Women have been highly impacted by the Ukraine war, and have headed humanitarian efforts in their communities, but are still absent from leadership positions. UN Women and Care called for their meaningful inclusion in planning and decision-making processes. Credit: Ed Holt/IPS
by Naureen Hossain (new york)
Inter Press Service
New York, May 11 (IPS) – A joint UN Women and CARE report on the gender disparities in the wake of the Ukrainian crisis calls for donors and humanitarian partners to take greater care to promote the voices of women and marginalized communities in the humanitarian effort.
The Rapid Gender Analysis by UN Women and CARE, released on May 4, 2022, revealed the challenges and hardships women and minority groups face in Ukraine. UN Women and CARE officers conducted interviews with over 170 participants to determine how the war impacted their needs and concerns.
The war has affected multiple areas of life, from education and healthcare access to their livelihoods. In the last two months, women have emerged to take on more authority in households and the community, including community and civil society organizations.
Women have been at the forefront of humanitarian efforts, the report reveals. However, they have not been included in leadership or the decision-making process.
The risk is that current humanitarian efforts do not fully address the more complex needs of the affected civilians, such as the disabled, people who have already been displaced before the current crisis, and ethnic minorities, such as the Roma.
Among the report’s key findings, women, men, boys, and girls have different needs that must be considered in the humanitarian response.
However, the current frameworks of humanitarian aid need to improve to address their complex needs better.
Women, minorities, and other underrepresented groups face greater pressure with the compounded and intersectional impact of the crisis that can leave them more vulnerable in conflict or the loss of income.
Even though they are at the forefront of humanitarian efforts in their communities, they are not included in the decision-making process of how humanitarian aid is disseminated to even the most vulnerable groups.
Sima Bahous, Executive Director of UN Women, said: “It’s critical that the humanitarian response in Ukraine takes into account and addresses the different needs of women and girls, men and boys, including those that are furthest left behind…Women have been playing vital roles in their communities’ humanitarian response. They must also be meaningfully involved in the planning and decision-making processes to make sure that their specific needs are met, especially those related to health, safety, and access to livelihoods.”
A UN Women Media Compact event discussed the findings of the report and media experiences with reporting on the war in Ukraine through the lens of gender. Presenting the report at the event on Tuesday were Felicia Dahlquist, Programme Analyst from UN Women’s Ukraine office, and Siobhan Foran, CARE Gender in Emergencies Coordinator.
The speakers agreed that there was a need for gender-responsive and socially inclusive humanitarian efforts. This response could address the needs across different sectors, from providing shelter and non-food items (NFI) and education to lessening the care burden on mothers at home.
Dahlquist and Foran acknowledged that multiple areas need to be addressed all at once in a crisis. This runs the risk of other factors such as gender and diversity competing for attention.
Another recommendation was to increase communications to ensure accountability to the affected populations. This would mean implementing feedback and complaints mechanisms to ensure effective procedures and diverse communications channels to disseminate information on humanitarian aid to various groups.
A key topic of discussion was the role that media could play in reporting the stories of women, men, and minority groups on the humanitarian front.
The speakers said that the media has the ability, and thus a responsibility to address the ongoing issues that women and minorities deal with, to present the nuance and complexity of their experiences within the context of their intersectional experiences.
The media have the potential to reflect the voices of these communities to the general public but also get the attention of donors and humanitarian agencies to increase their efforts to support women-led organizations.
Even as donors and humanitarian agencies are expected to be pragmatic in their program planning and implementation approach, Dahlquist said it is essential to remember the humanity of the people who need this aid.
The media could play a key role in showcasing that human element, especially among those groups that receive less coverage in the news, such as ethnic minorities and the LGBQTIA+ community.
Opinion by Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Anis Chowdhury (sydney and kuala lumpur)
Inter Press Service
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, May 10 (IPS) – The world is being pressed by financial interests to raise interest rates, ostensibly to check inflation. After the US Federal Reserve started raising interest rates, more central banks have been doing likewise.
Considering inflation’s contemporary causes, such ‘follow the leader’ central bank mimicry cannot check it except by slowing economies. Worse, this has meant taking on huge new risks, seriously damaging world economic prospects in the medium and long-term.
Anis ChowdhuryInflation bogey dangerous
Much earlier, World Bank supported research had shown moderate inflation – in the range of 15–30% – was not harmful to growth, and could “be reduced only at a substantial cost to … growth”.
Raising interest rates will derail recovery and worsen supply disruptions and shortages due to the pandemic, war and sanctions. European Central Bank (ECB) Executive Board member Fabio Panetta has noted the euro zone is “de facto stagnating” as economic growth has almost stopped.
As policymakers struggle with inflation, growth and wellbeing are being subjected to huge risks. As Panetta warns, “monetary tightening aimed at containing inflation would end up hampering growth that is already weakening”.
Interest rates rising globally
Among emerging markets and developing economies, South Africa’s central bank raised interest rates for the first time in three years in November 2021.
Jomo Kwame SundaramOn 4 May, the Reserve Bank of India raised interest rates – its first rate change in two years and first rate hike in nearly four. On 5 May, Chile’s central bank raised interest rates. Pressed by finance to curb inflation, more central bankers are tightening monetary policy.
Without evidence or reasoning, they insist higher interest rates will check inflation. Their recognized adverse effects for recovery and growth are dismissed as unavoidably necessary short-term costs for some unspecified long-term gains.
But despite facing higher inflationary expectations, tightening international monetary conditions, and Ukraine war uncertainties, the ECB and Bank of Japan have not joined the bandwagon, refusing to raise policy interest rates so far.
Interest rate – blunt tool
But central bankers’ dogmatic stances, knee-jerk responses and ‘follow the leader’ behaviour are not helpful. Even when inflation reaches dangerous levels, raising interest rates may still not be the right policy response for several reasons.
First, raising interest rates only addresses the symptoms – not the causes – of inflation. Inflation is often said to be a consequence of an economy ‘overheating’. But overheating can be due to many factors.
Higher interest rates may relieve overheating, by slowing economic activity. But a good doctor should first investigate and diagnose an ailment’s causes before prescribing appropriate treatment – which may or may not require medication.
It is widely accepted that the current inflationary surge is due to supply chain disruptions – exacerbated by war and sanctions – especially of essential goods such as food and fuel. If so, long-term solutions require increasing supplies, including by removing bottlenecks.
Higher interest rates reduce aggregate demand. But simply raising interest rates does not even address the specific causes of inflation, let alone rising prices due to supply disruptions of essential goods, such as food and fuel.
Interest rate – indiscriminate
Second, the interest rate affects all sectors, everyone. It does not even distinguish between sectors or industries needing to expand or be encouraged, and those that should be phased out, for being less productive or inefficient.
Also, raising interest rates too often, and to excessively high levels, can squeeze, or even kill productive and efficient businesses along with inefficient or less productive ones.
