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Sudan. Young People For Peace and Non-Violence Action.

A Sudanese University student Fatah Elalim brought back lessons to his community in Sudan’s Western Kordofan State, about dialogue as a way to transform local conflicts non-violently.

Fatah Elalim is a student at the University of Dalanj, located in the second biggest city in South Kordofan State, a conflict-affected area at the border with South Sudan. When he is not in class, he moderates Sustained Dialogues between diverse students, organised by the University’s Peace and Development Studies Centre.

Each week Fatah Elalim facilitates dialogue sessions for a group of ten students, during which he helps them deconstruct prejudices and negative stereotypes by giving them space to reflect on and analyse their identities and life experiences.

The students talk about the conflicts they witness or have participated in, with a particular focus on issues of discrimination between rural and urban students, women and men, and students from diverse communities. By meeting on a weekly basis over a few months, the dialogue participants strengthen their understanding of each other’s experiences and perceptions. They eventually collaborate to design and plan non-violent actions they can take for peace on and off campus.

Last June, when Fatah Elalim was home, he witnessed violence breaking-out between his community and a nearby community. Many casualties were reported. Confident that he could contribute to resolve this conflict non-violently, he decided to create a Sustained Dialogue in his own community and make an effort to scale-down the violence. He explained, “with the help of some friends we selected a few young men who were potentially the driving force of the violence and talked about the possibility of bringing them together for a dialogue session.”

After this meeting, Fatah Elalim brought together twenty-three community members of different ages and spoke about the positive role of dialogue in mitigating tensions and in helping both communities foster peaceful coexistence.

“I was impressed by the positive reaction from the young people towards the Sustained Dialogue idea. Throughout my vacation time, many of them came to me asking about the [process].” The Fatah Elalim’s conversations and meeting began to pay off. He explained, “many of them started re-assessing their views about conflict and its fatal impacts on the local communities. Although, tensions were high and people were hateful, we succeeded in making the community more aware and cautious about taking part in any future conflict.”

Syria. Behind ‘Operation Olive Branch’.

Thursday, 1 February 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

Are Turkey and the United States on a collision course on operation Olive Branch? What consequences could we expect for the region?

The Turkish raid in Afrin – Operation ‘Olive Branch’ – has put Turkey on a collision course with Washington. But, to a lesser extent, it has also put Turkey on a collision course with Moscow. Turkey intends to stop the YPG from establishing an autonomous region in northern Syria. It could achieve some form of ‘state’ linking the Afrin canton with the Kobani and Jazeera cantons further east. Ankara calls this potential formation a “terror corridor.” Given the geographic boundaries, the operation could extend as far as the Iraqi border. Ideally, Turkey wants to secure a buffer zone deep within Syrian territory to ensure the PKK and YPG have no direct territory links.

Turkey was always more concerned about the expansion of PKK (Kurdish Workers’ Party) ambitions westward within Turkey. But, the U.S. announcement that it was planning to train some 30,000 troops based mostly on the YPG (People’s Protection Units) to police the Turco-Syrian border was the trigger. The YPG are the main element behind the U.S. backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The Turks want to take Afrin to end the YPG/PYD Kurds’ hopes of ever controlling a territory in north-western Syria with access to the Mediterranean. The Turkish plan clashes with the Americans on paper, but less so on the ground. The Americans were more committed to protecting Kurdish interests, east of the Euphrates. Russia, perhaps, was more involved with Afrin claims. Since early 2017, in order to ensure the defeat of ISIS and bring them alongside in the fight against the other rebels (al-Qaida/Nusra, /etc.), Moscow would protect the YPG.

That suggests that Turkey and Russia may have agreed about the offensive because both don’t want to see an American backed ‘border force’. Moscow remains intent on pursuing the Syrian comprehensive peace plan such that the PYD/YPG are rewarded with the kind of partial autonomy that the Kurds enjoyed in Iraq after the U.S. invasion. Given the absence of resources like oil it should be easier to achieve than the Iraqi example. I also believe that despite the rhetoric from Damascus, the Syrian leadership seems ready to concede Turkey a few security concerns in exchange of a bigger peace. Similarly, Turkey publicly complained about the Syrian offensive over Idlib, but privately it’s likely it approved, given the role this had in getting rid of ‘Tahrir al-Sham’, the latest incarnation of al-Qaida in Syria.
Indeed, one of the risks is that Turkey may rely on its Arab allies within Syria from the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA), the original and disjointed Syrian military opposition, which Damascus considers part of the ‘terrorist’ forces. The FSA faded in the shadows as the Salafi / radical groups, many backed by some of the Gulf petro monarchies stole the scene. The United States had encouraged and organized a coalition comprising some FSA and YPG forces, calling them the Syrian Democratic Forces. It was the U.S. main ally in the fight against ISIS in Raqqa.

Turkey has caused an embarrassing problem for the United States. Already struggling to keep together a crumbling Middle Eastern diplomacy – except when it comes to Israel – it must mediate between two allies. One is Turkey, evidently, which, it should be noted, has the NATO’s second largest army. The other allies are the Kurds in Syria, whom the U.S. encouraged with recent suggestions that the U.S. would help them set up a 30,000 strong force in northern Syria to act as a barrier from both Damascus and Ankara. Erdogan understood the U.S. was serious, as Washington increased its own troops in the area from 500 to 2,000. Thus, the risk that U.S. and Turkish troops might clash is substantial.The main goal for Syria, Turkey, Russia and Iran – if not the United States necessarily – is to stabilize Syria. Russia’s military and diplomatic efforts are aimed to reach that goal; and also to keep Damascus within its sphere. Washington has urged Turkey to set a time limit and declare how far it intends to conduct its operation against the terrorist PKK’s Syrian affiliate, the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its armed People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Afrin. Nevertheless, both presidents Trump and Obama had assured Turkey that the YPG – America’s allies against ISIS (and eventually/presumably against Asad as well) would shift away from the Ifrin and Idlib areas, further east, beyond the Euphrates. Ankara insists that the YPG has not done so. Ankara also asserts that the U.S. has heavily armed the YPG – since the Obama administration. Therefore, Erdogan – with the support of many Turks, and certainly his voter base – will push the YPG as far east as possible.

