Conflict Prevention

Can you outline the basic tenets of the Arms Trade Treaty and discuss what it aims to accomplish?

Prior to the arms trade treaty, there was no real global set of rules governing the trade, export or transport of conventional weapons. The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) sets up standards for the cross-border transfer of eight categories of weapons; tanks, combat vehicles, all the way down to small and light weapons. It seeks to curb the irresponsible and illegal trade of weapons and prevent their sale into illicit markets.

Prior to authorizing any sale of weapons, the exporter has to assess whether the transfer is going to be used to facilitate or commit genocide, crimes against humanity, or other international humanitarian laws. If there is a known risk, they are prohibited from making that sale or transfer. Countries will then be held accountable through annual reporting requirements on arms transfers.

What are some objections to the treaty? Can you summarize the treaty’s main limitations?

The three countries that objected to the treaty are North Korea, Iran and Syria. I should say that the objections that these three countries held were echoed by a number of other countries. North Korea didn’t like the idea that exporters would be judging the humanitarian rights record of the importing countries. Iran, for their part, said that, “they didn’t approve of the transfer of conventional arms to foreign occupiers,” which is a thinly veiled reference to Israel. Syria objected because they didn’t like the fact that transfers or exports to armed groups or non-state actors (e.g. rebels in Syria) were not covered.

The treaty is also criticized for its relatively narrow scope; it doesn’t cover gifts and loans, which is a significant loophole. Furthermore, there’s no enforcement mechanism – that’s left to states to resolve.

Though the United States, the world's biggest arms exporter, voted yes on Tuesday, what are the chances of the U.S. ratifying the treaty? There’s stiff resistance from the National Rifle Association and conservatives in the Senate, where it needs a two-thirds majority to win ratification.

The focus of this treaty is entirely on the international trade and transfer of conventional weapons. The preamble of the ATT explicitly acknowledges that states retain their sovereignty and their authority to regulate the internal transfer and internal domestic possession of conventional weapons. It no way infringes upon private ownership. In fact, the American Bar Association was commissioned to do an analysis of the ATT and they found that the treaty is entirely consistent with the Second Amendment.

In the short term, there will definitely be opposition to the treaty in the U.S. The New York Times reports that over 50 senators are against it. So I don’t think this is going to happen anytime soon. But in the long term, the position of the NRA and other treaty opponents will likely be undermined. The current gun safety debate in the U.S., triggered by the Newtown massacre, weakens their position. And considering the fact that the only three countries that currently oppose the treaty are Iran, Syria and the North Korea, the NRA’s alignment with that trio certainly does not put them in a good light.

Why have Russia and China, two leading sellers of conventional weapons, abstained from voting? What does this mean for export control?

In short, China was opposed to the fact that the treaty was approved in a setting that did not allow every state veto power. It was previously negotiated at the UN Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, but consensus was blocked by opposition from Iran, North Korea and Syria. The ATT was then moved to the UN General Assembly, which requires only a simple majority to adopt a treaty. Wary of establishing a precedent, China argued that this move weakened the treaty.

Russia, for its part, felt that a number of the definitions, such as the term “genocide,” were not sufficiently clarified. Should these definitions be more appropriately defined, I believe it would be more acceptable to the Russians.

Russia is the second largest exporter of conventional weapons and China the fifth largest. The fact that these two countries did not approve the treaty outright obviously does not bode well for its implementation.

Anna MacDonald, the head of arms control for Oxfam International, has said, “This treaty won’t solve the problems of Syria overnight…but it will help to prevent future Syrias.” How might this treaty affect the current situation in Syria, if it were to be ratified today, and how might it prevent armed violence in the future?

Even by the most optimistic estimates, we are still one to two years away from this treaty’s ratification and entry into force. If it did enter into force today, it would make Russian sales of weapons to Syria much more difficult. Eventually, post-ratification, this will develop into an international norm. This is what happened with nuclear weapons, biological weapons and chemical weapons. It takes years, but eventually, it will develop into a norm, and this will raise political costs for countries that contravene the norm.

Another thing that the treaty will do is publicly name violators, ostracizing these countries within the international community. In terms of preventing future Syrias, the treaty will fill gaps that currently exist in the global arms trade. Only about 50 countries currently have related laws on the books, so once this treaty is approved with broad support from the international community, it will serve to diminish the now flourishing illicit market for these weapons.

What challenges will stand in the way of effective enforcement of this treaty?

It remains to be seen if countries are willing to subordinate their economic interests to fulfill their obligations under this treaty, so it’s entirely likely that countries will enact laws on the books without enforcing them. We saw this with China’s national export control system in the 90s and well into 2000s; they had laws on the books but they lacked the will or the capacity to enforce many of them. As a result, Chinese missile and nuclear weapons technology found its way into illicit markets.

It’s going to take some significant work on the part of the international community to push countries to actively enforce this treaty and fill these gaps. The ATT is a good start, but it’s a framework for international export control systems; more work needs to be done to build a robust regime that prevents these guns and weapons from falling into the wrong hands.

EastWest Direct is an ongoing series of interviews with EWI experts tied to breaking news stories.

What do you feel is the motivation for this recent ratcheting up of the rhetoric and threats by the North Korean leadership?

In this situation, we have a young leader who feels he has to prove himself—in particular, to his generals. Kim Jong-un wants to solidify his claim to authority after his father’s death. He also has to prove himself internationally and I think he is being advised that this is the way to do it. You can look at similar actions that have occurred earlier – the 2006 and 2009 nuclear bomb tests, for example. They’ve also shut down Kaesong City before, as they did earlier this week. These things were done in the past to demonstrate the nation’s sovereignty; they also seem to think that this bolsters the country’s reputation in the world. I think the difference this time is that everything is happening much quicker. The pace is greater in terms of the amount of rhetoric and the threats to South Korea, the region and even to the embassies in Pyongyang.

Are these actions being taken seriously by the international community?

If you look at reports out of Pyongyang, the embassies have not fled, so it appears that foreign government officials have become immune to the rhetoric. On the other hand, I know the United States takes it very seriously. It’s one of those situations where the probability of an attack is pretty low, but the risk of large scale casualties and damage is dramatic. So you need to take actions appropriately, factoring in the tremendous risk if you get it wrong.

Based on your experiences in South Korea working with the U.S. military, can you offer an estimate of North Korea’s offensive capacity?

