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Aujourd’hui dans l’Expresso : une situation toujours tendue au Kosovo, de nouvelles recommandations européennes sur le dépistage du cancer et une possible levée de l’embargo finlandais sur les armes à destination de la Turquie.

By External Source
Dec 13 2022 (IPS-Partners)

 
Q1: The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) faces one of the most long-standing, complex protracted crisis on the globe. In such a context, how important is it for aid stakeholders to support the education sector among the multitude of urgent priorities in the country? Why must education be a leading priority?

“Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world”, says the proverb. To deprive children of their education is to deprive oneself of an excellent tool for emancipation and personal development. Without education, there is no development, no social cohesion, and no peace. An educated population is a population that is aware of and armed to face the many challenges and obstacles that will be on its way to sustainable development and peace. Without education there is no development and without development there is no peace.
We have experienced that support to education can contribute to peaceful cohabitation between communities that can be affected by inter-community conflicts, as their children are called upon to attend together the schools we have supported. At these schools, children learn moral values and this can lead to sustainable solutions as the school shapes generations that can live together without discrimination.

Q2: The UN system works with the Government and partners to strengthen complementarity and coherence between emergency relief, development, and peacebuilding efforts – the ‘triple-nexus’ – in Tanganyika Province, DRC as the region gradually becomes more peaceful. As part of these efforts, ECW funding supports UN, civil society, and local community partners to jointly deliver holistic education programmes to vulnerable girls and boys. Can you explain what this “triple nexus” means in the DRC, how it translates into action and why it is so important?

The whole nexus approach is an approach based on the search for durables solutions, by addressing vulnerabilities and tackling causes, including structural causes, which I like to call the Gordian knots. In many conflict-affected countries and fragile states, most of the efforts, investments, aid, go towards the symptoms, the effects, the consequences. And year after year, the same things are repeated. But the same recipes will not have different results. A prolonged, chronic humanitarian crisis has causes. Let’s look for them, let’s try to understand them, let’s have a common understanding, with development, peace, human rights, and humanitarian actors together. Once we have found the causes, what are the best remedies, or the paths to the remedies. A land problem? A problem of access or distribution of resources? A problem of identity, of justice? Extreme poverty? the list can be long, but it is important to name the problem(s) and then work with the right actors, with an inter-disciplinary approach because problems are usually intertwined. Two issues we will work on with this approach are, for example, chronic food insecurity and durable solutions for internally displaced people, including in the Tanganyika province for the latter.

Q3: You recently stated “We need more instruments like Education Cannot Wait”, noting that ECW operates with humanitarian speed and achieves development depth in crises. This is an important acknowledgement and recognition of ECW’s work in the UN and of multilateral systems operating in crises contexts. Could you elaborate further on your statement, particularly the why and the how?

Development should almost never stop. Because we should always do our level best to help people get back on their feet and get on with their lives. Always do our level best to get local systems, including public services, running and the local economy back on stream. In crisis context, we can call it emergency development. To avoid falling into the humanitarian dependency trap, which can hurt people’s dignity and sometimes induce harmful behaviours and practices. So, everything that can be done to help with this, with a development lense – agriculture cannot wait; health cannot wait; job creation cannot wait; business development cannot wait; building a house cannot wait – should become part and parcel on our way of thinking and way of working. This is also the nexus at work.

 

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La décision des Pays-Bas et de l’Autriche de bloquer l’adhésion de la Bulgarie à l’espace Schengen a renforcé la rhétorique des milieux pro-russes. Le chef du parti populiste Vazrazhdane Kostadin Kostadinov a déclaré que cette décision suscite l’hypocrisie de l’UE.