US bankruptcies had soared in the early 1980s after US Fed chair Volcker’s legendary interest rate spike. “Thousands of businesses that took out bank loans could fail”, warned a leading UK tax advisory firm recently.
Third, interest rates do not distinguish among households and businesses. Higher interest rates may discourage household expenditure, but also dampen all kinds of spending – for both consumption and investment.
Hence, overall demand may shrink – discouraging investment in new technology, plant, equipment and skills. Thus, higher interest rates adversely affect long-term productive capacities and technological progress of economies.
Debt, recessions and financial crises
Fourth, higher interest rates raise debt servicing costs for governments, businesses and households. With the exceptionally low interest rates previously available after the 2008-09 global financial crisis (GFC), debt burdens rose in most countries.
These undoubtedly encouraged risky, speculative behaviour as well as unproductive share buybacks, increased dividends, and mergers & acquisitions. Interest rate hikes have triggered many recessions and financial crises. Thus, raising interest rates now will likely trigger a new, albeit different era of stagflation.
The pandemic has pushed public debt to historic new highs. Forty-four per cent of low-income and least developed countries were at high risk of, or already in external debt distress in 2020.
Fifth, paradoxically, higher interest rates raise debt-servicing expenses, especially mortgage payments, for indebted households. Costs of living also rise if businesses pass higher interest costs on to consumers by raising prices.
Hence, the main beneficiaries of low inflation and higher interest rates are the holders of financial assets who fear the relative diminution of their value.
Developing countries vulnerable
Developing countries are particularly vulnerable. Higher interest rates in developed countries – particularly the US – trigger capital outflows from developing countries – causing exchange rate depreciations and inflationary pressures.
Higher interest rates and weaker exchange rates will aggravate already high debt service burdens – as happened in Latin America in the early 1980s after US Fed chair Volcker greatly increased US interest rates.
To discourage sudden capital outflows and prevent large currency depreciations, developing countries raise interest rates sharply. This may lead to economic collapse – as in Indonesia during the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis.
Although pandemic response measures – such as debt moratoria – provided some relief, business failures rose nearly 60% in 2020 from 2019. Middle- and low-income countries saw more business failures.
The World Bank’s Pulse Enterprise Survey – of 24 middle- and low-income countries – found 40% of businesses surveyed in January 2021 expected to be in arrears within six months.
This included more than 70% of firms in Nepal and the Philippines, and over 60% in Turkey and South Africa. Business failures of such scale can trigger banking crises as non-performing loans suddenly soar.
Instead of checking contemporary inflation, raising interest rates is likely to greatly damage recovery and medium-term growth prospects. Hence, it is imperative for developing countries to innovatively develop appropriate means to better address the economic dilemmas they face.
NEW YORK, May 10 (IPS) – “Whatever the circle of hell in which we live,
I think we are free to break out of it.”
– Jean-Paul Sartre, Preface to the Deutsche Gramaphon recording of No Exit
Mr. Vladimir Putin’s illegal War of Aggression in Ukraine, launched on February 24, 2022, brought into stark relief the fractured state of Global Peace and Security. Militarized conflicts, civilian deaths and forced migration in the tens of millions have been ongoing for decades, with little or no relief to the beleaguered victims.
The war in Ukraine appears to have displaced other ongoing major wars in Yemen, Ethiopia, and Myanmar in the global public imagination thanks to the 24/7 news cycle. The primary mandate of the United Nations is to ensure the maintenance of Global Peace and Security, sadly we seem to have neither, apart from a lot of talk by eminent personages with little or no action to redress the dystopian realities and carnage on the ground.
The Latin motto res, non verba comes to mind – meaning “deeds, and not words” – as quite an appropriate model for the United Nations to adopt rather than sticking to ‘business as usual’ – which is quite lame and pathetic to say the least in these trying times.
Secretary-General António Guterres must not leave diplomacy, mediation, and negotiation to half-baked UN diplomats out in the field and even within his own Executive Office – UN-EOSG.
In the context of current world affairs and international relations, it is imperative that the Secretary-General plays a more pivotal and far-greater active role to uphold the primary mandate of the United Nations and ensure the maintenance of Global Peace and Security.
The time for protecting the image and status of the UN Secretary-General is over, as well as being held hostage by the P-5 Permanent Member States of the UN Security Council who have run roughshod over all current and previous UN Secretaries-General.
Rather than being risk averse, Secretary-General Guterres must play a much more active and visible role on the global stage and behind-the-scenes – traveling incessantly to war-torn UN member states to meet the protagonists regularly and personally mediating, using his high office and moral standing to good effect – to boost UN mediation efforts.
Reminiscent of the active and energetic interventions of one of his predecessors, the late Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold, who sadly paid the ultimate price along with 15 other UN advisors, bodyguards, and aircrew when their plane was shot down on September 18, 1961, in Northern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.
In today’s geopolitical environment, Secretary-General Guterres cannot be seen as one of the last of a long line of diplomats and politicians to visit a war-torn region, as was the case of his recent visit in late April 2022 to Moscow and Kyiv – to put it bluntly this is bad optics.
Secretary-General Guterres must use his Executive Office to better effect and the global public needs to be aware and supportive. Given the very high stakes involved he must be much more proactive regarding Ukraine, and all ongoing wars and armed conflicts in evenhanded fashion – without fear nor favor.
On the plus side Secretary-General Guterres did call the war in Ukraine “evil and unacceptable” and called for justice. However, Guterres’ call fell on deaf ears in Moscow, demonstrated by the fact that Russia launched five missiles striking central Kyiv less than one hour after he held a news conference with Ukrainian President Vlodymyr Zelenskyy.
So, what is to be done when a P-5 Permanent Member State of the UN Security Council goes “rogue” – i.e., beyond the bounds of civilized, rules-based behavior of a nation-state in the 21st Century adhering to tenets of Global Peace and Security enshrined in the UN Charter, the Laws of War, the Geneva Conventions, and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court – as in the case of Mr. Putin and his government?
Notwithstanding the fact that Secretary-General Guterres is a former Prime Minister of Portugal, he must demonstrate his independence from the Western powers, and immediately follow-up on his Moscow and Kyiv visit by visiting Beijing to enlist President Xi Jingping’s not-so-inconsequential support to put pressure on Moscow to end the aggression in Ukraine and call off the dogs of war.
And while he is negotiating in Beijing, he must also secure the support of China to pressure the Tatmadaw Kyi military junta to standdown and restore democracy without delay in Myanmar to provide relief to its beleaguered peoples. Non-confrontational diplomacy is the key to success in Beijing something that Secretary-General Guterres is adept at doing, which he should use to good effect considering that the Chinese are not belligerents.
Beijing is more inclined towards global trade and commerce and promoting their ambitious “Belt and Road Initiative” global megaproject, which is undoubtedly being hampered by war in Ukraine.