Their initial capacity is rather large: there are estimates of up to 7,000 artillery tubes that can reach Seoul, which could produce millions of casualties during an initial assault. On the other hand, the counterattack from the combined forces command would be devastating to North Korea. I believe that they know that. The only thing that they could do is to inflict a huge amount of casualties in Seoul and then the combined South Korean and U.S. forces would attack rather quickly and it would be pretty ugly for North Korea.

So that’s your assessment of the worst-case scenario?

The worst case scenario would be an an artillery and ground attack on Seoul. There would be immediate casualties in South Korea followed by a decisive coalition counter attack. Withan armyof over 600,000 soldiers, South Korea would provide the primary ground troops. The air and naval forces associated with that attack would be strongly supported by the United States.

Setting aside government propaganda, how do you think the average North Korean citizen views the current situation?

North Korea is a country that has been isolated for well over 50 years to an incredible degree. In 1953, the average North Korean and average South Korean were very much alike, even physically. Today the average North Korean is about three inches shorter and 40 pounds lighter than the average South Korean. There has been a policy of starvation for three generations. I think North Koreans support the government because that’s the only thing they know. If average North Koreans had a greater understanding of the outside world and could see the dramatically higher standard of living that South Koreans enjoy, I think they would be opposed to their government’s actions. But, of course, that’s why they’re kept isolated.

Given China’s role as North Korea’s only ally, do you think that it will work to lessen tensions? There were some recent comments from President Xi warning North Korea indirectly not to stir up trouble.

China stands to lose a huge amount, as does the entire region, if the situation spins out of control. The enormous economic progress we’ve seen would be jeopardized. Like President Xi, Russia’s President Putin and German Chancellor Merkel cautioned the North Koreans to avoid provocations. I think that, if needed, both Russia and China would take stronger actions to try to stop Pyongyang from doing something foolhardy.

EastWest Direct is an ongoing series of interviews with EWI experts tied to breaking news stories.

I would first of all like to thank the organizers of this event, CCME (Council for Moroccans Abroad), for providing me with the opportunity to speak here about such a current topic. Having recently emigrated myself – albeit within the European Union - and working in the field of international relations, I feel today’s topic of ‘Migration, Identity and Foreign Relations’ is close at heart.

But allow me first to say a couple of things about my work, so as to give a background to the discussion points I would like to raise. I am the Program Coordinator for the Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention. This Network celebrates its 5th anniversary this year, as it was launched at the European Parliament in 2008 by the EastWest Institute upon the recommendation of a high-level task force. This task force existed of seasoned diplomats and politicians, who are convinced that parliamentarians are in a unique position to not only identify the early warning signs of civil unrest and looming conflict, but that they are also capable of acting upon such early warning and respond with preventative measures.

So today we have a network of nearly 100 parliamentarians from all over the world dedicated to prevent conflict. Conflict in the traditional military or armed sense, but the network also tackles more contemporary sources of conflict, such as access to water, food and energy, as well as issues of cyber crime. And although many of these sources of conflict are addressed by parliaments individually, bringing parliamentarians together to force joint strategies is often times more effective, given the fact that these threats will not stop at any country’s border. This is the reality of globalization in which we live; we cross borders for work, we travel for pleasure, and our governments increasingly need to look outwards for partners to cooperate with. New cultures and countries are only but a click away.

But how do we make sure that in this interconnected world, we stay true to our culture and values? This can be a particular challenge for people emigrating. The new culture in which they will be absorbed might not seem welcoming and it might be difficult to overcome the language barrier. It is therefore very positive that organizations such as CCME exist in order to assist those who have moved abroad, as a focal point, ensuring they have a voice as well.

In my professional capacity, I meet parliamentarians on a daily basis and some of them worry about the amount of immigrants their country is taking up. They worry about the fact that large scale migration might change their culture and some might blame domestic issues, such as unemployment, on the immigrants. Yet other countries struggle with actively engaging immigrant communities, because they live secluded by their own traditions, hardly interacting with the host country’s culture. Many large cities have a China town, where the Chinese population lives in relative solitude, protecting values and customs from outside influences. Many of these countries struggle with being able to provide the immigrant communities with a sense of belonging. Most of these problems can be overcome, for example by providing language courses which also touch upon cultural aspects of the host society. Religious and cultural organizations, or indeed organizations such as CMEE, can also play a key role in fostering understanding and can act as a focal point for authorities to approach. The goal is to create social conditions in which people from different background can live together in harmony and enjoy their fundamental freedoms.

We encounter potential dangerous conflict when either group wishes to force their identity upon the other group, demanding assimilation. In the aforementioned scenarios dialogue might overcome misunderstanding and misinterpretations. When the host or the immigrating community insist upon the assimilation of the other is when we experience conflict. Insistence of the host community might lead to even more seclusion by the immigrant population and can lead to a strengthening of their native identity, even radicalization in extreme cases. Insisting on assimilation of the host community to accept norms and standards of the immigration community might lead to discrimination and that crimes based upon the notion that the immigrants are intruders out to destroy the values of the host community.

We believe parliamentarians have a key role to play in ensuring that the debate is taking place. Not discussing problems arising from migration does not solve any problems, but it makes them fester in society until there is a – usually violent – eruption of the build up pressure this has caused. In both the host country of the immigrant, as well as the home country parliamentarians can hold open dialogue and engage with parliamentarians on the other side of this dialogue to help foster understanding.

But also the migrating communities themselves have a large role to play when it comes to parliament. Immigrant communities with a strong sense of identity have in the past successfully lobbied parliamentarians for recognition of their particular problems. And in countries where we speak of ‘second or third generation’ immigrants – a group which often feels disenfranchised with links both (or neither) to the host county’s culture and that of the country of origin of the previous generation(s) – it is key to have political participation by the immigrant communities. As they often have grown up in the host community, we need to encourage them to vote, elect officials who advocate their cause within the host community’s culture and eventually elect role models of these groups as elected officials.