Monténégro : plus rien ne fonctionne, pas même la Constitution
Crise politique et constitutionnelle : le Monténégro dans l'impasse
Crise politique au Monténégro : et si le pire était à venir ?
Crise politique au Monténégro : l'art de marquer des buts contre son camp
Monténégro : le DPS de Milo Đukanović ne passe pas le test des municipales

/ Courrier des Balkans, Monténégro, Après Milo, Politique intérieure

Monténégro : plus rien ne fonctionne, pas même la Constitution
Crise politique et constitutionnelle : le Monténégro dans l'impasse
Crise politique au Monténégro : et si le pire était à venir ?
Crise politique au Monténégro : l'art de marquer des buts contre son camp
Monténégro : le DPS de Milo Đukanović ne passe pas le test des municipales

/ Courrier des Balkans, Monténégro, Après Milo, Politique intérieure

In several African regions, economic integration has successfully reduced tariff protection by freezing the opportunity to raise applied tariffs against fellow integration partners above those promised. We examine whether these regional tariff commitments have come at the expense of adverse side-effects on the prevalence of non-tariff trade barriers. Comparing the effects of applied tariff overhangs – the difference between MFN bound tariffs and effectively applied tariffs – towards all vis-à-vis African trading partners on SPS and TBT notifications of 35 African WTO members from 2001-2017, we find no general relationship between tariff overhangs and import regulation in our preferred model setting. Larger tariff overhangs specific to intra-African trade relations, however, increase the probability of SPS measures and TBT and thereby contrast with the common assumption of the former functioning as a flexible policy valve. We see the nature of Africa’s formal trade relations as an explanation for these findings. While regional tariff commitments have not only significantly moved African countries away from multilateral commitments, they have also sharply reduced their tariff policy space within Africa, thus seemingly leaving regulatory policy as one of the few legitimate options to level the playing field with the by far closest market competitors.

In several African regions, economic integration has successfully reduced tariff protection by freezing the opportunity to raise applied tariffs against fellow integration partners above those promised. We examine whether these regional tariff commitments have come at the expense of adverse side-effects on the prevalence of non-tariff trade barriers. Comparing the effects of applied tariff overhangs – the difference between MFN bound tariffs and effectively applied tariffs – towards all vis-à-vis African trading partners on SPS and TBT notifications of 35 African WTO members from 2001-2017, we find no general relationship between tariff overhangs and import regulation in our preferred model setting. Larger tariff overhangs specific to intra-African trade relations, however, increase the probability of SPS measures and TBT and thereby contrast with the common assumption of the former functioning as a flexible policy valve. We see the nature of Africa’s formal trade relations as an explanation for these findings. While regional tariff commitments have not only significantly moved African countries away from multilateral commitments, they have also sharply reduced their tariff policy space within Africa, thus seemingly leaving regulatory policy as one of the few legitimate options to level the playing field with the by far closest market competitors.

In several African regions, economic integration has successfully reduced tariff protection by freezing the opportunity to raise applied tariffs against fellow integration partners above those promised. We examine whether these regional tariff commitments have come at the expense of adverse side-effects on the prevalence of non-tariff trade barriers. Comparing the effects of applied tariff overhangs – the difference between MFN bound tariffs and effectively applied tariffs – towards all vis-à-vis African trading partners on SPS and TBT notifications of 35 African WTO members from 2001-2017, we find no general relationship between tariff overhangs and import regulation in our preferred model setting. Larger tariff overhangs specific to intra-African trade relations, however, increase the probability of SPS measures and TBT and thereby contrast with the common assumption of the former functioning as a flexible policy valve. We see the nature of Africa’s formal trade relations as an explanation for these findings. While regional tariff commitments have not only significantly moved African countries away from multilateral commitments, they have also sharply reduced their tariff policy space within Africa, thus seemingly leaving regulatory policy as one of the few legitimate options to level the playing field with the by far closest market competitors.

Finnland überdenkt möglicherweise seine 2019 getroffene Entscheidung, keine Waffen an die Türkei zu verkaufen, um seinen NATO-Beitrittsprozess zu beschleunigen.

German automakers and Asian battery suppliers are getting together in Hungary in a multi-billion-dollar marriage of convenience to drive their electric ambitions.