The United States does not want to lose Turkey as an ally. It has too high a strategic value. It also has other things that Turkey wants, including the dissident Fethullah Gulen, whom Erdogan suspects of being one of the main instigators of the July 2016 coup attempt. Erdogan is playing himself up for the next elections (2019), and he wants to use Afrin as a trophy for electoral campaign purposes to appeal to the Ataturk nationalists and AKP Party supporters, who dream of an ‘Ottoman renaissance’. Tensions between Ankara and Washington are stronger where the subject of Jerusalem is concerned. Indeed, Israel is one of the leys to understanding what is happening.

The U.S. wants to make sure that Syria emerges broken up from the conflict. Otherwise, Iran and Russia would emerge too powerful for American and Israeli interests. Thus, it’s important to contain Kurdish ambitions with a military action designed not to eliminate but merely ‘scratch’ the Kurds such that they don’t become too greedy. Ultimately, the main tensions will be south in the Golan and closer to Damascus, which Israel attacks almost on a regular basis as a provocation. Nonetheless, while Moscow appears to have given Turkey a ‘yellow light’ for operation Olive Branch, there’s the risk that the Syrian air force may shoot down a Turkish fighter jet, as President Asad has warned would happen in case of Turkish incursions in its air space. As part of its strategy to maintain good relations with Turkey, one of Russia’s diplomatic victories of 2017, Moscow may have advised Damascus to give up any plans of retaliating against Turkish jets in its airspace.

Alessandro Bruno

Anti-Migration Walls.

Thursday, 1 February 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

The year 2016 was the year of anti-immigration walls, the militarisation of frontiers and a record year for deaths in the Mediterranean, sad phenomena closely affecting Europe.
The famous ‘Balkan route’ bringing migrants from the Middle East to Europe was broken up by a series of barriers to stem the flow of migrants: first among these is the Evros wall between Greece and Turkey, followed in 2014 by that between Bulgaria and the nation led by Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan.

While 2015 ended with the decision of the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, to suspend the Dublin regulations (the European legislation that obliges migrants to seek protection in the first country of the EU that they enter) and to receive on German territory more than 600,000 Syrian war refugees, 2016 represents a diametrically opposed position. In fact, in the early months of the year, the Balkan route was blocked by the tightening of border controls by countries like Hungary and Fyrom (Former Republic of Macedonia), and by the construction of wars and fences such as the one 175 kilometres long between Hungary and Serbia, built by the nationalist government of Viktor Orban. In a matter of a few months, populist and xenophobic campaigns, instigated by extreme right parties, poured petrol on the fires of discontent in Europe, a continent wounded by the crisis, making immigrants the scapegoat of the EU that was becoming increasingly disjointed and weak.

Added to the concrete and barbed wire barriers is the bureaucratic sort blocking millions of fleeing men and women in an infernal limbo; the agreement sealed by Brussels with Ankara on 18 March 2016 has, in fact, definitively closed the Balkan route linking Turkey with north-west Europe, a route that passed through Greece, Fyrom, Serbia, Hungary, Austria and the other Balkan states. In return for six billion Euro in aid, Ankara agreed with the EU not to allow refugees to leave the two coasts and to accept that migrants reaching Greece after 20 March should be deported to Turkish territory.In a short time, the political EU-Turkey wall produced its effects in abundance, transforming the hotspots, former registration centres, into four inter-connected walls.In effect open air prisons where migrants are forced to await enforced repatriation.

Nevertheless, the phenomenon of raising anti-migration barriers is not new in Europe: there is the well-known case of the barbed wire barrier built by Spain in 1990 to halt illegal migration and the trade in drugs from Morocco to the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla. Together with the raising of walls, there has also been the business of investments for the control of frontiers. “Resettlement, relocation and the protection of borders go together. I am confident we will make good progress in 2016”, Juncker said as he opened the Dutch semestral presidency of the EU and launched the idea of Europe-wide border guards. This idea became fact in September 2016 with the creation of a European Border Guard, substantially to reinforce Frontex, the European agency for the control of external borders. The new force, even though it has no guards of its own, can count upon 1,500 agents chosen from the national border guards, ready to intervene in case of an emergency in any of the European countries. The expenditure of European funds, neither for the protection of human life nor to aid people in difficulty, but for the militarisation of borders in the past decade, has been enormous. According to the Border Wars report (Mark Akkerman, ‘Border Wars: the Arms Dealers Profiting from Europe’s Refugee Tragedy’, Transnational Institute, December 2016) edited by student Mark Akkerman, the bill for Frontex between 2005 and 2016 increased by 3,688%, moving from 6.3 million to 238.7 million Euro per annum. Notably, it has almost trebled from 97 million in 2014 to reach 281 million Euro in 2017. The first beneficiaries of the policy of reinforcing frontiers are the militaristic, technological and security firms.