A good example of such integration where the cultural identity has not been lost is that of the Indian community, the Sikhs, in the United Kingdom. This community at first was viewed upon as foreign and almost as one encroaching upon British culture, although India had been a dominated by the British empire. By now, however, the British parliament has an ‘All Party Parliamentary Group for British Sikhs,' which deals with issues relevant to the Sikh community. That does not mean that all problems have been solved and everyone in the British society is just peacefully living next to one another. 2011 saw the first Sikh Member of Parliament wearing a traditional turban in parliament. The Sikh community found this ‘too little, too late’ whilst for many British this was already going out on a limb to give a cultural minority the right to display a religious symbol in parliament. Many European countries share this rigid separation between religion and State. Only in recent years have European societies come to accept that immigrant communities have become such an inherent part of their national identity that allowances should be made for their traditional garments. This is not something which can be changed with one single generation of immigrants though; it takes decades for such change to be broadly supported by and indeed incorporated into the culture of the host community.

I feel it is my duty, however, to point out that this is not an issue dealt with merely in Western Europe, as we sometimes are inclined to think. Let me cite another example: In Turkey the separation between religion and State may be even stricter than in some Western European countries. In 2011 it was the APK party of the current Prime Minister Erdogan who placed a female candidate on its list for the district of Antalya who was known to wear a headscarf. Now, the APK knew that the candidate in question had no chance of winning in this district, thereby preventing a full-blown parliamentary crisis, but it still caused quite the commotion. This goes to show that whilst our discussions mostly focus on Moroccans abroad and that the majority of those who emigrate to (Western) Europe, these are not issues unique for this relationship between Moroccan immigrants and European host communities.

I will leave it at that for now, but I would be delighted to continue the discussion after the interventions of the other most honorable speakers on the panel and I would welcome any questions there might be afterwards.

Thank you.

EWI's Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention mobilizes members in parliaments across the globe to find pioneering ways to prevent and end conflicts

Some caveats are necessary before pronouncing on the UPA government’s foreign policy, especially the apparent mishandling of relations with Sri Lanka and the case of the Italian marines, as well as the setback in the Maldives. First, no country can have a foreign policy that is seen as being without fault by the public. This is particularly true of democracies where all kinds of opinions get expressed, political partisanship is normal as Opposition parties will always find some reason to contest government decisions, and the civil society has its own views on how policies should be framed on humanitarian and peacebuilding issues in particular.

Second, even countries more powerful than India, better governed, with wider internal debates and inputs from specialists, with greater sense of purpose and more aggressive in safeguarding national interest appear to make serious foreign policy mistakes or manifestly fail to achieve their objectives.

Third, it should not be assumed that big countries can have their way with small countries. The international system presents an obstacle as principles of sovereignty are involved and the reaction of competing powerful countries, in the region or outside, have to be factored into decision-making, especially if the smaller countries have a sensitive geopolitical location.

A further point needs to be made specifically with regard to India. Our foreign policy problems are numerous and complex. Pakistan has been a perennial problem ever since we became independent, confronting us with military challenges, religious extremism and terrorism. Our other neighbours, barring Bhutan, have played external powers against us as a balancing factor. China and Pakistan have boosted the capacity and the confidence of our neighbours to oppose us, and, until the major improvement of our relations with the U.S., the American card has come in handy too. It is not absent even today in the triangular India-U.S.-Pakistan diplomatic equation, with the situation in Afghanistan adding to its complexity.

The issues relating to the presence and treatment of Indian ethnic groups in neighbouring countries makes the management of relations with the latter more difficult. These issues spill over into domestic politics and cannot be treated solely as a foreign policy agenda. Our response to Islamic terrorism from Pakistan, which is essentially a foreign policy challenge, gets embroiled with the secular-communal debate in India as well as electoral considerations because a robust physical and legal response to local linkages of Pakistan-sponsored terrorism is seen as targeting our own Muslim population unfairly.

With all these caveats, our handling of the Sri Lanka issue at the recent UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) at Geneva deserves to be seen as a particularly low point in our diplomacy. Sri Lanka has not been an easy partner to deal with; its discriminatory policies towards the Tamil population have been the source of tensions with India for long. If Sri Lanka had been wiser, it would have avoided creating a festering domestic ethnic situation that objectively impinged on India and was bound to provoke Indian interference and be a source of mistrust between the two countries. Sri Lanka has not, as a result, been sufficiently cognisant of our security concerns. It has exploited its geopolitical position and our adversarial relationship with China and Pakistan to carve out space for itself to frustrate us in many ways. It has played its cards ably by also cooperating with us in some areas and giving us enough stakes to blunt our responses to its provocations.

Sri Lanka’s failure to resolve ethnic issues after crushing the LTTE, the lack of progress on reconciliation and accountability issues, the reneging on implementing the 13th Amendment, the agitation of the issue of human rights violations of the civilian Tamil population in the final stages of military operations against the LTTE by the Sri Lankan diaspora, amplified by reports of Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, all led to the stigmatisation of Sri Lanka on human rights issues in a U.S.-sponsored resolution at the UNHRC last year. India departed from its principled position not to back country-specific resolutions at Geneva by voting in favour of the resolution after working to dilute those parts of it that were too intrusive and disrespectful of Sri Lankan sovereignty.

Our positive vote then and this year was a mistake. India has itself been targeted for human rights violations in Jammu & Kashmir by the Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International without any allowance for its democracy, the independence of its judiciary, an alert press and the fact these organisations largely relied on exposures of abuses by Indian sources. The U.S. too has played its part to embarrass India in the past on human rights violations in Jammu & Kashmir in a bid to be even-handed towards Pakistan accused of abetting terrorist attacks against us. We have had to fight attempts by Pakistan to castigate us at the human rights forum at Geneva.

This time too, India worked initially to moderate the resolution on these counts. Having departed from its principled position last year, India could not vote against the resolution or abstain this year without a show of tangible progress by Sri Lanka on pending issues, including on the recommendations of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission. What made our diplomacy almost farcical at Geneva was the bizarre attempt by India to work at the last minute to strengthen the very resolution that it had worked to soften earlier, not because any objective external policy factor had changed or the Sri Lankan government had committed a new breach of human rights or that India had not done its diplomatic homework earlier thoroughly enough and new factors had emerged to warrant a review of its earlier position. It was simply a case of internal threats to the UPA government form the DMK, the latter’s demagoguery on “genocide” in Sri Lanka four years after military operations in the island nation have ended that led to this last-minute scramble to appease an internal regional lobby at Geneva.

