist fighters under the leadership of Qazi Muhammad.

January 1946 – (IRAN) The Kurdish Republic of Mahābād is established as a Kurdish state, with backing from the Soviet Union. The short-lived country encompasses the city of Mahābād in Iran, which is largely Kurdish and near the Iraq border. However, Soviets withdraw the same year and the Republic of Mahābād collapses.

August 16, 1946 – (IRAQ) The Kurdish Democratic Party of Iraq (KDP) is established.

1957 – (SYRIA) 250 Kurdish children die in an arson attack on a cinema. It is blamed on Arab nationalists.

1958 – (SYRIA) The government formally bans all Kurdish-language publications.

1958 – (IRAQ) After Iraq’s 1958 revolution, a new constitution is established, which declares Arabs and Kurds as “partners in this homeland.”

1961 – (IRAQ) KDP begins a rebellion in northern Iraq. Within two weeks, the Iraqi government dissolves the Kurdish Democratic Party.

March 1970 – (IRAQ) A peace agreement between Iraqi government and Kurds grants the Kurds autonomy. Kurdish is recognized as an official language, and an amendment to the constitution states: “the Iraqi people is made up of two nationalities: the Arab nationality and the Kurdish nationality.”

March 6, 1975 – (ALGERIA) Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi of Iran sign a treaty. Iraq gives up claims to the Shatt-al-Arab waterway, while Iran agrees to end its support of the independence seeking Kurds.

June 1975 – (IRAQ) Former KDP Leader Jalal Talabani, establishes the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). The following year, PUK takes up an armed campaign against the Iraqi government.

1978 – (IRAQ) KDP and PUK forces clash, leaving many dead.

1978 – (TURKEY) Abdullah Öcalan forms the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a Kurdish separatist group.

Late 1970s – (IRAQ) The Baath Party, under Hussein’s leadership, uproots Kurds from areas with Kurdish majorities, and settles southern-Iraqi Arabs into those regions. Into the 1980s, Kurds are forcibly removed from the Iranian border as Kurds are suspected of aiding Iranian forces during the Iran-Iraq War.

1979 – (IRAQ) Mustafa Barzani dies in Washington, DC. His son, Massoud Barzani, is elected president of KDP following his death.

1980 – (IRAQ) The Iran-Iraq War begins. Although the KDP forces work closely with Iran, the PUK does not.

1983 – (IRAQ) PUK agrees to a ceasefire with Iraq and begins negotiations on Kurdish autonomy.

August 1984 – (TURKEY) PKK launches a violent separatist campaign in Turkey, starting with killing two soldiers. The conflict eventually spreads to Iran, Iraq and Syria.

1985 – (IRAQ) The ceasefire between Iraq and PUK breaks down.

1986 – (IRAQ) After an Iranian-sponsored reconciliation, both KDP and PUK receive support from Tehran.

1987 – (TURKEY) Turkey imposes a state of emergency in the southeastern region of the country in response to PKK attacks.

February-August 1988 – (IRAQ) During Operation Anfal (“spoils” in Arabic), created to quell Kurdish resistance, the Iraqi military uses large quantities of chemical weapons on Kurdish civilians. Iraqi forces destroy more than 4,000 villages in Kurdistan. It is believed that some 100,000 Kurds were killed.

March 16, 1988 – (IRAQ) Iraq uses poison gas against the Kurdish people in Halabja in northern Iraq. Thousands of people are believed to have died in the attack.

1990-1991 – (IRAQ) The Gulf War begins when Hussein invades Kuwait, seeking its oil reserves. There is a mass exodus of Kurds out of Iraq as more than a million flee into Turkey and Iran.

February 28, 1991 – (IRAQ) Hussein agrees to a ceasefire, ending the Gulf War.

March 1991 – (IRAQ) Kurdish uprising begins, and in two weeks, the Kurdish militia gains control of Iraqi Kurdistan, including the oil-rich town of Kirkuk. After allied support to the Kurds is denied, Iraq crushes the uprising. Two million Kurds flee, but are forced to hide out in the mountains as Turkey closes its border.

April 1991 – (IRAQ) A safe haven is established in Iraqi Kurdistan by the United States, the United Kingdom and France. Iraqi forces are barred from operating within the region, and Kurds begin autonomous rule, with KDP leading the north and PUK leading the south.

1992 – (IRAQ) In an anti-PKK operation, 20,000 Turkish troops enter Kurdish safe havens in Iraq.

1994-1998 – (IRAQ) PUK and KDP members engage in armed conflict, known as the Fratricide War, in Iraqi Kurdistan.

1995 – (IRAQ) Approximately 35,000 Turkish troops launch an offensive against Kurds in northern Iraq.

1996 – (IRAQ) Iraq launches attacks against Kurdish cities, including Erbil and Kirkuk.

October 8, 1997 – (TURKEY) The United States lists PKK as a terrorist group.

1998 – (IRAQ) The conflict between KDP and PUK ends, and a peace agreement is reached. This is brokered by the United States, and the accord is signed in Washington.

1999 – (TURKEY) PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan is captured in Nairobi, Kenya, by Turkish officials.

2002 – (TURKEY) Under pressure from the European Union, Turkey legalizes broadcasts and education in the Kurdish language. Turkish forces still combat PKK, including military incursions into northern Iraq.

May 2002 – (TURKEY) The European Union designates the PKK as a terrorist organization.

February 1, 2004 – (IRAQ) Two suicide bombs kill more than 50 people in Erbil. The targets are the headquarters of KDP and PUK, and several top Kurdish officials from both parties are killed.

March 2004 – (SYRIA) Nine people are killed at a football (soccer) arena in Qamishli after clashes with riot police. Kurds demonstrate throughout the city, and unrest spreads to nearby towns in the following days, after security forces open fire at the funerals.

June 2004 – (TURKEY) State TV broadcasts Kurdish-language programs for the first time.

April 6-7, 2005 – (IRAQ) Kurdish leader Talabani is selected the country’s president by the transitional national assembly, and is sworn in the next day.

July 2005 – (TURKEY) Six people die from a bomb planted on a train by a Kurdish guerrilla. Turkish officials blame the PKK.

2005 – (IRAQ) The 2005 Iraqi constitution upholds Kurdish autonomy, and designates Kurdistan as an autonomous federal region.

August-September 2006 – (TURKEY) A wave of bomb attacks target a resort area in Turkey, as well as Istanbul. Separatist group Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAC) claims responsibility for most of the attacks and threatens it will turn Turkey into “hell.”

December 2007 – (TURKEY) Turkey launches attacks in Iraqi Kurdistan, targeting PKK outposts.

2009 – (TURKEY) A policy called the Kurdish Initiative increases Kurdish language rights and reduces military presence in the mostly Kurdish southeast.

September 2010 – (IRAN) A bomb detonates during a parade in Mahābād, leaving 12 dead and dozens injured. No group claims responsibility for the attack, but authorities blame Kurdish separatists. In 2014, authorities arrest members of Koumaleh, a Kurdish armed group, for the attack.

April 2011 – (SYRIA) Syria grants citizenship to thousands in the Kurdish region. According to Human Rights Watch, an exceptional census stripped 20% of Kurdish Syrians of their citizenship in 1962.

October 2011 – (SYRIA) Meshaal Tammo, a Syrian Kurdish activist, is assassinated. Many Kurds blame Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime for the assassination.

October 19, 2011 – (TURKEY) Kurdish militants kill 24 Turkish troops near the Iraqi border, a PKK base area.

June 2012 – (TURKEY) Turkish forces strike PKK rebel bases in Iraq after a PKK attack in southern Turkey kills eight Turkish soldiers.

July 2012 – (SYRIA) Amid the country’s civil war, Syrian security forces retreat from several Kurdish towns in the northeastern part of the country.

August 2012 – (TURKEY) Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan warns that any attempts by the PKK to launch cross-border attacks from Syria would be met by force; the Turkish Army then performs a large exercise less than a mile from border villages now controlled by the Syrian Kurdish group Democratic Union Party (PYD).

December 2012 – (TURKEY) Erdogan announces the government has begun peace talks with the PKK.

January 10, 2013 – (FRANCE) Three Kurdish women are found shot dead in Paris, one of whom was a founding member of the PKK.

March 21, 2013 – (TURKEY) Imprisoned PKK founder Abdullah Ocalan calls for dialogue: a letter from him is read in the Turkish Parliament, “We for tens of years gave up our lives for this struggle, we paid a price. We have come to a point at which the guns must be silent and ideas must talk.”

March 25, 2013 – (TURKEY) Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan and Iraqi Kurdistan Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani negotiate a framework deal that includes an outline for a direct pipeline export of oil and gas. The pipeline would have the Kurdish crude oil transported from the Kurdish Regional Government directly into Turkey, allowing the KRG to be a competitive supplier of oil to Turkey.

June 2014 – (IRAQ) Refugees flee fighting and flood into Iraqi Kurdistan to the north as ISIS militants take over Mosul. Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) closes then reopens, with restrictions, border crossings used by those fleeing ISIS.

June 23, 2014 – (IRAQ) Iraqi Kurdistan President Barzani says that “Iraq is obviously falling apart, and it’s obvious that the federal or central government has lost control over everything.”

Early August 2014 – (IRAQ) Reportedly 40,000 Yazidi, a minority group of Kurdish descent, flee to a mountainous region in northwestern Iraq to escape ISIS, after the group storms Sinjar, a town near the Syrian border. Also, 100,000 Christians flee to Erbil, after Kurdish leadership there promises protection in the city.

August 11, 2014 – (IRAQ) Kurdish fighters in Kurdistan, who are called Peshmerga, work with Iraqi armed forces to deliver aid to Yazidis stranded on Mount Sinjar after fleeing ISIS fighters.

August 12, 2014 – (IRAQ) Some Yazidi tell CNN that PKK fighters control parts of the mountain, and have offered food and protection from ISIS.

December 2, 2014 – (IRAQ) The government of Iraq and the government of Iraqi Kurdistan sign an agreement to share oil revenues and military resources. Iraq will now pay the salaries of Peshmerga fighters battling ISIS and act as an intermediary to deliver US weapons to Kurdish forces. The Kurdistan government will deliver more than half a million barrels of oil daily to the Iraqi government. Profits from the sale of the oil will be split between the two governments.

January 26, 2015 – (SYRIA) After 112 days of fighting, the YPG, Kurdish fighters also known as the People’s Protection Units, take control of the city of Kobani from ISIS.

March 21, 2015 – (TURKEY) In a letter read to thousands during a celebration in the city of Diyarbakir, imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan urges fighters under his command to lay down their arms, stop waging war against the Turkish state and join a “congress.”

May 18, 2015 – (TURKEY) In the run-up to parliamentary elections on June 7, an explosion rocks the office of the Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) in Adana, in southeastern Turkey. Six people are injured.

June 7, 2015 – (TURKEY) Three-year-old fledgling party Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) receives more than 13% of the vote, winning 80 seats in the 550-seat parliament.

June 16, 2015 – (SYRIA) Kurdish forces in the Syrian town, Tal Abyad say they have defeated ISIS fighters and taken back the town on the Turkish border.

June 23, 2015 – (SYRIA) Kurdish fighters announce that they have taken back the town of Ain Issa, located 30 miles north of the ISIS stronghold, Raqqa, a city proclaimed to be the capital of the caliphate. A military base near Ain Issa, which had been occupied by ISIS since last August, is abandoned by the terrorist group the night before the Kurdish forces seize the town.

February 17, 2016 – (IRAQ) Turkish airstrikes target some of the PKK’s top figures in northern Iraq’s Haftanin region. Airstrikes come after a terrorist attack in Turkey kills 28, although no Kurdish group has claimed responsibility for those attacks.

March 13, 2016 – (TURKEY) A car bomb attack kills at least 37 people in Ankara. The Kurdistan Freedom Falcons, or TAK – an offshoot of the Kurdish separatist group PKK – takes responsibility for the attack.

March 17, 2016 – (SYRIA) Kurds declare that a swath of northeastern Syria is now a separate autonomous region under Kurdish control. The claim stirs up controversy, as Syrian and Turkish officials say it goes against the goal of creating a unified country after years of civil war.

July 20, 2016 – (TURKEY) Following a failed coup attempt, President Erdogan declares a state of emergency. In the first three months, pro-Kurdish media outlets are shut down, and tens of thousands of civil servants with alleged PKK connections are dismissed or suspended. The purge includes ministers of parliament, military leaders, police, teachers and mayors, including in the Kurdish-majority city of Diyarbakir.

September 25, 2017 – (IRAQ) Iraqi Kurds vote in favor of declaring independence from Iraq. More than 92% of the roughly 3 million people vote “yes” to independence.

March 23, 2019 – (SYRIA) Kurdish forces announce they have captured the eastern Syrian pocket of Baghouz, the last populated area under ISIS rule.

October 9, 2019 – (TURKEY/SYRIA) Turkey launches a military offensive into northeastern Syria, just days after US President Donald Trump’s administration announced that US troops would leave the border area. Erdogan’s “Operation Peace Spring” is an effort to drive away Kurdish forces from the border, and use the area to resettle around two million Syrian refugees. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) who operate in the region are Kurdish-led, and still hold thousands of ISIS fighters captured in battle.

October 17, 2019 – (TURKEY/SYRIA) US Vice President Mike Pence announces that he and Erdogan agreed to a ceasefire halting Turkey’s incursion into northern Syria. The Turkish government insists that the agreement is not a ceasefire, but only a “pause” on operations in the region.

November 15, 2019 – (TURKEY/SYRIA) Turkey’s decision to launch a military operation targeting US-Kurdish partners in northern Syria and the Trump administration’s subsequent retreat allowed ISIS to rebuild itself and boosted its ability to launch attacks abroad, the Pentagon’s Inspector General says in an Operation Inherent Resolve quarterly report.

March 24, 2020 – (SYRIA) The SDF releases a statement calling for a humanitarian truce in response to a United Nations appeal for a global ceasefire to combat the coronavirus.

July 30, 2020 – (SYRIA) During a US Senate committee hearing, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirms the Trump administration’s support for the Delta Crescent Energy firm’s deal to develop and modernize oil fields in northeast Syria under control of the SDF. The following week, Syria’s foreign ministry calls the deal an attempt to “steal” the oil.

February 8, 2021 – (SYRIA) Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby is questioned about the Delta Crescent Energy deal during a press conference. He says that the US Department of Defense under the Joe Biden administration is focused on fighting ISIS. It is not aiding a private company.

January 20-26, 2022 – (SYRIA) ISIS lays siege to a prison in northeast Syria, in an attempt to break out thousands of the group’s members who were detained in 2019. In coordination with US-led coalition airstrikes, SDF regains control of the prison. This is believed to be the biggest coordinated attack by ISIS since the fall of the caliphate three years prior.

September 16, 2022 – (IRAN) Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian woman, dies after being detained by “morality police” and taken to a “re-education center,” allegedly for not abiding by the country’s conservative dress code. Public anger over her death combines with a range of grievances against the Islamic Republic’s oppressive regime to fuel months of nationwide demonstrations, which continue despite law makers urging the country’s judiciary to “show no leniency” to protesters.

November 12, 2022 – (IRAN) The Norway-based Iran Human Rights NGO (IHRNGO) group claims Iranian security forces have killed at least 326 people since nationwide protests erupted two months ago. Authorities have unleashed a deadly crackdown on demonstrators, with reports of forced detentions and physical abuse being used to target the country’s Kurdish minority group.

[ad_2]

Source link

April 10, 2024
Syrian Civil War Fast Facts | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Here’s a look at ongoing civil war in Syria.

Bashar al-Assad has ruled Syria as president since July 2000. His father, Hafez al-Assad, ruled Syria from 1970-2000.

The ongoing violence against civilians has been condemned by the Arab League, the European Union, the United States and other countries.

Roughly 5 million Syrians have fled to neighboring countries, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, and more than 6.8 million people are displaced internally.