After two bloody world wars where tens of millions of human beings died, nobody wants another largescale inter-European war, which has potential ramifications for militaries and civilians well beyond Europe.
In fact, Mr. Putin’s War of Aggression in Ukraine is already deepening world hunger given that global wheat production, storage and supply is severely hampered by fighting. The power of the United Nations is a reflected power – i.e., that of its leading member states adhering to a rules-based system of global governance – and that power is what all UN Secretaries-General must harness for the greater good through the arts of diplomacy, mediation, and negotiation to maintain Global Peace and Security.
Secretary-General Guterres is urgently called upon to demonstrate his leadership and political acumen in these dystopian and troubled times, using his moral courage as a beacon to rally global publics to support the mandate and mission of the United Nations. The UN Secretary-General cannot and must not be relegated to the role of bystander while belligerents run amok, he/she must lead, irrespective of the personal cost, without fear nor favor.
As for Secretary-General Guterres a devout Catholic (close to His Holiness Pope Francis an outspoken critic of war), he cannot accomplish this mammoth task alone – to enhance his moral authority he needs to harness the power and voice of civil society together with that of the world’s multiple religions – all working together at manifold levels to maintain Global Peace and Security.
Dr Purnaka L. de Silva is Professor UN Studies (M.A. Program) at the School of Diplomacy and International Relations, Seton Hall University, and Director, Institute of Strategic Studies and Democracy (ISSD) Malta. In March 2022 he received Seton Hall University’s College Adjunct Faculty Teacher of the Year Award, and in December 2021 was nominated Diplomacy Professor of the Year by the School of Diplomacy and International Relations.
Delivering medicine and humanitarian aid to those in need. Credit: 100%LIFE via UNAIDS
Opinion by Eamonn Murphy (geneva)
Inter Press Service
GENEVA, May 06 (IPS) – The writer is UNAIDS Deputy Executive Director and is leading UNAIDS’ humanitarian response.Alongside the devastation caused by bombs and bullets, the war in Ukraine has wrought another danger that can be as deadly as the violence itself: the disruption of access to health services for people who will not survive if cut off from health care.
Health provision has been badly hit, and supply lines crucial for the delivery of medicines severely disrupted. The World Health Organization (WHO) has verified 186 attacks on health-care facilities since the war began.
WHO’s survey showed that of the Ukrainian households in which someone has a chronic health condition, one in three are now unable to get the medicines and care they need.
People living with HIV depend upon daily medication to keep them healthy and alive. More than 40 health-care facilities that provided HIV treatment, prevention and care services before the war have closed or been destroyed.
Many Ukrainians hemmed in by the conflict are unable to make a journey to the health facilities that remain. Approximately 260 000 Ukrainians are living with HIV. UNAIDS is working with partners to ensure the continuity of HIV services. Disruption to treatment services puts their lives on the line and risks a resurgence of the country’s HIV pandemic.
In what is a huge achievement, medicines have successfully been brought into Ukraine, thanks to PEPFAR (the United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), which has committed US$ 13 million to procure 51 million emergency doses of HIV medicines, enough to keep Ukrainians living with HIV supplied with life-saving treatment for a year.
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria also is fast-tracking US$15 million in emergency funds for Ukraine and some nearby countries to enable continued provision of life-saving care.
Delivering medicine and humanitarian aid to those in need. Credit: 100%LIFE via UNAIDS
Now that HIV medicines have reached Ukraine, attention is focused on getting them to everyone who needs them. Before the war, the Ukranian AIDS response had built up an exemplary model of community-led services working in partnership with government. It’s the resilience of that network of community-led services built up over decades that has enabled the AIDS response to continue.
The Public Health Center of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine and civil society organizations such as 100% Life, the country’s biggest network of people living with HIV, are working together to maintain services.
Delivering medicines in this war is a huge logistical and security challenge. Several volunteer drivers working for 100% Life have been killed while trying to deliver desperately needed HIV medicines to front-line areas.
Despite the enormous difficulties involved, grass-roots organizations are a lifeline for many people who move to safer places within or outside the country, providing them with humanitarian aid and HIV medicines—even in areas of intense conflict. Their courageous work is saving lives, but the needs and challenges are huge and growing, and resources are not sufficient.
“The situation for people living with HIV in Ukraine is desperate. We are trying to deliver medicines, food and other emergency assistance to people in need, but the work is dangerous and volunteer drivers are putting their lives at risk. If we don’t get more help, I am not sure how much longer we can continue, especially reaching people in the front-line zones,” Dmytro Sherembey, the Head of the 100% LIFE Coordination Council, has shared.
That is why UNAIDS has issued an urgent call to the international community to upscale support to help these everyday heroes to save lives.
The challenge to reach people in need has been greatly exacerbated by the displacement of people. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, there are now 7.7 million internally displaced people in Ukraine.
The war has also caused millions of Ukrainians to flee their homes and seek refuge in neighbouring countries, including Czechia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.
It is estimated that up to 30 000 Ukrainian refugees may currently need HIV medicines as the stocks they carry with them become depleted. WHO has helped to broker a deal with the pharmaceutical company ViiV Healthcare to provide donations of HIV medicines to Czechia, Poland and other European Union countries receiving large numbers of Ukrainian refugees.
Ensuring that the medicines get to those who need them requires the involvement of communities of people living with HIV and key population networks in host countries to ensure tailored outreach and trust-building. These community-led organizations require upscaled international support too.
It’s clear from listening to those receiving and providing health services on the ground that what Ukraine most needs is peace. That is why the United Nations Secretary-General has called for a complete cessation of hostilities and the withdrawal of all Russian troops from Ukraine.
The damage of this awful war means, however, that even once there is peace, enormous and long-term needs for international assistance will remain. Support will be needed in particular for community-led organizations, whose partnership with the public health system is key to ensuring health for all.
Meanwhile, as the impact of the war worsens, the world must increase support to Ukrainian civil society organizations to maintain health provision. This is vital to preventing a resurgence of Ukraine’s HIV pandemic. And for Ukrainians living with HIV, it is literally a matter of life and death.
Civil society networks, on whose creativity and courage?HIV services depend, are managing to get life-saving HIV medicines to people. They do it on a shoestring, powered only by determination and love of humanity.
Many of those involved are themselves people living with HIV—they understand the gravity of what is at stake if they cannot continue their work. The help they provide to save lives risks their own. They do not seek international admiration, but they do need an upscaling of international help. And they need it now.
KYIV, Ukraine, May 05 (IPS) – Before the war, Ukraine’s dream to become part of the EU was exactly that – a dream. But the new political reality could make it come true.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine changed and to some extent even destroyed the familiar international political reality. Up until 24 February, Russia had been integrated into the global economy, had excellent growth prospects, and the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline was almost finished.