Worse for us, we got rebuffed by the US as it feared toughening the resolution may reduce the number of countries supporting it. We ended by looking bloody-minded and the US looking moderate. Such conduct erodes the credibility of our diplomacy abroad, besides raising fears at home that the government in New Delhi is losing grip over foreign policy under regional pressures. This has other longer-term implications — unless the primacy of New Delhi in foreign policy is restored — in that foreign countries and missions will start interacting at the regional level in terms of understanding the dynamics of Indian foreign policymaking and influencing it outside New Delhi.

The case of the Italian marines has lost its dramatic edge after their return to India. The Italians were escalating the issue by defying the Supreme Court and treating India with political disdain. The Supreme Court, in return, was escalating a bilateral issue with Italy into a multilateral one with the larger international community by interpreting the provisions of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations (VCDR) on diplomatic immunity in a way that would uphold its dignity. The government was caught in a vice as it could not give precedence to its international obligations over the views of the highest court of the land. When the Italians protested against the court’s order restraining the Italian Ambassador from leaving the country, it took the plea that while it was aware of the provisions of the VCDR, it was bound by the court’s decision.

The problem might have been avoided in the first place if the government was not so accommodative towards the marines by opposing back-to-back furloughs to them in Italy on unconvincing grounds. The government also did not guide the Supreme Court properly on the issue of diplomatic immunity of the Ambassador and the unenforceable nature of his undertaking, which was political rather than legal in character. Of course, by disowning its word, Italy was guilty of a serious breach of faith. The government can take credit that its firmness compelled Italy to review its decision on the marines, and the Supreme Court even more so by its willingness to reinterpret the VCDR to suit the particular circumstances of the case.

The Italian government has shown political courage in reversing its decision despite potential backlash at home and deserves to be commended for acting sensibly and honourably at the end. It would be wise for India not to claim a diplomatic victory as escalation would have hurt the interests of both countries.

The defiance with which the Maldives have treated Indian interests in the commercial dispute with GMR over the airport contract and later the way the understanding reached with Indian emissaries over the arrest of former president Mohamed Nasheed was violated has provoked a debate on the conduct of the country’s foreign policy reflected in its inability to exercise sufficient weight in its periphery.

Since India looms large in our smaller neighbours and our representatives there get will-nilly involved in their domestic politics, we need to pay greater political attention to even the smallest of them and assign diplomats there with appropriate political skills. Beyond this, of course, we have to keep in mind that even powerful countries cannot easily bully neighbours — the U.S. has tasted the defiance of Venezuela and Cuba. We have also to contend with the China factor in our neighbourhood.

What is important, however, is the assessment countries make of India’s likely responses if its vital interests are undermined. If their experience tells them that India’s tolerance levels are very high and that they can get away with defiance, they will be prone to do so. But if the perception of India changes and it is seen as acting boldly to protect its interests, the inclination to defy India would be less. Our softness towards both China and Pakistan, despite provocations, gives an image of accommodation, prudence, undue caution, a disinclination to be provoked and a reluctance to make hard choices. There is a range of conduct between being aggressive and being pusillanimous. Our foreign policy has to show greater firmness, which has not been the hallmark of the UPA government or those before it.

Click here to read this piece at Tehelka.com.

Contrary to all expectations, the Italian marines have returned to India for trial. After having formally announced that the marines will not come back, the Italian government has dramatically reversed its position. This suggests that the hardliners in the government — apparently the foreign and defense ministers — have been overruled by wiser heads. It was not normal for a country with diplomatic traditions as old as Italy’s to violate its solemn word to another friendly country so flagrantly, striking by its action at the basic structure of diplomacy which rests on the principle that countries will honor their commitments.

Even if the Italian government has had to swallow its pride and lay itself open to the charge internally of grossly mishandling the case in the first instance and misjudging the strength of the Indian reaction, especially that of the Supreme Court, it is just as well that good sense has prevailed and further escalation of differences has been avoided.

In such cases of volte-face, especially by a major European power, some face-saving compromise between parties can be expected, but no such compromise is visible. The clarifications sought by Rome and given by New Delhi that the marines will not be arrested on their return and will not face the death penalty amount to little as the marines were already on bail, were returning within the four-week deadline laid down by the Supreme Court and the circumstances of the case do not at all justify the death penalty.

It is just as well that the situation has been defused and further deterioration of bilateral ties averted. By announcing that the marines would not return, the Italian government had deliberately raised the political and legal ante to a level that put enormous stress on bilateral ties. The Supreme Court and the country at large felt duped by the Italian decision. It defied belief that the Italian government would knowingly give a false affidavit to the Supreme Court and cover up further its deceptive intentions by approving a false undertaking by its ambassador. Even if the Italian government has strongly disagreed with India’s position on jurisdiction over the two marines, and even if it has faced intense public pressure at home to defend their rights, recourse to duplicity and fraud to spirit away the marines from Indian judicial control was hardly defensible. It had the option to take strong political steps to show its displeasure by recalling its ambassador in protest, curtailing official links, mobilizing the European Union in its favor, taking up the issue in whichever international forum was available to it. It opted, instead, to show contempt for the Indian Supreme Court and disdain for India.

In a sense, the conditions for the crisis were created by the Indian side. The Supreme Court was extraordinarily accommodating in entertaining the plea to let the marines go back to Italy in February for voting when they had returned just a month earlier after spending Christmas with their families. Why did the Supreme Court feel that it was important that they should vote? In granting successive furloughs in Italy, the consideration shown for those responsible for recklessly killing two Indian citizens seemed excessive.

The Supreme Court, for all its generosity, had to have a guarantee that the marines would return. Such a guarantee could only come from the ambassador in the name of his government, and it was given. It was overlooked that this guarantee was inherently political, not legally enforceable in case of default. Neither the counsel for the Italians nor the government counsel had reason to clarify to the judges that, under the immunity provisions of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, any undertaking by the ambassador would not be legally actionable against his person if not eventually honored, as both wanted the marines to have a break and were willing to rely on the good faith of the Italian government. In retrospect, the Supreme Court could be accused of being naive, but, in all fairness, neither the court nor the government could have anticipated the Italian government’s unscrupulous conduct.

While the furor in India over this was justified, calls for punitive action against the ambassador, even by leading jurists, on the ground that the ambassador had voluntarily subjected himself to the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, seemed ill-conceived and violative of the provisions of the VCDR, which are clear about the diplomatic immunity of ambassadors.