According to UNICEF’s Representative in Syria, Bo Viktor Nylund, “Since 2011, nearly 12,000 children were verified as killed or injured in Syria, that’s one child every eight hours over the past ten years.” Nylund said that the actual figures are likely much higher.

When the civil war began in 2011, there were four main factions of fighting groups throughout the country: Kurdish forces, ISIS, other opposition (such as Jaish al Fateh, an alliance between the Nusra Front and Ahrar-al-Sham) and the Assad regime.

March 2011 – Violence flares in Daraa after a group of teens and children are arrested for writing political graffiti. Dozens of people are killed when security forces crack down on demonstrations.

March 24, 2011 – In response to continuing protests, the Syrian government announces several plans to appease citizens. State employees will receive an immediate salary increase. The government also plans to study lifting Syria’s long standing emergency law and the licensing of new political parties.

March 30, 2011 – Assad addresses the nation in a 45-minute televised speech. He acknowledges that the government has not met the people’s needs, but he does not offer any concrete changes. The state of emergency remains in effect.

April 21, 2011 – Assad lifts the country’s 48-year-old state of emergency. He also abolishes the Higher State Security Court and issues a decree “regulating the right to peaceful protest, as one of the basic human rights guaranteed by the Syrian Constitution.”

May 18, 2011 – The United States imposes sanctions against Assad and six other senior Syrian officials. The Treasury Department details the sanctions by saying, “As a result of this action, any property in the United States or in the possession or control of US persons in which the individuals listed in the Annex have an interest is blocked, and US persons are generally prohibited from engaging in transactions with them.”

August 18, 2011 – The US imposes new economic sanctions on Syria, freezing Syrian government assets in the US, barring Americans from making new investments in the country and prohibiting any US transactions relating to Syrian petroleum products, among other things.

September 2, 2011 – The European Union bans the import of Syrian oil.

September 23, 2011 – The EU imposes additional sanctions against Syria, due to “the continuing brutal campaign” by the government against its own people.

October 2, 2011 – A new alignment of Syrian opposition groups establishes the Syrian National Council, a framework through which to end Assad’s government and establish a democratic system.

October 4, 2011 – Russia and China veto a UN Security Council resolution that would call for an immediate halt to the crackdown in Syria against opponents of Assad. Nine of the 15-member council countries, including the United States, voted in favor of adopting the resolution.

November 12, 2011 – The Arab League suspends Syria’s membership, effective November 16, 2011.

November 27, 2011 – Foreign ministers from 19 Arab League countries vote to impose economic sanctions against the Syrian regime for its part in a bloody crackdown on civilian demonstrators.

November 30, 2011 – Turkey announces a series of measures, including financial sanctions, against Syria.

December 19, 2011 – Syria signs an Arab League proposal aimed at ending violence between government forces and protesters.

January 28, 2012 – The Arab League suspends its mission in Syria as violence there continues.

February 2, 2012 – A UN Security Council meeting ends with no agreement on a draft resolution intended to pressure Syria to end its crackdown on anti-government demonstrators.

February 4, 2012 – A UN Security Council resolution condemning Syria is not adopted after Russia and China vote against it.

February 6, 2012 – The United States closes its embassy in Damascus and recalls its diplomats.

February 7, 2012 – The Gulf Cooperation Council announces its member states are pulling their ambassadors from Damascus and expelling the Syrian ambassadors in their countries.

February 16, 2012 – The United Nations General Assembly passes a nonbinding resolution endorsing the Arab League plan for Assad to step down. The vote was 137 in favor and 12 against, with 17 abstentions.

February 26, 2012 – Syrians vote on a constitutional referendum in polling centers across the country. Almost 90% of voters approve the changes to the constitution, which include the possibility of a multi-party system.

March 13, 2012 – Kofi Annan, the UN special envoy to Syria, meets in Turkey with government officials and Syrian opposition members. In a visit to Syria over the weekend, he calls for a ceasefire, the release of detainees and allowing unfettered access to relief agencies to deliver much-needed aid.

March 15, 2012 – The Gulf Cooperation Council announces that the six member countries will close their Syrian embassies and calls on the international community “to stop what is going on in Syria.”

March 27, 2012 – The Syrian government accepts Annan’s plan to end violence. The proposal seeks to stop the violence, give access to humanitarian agencies, release detainees and start a political dialogue to address the concerns of the Syrian people.

April 1, 2012 – At a conference in Istanbul, the international group Friends of the Syrian People formally recognizes the Syrian National Council as a legitimate representative of the Syrian people.

July 30, 2012 – The Syrian Charge d’Affaires in London, Khaled al-Ayoubi, resigns, stating he is “no longer willing to represent a regime that has committed such violent and oppressive acts against its own people.”

August 2, 2012 – UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announces that Annan will not renew his mandate when it expires at the end of August.

August 6, 2012 – Syrian Prime Minister Riyad Hijab’s resignation from office and defection from Assad’s regime is read on Al Jazeera by his spokesman Muhammad el-Etri. Hijab and his family are said to have left Syria overnight, arriving in Jordan. Hijab is the highest-profile official to defect.

August 9, 2012 – Syrian television reports that Assad has appointed Health Minister Wael al-Halki as the new prime minister.

October 3, 2012 – Five people are killed by Syrian shelling in the Turkish border town of Akcakale. In response, Turkey fires on Syrian targets and its parliament authorizes a resolution giving the government permission to deploy its soldiers to foreign countries.

November 11, 2012 – Israel fires warning shots toward Syria after a mortar shell hits an Israeli military post. It is the first time Israel has fired on Syria across the Golan Heights since the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

November 11, 2012 – Syrian opposition factions formally agree to unite as the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces.

November 13, 2012 – Sheikh Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib is elected leader of the Syrian opposition collective, the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces.

January 6, 2013 – Assad announces he will not step down and that his vision of Syria’s future includes a new constitution and an end to support for the opposition. The opposition refuses to work with Assad’s government.

March 19, 2013 – The National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces elects Ghassan Hitto as its prime minister. Though born in Damascus, Hitto has spent much of his life in the United States, and holds dual US and Syrian citizenship.

April 25, 2013 – US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel announces the United States has evidence that the chemical weapon sarin has been used in Syria on a small scale.

May 27, 2013 – EU nations end the arms embargo against the Syrian rebels.

June 13, 2013 – US President Barack Obama says that Syria has crossed a “red line” with its use of chemical weapons against rebels. His administration indicates that it will be stepping up its support of the rebels, who have been calling for the US and others to provide arms needed to battle Assad’s forces.

July 6, 2013 – Ahmad Assi Jarba is elected the new leader of the Syrian National Coalition.

August 18, 2013 – A team of UN weapons inspectors arrives in Syria to begin an investigation into whether chemical weapons have been used during the civil war.

August 22, 2013 – The UN and the US call for an immediate investigation of Syrian activists’ claims that the Assad government used chemical weapons in an attack on civilians on August 21. Anti-regime activist groups in Syria say more than 1,300 people were killed in the attack outside Damascus, many of them women and children.

August 24, 2013 – Medical charity Doctors Without Borders announces that three hospitals near Damascus treated more than 3,000 patients suffering “neurotoxic symptoms” on August 21. Reportedly, 355 of the patients died.

August 26, 2013 – UN inspectors reach the site of a reported chemical attack in Moadamiyet al-Sham, near Damascus. En route to the site, the team’s convoy is hit by sniper fire. No one is injured.

August 29, 2013 – The UK’s Parliament votes against any military action in Syria.

August 30, 2013 – US Secretary of State John Kerry says that US intelligence information has found that 1,429 people were killed in last week’s chemical weapons attack in Syria, including at least 426 children.

September 9, 2013 – Syria agrees to a Russian proposal to give up control of its chemical weapons.

September 10, 2013 – In a speech, Obama says he will not “put American boots on the ground in Syria,” but does not rule out other military options.

September 14, 2013 – The United States and Russia agree to a plan to eliminate chemical weapons in Syria.

September 16, 2013 – The United Nations releases a report from chemical weapons inspectors who investigated the August 21 incident. Inspectors say there is “clear and convincing evidence” that sarin was used.

September 20, 2013 – Syria releases an initial report on its chemical weapons program.

September 27, 2013 – The UN Security Council passes a resolution requiring Syria to eliminate its arsenal of chemical weapons. Assad says he will abide by the resolution.

September 30, 2013 – At the UN General Assembly in New York, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem says that Syria is not engaged in a civil war, but a war on terror.

October 6, 2013 – Syria begins dismantling its chemical weapons program, including the destruction of missile warheads and aerial bombs.

October 31, 2013 – The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons announces that Syria has destroyed all its declared chemical weapons production facilities.

November 25, 2013 – The United Nations announces that starting January 22 in Geneva, Switzerland, the Syrian government and an unknown number of opposition groups will meet at a “Geneva II” conference meant to broker an end to the Syrian civil war.

December 2, 2013 – UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay says that a UN fact-finding team has found “massive evidence” that the highest levels of the Syrian government are responsible for war crimes.

January 20, 2014 – The Syria National Coalition announces it won’t participate in the Geneva II talks unless the United Nations rescinds its surprise invitation to Iran or Iran agrees to certain conditions. The United Nations later rescinds Iran’s invitation.

February 13, 2014 – The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons tells CNN that Syria has shipped out 11% of its chemical weapons stockpile, falling far short of the February 5 deadline to have all such arms removed from the country.

February 15, 2014 – A second round of peace talks ends in Geneva, Switzerland, with little progress in ending Syria’s civil war.

February 23, 2014 – The UN Security Council unanimously passes a resolution boosting access to humanitarian aid in Syria.

June 3, 2014 – Assad is reelected, reportedly receiving 88.7% of the vote in the country’s first election since civil war broke out in 2011.

September 22-23, 2014 – The United States and allies launch airstrikes against ISIS targets in Syria, focusing on the city of Raqqa.

September 14-15, 2015 – A Pentagon spokesperson says the Russian military appears to be attempting to set up a forward operating base in western Syria, in the area around the port city of Latakia. Russian President Vladimir Putin says that Russia is supporting the Syrian government in its fight against ISIS.

October 30, 2015 – White House spokesman Josh Earnest says that the US will be deploying “less than 50” Special Operations forces, who will be sent to Kurdish-controlled territory in northern Syria. The American troops will help local Kurdish and Arab forces fighting ISIS with logistics and are planning to bolster their efforts.

February 26, 2016 – A temporary cessation of hostilities goes into effect. The truce calls for the Syrian regime and rebels to give relief organizations access to disputed territories so they can assist civilians.

March 15, 2016 – Russia starts withdrawing its forces from Syria. A spokeswoman for Assad tells CNN that the Russian campaign is winding down after achieving its goal of helping Syrian troops take back territory claimed by terrorists.

September 15, 2016 – At least 23 people, including nine children, are killed during airstrikes in Syria, with the United States and Russia accusing each other of violating the ceasefire in effect since September 12.

September 17, 2016 – US-led coalition airstrikes near Deir Ezzor Airport intended to target ISIS instead kill 62 Syrian soldiers.

September 20, 2016 – An aid convoy and warehouse of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent are bombed; no one claims responsibility. The strike prompts the UN to halt aid operations in Syria.

September 23-25, 2016 – About 200 airstrikes hit Aleppo during the weekend, with one activist telling CNN it is a level of bombing they have not seen before.

December 13, 2016 – As government forces take control of most of Aleppo from rebel groups, Turkey and Russia broker a ceasefire for eastern Aleppo so that civilians can be evacuated. The UN Security Council holds an emergency session amid reports of mounting civilian deaths and extrajudicial killings. The ceasefire collapses less than a day after it is implemented.

December 22, 2016 – Syria’s state-run media announces government forces have taken full control of Aleppo, ending more than four years of rebel rule there.

April 4, 2017 – Dozens of civilians are reportedly killed in a suspected chemical attack in the rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhoun. The Russian Defense Ministry claims that gas was released when Syrian forces bombed a chemical munitions depot operated by terrorists. Activists, however, say that Syrians carried out a targeted chemical attack.

April 6, 2017 – The United States launches a military strike on a Syrian government airbase in response to the chemical weapon attack on civilians. On US President Donald Trump’s orders, US warships launch 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at the airbase which was home to the warplanes that carried out the chemical attacks.

July 7, 2017 – Trump and Putin reach an agreement on curbing violence in southwest Syria during their meeting at the G20 in Hamburg, Germany. The ceasefire will take effect in the de-escalation zone beginning at noon Damascus time on July 9.

October 17, 2017 – ISIS loses control of its self-declared capital, Raqqa. US-backed forces fighting in Raqqa say “major military operations” have ended, though there are still pockets of resistance in the city.

October 26, 2017 – A joint report from the United Nations and international chemical weapons inspectors finds that the Assad regime was responsible for the April 2017 sarin attack that killed more than 80 people. Syria has repeatedly denied it had anything to do with the attack and also denies it has any chemical weapons.

February 24, 2018 – The UN Security Council unanimously approves a 30-day ceasefire resolution in Syria, though it is unclear when the ceasefire is meant to start, or how it will be enforced.

February 27, 2018 – Within minutes of when a five-hour “humanitarian pause” ordered by Putin – from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. – is meant to start, activists on the ground report shelling and artillery fire from pro-regime positions, killing at least one person in the rebel-held enclave of Eastern Ghouta.

April 7, 2018 – Helicopters drop barrel bombs filled with toxic gas on the last rebel-held town in Eastern Ghouta, activist groups say. The World Health Organization later says that as many as 500 people may have been affected by the attack.

April 14, 2018 – The United States, France and the United Kingdom launch airstrikes on Syria in response to the chemical weapons attack in Eastern Ghouta a week earlier.

September 17, 2018 – Russia and Turkey announce they have agreed to create a demilitarized zone in Syria’s Idlib province, potentially thwarting a large-scale military operation and impending humanitarian disaster in the country’s last rebel stronghold. The zone, which will be patrolled by Turkish and Russian military units, will become operational from October 15.

December 19, 2018 – Trump tweets, “We have defeated ISIS in Syria, my only reason for being there during the Trump Presidency.” A US defense official and an administration official tell CNN that planning for the “full” and “rapid” withdrawal of US military from Syria is already underway.

March 23, 2019 – Kurdish forces announce they have captured the eastern Syrian pocket of Baghouz, the last populated area under ISIS rule.

October 9, 2019 – Turkey launches a military offensive into northeastern Syria, just days after the Trump administration announced that US troops would leave the border area. Erdogan’s “Operation Peace Spring” is an effort to drive away Kurdish forces from the border, and use the area to resettle around two million Syrian refugees.

March 5, 2020 – Turkey and Russia announce a ceasefire in Idlib, Syria’s last opposition enclave, agreeing to establish a security corridor with joint patrols.

April 8, 2020 – The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons’ Investigation and Identification Team (IIT) releases a report concluding that Syrian government forces were responsible for a series of chemical attacks on a Syrian town in late March 2017.

May 26, 2021 – Assad is reelected.

In photos: Syria’s civil war

[ad_2]

Source link

April 4, 2024
Taliban Fast Facts | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Here’s a look at the Taliban, a Sunni Islamist organization operating primarily in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The group’s aim is to impose its interpretation of Islamic law on Afghanistan and remove foreign influence from the country.

Taliban, in Pashto, is the plural of Talib, which means student.

Most members are Pashtun, the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan.

Mawlawi Haibatullah Akhundzada has been the Taliban’s supreme leader since 2016.

Reclusive leader Mullah Mohammed Omar led the Taliban from the mid-1990s until his death in 2013.

The exact number of Taliban forces is unknown.

1979-1989 – The Soviet Union invades and occupies Afghanistan. Afghan resistance fighters, known collectively as mujahedeen, fight back.

1989-1993 – After the Soviet Union withdraws, fighting among the mujahedeen erupts.

1994 – The Taliban forms, comprised mostly of students and led by Mullah Mohammed Omar.

November 1994 – The Taliban take control of the city of Kandahar.

September 1996 – The capital, Kabul, falls to the Taliban.