As revealed in ‘Border Wars’, lucrative contracts were made between the EU and arms-producing companies such as Airbus, Finmeccanica, Thales and Safran, together with the technological giant Indra. These companies not only benefited from the militarisation of the borders of Europe but also created political pressure in favour of this approach by lobbying. Other beneficiaries of European funds have been Israeli companies (the only ones from outside Europe, due to an EU-Israel 1996 agreement), in appreciation for Israel’s contribution in reinforcing the borders of Bulgaria and Hungary, promoting its competence as shown by its control of the West Bank wall and that of the border with Gaza.
The Israel Company BTec Electronic Security Systems was chosen by Frontex to take part in a workshop on Platforms and sensors for guarding borders. The letter of presentation boasted of the excellent ‘technologies, solutions and products installed on the Israeli-Palestinian border’.Lastly, Akkerman revealed that many of the companies doing business with Frontex are the same ones selling arms to the Middle Eastern and African countries from where migrants are fleeing, following the mirage of the European dream. The unprecedented economic expenditure for the control and militarisation of borders has also coincided with the dramatic record of deaths in the Mediterranean where, according to figures obtained by IOM (International Organization for Migration) 5,143 persons were drowned in 2016. It is estimated that 3,718 people lost their lives crossing the Mediterranean in 2017.

In the World: the case of Mexico

To add to the sorry list of extra-European anti-migration walls we must add that between the US and Mexico. The latter returned to the attention of international news when President Trump brought up the issue of planning the wall, making it part of his political manifesto. Doubtless the most frequented border in the world is that between Mexico and the US, with around 350 million legal crossings every year, and it is one of the most guarded.
According to some estimates, from 2005 to the present day, the US has spent 132 billion dollars to reinforce its security, increasing expenditure each year (in 2015, almost 3.8 billion dollars were spent on it). However, the wall is so long that is practically impossible to guard it properly: it is 3,200 kilometres long. In real terms, there are at present, at the more sensitive points of the border, structures that act as barriers, together about 1,000 kilometres long. Of these, about 560 kilometres are made up of a simple fence five metres high, while along a little less than 500 kilometres, there is a very low barrier to prevent vehicles passing. A further 1,500 kilometres is taken up by natural obstacles such as mountains and water courses. Despite this, the American government spends billions of additional dollars annually on such things as ‘sensors, night-vision cameras, radar, helicopters and drones and legal expenses to prosecute those caught crossing the border illegally’, as summed up by Arizona Republic. The main company that sees to the control of the border is Border Patrol, a federal agency with over 20,000 employees —making it one of the biggest in the country — occasionally backed up by local forces.

Despite this deployment of forces, hundreds of thousands of people try each year to cross the border illegally, mostly to improve their living standards. Every year, many Mexicans and Central Americans are captured by the armed forces guarding the border. In 2016 they numbered almost 416,000: in recent years, the number has gone down for different reasons, one of which is the improvement of the economy in Mexico, the increase in security measures by American governments and the creating of new ways to enter American territory illegally (such as obtaining a legal permit, perhaps for tourism, and staying in the US after its expiry).At present there are eleven million people living in the US who contribute to its economy.
Trump’s intention to deport them all or to suddenly interrupt the flow of immigrants would create considerable problems. If it were to be built, Trump’s wall — costing tens of billions of dollars and considered strategically useless — would not resolve these problems but would probably cause more suffering and harm to the American economy:
in fact it has been calculated that if the government were to implement a programme of deportation en masse and halted new arrivals, as Trump has promised, the American GNP would diminish by 1.5%.
(CB/DF)

Nicaragua’s Channel Future.

The channel aims to be the most ambitious project in the history of Nicaragua and the largest to be developed in Latin America, after the construction of the Panama Canal.

The Chinese telecommunications entrepreneur Wang Jing announced an investment of 40,000 million dollars, almost four times the GDP of Nicaragua. The plan is to build in ten years a channel that crosses the country from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Thus, a double-span canal to Panama that provides an alternative transoceanic passage in the region.

The Nicaragua’s National Assembly approved the project by majority on June 13 of 2014. The promoter company, HK Nicaragua Canal Development Investment Co. Limited (HKND Group), has its HQs in Hong Kong and it is headed by W. Jing. The agreement signed between Ortega and W. Jing attributes to the Chinese company the control of the channel for fifty years, extendable for another fifty years. However, it was intended that the work began in late 2014 but currently it has not advanced with the megastructure.

In December 2014, W. Jing and the government of Nicaragua inaugurated the first works of the interoceanic canal. Nevertheless, the project currently does not advance as planned and this arises questions about the viability of the channel. The HKND group in charge of the mega project offered subprojects that included oil pipelines, roads, tourist centres, airport, railroad, among others; also, the subprojects included the intention to purchase provisions to feed about 25 thousand workers. Nonetheless, none of these projects has started.

Despite the great promotion of the project, the promise of the channel is uncertain, especially, because the businessman W. Jing has not visited Nicaragua in over two years. Therefore, the HKND group has gradually decreased its presence in the Central American country. On the other hand, W. Jing has maintained a low international profile until the point where there is not news about him. However, recently he reappeared in an article by Bloomberg Businessweek, which mentions the mishaps that confront their different projects in the world Jing’s current situation in the business area is problematic. On one hand, he has had difficulties positioning his company Xinwei as a strong telecommunications corporation. On the other hand, W. Jing has had to face the recent business scandal related to Ukraine.

The recent nineteen agreements, in different sectors, signed by Panama and China strengthen the commercial relationship between these two nations, which undoubtedly will benefit the pursuit of economic strengthening. Panama, with the deepening of these commercial and investment links with China, will be positioned as an important logistics hub in the region. Panama will increase the flow and interaction of the market in Latin America through its channel.

Additionally, the possibility of materializing Nicaragua’s interoceanic channel is greatly diminished by the fact of Panama being a geostrategic partner in China’s trade policy. This possibility could take place if China finds a more favourable scenario with Panama than with Nicaragua. Likewise, with the recent agreements signed, China gains a logistics hub and will be able to strength its presence in the growing and important Latin American market.

