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Streets in Rafah were emptying as families continue to flee in search of safety, following an evacuation order by the Israeli authorities. Credit: UNRWA

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 10 2024 (IPS)

An overwhelmingly staggering 186,000 killings in Gaza –- compared with the official figure of over 37,000—has resurrected accusations of genocide and war crimes in the devastating nine-month-old war between Israel and Hamas, with no signs of a cease-fire.

The new estimates have come from The Lancet, one of the most prestigious peer-reviewed British medical journals.

In recent conflicts, says the article, titled “Counting the Deaths in Gaza: Difficult but Essential”, indirect deaths range from three to 15 times the number of direct deaths.

“Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death to the 37, 396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186, 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza,” according to The Lancet.

The disproportionate killings in Gaza are in retaliation to the 1,200 killed by Hamas inside Israel on October 7.

Dr. Simon Adams, President and CEO of the Center for Victims of Torture, the largest international organization that treats survivors and advocates for an end to torture worldwide, told IPS “since the beginning of this war, Israel’s military operations in Gaza have consistently violated the international legal principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution”.

The result has been incalculable civilian suffering in Gaza. It is impossible to have an accurate death toll when so many bodies are still under the rubble, or literally torn to pieces because Israel continues to conduct airstrikes on residential buildings, hospitals, and even UN schools where displaced and vulnerable civilians are sheltering, he pointed out.

“The Israeli government’s collective punishment of the Palestinian people is a war crime. Their actions have made it impossible to provide an accurate death toll. But I certainly trust The Lancet’s scientific rationale more than I trust any press release by the Israeli Defense Forces,” declared Dr Adams.

Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), told IPS conflict-related mortality estimates are the standard methodology for determining actual deaths resulting from a war, and have sadly been all too accurate.

“If Israel continues its indiscriminate bombardment and starvation of the Palestinian people, we can expect the actual death figure to exceed 200,000, to say nothing of the hundreds of thousands of injured and traumatized people who will suffer for decades to come”, she declared.

Nihad Awad, National Executive Director, Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), said:

“We have all known that the real death toll in the Israeli genocide in Gaza is much higher than has been reported. This new data by respected researchers adds yet another piece of evidence proving that a genocide is occurring in Gaza and necessitating international action to end the suffering and bring justice to the Palestinian people.”

This realistic death toll, he pointed out, is backed up by the new reports that Israeli forces are free to kill civilians and destroy homes at will, without any of the rules of engagement required by international law.

“The Biden administration – which is enabling the genocide, ethnic cleansing and forced starvation – must act to stop this growing horror.”

He said The Lancet figures – estimating almost eight percent of the Gaza population killed – would be equivalent to some 26 million Americans killed, or almost the entire population of Texas.

“President Biden and his administration have been supplying the weapons for Israel to commit this horrible genocide and have been obstructing any accountability for Israel,” said Awad.

Asked about the findings, UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said: “We were not involved, as far as I know, into this study. I think it is not a stretch of the imagination that the numbers are probably undercounted, given the fact that the debris and rubble is yet to be cleared. But whatever number we’re speaking about, it is tragic, overwhelming, and even hard to imagine”.

The Lancet says using the 2022 Gaza Strip population estimate of 2, 375, 259 would translate to 7·9% of the total population in the Gaza Strip.

A report from Feb 7, 2024, at the time when the direct death toll was 28, 000, estimated that without a ceasefire there would be between 58, 260 deaths (without an epidemic or escalation) and 85, 750 deaths (if both occurred) by Aug 6, 2024, says the Lancet, which has extremely high standards for its research papers.

Armed conflicts, The Lancet says, have indirect health implications beyond the direct harm from violence. Even if the conflict ends immediately, there will continue to be many indirect deaths in the coming months and years from causes such as reproductive, communicable, and non-communicable diseases.

The total death toll is expected to be large given the intensity of this conflict; destroyed health-care infrastructure; severe shortages of food, water, and shelter; the population’s inability to flee to safe places; and the loss of funding to UNRWA, one of the very few humanitarian organisations still active in the Gaza Strip.

An immediate and urgent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip is essential, accompanied by measures to enable the distribution of medical supplies, food, clean water, and other resources for basic human needs.

At the same time, there is a need to record the scale and nature of suffering in this conflict. Documenting the true scale is crucial for ensuring historical accountability and acknowledging the full cost of the war. It is also a legal requirement.

The interim measures set out by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in January, 2024, require Israel to “take effective measures to prevent the destruction and ensure the preservation of evidence related to allegations of acts within the scope of … the Genocide Convention”.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Pakistan and Iran continue deporting Afghan refugees to their country of origin, leaving returnees in dire situations. Credit: Learning Together.

By External Source
Jul 9 2024 (IPS)

Sarai e Shamali camp in Kabul is a temporary refugee shelter. The camp receives on average 100 Afghans a day, forcibly returned from Pakistan and Iran where most had sought asylum when the Taliban took over power in Afghanistan three years ago.

The deportation has left these individuals in a desperate situation, facing severe financial hardship, homelessness, and a lack of means to earn a living.

Mastora, 32, spent her entire life in Pakistan with her family, where her husband sold leather, and they lived comfortably. Now, forcibly returned to Afghanistan, they have left everything behind in Pakistan and have nothing. “We have no house, no means of livelihood, not even money for transportation, and the Taliban do not provide us any support,” says Mastora.

Seven women were interviewed for this report; three of them were forcibly returned from Iran and four from Pakistan. Mastora, a mother of five, was among the women interviewed.

She was born in Pakistan where her parents had moved 40 years ago from poverty-stricken Afghanistan in search of a better life.

Mastora and her family are among the hundreds of thousands of Afghans who have been expelled from Pakistan when last year the country suddenly announced a forced deportation of undocumented Afghan refugees from the country, uprooting families that have been living in Pakistan for decades.

Iran also decided to send back Afghan refugees living in the country.

Pakistan has expelled more than 500 000 Afghans in the first phase of the deportation in November last year. The country’s authorities have announced a second phase of expulsion to be carried out in July this year that would affect 800 000 Afghans who they claim are illegal migrants.

All the women interviewed had no place to live; only four had managed to rent a house after several days of living in misery. The government of Afghanistan has failed to provide them with any support. Of the seven women interviewed, only one had received 1800 afghani (equivalent to 23 euros) from the UN when she was departing from Pakistan.

The arrival of the deportees has had immediate impact on Kabul where the cost of rent and prices of real estate have risen significantly.

The reason why many Afghans fled to neighbouring Pakistan and Iran was largely due to economic collapse after the Taliban takeover of power, persecution faced by many and the ensuing harsh oppression of women under the hard-line Islamist Taliban regime.

Afghans are however, being forcibly returned to a country where the conditions have worsened.

Madina Azizi, a civil activist and law graduate fled to Afghanistan a year ago. “I was in Pakistan for over nine months”, she said, “and now I have been forced to return to Afghanistan and I fear for my security. In Pakistan I did not live from one day to the next in fear of the Taliban coming after me”, said Azizi

In addition to financial issues, the women are also deeply worried about their daughters’ future in Afghanistan where the Taliban have clamped down girls’ education.

Shakiba and Taj Begum have been deported from Pakistan. They are illiterate, but their husbands are well-educated, and according to them, that’s why they know the value of education.

“I was in Pakistan for seven years; my daughter is 16 years old, and she was studying in the 9th grade. In Pakistan, my husband and I were working to build the future of our children, but now we have nothing here, we have no job, we have no shelter, and I am worried about the future of my two daughters, says Shakiba. ”

Begum also voices similar worries. “I was in Pakistan for four years. I have a daughter who was studying in grade 7 in Pakistan; my husband was a tailor. Our life was much better than it is now in Afghanistan. It’s been two weeks since we returned, and we haven’t found a home yet. We haven’t received any help. We are left wondering what to do.”

Malai, Feroza and Halima, deportees from Iran say they left Afghanistan after the Taliban took over power because they were no longer allowed to work. In Iran, however, they all had gainful employment. Malai worked as a cleaner with her husband, Feroza worked in a restaurant while Halima worked a hairdressing salon.

“Now we can barely manage our lives. If we are able to procure food for breakfast, we struggle to have some for the evening. When we are able to procure food for one day we have to portion it for the next day as well. We are living in great difficulties. We often have survived on tea and bread for days”, the women say.

The women have also recounted how their daughters and sons have no work and do not receive any support. The girls are not allowed to pursue further studies.

Due to the economic hardship and security risks facing the women who have been forced back into Afghanistan, immigration experts and women’s rights activists are calling on the Pakistani and Iranian authorities to halt the forced deportation of Afghans.

Excerpt:

The author is an Afghanistan-based female journalist, trained with Finnish support before the Taliban take-over. Her identity is withheld for security reasons

Joey Shea is the UAE researcher at Human Rights Watch.

By Joey Shea
Jul 9 2024 (IPS)

At least 84 Emirati human rights defenders and political dissidents are on trial in the UAE, facing death sentences or life in prison on spurious charges related to their political activism and human rights work, in a case that has its origins in another from over a decade ago. A verdict is expected July 10.

“We hope that before you sentence us to death, you will give us the opportunity to defend ourselves,” implored Sheikh Muhammad al-Siddiq, an Emirati political dissident, during a March court hearing.

Public scrutiny on this case is necessary for these defendants to have any hope for freedom. The silence of the international community – now and over the last decade – has led us to where we are now: 84 of the UAE’s brightest civil society members are at risk of losing their voices forever.

Public scrutiny on this case is necessary for these defendants to have any hope for freedom. The silence of the international community – now and over the last decade – has led us to where we are now: 84 of the UAE’s brightest civil society members are at risk of losing their voices forever

The trial has been characterized by t fair trial and due process violations. Emirati authorities have restricted access to case material and information, shrouded the hearings in secrecy, and violated the principle of double jeopardy—an international legal rule that prohibits trying people twice for the same offense after they had received a final verdict. Judges have brazenly directed witness testimony. Most disturbingly, defendants have repeatedly described abusive detention conditions such as physical assaults, forced nudity, and prolonged solitary confinement that would amount to torture.

Emirati authorities announced the mass trial in December 2023 as the eyes of the world were on the UAE during the COP28 climate summit in Dubai: The timing was shocking, during an international meeting in the UAE that was promised to be “the most inclusive ever held.”

The bold timing can be chalked up to the impunity the UAE has enjoyed over the last decade. Despite the country’s continuing crackdown on political dissidents and civil society, few, if any, governments have dared to criticize the country’s rights record. The UAE has become a key security ally for many governments and has fostered strong economic ties.

The new trial can trace its origins back to the 2013 “UAE94” mass trial of political dissidents, where an Abu Dhabi court sentenced 69 defendants to between 5 and 15 years in prison on charges related to their political activism.

Most of the defendants from the 2013 trial are being tried in the new case on nearly identical charges, even after having served their full sentences. Emirati human rights defenders believe the authorities brought the new case to keep the dissidents detained indefinitely – there is little hope for an alternative outcome unless allied governments speak out.

Diplomatic missions expressed some concern over the UAE’s crackdown on civil and political rights in 2011 and 2013. In 2013, international institutions at least attempted to send observers to the trial. No embassy has sent monitors to observe trial proceedings to our knowledge.

But limited scrutiny was quickly traded for stronger economic and security relationships. Human rights groups have been pushing for sustained attention on the case for years, but instead silence has prevailed. This silence has led to Emirati state security authorities becoming emboldened and acting with greater impunity.

The UAE has long leveraged its economic and security relationships to prevent public criticism of its human rights record, but now the silence from the UAE’s western allies is nearly absolute. More than a decade on from the UAE94 trial, the silence from the UAE’s partners is total. During my recent trip to the UAE, diplomatic missions told me that public expression of concern for the fair trial violations we documented was out of the question; even private engagement was highly unlikely.

All governments concerned with human rights, particularly close security and economic allies of the UAE, should publicly condemn the trial’s abuses and send monitors to the July 10 session.

Sustained public attention and pressure may have led to the release of the UAE94 defendants upon completion of their sentences. Instead, the case was lost to political expediency and the new case was announced.

While the 2013 trial was covered extensively by the international press, the new case has barely made headlines. A few dedicated and brave outlets that have closely followed the trial, often at great personal risk to staff, but many more have not. Reporters following the trial could face travel bans, intimidation and deportation.

If neither the foreign press nor the diplomatic community provide the necessary scrutiny, the 84 may be condemned to suffer for many more years on July 10.

 

Excerpt:

Joey Shea is the UAE researcher at Human Rights Watch.

On 15 November 2022, the world’s population reached an estimated 8.0 billion people, a milestone in human development. This unprecedented growth, according to the UN, is due to the gradual increase in human lifespan owing to improvements in public health, nutrition, personal hygiene and medicine. It is also the result of high and persistent levels of fertility in some countries. Meanwhile, the UN will be commemorating World Population Day on July 11.