1996-2001 – The group imposes strict Islamic laws on the Afghan people. Women must wear head-to-toe coverings, are not allowed to attend school or work outside the home and are forbidden to travel alone. Television, music and non-Islamic holidays are banned.

1997 – The Taliban issue an edict renaming Afghanistan the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The country is only officially recognized by three countries: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

1997- Omar forges a relationship with Osama bin Laden, the leader of al Qaeda, who then moves his base of operations to Kandahar.

August 1998 – The Taliban capture the city of Mazar-e-Sharif, gaining control of about 90% of Afghanistan.

October 7, 2001 – Less than a month after terrorists linked to al Qaeda carry out the 9/11 attacks, American and allied forces begin an invasion of Afghanistan called Operation Enduring Freedom.

December 2001 – The Taliban lose its last major stronghold as Kandahar falls. Hamid Karzai is chosen as interim leader of Afghanistan.

November 3, 2004 – Karzai is officially elected president of Afghanistan.

December 2006 – Senior Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani is killed in an airstrike by the United States.

December 11, 2007 – Allied commanders report that Afghan troops backed by NATO have recaptured the provincial town of Musa Qala from Taliban control.

October 21, 2008 – Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal confirms that Saudi Arabia hosted talks between Afghan officials and the Taliban in September. It is reported that no agreements were made.

April 25, 2011 – Hundreds of prisoners escape from a prison in Kandahar by crawling through a tunnel. The Taliban take responsibility for the escape and claim that 541 prisoners escaped, while the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force says the number is 470.

September 10, 2011 – Two Afghan civilians are killed, and 77 US troops are wounded in a truck bombing at the entrance of Combat Outpost Sayed Abad, an ISAF base in Afghanistan’s Wardak province. The Taliban claim responsibility.

September 13, 2011 – Taliban militants open fire on the US embassy and ISAF headquarters in central Kabul. Three police officers and one civilian are killed.

February 27, 2012 – The Taliban claim responsibility for a suicide bombing near the front gate of the ISAF base at the Jalalabad airport in Afghanistan. At least nine people are killed and 12 are wounded in the explosion. The Taliban say the bombing is in retaliation for the burning of Qurans by NATO troops.

June 18, 2013 – An official political office of the Taliban opens in Doha, Qatar’s capital city. The Taliban claim they hope to improve relations with other countries and head toward a peaceful solution in Afghanistan.

September 21, 2013 – A Pakistani official announces that Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, one of the founding members of the Taliban, has been released from prison. Baradar had been captured in Karachi, Pakistan, in 2010.

May 31, 2014 – The United States transfer five Guantánamo Bay detainees to Qatar in exchange for the release of US Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. It is believed Bergdahl was being held by the Taliban and the al Qaeda-aligned Haqqani network in Pakistan. The detainees released are Khair Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Mullah Norullah Nori, Abdul Haq Wasiq and Mohammad Nabi Omari.

July 29, 2015 – An Afghan government spokesman says in a news release that Taliban leader Omar died in April 2013 in Pakistan, citing “credible information.” A spokesman for Afghanistan’s intelligence service tells CNN that Omar died in a hospital in Karachi at that time.

September 28, 2015 – Taliban insurgents seize the main roundabout in the Afghan provincial capital of Kunduz, then free more than 500 inmates at the prison.

December 21, 2015 – A police official says Taliban forces have taken almost complete control over Sangin, a strategically important city in Afghanistan’s Helmand province.

May 21, 2016 – Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour is killed in an airstrike in Pakistan.

May 25, 2016 – The Taliban name Mawlawi Haibatullah Akhundzada as their new leader. He is a senior religious cleric from the Taliban’s founding generation.

January 25, 2017 – The Taliban release an open letter to newly elected US President Donald Trump. The letter calls on Trump to withdraw US forces from Afghanistan.

April 21, 2017 – The Taliban attack a northern army base in Afghanistan, killing or wounding more than 100 people.

July 25, 2017 – CNN reports it has exclusive videos that suggest the Taliban have received improved weaponry in Afghanistan that appears to have been supplied by the Russian government. Moscow categorically denies arming the Taliban.

August 3, 2017 – Taliban and ISIS forces launch a joint attack on a village in northern Afghanistan, killing 50 people, including women and children, local officials say.

January 27, 2018 – An attacker driving an ambulance packed with explosives detonates them in Kabul, killing 95 people and injuring 191 others, Afghan officials say. The Taliban claim responsibility.

February 28, 2018 – Afghan President Ashraf Ghani says the government is willing to recognize the Taliban as a legitimate political party as part of a potential ceasefire agreement.

April 12, 2018 – At least 14 people, including a district governor, are killed and at least five are injured in a Taliban attack in Afghanistan’s southeastern Ghazni province.

June 7, 2018 – In a video message, Ghani announces that Afghan forces have agreed to a ceasefire with the Taliban between June 12 and June 21. The proposed truce coincides with the holiday of Eid al-Fitr, the period during which Muslims celebrate the end of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting.

June 15-17, 2018 – The three-day-old ceasefire between the Taliban, Afghan forces and the NATO-led coalition is marred by two deadly attacks. ISIS, which did not participate in the truce, claims responsibility for a suicide bombing in the Nangarhar province that kills at least 25 people, including Taliban members and civilians. A second suicide bombing is carried out near the Nangarhar governor’s compound, killing at least 18 people and injuring at least 49. There is no immediate claim of responsibility for the second attack.

August 10, 2018 – The Taliban launch an attack on the strategic Afghan city of Ghazni, south of the capital Kabul, seizing key buildings and trading fire with security forces. At least 16 people are killed and 40 are injured, most are Afghan security forces.

October 13, 2018 – The Taliban issues a statement announcing that the group met with the US envoy for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, to discuss the conflict in Afghanistan. The United States does not confirm that the meeting occurred.

November 9, 2018 – In Moscow, Taliban representatives participate in talks with diplomats from Russia, Pakistan, India and other countries, as well as officials from the Afghan government. The United States sends a diplomat from its embassy in Moscow as an observer.

January 22, 2019 – Authorities say at least 12 members of the Afghan military were killed and another 28 injured when the Taliban carried out a suicide attack on a military base in the central province of Maidan Wardak.

January 28, 2019 – Officials from the United States and the Taliban announce they have agreed to a framework that could end the war in Afghanistan. The framework for peace would see the Taliban vow to prevent the country from being used as a hub for terrorism in return for a US military withdrawal. An Afghan source close to the negotiations tells CNN that while a ceasefire and US withdrawal were both discussed, neither side came to final conclusions.

January 30, 2019 – In its quarterly report to the US Congress, the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction declares the Taliban expanded its control of territory in 2018 while the Afghan government lost control of territory. In October 2018, the Afghan government controlled just 53.8% of districts in the country, according to the report. The insurgency made gains to control 12.3% of districts while 33.9% of districts were contested.

February 5-6, 2019 – Talks are held in Moscow between Taliban leaders and politicians from the government of Afghanistan.

March 12, 2019 – Peace talks between representatives from the United States and the Taliban end without a finalized agreement. Khalilzad, the main American negotiator, says that progress has been made and the talks yielded two draft proposals.

September 7-8, 2019 – Trump announces that Taliban leaders were to travel to the Unites States for secret peace talks over the weekend but that the meeting has been canceled and he has called off peace talks with the militant group entirely. Trump tweets that he scrapped the meeting after the Taliban took credit for an attack in Kabul, Afghanistan, that killed a dozen people, including an American soldier.

November 28, 2019 – On a surprise trip to Afghanistan for a Thanksgiving visit with US troops, Trump announces that peace talks with the Taliban have restarted.

February 29, 2020 – The United States and the Taliban sign a historic agreement which sets into motion the potential of a full withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. The “Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan” outlines a series of commitments from the United States and the Taliban related to troop levels, counterterrorism and the intra-Afghan dialogue aimed at bringing about “a permanent and comprehensive ceasefire.”

August 9, 2020 – Afghanistan’s grand assembly of elders, the consultative Loya Jirga, passes a resolution calling for the release of the last group of some 5,000 Taliban prisoners, paving the way for direct peace talks with the insurgent group. The release of the 400 prisoners is part of the agreement signed by the US and the Taliban in February.

April 14, 2021 – US President Joe Biden formally announces his decision to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan before September 11, 2021, deeming the prolonged and intractable conflict in Afghanistan no longer aligns with American priorities.

August 15, 2021 – After the Taliban seize control of every major city across Afghanistan, in just two weeks, they take control of the presidential palace in Kabul. A senior Afghan official and a senior diplomatic source tell CNN that Ghani has left the country.

August 30, 2021 – The last US military planes leave Afghanistan.

September 7, 2021 – The Taliban announce the formation of a hardline interim government for Afghanistan. Four men receiving senior positions in the government had previously been detained by the United States at Guantánamo Bay, and were released as part of a prisoner swap for Bergdahl in 2014.

November 30, 2021 – New research released by Human Rights Watch (HRW) details “the summary execution or enforced disappearance” of 47 former members of the Afghan National Security Forces who had surrendered or were apprehended by Taliban forces between August 15 and October 31. A Taliban deputy spokesman rejects the HRW report, saying that the Taliban established a general amnesty on their first day of power in Afghanistan.

December 27, 2021 – The Taliban says it has dissolved Afghanistan’s election commission as well as its ministries for peace and parliamentary affairs, further eroding state institutions set up by the country’s previous Western-backed governments.

February 11, 2022 – Biden signs an executive order allowing $7 billion in frozen assets from Afghanistan’s central bank to eventually be distributed inside the country and to potentially fund litigation brought by families of victims of the September 11 terror attacks. The Taliban has claimed rights to the funds, which include assets like currency and gold, but the United States has declined access to them after Afghanistan’s democratic government fell. The United States has not recognized the Taliban as the government of Afghanistan.

March 23, 2022 – The Taliban prevents girls above the 6th grade in Afghanistan from making their much-anticipated return to school. They are told to stay at home until a school uniform appropriate to Sharia and Afghan customs and culture can be designed, the Taliban-run Bakhtar News Agency reported. The Taliban originally said that schools would open for all students – including girls – after the Afghan new year, which is celebrated on March 21, on the condition that boys and girls were separated either in different schools or by different learning hours.

November 13, 2022 – The Taliban orders judges in Afghanistan to fully impose their interpretation of Sharia Law, including potential public executions, amputations and flogging, a move experts fear will lead to a further deterioration of human rights in the impoverished country.

December 20, 2022 – The Taliban government suspends university education for all female students in Afghanistan.

December 24, 2022 – The Taliban administration orders all local and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to stop their female employees from coming to work, according to a letter by the Ministry of Economy sent to all licensed NGOs.

June 15, 2023 – The United Nations releases a report saying that since re-taking control of the country,the Taliban has committed “egregious systematic violations of women’s rights,” by restricting their access to education and employment and their ability to move freely in society.

[ad_2]

Source link

March 15, 2024
2008 Georgia Russia Conflict Fast Facts | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Here’s a look at the 2008 military conflict between Russia and Georgia.

The conflict centered on South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two “breakaway provinces” in Georgia. They are officially part of Georgia, but have separate governments unrecognized by most countries.

Abkhazia and South Ossetia are supported by Russia.

During the five-day conflict, 170 servicemen, 14 policemen, and 228 civilians from Georgia were killed and 1,747 wounded. Sixty-seven Russian servicemen were killed and 283 were wounded, and 365 South Ossetian servicemen and civilians (combined) were killed, according to an official EU fact-finding report about the conflict.

1918-1921- Georgia is briefly an independent state after separating from the Russian Empire.

1921 – After the Red Army invasion, Georgia and Abkhazia are declared Soviet Socialist republics.

1922 – The South Ossetia Autonomous Oblast is created within Georgia.

1931 – Abkhazia’s status is reduced to an autonomous republic within Georgia.

1990 – South Ossetia declares its independence from Georgia.

April 9, 1991 – Georgia declares independence.

1991-1992 – Civil war breaks out in Georgia. Zviad Gamsakhurdia is deposed as president.

1992 – Abkhazia declares its independence from Georgia, leading to armed conflict.

October 1992 – Eduard Shevardnadze is elected to lead Georgia. He is reelected in 1995 and 2000.

September 1993 – Abkhazian separatist forces defeat the Georgian military.

October 1993 – Georgia joins the Commonwealth of Independent States.

May 1994 – A ceasefire is agreed upon and signed between the Georgian government and Abkhaz separatists. Russian peacekeeping forces are deployed to the area.

October 2001 – Fighting resumes between Abkhaz troops and Georgian paramilitaries. Russia states that it believes Georgia is harboring Chechen rebels, a claim denied by Georgia.

September 2002 – Russian President Vladimir Putin sends a letter to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, UN Security Council members, and members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe stating that Georgia must respond to accusations they are harboring Chechen militants or face military action from Russia.

October 2002 – Tensions with Russia are defused after Shevardnadze promises to work with Russia to fight Chechen rebels.

November 2003 – Shevardnadze is forced to leave office in the “Rose Revolution.”

July 2005 – Under terms of a deal reached in May, Russia starts to withdraw its troops from two Soviet-era military bases.

May-June 2006 – Tensions between Georgia and Russia rise again when Georgia demands that Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia have visas.

November 12, 2006 – A referendum is voted upon in which South Ossetians overwhelmingly demand independence.

November 2007 – Russia announces that it has withdrawn its Georgia-based troops. It retains a peacekeeping presence in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

April 3, 2008 – NATO members at a summit in Bucharest, Romania, defer the decision on Georgia and Ukraine’s admittance until December 2008.

April 21, 2008 – Georgia accuses Russia of shooting down an unmanned drone over Abkhazia on April 20. Russia denies the claim.

April 29, 2008 – Russia sends more troops to Abkhazia to counter what it says are Georgia’s plans for an attack.

May 26, 2008 – A UN investigation concludes that the drone shot down on April 21 was struck by a missile from a Russian fighter jet.

May 30-31, 2008 – Russia sends several hundred unarmed troops to Abkhazia, saying they are needed for railway repairs. Georgia accuses Russia of planning a military intervention.

August 7-8, 2008 – Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili sends troops into South Ossetia. Russia responds by moving its troops to the border, flying aircraft over Georgia, and beginning air strikes in South Ossetia.

August 8, 2008 – The United States, United Kingdom and NATO call for a cease fire of military hostilities by both Russia and Georgia.

August 9, 2008 – A delegation of EU and US diplomats head to Georgia to resolve escalating tensions.

August 10, 2008 – Russia moves tanks and soldiers through South Ossetia and into Georgia proper, advancing towards the city of Gori.

August 12, 2008 – Russia calls a halt to its military incursion into Georgia and agrees to a six-point diplomatic push for peace. The plan is announced by French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

August 13, 2008 – US President George W. Bush announces humanitarian aid is to be sent to Georgia. It is also announced that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will be sent to France and Georgia for a diplomatic mission.

August 15, 2008 – Saakashvili signs a cease fire agreement with Russia. The deal is brokered by Sarkozy.

August 16, 2008 – Medvedev signs the cease fire agreement.

August 22, 2008 – Russia partially withdraws its troops from Georgia, as part of the cease fire agreement. Russia maintains soldiers at checkpoints near the disputed territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

August 26, 2008 – Medvedev signs an order recognizing the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. In response, President Bush releases a statement saying, in part, “The United States condemns the decision by the Russian president to recognize as independent states the Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia…The territorial integrity and borders of Georgia must be respected, just as those of Russia or any other country.”

July 2009 – UN observers leave Georgia after nearly 16 years. The mission was not extended due to a Russian veto.

September 2009 – A report from an EU fact-finding mission determines that historical tensions and overreaction on the part of both Russia and Georgia contributed to the five-day conflict. Georgia’s attack on the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali on the night of August 7 is seen as the start of the armed conflict, however the report notes that the attack was the culmination of years of increasing tensions, provocations and incidents.

January 27, 2016 – The Hague-based International Criminal Court authorizes a probe into possible war crimes committed by Russian, Georgian and South Ossetian forces during the conflict.