Given the latest movements regarding its trade policy, China has opted to deepen its free trade with the infrastructure offered by Panama. The infrastructure is modern, and it is currently making extensions; also, it is important to highlight that it has years of experience and improvement in the field of maritime trade. Above mentioned, one can affirm that the Panama Canal accomplish the requirements that the Chinese trade policy needs. For that reason, the following question arises: does China need another interoceanic canal? Does China support Wang Jin in the construction of the Nicaragua canal?

Nowadays, no reliable indicators that show a serious interest from international investors to develop the project. It involves enormous technical, technological and logistical challenges that have not been developed; therefore, this enterprise is delayed and has no evidence of concrete progress. On the other hand, leaders of the private sector in Nicaragua have doubts about the promises made by the government and W. Jing because the businessman has not shown a serious interest in the development of the project. In the same way, the problems W. Jing is facing with his other companies are evidence that it is not a good moment to start an entrepreneur like the cannel.

Besides previous information, it is important to keep in mind that the Chinese government’s trade policy with Panama is against it. So far there is not reliable plans in the construction of Nicaragua’s channel because of three reasons; first, the signing of nineteen agreements with Panama on trade matters; second, cooperation with the China Development Bank; finally, the study to negotiate a free trade agreement (FTA).

Camilo Salazar

Bangladesh. At The Roots Of Islamist Extremism.

“Here in Bangladesh the factors which drive Jihadist recruitment and mobilisation are multiple. The processes of Islamist radicalisation have historical roots which must be taken into consideration and which exceed the connection poverty-extremism”. Shahab Enam Khan, docent in international relations at Jahangimagar University in Dacca and a member of the Enterprise Institute, has completed an extensive study of radical Islamist movements. In a recent interview the scholar recalls that to understand the spread of jihadist-Salafism and the future challenges it is necessary to look at the past: to the period immediately following the country’s independence, obtained in 1971 after a bloody war to free itself from control by Pakistan.

The conditions for the affirmation of radicalisation of Islamist matrix, says Shahan Enam Khan, depend on the political polarisation created in the years following independence. When political movements and parties fought each other in the name of different principles and ideologies, while institutional incapacity to guarantee efficient governance became increasingly evident.
This led to a political vacuum plugged with new radical Islamist movements, whose recruitment strategies focussed precisely on criticism of the establishment, and the incapacity to guarantee services and rights for the majority of the population.
Corruption of the administrative and statuary machine together with that which invests the judiciary sector, supplied other elements for propaganda.

In more recent years, another factor has emerged: contradiction between the country’s economic growth, which benefits only an educated urban elite, and the non-inclusion of the majority of the population, especially in rural areas.
According to recent estimates by the Asian Development Bank, Bangladesh’s gross domestic product in 2017 grew by more than 7%, and forecasts for 2018 remain at the same level.

However growth is not inclusive and poverty remains widespread, according to reports issued by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics and the World Bank: about 30% of the population lives below the national poverty line, 17% (circa 25 million) suffer from extreme poverty; the unemployment rate is about 4%; every year of between 2 million and 700,000 more young people wanting to enter the world of work, only one fourth succeeds; the average monthly salary goes no higher than 5.500 Taka (60 euro), one third of the sum necessary for living in a decent manner.

Around these factors, groups pertaining to the local variegated radical galaxy have organised a rhetorical battle. This battle passes by various channels of distribution, ranging from pamphlets printed underground and distributed in rural areas and city peripheries, to word of mouth communication, ending up on social media, ever more accessible and inexpensive. Precisely along these channels of communication beginning with the institution of the so-called Islamic State in the Summer of 2014, there has been a grafting of global jihadist rhetoric, of the group led by the self-proclaimed Calif Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and the earlier one of al-Qaeda. Both the present number one of al-Qaeda, Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri and his rival, al-Baghdadi, look with particular interest towards the Indian sub-continent, potentially an enormous recruitment area.

With its 172 million Muslims and intermittent but constant unrest between different religious communities, India is the morsel most sought after. Bangladesh, a nation with the fourth largest Muslim population in the world and a secular nationalist government led by Sheikh Hasina of the Awami League and unpopular with the Islamists, follows immediately. Not by chance, in September 2014 al-Zawahiri announced the creation of al-Qaeda on the Indian sub-continent (AQIS Asian quantum Information Science Conference).

Unlike the leader of the so called Islamic State, which only recently appeared in the area of South East Asia, here the al-Qaeda roots are solid, based on alliances, contacts, acquaintances consolidated during decades, since the 1990s, and Afghan Mujahedin resistance to Soviet occupation. That jihad involved about 3,400 Bangladeshi. Some of them formed in 1992 the group Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami Bangladesh (local branch of the Pakistani group of the same name), which in 2005 inaugurated an ambitious agenda of power taking in ten years, supressed by members of the security.

From the end of the 1990’s to the beginning of the following decade, professor Shahab Enam Khan told Fides, the scene was dominated by two more groups : Jamaitul Mujahedin Bangladesh and Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh, responsible in the Summer of 2005 for 500 explosions in different parts of the country. Groups with a network of militants active in rural areas and metropolitan peripheries, composed mainly of young men without schooling, poor, marginalised, excluded from the job market, lacking opportunities for social improvement, filled with resentment.

However, widespread poverty and lack of schooling alone cannot explain the spread of Islamist fundamentalism. Here in Bangladesh, as elsewhere, in jihadist mobilisation other factors come into play, as sociologist Diego Gambetta explains in his book Engineers of Jihad: the Curious Connection Between Violent Extremism and Education. And as demonstrated in biographies of certain Bangladeshi jihadists. The leader Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh, Bangla Bahi (also known as Siddiqul Islam and Aziz Ur-Rahman, executed in 2007), who had a degree in Bengali literature. Four of the five jihadists responsible for the attack in July 2016 at Holey Artisan Bakery in Dacca for which the so-called Islamic State claimed responsibility, came from well-off, privileged families, had solid studies behind them, and guarantees for the future.