By Yumeng Li
WASHINGTON DC, Jul 9 2024 (IPS)

Across East Asia, birthrates are plummeting. Japan’s has been falling for eight straight years and recently hit a record low of 1.2 children per woman, the lowest since record keeping began in 1899.

For reference, a total fertility rate of 2.1 is needed to maintain a stable population. China’s total fertility rate is now approaching 1.0. South Korea’s plummeted in 2023 to a record low of 0.72, the worlds’ lowest.

While global population continues to grow overall, East Asia is facing a rapidly shrinking and aging population. It’s a remarkable demographic polarization. What are the factors behind it?

Amid bleak employment prospects, demanding work environment, and rising costs of living and childrearing in the backdrop of economic instability, young people in East Asia are skeptical about marriage and children.

The COVID-19 pandemic triggered massive labor market disruptions and doubled the unemployment rate among youth in Asia and the Pacific. China faces unprecedented youth unemployment of 21.3%, including many college graduates.

Japan’s inflation-adjusted real wages have been declining for two straight years, and not keeping pace with rising living expenses. Yet long working hours and a phenomenon of overwork-related deaths, known as karoshi, persist.

South Korea and China are the first and second most expensive countries in the world to raise children. Korean households spending an average of 17.5% of their monthly income on private tutoring, close to the total amount spent on food and housing.

But economic conditions are just part of the story. Behind East Asia’s falling fertility rates are concerns over deep gender inequality. Persistent traditional gender roles make East Asian women bear the double burden responsibility for housework and childrearing plus holding down a job in an intense overwork culture.

On top of this, workplace discriminates against mothers. “Maternal harassment” is prevalent in Japan, with women having bonuses reduced, pressured to resign, or fired when they become pregnant. In Korea, 46% of unemployed married women are “career-interrupted,” i.e. their professional lives are disrupted by marriage, pregnancy, childcare, or other family-related matters.

In China women face job discrimination based on marital or parental status. Employers often view women as “time bombs” likely to take multiple maternity leaves with the nation’s pronatalist policies, and so are reluctant to hire or promote them.

Meanwhile fear-mongering, pronatalist rhetoric that raises the alarm about population decline is dangerous in how it assigns women outsized responsibilities or “duties” to bear children, and even blames women’s rights movements.

On the stump South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol blamed feminism for the country’s low fertility fate because it prevented “healthy relationships between men and women.” Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke before the National Women’s Congress of the need to “actively cultivate a new culture of marriage and childbearing.”

Such rhetoric not only ignores the economic determinants of fertility, it blames women and treats them as reproductive vessels, infringing on their autonomy, intensifying gender inequality, and exerting coercive social pressure that undermines their reproductive choices and rights.

Reproductive rights aren’t just a matter of managing population size; they are fundamental human rights. To build a sustainable and just future, governments need to address the deeper economic and social causes of declining fertility while respecting women’s rights. Combating these structural inequities is critical for a healthier population, regardless of whether the goal is to raise low fertility rates.

We know from experience that trying to push people into having more children by offering subsidies, tax breaks, or cash allowances doesn’t work. A better way to start ameliorating the tough economics of having children in East Asia would be to develop a more family-friendly work culture including flexible hours and working at home, government services that help mothers stay in or re-enter the workforce.

Men and women, birth, adoptive, and surrogate parents alike, would all benefit from paid parental leave and other family-friendly workplace policies.

To tackle gender inequity at work, policymakers should clearly define and prohibit gender discrimination by employers in recruiting, evaluation, and assigning benefits. We need more specific enforcement of anti-discrimination laws and better mechanisms for bringing complaints to uphold the rights women in the workplace.

We also need to combat stigma and discrimination against single parents, non-traditional partnerships, and same-sex couples and so they can access the same parental benefits and child care infrastructure as traditional parents.

We won’t get to a more sustainable and equitable future without respecting women’s rights and addressing structural economic and social injustices. Rather than trying to reverse demographic trends by raising fertility rates, we have a window of opportunity to adapt to those trends fairly and equitably.

Recognizing the pitfalls of pronatalist campaigns that erode women’s autonomy, governments in East Asia and everywhere have a responsibility to adopt rights-based policies that respect it.

Yumeng Li is an undergraduate at Duke University and a Stanback Population Research Fellow at the Population Institute, a nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., that supports reproductive health and rights.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Tidal waves on Namkhana Island have flooded a house in West Bengal, India. Tidal waves on Namkhana Island have flooded a house in West Bengal, India. Natural disasters. Storms, heavy rainfall, and floods wreck havoc here. Credit: Supratim Bhattacharjee / Climate Visuals

By Aishwarya Bajpai
NEW DELHI, Jul 9 2024 (IPS)

Cyclones and floods have become increasingly frequent across different parts of India, posing a significant threat to the country’s population.

According to global data, India ranks as the second-highest-risk nation, with 390 million people potentially to be affected by flooding due to climate change and among them are 4.9 million fishworkers.

Venkatesh Salagrama, a Kakinada-based expert on small-scale fisheries, and also an independent consultant to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization has been quoted as saying: “For every boat in the sea, there are at least 5-20 people depending on it.”

From 2015 to 2023, Indians have faced the devastating impacts of floods and heavy rainfall (see graph). Among those most affected are the ‘ocean people’ or fishworkers, whose lives are further endangered by rising temperatures and unpredictable weather patterns.

People in India affected by floods. Credit: Aishwarya Bajpai/IPS

They already struggle with government initiatives aimed at intensifying the use of the ocean for the blue economy and the corporatization of coastal lands for port development, known as the nationwide ‘Sagarmala Project’ further denying them rights to coastal lands. Thereby, making the rights of fishworkers precarious, with no protective government laws in place. Climate change exacerbates their vulnerability, turning their worst fears into reality.

For instance, recently in December 2023, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh (southern coastal states in India) and faced Cyclone Michaung, which led to extensive flooding. The cyclone brought extreme rainfall, with parts of the Tamil Nadu coast experiencing more rainfall in a single day than the average annual rainfall, a consequence of climate change.

In places like Kayalpattinam and Thoothukudi, where the average annual rainfall is around 900-950 mm, more than 1000 mm fell in a single day. However, the cyclone was not the immediate cause of the flooding.

“The flooding was largely a result of human mismanagement. Excessive urbanization and development in natural floodplains, combined with inadequate preparation, exacerbated the situation. The state government failed to release water from reservoirs and lakes before the cyclone, leading to overflowing when the heavy rains arrived,” R. Sridhar, Coastal Researcher and Research Scholar at Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi told IPS.

As a result, houses and roads were submerged, cutting off access to various villages and delaying rescue and relief efforts. The state’s response was hampered by damaged infrastructure, and the relief efforts from both the state and NGOs were delayed due to inaccessible roads and train routes.

Before the cyclone, fishworkers were already affected as they were not allowed to venture into the sea due to cyclone warnings, resulting in an initial loss of income. Once the cyclone hit, flooding damaged boats parked both in harbors and along the shoreline, affecting small and mechanized boats alike. Nets and other essential fishing gear were also damaged, representing a significant financial loss as nets are crucial and expensive. The fisher community experienced extensive damage, highlighting the severe impact on their livelihood and resources.

A fishworker only identified Simhadri, a survivor of the cyclone was quoted in The New India Express as saying: “Every fisherman in Gollapudi suffered an average loss of Rs 1 lakh (about USD 1,200) as the fishing nets, motors, and boats got damaged while some were drowned. The collector should pay a visit and provide financial assistance.”

The homes of fishworkers in Andhra Pradesh, provide insight into their living conditions and the challenges they face in maintaining their households. Credit: Aishwarya Bajpai/IPS

There was a significant failure in predicting the extent of rainfall. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) did not provide adequate warnings, resulting in insufficient preparations with Union blaming the state government and vice a versa. The state government requested over 5060 crore from the Union government for flood relief but received only a fraction, which was 450 crores. The capacity of NGOs to provide aid was also limited due to restrictions like the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA).

Sridhar further added that “This highlights the need for a more participatory and democratized approach to meteorology, involving fishworkers and ocean people in modern scientific prediction methods who have the traditional knowledge of the sea and weather. Moreover, in terms of preparation, proactive measures such as releasing water from reservoirs before the cyclone would have mitigated the flooding. However, the state government did not take these steps, blaming inadequate warnings from the IMD.”

The ocean people, or fishworkers, are experiencing daily losses, making their plight a clear candidate for the ‘Loss and Damage Fund.’ At the COP27 and 28 world leaders recognized the need to support low-income developing countries grappling with the devastating impacts of climate change.

The result was the creation of the Loss and Damage Fund, a financial lifeline aimed at helping these vulnerable nations recover from climate-induced natural disasters. To ensure the effective implementation of this fund, a Transitional Committee was established, including representatives from 24 developed and developing nations. This collaborative effort underscores a global commitment to addressing the urgent needs of those most affected by climate change.

A compelling aspect of the Loss and Damage Fund is its recognition of both economic and non-economic losses. Non-economic losses encompass injury, loss of life, health, rights, biodiversity, ecosystem services, indigenous knowledge, and cultural heritage—areas where marginalized communities are most affected. For instance, while economic losses might include income forfeited due to heatwaves, non-economic losses would cover the displacement of communities from coastal villages due to beach erosion.

The faces of fishworkers from Andhra Pradesh portray the many work challenges they have faced since the COVID-19 pandemic. Aishwarya Bajpai/IPS

This highlights the profound vulnerability of fishworkers and ocean-dependent communities, acutely impacted by these environmental changes. Further, due to limited economic and social resources available with the fishworkers, some adaptive and counter measures are beyond the fishworkers’ capacities.

The Loss and Damage Fund can be allocated to those results of extreme climate events that cannot be countered or are beyond the practice of climate adaptation (activities to prepare and adjust to the climate change), for example, loss of lives and cultural practices. This complexity will make it harder for marginalized communities like fishworkers to argue their case and access the fund.

Cyclone Yass was a disaster. A low-pressure area formed over the North Andaman Sea and adjoining the east-central Bay of Bengal around May 22, 2021, and further intensified into a severe cyclonic storm, named ‘Cyclone Yaas’. While the coastal region of Sunderban was preparing for a thunderstorm and was thinking of the scale of damage the cyclone could bring, the scenario was a bit different. There was hardly any storm on that day but due to rising sea level, the whole Sunderban and Howrah region, the banks of the Ganges, got flooded, devastating fish stock. Credit: Credit: Kaushik Dutta / Climate Visuals

Despite establishing such measures, the global response has often been more talk than action. Experts argue that the pledged amounts fall drastically short, covering less than 0.2 percent of what developing countries require, estimated at a minimum of $400 billion annually, according to the Loss and Damage Finance Landscape report. In response, members of the Transitional Committee from developing nations have proposed that the fund should aim to allocate at least USD 100 billion annually by 2030 to meet these pressing needs.

“The loss and damage fund should be considered for not only immediate relief and rescue operations but also for preparedness and spreading knowledge. A participatory approach to meteorology can enhance prediction accuracy and disaster preparedness. Additionally, slower and ongoing disasters like coastal erosion and declining fish catches due to climate change also require attention. Fishworkers in various regions have demanded compensation for “fish famine” similar to agricultural famine relief,” Sridhar said.

The Adaptation Gap Report 2023 emphasizes that “a justice lens underscores that loss and damage is not the product of climate hazards alone but is influenced by differential vulnerabilities to climate change, which are often driven by a range of socio-political processes, including racism and histories of colonialism and exploitation.”

As India continues to battle these extreme weather events, the call for tangible action and equitable solutions becomes ever more urgent. The world watches and waits—will the promises of climate justice be fulfilled, or will they remain hollow words in the face of escalating crises?

This feature is published with the support of Open Society Foundations.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Excerpt:

Fishworkers in India bear the brunt of climate change-induced extreme weather events. While they should be considered a potential beneficiary of the Loss and Damage Fund, the complexity of their situation may make it harder for communities like fishworkers to access the fund.

Dormitory of indigenous girls of the Awajún people, in shelters where they live and receive intercultural bilingual education, in the province of Condorcanqui, state of Amazonas, in northeastern Peru. Credit: Courtesy of Rosemary Pioc

By Mariela Jara
LIMA, Jul 8 2024 (IPS)

The main fear facing women leaders who have denounced the systematic rape of girls from the Awajún indigenous people in the northeastern Peruvian department of Amazonas is that, despite the media coverage and sanctions announced by the authorities, it will all come to nothing.

“Our reports started in 2010 and the government has not acted to eradicate rapes against girls. We fear that once again there will be impunity, and the government is very strategic in this,” said Rosemary Pioc, president of the Awajún/Wampis Umukai Yawi (Comuawuy) Women’s Council, from the municipality of Condorcanqui, to IPS.