[ad_2]

Source link

March 13, 2024
Mahmoud Abbas Fast Facts | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Here’s a look at the life of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Birth date: 1935

Birth place: Safed, Palestine

Marriage: Amina Abbas

Children: Three sons Mazen (died in 2002), Yasser and Tareq

Education: Damascus University, B.A.; Oriental College (in Moscow), Ph.D.

His family left the British Mandate area Safed, Palestine, to live in Syria as refugees in 1948.

Abbas laid floor tiles and taught elementary school before earning a law degree.

Played an integral role in the forging of the Declaration of Principles, the historic Oslo Accords signed in 1993 by PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin of Israel.

Was the primary force behind the Palestine National Council’s decision to work with Israeli peace groups.

He is also known as Abu Mazen. (Abu is a slang term to describe the head of a family or father of children.)

1959 – Founding member of the Palestinian National Liberation Movement (Fatah), which became the largest political group of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).

1964 – Fatah joins the PLO.

1967 – Is appointed to Fatah’s Central Committee.

1968 – Joins the Palestinian National Council (PNC).

1980 – Is elected to the PLO’s Executive Committee.

September 1993 – Accompanies Arafat to the White House to sign the Oslo Accords, or the Declaration of Principles.

1995 – Signs the Interim Peace Agreement with Israel.

March 19, 2003 – Accepts the position of prime minister of the Palestinian Authority.

June 3, 2003 – Meets with US President George W. Bush and the leaders of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Bahrain, in Egypt, regarding peace efforts.

September 6, 2003 – Resigns as prime minister of the Palestinian Authority.

November 11, 2004 – Becomes the chairman of the PLO after Arafat’s death.

January 9, 2005 – Declares victory in Palestinian presidential elections.

May 26, 2005 – Meets with Bush; the first meeting with the Palestinian Authority in the White House since peace talks broke down in 2000. Bush pledges to give the Palestinian Authority $50 million in aid.

May 31, 2005 – Undergoes a successful, minor heart procedure in a hospital in Amman, Jordan.

February 21, 2006 – Asks Hamas leader Ismail Haniya to assemble a government. Haniya is sworn in in March.

June 14, 2007 – Dissolves the government and dismisses Haniya as prime minister. Haniya rejects this and remains the de facto leader in the Gaza Strip.

June 15, 2007 – Appoints economist Salam Fayyad as the new prime minister of an emergency Palestinian Cabinet.

November 27, 2007 – Attends the Annapolis Middle East Peace Conference, the first formal peace conference sponsored by the US since 2000. Top diplomats and representatives from dozens of countries and organizations also attend, hoping to restart stalled Middle East peace negotiations.

April 24, 2008 – Meets with Bush at the White House.

January 2009 – Extends his term in office until 2010, citing a clause in the constitution.

December 16, 2009 – The PLO’s Central Council votes to extend Abbas’s term as president indefinitely.

May 4, 2011 – Abbas and Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal formally adopt a reconciliation agreement during a ceremony in Egypt.

September 16, 2011 – Abbas announces during a speech in Ramallah that he will pursue a full United Nations membership bid for Palestine.

September 23, 2011 – Abbas submits a statehood application letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations.

January 3, 2013 – Abbas issues a decree renaming the organization the “State of Palestine.”

December 31, 2014 – One day after the UN Security Council rejects a resolution calling for Palestinian statehood by 2017, and for Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and East Jerusalem, Abbas applies to join the International Criminal Court. This sets the stage for the Palestinian Authority to possibly pursue war crime complaints against Israel.

September 30, 2015 – Addresses the UN General Assembly before the historic raising of the Palestinian flag at the United Nations, saying the Palestinian Authority is no longer bound by the Oslo Accords.

September 8, 2016 – Once-secret Soviet documents, obtained by CNN from the Mitrokhin Archive at Churchill College at the University of Cambridge, claim that Abbas, who completed graduate work in Moscow in 1982, was a KGB agent while he was a member of the PLO in Damascus. Palestinian leaders decry the report as a “smear campaign.”

September 30, 2016 – Attends the funeral of Israeli statesman Shimon Peres and shakes hands with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

October 6, 2016 – Is hospitalized to have his heart tested.

May 3, 2017 – Meets with US President Donald Trump at the White House.

December 10, 2017 – Abbas cancels a meeting with US Vice President Mike Pence following Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

January 14, 2018 – Abbas calls on the PLO to “revise all the agreements signed between the PLO and Israel because Israel has brought these agreements to a dead end,” and accuses Israel of ending the Oslo agreement. This criticism comes six weeks after Trump announces recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

April 30, 2018 – Abbas speaks at the opening of the Palestinian National Council remarking that the Holocaust was driven not by antisemitism, but by the financial activities of European Jews. He apologizes a few days later.

May 28, 2018 – Is released from the hospital after being treated for pneumonia.

January 28, 2020 – Abbas rejects Trump’s Middle East “Peace to Prosperity” plan, unveiled alongside Netanyahu at the White House, saying at a news conference from Ramallah in the West Bank that “Jerusalem is not for sale. All our rights are not for sale or for compromise. Your deal is a conspiracy and it will not work.” Abbas, having cut diplomatic contact with the US in December 2017, did not attend the unveiling and had not been briefed in the plan.

April 29, 2021 – Abbas announces the postponement of planned parliamentary elections, saying Israel has failed to confirm it will allow voting in East Jerusalem.

August 16, 2022 – At a news conference in Berlin, Abbas says Israel has caused “50 Holocausts” against Palestinians, triggering outrage from world leaders and a social media storm.

November 5, 2023 – Abbas meets with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Ramallah amid escalating settler violence in the West Bank following Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7.

[ad_2]

Source link

December 26, 2023
Gerry Adams Fast Facts | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Here’s a look at the life of Gerry Adams, former president of Sinn Fein, the leading republican political party in Northern Ireland.

Birth date: October 6, 1948

Birth place: Belfast, Northern Ireland

Birth name: Gerard Adams

Father: Gerry Adams, laborer and republican activist

Mother: Annie (Hannaway) Adams, mill worker

Marriage: Colette (McArdle) Adams (1971-present)

Children: Gearóid

Religion: Catholic

Sinn Fein means “we ourselves.”

Has written more than 10 books.

Denies being a member of the Irish Republican Army.

Early 1960s – Joins Sinn Fein, which supports the reunion of British-ruled Northern Ireland with the rest of Ireland.

1972 – Suspected of being an Irish Republican Army leader, Adams is interned without trial.

July 1972 – Is released to participate in secret peace talks with the British government.

1973-1977 – After peace talks fail, Adams is imprisoned again.

1978 – Elected vice president of Sinn Fein.

1983 – Elected president of Sinn Fein.

1983-1992 – Is the elected representative for West Belfast in the British House of Commons. Following Sinn Fein policy, Adams never takes his seat in order to avoid taking the obligatory oath of loyalty to the Queen of England.

1984 – Is shot and seriously wounded during an assassination attempt.

1988 – Begins talks with John Hume, the leader of Northern Ireland’s Social Democratic and Labour Party.

1993 – Adams and Hume issue a statement suggesting ways to peacefully settle the conflict in Northern Ireland.

1994 – Is granted his first US visa.

1997 – Meets with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

April 1998 – The Good Friday Agreement, also known as the Belfast Agreement, is signed, establishing a democratically elected assembly in Northern Ireland. The assembly is suspended several times, with the last suspension ending in 2007.

June 1998 – Is elected to the new Northern Ireland Assembly.

2011 – Is elected to the Dáil, Ireland’s parliament.

April 30-May 4, 2014 – Adams is held for questioning in connection with the 1972 Irish Republican Army abduction and slaying of Jean McConville, a mother of 10.

May 19, 2015 – Meets Prince Charles. This is the first meeting between a member of the British Royal Family and the leader of Sinn Fein.

May 22, 2015 – Calls the election results making Ireland the first country in the world to legalize same-sex marriage through popular vote, “a huge day for equality.”

September 29, 2015 – Northern Ireland’s Public Prosecution Service confirms that Adams and six others will not be prosecuted in connection with the 1972 murder of Jean McConville.

March 16, 2016 – The Secret Service apologizes for denying Adams entry to a White House reception, blaming the mix-up on an administrative error. Adams was invited to attend St. Patrick’s Day celebrations on March 15, but when he arrived he says staff informed him that there was an issue of security.

November 18, 2017 – During Sinn Fein’s annual meeting in Dublin, Ireland, Adams announces his intention to stand down as president in 2018.

February 10, 2018 – Steps down as president of Sinn Fein.

July 13, 2018 – An explosive device is thrown at Adams’ home in Belfast, and at the home of Bobby Storey, another Sinn Fein leader. An arrest is made on July 17 in connection to the attacks.

October 2018 – “The Negotiator’s Cook Book,” which contains recipes Adam’s calls “the best-kept secrets” behind the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, is published.

October 17, 2019 – A Belfast court dismisses a case against former IRA member Ivor Bell, also clearing Adams of any links to the murder of McConville.

February 2020 – The Guardian reports that Adams is part of Sinn Fein’s government formation negotiating team, according to a leaked brief. His name does not appear on the list of the negotiating team released by the party. This follows Sinn Fein’s win of a number of seats during Ireland’s general election earlier in the month. In his blog, Adams writes the that the party has always had additional advisers.

May 13, 2020 – The United Kingdom’s Supreme Court rules that Adams was unlawfully imprisoned in the 1970s and overturns two convictions against him for trying to escape from prison.

April 28, 2023 – Belfast’s high court rules that Adams was wrongly denied compensation after his convictions were overturned in 2020.

July 4, 2023 – The House of Lords announces amendments to the government’s legacy bill which would deny compensation to Adams and others who were imprisoned without trial in the 1970s.

[ad_2]

Source link

September 29, 2023
The fight for the sacred Black Hills of South Dakota takes center stage in the documentary ‘Lakota Nation vs. United States’ | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Jesse Short Bull grew up a mile from an Indian reservation in South Dakota not realizing the ground he was stepping on was once soaked with the blood of his ancestors.

Less than a century ago, the Indigenous people of the Lakota Dakota Nakota Nation were killed defending themselves from the United States government, which broke a treaty that vowed the sacred lands, including the Black Hills, would belong to the tribes forever.

“I was like any other kid in America. The real history didn’t exist to me. I had no clue, and the truth was never taught to us,” Short Bull, whose Lakota name is Mni Wanca Wicapi (Ocean Star), told CNN. “When I became older, I wanted to understand what happened and why, and I started to fill in all the missing pieces.”

These missing pieces, which led to Short Bull’s revelation of the violent injustices that led to the creation of South Dakota, is the topic of his documentary, “Lakota Nation vs. United States,” which was released Friday.

The documentary, co-produced by actor Mark Ruffalo, is an in-depth and seldom-heard account of American history – a history that begins with the theft of land and the sacrifice of the Indigenous people who refused to surrender it.

“This film is very much a push for land back, for the return of land, there’s no misunderstanding that’s what they’re looking for,” said film co-director Laura Tomaselli.

Woven together by interviews with community leaders and activists, historical footage and racist Hollywood film depictions, the IFC Films documentary is split into three parts: extermination, assimilation and reparations.

“It’s not about being angry, it’s not about being bitter. It’s about a lot of people appreciating this country and its constitution. Not realizing our treaty, which was bound to that constitution, is negated to being an old dusty antique that has no meaning,” Short Bull said. “Nothing exists to them from our country or our land or our people. But to us, it exists. We’re real.”

The documentary, elegantly narrated by Oglala Lakota poet Layli Long Soldier, begins with a string of broken treaties by the federal government.

Within the land legally protected by these treaties are the Black Hills, a holy site described in the film by Milo Yellow Hair, an Oglala Lakota elder and activist, as “our cradle of civilization, the heart of everything that is.”

The Black Hills are a place of emergence, the birthplace of dozens of Indigenous tribes who consider it to be the most sacred place in the world.

“It is one of the oldest places on the Earth, over 5 billion years old,” Yellow Hair said. “So we say from the Black Hills and the Wind Cave is that place, that opening on this mother Earth that breathes.”

When gold was discovered on this land in 1851, war broke out for 17 years, forcing Indigenous leaders to fight gun-holstered soldiers with bows and arrows.

In 1868, in efforts to make peace after consistently losing battles against Indigenous tribes, the US government signed the Treaty of Fort Laramie. The treaty designated millions of acres west of the Missouri River for the absolute and undisturbed use and occupation of the Great Sioux Nation, which encompasses over a dozen tribes.

The treaty says the US government “solemnly agrees that no person, except those herein designated and authorized so to do…shall ever be permitted to pass over, settle upon, or reside in the territory described in this article.”

But it became another broken promise.

In 1980, the US Supreme Court ordered over $100 million to be paid to the Great Sioux Nation because of the broken treaty. But the nation hasn’t taken the money. Since 1980 that original $100 million has accrued interest and grown to more than $2 billion.

But despite the poverty they face, the Great Sioux Nation still refuses the money. Because the land was never for sale.

“We are nothing without the Black Hills, that’s why the Black Hills are not for sale, because we are not for sale,” Sicangu Lakota historian Nick Estes says in the documentary. “How can you sell your very identity of what makes you an Indigenous person?”

The documentary also offers in-depth analysis into forced assimilation tactics deployed by the US government to weaken Lakota Dakota Nakota tribes who were still fighting back. One method was killing off their buffalo and depleting their resources, so they began to starve and had no choice but to depend on the government, according to the film.

Another method was taking away their children and enrolling them in boarding schools, stripping them of their Indigenous names and clothing, banning them from speaking their languages and forcing them to cut their hair. If they resisted, they were punished, often violently.

With the intention of conquering their people by destroying their culture, says Oglala Lakota activist Nick Tilsen, “they outlawed our language, they made our ceremonies illegal, they criminalized us for living our way of life.”

After premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival in June 2022, “Lakota Nation vs. United States” has played on the screens at Indigenous reservations where the tragic story takes place.

At Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, nearly 200 people, including elders who still carry stories of dark days, attended the screening, and many were in tears, says Hunkpapa Lakota elder Cedric Good House.

“We were impressed with Jesse and everybody else because it took real bravery to do this, a lot of courage,” Good House told CNN. “It’s coming at a time when people think they can know it all in a matter of a minute. They’ll read a little clip on Facebook and that’s it.”

“But here is this lengthy documentary and people are getting captivated by the truth, and after they finish watching they can see this is still applicable to us today. We can point it out for them,” he continued. “Look what’s happening today here and here and here, we are still fighting.”

The Standing Rock Sioux have been recently entangled in another battle against the federal government, mainly the US Army Corps of Engineers, the agency responsible for approving the Dakota Access Pipeline.

A violation of the Treaty of Fort Laramie, the pipeline is a 1,172-mile underground conduit that would transport some 470,000 barrels of crude oil a day – stretching across North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois.

The Standing Rock Sioux, whose reservation resides near where the pipeline runs, say it will not only endanger their main source of drinking water – the Missouri River – but also their sacred tribal grounds.

“This movie is about our history, but here in the present we see nothing has changed,” Good House said. “This is our sacred land, and we try to get ourselves into the process, but the process still doesn’t address us.”

In a desperate fight to protect their land and Unci Maka, or Mother Earth, Native tribal members alongside non-Indigenous allies and environmentalists demonstrated for years against the construction of the oil pipeline until they were forcibly removed from the protest site in 2017.

“We’re not here to chase people off land. We’re not here to take over their farms and ranches and start charging people for crossing our territory,” Good House said. “We are protecting this Earth, we’re not here to do what the government has done to us.”

In the land where ceremonies were once held and their ancestors bones now lay, Indigenous holy sites are still being exploited for profit, elders and activists say in the film.

After killing those who attempted to protect it, the US government has turned stolen land into tourist attractions, Short Bull says, making money off the ongoing pain and suffering of Lakota Dakota Nakota tribes.