The Vienna Convention (Article 32.2) says that the waiver has to be expressed. In this case, the Italian government did not say, nor would it have done so, that in case of default the ambassador could be proceeded against legally as his diplomatic immunity could be considered waived. The convention also requires a second waiver for the execution of any judgment, which means that even if the court were to claim that the Italian ambassador had voluntarily submitted himself to its jurisdiction in the first instance, a further waiver by the Italian government of the ambassador’s immunity would be necessary for any punishment. Article 32.3, which says that initiation of proceedings under Article 37 by a diplomatic agent will not allow him to claim immunity in case of a counter-claim directly connected to the principal claim, is not applicable as Article 37 relates to families of diplomatic agents, the service, technical and administrative staff of the mission, and not to the ambassador.

The Supreme Court’s order restraining the ambassador from leaving the country has already created a major precedent by interpreting loosely a country’s obligation under the VCDR to respect the diplomatic immunity of an ambassador. This has caused serious disquiet in diplomatic missions in New Delhi, as the possibility that Indian courts could, in future too, interpret the principle of diplomatic immunity circumstantially cannot be ruled out. In any case, bilateral options against Italy being available to us, converting our differences with Italy into an international issue by seriously infringing the VCDR and disturbing the principles of diplomatic functioning in general would have been most unwise.

The Italian government showed prudence in not asking the ambassador to defy the court’s order, as any physical restraint on him would have gravely escalated matters. The court’s order and the external affairs ministry’s statement that the government was bound by it did put enormous political and psychological pressure on the Italian government. The EU has been measured in its support for Italy, but a big India-EU dispute could have arisen if we had been cavalier with the VCDR. While it is true that American and European countries have disregarded the principle of diplomatic immunity by subjecting some of our missions to local labor laws, to judgments of local courts on compensation issues — attaching bank accounts to force payments, imposing traffic fines and so on — we have to be careful not to widen the scope of such breaches by unilateral action against the person of an ambassador.

Fortunately, escalation has been avoided. The Italian government should be commended for retreating from an untenable position. For us, seeking to rewrite international law on diplomatic immunity was a fraught option. India and Italy can now, hopefully, resume normal, friendly business with each other. 

The Arab Spring began on 18th December 2010 when a young, jobless Tunisian graduate was selling vegetables from a cart. After his wares were consistently seized by the police, he set himself on fire in protest. This act sparked demonstrations and protests across Tunisia, which led to the toppling of the 23 year reign of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. The wave of protest quickly spread across North Africa and the Middle East, with pro-democratic rebellions that toppled regimes and left many Arab citizens with increased civil rights.

Women were essential

Women were essential to helping maintain the movement. In Yemen, it was a young woman who first led demonstrations on her university campus against the long rule of Ali Abdullah Saleh. In Bahrain, women were some of the first to pour into Pearl Square in the capital city demanding change, often carrying their children with them. In Cairo, women were involved in arranging food deliveries, blankets and medical help which allowed a moment to turn into a movement.

Even in the more conservative regimes of the region women reacted against their leadership’s actions. Hundreds of Syrian women marched through the town of Beida to protest the detention of their men. When Yemini President Saleh announced that it was un-Islamic for men and women to march side by side in protest, thousands of women flooded the streets just to prove him wrong.

Women continue to support the demonstrations by working as nurses in makeshift hospitals, cooking food for protesters, and giving speeches and singing songs at demonstrations. Their support has been vital in sustaining the Arab Spring. However, the movement itself does not rest upon gender equality. Women of all countries involved agree on that. It is about regime change to bring freedoms to people of genders, all religions and race.

Above all, it is about the freedom to express oneself. In addition to the right to freedom psychologically, socially, and economically, the demonstrators call for the ability to speak their minds and simply be themselves.

Even though the movement is about the rights of everyone, women make up a substantial proportion of the Arab Spring countries. In Tunisia, for example, it was the grievances of the young, well educated and unemployed people that sparked the revolution. Two-thirds of that population is made up of Tunisian women.

Women in Arab nations like men face problems in terms of lack of opportunities and employment options. But it is worse because while more and more Muslim women are attending university, they have even fewer opportunities than their male colleagues to speak or to secure a job. It is only natural then for them to question the nature of the system in their country. This frustration can be seen by the level of support women have contributed to the movement.

Will only men benefit?

The question remains as to whether the Arab Spring has benefited women. After all their hard work and support, many women fear that only the men will gain the freedoms for which both genders fought. Many women report that while the men were happy for the women’s support during the revolution, some men feel that now it’s time for women to go back home to their “normal lives.” It is alarming that women’s efforts are at risk of being unrewarded and that men who welcomed their support on the street may not welcome their presence in business or government.

Additionally, rape and sexual assault are being used as weapons against women. Assault and harassment were problems before the revolutions, but heightened levels of such violence has led many to believe that they are being used as a way to silence women and keep them indoors. Ultra-conservative Islamists have blamed women who are sexually assaulted at demonstrations by saying the harassment was their fault for mixing inappropriately with men.

There have also been high profile accounts of female journalists being attacked and sexually assaulted during protests. These stories include that of Natasha Smith, a young British journalism student who went to Egypt to cover women’s rights for her final project. She was separated from her two male companions by dozens of frenzied men who dragged her across the ground as they ripped off her skirt, undergarments, shoes and shirt. She was ultimately saved from the continued assault by a different group of Egyptian men.

Cases like these are appalling in and of themselves, however what is even more shocking is that law enforcement has been unwilling to challenge this wave of sexual violence. Indeed, when law suits have been filed against perpetrators of sexual assault the victims themselves have been targeted. A lawyer from Benghazi named Iman Al-Obaidi told journalists that she was raped by security forces in March 2011; she was then accused of defamation against the Qadaffi government. She was subsequently arrested by security police, forced into a car, and detained for several days.

The detentions have often brought sexual discomfort. In 2011, Samira Ibrahim and Maha Mohamed brought a case to the Egyptian courts challenging the legality of forced virginity tests of female protesters. In the face of increased sexual violence towards women, both Samira and Maha won their cases.

Driven into traditional roles?

Despite Samira and Maha’s landmark cases, women express their concern of being driven into more traditional roles due to increasing violence and the militarisation of the economy. At the same time, many of the Arab Spring nations have been experiencing the rise of “political Islam.” These are Islamic parties such as Egypt’s Freedom and Justice Party or Tunisia’s formerly outlawed Islamic Ennanhda party. Ennanhda has since dropped the Islamic portion of its name but its core values remain the same. Both of these parties recently secured over 40% of the available seats in their respective countries.