In June, women leaders from Comuawuy reported the rape of 532 girls between 2010 and 2024 in schools of Condorcanqui, one of the seven provinces of the department of Amazonas. These schools provide bilingual education to children and teenagers between the ages of five and 17.

Girls as young as five years old have died in these schools and shelters, infected with HIV/AIDS by their aggressors.

This is aggravated sexual violence against indigenous girls living in poverty and vulnerability, while sexual aggression against minors is on the rise in this South American country of 33 million inhabitants."I’ve picked up abused, bloodied girls, and I’ve listened to their despair when their parents paid no heed when told of the rapes": Rosemary Pioc.

According to the Ministry of Women and Vulnerable Populations, Peru registered 30,000 reports of sexual violence against children under 17 years of age in 2023.

However, many cases do not reach the public authorities due to various economic, social and administrative barriers, especially when rural populations or indigenous communities are involved.

Peru has 55 indigenous peoples, with a population of four million, living in the national territory since time immemorial, according to the Ministry of Culture database.

Four of these indigenous peoples live in Andean areas and 51 in Amazonian territories, including the Awajún people, who live in the departments of Amazonas, San Martín, Loreto, Ucayali and Cajamarca. However, 96.4% of the indigenous population are Andean peoples, mainly Quechua, and only 3.6% are Amazonian peoples.

Although national and international law guarantee their rights and identities, in practice this is not so for indigenous girls, while poverty and inequalities in access to education, health and food persist.

According to official 2024 figures, 30% of the national population lives in poverty. When differentiated by ethnic self-identification, this rises to 35% among those who learned a native language in childhood.

Extreme poverty reached 5.7%, a national average that rises to 10.5% in Amazonas, a department with more than 433,000 inhabitants, where indigenous families live mainly from agriculture, hunting, fishing and gathering wild fruits.

Rosemary Pioc, president of the Awajún/Wampis Umukai Yawi Council of Women. Credit: Courtesy of Rosemary Pioc

“I’ve picked up bloodied girls”.

Bilingual intercultural education is a state policy in Peru.

Thus, student residences were created to enhance access to education for indigenous children and teenagers living in remote communities, in the case of the province of Condorcanqui, on the banks of the Cenepa, Nieva and Santiago rivers.

The province hosts 18 residences, where the girls live throughout the year, receive meals and attend school.

“Since they cannot return home every day because they are hours or days away by river, the teacher or facilitator takes advantage of this situation and abuses them instead of guaranteeing their care,” said Pioc, herself a member of the Awajún people.

More than 500 rapes have been documented in the last 14 years in this scenario.

The leader explained that these shelters are licensed by the Ministry of Education, although they survive in very poor conditions and are left to their own devices.

Pioc has been denouncing sexual violence against her pupils for years, but the Local Educational Management Unit (Ugel), the Amazonas regional government’s decentralized body for education, has not addressed them in order to prosecute and dismiss the aggressor teachers.

Another dormitory in one of the bilingual intercultural schools where parents of the Awajún people, who live in remote areas along the banks of Peru’s Amazonian rivers, send their daughters between the ages of five and 17. Credit: Courtesy of Rosemary Pioc

“We are in the country of the upside down, because in 2017 a colleague and I were reported for denouncing and defending girls,” she said.

Pioc, as a native of Condorcanqui, knows her reality well. When she was a primary school teacher, she experienced terrible things. “I’ve picked up abused, bloodied girls, and I’ve listened to their despair when their parents paid no heed when told of the rapes”, she said.

She has left teaching to dedicate herself completely to Comuawuy, continue with the reports and prevent impunity.

“A headmaster touched two pupils. Their parents, with great effort, reported him to the Ugel, but nothing happened. He carried on with his contract and then raped his five-year-old niece. ‘Report me if you want. Nothing will happen to me’, he warned me. And so it was. I was the one prosecuted”, she complains.

A month ago, the indigenous women’s reports were widely heard when the Minister of Education, Morgan Quero, and the head of Women’s Affairs, Teresa Hernández, justified the events by attributing them to indigenous cultural practices.

The statements were roundly rejected by various sectors, deeming them racist and evasive of the government’s responsibility to sanction and prevent sexual violence.

Pioc decried the ministers’ statements and expressed her disbelief at the announcements of sanctions and other measures ordered by the Education Office. “They are setting up technical roundtables, but only when the rapists are in prison and the girls’ health has been taken care of will we say they have complied,” she said.

The two ministers later apologised and said they had been misunderstood, but they remain in their posts, despite many calls for their dismissal.

Genoveva Gómez, head of the Amazonas Ombudsman’s Office. Credit: Amazonas Ombudsman Office

Victims hurt for life

Genoveva Gómez, lawyer heading the Amazonas Ombudsman’s Office, says her sector reported in 2017, 2018 and 2019 the deprivation of student residences and flaws in the investigation of sexual violence cases at the administrative level and in the prosecutor’s office.

In order to correct this situation, her office has recommended “increasing the budget, strengthening the Permanent Commission for Administrative Proceedings, which is responsible for investigating teachers, and that cases that are time-barred at the administrative level should be referred to the Public Prosecutor’s Office because rape is a crime that has no statute of limitations,” she explained.

Gómez spoke to IPS as she travelled from Chachapoyas, also in the department of Amazonas and the headquarters of her organisation, to Condorcanqui, to take part in a meeting of the Coordination Body for the Prevention, Attention and Punishment of Cases of Violence Against Women and Family Members, convened by the mayor of that municipality.

The lawyer argued that the Awajún girls who have been sexually assaulted will be hurt for life and that it is urgent to implement mechanisms that guarantee justice, and emotional support for them and their families.

“As a society we must be clear that these acts violate fundamental rights and should not go unnoticed,” she stressed.

Gómez said that by August at the latest Condorcanqui will have a Gesell Chamber, a key means for the prosecutorial investigation in cases of sexual violence against minors to avoid re-victimisation through a single interview. The nearest one was in the city of Bagua Grande, a seven-hour car ride.

The chamber consists of two rooms separated by a one-way viewing glass. In one room, children and teenagers who are victims of rape and other sexual assaults talk about this violence with psychologists and provide information relevant to the case. In the other, family members, lawyers and prosecutors observe without being seen by the victim.

Afterwards, the psychologist in charge asks them about aspects requested by the observers. Everything is recorded and serves as valid evidence for the trial, and the victim does not have to testify in court.

Gómez also stated that access to justice has many barriers and it is up to the government to remove them so as not to send a message of impunity to the population, in particular to the Awajún girls.

She also welcomed the presence of representatives of the education sector in the area, but considered that this should not be a reactive work for a determined period of time, but rather a sustained and planned one that includes prevention.

The theme of the 2024 High Level Political Forum (HPLF) is “Reinforcing the 2030 Agenda and eradicating poverty in times of multiple crisis: the effective delivery of sustainable, resilient and innovative solutions”. The first meeting will be held from 8 July, to 12 July, and the second meeting, from 15 July, to 18 July, under the auspices of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).

By Simone Galimberti
KATHMANDU, Nepal, Jul 8 2024 (IPS)

A High-Level Political Forum – described as one of the most important events of the year for discussing the implementation of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—will take place at the United Nations through July 18.

Will this year edition be covered by global media? Will the international community and the people in general pay attention to it?

The HLPF was envisioned as an exercise in accountability, the only way to hold the member states of the United Nations, accountable to the Agenda 2030, the global blueprint in force since 2015 with its actionable SDGs.

Taking stock of the lack of serious commitment towards the implementation of the SDGs’ predecessor, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the international community came up with a different, tighter approach.

After strenuous negotiations, the member states managed to hammer out a stronger mechanism to keep a check on nations would fare in implementing their SDGs.
Despite the divisions, the idea of the HLPF emerged as an acceptable compromise for both sides.

On one side, there was those countries who wanted a loose, “bottom up” approach where the governments would be in charge to set their own plans and targets without legally binding provisions.

These nations would sign up to the Agenda 2030 on condition that they would remain their own masters in devising the plans to achieve the SDGs. In doing so, they also wanted no real and meaningful oversight on their work, accountability was established to be light by purpose during the negotiations.

On the other hand, other nations wanted a much more vigorous enforcing mechanism with real accountability powers. This explains how the HLPF ended up to be a peer-to-peer mechanism where member states would be invited, every two years, to present their national reviews, the so called National Voluntary Reviews or NVRs.

In a concession to those calling for a strong accountability framework, it was agreed that, every four years, the HLPF would entail two official sessions, one of which would be branded as the SDG Summit at the level of the Heads of State and Governments.

Despite the good intentions, the HLPF never achieved the aims it was devised for.

It struggled to get traction and garner the visibility it was hoped it would be able to garner and basically it has become a very technical mechanism for a relatively limited circle of experts and civil society activists.

Most seriously, it was never be able to register with the governments that would see it either as a minor inconvenience or as a missed opportunity. Both sides still saw worthwhile giving the HLPF a pretense of an being an important event.

There is no doubt that having member nations voluntary presenting their VNRs would be better than having no platform at all to understand what nations are doing to implement the SDGs.

Moreover, the HLPF with its rich program of side events has established itself as an important learning and capacity building platform.

Yet it is high time the international community started to rethink the whole exercise.

As it occurred when drafting a new plan replacing the MDGs, also in this case, the degree of ambition must rise.

The recently released Sustainable Development Goals Report 2024, the only official UN publication tracking the status of implementation of the goals, once again portrays a very challenging scenario.

The entire international community is falling well short of their responsibilities and whole humanity is far off in ensuring the wellbeing and sustainability of the planet in the years to come.

Perhaps we should not only fault a weak framework that allows governments off the hook in upholding their pledges.

The whole international system based on cooperation among states is under stress with several ongoing geopolitical crises and perhaps others, even more serious and consequential, are about to emerge.

Despite this worrying scenario, the international community must rise to the challenge

That’s why it is essential to start devising an even more audacious post Agenda 2030 plan.

It needs to have much stronger enforcing mechanisms while maintaining some of its innovations, real improvements relatively to the MDGs.

For example, we should not hesitate at reaffirming the validity of having the 17 SDGs in place.

Over the years, important steps were met in terms of devising the indispensable data for planning their execution and tracking the outcomes.

Plus, the idea of the SDGs somehow got traction in the people’s imagination even though now it requires some brand revamping. The real problem now is the way SDGs should be reported and tracked and the HLPF is simply unfit for the job.

A bold proposal: the international community should work on devising an international binding legal instrument, in simpler terms, a treaty. Such a tool would do a better at creating, among the member nations, more ownership, accountability, and a sense of urgency compounded by a new legal responsibility towards the implementation of the SDGs.

It is now imperative to have much robust oversight mechanisms and such radical changes would be at the foundation of a revamped future post Agenda 2030 process. We need new instruments in order to ensure that governments will really do whatever they can to achieve the SDGs.

The current national reviews cannot continue to be the way they are: voluntary exercises that are implemented and presented just because of a moral obligation of the signatories of the Agenda 2030.

Instead, they must be transformed into real accounting on what each government is doing according to fixed mandatory parameters, including the type and quality of data and information to be included.

Moreover, what I called the future Mandatory National Reviews or MNRs, should also make space to insert data and information of what local governments are doing. Basically, the new MNRs should also contain what are now the unofficial and almost informal Local Voluntary Reviews or LVRs that are still conveniently seen as “add-ons”.

Such reporting should be made on annual basis with no option of derogation nor any flexibility.

Yet in designing it, the unique circumstances of the member states must be taken into account, with significantly simplified reporting obligations for, say, small island developing nations.

All these would require enhanced capabilities on the part of the same governments and with them, substantial resources.

The UN Regional Commissions, the UNDP country level offices and the UN Resident Coordinators who now have bigger authority and responsibilities, should play a bigger role in supporting their host countries in fulfilling the requirements that the treaty would entail.

Such new responsibilities on the part of the nations can only be met by allowing the UN to have a much-strengthened role, a real “mandate” at assessing and evaluating their efforts or dearth of them.

At the moment, the UN agencies and programs at country levels, wherever they operate, are essentially partner of their host governments and it is the way it should be. They fund many of their programs and they are themselves co-implementers of others.

In all fairness, they cannot play the function of evaluators and trackers of what the national government are doing. This is the reason why a treaty would establish a new UN entity entirely focused on assessing and tracking the governments’ work.

Such entity should operate entirely independently and be de facto separated from the UN work on the ground. Shielded by design from any political interferences or influences by national authorities and donor agencies, the new UN entity must be free to issue forthright and impartial assessments with a list of recommendations if due.

A would-be treaty must also entail provisions about financing as well. In practice it would mean putting into a legal signature to the pledge to fulfill the SDGs Stimulus as envisioned by the UN Secretary Antonio Guterres.