Deep in the Black Hills stands a mountain known as the Six Grandfathers, or Tȟuŋkášila Šákpe, whose peaks were blown up to carve the faces of four presidents – now known as the Mount Rushmore National Memorial.

“Mount Rushmore represents and is the ultimate shrine to White supremacy,” activist Krystal Two Bulls of the Northern Cheyenne and Oglala Lakota says in the film. “Our sacred mountain, the Six Grandfathers, of course they carved four racist White men into our sacred mountain, who believed in slavery, who actually removed us from our lands.”

Today the children of the Indigenous leaders who died to preserve whatever land they could continue their ancestors’ purpose: demanding their land back.

And as the world suffers a climate crisis where Indigenous traditions, like controlled burning, are now being used to fight it, “it’s a no brainer” to return the land to those who can actually care for it, says Tomaselli, the film’s co-director.

“If you are a non Indigenous person and you’re concerned about the climate, it should be obvious to throw all of your energy behind people that were living here before any of our ancestors showed up, tribes who have been taking care of this environment better than anyone has before,” Tomaselli said.

As calamities happen around them for the sake of money, Short Bull says – gold mining, coal mining, the pipeline development, deforestation – the Indigenous people living there still have no say.

But with their demand for land back comes a warning.

“I want people to remember that there is bloodshed on Earth and our relatives’ blood is on this ground,” Short Bull said. “This planet was not created for you to just take, take, take. The Earth is an extension of you, and if you’re not going to take care of it, disaster is coming.”

[ad_2]

Source link

July 16, 2023
Hundreds of rockets fired at Israel amid deadly IDF airstrikes in Gaza | CNN

[ad_1]

Gaza and Jerusalem
CNN
—

Israel’s army and Palestinian militants exchanged heavy cross-border fire on Wednesday, with hundreds of rockets launched from Gaza towards Israel after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) carried out deadly strikes on what it says are Islamic Jihad organization targets along the strip.

The latest violence came after Israeli military airstrikes earlier in the week killed three leaders of the Palestinian militant group and 10 other Palestinian men, women and children in Gaza and led to threats of retaliation.

In a new update early Thursday, the IDF said it had targeted another Islamic Jihad commander who was a “central figure” in the Palestinian militant group.

“We just targeted Ali Ghali, the commander of Islamic Jihad’s Rocket Launching Force, as well as two other Islamic Jihad operatives in Gaza,” the IDF said in a tweet, adding that Ghali was “responsible for the recent rocket barrages launched against Israel.”

Israel has been bombarding the Islamic Jihad’s operatives and infrastructure, using unmanned drones for surveillance as it monitors militant preparations to propel rockets, IDF chief spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said Wednesday.

At least six Palestinians were killed in Wednesday’s airstrikes, the Ministry of Health in Gaza said, revising down its earlier count.

Hamas, the Palestinian militant movement that runs Gaza, issued a statement Wednesday strongly suggesting that its forces were releasing rockets towards Israel, shortly after the IDF said firmly it believed Hamas was not doing so.

“The Palestinian resistance with all its factions, led by the Nasser Salah al-Din Brigades, is participating now in a unified manner by teaching the enemy a lesson that it will not forget and confirming that Palestinian blood is not cheap,” said the statement, issued by Muhammad al-Buraim, an official in the joint resistance committees in Palestine.

The statement appeared designed to reject an assertion by IDF chief spokesman Hagari that the IDF saw only Islamic Jihad, not Hamas, firing rockets.

Nearly 500 rockets were fired from Gaza towards Israel in the recent barrage, according to the IDF, as of 9:30 p.m. local time. Of those, 153 were intercepted by Israeli missile defenses and 107 fell short, landing in Gaza.

The IDF said fighter jets and helicopters targeted over 40 rocket and mortar shells launchers belonging to Islamic Jihad terrorist across the Gaza Strip, adding that it is continuing to target launchers and additional posts belonging to the militant organization.

Civilians in Israel have been asked to act according to the special instructions posted on the National Emergency Portal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top officials Wednesday downplayed the idea that a ceasefire with Islamic Jihad was imminent, with Netanyahu saying: “The campaign is not over yet.”

National Security Council chair Tzachi Hanegbi said that rumors of a ceasefire were “premature,” while Defense Minister Yoav Gallant struck a slightly more optimistic note, saying: “I hope we’ll bring it to an end soon, but we’re ready for the option that it will be prolonged.”

Over half a million Israelis were in or near shelters, the IDF spokesman Hagari said just after 2 p.m. local time (7 a.m. ET) on Wednesday.

International leaders have condemned the hostilities. The United Nations Secretary-General urged all parties to exercise “maximum restraint” over the escalation of violence in Gaza, a statement by Farhan Haq, deputy spokesperson for the Secretary-General, said on Wednesday.

“The Secretary General condemns the civilian loss of life, including that of children and women, which he views as unacceptable and must stop immediately,” the statement said.

“Israel must abide by its obligations under international humanitarian law, including the proportional use of force and taking all feasible precautions to spare civilians and civilian objects in the conduct of military operations. “

The statement continued to say the Secretary-General also condemns the “indiscriminate launch” of rockets from Gaza into Israel, adding it “violates international humanitarian law and puts at risk both Palestinian and Israeli civilians.”

Qatar has been engaged in “intensive and continuous calls” to stop Israel’s “brutal aggression” on the Gaza Strip to avoid “more losses,” the spokesperson for Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Majed Al-Ansari said in a statement on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Egyptian state-affiliated XtraNews said there are “intensive efforts” to reach a ceasefire in Gaza, citing Egyptian sources, without clarifying which parties have been communicated with. The news was carried on Egyptian state newspaper’s Al Ahram’s online website.

Hamas said in a statement that the head of its political bureau, Ismail Haniya, spoke with officials from Egypt, Qatar and the UN.

The Ministry of Health in Gaza said one person was killed in Wednesday’s attack. It named him as Muhammad Yusuf Saleh Abu Ta’ima, 25, and said he was killed in the bombing east of Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip.

A CNN producer in Gaza reported explosions in Khan Younis, Rafah and northern Gaza.

Shortly after, he saw at least six rockets fired from Gaza towards Israel. Sirens warning of incoming rockets sounded in the southern Israeli cities of Sderot and Ashkelon and the Lachish area, all near the Gaza Strip, the Israel Defense Forces said. Sirens later sounded in Tel Aviv, Israel’s main city on the Mediterranean coast, warning of potential incoming rocket fire.

Several locations in Israel suffered direct hits by rockets from Gaza, authorities said, but there were no immediate reports of casualties. A rocket landed near buildings and caused extensive damage in Ashkelon, pictures distributed by Israel Fire & Rescue Authority showed. A building in Kibbutz Nir Am also was hit, and a rocket landed in the garden of a house in Sderot.

One of the three Islamic Jihad commanders killed on Tuesday was working on capabilities to launch rockets from the West Bank toward Israel, IDF chief spokesman Hagari said at the time.

Rockets have never been fired from the West Bank into Israel.

Islamic Jihad confirmed three of its commanders were killed in the overnight operation along with their wives and children.

The commanders killed were Jihad Shaker Al-Ghannam, secretary of the Military Council in the al Quds Brigades; Khalil Salah al Bahtini, commander of the Northern Region in the al Quds Brigades; and Ezzedine, one of the leaders of the military wing of the al Quds Brigades in the West Bank, the group said.

Hagari said the operation had been planned since last Tuesday, when Islamic Jihad fired more than 100 rockets toward Israel following the death of its former spokesman while on hunger strike in an Israeli prison.

But, the IDF did not have the “operational conditions” until overnight Tuesday.

The IDF launched a further strike on Tuesday, saying its air force targeted “a terrorist squad” belonging to Islamic Jihad in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip.

The Palestinian ministry of health in Gaza said two people were killed and two others injured in that attack east of Khan Younis, although they have yet to identify them, bringing the death toll in Gaza to 15 on Tuesday.

Gaza is one of the most densely packed places in the world, an isolated coastal enclave of almost two million people crammed into 140 square miles.

Governed by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, the territory is largely cut off from the rest of the world by an Israeli blockade of Gaza’s land, air and sea dating back to 2007. Egypt controls Gaza’s southern border crossing, Rafah.

Israel has placed heavy restrictions on the freedom of civilian movement and controls the importation of basic goods into the narrow coastal strip.

[ad_2]

Source link

May 10, 2023
3-day Sudan ceasefire announced by US Secretary of State | CNN Politics

[ad_1]

CNN
—

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday announced that the warring factions in Sudan agreed to a a ceasefire, “starting at midnight on April 24, to last for 72 hours.”

The agreement between the Sudanese Armed Forces, or SAF, and the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, came “following intense negotiation over the past 48 hours,” Blinken said.

“The United States urges the SAF and RSF to immediately and fully uphold the ceasefire,” Blinken said. “To support a durable end to the fighting, the United States will coordinate with regional and international partners, and Sudanese civilian stakeholders, to assist in the creation of a committee to oversee the negotiation, conclusion, and implementation of a permanent cessation of hostilities and humanitarian arrangements in Sudan.”

In a written statement Monday, the RSF said it had agreed to the truce “in order to open humanitarian corridors, facilitate the movement of citizens and residents, enable them to fulfill their needs, reach hospitals and safe areas, and evacuate diplomatic missions.”

Previously agreed ceasefires have broken down, although brief lulls in the fighting have allowed foreign civilians to evacuate Sudan to safety.

If the new three-day cessation of fighting holds, it could create an opportunity to get much-needed critical resources like food and medical supplies to those in need.

It could also allow for the safe passage of the “dozens” of Americans who Blinken said have expressed interest in leaving Sudan.

Although a number of nations are evacuating their citizens, US officials have repeatedly said they do not plan to evacuate Americans from the country due to conditions on the ground.

National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told CNN’s “This Morning” Monday the situation in Sudan “is not conducive and not safe to try to conduct some kind of a larger military evacuation of American citizens.”

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Monday, however, that the US government is “actively facilitating the departure of American citizens who want to leave Sudan” through means like overland convoys.

All US government employees were evacuated from Khartoum in a US military operation and the US embassy was “temporarily” closed this weekend after a week of heavy fighting between rival military factions which has left hundreds dead and thousands wounded.

President Joe Biden has asked for “every conceivable option” to help Americans who remain in Sudan, Sullivan said.

“Right now, we believe that the best way for us to help facilitate people’s departure is in fact to support this land evacuation route, as well as work with allies and partners who are working on their own evacuation plans as well,” he said at a White House briefing.

Blinken, who noted that the US does not have specific counts of how many Americans are in Sudan “because Americans are not required to register” with the US State Department, said the US has been in touch with American citizens on the ground to provide “consular services, other services, advice.”

“We do know of course the number of Americans who have registered with us, and with whom we’re in very active touch, communication. Of those, I would say some dozens have expressed an interest in leaving,” Blinken said at a news conference at the State Department.

“In just the last 36 hours since the embassy evacuation was completed, we’ve continued to be in close communication with US citizens and individuals affiliated with the US government to provide assistance and facilitate available departure routes for those seeking to move to safety via land, air and sea,” said Blinken, noting that included American citizens “traveling overland in the UN convoy from Khartoum to Port Sudan.”

“We’re also deploying naval assets to Port Sudan in the Red Sea in case Americans who get out to Port Sudan want to be transported elsewhere or need any kind of care,” he added.

Sullivan said the US has “deployed US intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets to support land evacuation routes, which Americans are using, and we’re moving naval assets within the region to provide support.”

“American citizens have begun arriving in Port Sudan and we are helping to facilitate their onward travel,” he said.

Officials told congressional staffers last week that there could be an estimated 16,000 American citizens in Sudan, most of whom are dual nationals.

Both Blinken and Kirby echoed this on Monday and suggested that many of those dual nationals “don’t want to leave” the country.

“We think the vast majority of these American citizens in Sudan, and they’re not all in Khartoum, are dual nationals – these are people who grew up in Sudan, who have families, their work, their businesses there, who don’t want to leave,” he said.

In the days leading up to the evacuation, officials in Washington and the US Embassy in Khartoum repeatedly stressed that they did not envision carrying out a government-coordinated evacuation of American citizens due to the lack of an operational airport and the ongoing fighting on the ground.

Still, there are worries about how to get Americans who wish to depart out of Sudan safely, especially now that the US does not have a diplomatic presence there. Although the US State Department warned US citizens against traveling to Sudan, some Americans with loved ones in the country suggested that the government had not done enough to advise Americans already in the country to leave.

Some countries have already successfully carried out evacuations, including Spain, Jordan, Italy, France, Denmark and Germany, while the United Kingdom has evacuated embassy staff. Several of their convoys also carried citizens from other countries.

Saudi Arabia evacuated 10 Saudi nationals and 189 foreigners including Americans from Sudan, the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Twitter Monday.

More evacuations are still being planned or are underway for the countries like China and India.

There is immense concern about the safety of those who still remain in the country, regardless of their nationality, given the ongoing violence and its impact on critical resources like food, water and medical care. Internet connectivity has also been unreliable, leaving family members and friends outside of Sudan to worry if their loved ones are safe.

The US government typically does not facilitate evacuations for regular citizens, and the US withdrawal from Afghanistan presented a rare – and chaotic – exception to that norm. Although the Biden administration has sought to avoid comparisons to that event, “Kabul casts a very long shadow over Khartoum,” in the words of one former official.

Rebecca Winter, whose sister and 18-month-old niece are in Sudan, told CNN that they are in an “awful holding pattern” because her sister “has been told by both the US embassy and the international school that she works for that she has to shelter in place, and that she should not accept any offers for private evacuation.”

“So she is just stuck waiting right now in fear,” she said.

Although the US State Department warned Americans against traveling to Sudan, Winter said that according to her sister, “US employees there were not asked to leave the country.”

Fatima Elsheikh, whose two brothers are in Sudan, also pushed back on the claim that US citizens who were already on the ground were warned before the outbreak of violence.

“It makes me upset, because there was no warning. I don’t, I think it’s being painted as a country that’s been war-torn for a while, which isn’t true. This is unprecedented, what’s happening,” she said.

The State Department travel advisory for Sudan prior to the outbreak of violence did not specifically tell Americans already in the country to leave, but advised them to “have evacuation plans that do not rely on U.S. government assistance” and “have a personal emergency action plan that does not rely on U.S. government assistance.”

Blinken said Monday that the effort to assist Americans will “be an ongoing process.” He said the US is looking at resuming its diplomatic presence in Sudan, including in Port Sudan, but “that’s going to be entirely dependent on the conditions in Sudan.”

Kirby said Monday morning that the violence in Sudan “is increasing,” and urged Americans remaining in the country to shelter in place.

“It’s more dangerous today than it was just yesterday, the day before, and so, the best advice we can give to those Americans who did not abide by our warnings to leave Sudan and not to travel to Sudan is to stay sheltered in place,” Kirby told CNN’s Don Lemon.

Blinken said that “some of the convoys that have tried to move people out” of Khartoum “have encountered problems, including robbery, looting, that kind of thing,” but did not specify whether those convoys were carrying US citizens.

[ad_2]

Source link

April 24, 2023
Sudan’s paramilitary RSF announces 72-hour ceasefire ahead of Muslim holiday | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

One of Sudan’s two warring factions has declared a 72-hour truce after nearly a week of fierce fighting, which has left more than 330 people dead and pushed tens of thousands of refugees to flee the country.

The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) announced the ceasefire in a statement on Twitter early Friday morning local time. The ceasefire is due to begin at 6 a.m., the statement added.

The ceasefire comes just ahead of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

“The truce coincides with the blessed Eid al-Fitr … to open humanitarian corridors to evacuate citizens and give them the opportunity to greet their families,” the RSF said.

However it is not yet clear whether the announcement will bring fighting to a halt. The rival Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) have yet to comment on the announcement.