Moreover, NATO had no intention of expanding in any direction and Ukraine joining the EU seemed to be a very long way off given the usual plethora of domestic problems the country was facing.
The Kremlin has chosen a calculated gamble to play to its own advantages, at great cost to many. Russia’s war against Ukraine is a profound crisis capable of dramatically changing how things pan out in the future, making certain developments highly probable which just two months ago seemed utterly implausible.
One such scenario relates to Ukraine’s EU membership. On 28 February in the besieged capital of Kyiv, the fate of which at that point was entirely unclear, President Zelenskyy signed a formal request to accede to the European Union along with a joint declaration with the prime minister and head of the Ukrainian parliament.
At that point, Kyiv had already been clinging on for four days, and the first doubts regarding Russia’s ability to wage a quick and successful campaign were beginning to plunge Europe into a state of strategic uncertainty.
Nickolay KapitonenkoThis was a great symbolic moment for Zelenskyy. For many Ukrainians, it was a light at the end of the tunnel, and for the EU it provided a potential basis for the future restructuring of the entire system of international security. And there is little doubt that the system needs restructuring.
In March 2014, a similar sense of symbolism and hope for the future accompanied the signing of the EU–Ukraine Association Agreement, less than a week after the Crimean status referendum and at the height of the complex and volatile revolutionary events in Kyiv.
This step made a crucial contribution to the consolidation of Ukrainian statehood, to the country’s vision for the future and to its fundamental system of values. Stripped of the hope of rapid accession to the EU – the fact that the Association Agreement never provided for membership is often called to mind in Europe – Ukraine could at least focus on realising the potential of the most extensive association agreement in history.
In 2022, the context of the negotiations regarding EU–Ukraine relations changed dramatically. From an ever-moving prospect, Ukraine’s integration into the EU became one of very few elements capable of making some form of progress when it came to resolving the conflict.
NATO is not an option
It is all about security guarantees. The Russian invasion forced Ukraine to prepare for the next war. No promises — whether written or verbal — would be enough. From now on, when it came to relations with Russia, any Ukrainian government would have to proceed on the basis of a worst-case scenario regarding the course of events.
The only way of preventing renewed aggression from Russia is either to rely on direct security guarantees, or to invest a significant share of resources in constructing and supporting effective, modern armed forces. Membership in NATO could also be an effective mechanism to guarantee security but this does not seem realistic and Russia has declared it a threat to its security.
The rationale that prevailed before the war continues to apply here: a high risk of direct conflict with Russia makes Ukraine’s aim of NATO accession more difficult. In light of this, there are ongoing discussions about security guarantees on the individual country level and even on a multilateral basis outside NATO.
This is a complex debate. Firstly, few are in a position to give such guarantees, especially when we are talking about a potential conflict with Russia. The US is probably the only country that could provide effective and credible guarantees. It is the only country with the capacity to project its military power to an extent that would deter Russia.
Secondly, there are not many countries that would be willing to provide security guarantees carrying such high future risks. That said, the West cannot afford to refuse a dialogue on the issue of security guarantees because a continuation of the conflict in its current state presents Europe with serious problems.
Membership of the European Union, on the other hand, does not seem to antagonise Russia in the same way. In its pre-war rhetoric, Moscow never raised the issue of EU expansion and never accused the EU of being a threat to its security. This creates a certain amount of scope to pursue other possibilities.
Of course, EU membership cannot be seen as providing a complete security guarantee. However, it is capable of increasing the costs of aggression for Russia and providing the prospect of recovery for Ukraine’s frail economy. Such recovery would be a precondition for Ukraine to be able to sustain effective defence capabilities.
An open door for European membership
Obviously, it is not as simple as this. At the conceptual level, and this is something many European officials have already pointed out, it is impossible to force EU membership, even with the ‘accelerated procedure’. It is a lengthy and complex process requiring coordination of a myriad aspects, from legislation to technical standards.
Even the most optimistic assessments of Ukrainian politicians and diplomats suggest that the process could take several years. Austria, Sweden, and Finland joined in record speed, and the process still took around four years. Since then, the situation has not got any easier, indeed it has arguably become more complex as the number of legal norms and standards within the EU has increased significantly.
Moreover, there is already a ‘queue’ of five other countries waiting to join. These are all undeniably relevant obstacles, given the strong impact of EU bureaucracy and procedures even in these exceptional circumstances.
At the political level, there must be a consensus among all the member states of the EU. The overall situation in Europe has changed so much that rather than the purely symbolic support provided before the war in the form of declarations signed by a number of European states, today there is a broad social consensus when it comes to Ukraine’s European future.
This consensus was already manifested in the official statements from heads of various Eastern European countries asserting that Ukraine deserved to be provided the immediate prospect of membership.
Public opinion throughout Europe is gradually leaning towards supporting this idea – this is also evident in the reactions of national parliaments to the addresses given by the Ukrainian president.
Today, there are very few European politicians who would formally object to the very idea of Ukraine having a future in Europe. Of course, the task will not necessarily be easy. The sympathy and empathy expressed by Europeans towards Ukraine now needs to be translated into political results.
Mobilising the support of the most influential EU member states – Germany and France – will be of critical importance. What is required here is extremely delicate diplomacy and a thorough understanding of Berlin’s and Paris’ interests.
This includes restoring European security. Furthermore, taking this path would require putting an end to old disagreements or, at the very least, map out the prospects of this being achieved.
A question of European security
Yet all the key arguments pertain to security matters. It is not just about Ukraine protecting Europe from Russian revisionism at the cost of so many lives — and how EU membership could serve as a gesture of recognition of the importance of the country’s contribution to European security.
The issue is also that this European security is unlikely to be possible if Ukraine, as before the war, continues to remain in Europe’s ‘grey zone’, without allies, guarantees or a certain future. The threats for Ukraine may not be the same threats as for Europe – however, since Russia’s invasion, everything has fundamentally changed.
In the two months since the start of the conflict, Ukraine is no better prepared for EU membership than before the war. For Europeans, Ukraine joining the EU will be associated with certain risks and problems. But something else has changed as well – the overall situation when it comes to European security.
A continuation of the war will cost Europe far more. The EU can no longer stand by and wait, it, too needs to find a way out of the war being waged by Russia.
If Ukraine is granted the candidate country status in June, this will be an encouraging signal for everyone. That which up until 24 February seemed an impossibility, would become a subject of discussion and an entirely realistic, albeit somewhat remote prospect.
Nickolay Kapitonenko is an associate professor at the Institute of International Relations at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and director of the Centre for International Relations Studies.
Source: International Politics and Society (IPS)-Journal published by the International Political Analysis Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin
UNITED NATIONS, May 04 (IPS) – The Russian Federation, which invaded Ukraine last February killing scores of civilians and destroying entire cities, has been condemned, vilified and ostracized by the international community.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was emphatic last month when he remarked: “The use of force by one country against another is the repudiation of the principles that every country has committed to uphold. This applies to the present military offensive. It is wrong. It is against the Charter. It is unacceptable”.