This is estimated to be $500 billion a year, an amount that, if you also considering the financing required to fight climate change and biodiversity loss, would be considerably bigger. Like for any treaty consultations, it will be up to the officials to reach a compromise on the technicalities of the financing, for example, deciding if existing multilateral entities and programs would be fit for the purpose to deliver such funding.

I am fully aware that many governments would balk at the idea of another binding treaty.

There will be a lot of pushbacks but, after all, this is always what occurs when bold plans are unfolded.

It took many years, for example, to agree on the need of a plastic pollution treaty whose difficult negotiations are reaching the last mile at the end of the year in South Korea even though the road ahead is still very bumpy.

Yet a treaty is the only way forward if the international community is serious to revert and change direction from the dangerous path that humanity is taking. With no action, it is impossible to envision a better, more sustainable and just world. The viability of future generations is at risk.

To assuage those nations that won’t embrace this idea, those governments that, without doubts, would pull a lot of roadblocks on the way to reach a consensus on the need of a binding legal instrument, a reminder: a treaty is always the result of compromises that must be agreed by all the sides.

Even the SDGs are far from being ideal.

Fundamental issues like the rights of LGBTQ+ communities and the same concept of democracy are remarkably absent from the Agenda 2030. I even got a name that could be considered for such bold milestone: the Treaty for a Sustainable and Just Future.

Working only on extending the SDGs to a longer framework, possibly 2045, is simply no more sufficient. It has become totally inadequate.

We need better tools to ensure that governments around the world take the post Agenda 2030 plan seriously. We need some bold thinking and some nations championing such ambitious approach to start a conversation. What at the moment counts is to start a conversation about a treaty.

Hopefully the civil society would push for it. Perhaps, what would be really a global multi stakeholder coalition of hope, would take shape and starts demanding what the planet and humanity truly require.

Simone Galimberti writes about the SDGs, youth-centered policy-making and a stronger and better United Nations.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Dr. Abdulrahman Bizri, member of the Lebanese parliament and the parliamentary committee on public health, professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the American University of Beirut (AUB) and chair of the national COVID vaccine committee and response.

By Randa El Ozeir
BEIRUT & TORONTO , Jul 8 2024 (IPS)

This summer is bringing an additional challenge to the public health front in Lebanon, along with higher-than-normal temperatures.

An uptick in food- and water-borne communicable diseases, mainly viral hepatitis A, has been registered in the country, according to recent statistics released by the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health from numbers collected in hospitals, health centers and laboratories.

The hepatitis A virus (HAV) causes hepatitis A, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), which causes inflammation of the liver. The virus is primarily spread when an uninfected (and unvaccinated) person ingests food or water that is contaminated with the feces of an infected person. The disease is closely associated with unsafe water or food, inadequate sanitation, poor personal hygiene and oral-anal sex.”

An unrelenting, thorny economic crisis has been ravaging the country for years and is considered the main culprit for the deterioration of basic facilities, community installations and public services.

Dr. Abdulrahman Bizri, member of the Lebanese parliament and the parliamentary committee on public health, professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the American University of Beirut (AUB) and chairperson of the national COVID vaccine committee and response, blames the collapse of Lebanese currency, the negligence, the intractable economic, political and livelihood crises, the mismanagement and the prevailing misconduct for the complications of preventing and containing diseases, including communicable types.

“All these factors led to failure in sustaining health infrastructure, such as sewage, and providing clean water to households for direct or indirect human use through produce and/or livestock, which resulted in the spread of many diseases, namely the infectious ones transmitted through contaminated water, such as cholera, hepatitis A, acute diarrhea, dysentery, salmonella and other diseases.”

Staff Shortages and Budget Cuts

Government dysfunction, scarcity of maintenance and investment and corruption slowed down the development of services and responses to health outbreaks.

Dr. Hussein Hassan, professor and researcher in food safety and food production at Lebanese American University (LAU), points out two additional elements that have deeply affected the public health situation: the reduced funding and the exodus of medical doctors.

“In hospitals, for example, we have staff shortages due to the brain drain while we are suffering from inefficiency and ghost workers. Unfortunately, we also have bribery and budget cuts that delay much-needed projects.”

Can the Ministry of Health (MoH), with its current shape in light of government spending, decrease its ability to manage and protect against communicable diseases?

Bizri says that “MoH is facing an uphill battle due to its limited and low capacities. It relies heavily on the support of the international community,  for example, WHO, UNICEF, and UNHCR, among others, to control these diseases.”

Dr. Hussein Hassan, professor and researcher in food safety and food production at the Lebanese American University (LAU).

Bridging the gap requires a comprehensive and holistic approach to dealing with the situation based on short-term and long-term steps to be taken on many official and public levels. Hassan believes that “we need to strengthen the surveillance of outbreaks, execute mass vaccination campaigns, provide affected individuals with required supplies, and improve the water and sanitation in crowded areas by installing purification systems and even distributing bottled water.”

Large Presence of Syrian refugees

Poverty, poor public awareness, inadequate education, a social environment with minimal knowledge and disregarding good hygiene practices contribute to communicable disease transmission.

Bizri refers to the sizable presence of Syrian refugees who live in difficult and bad conditions, congregated in unorganized camps with insufficient reliable health structures or safe drinking water. He applauded the three-way partnership between the Lebanese Ministry of Health,  international organizations like WHO and UNHCR, and the considerable Lebanese medical private sector in fighting diseases threatening the country.

“Lebanon succeeded in containing many epidemics that had the potential to prevail. The Lebanese medical body, including civil society, massively volunteered to control the spread of these diseases. The health sector spearheaded the efforts to address the COVID-19 pandemic and is still at the forefront of fighting communicable diseases.”

However, he has reservations regarding the “skeptical role of UNHCR in its fight against many of the epidemics menacing Lebanon as an outcome of the concentrated existence of Syrian refugees, since it does not deal transparently with the Lebanese government and its official institutions.”

To ensure continuity of public health preventative and controlling programs, Hassan mapped out some long-term measures to be put in place, including “economic and political stability, strengthening the healthcare system, investing in improving water supply and sewage systems, and developing and implementing maintenance programs related to water safety, particularly among refugees.”

He acknowledges the crucial role played by international collaboration and financial and technical support delivered by non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

Mistrust has dented the relationship between the healthcare system and the citizens.

“I believe that Lebanese citizens lost faith in the health sector long ago,” said Bizri. “Yet they keep depending on this sector, which offers affordable health and medical services compared to the private healthcare costs in Lebanon. The country boasts advanced medical services and treatments, but its public health is still enduring a significant deficit.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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By Daud Khan
ROME, Jul 8 2024 (IPS)

Immigrants are essential to Europe’s economic survival. They are needed for doing the jobs that most Europeans no longer want to do. Jobs that involve manual labor in agriculture and industry; or providing home help, care for the elderly; or working un-social hours in the catering business.

Daud Khan

So, why are a growing number of European political parties, including mainstream parties, taking an ever stronger anti-immigration stance and why are people voting for them?

I have previously argued that no one really wants immigration to stop, or for immigrants to leave. What the anti-immigrant parties want to do is to create a new subclass of low paid workers who have no rights and no political power (Europe’s Shift to the Far Right and its Impact on Immigration | Inter Press Service (ipsnews.net). Such a “new immigrant proletariat” would enhance profits of those employing such immigrant workers, as well as raise overall living standards of the general population.

Recent events in Italy appear to confirm my hypothesis that low-paid illegal work in deeply imbedded in the system.

On 17 June, in a farm south of Rome an agricultural worker was critically injured and subsequently died. Satnam Singh’s right arm was caught in an agriculture machine and was chopped off. The owner of the farm placed the truncated arm in a box; he then deposited the box, and the injured Satnam Singh, outside his house and drove off. Satnam was eventually taken to hospital, but the delay in getting him medical aid meant that it was not possible to save his life.

What came to light in the subsequent investigations is that Satnam has no stay permit, no work contract and was paid a pittance for back breaking work in debilitating heat and biting cold. The Minister of Agriculture was quick to denounce the event leading to Satnam Sigh’s death and police are prosecuting the owner of the farm. However, the minister was also pointed out Italy’s agriculture sector is viable, dynamic and law abiding, and should not be criminalized due to a single unfortunate event

However, studies and surveys, mostly done by the trade unions, put a lie to his statement. In the case of the agriculture sector, of the roughly 1 million workers, some 230,000 are estimated illegal 1. Like Satnam, they are low-paid and badly treated. There are also allegations of different forms of abuse, as well as widespread use of amphetamines and painkillers to make them work harder.

Moreover, what is also emerging from various investigations is how the system, which supposedly aims to create more legal and controlled immigration, actually works to ensure an ample supply of illegal immigrants. The system works as follow:

Under Italian Law (the Bossi-Fini Act of 2002) Italian employers can ask for foreign workers to legally enter Italy to work in specific sectors, including agriculture and the tourism sector. The implicit agreement is the once they are in Italy, the employer who sponsored their entry would provide them a work contract and wages that are in line with industry standards.

However, in many cases the sponsoring employer does not show up to pick up the workers – let alone provide a job or a contract. The arriving workers find themselves in a foreign country where they cannot speak the language, without a job and without papers. The phenomenon is particularly acute in some regions of Italy such as Campagna (around Naples) where only 3% of workers who enter Italy legally actually sign a contract with the employer who sponsored their entry into the country.

It is here that the so called “contractors” step in. These contractors pick up the newly arrived workers providing them with immediate help and assistance. They then act as intermediaries to arrange jobs for them at wages that are a fraction of what Italians doing the same job would be paid. Moreover, these unscrupulous contractors skim off much of what the workers earn for renting them a house and for providing transport to and from work.

And all this is happening in front of everyone’s eyes, including those of various local and national authorities. For example, authorities know which companies sponsored foreign workers to enter Italy. They also know how many work contracts these companies signed with these immigrant workers. Recent reports show that in the Naples area 22,000 sponsored workers entered the country but not one of the signed a contract.

Similarly, the owner of the farm where Satnam Singh died had declared to the local authorities that he had only one tractor and no workers – facts that were patently untrue but no one ever bothered to check.

These and other facts are often well covered in reports done by the trade unions or by investigative journalists particularly after an accident or an untoward event happens. Moreover, there is nothing really clandestine about what is happening. One has only to drive around the agriculturally rich areas around Rome or the central or northern parts of Italy to see an army of workers from South Asia attending to livestock or toiling in the fields that supply the city with fresh fruit and vegetable. In more southern parts of Italy, it is young men from Africa that are picking oranges and tomatoes.

Similarly in cities such as Rome and Milan there are armies of illegals who work as “riders” delivering food to people’s homes; working as cooks, dishwasher and waiters in restaurants and bars; or working as cleaners or caregivers in people’s homes.

The system seems to suit everyone and if every so often a Satnam Singh dies – well so be it.

1 https://www.fondazionerizzotto.it/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Sintesi-VI-Rapporto_301122.pdf

Daud Khan is a retired UN staff based in Rome. He has degrees in economics from LSE and Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar; and a degree in Environmental Management from Imperial College London.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Credit: Oleksandr Rupeta/NurPhoto via Getty Images

By Inés M. Pousadela
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, Jul 8 2024 (IPS)

In June, the Namibian High Court struck down two sections of the country’s Sexual Offences Act that criminalised consensual sexual relations between men, finding them unconstitutional. While hardly anyone has been convicted for decades, the fact that their relationships were criminalised forced gay men to live in fear, perpetuated stigma and denied them recognition as rights holders, enabling discrimination, harassment and abuse.

In decriminalising same-sex relations, Namibia follows in the footsteps of Mauritius, which did so in 2023. In both countries, the criminalisation of consensual same-sex relations dated back to colonial times. Colonial overlords imposed these criminal provisions and countries typically retained them at independence, long after the UK had changed its laws.

Namibia gained independence from South Africa in 1990 but retained the criminal provisions South Africa inherited from the UK. South Africa then decriminalised male same-sex conduct in 1994 – sex between women was never criminalised – and recognised same-sex marriage in 2006. But Namibia hadn’t followed the same path – until now.

A concerning regional landscape

Following the decriminalisation of same-sex relations, Namibia is ranked 56th out of 196 countries on Equaldex’s Equality Index, which ranks countries according to their LGBTQI+ friendliness. Only three African countries are ranked higher: South Africa, Cabo Verde and the Seychelles.

Today, 66 countries around the world criminalise same-sex relationships: 31 in Africa, 22 in Asia and the Middle East, six in the Pacific and five in the Caribbean. A disproportionate number are members of the Commonwealth, the alliance mostly made up of countries colonised by the UK. Thirteen of the 29 Commonwealth countries that criminalise same-sex relations are African. This often comes with harsh prison sentences – up to 14 years in Kenya and up to life imprisonment in Sierra Leone and Tanzania. In northern Nigeria and Uganda, the death penalty can apply.