World leaders and international organizations have been urging the RSF and SAF to strike a deal since clashes began on Saturday – but several temporary ceasefires have repeatedly broken down, with both sides trading blame for violating the terms.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke to the heads of both factions earlier this week, and again on Thursday to urge a ceasefire through at least the end of the Eid weekend.

UN Secretary General António Guterres also called for a ceasefire on Thursday “for at least three days marking the Eid al Fitr celebrations to allow civilians trapped in conflict zones to escape and to seek medical treatment, food and other essential supplies.”

The pleas for a ceasefire have grown more urgent in recent days as the death toll climbs. Most hospitals in the capital Khartoum are out of operation, with many having come under attack by shelling; meanwhile, those still operating are rapidly running out of supplies to treat survivors.

Residents have been stranded at home and in shelters without food or water, surrounded by the threat of gunfire and artillery outside.

The fighting could force millions into hunger, the World Food Program (WFP) warned on Thursday.

“Record numbers of people were already facing hunger in Sudan before the conflict erupted on April 15,” it said in a statement, adding that the fighting was preventing the organization from delivering emergency food to civilians.

The ceasefire could provide a crucial window not just for aid distribution and medical care – but for foreign governments to reach their citizens stranded in Sudan.

The US Defense Department said on Thursday it was deploying “additional capabilities” nearby Sudan to secure the US Embassy in the country and assist with a potential evacuation, if the situation calls for it. It includes hundreds of Marines who are already in nearby Djibouti, a US defense official told CNN, with aircraft capable of bringing in ground units to secure an embassy.

US President Joe Biden had “authorized the military to move forward with pre-positioning forces and to develop options in case – and I want to stress right now – in case there’s a need for an evacuation,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Thursday.

Officials told staffers Wednesday that there are an estimated 16,000 American citizens in Sudan, most of whom are dual nationals. Roughly 500 had contacted the US Embassy since the outbreak of fighting, though only around 50 of those people had asked for help, according to the staffers.

Some countries have already begun the evacuation process, with Japan announcing it would send its Self-Defense Forces to evacuate 60 Japanese nationals, including embassy staff, from Sudan.

Sudan’s army also said Thursday that 177 Egyptian soldiers who had been trapped in the country were evacuated and safely returned to Egypt.

Local residents, too, are fleeing the country in huge numbers. Eyewitnesses in Khartoum describe growing lines of people at bus stops, hoping to escape the fighting. And up to 20,000 refugees from Sudan’s Darfur region have fled to neighboring Chad in recent days, according to a statement from the UN Refugee Agency.

[ad_2]

Source link

April 20, 2023
‘We left behind children in incubators:’ Witnesses describe hospital shelled in Sudan’s clashes | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

As fighting between warring factions has engulfed Sudan in recent days, hospitals treating people wounded in clashes have themselves become the targets for attacks, dealing the nation’s healthcare sector a devastating blow.

In one episode, five eyewitnesses told CNN that the paramilitary group battling Sudan’s military for control of the country besieged and shelled a hospital in the capital Khartoum on Sunday, leaving at least one child dead and sending panicked medical staff fleeing for their lives.

The leaders of the opposing sides, Sudan’s military leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy and paramilitary chief Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, have traded blame for instigating the fighting that has spread across the country since Saturday. Burhan has accused Dagalo of staging an “attempted coup”; Dagolo has in turn called Burhan a “criminal.”

But at al-Moallem hospital in central Khartoum, where intense shelling forced staffers to evacuate, leaving some patients behind, witnesses said they have little doubt about what happened.

“I have no doubt that they deliberately targeted the hospital,” said one medic who evacuated the hospital on Sunday after Dagalo’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) laid siege to it. CNN is not using any of the real names of the hospital medics in this article for safety reasons.

The hospital is meters away from Sudan’s army headquarters, which the RSF has made repeated attempts to take over. Medics said it was treating scores of wounded army soldiers and their families. The hospital’s maternity ward was struck in the shelling, causing a wall there to collapse, according to hospital employees.

A 6-year-old child died in the building, one medic said. Two other children were seriously wounded. As the shelling intensified, medics and patients huddled together in the corridor and prayed.

At first we were praying for salvation,” the medic said. “Then when the shelling got worse, we started to discuss what would be the most painless part of the body to be shot in and began to pray instead to die painlessly.”

It’s unclear whether the RSF has taken control of the hospital as it attempts to take over the nearby army headquarters, a flashpoint in Khartoum’s violence.

“The evacuation was chaos,” the medic said. “I thought I was going to vomit. I was stumbling and falling on the ground.”

“Can you believe that we left the hospital and left behind children in incubators and patients in intensive care without any medical personnel,” another medic said. “The smell of death was everywhere.”

“There was no electricity, no water there inside the hospital,” said a third medic. “None of our equipment was working, a woman sheltering with us had a two-day-old baby. I don’t even know what happened to her.”

At least half a dozen hospitals have been struck by both warring sides, according to Sudan’s Doctors Trade Union.

“Sudan’s hospitals under fire,” the Central Committee of Sudan doctors said in a statement on its Facebook page, warning of the potential collapse of the health sector if clashes continue.

“Most of the large and specialized hospitals are out of service as a result of being forcibly evacuated by the conflicting military forces or being targeted by bombing and others. Some other hospitals have been cut off from human and medical supplies, water and electricity,” the committee said.

Doctors Without Borders said its teams were “trapped by the ongoing heavy fighting and are unable to access warehouses to deliver vital medical supplies to hospitals,” and that its premises in Nyala, South Sarfur, had been looted.

Food, water and power shortages are rampant as Sudan has endured a third day of fighting, that has spread from Khartoum across the nation.

“Food in the fridge and freezers have gone bad,” Eman Abu Garjah, a Sudanese-British doctor based in Khartoum, told CNN. “We don’t have any supplies at the moment, that’s why we’re trying to go somewhere where the shops are open.”

“The planes were flying overhead earlier in the day. They didn’t just wake us up, they prevented us from going back to sleep,” she said.

“It’s Ramadan, we’re up for early morning prayers and after that usually you have a little bit of a siesta and wake up again for the afternoon prayers. But sleep was just not possible. The house was rattling and the windows were shaking.”

Until recently, Dagalo and Burhan were allies. The pair worked together to topple ousted Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir in 2019 and played a pivotal role in the military coup in 2021.

However, tensions arose during recent negotiations to integrate the RSF into the country’s military as part of plans to restore civilian rule.

In an interview with CNN on Monday, Burhan accused Dagalo of attempting to “capture and kill” him during an attempt by the paramilitary leader to seize the presidential palace.

In response to the allegation, an RSF spokesperson called Burhan, “a wanted fugitive.”

“We are seeking to capture him and bringing him to justice. We are fighting for all Sudanese people,” the RSF spokesperson said.

Burhan also accused the RSF of breaking a proposed ceasefire on Sunday and Monday.

“Yesterday and today a humanitarian ceasefire proposal was put forward and agreed upon,” said Burhan from army headquarters, as gunshots rang out in the background.

“Sadly, he did not abide by (the ceasefire),” he added. “You can hear right now the attempts to storm the Army headquarters, and indiscriminate mortar attacks. He’s using the humanitarian pause to continue the fight.”

The RSF denies that it broke ceasefire.

It is unclear how much control the RSF has wrested from the country’s military. Dagalo claims he now controls the country’s main military sites, a claim repeatedly disputed by Burhan.

“We’re under attack from all directions,” Dagalo told CNN’s Larry Madowo in a telephone interview on Sunday. “We stopped fighting and the other side did not, which put us in a predicament and we had to keep fighting to defend ourselves,” he claimed.

The RSF is the preeminent paramilitary group in Sudan, whose leader, Dagalo, has enjoyed a rapid rise to power.

During Sudan’s Darfur conflict, starting in the early 2000s, he was the leader of Sudan’s notorious Janjaweed forces, implicated in human rights violations and atrocities.

An international outcry saw ex-President Bashir formalize the group into paramilitary forces known as the Border Intelligence Units.

In 2007, its troops became part of the country’s intelligence services and, in 2013, Bashir created the RSF, a paramilitary group overseen by him and led by Dagalo. Dagalo turned against Bashir in 2019.

Months before the coup that unseated Bashir in April 2019, Dagalo’s forces opened fire on an anti-Bashir, pro-democracy sit-in in Khartoum, killing at least 118 people.

He was later appointed deputy of the transitional Sovereign Council that ruled Sudan in partnership with civilian leadership.

International powers have expressed alarm at the current violence in Sudan. Apart from concerns over civilians there are likely other motivations at play, the country is resource-rich and strategically located. CNN has previously reported on how Russia has colluded with its military leaders to smuggle gold out of Sudan.

[ad_2]

Source link

April 18, 2023
Students trapped, hospitals shelled and diplomats assaulted as Sudan fighting intensifies | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

For more than three days, students at the University of Khartoum have been trapped inside campus buildings as artillery and gunfire rain down around them in Sudan’s capital.

Fierce fighting between the country’s army and a paramilitary group has spread across the nation since erupting Saturday – but the university area is a particular hotspot due to its proximity to the General Command of the Armed Forces, with warplanes hovering overhead and nearby buildings destroyed by fire.

“It is scary that our country will turn into a battlefield overnight,” said 23-year-old Al-Muzaffar Farouk, one of 89 students, faculty members and staff sheltering inside the university library.

Food and water are running low, but leaving is not an option – one student has already been killed by gunfire outside. Khalid Abdulmun’em had been trying to run to the library from a nearby building when he was struck, said Farouk.

The students retrieved his body and brought it inside “despite the bullets that were falling on us,” he added.

The university confirmed Abdulmun’em’s death in a Facebook post, saying he had been shot in the campus’ surroundings. In a separate post on Monday, the university urged humanitarian organizations to help evacuate dozens of people stranded on campus.

Khartoum has been wracked by violence and chaos in a bloody tussle for power between Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, Sudan’s military leader, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, head of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

The two leaders have traded blame for instigating the fighting and breaking temporary ceasefires. Meanwhile, civilians are paying the price, with at least 180 people killed and 1,800 others injured, according to UN officials on Monday.

“I can see outside smoke rising from buildings. And I can hear from my residence blasts, heavy gunfire from outside. The streets are totally empty,” said Red Cross staffer Germain Mwehu from Khartoum.

“In the building where I stay, I saw families with children, children crying when there are airstrikes, children horrified,” Mwehu said, adding that people had little to no access to food or medicine given the fierce fighting outside.

Children are among those killed; a 6-year-old child died on Monday after the RSF shelled a hospital in Khartoum and damaged a maternity ward. Medics were forced to evacuate, leaving patients behind – some just newborns in incubators.

At least half a dozen hospitals have been struck by both warring sides, according to Sudan’s Doctors Trade Union.

Even diplomats and humanitarian workers have been targeted.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed there was an attack on a US diplomatic convoy on Monday.

“Yesterday, we had an American diplomatic convoy that was fired on. All of our people are safe, but this the action was reckless, it was irresponsible and, of course, unsafe,” Blinken said in a press conference on Tuesday.

The European Union ambassador to Sudan was also assaulted in his residency on Monday, though he is now doing fine, according to a spokesperson for the EU’s top diplomat.

And three workers from the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) were killed in the western region of Darfur, prompting the WFP to temporarily halt all services in the country.

In statements early Tuesday morning, the two rival factions pointed fingers at each other.

The RSF accused the army of conducting airstrikes on residential neighborhoods and of attacking the EU ambassador’s headquarters in Khartoum; meanwhile, the army accused the RSF of targeting the ambassador’s residency, and of targeting the WFP’s headquarters in Darfur.

The UN and various foreign leaders have called for peace, with Blinken speaking separately with Burhan and Dagalo on Tuesday.

Blinken “expressed his grave concern about the death and injury of so many Sudanese civilians,” and argued a ceasefire was necessary to deliver aid, reunify separated families, and ensure the safety of diplomatic and humanitarian staff, according to a readout from the US State Department.

In his own statement, Dagalo said the RSF “will have another call” to continue dialogue. Burhan’s office also confirmed he had spoken with Blinken about the critical situation in Sudan.

The foreign ministers of G7 nations, comprised of some of the world’s largest economies, urged the factions to “end hostilities immediately” in their joint statement from Japan on Tuesday.

Volker Perthes, the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative for Sudan, said on Monday the organization has been trying to convince the two rival parties to “hold the fire” for a period of time, and asked them to protect embassies, UN offices, humanitarian and medical facilities.

Both sides had agreed to a three-hour ceasefire on Sunday, and again on Monday, with fighting resuming afterward, Perthes said.

But both Burhan and Dagalo have since accused the other of breaking that ceasefire.

When CNN spoke to Burhan on Monday afternoon, the sound of gunshots rang out in the background despite the supposed ceasefire – and Burhan claimed Dagalo had violated it for the second day.

A spokesperson for the RSF rebutted the accusation, claiming that they had been trying to abide by the ceasefire, but “they keep firing which leaves no choice” but for the RSF to “defend itself by firing back.”

[ad_2]

Source link

April 17, 2023
Biden touts dividends of peace in Belfast, even as tensions persist | CNN Politics

[ad_1]

Belfast, Northern Ireland
CNN
—

When President Joe Biden spoke here Wednesday to mark a quarter-century of the Good Friday Agreement, it wasn’t from the seat of the Northern Ireland Assembly – currently suspended over a Brexit trade dispute – but from a new university campus downtown.

The choice of venue for Biden’s sole public event in Belfast was a symbolic one. While decades of violence between Nationalists and Unionists has been mostly left to another era, the peace is fragile and the politics are broken – making Biden’s speech to students as much about the future of this region as its bloody past.

Biden’s optimistic speech did not paper over tensions that persist 25 years after the Good Friday Agreement was signed. He made a direct call for the parties in Northern Ireland to return to the power-sharing government – between those who want to remain part of the United Kingdom and those who favor a united Ireland – that was a central pillar of the Good Friday Agreement. And he even harkened back to the Capitol insurrection on January 6, 2021, as evidence that democratic institutions require constant maintenance.

“We learn anew with every generation a democracy needs champions,” he said, adding later: “As a friend, I hope it’s not too presumptuous of me to say that I believe democratic institutions established in the Good Friday Agreement remain critical for the future of Northern Ireland.”

“That’s a judgment for you to make, not me,” he said, “but I hope it happens.”

Nearly immediately after the president concluded his speech, a key player in the paralyzed power-sharing government downplayed the impact Biden’s speech might have on the situation.

“It doesn’t change the political dynamic in Northern Ireland,” said Jeffrey Donaldson, leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, which withdrew from the government in dispute of Brexit trade rules. “We know what needs to happen.”

Departing Washington on Tuesday, Biden described the goal of his brief 15-hour visit to Northern Ireland bluntly: ensuring the US-brokered accord remains in place.

“Keep the peace, that’s the main thing,” he said before boarding Air Force One. “Keep your fingers crossed.”

Biden’s frank outlook was a reflection of the lingering tensions in this once-restive region.

While Biden was invited to speak from Stormont, the stately parliament building overlooking Belfast, he turned down the offer while the power-sharing arrangement remains mired in dysfunction. The regional government has operated only sporadically since it was formed and hasn’t been in place for more than a year as the main unionist party resists new Brexit-related trade rules.

Both Biden and the British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak had once hoped those differences might be resolved by the time of Biden’s visit this week. But they weren’t, leaving one of the primary ambitions of the Good Friday Agreement unfulfilled at just the moment the accord is being celebrated.

Biden’s aides worked around the disappointment by scheduling his speech at the new campus of Ulster University in Belfast, which cost millions of pounds to construct and can accommodate thousands of students – most of whom were born after the Good Friday Agreement was signed.

“The idea to have a glass building here when I was here in ’91 was highly unlikely,” Biden said as he opened his speech, recalling the violent era before the accord known as The Troubles, when car bombs and assassinations became part of everyday life in Belfast.

“Where barbed wire once sliced up the city, today we find a cathedral of learning, built of glass to let the light shine in and out. It just has a profound impact,” he said. “And for someone who’s come back to see it, you know it’s an incredible testament to the power and the possibilities of peace.”