The rise of these Islamic parties has multiple causes. In addition to the religious backing they have, under previous regimes Islamic organisations have been able to provide charities, social services, jobs and business opportunities to the population establishing a network of support across the country.

However, it is not only male conservatives that support the Islamic parties. While proportionally more men indicated in a 2012 Gallup poll that they think Sharia should be the only source of law, proportionally more women indicated that it should be a source, but not the source.

Nevertheless, the effects of the increase in Islamic party power have had a disproportionate effect on women. Salafist students, who support a strict interpretation of Islam, have called for gender separation in their courses and for women to be fully covered when attending university. Worryingly, the second demand has met little resistance from university administrators.

Once considered the most liberal of the Middle Eastern countries, Tunisia has seen a sharp rise in the number of women wearing veils. All the while, campaigns promote Islamic parties as a platform for change even though some of these groups look to implement a purist interpretation of Islam that would call for secular laws to be rolled back. And with the rise of these parties, in some instances women have less representation in government than before the revolutions.

Women’s representation in government

Many of the newer Arab democracies have employed electoral quota laws to try and increase women’s representation in government. The effectiveness of quota systems is however under debate.

Tunisia, for example, has implemented a “zipping” system where every other candidate on an electoral list must be female. Egypt issued a decree abolishing a quota requiring 64 of 518 seats be filled by women and instead requires all electoral lists to include at least one women. There are concerns with both systems. In Egypt, few women are nominated and are often placed at the bottom of the list. Women in Tunisia fear that the regulations won’t be enforced if officials claim that there aren’t enough qualified women to run. This, they assert, is a farce because even in the most rural regions there are female doctors, lawyers, and teachers.

The performance of electoral lists seems to be disappointing as only 2 women are currently in cabinet positions in Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya, all countries that maintain quotas. Yet are these results better than not having a provision at all? In Tunisia 4 of 6 constitutional draft committees were headed by women but in Egypt, the number of women parliamentarians has dropped from 12% to 2%. The international average is around 21%.

Gaining a sense of empowerment

However, despite the hardships women have endured as a result of the Arab Spring, there have been distinct benefits as well. Women activists in Arab Spring countries most notably point to the sense of empowerment that women have found by fighting for their rights. The experience they have obtained pushing for collective, national goals has been invaluable. They cannot be legislated away or removed from an individual’s memory. This experience of coming together to be agents of positive change has become a seed that will grow into greater demands for women’s rights. Women have learned that they have to fight for their freedoms and that these freedoms are worth fighting for.

In fact, this mobilization is working. Last November, the Egyptian government dropped the controversial Article 68 which had affirmed the government’s commitment to gender equality as long as it didn’t interfere with the rulings of Sharia. Now, there will be equality for all citizens, regardless of gender, race, or religion. Similarly in Tunisia, the draft constitution guarantees non-discrimination on any grounds, including gender.

However, there is still work to be done and that work is being done by very dedicated women in the Arab Spring nations. Protests continue over the implementation of Tunisia’s Article 28 which describes women’s roles in the family as “complementary” to those of men’s. After women’s positive experience mobilising for their rights, women will not accept the definition of their roles in relation to those of a man. Women must be defined in their own right.

Furthermore, mobilization has continued at the grassroots level. Anti-harassment backlash in Egypt has been undertaken in a variety of forms. In addition to self-defence courses, there have been marches in Cairo against sexual harassment. These women are responding to ultra- conservative Islamists who say women invite sexual assault by attending anti-government demonstrations where they mix with men. As recently as early February, an Egyptian lawmaker remarked that women are sometimes fully responsible for rape because they put themselves into that situation. In response, women brandish knives at the rallies and threaten to cut off the hands of attackers.

However, there are also creative reactions that don’t respond to violence with violence. An app called Harassmap now sends text alerts to women regarding “danger zones” where harassment or assaults have been reported.

There has also been a push to make sure that all voices, including women, are being included in the conversations about constitutions, law, and the role of religion. In Tunisia, Amira Yahyaoui founded Al Bawsla, an organisation that helps people understand the role politics plays in their lives and how to work together to protect their rights. Likewise, as in Tunisia, Alaa Murabit is publishing a Libyan Women’s Charter that has been produced in consultation with women across Libya. It will lay out the specific needs and demands of Libyan women which will then be used to influence the writing of the new constitution.

Ultimately, the women of the Arab Spring nations have faced hardship. They have endured continuing sexual abuse and have fought to maintain their rights in the face of powerful conservative Islamic parties. Despite these difficulties, the Arab Spring has provided an opportunity for women to participate politically by toppling regimes and to fight for the issues that affect them. While, the quantifiable results of this fight have been disappointing thus far, it is up to the women of these nations to push against traditionalist forces that look to diminish their rights. The revolution won’t truly be over until there are rights for everyone, not just the men of the Arab Spring nations.

Young democracies are the most vulnerable to political and economic instability. A growing number of countries, including in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), are also exposed to risk-multipliers emerging out of the climate-energy-resource nexus. Renewed food price shocks in Tunisia and Egypt for example could tip both countries into violence again. The risk of an eruption of violence over people’s inability to feed their families is very real due to the prospect of a food price spike this year driven by the US drought in 2012.

This is an issue for preventive diplomacy. Its success depends on anticipating threshold moments when latent conflicts may erupt and translate into violence. Prices for food, fuel and other resources can be such thresholds. Although the increase in the price of bread was not the cause of the Arab Spring it was the spark that ignited it. Nevertheless, current external interventions and support packages for the region have done nothing to improve resilience to food and energy spice spikes.

Projections on climate, energy and resource trends for the MENA region suggest that risks of instability remain high well into the 2020s. Climate change will likely impact severely on agricultural production and the attractiveness of the region to international tourism. Continuing dependency on the import of fossil fuels at volatile prices in several countries in the region will further impose significant constraints on the prospects of economic growth.