Some Commonwealth African states that have long criminalised same-sex relations, including Ghana, Kenya and Uganda, are experiencing a strong conservative backlash. Typically, small gains in rights have provoked disproportionate responses from anti-rights forces, who assert that LGBTQI+ rights are part of an imported western agenda – even though it’s criminalisation that was imported, and the anti-rights backlash is lavishly funded by foreign forces.

Intertwined legal cases

Same-sex marriage reached Namibia’s courts long before same-sex relationships were no longer a crime. In 2017, two men who’d married in South Africa, one Namibian and the other South African, filed a court application to prevent the South African partner and the couple’s son being treated as ‘prohibited immigrants’. They argued that the Department of Home Affairs and Immigration had discriminated against them on the basis of their sexual orientation and sought recognition of their marriage and joint guardianship of their son. A similar case was filed by a female couple – one Namibian and the other German – and the cases were merged.

In early 2018, the male couple won a petition allowing the South African partner to enter Namibia to be with his husband and son. But in January 2022, the High Court rejected the petition to recognise same-sex marriages celebrated abroad. The judges expressed sympathy for the applicants, but said they couldn’t overturn previous rulings by Namibia’s Supreme Court. However, this raised campaigners’ hopes of a favourable decision in a Supreme Court appeal.

Indeed, in May 2023, the Supreme Court recognised same-sex marriages performed abroad between Namibian citizens and foreign nationals. But the court also said homosexuality was a complex issue and same-sex marriage should be dealt with by parliament.

Meanwhile, same-sex relations between consenting adult males remained a criminal offence. But the time was ripe: in 2021, Namibian LGBTQI+ activists held the country’s largest-ever Pride celebration, which included calls for the repeal of criminalisation. And in 2022, a few months after the High Court decision not to recognise foreign same-sex marriages, LGBTQI+ activist Friedel Dausab challenged the common law offence of sodomy in court. Supported by the Human Dignity Trust, he argued that criminalisation of his identity was incompatible with his constitutional rights.

The High Court handed down its positive decision on 21 June 2024. The judges agreed that laws criminalising same-sex relationships amounted to unfair discrimination and were therefore unconstitutional and invalid.

Conservative backlash

LGBTQI+ advocates around the world welcomed the court’s decision, as did UNAIDS, the UN agency leading the global effort to end HIV/AIDS. But by the time the ruling came, resistance was underway.

In July 2023, in response to the Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage, parliament’s upper house quickly passed a bill banning same-sex marriages, including those contracted abroad. The bill would make it an offence to perform, participate in, promote or advertise these marriages, punishable by up to six years in prison. It was subsequently passed by parliament’s lower house and is currently awaiting the president’s decision to assent or veto. An appeal against the court’s decriminalisation decision also can’t be ruled out.

The way forward

While the direction of change so far makes it an example for the region, Namibia still has a long way to go. Outstanding issues include comprehensive protection against discrimination, marriage equality and adoption rights, recognition of non-binary genders, legalisation of gender reassignment and a ban on ‘conversion therapy’, a practice UN experts consider akin to torture.

Social change should be as much a priority as legal progress. The Equality Index makes it clear: social attitudes lag behind laws, with public homophobia a persistent problem. Moral panics, episodically mobilised by anti-rights reactions, cause public opinion to fluctuate, with no decisive majority in favour of equality. This means legal change won’t be enough, and won’t continue unless the climate of opinion changes.

In Namibia, as elsewhere, there’s a tug-of-war between forces fighting for rights and those resisting progress. It’s now a top priority for Namibian LGBTQI+ activists to shift attitudes. In doing so, they should show solidarity with their peers in less tolerant environments and become a source of hope beyond the country’s borders.

Inés M. Pousadela is CIVICUS Senior Research Specialist, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

 

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By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Jul 8 2024 (IPS)

For some time, most multilateral financial institutions have urged developing countries to borrow commercially, but not from China. Now, borrowers are stuck in debt traps with little prospect of escape.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

More debt, less growth since 2008
The last decade and a half has seen protracted worldwide stagnation, with some economies and people faring much worse than others.

The 2008 global financial crisis and Great Recession have recently been worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic, US Federal Reserve Bank-led interest rate hikes and escalating geopolitical economic warfare.

Following Reagan-inspired tax cuts, ostensibly to induce more private investments, budget deficits have loomed larger. Instead of enabling rapid recovery, greater fiscal austerity is now demanded, as in the 1980s.

After fiscal expansion averted the worst in 2009, unconventional monetary policies, mainly ‘quantitative easing’ (QE), took over. The European Central Bank (ECB) followed the US Fed’s QE lead for over a decade.

QE’s lower interest rates encouraged more borrowing as more credit became available and affordable. With rich nations offering less concessional finance, developing countries had little choice but to turn to markets for loans.

Spending counter-cyclically in a downturn requires government borrowing, which QE made more accessible and cheaper. The resulting borrowing surge has since returned to haunt these economies since 2022-23, when interest rates spiked.

Pushing debt
World Bank slogans, such as ‘from billions to trillions’, urged developing country governments to borrow more on market terms to meet their funding needs for the SDGs, climate and the pandemic.

With capital accounts open, many private investors have long sought ‘safety’ abroad. But when lucrative direct investment opportunities beckoned, e.g., in India, some ‘capital flight’ returned as foreign investments, typically privileged and protected by host governments and international treaties.

Easier credit availability on almost concessional terms, thanks to QE, enabled more, often innovative, financialization. Blended finance and other such innovations promised to ‘de-risk’ private investments, especially from abroad.

Despite less bank borrowing than in the 1970s, indebtedness increased with more market-based debt. However, such indebtedness did not grow the real economy much despite much private technological innovation.

Borrowing sours
The US Fed started raising interest rates from early 2022, blaming inflation on the tight labour market. As interest rates rose sharply, debt became more burdensome.

Thus, government borrowing worldwide became more constrained when more needed. Raising interest rates has dampened demand, including private and government spending for investment and consumption.

But recent economic contractions have been mainly due to supply-side disruptions. The second Cold War, the COVID-19 pandemic, and geo-political economic aggression have disrupted supply lines and logistics.

Raising interest rates dampens demand but does not address supply-side disruptions. Inappropriate policies have not helped, as such anti-inflationary measures have cut jobs, incomes, spending and demand worldwide.

Worse for some
Following the 2008 global financial crisis, successive US presidents have successfully maintained full employment. All central banks are committed to ensuring financial stability, but the US Fed also has an almost unique second mandate to maintain full employment.

Developing countries now face many more constraints on what they can do. Most are heavily indebted with little policy space for manoeuvre. With more financing from markets, the pro-cyclical bias is more pronounced.

Vulnerable developing countries believe they have little choice but to surrender to the market. Poverty in the poorest countries has not declined for almost a decade, while food security has not improved for even longer.

Worse, geopolitics has put much pressure on the Global South to spend more on the military. But most recent food price increases were due to speculation and ‘artificial’ rather than real shortages.

Poor worst off
The likelihood of distress increases with debt burdens. Debt stress has grown tremendously in the last two years, especially for developing countries heavily borrowing in major Western currencies.

Although the apparent reasons for central banks raising interest rates are rarely cited anymore, interest rates have not fallen, and funds have not flowed back to developing countries.

For at least a decade, the US has increasingly warned developing countries against borrowing from China despite its low interest rates compared to most other credit sources except Japan.

Consequently, China’s lending to developing countries, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, has fallen since 2016. By 2022, poorer countries had borrowed much more from commercial sources. But such private capital has since fled to the US and other Western markets offering high returns with more security.

Capital flight from developing countries, especially the poorest, followed as much less money went to the poorest developing countries via markets. With fewer funding options, the poorest countries have been the most vulnerable.

Negotiating with varied private creditors in markets, rather than via intergovernmental arrangements, has proved much more difficult. With much more private market funding, such financiers will not take instructions from governments unless compelled to do so.

Hence, little on the horizon offers any real hope of significant debt relief, let alone strong recovery and improved prospects for sustainable development in the Global South.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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A police officer walks after using tear gas to disperse protesters during a demonstration over police killings of people protesting against Kenya's proposed finance bill in Nairobi, June 27, 2024. Credit: Voice of America (VoA)

By Danny Bradlow
PRETORIA, South Africa, Jul 5 2024 (IPS)

The recent Kenyan protests are a warning that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is failing. The public does not think it is helping its member countries manage their economic and financial problems, which are being exacerbated by a rapidly changing global political economy.

To be sure, the IMF is not the only cause of Kenya’s problems with raising the funds to meet its substantial debt obligations and deal with its budget deficit. Other causes include the failure of the governing class to deal with corruption, to spend public finances responsibly and to manage an economy that produces jobs and improves the living standards of Kenya’s young population.

The country has also been hammered by drought, floods and locust infestations in recent years. In addition, its creditors are demanding that it continue servicing its large external debts despite its domestic challenges and a difficult international financial and economic environment.

Danny Bradlow

The IMF has provided financial support to Kenya. But the financing is subject to tough conditions which suggest that debt obligations matter more than the needs of long-suffering citizens. This is despite the IMF claiming that its mandate now includes helping states deal with issues like climate, digitalisation, gender, governance and inequality.

Unfortunately, Kenya is not an isolated case. Twenty-one African countries are receiving IMF support. In Africa, debt service, on average, exceeds the combined amounts governments are spending on health, education, climate and social services.

The tough conditions attached to IMF financing have led the citizens of Kenya and other African countries to conclude that a too powerful IMF is the cause of their problems. However, my research into the law, politics and history of the international financial institutions suggests the opposite: the real problem is the IMF’s decline in authority and efficacy.

Some history will help explain this and indicate a partial solution.

The history

When the treaty establishing the IMF was negotiated 80 years ago, it was expected to have resources equal to roughly 3% of global GDP. This was to help deal with the monetary and balance of payments problems of 44 countries. Today, the IMF is expected to help its 191 member countries deal with fiscal, monetary, financial and foreign exchange problems and with “new” issues like climate, gender and inequality.

To fulfil these responsibilities, its member states have provided the IMF with resources equal to only about 1% of global GDP.

The decline in its resources relative to the size of the global economy and of its membership has at least two pernicious effects.

The first is that it is providing its member states with less financial support than they require if they are to meet the needs of their citizens and comply with their legal commitments to creditors and citizens. The result is that the IMF remains a purveyor of austerity policies. It requires a country to make deeper spending cuts than would be needed if the IMF had adequate resources.

The second effect of declining resources is that it weakens the IMF’s bargaining position in managing sovereign debt crises. This is important because the IMF plays a critical role in such crises. It helps determine when a country needs debt relief or forgiveness, how big the gap between the country’s financial obligations and available resources is, how much the IMF will contribute to filling this gap and how much its other creditors must contribute.

When Mexico announced that it could not meet its debt obligations in 1982, the IMF stated that it would provide about a third of the money that Mexico needed to meet its obligations, provided its commercial creditors contributed the remaining funds. It was able to push the creditors to reach agreement with Mexico within months. It had sufficient resources to repeat the exercise in other developing countries in Latin America and eastern Europe.

The conditions that the IMF imposed on Mexico and the other debtor countries in return for this financial support created serious problems for these countries. Still, the IMF was an effective actor in the 1980s debt crisis.

Today, the IMF is unable to play such a decisive role. For example, it has provided Zambia with less than 10% of its financing needs. It has been four years since Zambia defaulted on its debt and, even with IMF support, it has not yet concluded restructuring agreements with all its creditors.

What is to be done?

The solution to this problem requires the rich countries to provide sufficient finances for the IMF to carry out its mandate. They must also surrender some control and make the organisation more democratic and accountable.

In the short term, the IMF can take two actions.

First, it must set out detailed policies and procedures that explain to its own staff, to its member states and to the inhabitants of these states what it can and will do. These policies should clarify the criteria that the IMF will use to determine when and how to incorporate climate, gender, inequality and other social issues into IMF operations.

They should also describe with whom it will consult, how external actors can engage with the IMF and the process it will follow in designing and implementing its operations. In fact, there are international norms and standards that the IMF can use to develop policies and procedures that are principled and transparent.

Second, the IMF must acknowledge that the issues raised by its expanded mandate are complex and that the risk of mistakes is high.

Consequently, the IMF needs a mechanism that can help it identify its mistakes, address their adverse impacts in a timely manner and avoid repeating them.

In short, the IMF must create an independent accountability mechanism such as an external ombudsman who can receive complaints.

Currently, the IMF is the only multilateral financial institution without such a mechanism. It therefore lacks the means for identifying unanticipated problems in its operations when they can still be corrected and for learning about the impact of its operations on the communities and people it is supposed to be helping.