He cast the 1998 agreement, brokered with heavy involvement from the United States, as a rare glimmer of bipartisanship in Washington.

“Protecting the peace, preserving the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement is a priority for Democrats and Republicans alike in the United States,” he said. “And that is unusual today. Because we’ve been very divided on our parties. This is something that brings Washington together. It brings America together.”

For some students in Biden’s audience, the violence from The Troubles isn’t even a distant memory, since they weren’t around to experience it first-hand. Instead, it is economic opportunity that appears top of mind, particularly as Britain’s exit from the European Union complicates trade relations in the region.

Biden focused in part on the economy in his speech, and has appointed a special envoy to Northern Ireland, former US Rep. Joe Kennedy III, to focus mainly on cultivating foreign investment in the territory. Under a new agreement between the UK and the EU, Northern Ireland will essentially remain part of the EU common market, potentially making it more attractive for businesses.

“Peace and economic opportunity go together,” Biden said during his remarks, predicting scores of American businesses were ready to invest in Northern Ireland.

Ahead of the speech, Biden sat for brief talks over coffee with Sunak, though won’t participate in any major public events with him while he’s here. Biden is also not attending next month’s coronation of King Charles III in London, leading some to identify a generally negative attitude toward the United Kingdom (The White House denies this, and points out no president has ever attended a British monarch’s coronation).

On Wednesday, Biden also met separately with the leaders of the five parties that make up Northern Ireland’s power-sharing government, during which he stressed the importance of resuming the arrangement as part of the Good Friday Agreement’s legacy.

“I’m going to listen,” Biden said when asked about his message for the leaders.

It remains to be seen how successful he will be, however, and some Loyalists have quietly questioned how evenhanded the proudly Irish-American president can be when it comes to matters relating to his beloved ancestral homeland.

That includes the former leader of the Democratic Unionist Party Arlene Foster, who previously served as the first minister of Northern Ireland. She told the local radio earlier that Biden “hates the United Kingdom,” a charge later rejected by senior US officials.

“I think the track record of the president shows that he’s not anti-British,” said Amanda Sloat, the senior director for Europe at the National Security Council. “The president has been very actively engaged throughout his career, dating back to when he was a senator, in the peace process in Northern Ireland.”

Biden himself seemed to make an attempt at rebutting the criticism himself in his speech, referencing not his well-known Irish roots in his speech but his English ancestors.

Biden’s speech was the only public event on his schedule in Belfast before he departed for Dublin in the Republic of Ireland later Wednesday afternoon. The second leg of his trip – with stops in two ancestral hometowns and a visit to the Knock Shrine – promises to be more personal, and less politically fraught, than his brief stop in Belfast.

That begins later Wednesday, when Biden will travel to County Louth in search of his family roots. The region along the border with Northern Ireland was where Biden’s great-great-great-grandfather, Owen Finnegan, was born in 1818.

When he tours the Carlingford Castle, Biden will be able to peer out from its tower to Newry, in the North, where Owen Finnegan set out in 1849 for his journey to the US aboard a ship called the Marchioness of Bute.

This story and headline have been updated with additional details.

[ad_2]

Source link

April 12, 2023
Biden’s trip to Ireland is part homecoming, part diplomacy and part politics | CNN Politics

[ad_1]

Belfast, Northern Ireland
CNN
—

When President Joe Biden was isolating with Covid in the White House last summer, atop the stack of books on his desk was a 320-page paperback: “JFK in Ireland.”

The last Irish Catholic president visited his ancestral homeland in 1963, five months before his assassination. He told his aides afterwards it was the “best four days of my life.”

Sixty years later, the current Irish Catholic president (Secret Service codename: Celtic) departs Tuesday for his own visit bound to make a similar impression – first to Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, and then onto Ireland from Wednesday through Saturday.

Part homecoming, part statecraft and part politics, this week’s trip amounts to a timely intersection of Biden’s deeply felt personal history with his ingrained view of American foreign policy as a force for enduring good.

Departing Washington on Tuesday, Biden described his goal as “making sure the Irish accords and the Windsor Agreement stay in place – keep the peace.”

“Keep your fingers crossed,” he told reporters before boarding Air Force One.

The visit is timed to commemorate the 1998 signing of the Good Friday Agreement, which ended decades of sectarian bloodshed in Northern Ireland known as The Troubles. The agreement came about with significant American investment, particularly from Democrats like Bill Clinton and Sen. George Mitchell, a legacy Biden is eager to highlight when he stops in Belfast starting Tuesday.

But it will be his personal engagements in the Republic of Ireland later in the week, including stops in County Louth and County Mayo to explore his family roots, that will best capture what Biden himself has described as perhaps his single most defining trait.

“As many of you know, I, like all of you, take pride in my Irish ancestry,” he said during a St. Patrick’s Day luncheon last month. “And as long as I can remember, it’s been sort of part of my soul.”

Described by Ireland’s prime minister last month as “unmistakably a son of Ireland,” Biden has at various moments ascribed his temper, his nostalgic streak, his politics and his humor all to his Irish roots. He quotes poets like William Butler Yeats and Seamus Heaney freely; the most famous passage from Yeats’ “Easter 1916” has appeared no fewer than 12 times in Biden’s public remarks since he took office.

“They think I do it because I’m Irish,” Biden said recently. “I do it because they’re the best poets.”

Ahead of the trip, the White House distributed an extensive family genealogy stretching as far back as 1803, to the shoemakers and civil engineers and union overseers who would eventually leave Ireland on ships bound for America. Most left during the Irish famine of the 1840s and 1850s on what Biden has called the “coffin ships” because so many of their passengers didn’t survive the passage.

His ancestors’ experiences have left indelible impressions on Biden, whose persona is defined by eternal optimism despite his own experience of profound loss.

“One of my colleagues in the Senate, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, once made this simple but profound observation about us Irish: ‘To fail to understand that life is going to knock you down is to fail to understand the Irishness of life,’” he wrote in his 2017 memoir.

Returning to Ireland as president has long been in the cards for Biden, who is also planning to meet with Irish leaders, address Parliament and deliver a nighttime speech in front of St. Muredach’s Cathedral, in the northwest of Ireland, before returning to Washington on Saturday. The White House said Biden’s great-great-great grandfather Edward Blewitt sold 28,000 bricks to the cathedral in 1828 to construct its pillars.

He’ll be joined members of his family for the journey, including his son Hunter and sister Valerie. When he visited as vice president in 2016, he spent six days crisscrossing the island with several grandchildren and his sister, a newly generated family-tree in hand.

By coincidence, Biden was on that visit to Ireland the same day a majority of British voters elected to leave the European Union, a decision he opposed and which posed thorny questions for Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK.

As aides set to work planning his visit as president, Brexit’s legacy continued to loom. A dispute over trade rules between the UK and the European Union, to which the Republic of Ireland belongs, tested the Good Friday agreement and its fragile peace.

It was a matter Biden took outsized interest in upon taking office. He warned successive British prime ministers to resolve the dispute before the anniversary – tacitly hinging his entire trip on it. After months of negotiations, the current PM Rishi Sunak struck a deal resolving the dispute in February, though Northern Ireland’s main unionist political party has yet to sign on. Still, the arrangement paved the way for Biden’s visit this month.

Sunak is expected to meet Biden when he arrives, and the two will meet for talks in Belfast on Wednesday.

Biden hopes to use his trip as a reminder of what sustained diplomacy can yield at a moment America’s role abroad is being debated. An isolationist strain among Republicans has led to questions about the durability of Washington’s global leadership. The Good Friday Agreement, brokered by the United States, stands as one of the most lasting examples of US diplomacy from the end of the 20th century.

“President Biden has been talking about liberal internationalism as something that can return, he talks about democracy versus autocracy, all of this kind of stuff. So within that, I think that he wants to see good examples of the rule of law in US foreign policy. And this is a great example of that. This was an achievement,” said Liam Kennedy, director of the Clinton Institute for American Studies at the University College Dublin.

“The Good Friday Agreement is certainly one of those things where you can get real bipartisan buy-in in Washington,” Kennedy said. “Believe me, that’s a pretty unusual thing.”

The bloody tensions between Protestant Unionists, who support remaining part of the United Kingdom, and Catholic Irish Nationalists, who support reunification with the Republic, have mostly been left in another era. The Troubles led to more than 3,500 deaths, most of them civilians, and even more casualties.

As a senator, Biden was outspoken in favor of American peacemaking efforts in Northern Ireland. He also opposed extraditing IRA suspects from the US to Britain, arguing the justice system that existed in Northern Ireland at the time wasn’t fair.

In 1988, he told the Irish America magazine in a cover story (headline: “Fiery Joe Biden: White House bound?”) that as president he’d be active in trying to reach a peace.

“If we have a moral obligation in other parts of the world, why in God’s name don’t we have a moral obligation to Ireland? It’s part of our blood. It’s the blood of my blood, bone of my bone,” he said.

A decade later, three-way talks between the US, Ireland and Britain yielded the Good Friday Agreement, which sought to end the bloodshed through a power sharing government between the unionists and nationalists.

Yet that government has functioned only sporadically in the quarter-century since the accord was signed and has been frozen for more than a year after the Democratic Unionists withdrew because of the Brexit trade dispute.

John Finucane, a member of the British Parliament from Irish nationalist Sinn Fein party, said Biden’s visit to Northern Ireland this week would be a “huge help” toward resolving some of the lingering differences.

A lawyer whose own father was murdered by Loyalist paramilitaries in collusion with UK state forces in 1989, Finucane said Biden’s visit was a reminder of the American role in brokering peace.

“It’s no secret that I don’t think we would have had a peace process or certainly a Good Friday Agreement without the involvement of the American administration, and successive American administrations in implementing our peace,” he said. “Joe Biden himself has a very strong track record in supporting our peace process. So I think it is very fitting that he will be coming here next week.”

Still, the threat of violence has never entirely disappeared, a reality made evident when British intelligence services raised the terrorism threat level in Northern Ireland from “substantial” to “severe” in late March.

An operation called “Operation Rondoletto” taking place over Easter weekend ahead of Biden’s visit was set to cost around $8.7 million (£7 million), the police service said, and include motorcycle escort officers, firearms specialists and search specialists.

Asked last month whether the heightened terror level would dissuade him from visiting, however, Biden hardly sounded concerned.

“No, they can’t keep me out,” he said.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

[ad_2]

Source link

April 11, 2023
UK reaches its biggest trade deal since Brexit, joining trans-Pacific partnership | CNN Business

[ad_1]

Atlanta/Hong Kong
CNN
—

Britain has reached an agreement to join a major trans-Pacific partnership, calling it its biggest trade deal since Brexit.

The country will become the first new member, and the first in Europe, to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) since it came into force in 2018.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced the move early Friday, hailing it as a historic move that could help lift economic growth in the country by £1.8 billion ($2.2 billion) in the long run.

“The bloc is home to more 500 million people and will be worth 15% of global GDP once the UK joins,” Sunak’s office said.

The CPTPP is a free trade agreement with 11 members: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, New Zealand, Singapore and Vietnam. It succeeded the Trans-Pacific Partnership after the United States withdrew under former President Donald Trump in 2017.

The UK agreement comes almost two years after it began talks to join the pact.

As a member, more than 99% of UK exports to those 11 countries will now be eligible for tariff-free trade. That includes major exports, such as cheese, cars, chocolate, machinery, gin and whisky.

In the year through September 2022, the United Kingdom exported £60.5 billion ($75 billion) worth of goods to CPTPP countries, Sunak’s office said in a statement.

Dairy farmers, for example, sent £23.9 million ($29.6 million) worth of products such as cheese and butter to Canada, Chile, Japan and Mexico last year, and were set to “benefit from lower tariffs,” it added.

The deal also aims to lift red tape for British businesses, which will no longer be required to set up local offices or be residents of the pact’s member countries to provide services there.

Services made up a huge chunk — 43% — of overall UK trade with CPTPP members last year, according to Sunak’s office.

“We are at our heart an open and free-trading nation,” the prime minister said in the statement, seeking to cast the deal as an example of the “economic benefits of our post-Brexit freedoms.”

“As part of CPTPP, the UK is now in a prime position in the global economy to seize opportunities for new jobs, growth and innovation,” Sunak added.

Several businesses expressed their support for the deal in the government statement, including global bank Standard Chartered

(SCBFF) and spirits maker Pernod Ricard

(PDRDF).

Joining the pact “is a big opportunity for our Scotch whisky business,” said Anishka Jelicich, Pernod Ricard’s UK director of public affairs.

“Five of our top 20 export markets are CPTPP members. We expect tariff cuts and smoother access to some of the world’s fastest growing economies to increase exports and secure jobs and investment in the UK, with sales doubling in some markets.”

[ad_2]

Source link

March 30, 2023
The heavily armed DMZ separating North and South Korea has become a wildlife haven | CNN

[ad_1]

CNN
—

Between North and South Korea lies the demilitarized zone (DMZ), one of the world’s most heavily armed borders. The 160-mile stretch is barred with fences and landmines and is largely empty of human activity.

But that isolation has inadvertently turned the area into a haven for wildlife. Google released street view images of the DMZ for the first time this week, offering a rare glimpse into the flora and fauna that inhabit this no man’s land.

The images are part of a project done in collaboration with several Korean institutions to mark the 70th anniversary of the Korean War armistice, which brought hostilities to a halt in 1953 and mapped out the DMZ, though technically the war never ended as no peace treaty was ever signed.

The project allows viewers to take a “virtual tour” with Google’s street view function, highlighting cultural relics and heritage sites near the DMZ such as war-torn buildings and defense bunkers.

But the most surprising images are of the more than 6,100 species thriving in the DMZ, ranging from reptiles and birds to plants.

Of Korea’s 267 endangered species, 38% live in the DMZ, according to Google.

“After the Korean War, the DMZ had minimal human interference for over 70 years, and the damaged nature recovered on its own,” it said on its site. “As a result, it built up a new ecosystem not seen around the cities and has become a sanctuary for wildlife.”

The DMZ’s inhabitants include endangered mountain goats who live in the rocky mountains; musk deer with long fangs who live in old-growth forests; otters who swim along the river running through the two Koreas; and endangered golden eagles, who often spend their winters in civilian border areas where residents feed the hungry hunters.

Many of the images were captured by unmanned cameras installed by South Korea’s National Institute of Ecology. In 2019, these cameras photographed a young Asiatic black bear for the first time in 20 years – delighting researchers long concerned with the endangered population’s decline due to poaching and habitat destruction.

Seung-ho Lee, president of the DMZ Forum, a group that campaigns to protect the area’s ecological and cultural heritage, told CNN in 2019 that the DMZ had also become an oasis for migratory birds because of worsening conditions on either side of the border. Logging and flooding had damaged North Korean land, while urban development and pollution had fragmented habitats in South Korea, he said.

“We call the region an accidental paradise,” he said at the time.

The Google images also show pristine, biodiverse landscapes. Users can use street view to explore the Yongneup high moor, boasting wide grassy fields filled with wetland plants, or the Hantan River Gorge, with turquoise water snaking between high granite walls.

Many voices in both the Koreas and international environmental organizations have been calling for the conservation of the DMZ for decades. But the process isn’t easy, as it requires cooperation from both Seoul and Pyongyang.

There has been some progress in recent years, with former South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un vowing in 2018 to turn the DMZ into a “peace zone.” The following year, South Korea opened the first of three “peace trails” for a limited number of visitors along the DMZ, bringing hikers past observatories and barbed-wire fences.

However, relations have deteriorated since then, with tensions skyrocketing in 2022 as North Korea fired a record number of missiles, and as a new South Korean president took office.

[ad_2]

Source link

February 23, 2023
Why Colombia was forced to backtrack on a promising ceasefire announcement | CNN

[ad_1]

CNNE
—

What began as a hopeful announcement of a six-month ceasefire with the National Liberation Army (ELN) and other armed groups in Colombia, has ended in a political entanglement that casts doubts on the armed groups’ desire for peace – and raises questions about Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s future announcements regarding the ongoing peace process.