Niederländische Politiker:innen haben die Regierung des Landes kritisiert, nachdem diese offenbar Berechnungen über das vorgeschlagene neue Rentensystem mit den Medien geteilt hatte, bevor sie dem Parlament vorgelegt wurden.

Bundeskanzler Olaf Scholz hat die lang erwarteten Leitlinien für seinen "Klima-Club" vorgestellt, eine Plattform für Länder, die das Klima schützen wollen. Der Vorschlag könnte jedoch von ähnlichen, kürzlich angekündigten Initiativen überlagert werden.

COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh. Credit: United Nations
 
AFRICA COP DENIES AFRICAN WOMEN & GIRLS’ DEMANDS

By Anwarul K. Chowdhury
NEW YORK, Dec 13 2022 (IPS)

The African women and Girls were deeply concerned about the lack of commitment by UNFCCC Parties as climate change continues to impact negatively on the continent victimizing more women and girls.

The WGC has uplifted the voices of African feminists at COP27, asserting their power to demand climate-justice articulated in the powerful set of proposals presented as the African Women and Girls’ Demands. [ Link: WGC_COP27-African-Feminists-Demands_EN_final.pdf (womengenderclimate.org) ] The demands stress in particular the need for more Inclusion of women and young people in decision-making processes;

Imali Ngusale, FEMNET Communication Officer, Kenya was clear in her pronouncement on this dimension saying that “Remarks about women and youth engagement have been regurgitated in well-crafted speeches. Promises have been made year in year out, but the reality check keeps us guessing whether the implementation of the GAP is a promise that may never be achieved. A gender responsive climate change negotiation is what we need. The time for action is yesterday.”

“… We are saddened by the outcomes of the implementation for the GAP. The GAP remains the beacon of hope for women and girls who are at the frontline of the climate crises,” lamented Queen Nwanyinnaya Chikwendu, a Climate Change and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) Activist of Nigeria.

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury

In a hard-hitting statement, the WGC spokesperson Carmen Capriles said out loud in her statement at the closing ceremony on 20 November that “This COP is not a safe space for women environmental and human rights defenders, neither at this venue nor in its decisions. We have experienced being sidelined once again, we have experienced harassment, oppression and resistance against our feminist climate justice demands, however, this only makes us stronger.”

This powerful one-page statement has been posted on the reliable and prestigious Women’s UN Regional Network (WUNRN) website and worth reading by all activists and supporters for the rights of women and girls. It would be worthwhile for the UN to look into the issues raised by in the WGC statement at COP27 and publicly share its findings. UN Women and UN DESA which oversee NGO participation throughout the UN system should be the lead entities to pursue this matter from the UN Headquarters.

Expressing a total dismay with the lack of substance in the outcome, politicization and non-participatory process, Zainab Yunusa, Climate Change and Development Activist of Nigeria pondered, “As a young African climate justice feminist, I came to COP27 excited to see concrete decisions to follow the intermediate review of the Gender Action Plan (GAP)…. Rather, I witnessed restrictive negotiation processes that undermined my contributions.”

“I observed the cunning political power play of ‘who pays for what,’ at the expense of the sufferings of women and girls of intersecting diversities. I saw a weak, intangible, eleventh-hour GAP decision that merely sought to tick the box of arriving at an outcome. COP27 side-lined the gender agenda in climate action. It failed women human rights defenders, indigenous women, young women, National Gender Climate Change Focal Points, and gender climate justice advocates clamoring for gender equality in climate action.”

Gender-Climate Change activists are wondering whether these frustrations would reappear at COP28. Their limited expectation, however, relates to the skillful, transparent, and impartial handling of the negotiations at the final stages at COP27 by the facilitator Hana Al-Hashimi of the delegation of UAE, the next host.

WIKIGENDER’S ROLE DOUBTED:

In the context of gender and climate advocacy, a number of civil society activists have expressed doubts about the role of the Wikigender, which claims to be “ a global online collaborative platform linking policymakers, civil society and experts from both developed and developing countries to find solutions to advance gender equality.” It reportedly provides a “centralized space for knowledge exchange on key emerging issues, with a strong focus on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and in particular on SDG 5”.