Danny Bradlow is Professor/Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancement of Scholarship, University of Pretoria

Source: The Conversation

https://theconversation.com/the-imf-is-failing-countries-like-kenya-why-and-what-can-be-done-about-it-233825

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Kenya’s need for climate finance is great—the country has been battered by climate change-related disasters for years—but as this analysis shows, the arrangements remain opaque, leaving the affected communities vulnerable.

Mahrang Baloch during a public appearance. The 30-year-old has emerged as a prominent figure in the Baloch movement. Credit: Mehrab Khalid/IPS

By Karlos Zurutuza
ROME, Jul 4 2024 (IPS)

A 30-year-old woman speaks before tens of thousands gathered in southern Pakistan. Men of all ages listen to her speech in almost reverential silence, many holding up her portrait and chanting her name: Mahrang Baloch.

This took place on January 24 in Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan, 900 kilometers southwest of Islamabad. The large, predominantly male crowd that gathered to welcome a group of women was unexpected for many. However, the reasons behind it were compelling.

They were welcomed back home after leading a women’s march towards Islamabad that lasted several months, demanding justice and reparations for missing Baloch people. In a phone conversation with IPS from Quetta, Mahrang Baloch provides the context behind what became known as the ‘march against the Baloch genocide’.

“For two decades, Pakistani security forces have been conducting a brutal military operation against political activists, dissenters, journalists, writers, and even artists to suppress the rebellion for an independent Balochistan, resulting in thousands of disappearances.”

Divided across the borders of Pakistan, Iran, and Afghanistan, the Baloch people number between 15 and 20 million, with their own language and culture.

Following Britain’s withdrawal from India, they declared their own state in 1947, even before Pakistan did. However, seven months later, that territory was annexed by Islamabad. Today, they live in the country’s largest and most sparsely populated province in the country, also the richest in resources, yet plagued by poverty and violence.

Mahrang Baloch, a surgeon by profession, recalls being fifteen years old when her father, an administration official known for his political activism, was arrested in 2009. Two years later, his body was found in a ditch after being savagely mutilated.

“There is no Baloch family that has not lost one of their own in this conflict,” says the prominent activist. Remaining silent, however, doesn’t seem to be an option for them.

“We at the Baloch Unity Committee (BYC) will fight against the Baloch genocide and defend Baloch national rights with public power in the political arena. However, we will continue our struggle outside the so-called parliament of Pakistan, which lacks a true mandate from the people and facilitates the Baloch genocide,” explains the mass leader.

 

Sammi Deen Baloch in Dublin after receiving a human rights award last June. She has not heard from her father since his kidnapping in 2009. (Photo provided by SDB)

 

Harassment

International organizations such as Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch have consistently accused Pakistani security forces of committing serious human rights violations, including arbitrary detentions and extrajudicial executions.

Pakistani authorities declined to respond to questions posed by IPS via email. Meanwhile, the Voice for Missing Baloch People (VBMP), a local platform, cites more than 8,000 cases of enforced disappearances in the last two decades.

The secretary general of that organization is Sammi Deen Baloch, a 25-year-old Baloch woman who led last winter’s march to Islamabad alongside Mahrang Baloch. Baloch is a common surname in the region. The two women are not related.

Sammi Deen also participated in previous marches conducted in 2010, 2011 and 2013. Her father disappeared in 2009, and she has not heard from him ever since. “Fifteen years later, I still don’t know if I am an orphan, and my mother doesn’t know if she is a widow either,” says the young activist.

Last May, Sammi Deen travelled to Dublin (Ireland) to collect the Asia Pacific Human Rights Award, which is given annually to outstanding human rights defenders.

However, bringing Balochistan into the international spotlight always comes at a cost.

“They resort to all kinds of strategies to silence us, from smear campaigns to threats which are also directed against our families. They even file false police reports against us constantly,” Sammi Deen Baloch told IPS over the phone from Quetta.

Mahrang Baloch visited Norway last June after receiving an invitation from the PEN Club International, a global association of writers with consultative status at the UN. Even in the Scandinavian country she was harassed during her stay, forcing the Norwegian police to intervene on several occasions.

Despite the pressure endured by these women, Sammi Deen points to “significant progress” in the attitude of her people after the last march.

“Until very recently, most of the thousands of affected families remained silent out of fear of reprisals, but people massively joined the last protest. Today, more and more people are raising their voices to denounce what is happening,” claims the activist.

 

Khair Bux Marri at his residence in Karachi in 2009. Until his death in 2014, he was one of the most influential and respected leaders of the Baloch people. Credit: Karlos Zurutuza/IPS

 

Thirst for Leadership

Baloch society has historically been organised along tribal lines. Some of its most charismatic leaders, such as Khair Bux Marri, Attaullah Mengal or Akbar Khan Bugti, eventually paid with imprisonment, exile and even death for their opposition to what they saw as a state of occupation by Pakistan.

Muhammad Amir Rana is a security and political economy analyst as well as the President of the Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies. In a telephone conversation with IPS from Islamabad, Rana points to a certain “need for leadership” as one of the keys behind the massive support for Baloch activists.

“The problem is that all those historical leaders are already dead, and those who remain in Balochistan are seen as people close to the establishment by a large part of Baloch society. They no longer represent their people,” explains the analyst.

He also highlights the presence of an “emerging” Baloch civil society structured around the Baloch Unity Committee (BYC), the Baloch Students Organization (BSO Azad ) or the VBMP.

“Mahrang Baloch is a young woman with an academic background who has managed to put the issue of the missing Baloch people in the spotlight, but who also brings together the feelings of her people and seems to be able to channel that into a political movement,” says the expert.

 

Karima Baloch used to hide her face for security reasons. The student leader went into exile in Canada, where she died in 2020 under circumstances not yet clarified (Photo: BSO Azad)

 

It’s an opinion shared by many, including Mir Mohamad Ali Talpur, a renowned Baloch journalist and intellectual.

“The mainstream parties often try to supplant the civil society but they, with their limited aims, are too shallow to take up the mantle. As for the tribal chiefs that remain, they are stooges of the government and their power stems from the governmental support and from the tribes,” Talpur tells IPS over the phone from Hyderabad, 1,300 kilometres southwest of Islamabad.

He also highlights the changes the last march led by women produced.

“Since the last march, all abductions have resulted in protests which include blockades of roads and other similar actions. Mahrang and Sammi have a charismatic aura and emulating them is considered honourable in both urban and tribal sections of society,” explains Talpur. He also stresses that both women give “continuity to Karima Baloch´s legacy.”

He refers to that Baloch student leader forced into exile in Canada, where she died in 2020 in circumstances that have not yet been clarified. The BBC, the British public broadcaster, even included her in its list of “the 100 most inspiring and influential women of 2016.”

As for the more pressing present, Talpur is blunt about the social impact of the women-led march:

“The most significant change is that people have realized that remaining silent about the injustices perpetrated against them only allows things to worsen.”

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Girls at Dabaso Girls School in Malindi, Kenya, pose with a ball during break time. Universal secondary education could virtually end child marriage and reduce early childbearing by up to three-fourths, according to an African Union and UNESCO report. Credit: Courtesy of Stafford Ondego for the EDT PROJECT

By Maina Waruru
NAIROBI & ADDIS ABABA, Jul 4 2024 (IPS)

Investing in teachers and school leaders in Africa is the most important factor in promoting educational opportunities for girls, keeping them in school and ending child marriage, ultimately reducing gender inequality through education.

Having more female teachers in schools and having more of them lead the institutions is even more important for keeping the girls in school beyond the primary level and providing them with role models to motivate them to continue learning.

While low educational attainment for girls and child marriage are profoundly detrimental for the girls, their families, communities, and societies, investments in teachers and school leaders are also key in ending lack of learning, identified as the single biggest cause of school dropout for girls, besides traditional factors including social and cultural ones.

Despite data showing that less than a fifth of teachers at the secondary level for example, are women in many African countries, and the proportion of female school leaders is even lower, the teachers have been proven to improve student learning and girls’ retention beyond primary and lower secondary school.

As a result, better opportunities must be given to women teachers and school leaders in order to bring additional benefits to girls’ education, as women often remain in teaching for a longer time, a report by the United Nations and the African Union says.

The absence of the above has led to high drop-outs, resulting in low educational attainment, a higher prevalence of child marriage, and higher risks of early childbearing for girls across Africa, according to the report, Educating Girls and Ending Child Marriage in Africa: Investment Case and the Role of Teachers and School Leaders.

“Increasing investments in girls’ education yields large economic benefits, apart from being the right thing to do. This requires interventions for adolescent girls, but it should also start with enhancing foundational learning through better teaching and school leadership,” the document tabled at the 1st Pan-African Conference on Girls and Women’s Education taking place July 2–5 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

The lack of foundational learning is a key cause leading to drop-out in primary and lower-secondary schools, it finds, further noting that while teachers and school leaders are key to it, new approaches are also needed for pedagogy and for training teachers and school heads.

“Targeted interventions for adolescent girls are needed, but they often reach only a small share of girls still in school at that age; by contrast, improving foundational learning would benefit a larger share of girls (and boys) and could also make sense from a cost-benefit point of view,” it adds.

Parents in 10 francophone countries who responded to household surveys cited the lack of learning in school—the absence of teaching despite children attending classes—for their children dropping out, accounting for over 40 percent of both girls and boys dropping out of primary school, it further reveals.

The lack of learning, blamed on teacher absence, accounts for more than a third of students dropping out at the lower secondary level, meaning that improving learning could automatically lead to significantly increased educational attainment for girls and boys alike.

“To improve learning, reviews from impact evaluations and analysis of student assessment data suggest that teachers and school leaders are key. Yet new approaches are needed for professional development, including through structured pedagogy and training emphasizing practice. Teachers must also be better educated; household surveys for 10 francophone countries suggest that only one-third of teachers in primary schools have a post-secondary diploma,” the survey carried out in 2023 laments.

It calls for “better opportunities” for female teachers and school principals, noting that this would bring additional benefits as women also tend to remain in teaching for a longer time compared to men.

Better professional standards and competency frameworks are also needed for teachers to make the profession more attractive and gender-sensitive, it finds, revealing that countries have not yet “treated teaching as a career” and lack a clear definition of competencies needed at different levels of the profession.

Throughout sub-Saharan Africa, just over two-thirds of girls complete their primary education and four in ten complete lower secondary education explains the study authored by Quentin Wodon, Chata Male, and Adenike Onagoruwa for the African Union’s  International Centre for the Education of Girls and Women in Africa (AU/CIEFFA) and the UN agency for education, culture and science, UNESCO.

Quoting the latest data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics, it reveals that while nine in ten girls complete their primary education and over three in four complete their lower secondary education globally, the proportions are much lower in Sub-Saharan Africa, where slightly over two-thirds of the girls—69 percent compared to 73 percent boys—complete their primary education, and four out of ten girls—43 percent compared to 46 percent boys—complete lower secondary education.

Providing girls and women with adequate opportunities for education could have large positive impacts on many development outcomes, including higher earnings and standards of living for families, ending child marriage and early childbearing, reducing fertility, on health and nutrition, and on well-being, among others.

It observes that gains made in earnings are substantial, especially with a secondary education, noting that women with primary education earn more than those with no education, “but women with secondary education earn more than twice as much, but gains with tertiary education are even larger.”

Each additional year of secondary education for a girl could reduce their risk of marrying as a child and having a child before the age of 18.

“Universal secondary education could virtually end child marriage and reduce early childbearing by up to three-fourths. By contrast, primary education in most countries does not lead to large reductions in child marriage and early childbearing,” it declares.

The organizations make a strong case for the importance of secondary education for girls, explaining that universal secondary education would also have health benefits, including increasing women’s knowledge of HIV/AIDS by one-tenth, increasing women’s decision-making for their own healthcare by a fourth, helping reduce under-five mortality by one-third, and potentially lowering under-five stunting in infants by up to 20 percent.

In addition, secondary education while ending child marriage could reduce fertility—the number of children women have over their lifetime nationally by a third on average—slowing population growth and enabling countries to benefit from the “demographic dividend.”

Other benefits include a reduction in “intimate partner” violence, an increase in women’s decision-making in the household by a fifth and the likelihood of registering children at birth by over 25 percent.

To remedy the crisis, there was a need to improve the attractiveness of the teaching profession as one way of getting more females heading schools, Wodon, Director of UNESCO’s International Institute for Capacity Building in Africa (IICBA), said during the report’s launch at the conference.

“Virtually all teachers are dissatisfied with their job, meaning that there is a need to improve job satisfaction in the profession besides improving salaries,” he noted.

While retaining girls in school lowered fertility rates by up to a third in some countries, the study’s aim for advocating for more education for girls had nothing to do with the need for lower fertility but was in the interest of empowering girls and women in decision-making.

Empowering girls through education places them in a better position in society in terms of power relations between them and males, observed Lorato Modongo, an AU-CIEFFA official.