And while the US and Western European nations have cut off all commercial and financial ties with Russia— treating Moscow as an international pariah– the UN Secretariat is continuing its multi-million-dollar contracts with a blacklisted Russia.
Metaphorically speaking, it triggers the question: does the UN’s right hand know what its left foot is up to?
The goods and services from Russia are primarily air transportation, mostly helicopters, including maintenance and servicing; information and communication technologies (ICT); and food catering, largely for the UN’s 12 peacekeeping missions.
Asked if the UN had received a letter from the Ukrainian Mission urging the Secretariat to end its procurements from Russia, UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters last month: “We did receive, earlier in March, a petition by the Permanent Mission of Ukraine to us, to quote, “immediately suspend all non essential procurement cooperation of the UN with the Russian Federation.”
“We responded to the Permanent Mission of Ukraine a few days later that the procuring of goods and services and works by the UN Secretariat, is in accordance with the mandate given to us by the General Assembly and in with the Financial Regulations of the UN, which requires such procurement actions to be done on the basis of best value for money, fairness, integrity and transparency, and effective international competition.”
He also pointed out that “it’s no secret that a lot of our aviation procurement for peacekeeping and just logistics comes from the Russian Federation, with also quite a bit from Ukraine.”
“The rules are set by the General Assembly, and we follow those rules. So, our position is set by the rules… the financial rules that we have… that we follow… The rules say procurement actions are done on the basis of best value for money, fairness, integrity and transparency, and effective international competition”.
But the 193-member General Assembly, the UN’s highest policy-making body, is missing in action (MIA) — or perhaps planning to pass the buck to the UN’s Administrative and Budgetary Committee.
Asked for a response to comments from the UN Spokesperson‘s office, Christian Saunders, Assistant Secretary General for Supply Chain Management at the Department of Operational Support, told IPS: “The information provided during the briefing by the UN spokesperson remains valid.”
According to the latest available figures, the UN’s purchases from Russia amounted to about $115.6 million in 2021, with Moscow listed as the 5th largest supplier behind the US, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kenya and Switzerland.
The breakdown is as follows: US ($456.2 million), UAE ($329.3 million), Kenya ($192.4 million), Switzerland ($182.3 million) and Russia ($115.6 million).
The UN also has trade links with Russia’s largest helicopter operator, UTair – Helicopter Services, described as a leading provider of aviation services to companies in the fuel and energy industries, plus the United Nations.
Last year, the UN Procurement Division (UNPD) called for tenders for the following contracts in aviation procurement, where Russia has remained a front-runner.
One Medium Fixed Wing Turboprop Passenger Aircraft Support of UNISFA for a period of one year Plus two optional extension periods of one year each.
An Air Ambulance Aircraft Service with Guaranteed Availability based in Europe in support of UN Operations, for a period of three months, plus three optional extension periods of three months each.
A second Air Ambulance Aircraft Service with Guaranteed Availability based in Accra, Ghana in support of UN Operations, for a period of three months plus three optional extension periods of three months each.
Meanwhile, the approved budget for UN Peacekeeping operations for the fiscal year 1 July 2021 – 30 June 2022 is a staggering $6.38 billion. (A/C.5/75/25)—and payments to Russian contractors will flow largely from this budget.
But one question cries out for an answer: how will the UN pay for these purchases and services when Russians have been barred from most of the international banking system?
Speaking of Russia’s isolation at the UN, US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told reporters May 3: “We have been successful in isolating Russia in the Security Council, and that’s a significant success. We have been successful in unifying the voices condemning Russia in the General Assembly, but it came about because there was so much support for it in the Security Council. And getting 141 votes to support that effort was a significant success for all of us””.
“And we have been successful in unifying the UN in suspending Russia from the Human Rights Council. Russia is isolated in the Security Council, and every time we have a discussion in the Security Council as it relates to Russia, they are on the defensive and we will continue to keep them on the defensive until they end their brutal attack on the Ukrainian people”.
Last week Russia was suspended from the UN World Tourism Organization (UNETO), shortly after Moscow announced it had decided to quit in anticipation of the suspension.
Ian Williams, President of the Foreign Press Association, told IPS it is difficult within the rule, but the UN can be notoriously slow in paying its bills which might be appropriate in this case.
“But they do need an official body to bar contracts for Russian companies to protect staff involved and to ward off breach of contract. It is hard to leave it to the courage, or caprice, of UN bureaucrats”.
The UN had no compunction in hiring a CIA founded company to run UN missions along the Iraq-Kuwait border despite Iraqi protests at the UN, said Williams, author of ‘Untold: The Real Story of the United Nations in Peace and War.’
Opinion by Paul Teng, Genevieve Donnellon-May (singapore)
Inter Press Service
SINGAPORE, May 02 (IPS) – Amidst a backdrop of rising food insecurity worldwide and a global food supply chain crisis, many countries are attempting to increase the level of food self-production. One improved input for farming which is receiving renewed attention is improved seed. The two most populous countries in the world, China and India, have recently made ground-breaking moves to improve their competitive position by developing new seeds which will improve their food production and increase resilience to climate change. So far, in 2022, new regulations on using biotechnology (genetic modification and gene editing) have been put in place by both countries to ultimately allow smallholder farmers to benefit from these new seeds.
Paul Teng
The COVID pandemic and, more recently, the Ukraine-Russia war have significantly disrupted food production and supply chains for food and farm inputs. Fears are growing about reduced crop planting by farmers in developing countries and reduced yields due to the lesser use of high-priced fertilizers. Apart from fertilizers, supply chain disruptions affect all inputs needed for farming, including seeds. The seed is the first link in the food chain.
The availability and access to seeds are essential to farmers, particularly in developing countries or areas affected by droughts and other disasters, giving rise to the concept of “seed security, which the UN FAO defines as the “ready access by rural households, particularly farmers and farming communities, to adequate quantities of quality seed and planting materials of crop varieties, adapted to their agro-ecological conditions and socioeconomic needs, at planting time, under normal and abnormal weather conditions.” In many developing countries, quality seed is commonly produced by companies operating under public scrutiny.
The importance of having reliable supplies of improved seeds for farmers has been particularly highlighted in the world’s most populous country, China, where seeds are high on the policy agenda.
In early April 2022, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for working toward food self-sufficiency and developing the country’s seed industry during a visit to a seed laboratory in Hainan Province, southern China. He noted that China’s food security could only be safeguarded when seed resources are firmly held in its own hands. President Xi’s comments come at a time when many countries aim to increase their self-production of food in anticipation of disruptions in supply chains such as those caused by the Ukraine-Russia crisis and the COVID pandemic.