Behind the affirmation of Islamist radicalisation there lies another battle of even greater importance, social and ideological. It concerns the definition of Bangladeshi identity, the role of Islam– and what form of Islam – within a social and cultural transition which in the 21st led century a country split between a majority anchored to the cultural and social coordinates of the rural world and a minority in power and is influenced by alternative exogenous models. Jihadist groups are also response to this transfer.

They exploit the new social and identity fractures. Fractures which are part of the deeper rift that has countermarked Bangladesh since its establishment: the rift between those who have in mind a nation which is secular and liberal , as stated in the country’s first Constitution 1973, and those instead who aspire to a nation founded on Islam as the state religion, as stated in the 1988 constitutional amendment. More than in poverty, it is in this cultural land-sliding – badly managed and often stoked by institutional politics– that the matrices of Islamist radicalism must be tracked down.

Julian Battiston

A Precursor Of The Fight Against Landgrabbing

Henri Burin des Roziers was a French Dominican, who in Brazil was called the advocate of “the landless”. He died Sunday, November 26^th, 2017 at the age of 87 in the Saint-Jacques convent of Paris even though he would have liked to be in Brazil when “death surprises him.”

Born in Paris in 1930, from a bourgeois Catholic family, he was 17 years old when with the Saint Vincent de Paul Confreres he visited the working class families in the outskirts of Paris. There were five children in his family, but in that visit he discovers families of seven or eight children packed up with their parents in narrow slums. This experience brought him out from his comfort zone: “It struck me a lot – he will comment later – Why was I enjoying such advantages, and not they?”

The Algerian war (1954 – 1962), in which he lived as a second lieutenant between 1954 and 1956, contributed in finally opening his mind to the perception of injustices. In 1957, while obtaining a doctorate in law, he met the Dominican Congar. In Yves Congar he discovered the free spirit of a great theologian who later would infuse that freedom into Vatican II opening it towards the world and the future.

Thus, in 1958, he joined the Dominicans and was ordained a priest in 1963 just in the middle of Vatican II. Afterwards he becomes chaplain of the Law Faculty, in rue d’Assas (Paris) whose paving stones became the weapon of the May 68 student revolution. In a book of interviews, he told how, in those days, he did not hesitate to hide wanted students in Saint-Yves center and, dressed as a priest, to carry them in his car.

He became a worker priest in Besançon and in 1970 in Annecy took care of Tunisian immigrants, employed in small factories and suffering from racism and health problems. There he defended them before the labor courts, engaged himself with tramps and suffered from the refusal of local politicians who did not appreciate his commitment with the poor. He then met the theology of liberation and agreed with his community to move to Brazil where he arrives in 1978.

He started immediately to serve in the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT). This commission, created two years earlier by the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (CNBB), had as its mission to support the agrarian reform and to accompany the peasants’ fight against injustices. In the Amazon, he becomes the advocate of landless peasants and of the forest against major mining projects.

With the end of the dictatorship and the promises of land reform, the landless in Brazil put their hope in the Movement of the Landless (MST), but the “fazendeiros”, the big landowners, were ready to do anything to defend their privileges: peasants were imprisoned and tortured for occupying fallow land. With other Dominicans, Henri fought for their liberation, kept explaining that “complaining” was a way of overcoming the fear of reprisals, accompanied the peasants to the federal police, and defended their family when some of them were murdered.

The “fazendeiros” put a price on his head and Father Henri had to protect himself from possible “pistoleiros” and hit men. In 2005 an American nun, Dorothy Stang, was murdered. “At the time of her assassination, while Dorothea was prized of 50,000 reis, I was 100,000 reis. The state governor imposed protection for me. I could not refuse so as not to be deported from Brazil,” he wrote in his book Comme une rage de justice (Cerf, 2016). He then remembered the words of a liberation theologian Tomas Balduino, one of the Pastoral Commission of the Land’s founders, he had listened long before in Paris: ” Living the Gospel nowadays, is very costly.”

As a scholar in law, theology and philosophy, Henry saw all the implications of injustice and was outraged. In “its region” the Amazon, “In 2010, there were 207 land conflicts, 18 murders and 30 death threats,” he stated in a conference shortly before his death. The legion of honor knight, he received in 2005 an international award for Human Rights, and now just joined the legion of all faith members who understood that the Land is of God. And fought for a land administration tempered with justice. “His life, after all, was in perfect harmony with his ideas,” said his niece Aude Ragozin.

John Paul Pezzi, mccj
VIVAT International NGO
with consultative special status at UN

Middle East 2018 Perspectives.

Monday, 1 January 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

The year 2018 could See Current Middle East Tensions Reach Their Inevitable Bloody Conclusion.

The Middle East has been a center of tension and instability since the end of WW1. Even then, 2017 stands out as being an especially tense year for the region. There are many open conflicts and growing tensions between Iran and the United States and a new instability in the Gulf region, even as the war in Syria is ending, leaving President al-Asad in power. That may prove to be a short lived victory. However stress filled 2017 was for the Middle East; 2018 is shaping up to be worst.

Jerusalem and the Palestinian Question return to the Fore

The mere signature of a single document has altered expectations for the Middle East in 2018. U.S. President Donald Trump has approved a Law that had existed since 1995, a period when there was still optimism for the Oslo Accord Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process, to move the American embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. All of Trump’s predecessors understood the implications of such a step: no less than a full recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. This step, in the logic of the U.S. being a ‘neutral’ broker, should only have come at the end of a comprehensive and signed peace agreement between Palestinians and Israelis.