At the same time, stronger GDP growth alone cannot address negative development trends. Economic development can be undermined by systemic risks emerging out of instabilities in global markets but also, in the medium term, by climate, energy and water pressures. Therefore, a greater focus is necessary on directly building national resilience against these risks. Current external stabilising efforts in MENA, especially from Europe, are focusing on providing incentives for continued democratic reforms, building civil society institutions and providing immediate jobs for young people. Whilst these are important areas a focused approach by donors to improve the prospects of medium term stability is lacking.

There is currently a gap in the political understanding of connections between political and economic stability on the one hand and the risks emerging from a changing climate as well as energy, food and water pressures on the other. Preventive diplomacy could greatly increase its impact if these factors were taken into account. External support for instable countries should not only be more joined up but also informed by an analysis of medium term drivers of risk to help prevent the eruption of violence. Support packages by international financial institutions, security sector reform efforts, diplomatic engagement, etc. have to be informed by the same understanding of systemic risks and the need to build national resilience.

It is therefore vital to use diplomatic means to “lobby” decision-makers in young democracies on the need to address their countries’ vulnerabilities. A better understanding of the risks emerging from climate change in particular could help build political will around resilience investments. Tackling vulnerability to drought and rising sea levels in the MENA region, for instance, can improve the prospects of stability. Resilient energy and water infrastructure is a key component of economic development and growth. It is also decisive for agricultural production, and hence food security. Thus, some of the most pressing issues in MENA such as energy poverty, economic development, and public health can be addressed through investments in the areas of renewable energy systems, energy efficiency, water infrastructure, desalination and irrigation systems. Joining forces around these issues could make a major difference. It is also the best use of scarce resources.

Parliamentarians can play a critical role in ensuring that these issues have been fully addressed in programming development assistance and economic support packages to vulnerable countries. The post-Arab Spring investment flows from Europe and the US provide a high-profile test case in a highly vulnerable region for parliamentarians in the relevant countries to use their oversight powers to improve the impact of preventative diplomacy programmes.

Nick Mabey is the founder, director and chief executive of E3G (Third Generation Environmentalism), a non-profit international organization dedicated to accelerating the transition to sustainable development. In addition to his management role, he leads E3G’s work on European climate change policy, climate diplomacy and foreign policy, and the security implications of climate change. As a member of the International Task Force on Preventive Diplomacy, composed of 24 outstanding experts and practitioners in the field of conflict prevention and resolution, Nick Mabey was one of the initiators of the Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention.

Sabrina Schulz is the head of office of the E3G office in Berlin. She is a policy expert working on climate change and energy and resource security. Her current work focuses on climate and energy issues in the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region, low-carbon urban development in China and the German Energiewende (energy transformation).

In the economic realm, he explained that both the United States and China are dealing with each other from points of weakness. The U.S. is coming from a position of sustained economic weakness due to the recession, while China is experiencing slowing economic growth relative to the past 30 years.

He also noted that China is moving up the value chain as a producer of goods and services, which in turn reinforces another major shift. The U.S. business community’s support for U.S.-China relations has deteriorated recently, stemming from disillusionment towards the Chinese market for U.S. exports and stiffer competition at home from higher-end Chinese imports.

In the political sphere, Firestein described 2012 as a “tectonic year.” For the first time since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, both the United States and China experienced the possibility of real leadership transitions in the same year, resulting in a lack of restraint in how U.S. and Chinese leaders framed the other country in public remarks.

Additionally, U.S. political leaders have changed the way they view and discuss China in American political discourse. In the past, both Democrats and Republicans framed China in terms of human rights issues, but today, the prism through which U.S. politicians view China is based on trade, investment and—ultimately—national competition. Firestein also noted that congressional sentiment towards China has deteriorated sharply.

He then explained the emerging geopolitical shifts in the U.S.-China relationship. In terms of balance of power, China’s military has made rapid and significant strides in its development, creating a more formidable challenge to U.S. foreign policy-making. The U.S. rebalancing or "pivot" to the Asia-Pacific region is another major geopolitical development. Lastly, Firestein pointed out two unique “firsts” in U.S.-China relations: neither the U.S. nor China are now dealing with each other in terms of sustained economic growth, and the two powers no longer share a grand common objective.

On March 12, a spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry said the government is prepared to talk to the United States about the concerns raised on March 11 by National Security Adviser Thomas Donilon on cyber-assisted theft of intellectual property. But as flagged by Donilon himself, the concerns raised are not limited to the commercial sector and go to deeper issues of national security. 

This linkage is not about whether the Chinese actions are destabilizing traditional areas of military activity. The United States, as revealed again in the Donilon speech, has now staked out its view of global Internet governance and order as in themselves constituting vital strategic interests. The United States will now regard as its enemies those countries that “seek the ability to sabotage our power grid, our financial institutions and our air traffic control systems,” as expressed by President Barack Obama in his State of the Union address this year. The remark is understood to have been an allusion to China, among others. But China is rejecting the very foundations or premises of this U.S. policy. 

The international system of 2013 could not have thrown up a policy challenge less likely to be solved soon than this one. Its solution depends on so many bureaucratic interests in two very different countries—from law enforcement and commerce to national defense and internal security. The issues range from the most sensitive intelligence sources and methods to protection of political leaders. The private sector, so very different in legal character and standing in each country, is heavily involved. The legal regimes and indeed the capabilities of its agencies to fight cyber crime are very different, and in both cases, weak.

In the two countries, though the balance of opinion among political elites on privacy and surveillance rights is very different, there is no strong consensus among policy elites. This lack of consensus constrains formulation of a national position on effective international cooperation. What’s worse, and what makes this problem so difficult, is that the “smoking gun” in cyber crime—if we are lucky enough to find one—is so indecipherable to the non-specialist it might as well be invisible. While specialists have no problem with it, having policymakers allocate large amounts of money to investigating cyber attacks (something many of them don’t understand and can’t actually see) is a very big demand. Even worse, staking the future of the entire strategic relationship between China and the United States on an early resolution of the challenges would seem foolhardy in the extreme. 

In his speech, Donilon acknowledged that a major weakness of the strategic relationship between the two countries is the lack of military exchanges. He noted that to solve major security challenges in the region and the world, such as the Korean nuclear situation, the armed forces of the two countries need a better understanding of each other and much more direct contact. He appealed for some action on this front. As importantly, however, if the two countries are to begin to address the global cybersecurity challenges, including the very sensitive bilateral ones, then the police and internal security organizations, and the lawyers, of both countries need much closer ties as well. 