Genevieve Donnellon-May
President Xi’s comments fit in the broader context of seed and food, issues that will only continue to grow in importance. They come at a time when there is rising food insecurity worldwide and a looming global food crisis brought on by the Ukraine-Russia War, a worsening geopolitical environment and growing vulnerability of the global food supply chains due to accelerated climate change impacts and Covid-19-related disruptions.
All the above background factors have led China and India to make important moves to tap a proven tool for developing new crop varieties, namely biotechnology.
In April 2022, China’s agriculture ministry announced plans for the first time after many years of deliberations to approve two new genetically modified corn varieties developed by the Syngenta Group. Earlier, In January 2022, China published new guidelines for the approval of gene-edited plants, paving the way for faster improvements to important food security crops. And this came amid a raft of measures to overhaul China’s seed industry, seen as a weak link in efforts to ensure it can feed the world’s biggest population. China’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Tang Renjian, had likened seeds to the “computer chips” of agriculture.
In an unrelated parallel development, India approved a key change in rules at the end of March 2022 to allow genome-edited plants or organisms without any “foreign” genes to be subjected to a different regulatory process than the one applied to genetically engineered products. As in China, this is anticipated to lead to faster development of new crop varieties that can meet the challenges of climate change and higher yields.
However, not all interested parties support the use of biotechnology to develop new seeds or patenting new crop varieties. Although the evidence is strong that multinational and domestic seed companies have played a major role in lifting crop production through their improved seeds, this has also led to concerns about the control that the private sector may have over this important input for food production. And related to this issue of control of seeds is the patenting of new seeds.
There has been a rise in ‘seed activism‘ and interest in seed sovereignty as part of the pushback against the modern agricultural system that is supported by patented seeds such as hybrids. This pushback has been helmed by groups which exploit the fear (often speculative) that by having control over seeds, a handful of multinational companies, rather than farmers or countries, have control over the global food supply. This omits the reality that farmers have the right to choose whatever seeds to plant and even keep their own seeds if desired. These groups have also failed to recognize that investments to innovate and produce new seeds would not have been possible without adequate protection of seeds as intellectual property. Countries like China and India realise the importance of promoting innovations in the seed industry.
China, in particular, has announced that it aims to revitalize the seed sector, encourage germplasm collection, and strengthen intellectual property protection in the sector. In China, views on the importance of seeds in food security are reflected in various domestic policies such as in 2022’s “No 1 Central Policy Document”, the country’s agricultural blueprint. A top policy priority is the development of the seed industry in China.
The issues of seed sovereignty based on farmer-saved seed, when balanced against the track record of improved seeds from companies which give high yields, are complex. But in the final analysis, farmers will choose the seeds that give them the most assured yields under risky conditions, even if they have to pay for such seeds. This has been the case with almost all the developed and developing countries with food surpluses for export, such as the U.S.A., Canada, Brazil and Argentina. And consumers, as well as food importers are those who benefit by there being more food at affordable prices.
The first “Green Revolution” in Asia which took off in the 1970s was based on improved seeds of wheat and rice, bred using technologies which were novel at that time. However, towards the latter part of the last millennium, the need for more novel technologies to improve crops became obvious as yield gains were stagnating in many crops. The challenges facing all smallholder farmers arising from changes in climate, pests and natural resource depletion are becoming more intense and frequent. And unless new seeds are developed and made available to farmers in shorter timeframes, it is the consuming public that will suffer the consequences of reduced, unreliable food supply and higher prices.
The conundrum is how to balance local ownership of seed sources which are commonly unimproved and low-yielding with improved high-yielding seeds developed by seed companies (either domestic or multinational) using modern science. Ultimately, smallholder farmers worldwide deserve new “seeds of hope”.
Paul Teng is Adjunct Senior Fellow, Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies at Nanyang Technological University Singapore. He has worked in the Asia Pacific region on agri-food issues for over thirty years, with international organizations, academia and the private sector.
Genevieve Donnellon-May is a master’s student in Water Science, Policy and Management at the University of Oxford. Genevieve’s research interests include China, Africa, transboundary governance, and the food-energy-water nexus.
WASHINGTON DC, May 02 (IPS) – The writer is Executive Director, Arms Control Association, Washington DC.Russian President Vladimir Putin’s brutal war on Ukraine, along with his implied threats of nuclear weapons use against any who would interfere, has raised the specter of nuclear conflict.
Last month, CIA Director William Burns said that although there is no sign that Russia is preparing to do so, “none of us can take lightly the threat posed by a potential resort to tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons.”
As the war drags on, it is vital that Russian, NATO, and U.S. leaders maintain lines of communication to prevent direct conflict and avoid rhetoric and actions that increase the risk of nuclear escalation.
Provocations could include deploying tactical nuclear weapons or developing new types of nuclear weapons designed for fighting and “winning” a regional nuclear war.
For these and other reasons, U.S. President Joe Biden was smart to announce in March that he will cancel a proposal by the Trump administration for a new nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile (SLCM), a weapon last deployed in 1991.
Before President Donald Trump, two Democratic and two Republican administrations had agreed that nuclear-armed cruise missiles on Navy ships were redundant and destabilizing and detract from higher-priority conventional missions.
Moreover, re-nuclearizing the fleet would create serious operational burdens. In 2019, Biden called this weapon a “bad idea” and said there is no need for new nuclear weapons. He was right then and is right to cancel the system now.
Nevertheless, some in Congress are pushing to restore funding for a nuclear SLCM to fill what they say is a “deterrence gap” against Russia’s tactical nuclear weapons arsenal and to provide a future president with “more credible” nuclear options in a future war with Russia in Europe or with China over Taiwan. A fight over the project, which would cost at least $9 billion through the end of the decade, is all but certain.
The arguments for reviving the nuclear SLCM program are as flimsy as they are dangerous. Serious policymakers all agree that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. But deploying nuclear-armed cruise missiles at sea would undoubtedly increase the possibility of nuclear war through miscalculation.
By deploying both conventional and nuclear-armed cruise missiles at sea, any launch of a conventional cruise missile inherently would send a nuclear signal and increase the potential for unintended nuclear use in a conflict with a nuclear-armed adversary because the adversary would have no way of knowing if the missile was nuclear or conventional.
Furthermore, even if Russia’s stockpile of 1,000 to 2,000 short-range nuclear warheads is larger in number than the U.S. stockpile of 320, there is no meaningful gap in capabilities. Superficial numerical comparisons ignore the fact that both sides already possess excess tactical nuclear destructive capacity, including multiple options for air and missile delivery of lower-yield nuclear warheads.
Both also store their tactical warheads separately from the delivery systems, meaning preparations for potential use would be detectable in advance.
If one president authorized the use of these weapons under “extreme” circumstances in a conventional war, as the policies of both countries allow, neither side would need or want to use more than a handful of these highly destructive weapons.