“It is a fact that we cannot educate girls without challenging power dynamics in patriarchal settings, where men make decisions for everyone,” she noted.

Overall, the report regrets that gender imbalances in education and beyond, including in occupational choices, result from deep-seated biases and discrimination against women, which percolate into education. It is therefore essential to reduce inequality both in and through education, acknowledging that education has a key role to play in reducing broader gender inequalities in societies.

“While educating girls and ending child marriage is the right thing to do, it is also a smart economic investment.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Members of a “Jugnu” club get trained by UN Women to support women who experience gender-based violence. Credit: UN Women

By Umang Dhingra
NEW DELHI, India, Jul 4 2024 (IPS)

As the temperature soars to new heights in India, so does domestic violence. It’s a well-established correlation that is largely left out of the climate change discussion, but the gap is glaring and needs to be bridged.

For the third summer in a row, temperatures in India are breaking historical records. The recent record high of 52.9° C (127.22° F), has resulted in loss of livelihood, water rationing, health impacts, and even death. The heat affects some more than others. As people are advised to shelter at home, those in lower economic strata contend with cramped living situations, lack of air conditioning, and power cuts.

Women bear the worst impacts. New Delhi’s Heat Action Plan (HAP) registers their greater vulnerability – noting, for example, that they’re more susceptible to falling sick from the heat compared to men, the heightened risks for pregnant people, and greater expectations of women to be caretakers. But it fails to note the increased threat of violence.¬¬¬¬¬

It is well-documented that temperature extremes lead to an increase in domestic violence cases, with low-income women bearing the brunt. In South Asia, for every degree that the temperature rises, domestic violence increases about 6%.

As India grapples with its large carbon footprint, rising temperatures, and growing population, intimate partner violence can be expected to increase drastically. P¬¬ar¬¬¬ticularly if greenhouse gas emissions aren’t regulated effectively, India could see a spike in domestic violence of more than 20% by the end of the century.

Extreme temperatures are associated with frustration, aggression, and disruptions in people’s daily routines. Researchers theorize this is the reason why heat has a such a strong influence on rates of intimate partner violence.

For low-income daily wage laborers in India, heat may result in loss of livelihood and income. Economic stress and resultant anxiety can significantly increase domestic violence risk.

In addition, women are expected to be caretakers for the family, which gives them little chance of escape from abusers and increases their vulnerability under extreme conditions. This phenomenon was prevalent during Covid-19 pandemic, when the “shadow pandemic” of domestic violence affected women across India.

The pandemic also revealed strong patterns of economic abuse of women due to unequal power dynamics within the family.

Despite research demonstrating this, the spike in domestic violence during heat waves remains hush-hush. New Delhi’s Heat Action Plan (HAP) does not mention gender-based violence even once across its 66 pages.

While it acknowledges women as a vulnerable group and deals with increased risk during pregnancy, other risks to women remain shrouded in the vagueness of “social norms” and “gender discrimination.” Failing to address the threat of intimate partner violence explicitly leaves out a key piece of the puzzle.

The omission has manifold impacts. It lets policymakers shy away from confronting the issue, creating a gap in policy at the highest level. It sets up government workers tasked with implementing the plans such as New Delhi’s HAP on the ground for failure.

With no guidance on how to deal with the predictable increase in domestic violence during extreme heat, government can offer little support for women who need it. Mahila Panchayats (“women’s councils”) and grassroots non-profits often help rural and low-income women find support and community, but extreme weather can cut them off from these resources.

Forced to stay indoors and unable to access help, women have little recourse or respite. In theory, India’s laws protect them. But in practice, implementation is spotty, and they remain vulnerable.

India’s climate policy must not leave women out in the cold. New Delhi’s Heat Action Plan and other policy initiatives must protect women and offer them accessible support. First responders and government workers must be given the tools they need to help support those at risk for domestic violence, not only during heat waves but year-round.

Finally, India’s problem with domestic violence might be exacerbated during the summers but is not unique to them. India needs a suite of policies and concrete actions to contend with rising intimate partner violence, starting at the grassroots level and prioritizing education, employment, economic stability, and family planning for all.

Heat waves and the stressors they bring might be unforeseeable in a sense, but rising temperatures and rising domestic violence are completely predictable effects of climate change. There’s no excuse for failing to redress them.

By leaving women vulnerable year after year, we are doing a disservice, both to women who need help and to the institutions that they place their trust in.

Umang Dhingra is a Duke University undergraduate and a Stanback Fellow at the Population Institute, a Washington D.C.-based nonprofit that supports reproductive health and rights.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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By Jewel Fraser
PORT-of-SPAIN, Trinidad , Jul 3 2024 (IPS)

Global South countries did get one benefit from the COVID-19 pandemic. A professor at St. George’s University in Grenada describes it as the pandemic’s “silver lining.” He was referring to the widespread use of next-generation genomic sequencing technology to identify, track, and trace the numerous variants of the Sars Cov-2 virus. Researchers and scientists in the Caribbean, Africa, and elsewhere have been eagerly harnessing genomic sequencing technology to develop resilience and greater self-sufficiency in numerous fields, ranging from health surveillance to agriculture and beyond.

In this podcast, IPS Caribbean correspondent Jewel Fraser speaks with Professor Dr. Martin Forde at St. George’s University in Grenada about a research paper published in The Lancet that he coauthored looking at the Caribbean’s use of genomic sequencing technology.

To be fully transparent, we recorded this interview in early 2023, and it’s possible that new developments have occurred since then. Also, Forde and his colleagues’ paper relied solely on the data available in the GISAID database.

Music credit: https://www.fesliyanstudios.com/

 

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By Anis Chowdhury
SYDNEY, Jul 3 2024 (IPS)

Fifty years ago on 1 May 1974, the Sixth Special Session of the General Assembly (April–May) adopted a revolutionary declaration and programme of action on the establishment of a New International Economic Order (NIEO) “based on equity, sovereign equality, interdependence, common interest and cooperation among all States, irrespective of their economic and social systems”. The hope was that a NIEO would “correct inequalities and redress existing injustices, make it possible to eliminate the widening gap between the developed and the developing countries and ensure steadily accelerating economic and social development and peace and justice for present and future generations”. Alas, what evolved is far from what was envisioned or called for.

Anis Chowdhury

Failed aid promise

The NIEO resolution reaffirmed the minimum target – originally defined in the strategy for the second Development Decade – of 1% of the gross national product (GNP) of each developed country to be transferred to developing countries, out of which 0.7% of GNP would be as official development assistance (ODA).

But, ODA steadily declined from around 51% of GNI in the early 1960s to around 32% during 2017-2021. Oxfam estimated that 50 years of broken promises meant a US$5.7 trillion aid shortfall by 2020. Only five countries met the ODA target of 0.7% of GNI: Denmark (0.70%), Germany (0.83%), Luxembourg (1.00%), Norway (0.86%) and Sweden (0.90%).

 

 

Unreformed international monetary system and financing of development

The NIEO resolution called for (i) full and effective participation of developing countries in all phases of decision-making at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank; (ii) adequate and orderly creation of additional liquidity through the additional allocation of special drawing rights (SDRs); and (iii) early establishment of a link between SDRs and additional development financing.

None has materialised. Despite repeated commitments, and notwithstanding some minor improvement between 2005 and 2015, the representation of developing countries in international financial institutions, regional development banks and standard-setting bodies, e.g., OECD’s international taxation, has remained largely unchanged. The governments of the largest developed countries continue to hold veto powers in the decision-making bodies of these institutions.

The unchanged mechanism for allocating SDRs in proportion to countries’ IMF quota shares meant that most of the latest SDRs allocation of (about US$650 billion) in 2021 went to advanced economies; developing countries received only about one third, the most vulnerable countries receiving much less. While both G7 and G20 called for a voluntary rechannelling of US$100 billion worth of unused SDRs, only a fraction has actually been rechannelled to developing countries.

Increased indebtedness

The NIEO resolution envisioned “appropriate urgent measures …to mitigate adverse consequences for … development … arising from the burden of external debt”. These included debt cancellations, moratorium, rescheduling or interest subsidisation, and reorientation of international financial institutions lending policies.

Failure to fulfil aid promises and reform the global financial architecture, including the IMF quota-based SDRs allocations, forced developing countries to borrow from commercial sources at exorbitantly high interest rates with shorter maturity terms and no mechanism for restructuring. This has exacerbated the debt crisis. Almost 40% of all developing countries (52 countries) suffer from severe debt problems and extremely expensive market-based financing.

Only after extensive lobbying by civil society organisations, did the IMF and the World Bank jointly take the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative in 1996, supplemented by the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative in 2005. Despite the IMF’s debt service relief, and some limited G20 debt service suspension during the Covid-19 pandemic for low-income countries (LICs), the debt crisis worsened, with 60% LICs already at high risk of or in debt distress.

Rising food insecurity

The NIEO resolution called for the accumulation of buffer stocks of commodities in order to offset market fluctuations, combat inflationary tendencies, and ensure grain and food security.

Developing countries are far from attaining food security. Even before the Ukraine war, food insecurity around the world was rising. The Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) estimated that in 2022 approximately 30% of the global population (2.4 billion people), did not have constant access to food. Among them, around 900 million people faced severe food insecurity, and an additional 122 million people have been pushed into hunger since 2019. World Bank projections show that by 2030, over 600 million people will still struggle to feed their families.

Meanwhile, Africa turned from a net-exporter to a net-importer of food since the adoption of NIEO resolution. While developing countries had an overall annual agricultural trade surplus of almost US$7 billion in the early 1960s, “since the beginning of the 1990s they have generally been net importers of agricultural products, with a deficit in 2001, for example, of US$11 billion.”

Deindustrialisation

The NIEO resolution called for “all efforts … by the international community” for “the industrialization of the developing countries”.

Except for a few countries in Asia, deindustrialisation has become the unfortunate fate for developing countries. For Africa, the GDP share of manufacturing declined from around 17% in 1990 to around 11% in 2019, and Africa remains the least industrialised region in the world. In most central Asian countries, manufacturing’s GDP shares declined from around 20% in the early 1990s to less than 10% in 2015. Large Latin American countries, e.g., Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Mexico also witnessed declines in manufacturing’s GDP shares.

The deindustrialisation has seen increasing specialisation in commodities, resource-based manufactures and low productivity services. Thus, majority of developing countries remain vulnerable to commodity price swings.

Even late-comer Asian developing countries, including China, face the risk of premature deindustrialisation. Some, e.g., Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand, are already are in a ‘middle-income trap’.

Trade and technology barriers

The NIEO resolution asked for “improved access to markets in developed countries through the progressive removal of tariff and non-tariff barriers and of restrictive business practices”.

Yet, there has been a resurgence of protectionism in OECD countries since the late 1970s. The trade protectionism under different guises, such as health and sanitary standards, persisted even after the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO). The World Bank has warned, “protectionist measures are on the rise… [and] detrimental policies have been outpacing trade-liberalizing policies”.

The NIEO resolution also emphasised that developing countries needed to be given “access on improved terms to modern technology and to adapt that technology, as appropriate… and … adapt commercial practices governing transfer of technology to the requirements of the developing countries”.

Still, strengthened intellectual property rights, reinforced in the WTO’s agreement on Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs), have raised the costs of acquiring technology, reducing technology transfers, raising transnational corporations (TNCs)’ monopoly powers. Developed countries refused to relax TRIPs to allow developing countries’ access to Covid-19 vaccines, drugs and testing technologies.

Unabated power of transnational corporations

The NIEO resolution demanded “permanent sovereignty of States over natural resources”; and “regulation and control over the activities of transnational corporations… to prevent interference in the internal affairs of the countries … to eliminate restrictive business practices…to conform to the national development plans and objectives of developing countries, …to transfer …technology and management skills to developing countries on equitable and favourable terms; to regulate the repatriation of the profits … and to promote reinvestment of their profits in developing countries”.

The UN Commission on TNCs, a body created in 1974 for the purpose, struggled to agree on the draft code of conduct on TNCs, and in 1994 was replaced by a Commission of the Trade and Development Board of UNCTAD.

TNCs continue to influence and mould domestic and international politics to their interests. TNCs have governments at their beck and call – witness their consistent success at dodging tax payments. Stringent WTO’s TRIPS was adopted at the behest of TNCs, especially to protect monopoly profits of big transnational pharmaceutical companies.

TNCs exert political influence to liberalise trade and investment; obtain subsidies; reduce their tax burdens; dilute working conditions; relax environmental protection. As Dani Rodrik noted, the WTO is heavily influenced by major banks and TNCs. Through the World Economic Forum (WEF), the TNCs are now setting global economic agenda.

