Recent developments in the Middle East and the arrival of the Biden administration offer unique opportunities to improve regional security. However, obstacles on the way to such progress have far from disappeared.
AFRICA 2021 AND COVID 19
This conflict is of course not the only one where force is used. The Sahel zone is suffering from many terrorist attacks and military reactions. The Congo has not come to rest (see my recent blog on the occasion of the killing of Lumumba 70 years ago) and is pulling its neighborhood into its fighting. However, in addition to these and other conflicts, Africa is also affected by the pandemic, we all suffer from. At the beginning of the pandemic, it seemed to be in a better situation.
How Nuclear Dependent States Could Respond to the Entry into Force of the TPNW
Since the dawn of the nuclear age in 1945, perceptions and strategic positions amongst States regarding nuclear weapons have always differed. The 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) has thrust these existing divisions to centre stage. The treaty is the result of an increasing emphasis placed by non-nuclear weapon States on the humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons and the persisting risks posed to all humanity by these weapons.
Globale Impfstrategie statt Impfnationalismus!
In den letzten Tagen wurde die EU-Politik hinsichtlich der Impfstoffversorgung gegen das Covid-19-Virus eingehender Kritik unterzogen. Alternativen wurden dabei kaum aufgezeigt. Auch wenn wir uns in einer Ausnahmesituation befinden, bleibt die entscheidende Frage vor allem, ob nicht eine überzeugende globale Strategie fehlt, in die die EU eingebunden werden sollte. Trotz Verständnis für nationale Perspektiven darf man nicht übersehen, wie viele Menschen weltweit eine Impfung brauchen und wie viele kaum eine Chance haben, 2021 noch eine zu bekommen. Wir werden auch in Europa Verzögerungen zur Kenntnis nehmen müssen, aber noch gehören wir zu den Privilegierten.
USA/EU: Eine neue Allianz?
Die USA haben einen neuen Präsidenten. Das erfreut nicht nur viele Amerikanerinnen und Amerikaner, sondern auch die meisten Europäerinnen und Europäer. Keine Frage: der Großteil von uns konnte mit Trump nicht viel anfangen – und umgekehrt. Die EU war für Trump keine attraktive Partnerin. Er hat sich einige Länder ausgesucht, mit denen er und sein Außenminister Pompeo vorzugsweise kommunizierten. Dazu gehörte auch Österreich, dessen Regierung sich eigenartigerweise besonders um Kontakte zu Trump bemühte, um nicht zu sagen, an Trump anbiederte.
25 January 2011: THE ARAB REVOLUTION TAKES SPEED BEFORE IT FAILS
The Arab revolt, or revolution, started not in Cairo but in Tunisia in December 2010. It started when a young Tunisian – Mohamed Bouazizi – set himself on fire because of continuing harassment by the police. (See my blog in German from December). It required some weeks for the revolutionary spirit to arrive in Egypt, the most populous Arab country. For a long time the dissatisfaction with the different regimes in Egypt had been growing in the population.
The poltical significance of the TPNW
CONGO – COLONIALISM, NEO-COLONIALISM AND CONTINUING WARS
It was 17th of January in the year 1961, when the first elected prime minister of the newly independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba was murdered. With him, the newly reached independence was murdered too. There is so much interconnection between the past horror of colonialism, the ongoing one-sided exploitation of natural resources and people, tribal disputes, regional interference, and lack of determination to stop the wars. Unfortunately, there seems not much hope for an end of this multi-layered conflict and people will continue to be killed.
Vaccine geopolitics, ‘big’ and ‘small’, and Europe’s challenge
The first doses of the Covid-19 vaccines being administered across the EU in the last days of 2020 marked a critical passage point in the management of the pandemic. In these first weeks, the epidemiological value of the vaccines could be seen as largely symbolic, as the number of those able to be vaccinated is still quite limited. Yet symbols matter, and EU leaders have seized this opportunity to underline how both the approval of the vaccine, and the organization of the common ‘V [for vaccine] days’ across the Union are a ‘touching proof of unity’ in Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s words.