The effect on the rest of the Middle East – the whole Islamic world in fact – will be significant. At its heart the focus of attention in the region could shift back to the Palestinian question and away from the brewing Iran-Saudi conflict. Or, more likely, the U.S. recognition of Jerusalem will exacerbate tensions between Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia, spilling into a proxy conflict involving on one side Hamas (and possibly the Palestinian Authority – PNA) and Hezbollah on the other.

It’s unclear whether Trump had been briefed about the risks he has taken. Until a few weeks ago, the situation in Palestine was showing enough promise to suggest that Hamas and the PNA could have reached a compromise in 2018, bolstering the chances of a resumption of peace talks. At the end of November 2017, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah and Hamas agreed to hold national elections by the end of 2018. A reconciliation in that sense would have allowed General al-Sisi’s Egypt to forego his concerns about Hamas’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Elections would have gone a long way toward releasing the population of Gaza from an embargo that has lasted for over ten years. Now, the ‘smart money’ is on tensions in the region reaching the point of another (the Third) intifada.

Trump’s Foreign Policy

To understand how the new United States stance on Jerusalem will affect the Middle East in 2018 and beyond, it’s first necessary to understand the foreign policy that Trump is pursuing. Trump’s electoral slogan was ‘America First’. In that sense he is pursuing more ‘realistic’ and less idealistic targets.

Under Trump the United States will focus more on protecting American interest and security rather than exporting democracy. President Obama tried to pursue a version of this policy. Obama had the misfortune of having inherited a number of foreign quagmires from his predecessor, George W. Bush in Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention the ‘war on terror’ – it’s difficult to wage war against an abstract noun. Still, Obama was hesitant to engage directly in regime change operations, preferring to wage war by proxy. Such was the case in Syria, for example.

Trump, more than Obama, appears to be focusing on fulfilling his electoral promises and satisfying, if not all Americans, his most solid base of support. It is in this context that the Jerusalem recognition must be analyzed. In choosing to move the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, Trump was able to satisfy the evangelical Christians who believe that the apocalypse will begin when the Third Temple is built on the site of the ‘Temple Mount’. Trump has also fulfilled the desires of his biggest electoral campaign donor, Jewish-American billionaire and Las Vegas casino owner Sheldon Adelson and the many American Zionists who are a major force behind the Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories that make a two-state solution so difficult, even if the political will to achieve it existed in the Knesset.

From this, it can be deduced that Trump is disengaging from the Middle East. He’s done his part; it’s now up to the others in the region to clean up the mess. The PNA president Abbas has already stated he won’t meet U.S. Vice President Pence when he will visit the region at the end of December. Frankly, it seems impossible for anyone to regard Washington as an honest or neutral broker in Middle East peace now. It’s possible that Trump’s son-in-law and adviser (whose own family construction business has profited from Israeli settlements) has worked out a deal with Saudi Prince Muhammad bin Salman (MbS) for Saudi Arabia to offer a substantial cash offer to Mahmoud Abbas to accept a Palestinian State, even smaller than what the current crumbs would entail. It’s unlikely, especially in a context of a Hamas-PNA reconciliation, that Abbas will accept such a literal sellout. Trump may have stated that he wants a “great deal for the Israelis and a great deal for the Palestinians”. Yet, a look at any map of the potential Palestinian State that the Israelis would allow now, suggests there’s only a ‘terrible deal’ in store.

Who Will Replace the United States in the Middle East?

That role is up for grabs; China or Russia will probably step in, but gradually, to do this in 2018. Russia has just helped Syria – and the world – rid itself of the ISIS plague. It has established close ties to all parties concerned from Turkey to Israel itself. As for the United States, it will only interfere where matters it thinks affect its national security. Where the Middle East is concerned, this translates to Israel’s security – or its perception. In other words, the U.S. will not purse the cause of Kurdish nationalism in Syria – as Obama’s administration was doing and Hillary Clinton would probably have done. Washington has already shown no support for the Iraqi Kurds when they stage their sovereignty referendum last September.

The U.S. and Saudi Arabia must have expected dismayed reactions to the Jerusalem announcement. They know that the Arab States that have signed peace agreements and established diplomatic relations with Israel will come under significant pressure in 2018. Egypt and Jordan are those States. Egypt’s President al-Sisi may have to come to terms with Hamas, even as he faces opposition from the Muslim Brotherhood (now operating underground) domestically. Jordan, whose Muslim Brotherhood remains an important and recognized political party in Parliament, will surely put pressure on King Abdullah to sever ties with Israel.

The Saudis will probably have already agreed with the Trump administration to ‘lubricate’ any resulting frictions by offering lavish injections of funds into the respective States’ coffers. Al-Sisi, in public, must show defiance against the Jerusalem decision or face electoral defeat in the summer of 2018 and/or an exacerbation of domestic violence. The need for funds will be even greater for Jordan, whose predictable rise in tension could prompt a sharp decline in tourism and related revenues. The alternative for Egypt or Jordan would be to face a backlash from the Saudis and their Gulf allies, which would imply enduring the tensions alone. Still, there’s one player that the Americans had not considered.

Washington Wants Isolation of Teheran

Qatar will focus its effort on sustaining the allies of Hamas. No wonder the Saudis isolated it in June 2017. Indeed, in 2018, Qatar will likely move even closer to the Iranian camp, which would also help stabilize Syria. Qatar was one of the main sponsors of the various Islamist militias operating in Syria and now being relegated to a few pockets as Asad’s loyalists regain control. Qatar, which is looking for an ever grander international presence (it will host the FIFA World Cup in 2022), has an opportunity to shine becoming the prime sponsor of the Palestinians.