Diminished States

The NIEO resolution contained the Charter on Economic Rights and Duties of States. However, neo-liberalism promoted by US President Reagan and UK Prime Minister Thatcher sees State as a problem. Privatisation, liberalisation and deregulation have significantly eroded the State from its customary intervention in regulating economic growth and promoting redistribution. The erosion of the State as an institution is visible in underfunded social programmes, a smaller public sector, weakened regulatory structures, foregone infrastructure projects, public assets sales and continued privatisation.

Questionable legitimacy of global economic governance

The NIEO resolution demanded that the United Nations, in particular the Economic and Social Council, be entrusted with the responsibility of setting global economic agenda and coordinating it as the most inclusive organisation with legitimacy. Besides the TNC takeover of global economic agenda setting through WEF, non-inclusive informal country groupings, e.g., G7 and G20, with questionable legitimacy and formal bodies, e.g., OECD and Bank for International Settlements, are acting as norm-setters. Thus, developing countries remain unpresented and disadvantaged.

Opportunity lost

The NIEO resolution was initiated in the wake of the collapse of the post-World War II Bretton Woods System in 1971, aimed at supporting development aspirations of developing and newly decolonised countries. However, the developed world failed to see that more orderly world growth and prosperity of developing countries would have benefited them too.

Instead, they engaged in protected negotiations dragging on for about two years. The resolution was adopted by a divisive majority vote (123 for, 50 against and 1 abstention) amidst fierce opposition from developed countries.

The United States took the position that “it cannot and does not accept any implication that the world is now embarked on the establishment of something called the New International Economic Order”. The NIEO effectively went into oblivion after President Reagan declared in 1981, “We should not seek to create new institutions”.

Thus, the developed world ensured NIEO’s failure while the global economy continues to struggle under a “non-system”. The world economy has also become more crisis prone; we had the Latin American debt crisis in the 1980s, the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis, the 1998 Russian financial crisis, the 2000 Turkish lira crisis and the 2002 Argentine crisis within a short span of two decades. And the global financial and economic crisis showed, a crisis originating in one corner of the globe can quickly engulf the whole world.

Yet, we still do not have a global financial governance mechanism to deal with such crises fairly. What is most disappointing may not be the failure of the NIEO as such, but the hope that it inspired.

A bleak future?

Initiated by Progressive International, delegates from over 25 countries of the Global South assembled in Havana on 27 January 2023 to declare their intent to build a NIEO fit for the 21st century, countering the TNCs’ global economic agenda setting behind the WEF. The signatories of NIEO-Mark II seek to rebuild the collective power of emerging and developing countries for fundamentally transforming the international system, and for alternative ways to respond to global crises.

NIEO-Mark II is essentially, a call for shared and differentiated responsibilities for equitable development. Developed countries acknowledge the principle of ‘common but differentiated responsibilities’, formalised at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. But they have failed to meet their financing commitments and reneged on various targets to address global warming.

Amidst ongoing global challenges, including the climate emergency geopolitical conflicts, public health crisis, global food insecurity, outstripping the response capacity of the UN, the UN Secretary-General has called for a Summit of the Future – Our Common Agenda to be held on 22-23 September 2024.

The Summit of the Future is expected to find multilateral solutions for better tomorrow; resulting in an inter-governmentally agreed “Pact for the Future” to tackle emerging threats and opportunities.

What is the chance that the nations would agree to the “Pact for the Future”? To what extent the Pact will accommodate NIEO-Mark II?

The world now is more divided than it was in the 1970s when NIEO-Mark I was first proposed. Yet, plagued by ideological conflicts, NIEO-Mark I failed, making the world more crisis prone. One can only hope that the rising ideological and geo-political tensions do not lead to a bleak future.

Anis Chowdhury, Emeritus Professor, Western Sydney University (Australia). Served as a senior official at the UN Department of Economic Social Affairs (UN-DESA, New York) and UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN-ESCAP, Bangkok) between 2008-2016.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Crerdit: STR/AFP via Getty Images

By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, Jul 3 2024 (IPS)

Myanmar’s army, at war with pro-democracy forces and ethnic militias, must know it’s nowhere near victory. It recently came close to losing control of Myawaddy, one of the country’s biggest cities, at a key location on the border with Thailand. Many areas are outside its control.

The army surely expected an easier ride when it ousted the elected government in a coup on 1 February 2021. It had ruled Myanmar for decades before democracy returned in 2015. But many democracy supporters took up arms, and in several parts of the country they’ve allied with militia groups from Myanmar’s ethnic minorities, with a long history of resisting military oppression.

Setbacks and violence

Army morale has collapsed. Thousands of soldiers are reported to have surrendered, including complete battalions – some out of moral objections to the junta’s violence and others because they saw defeat as inevitable. There have also been many defections, with defectors reporting they’d been ordered to kill unarmed civilians. Forces fighting the junta’s troops are encouraging defectors to join their ranks.

In response to reversals, in February the junta announced it would introduce compulsory conscription for young people, demanding up to five years of military service. An estimated 60,000 men are expected to be called up in the first round. The announcement prompted many young people to flee the country if they could, and if not, seek refuge in parts of Myanmar free from military control.

There have also been reports of army squads kidnapping people and forcing them to serve. Given minimal training, they’re cannon fodder and human shields. Rohingya people – an officially stateless Muslim minority – are among those reportedly being forcibly enlisted. They’re being pressed into service by the same military that committed genocide against them.

People who manage to cross into Thailand face hostility from Thai authorities and risk being returned against their will. Even after leaving Myanmar, refugees face the danger of transnational repression, as government intelligence agents reportedly operate in neighbouring countries and the authorities are freezing bank accounts, seizing assets and cancelling passports.

Conscription isn’t just about giving the junta more personnel to compensate for its losses – it’s also part of a sustained campaign of terror intended to subdue civilians and suppress activism. Neighbourhoods are being burned to the ground and hundreds have died in the flames. The air force is targeting unarmed towns and villages. The junta enjoys total impunity for these and many other vile acts.

The authorities hold thousands of political prisoners on fabricated charges and subject them to systematic torture. The UN independent fact-finding mission reports that at least 1,703 people have died in custody since the coup, likely an underestimate. Many have been convicted in secret military trials and some sentenced to death.

There’s also a growing humanitarian crisis, with many hospitals destroyed, acute food shortages in Rakhine state, where many Rohingya people live, and an estimated three million displaced. Voluntary groups are doing their best to help communities, but the situation is made much worse by the military obstructing access for aid workers.

International neglect

In March, UN human rights chief Volker Türk described the situation in Myanmar as ‘a never-ending nightmare’. It’s up to the international community to exert the pressure needed to end it.

It’s by no means certain the military will be defeated. Adversity could lead to infighting and the rise of even more vicious leaders. One thing that could make a decisive difference is disruption of the supply chain, particularly the jet fuel that enables lethal airstrikes on civilians. In April, the UN Human Rights Council passed a resolution calling on states to stop supplying the military with jet fuel. States should implement it.

Repressive states such as China, India and Russia have been happy enough to keep supplying the junta with weapons. But democratic states must take the lead and apply more concerted pressure. Some, including Australia, the UK and USA, have imposed new sanctions on junta members this year, but these have been slow in coming and fall short of the approach the Human Rights Council resolution demands.

But the worst response has come from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Ignoring reality and civil society’s proposals, ASEAN has stuck to a plan it developed in April 2021 that simply hasn’t worked. The junta takes advantage of ASEAN’s weakness. It announced compulsory conscription shortly after a visit by ASEAN’s Special Envoy for Myanmar.

ASEAN’s neglect has allowed human rights violations and, increasingly, transnational organised crime to flourish. The junta is involved in crimes such as drug trafficking, illegal gambling and online fraud. It uses the proceeds of these, often carried out with the help of Chinese gangs, to finance its war on its people. As a result, Myanmar now ranks number one on the Global Organized Crime Index. This is a regional problem, affecting people in Myanmar’s neighbouring countries as well.

ASEAN members also have an obligation to accept refugees from Myanmar, including those fleeing conscription. They should commit to protecting them and not forcing them back, particularly when they’re democracy and human rights activists whose lives would be at risk.

Forced conscription must be the tipping point for international action. This must include international justice, since there’s none in Myanmar. The junta has ignored an order from the International Court of Justice to protect Rohingya people and prevent actions that could violate the Genocide Convention, following a case brought by the government of The Gambia alleging genocide against the Rohingya. The UN Security Council should now use its power to refer Myanmar to the International Criminal Court so prosecutions of military leaders can begin.

China and Russia, which have so far refused to back calls for action, should end their block on Security Council action, in the interests of human rights and to prevent growing regional instability.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

 

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A child waits to fill water containers in Gaza. Credit: UNRWA
 
In its latest update last week. the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, reported “especially intense” airstrikes in central Gaza in recent days, particularly in Bureij, Maghazi and Nuseirat refugee camps and eastern Deir Al-Balah.
 
Meanwhile, the Israeli military’s ground offensive “continues to expand”, UNRWA noted, particularly in the southern regions of Gaza City and eastern Rafah, causing further suffering and further “destabilising” humanitarian aid flows.

By James E. Jennings
ATLANTA, Georgia, Jul 3 2024 (IPS)

Zionism is broken. It is finished as a political philosophy and cannot long survive. Having earned the visceral opposition of multitudes of people and countries around the world for engaging in vast overkill in Gaza, that historical reality will likely become clear to the Israeli people over time.

Still, how could the most powerful state in the Middle East, the most flourishing economically, with the strongest superpower backing, become defunct? It cannot—unless somehow its chief raison d’etrê, its founding philosophy, collapses. That has already happened.

In the wake of the October 7 attack by Hamas, the visceral racist core of Zionism has become evident in the indiscriminate slaughter of tens of thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians, including many thousands of children.

No reason of state can ever excuse that. Israel’s righteous anger against HAMAS for its obscene October 7 attack transitioned quickly into racial hatred, ending in, if not genocide, then certainly war crimes and crimes against humanity. Netanyahu and his Likud allies have not hidden their racism for decades. Now it is explicit in full view of the world.

The Zionism of Netanyahu and his supporters must be repudiated by the Israelis themselves. Israel’s leaders from Menachem Begin to today have long endorsed statements lauding Israel uber alles.

Zionism can only be rehabilitated if it separates its reason for existing from the current triumphalist military identity that is determined to kill, kill, and kill again until the utter destruction and suppression of all every tangible and ideological enemy.

In a recent CNN interview, former Shin Beth Director Ami Ayalon, was very explicit: he said “The toxic leadership of Prime Minister Netanyahu” [in pursuing an endless war] will “lead to the end of Zionism.” In that case, he said, “We cannot be secure and we shall lose our identity.”

Ayalon was preceded by a number of courageous Israeli thinkers and writers who warned of the same outcome—Israel was founded in 1948 but in their opinion, Zionism had already failed ideologically by the mid-1960s. They included Hebrew University professor Israel Shahak (1933-2001), who wrote, “It is my considered opinion that the State of Israel is a racist state in the full meaning of the term.”

He insisted that, “You cannot have humane Zionism. It (too) is a contradiction in terms.” Uri Avnery (1923-2018), a decorated Israeli soldier and later a publisher and politician, published a book in 1968 titled Israel without Zionists.

Many of the original Jewish colonists had utopian dreams, but their leaders would probably not recognize the grim, revengeful militarism of today’s Israel. A few tiny orthodox religious parties in Israel have never bought into the military machine that is the Likud Party’s pride and joy.

Some have steadfastly refused even to serve in the Israeli army because they don’t believe in the Israeli state. Now even they are being conscripted.

The original dream of Zionism from Theodore Herzl to Chaim Weizmann to David Ben Gurion, although containing seeds of a today’s hob-booted military identity, nevertheless also expressed a grandiosely humane, even a universal, goal—to become a “light to the nations.” In that, Israel has signally failed.

Like HAMAS and most Palestinians, Israel’s people—and Israel as a country—has become increasingly and deeply racist. Now racism—hatred of others for their differences—has become racial-ism, which is even worse, a doctrine of race superiority, which was the Nazi credo.

The Israel of Benjamin Netanyahu and his thuggish coalition has succumbed to such race hatred that Zionists from pre-1948 Palestine would not recognize it. A Jan. 6, 2024 opinion article in the Jerusalem Post urges Israel to reform its politics along better Zionist lines and take power away from the extremists now in charge. Commendable, but not nearly enough.

What if Abraham Lincoln had countenanced America’s original sin of slavery by merely taking half steps? We might still have “slavery lite.” No, Israel’s race-based philosophy must change to the democratic ideal: a single state in Israel and the occupied territories for Muslims, Christians, and Jews. One person, one vote.

When Palestinians are treated as human beings—as real people instead of enemies to be eradicated en masse—people everywhere would soon see how quickly peace would come to the Middle East.

James E. Jennings, PhD, is President, Conscience International
www.conscienceinternational.org
conscience@earthlink.net

IPS UN Bureau

 

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