The Wikigender University Programme engages with students working on gender equality issues. As an OECD Development Centre-supervised online community, activists wondered about the platform’s bias, more so as it deals with gender equality issues.

WOMEN’S PARTICIPATION MARGINALISED:

Another major concern widely shared by most activists was that too few women participated in COP27 climate negotiations. Women are historically underrepresented at the United Nations’ global conferences on climate change, and COP27 was no exception. A BBC analysis has found that women made up less than 34% of country negotiating teams at Sharm El-Sheikh. Some delegations were more than 90% male.

ActionAid UK emphasizes that “there is no getting around when women are in the room, they create solutions that are proven to be more sustainable.” To make the matter worse, the UN has estimated that 80% of people displaced by climate change are women. ActionAid said that climate change is exacerbating gender inequalities. Decisions at COP27 were not focused on the specific issues as well the perspectives which are of particular concern to women.

At COP27, the inaugural ‘family photo’ showed a dismal reality featuring 110 leaders present, but just seven of them were women. This was one of the lowest concentrations of women seen at the COPs, according to the Women’s Environment and Development Organization (WEDO), which tracks female participation at such events. Twelve years ago in 2011, countries pledged to increase female participation at these talks, but the share this year has fallen since a peak of 40% in 2018, according to WEDO.

According to the UN, young women are currently leading the charge on taking climate change action. Some of the most famous legal cases brought against governments for inaction on climate change, have been brought by women. It is obvious that the outcomes of the climate change negotiations will be affected by the lack of women participating. They must have a seat at the table.

As in other years, women, and especially women of color and from countries in the global South had been demanding, that their voices be heard and amplified in climate negotiations. Their demands fell into deaf ears. “When we talk about representation it is about more than numbers; it is meaningful representation and inclusion,” said Nada Elbohi, an Egyptian feminist and youth advocate, in a press release. “It is bringing the priorities of African women and girls to the table.”

CIVIL SOCIETY IGNORED IN A BIG WAY:

UNFCCC website claims that “Civil society and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are welcomed to these (annual COP and related) conferences as observers to offer opinions and expertise, and to further represent the people of the world.” There are 1400 such observer organizations grouped into nine constituencies namely, 1.Businesses and industry organizations; 2. Environmental organizations; 3. Local and municipal governments; 4. Trade unions; 5. Research and independent organizations; and organizations that work for 6. the rights of Indigenous people; 7. for Young people; 8. for Agricultural workers; and 9. for Women and gender rights.

Though these constituencies provide focal points for easier interaction with the UNFCCC Secretariat, based in Bonn, and individual governments, at COP27, such interactions did not happen. Complaining the lack of effective civil society space, Gina Cortes Valderrama, WGC Co-Focal Point, Women Engage for a Common Future (WECF) focused bluntly on the reality speaking on record that “Negotiations at COP27 have taken place amid deepened injustices in terms of access and inclusion, with participants facing discrimination, harassment and surveillance, and concerns for their safety as well as the safety of activists and human rights defender.”

She further added that “Instead of this being the space for guaranteeing human rights to all, it is being utilized as an Expo where capitalism, false solutions and colonial development models are greeted with red carpets while women and girls fade away in the memories of their lost land, of their damaged fields, of the ashes of their murdered.”

A WGC representative verbalized their anger by announcing that “Even as we call out the hypocrisy, inaction and injustice of this space, as civil society and movements connected in the fight for climate justice, we refuse to cede the space of multilateralism to short-sighted politicians and fossil-fuel driven corporate interests.”

Key civil society leaders were critical of their exclusion complaining that “Observers were consistently locked out of the negotiation rooms for a repeated ‘lack of sitting space’ excuse … We have also witnessed painful orchestration of last-minute decisions with few parties.”

They alerted the organizers and hosts of future COPs by saying that “This needs to be called out and ended.”