Still, the United States will remain vigilant when it comes to expanding Iranian and Russian influence. Washington is convinced that Iran wants to create a ‘corridor’ from Teheran to Beirut, trying to impose Shiite hegemony throughout the Middle East. Should Haider al-Abadi, who faces voters in 2018, move too far in Tehran’s lap, facilitating the ‘Shiite corridor’, the United States could intervene, and applying pressure through the Kurds. Meanwhile, there seems little doubt that Trump will also scrap the Iran nuclear deal in 2018. It was one of his election promises.

After the Jerusalem decision, Israel will have become even more concerned of Iranian retaliation. Lebanon should hold elections in 2018. Beirut was supposed to have called general elections in 2014 but the political crisis marked by the failure to elect a new President until 2017 and the war in Syria prompted the delay. The Americans – through the Saudis – will try to exert pressure through the Sunnis and Prime Minister Saad Hariri, whose role and power has become more ambiguous after the virtual ‘kidnapping’ in November 2017.

It may not come to that. The Israelis, Americans and Saudis have haste. They want to stop Hezbollah and the Shiite crescent from developing long before the summer of 2018. After all, Iran has also been a thorn on the Saudis’ flank in Yemen, where the civil war has taken another turn in favor of the Houthi rebels after the assassination of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh after he decided to switch allegiances.

The realignment of forces in the Middle East, characterized by Iran’s progressively rising influence from the Persian Gulf to the red Sea and the Mediterranean troubles Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. All it will take is a few Iranian made missiles landing near Riyadh, launched by Tehran’s allies (or from Hezbollah into Israel) and the Saudis could start using all the military toys they have recently bought from Uncle Sam against direct Iranian interests. Trump won’t necessarily intervene directly. He will be able to use tools like the nuclear deal and military support to help its allies fight of the Iranian ‘threat’ as the rivalry between Saudi Arabia-Israel and Iran sharpens.

Damascus’ success in reclaiming control over most of Syria, the demise of Islamic State and the Turkey’s increasing penetration in the Iranian –Russian sphere will bring these States to a dangerous crossroads in 2018. Finally, there’s another conclusion from the Jerusalem fallout that Trump and Netanyahu may not have considered. If there’s one issue that could unite the Arab world – however fleeting the chance – it might be Jerusalem. The Arab League, as happened in the 1973 oil embargo championed by the Saudis in retaliation for the Yom Kippur war, has been crippled. As for, Qatar, with Iran’s help might be able to build up sufficient diplomatic and regional pressure to either prevent a repeat of the 1982 Israeli -Shiite-Sunni war (most likely fought in Lebanon) or to cause the Saudi Crown Prince, Trump’s son-in-law Kushner and Bibi Netanyahu to reconsider their plans.

Alessandro Bruno

Laos. The Chance Of Living On Earth Longer.

Once, long ago, when the world was newly created, Phya Thaen, the highest god and creator, sent all creatures to the earth. As he was sending them down, he would tell each of them how many years they could live on earth.

When all creatures had left, he realized that he forgot to tell four creatures how many years they could live on earth. So, he called them back. “Human, Buffalo, Dog and Monkey, come here,” said Phya Thaen. “Yes, My Lord,” said the four creatures. “I have sent you down to earth without telling you how many years you could live on it.
I am going to tell you now,” said Phya Thaen. “Yes, My Lord,” said the four creatures in unison.

Phya Thaen turned to the human and said, “Human, you may live on earth for thirty years.” “Yes, My Lord,” said the Human. Phya Thaen turned to Buffalo and said, “Buffalo, I created you to help the human work in the field. You have to work hard all day long. I give the same amount of time as I had given to the Human, thirty years.” “Thirty years of hard work? That’s too much,” thought the buffalo.

So he said to Phya Thaen, “My Lord, may I have just ten years?” asked the buffalo.“Are you sure you want only ten years?” asked Phya Thaen. “Yes, My Lord; ten years is enough for me,” confirmed the buffalo. “Then, ten years you may have,” said Phya Thaen. The Human saw the chance of living on earth longer. So he said to Phya Thaen. “My Lord, may I have the twenty years that the buffalo does not want?” asked the Human. “Are you sure you want the Buffalo’s age?” asked Phya Thaen. “Yes, I am sure, My Lord,” said the human. “Then, twenty more years on earth you may have,” announced Phya Thaen. “Thank you, My Lord,” said the Human.

Phya Thaen then turned to Dog and said, “Dog, I created you to help the Human work at night. You have to work hard all night long, guarding the human’s property while he rests at night after his hard work. I give the same amount of time as I had given to the human at first, thirty years.” “Thirty years of sleepless nights? That’s too much,” thought the dog. So he said to Phya Thaen, “My Lord, may I have just ten years, like the buffalo?” asked the dog. “Are you sure you want only ten years?” asked Phya Thaen. “Yes, My Lord; ten years is enough for me,” confirmed the dog. “Then, ten years you may have,” said Phya Thaen.

The Human again saw the chance of living on earth longer. So he said to Phya Thaen. “My Lord, may I have the twenty years that the dog does not want?” asked the Human. “Are you sure you want the dog’s age?” asked Phya Thaen. “Yes, I am sure, My Lord,” said the Human. “Then, twenty more years on earth you may have,” announced Phya Thaen. “Thank you, My Lord,” said the Human. Phya Thaen then turned to the last creature, Monkey, and said, “Monkey, you are a funny creature, I created you to help entertain the Human after his work. You have to make him laugh and relax. I give the same amount of time as I had given to the human at first, thirty years.”