The underlying motivations of each are not well understood by the other. Donilon issued three demands to China. It is unlikely that China will be able to meet these demands in the short term in a way that satisfies the United States. The tension around cybersecurity issues will remain until both sides find a way of bridging the gulf between the countries’ different perceptions of them. Moreover, the bigger challenge may be addressing what the Foreign Ministry spokesperson in the remarks on March 12 called China’s marginalization in the digital world. That marginalization is the result of a deep gulf in Chinese and American cyber power. The gulf is evident in military capabilities, law enforcement capabilities, and legal regimes.

In light of the Donilon’s challenge to China and its positive response in principle, this short commentary offers an outline of concrete steps that might be taken to advance dialogue between the two countries. It centers on the idea of connecting Chinese and American cyber crime fighters and their policy advisers.

Understand the problem first

Little attention has been paid, in public debate at least, to ways of getting American and Chinese cyber crime fighters together to discuss solutions to the challenges raised by Donilon. This is an urgent matter. It would have to have a wide view of all of the challenges outlined above, at the same time focusing on concrete problems that are bedeviling the relationship today.

For its part, the EastWest Institute’s cyber crime legal working group, led by Norwegian Judge Stein Schjolberg, has recommended one course of action to address the threat to critical infrastructure referred to by Obama. In a 2011, summary report, this group suggested that a new treaty should be agreed upon that outlaws “intentional global cyber attacks against critical national infrastructures.” The group noted that this issue has “not yet been regulated by international law” and has not yet been sufficiently addressed in the practices of states. It further recommended that “all countries implement legislations necessary to establish as criminal offences under its domestic law, when committed intentionally and without right, whoever by destroying, damaging, or rendering unusable critical communications and information infrastructures” or “causes substantial and comprehensive disturbance to the national security, civil defense, public administration and services, public health or safety, or banking and financial services.”

To pursue that recommendation, policy makers would need to begin to navigate between the very divergent Chinese and American approaches toward treaty regulation of cyberspace, with the former favoring new formal treaty arrangements, and the latter so far not remotely disposed to any new treaty. The United States has argued that current international law is adequate. Yet Donilon’s appeal for the United States and China to agree on rules of the road for cyberspace may presage a shift on this point. 

The institutional structure of the bilateral relationship at official levels for addressing these issues is weak. It was only in September 2012 that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Chinese Ministry of Public Security agreed to an annual meeting.  They also agreed to lower level working interactions to address the structures to address the “full range of homeland security issues,” of which cyber crime was one. Even though the FBI set up an office in China in 2002 (mainly for counter-terrorism issues after 9/11), and China has maintained a ministry of public security representative in its Washington Embassy for some years, the cooperation in terms of cyber crime has been episodic. Those offices have so far clearly failed to bridge the huge gulfs between the two countries in this area of policy.

One view of the strategic framework of the relationship between the United States and China in cyberspace is spelled out in an EWI policy paper on this subject published in October 2012. One of its recommendations was the inclusion of China in the G8 working group on high-tech crime. At the Munich Security Conference in February 2103, an EWI briefing identified three urgent measures for international collaboration on fighting cyber crime and three for addressing stability in cyberspace. One of the anti-crime proposals which could have immediate symbolic effect was to develop an international action plan against the “most wanted” cyber criminals. A second was to create an international process for standardization of procedures and exchange of information among national and regional CERTs and other first responders. These sorts of ideas can be worked into the U.S.-China framework.

The international setting provides a foundation for closer connections between crime fighters in the United States and China. But this also remains weak. Separate from a sharp difference of opinion over the value of the Budapest Convention on Cyber Crime, which the United States has signed but which China refuses to sign, international cooperation on policing of cyber crime is a fairly recent phenomenon and expertise in most police forces and prosecutorial services remains weak. The first Interpol Cyber Crime Investigation Training Conference was held in Lyon, France in 2005. An Interpol General Assembly resolution of 2006 acknowledged global weaknesses in terms of investigating cyber crime, while calling for international standards on the search, seizure and investigation of electronic evidence. China is an active member of Interpol and has an office in Beijing. A Chinese vice minister visited Interpol HQ in Lyon in 2011 where he reasserted China’s commitment to international collaboration in fighting crime. Both China and the United States have trouble filling the rapidly expanding number of government posts in cyber crime fighting because demand is high and competition from the private sector is intense.

Is détente on cyber crime possible without addressing the military security dilemmas?

No. A close reading of Donilon’s speech and China’s reaction would suggest that the political will for closer cooperation between China and the United States on cyber crime is simply not there for the moment. That will probably change only if some mutual understanding can be reached at high levels on what China calls its marginalization and on what the United States regards as China’s quest for a military advantage in penetrating critical infrastructure. While these are each highly complex problems in their own right, there are crossover points between the two issues on which joint efforts might produce an improvement in the political atmosphere. One is to understand better the mutual dependence of the ICT sectors of the two countries, and the development trajectory of this relationship which will eventually see the lifting of technology trade bans on China. A second is to try to find the middle ground on legal approaches to critical infrastructure protection (perhaps simply by mutually compatible domestic legislation).

We can modify the three recommendations from EWI’s briefing for the 2013 Munich Security Conference to fit the U.S.-China scenario as follows: 

1. Commitment: States need to make an explicit commitment to strategic stability in cyberspace within the framework of a fully articulated foreign policy and national security doctrine. This has to be grounded in a series of overlapping bilateral and multilateral understandings. 
2. Transparency and understanding: Parliaments, business leaders and specialists in the two countries should undertake studies on the impact of their national military activities in cyberspace. 
3. Joint Action: The two governments, research organizations, businesses and NGOs need to foster the emergence of many more informal but highly focused exchange processes with a view to making progress on sub-elements (points of disagreement) within the larger picture of cybersecurity. 

The proposal

The Donilon demands and China’s positive response in principle need to be buttressed by quick action from the private sector and non-government organizations. To this end, private actors in the United States and China should set up a high-level task force to mobilize support for more effective cooperation between China and the United States in investigation and prosecution of cyber crime in three areas: (a) protecting intellectual property (b) securing critical national infrastructure in peacetime; and (c) practical measures for drawing the line in international law between criminal action and national security.

Greg Austin is a professorial fellow at the EastWest Institute. He leads the Institute's Policy Innovation Unit.