Although tactical nuclear bombs may produce relatively smaller explosive yields, from less than 1 kiloton TNT equivalent to 20 kilotons or more, their blast, heat, and radiation effects would be unlike anything seen in warfare since the 21-kiloton-yield atomic bomb that destroyed Nagasaki.
Proponents of the nuclear SLCM claim that if Putin used a tactical nuclear weapon to try to gain a military advantage or simply to intimidate, the U.S. president must have additional options to strike back with tactical nuclear weapons. They further argue that he should strike back even if that results in nuclear devastation within NATO and Russian territory.
Theories that nuclear war can be “limited” are extremely dangerous and ignore the unimaginable human suffering nuclear detonations would produce. In practice, once nuclear weapons are used by nuclear-armed adversaries, there is no guarantee the conflict would not quickly escalate to a catastrophic exchange involving the thousands of long-range strategic nuclear weapons in the U.S. and Russian arsenals.
As Gen. John Hyten, head of U.S. Strategic Command, said in 2018 after the annual Global Thunder wargame, “It ends bad. And the bad, meaning, it ends with global nuclear war.” As the supercomputer in the 1983 movie War Games ultimately calculated, “The only winning move is not to play.”
Adding a new type of tactical nuclear weapon to the U.S. arsenal will not enhance deterrence so much as it would increase the risk of nuclear war, mimic irresponsible Russian nuclear signaling, and prompt Russia and China to build their own sea- or land-based nuclear cruise missile systems. Biden made the right decision to cancel Trump’s proposed nuclear SLCM, and now Congress needs to back the president up.
The Arms Control Association (ACA), founded in 1971, is a national nonpartisan membership organization dedicated to promoting public understanding of and support for effective arms control policies. Through public education and media programs and its flagship journal, Arms Control Today, the ACA provides policymakers, the press, and the interested public with authoritative information, analysis, and commentary on arms control proposals, negotiations and agreements, and related national security issues.
TORONTO, Canada, Apr 29 (IPS) – The UN will be commemorating World Press Freedom Day on May 3. The following article is part of a series of IPS features and opinion pieces focused on media freedom globally.Empowered by a global pandemic and the drum beats of war, the strongest despots are growing more despotic, and criminal cartels even more brazen in their violence. Extremists of various hues are also stepping out of the shadows.
Just when the world most needs press freedom to thrive, the liberties that societies only really treasure when they are emasculated are coming under more pressure from different directions, old and new.
Farhana Haque RahmanThe 2021 World Press Freedom Index measured by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) declined last year, and is 12% down since first issued in 2013. RSF reported “a dramatic deterioration in people’s access to information and an increase in obstacles to news coverage”. The coronavirus pandemic was cited as widely used to block journalists’ access to information.
Lest you think that this deterioration is the preserve of less developed countries under autocratic rule, RSF noted an increase in attacks against journalists and arbitrary arrests in Germany, France, Italy and several other European states.
This year –as we approach World Press Freedom Day on May 3 — is measurably worse already, notably in Russia and China, but also in Mexico with an escalation of targeted killings of journalists by suspected drug traffickers.
Some 200 Russian journalists and several dozen foreign reporters have left Russia since the passing of a draconian media law on March 4 which criminalises “deliberately false” information. It outlaws calling the invasion of Ukraine a “war”. In addition Russia is still applying its “foreign agents” legislation to punish and intimidate critical media outlets, including PASMI dedicated exclusively to fighting corruption.
“The Russian authorities’ crackdown on independent media is escalating at breakneck speed. Evidently unsatisfied with merely blocking critical news sites or forcing reporters into exile, the Kremlin now seeks to incarcerate journalists who report on anti-war protests or Russian soldiers who refuse to fight in Ukraine,” Amnesty International said on April 14 commenting on the arrests of two journalists in the Russian republics of Altay and Khakassia.
“Apart from state propaganda, there is no media landscape in Russia,” Journalist Alexey Kovalyov, now based in Riga, told Al Jazeera. The power of that propaganda must not be underestimated. Accounts are widespread of people living in Ukraine telling relatives in Russia that they are being bombed by the Russian army but their own family members refuse to believe them.
The “world’s biggest jailer of press freedom defenders”, reports RSF, is however China, with 115 men and women currently incarcerated. China ranks 177 out of the 180 countries and territories surveyed. “Media freedom in China is declining at breakneck speed,” the Foreign Correspondents Club (FCC) stated in January. China has labelled the FCC an “illegal organisation” and appears in its rhetoric to be encouraging an exodus of foreign journalists.
Free media in Hong Kong, once among the freest in Asia, has been almost completely dismantled, according to Hong Kong Watch, a UK-based advocacy group. Its recent report followed the HK FCC’s announcement it would suspend its Human Rights Press Awards as it risked violating the city’s national security law imposed by Beijing in 2020.
Whereas Russia and China are deploying “lawfare” against independent journalists and big companies in developed countries are stifling the press with “vexatious” lawsuits, it is more a legal wasteland or absence of the state that is killing journalists in Mexico, among others.
A wave of murders has targeted at least eight journalists so far this year, with seven killed in all of 2021, making Mexico under populist President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador one of the most dangerous countries for the press. Journalists, in the words of Adela Navarro Bello, director of the Tijuana weekly Zeta, are “caught in the crossfire between the threats and bullets of narco-traffickers and organised crime and the threats and verbal attacks and attempts to morally annihilate us from the federal and state governments”.
International human rights organisation Article 19 says the Mexican government’s denial of what is happening “results in no urgent measures being taken to stop this brutal spiral of violence”.
A similar pattern is seen in Bangladesh where suspected narco-traffickers killed Bangladeshi journalist Mohiuddin Sarker Nayeem on April 13.
The Committee to Protect Journalists publishes an annual Global Impunity Index and notes that no one has been held to account in 81% of journalist murders worldwide over the past 10 years. Somalia tops the list, with Mexico ranked 6th and Bangladesh 11th.
State-sponsored or tolerated violence and political persecution aside, world press freedom is also being eroded in an insidious way in places where such freedoms are commonly understood to be vital in sustaining well-functioning democracies. Coupled with the apparently unstoppable rise of social media as a source of information – some surveys suggest 50% of adults in the US and UK get their news from social media – the state of much of the traditional press, digital or not, is far from healthy.
The annual Digital News Report by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism found the US ranked last in media trust, at 29%, among 92,000 news consumers polled in 46 countries. (Finland came top).
Governments must not be passive while the same powerful corporate lobbies that have spent fortunes over decades spreading climate dis/misinformation in traditional media now feed on the rapacity of Big Tech social media, which are failing to disclose comprehensive policies to combat this. Climate disinformation as a threat to climate action is highlighted in the latest UN Climate Reports.