COP27 PEOPLES’ DECLARATION:

In the final days of COP27, becoming increasingly frustrated, the Women and Gender Constituency together with different civil society movements across the world endorsed a joint COP27 Peoples’ Declaration for Climate Justice. The Declaration called for: (1) the decolonisation of the economy and our societies; (2) The repaying of climate debt and delivery of climate finance; (3) The defense of 1.5c with real zero goals by 2030 and rejection of false solutions; (4) Global solidarity, peace, and justice. Full text is available at COP27 Peoples’ Declaration (womengenderclimate.org).

This substantive and forward-looking Declaration should strengthen civil society solidarity and provide a blueprint for their activism in upcoming COPs and other UNFCCC platforms.

Given the ill-treatment and huge disappointment of the civil society observers being denied access during COP27, it would be beneficial for the COP process and the next COP Presidencies to allow one representative from each of these nine constituencies to be present at all the meetings of the Parties from COP28 onwards.

FOSSIL FUEL LOBBY COMES OUT OF THE SHADOW:

On one point there was a near-unanimous opinion at COP27 that the fossil fuel industry has finally come out of the shadows. One key takeaway from Sharm El-Sheikh was the presence and power of fossil fuel – be they delegates or countries.

Attendees connected to the oil and gas industry were everywhere. Some 636 were part of country delegations and trade teams, reflecting an increase of over 25% from COP26. The crammed pavilions felt at times like a fossil fuel trade fair. This influence was clearly reflected in the final text.

Sanne Van de Voort of Women Engage for a Common Future (WECF), commented, “… although it is long overdue, only a handful of countries presented their revised national plans in Sharm El-Sheikh; in contrast more than 600 fossil fuel and nuclear lobbyists flooded the COP premises, selling their false climate solutions”. According to the Spiegel, the COP27 became a marketplace where 20 major oil and gas deals were signed by climate-killers such as Shell and Equinor.”

Tzeporah Berman, international program director at grassroots environmental organization “Stand.Earth” lamented that “To be sure, the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and gas, is the chief driver of the climate crisis. Our failure to recognize this in 27 COPs is a result of the power of the fossil fuel incumbents, especially the big oil and gas companies out in force at this COP who have made their products invisible in the negotiations”

Climate-campaigners described the UN’s flagship climate conference as a “twisted joke” and said COP27 appeared to be a “festival of fossil fuels and their polluting friends, buoyed by recent bumper profits …The extraordinary presence of this industry’s lobbyists at these talks is therefore a twisted joke at the expense of both people and planet.”

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury is former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the United Nations, former Ambassador of Bangladesh to the UN and former President of the Security Council.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Excerpt:

Part Two of Three

The head of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) expects another wave of hundreds of thousands of refugees from Ukraine in Europe over the winter because of "unlivable" conditions, he said on Monday (12 December).

In today’s edition of the Capitals, find out more about Finland considering ending its arms embargo on Turkey for NATO’s sake, Montenegrin police clashing with anti-government protesters in the capital, and so much more.

Die österreichische Regierung sollte die Ausgaben kürzen, um die aktuellen Herausforderungen zu bewältigen, fordert der Fiskalrat des Landes. Dazu gehöre die Coronapandemie, deren Auswirkungen auf den Haushalt weiterhin zu spüren seien.

Das französische Außenministerium hat die Angriffe auf EU-Vollzugsbeamte im Norden des Kosovo am Wochenende aufs Schärfste verurteilt und sich besorgt über die zunehmenden Spannungen im Land geäußert.

La France « condamne fermement » les attaques au nord du Kosovo visant des forces de l’ordre de l’UE ce week-end et a dit sa préoccupation face à la tension montante dans le pays.

The groups of Socialists and Democrats (S&D) and the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) had a “clear alliance” in the EU House to protect Qatar, French MEP Manon Aubry told EURACTIV. In late November, the EU Left managed to pass...

Le gouvernement minoritaire slovaque est confronté à un vote de défiance difficile mardi (13 décembre). Son avenir dépend de quelques membres indécis du Parlement.