The Colombian government’s own chief negotiator, Otty Patiño, has since acknowledged that the agreement was not reached bilaterally. On Wednesday, the Colombian government spokesman announced that the executive order for the ceasefire had been suspended.

Analysts agree that it was a mistake to make the announcement without reaching a bilateral agreement, and believe that Petro’s government now faces a long way to go to right the wrong.

Here is a summary of what happened in recent days regarding the agreement of a bilateral ceasefire – that never happened – and what may happen in the future.

President Petro announced the ceasefire on December 31, giving hope to many sectors, especially communities plagued by violence.

He said that for six months, starting January 1, there would be a ceasefire with the ELN and four other armed groups: la Segunda Marquetalia (the Second Marquetalia), el Estado Mayor Central (High Command of the FARC), Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia (the Gaitanista Self-Defense Forces of Colombia) and the Autodefensas de la Sierra Nevada (Self-Defence Forces of the Sierra Nevada).

“The main objective of the ceasefire will be to stop the humanitarian impact… to halt offensive actions and to avoid armed incidents between law enforcement and unlawful organizations,” the statement said.

The announcement was applauded by many, including United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who in a statement indicated that he “welcomes” the announcement of the bilateral ceasefire since it “brings renewed hope for comprehensive peace to the Colombian people as the New Year dawns.”

According to Petro, the Organization of American States (OAS), as well as the Catholic Church and the Ombudsman’s Office, would oversee the bilateral ceasefire.

But the bilateral agreement did not happen.

Three days later, the ELN said in a statement that there was no bilateral ceasefire agreement with the Colombian government as Petro had announced on December 31.

“The ELN Dialogue Delegation has not discussed with the administration of Gustavo Petro any proposal for a bilateral ceasefire, therefore there is still no agreement on that matter,” says the January 1 statement.

The guerrillas said that “the ELN only complies with what is discussed and agreed upon at the Dialogue Table where we participate,” adding that the announcement is understood to be “a proposal to be reviewed in the next cycle” that will be carried out in Mexico.

Reuters reported that the announcement completely shocked the public, and after the announcement, Petro convened a meeting with the ministers of defense, interior and the high commissioner for peace to analyze the position of the rebel group, made up of some 2,400 fighters.

Colombian Interior Minister and government spokesman Alfonso Prada Gil on Wednesday announced at a press conference that the executive order establishing a ceasefire with the ELN had been suspended.

A new meeting between the parties is expected at negotiations between the ELN and the government of Colombia that will resume in Mexico

“We became aware of the statement of the ELN, and last night we made the decision to suspend the legal effects of that executive order until the negotiation table is reactivated in the coming days, and at that table we are going to bring that request of the protocols on behalf of the government, and we hope that the ELN will bring theirs, so that we can reactivate the dialogue,” he said.

Prada Gil invited the ELN to agree to a temporary ceasefire, while the next round of negotiations begin in Mexico.

After the uproar caused by the announcement, the head of the government’s delegation for the negotiation, Otty Patiño, did not clarify that Petro made a unilateral announcement without consulting the guerrillas, but instead “celebrated” the ELN’s decision to “examine the terms” that could make the ceasefire possible.

He also ventured to “interpret” Petro’s failed announcement as a “first step towards a new understanding and a new future.”

Analysts have agreed that Petro’s announcement of a bilateral ceasefire was a mistake, but some posit that it was the president’s way of pressuring the guerillas and, trying to advance the peace process with the ELN.

“It is evident that it is a mistake to proclaim a ceasefire with several organizations without having agreed to do so with all of them and without having the protocols for the oversight either. It is a mistake to commit the international community to something that is not yet agreed by the parties, but we are already in it,” political analyst Leon Valencia said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, retired Army Colonel Luis Alberto Villamarín said, Petro’s bilateral announcement was a move that backfired.

“He considered that by making a move like this he was going to subdue the ELN. Because the only means the ELN has to put pressure on the negotiating table is precisely their terrorist actions. And if the ELN commits to a bilateral ceasefire, that will prevent them from being strong on the negotiating table,” Villamarín said in an interview on CNNE’s Conclusiones.

“The only argument the ELN has is terrorism and Mr. Petro thought that he could take that away from them, tying their hands,” said the retired Army Colonel. “It was calculated but the ELN responded in kind,” he added.

Petro’s goal is to achieve what he calls “total peace,” which is also a political goal of his government.

He wants to disarm armed groups and organized crime and put an end a decades-long armed conflict that has left at least 450,000 dead and millions displaced.

And with that in mind, Petro’s administration has a two-prong approach: a peace negotiation with ELN guerrillas that have a political agenda, and legal processes with criminal organizations, which have no political agenda, said political analyst Ariel Avila, who is also a senator for the Green Party.

“This ceasefire includes the five organizations, the largest armed groups, and therefore safety could improve in about 180 municipalities… in the country,” Avila said in an interview with CNNE’s Conclusiones. “There will be areas where relief will be very low, as there are others where these groups (sic) have total relief where relief will be much greater.”

Despite Petro’s mistake of making that announcement without a bilateral agreement in place, he should still try and reach to reach a similar agreement, say experts, since the proposal was made public and it has been welcomed by the international community.

“Gustavo Petro made the bold move to propose a bilateral ceasefire without discussing it with the armed forces and with the ELN. Now it is known and widely accepted and supported by the international community. What is appropriate now is to agree on it urgently,” said León Valencia.

And if this agreement is reached, it would be twice as good, according to Avila, it will entail signing an agreement with the ELN, and implementing a law abiding process with the criminal organizations.

“The criminal delivers truth and delivers goods and in return the state offers a reduction of the sentence,” he pointed out.

[ad_2]

Source link

January 5, 2023
Brexit has cracked Britain’s economic foundations | CNN Business

[ad_1]

London
CNN
—

It’s been two years since former Prime Minister Boris Johnson signed his Brexit trade deal and triumphantly declared that Britain would be “prosperous, dynamic and contented” after completing its exit from the European Union.

The Brexit deal would enable UK companies to “do even more business” with the European Union, according to Johnson, and would leave Britain free to strike trade deals around the world while continuing to export seamlessly to the EU market of 450 million consumers.

In reality, Brexit has hobbled the UK economy, which remains the only member of the G7 — the group of advanced economies that also includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States — with an economy smaller than it was before the pandemic.

Years of uncertainty over the future trading relationship with the European Union, Britain’s largest trading partner, have damaged business investment, which in the third quarter was 8% below pre-pandemic levels despite a UK-EU trade deal being in place for nearly two years.

And the pound has taken a beating, making imports more expensive and stoking inflation while failing to boost exports, even as other parts of the world have enjoyed a post-pandemic trade boom.

Brexit has erected trade barriers for UK businesses and foreign companies that used Britain as a European base. It’s weighing on imports and exports, sapping investment and contributing to labor shortages. All this has exacerbated Britain’s inflation problem, hurting workers and the business community.

“The most plausible reason as to why Britain is doing comparatively worse than comparable countries is Brexit,” according to L. Alan Winters, co-director of the Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy at the University of Sussex.

The sense of gloom hanging over the UK economy is captured by striking workers, who are walking out in ever larger numbers over pay and conditions as the worst inflation in decades eats into their wages. At the same time, the government is cutting spending and hiking taxes to fill the hole in its budget.

While Brexit isn’t the cause of Britain’s cost-of-living crisis, it has made the problem more difficult to solve.

“The UK chose Brexit in a referendum, but the government then chose a particularly hard form of Brexit, which maximized the economic cost,” said Michael Saunders, a senior adviser at Oxford Economics and former Bank of England official. “Any hope for economic upside from Brexit is pretty much gone.”

Although Britain voted to leave the European Union in June 2016, its exit from the single market and customs union was finalized only on December 24, 2020, when the two sides finally agreed a free trade deal.

The Brexit deal, known as the Trade and Cooperation Agreement, came into effect on January 1, 2021.

It eliminated tariffs on most goods but introduced a raft of non-tariff barriers, such as border controls, customs checks, import duties and health inspections on plant and animal products.

Before Brexit, a farmer in Kent could ship a truckload of potatoes to Paris just as easily as they might send it to London. Those days are no more.

“We hear stories every single day from small businesses about the nightmare of forms, transportation, couriers, things getting stuck for weeks at a time… the epic length of the problems is just gobsmacking,” said Michelle Ovens, the founder of Small Business Britain, a campaign group.

“The way things have panned out in the last two years has been really bad for small businesses,” Ovens told CNN.

Researchers at the London School of Economics estimate that the variety of UK products exported to the European Union declined by 30% during the first year of Brexit. They said that this was likely because small exporters had exited small EU markets.

Take the example of Little Star, a UK company that makes jewelry for children. Its business took off in the Netherlands and it had plans to expand to France and Germany next. But since Brexit, only two of more than 30 of its Dutch customers are prepared to handle the costs and paperwork to obtain stock from the company.

Products that took two days to ship are now taking three weeks, while import duties and sales taxes have made it much harder to compete with European jewelers, according to Rob Walker, who co-founded the business with his wife, Vicky, in 2017. The company is now looking to the United States for growth opportunities.

“Isn’t it mad that we have to look to the other side of the Atlantic to do business, because it’s so difficult to do business with people 30 miles away?” Walker said.

A British Chambers of Commerce survey of more than 1,168 businesses published this month reported that 77% said Brexit has not helped them increase sales or grow their businesses. More than half said they were finding it difficult to adapt to the new rules for trading goods.

Siteright Construction Supplies, a manufacturer in Dorset, told the Chamber that importing parts from the European Union to fix broken machines has become a costly and “time-consuming nightmare.”

“Brexit has been the biggest-ever imposition of bureaucracy on business,” according to Siteright.

Nova Dog Chews, a producer of snacks for canines, said it would have lost all its EU trade had it not set up a base in the bloc. “This has cost our business a huge amount of money, which could have been invested in the UK had it not been for Brexit,” it added.

A UK government spokesperson told CNN that the government’s export support service has provided exporters with “practical support” on the implementation of the Brexit deal. The deal is “the world’s largest zero tariff, zero quota free trade deal,” the spokesperson added. “It secures the UK market access across key service sectors and opens new opportunities for UK businesses across the globe.”

Britain won’t easily replace what it has lost by forfeiting unfettered access to the world’s largest trading bloc.

The only substantive new trade deals it has struck since exiting the European Union, which did not simply roll over the deals it had as an EU member, have been with Australia and New Zealand. By the government’s own estimate, these will have a negligible impact on the UK economy, increasing GDP in the long run by just 0.1% and 0.03% respectively.

By contrast, the UK Office for Budget Responsibility, which produces economic forecasts for the government, expects Brexit to reduce Britain’s output by 4% over 15 years compared to remaining in the bloc. Exports and imports are projected to be around 15% lower in the long run.

Initial data has borne this out. According to the OBR, in the fourth quarter of 2021, UK goods export volumes to the European Union were 9% below 2019 levels, with imports from the European Union 18% lower. Goods exports to non-EU countries were 18% weaker than in 2019.

The United Kingdom “appears to have become a less trade-intensive economy, with trade as a share of GDP falling 12% since 2019, two and a half times more than in any other G7 country,” the OBR said in the March report.

The decline in exports to non-EU countries could be a sign that UK businesses have become less competitive as they battle higher supply chain costs following Brexit, according to Jun Du, an economics professor at Aston University in Birmingham.

“The UK’s trading ability has been damaged permanently [by Brexit],” Du told CNN. “It doesn’t mean it can’t recover, but it’s been set back for a number of years.”

Research by the Centre for European Reform, a think tank, estimates that over the 18 months to June 2022, UK goods trade is 7% lower than it would have been had Britain remained in the European Union.

Investment is 11% weaker and GDP is 5.5% smaller than it would have been, costing the economy £40 billion ($48.4 billion) in tax revenues annually. That’s enough to pay for three quarters of the spending cuts and tax rises that UK finance minister Jeremy Hunt announced in November.

The United Kingdom is projected to have one of the worst performing economies next year among developed nations.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development expects the UK economy to shrink by 0.4%, ahead only of sanctioned Russia. GDP in Germany is forecast to be 0.3% smaller.

The International Monetary Fund forecasts growth of just 0.3% for UK GDP next year, ahead of only Germany, Italy and Russia, which are expected to contract.

Both institutions say high inflation and rising interest rates will weigh on spending by consumers and businesses in Britain.

According to the Confederation of British Industry, a leading business group, the fall in private sector activity picked up pace in December and has now declined for five consecutive quarters.

The downward trend “looks set to deepen” in 2023, principal economist at the CBI Martin Sartorius said in a statement.

“Businesses continue to face a number of headwinds, with rising costs, labor shortages, and weakening demand contributing to a gloomy outlook for next year. ”

— Julia Horowitz contributed to this report.

[ad_2]

Source link

December 24, 2022
Sudan’s Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces sign agreement intended to lay groundwork for humanitarian assistance in Sudan, say US officials | CNN Politics

[ad_1]

CNN
—

The warring Sudanese parties have signed an agreement intended to lay the groundwork for humanitarian assistance to resume in Sudan, senior US State Department officials said Thursday.

The agreement signed in Jeddah by representatives from the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) is not a ceasefire, but rather “a declaration of commitment to protect the civilians of Sudan.”

The purpose of the declaration “is to guide the conduct of the two forces so that we can get in humanitarian assistance, help begin the restoration of essential services like electricity and water, to arrange for the withdrawal of security forces from hospitals and clinics, and to perform the respectful burial of the dead,” one of the officials explained.

The next step will be to negotiate a ceasefire which would allow those actions to take place, the official told reporters, and talks on that could begin as early as Friday.

Children caught in the crossfire as rival factions fight in Sudan

“We will move as fast as we can with the parties to get to actual actions. We’ve already made specific recommendations to each side to take actions and some of that is happening,” the official told reporters on a call.

A ceasefire monitoring mechanism has been developed to “help hold the parties accountable to what they’ve agreed to do,” the official said.

The declaration, the name of which was “requested by the parties to emphasize that they’re interested in trying to help the civilians who are suffering from this fighting,” was signed following days of “pre-negotiation talks” which have been mediated by the United States and Saudi Arabia.

Those talks began this weekend in Jeddah, weeks after the outbreak of fighting in Sudan that has left hundreds dead and thousands injured, caused tens of thousands to flee their homes and left the country on the brink of civil war and a massive humanitarian catastrophe.

A second senior State Department official said that it took longer than expected to get an agreement on the declaration, and “the negotiations were very tough,” particularly given “the depth of enmity” between the RSF and the SAF.

The first official said that the SAF and RSF negotiators “with the support of the Saudi and American mediators,” will now “begin to negotiate an actual short term ceasefire.”

The goal is to reach a ceasefire of up to 10 days, they said, “but we’ll have to see what’s possible to facilitate those activities.”

A ceasefire monitoring mechanism, which will be supported by the United Nations, Saudi Arabia, the US, “and other members of the international community,” has been developed. The second official said the mechanism includes “overhead imagery, including satellite data,” social media analysis, and on the ground reporting from Sudanese civil society members.

The official noted that “we’ve seen violations by both sides in all the ceasefires to date and don’t expect that to change.”

They said they intend to establish a committee that the ceasefire monitoring mechanism would report to, which would include representatives from the RSF, SAF, and international community. Asked about punitive measures, the official said that “the biggest one here would frankly be public attribution where possible,” which would help combat propaganda and misinformation about who was responsible for the violations.

The first official noted that this was just the initial phase of talks, telling reporters, “this is going to be a process so we are just at the first stage.”

“We did this in partnership with the Saudis, at the request of the two sides,” the first official said of the talks in Jeddah. “The two sides asked us to help them out with this, but there is every expectation that this process will be expanded to include, first and most importantly, Sudanese civilians, and secondly, regional partners in Africa and in the Arab world, and then the international community.”

[ad_2]

Source link

April 12, 2021