Press offices of international organisations, particularly the UN and large INGOs, also have a particular responsibility to uphold media freedom by eschewing the corporate dark arts of delay, denial and obfuscation.
A new proposal by the EU executive to protect journalists and campaigners from so-called vexatious lawsuits is highly welcome. The move would target “strategic lawsuits against public participation” known as Slapps, where the rich misuse legal means to silence troublesome investigative reporters and NGOs.
No press freedom, no democracy. Just like freedom of speech, that does not mean a free press can publish whatever it wants. Both need to be defined and, in these very dark times, defended.
Farhana Haque Rahman is Senior Vice President of IPS Inter Press Service and Executive Director IPS North America, including it’s UN Bureau; she served as the elected Director General of IPS from 2015-2019. A journalist and communications expert, she is a former senior official of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.
Refugees entering Poland from Ukraine at the Medyka border crossing point. March 2022. Credit: UNHCR/Chris Melzer
Opinion by Azza Karam (new york)
Inter Press Service
NEW YORK, Apr 19 (IPS) – “The war in Ukraine is a European …and a Christian… matter… It does not require the involvement of a colourful array of religions or people”. These words were uttered and affirmed by some European Protestant men, working in interfaith circles in Europe. The ‘colourful’ encompassed other than European, mostly Christian – and likely mostly male.
Add this perspective to another one from a seasoned Catholic lay male leader, diplomat and academic, echoing representatives working in various Vatican offices, who maintain that if there is to be any religious engagement around Ukraine or Russia, “it is the Pope who should be doing this …and this is the preference of European governments”.
To these people, the fact that the war in Ukraine (and economic sanctions against Russia), have raised the price of oil, gas, and wheat (and therefore basic staples such as bread) for all other inhabitants of our world, is simply irrelevant.
The important fact appears to that Europe is suffering – and losing face in doing so, one might add. The fact that there are religious minorities in Ukraine also suffering, is not meriting as much attention. The supremacy of the Catholic Pope, who is a leader of but 16 percent of the world’s religious populations, is also apparent in the discourse of many esteemed European male leaders.
Were European governments to see value-added to religious involvement in affairs of state, then it would clearly be the Pope who would merit the role, out of the thousands – if not more – of other faith leaders in (the rest of) the world.
Yet so significant is the war in Ukraine, along with the role of Russia (and perhaps after that China) in geopolitics, and the changing political, financial and economic consequences around a world already damaged by the vagaries of Covid lockdowns and declines in tourism (which was the source of basic income for hundreds of millions of people), that it is a staple of many conversations – outside of Europe.
One such perspective of some seasoned diplomats in the USA, is that “religion and religious institutions have nothing to do with this war nor play much of a role in it. This is one politician’s madness”. Someone must have forgotten to send the memo with the words of a Patriarch of the largest Church in Russia, with over 120 million adherents worldwide, justifying the war – and using a homophobic discourse to do so.
Or maybe we erased the other memo where millions of Russians voted for this one “mad” politician (as millions of others voted for other mad politicians elsewhere in the world).
And yet, as we ponder the rampant ignorance about the intersections of politics and religion worldwide, and the arrogance of some European religious and political actors, and as some of us listen to religious leaders from other corners of the world, it would be wise to ponder a couple of questions: are we sure that all religions would have found the Patriarch of Russia’s language, and its subject, quite so distasteful? And, are we sure that it is one man causing all this carnage and hate (and profit to weapons manufacturers, mercenaries, and all who make money from war)?
There are many forms of this kind of arrogance of ignorance, which have coalesced to bring our world to this point where it would seem that almost every corner of it, is blighted. For some it is the blight of many forms of extremism: from launching war against a sovereign nation and killing its people, to horrific gang violence, to desecrating sacred sites and attacking pilgrims and devotees during their prayers, even during times which are holy to both attacked and attackers.
For others, it is the blight of democracy abused and myriad human rights systematically and deeply violated. For yet others the blight is having to live with various forms of hate speech and hate filled actions, including those with distinct anti-Semitic and Islamophobic blows. Holocaust deniers are reemerging out of many layers of rotten woodwork in all corners of the world.
The semantics of Islamophobia are being argued about in some western government circles, even as veiled women are being openly abused in some streets and denied access to jobs in countries claiming respect for religious freedom, and where even turbaned Sikh men continue to face abuse because they are mistaken as Muslims, and/or because their form of dress is deemed injurious to secular sensibilities.
For others the blight is to have to contend with shootings by lone gunmen of innocents in schools or subways or nightclubs or concerts. All this in the middle of a public health epidemic that has claimed the lives of millions – and we are still counting (where it is possible to have reliable data) – and while climate change is contributing to the largest numbers of refugees and forcibly displaced peoples ever in recorded collective human history.
Yet climate change is still being denied. And as for misogyny, it is the new normal in private and public spaces, everywhere in the world – in Europe too.
But it is not all gloom. The same European country which decried the one million Syrian refugees it allowed in (and subsequently quietly offloaded thousands of them to other countries), has announced no limit to the number of Ukrainians needing to enter it, and sometimes ensuring that some of the newer Ukrainian refugees receive access to homes before other refugees (who had waited longer but now must continue their wait). Another European country which let some refugees die of cold on its borders rather than allow them in, is now providing all manner of support to the Ukrainian ones.
The United States, which a few months ago lost significant credibility as a result of a messy exit after a 20 year struggle against the Taliban in Afghanistan (leaving the country largely back in control of the Taliban), is today resonating with righteous indignation, and crowing that “the West is back”. The European Union too, has seen the error of its ways of being overly dependent on cheap Russian gas, and oil, and is now hastening to rid itself of such a dependency.
The war in Ukraine (albeit apparently not the ongoing horrors in Myanmar, Yemen, Mali, Niger, Cameroon, and Ethiopia – to name but a few) is indeed impacting our world. Like Covid-19, the war will doubtless continue to influence political, financial, and socio-cultural frames for decades. But here is another question: are we sure that the rampant and now fully on display discriminatory arrogance of ethnocentrism, and its appendages, will change?
This April 2022, witnesses another form of coalescing. Bahá’ís celebrate Ri?ván, a festival of joy and unity which commemorates the beginning of their Faith. For Hindus and many others also, this month marks the celebration of the Spring festival of the harvest, and the Hindu new year. For Sikhs as well, this April celebrates the birth of the religion as a collective faith.
Jews celebrate Pesach, or Passover, commemorating the exodus of the Jewish people escaping the slavery of the Egyptian Pharaoh. Christians (Western and Eastern) – celebrate the resurrection of Christ this Easter. All while Muslims observe the thirty days of fast known as Ramadan. There are more faith traditions celebrating and/or commemorating. Definitely the best time, then, to pray for – or for those of tender anti-religious sensibilities let us say ‘to reflect’ on: the twin birth of humility and mercy.
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