“Thirty years of being funny? That’s too much,” thought the monkey. So he said to Phya Thaen, “My Lord, may I have just ten years, like the dog and the buffalo?” asked the monkey. “Are you sure you want only ten years?” asked Phya Thaen. “Yes, My Lord; ten years is enough for me,” confirmed the monkey. “Then, ten years you may have,” said Phya Thaen. The Human again saw the chance of living on earth longer. So he said to Phya Thaen. “My Lord, may I have the twenty years that the monkey does not want?” asked the Human.

“Are you sure you want the monkey’s age?” asked Phya Thaen. “Yes, I am sure, My Lord,” said the Human. “Then, twenty more years on earth you may have,” announced Phya Thaen. “Thank you, My Lord,” said the Human. And the four creatures returned to earth. Since then, the Human could have ninety years on earth while the buffalo, the dog, and the monkey could have ten years each.

Folktale from Laos

(In Thai and Lao traditions, it is believed that people behave like human beings only in the first thirty year of their lives. From the age of 31 to 50 human beings are hard-working like the buffalo. From the age of 51 to 70, human beings behave like the dog. They become sleepless at night because of their worries about so many things in their lives. From the age of 71 to 90, human beings could be funny to the young in two ways. First, they become forgetful. Their forgetfulness may look funny to the young. Second, as they have lived so long, they have collected a lot of experiences and stories. They could tell stories to entertain the young.)

Brazil. Aparecida, 300 Years On The Side Of The People.

Monday, 1 January 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

The celebrations of the three hundredth anniversary of the rediscovery of the statue of Our Lady of Aparecida ended recently. “Mary shows by her silence that the Gospel is proclaimed from the peripheries, the caves and cellars of humanity”.

The rediscovery of the statue by the fishermen Domingos Garcia, Joao Alves and Filipe changed lives. Filipe kept the statue rescued from the depths of the river in his house from 1717 to 1732. Mere fishermen found a statue of Our Lady immersed in water; it was broken, discoloured and grey. This happened on 12 October, 1717.

The statue is just a small sculpture by an unknown artist, probably from the ceramics school of the Benedictine Order. It measures 36 cm in height and weighs 2,550 grams. It has a silver pedestal with designs. It was probably made in the first half of the seventeenth century. To the eyes of the artist and the people of Brazil, it has some noticeable details: the smiling form of the lips that reveal the front teeth, the face with its wrinkles, the carefully arranged hair with braids, the diadem on the forehead, the pleated skirt reaching to the ground, the small joined hands like those of a child, the plain and the refined sleeves, refined, close-fitting and folded in the style of the seventeenth century Paulistas, the original rose colour of the hands and face, worn away and darkened by the smoke of candles and the grey mud in the bottom of the river.

The cult of our Lady of the Conception was already deeply rooted in colonial Brazil and images of Our Lady with joined hands were plentiful. The Aparecida cult is the enigma of an icon that transforms itself and takes the face of the people and its dreams. We are aware that the first printed image of Our Lady of Aparecida, created in 1854, is a photo of Our Lady of the Conception with fair skin. That image was recreated and darkened by poor, black people. It directly reflects their working conditions of suffering and brings hope to thousands of exploited people. Mary always chooses the lowly and speaks their language. A people that loves her makes her go and live in the houses of the poor and, from that theological place, scatters to the four winds the news of this celestial visitation. The statue of the Immaculate Virgin presents a God who continues to want communion, beginning with the lowly. In Mary they discover the signs of a Mother who asks to be put back together, sewn up and rebuilt.

In that first moment, the head was reattached using beeswax. From this union, a Marian people was born that will never leave her. It was united in sorrow and in love by the smile of the Virgin. An immense piety blossomed in the homes and in the processions of the ordinary people. In Mexico, in 1531, we see in the Virgin of Guadalupe a preference for the indigenous people. The Morenita speaks Nahuatl and not Spanish, and wants a sanctuary in the land of the poor and not in the capital Tenochtitlan; that the Bishop. Juan de Zumarraga should come to the periphery of Tepeyac and not the contrary; that the official Church should go to the periphery of the indigenous people and half-castes; that the Church should not build a New Spain but discover in the roots and in the faces of people the authentic America.
In Brazil, for the enslaved blacks and the poor wounded by colonial exploitation, Mary does not present herself as a passively submissive woman; nor does she create an alienating religion. She is the woman able to say no and what she wants according to the will of God. Then the story is repeated in every country of Latin America and the Caribbean.
In Honduras she is the Virgin of the Poor, Our Lady of Suyapa; in Paraguay she is Our Lady of Caacupé; in Cuba she is the Virgin of Cobre; Our Lady of Chiquinquirà, in Colombia. At Lujan, in Argentina, she remains stubbornly fixed with local people on the left bank of the river Lujan. In Costa Rica she is Our Lady of the Angels, known as La Negrita, the Little Black Lady. She shows herself to a poor, simple child, Juana Pereira, in a place called Pueblo de los Negros, on 2 August, 1635.
Mary silently points out that the Gospel is to be proclaimed from the peripheries, the caves and cellars of humanity. Mary shows that the Gospel means staying with the poor and defending their lives, their faith and their hopes.

As the Brazilian bishop, Mons Luciano Mendes de Almeida, Archbishop of Marianna and former President of the Conference of the Bishops of Brazil, who died in 2006, once wrote: ‘The little image dragged up from the waters of a river by fishermen sends us a message of solidarity with her children sorely oppressed at the time. She identified with the Brazilians who were suffering the injustice of slavery. The Mother of God showed, in her face, wrinkled like that of her black children, the love she has for them and the dignity they deserve. In a time of discrimination, she became the Mother of all races and made us understand we are all brothers and sisters’.
For the last three hundred years, Mary has been the nascent Church immersing itself in the suffering people. She is the Virgin of Sorrows, the dark-skinned Mother of Heaven, the Woman restored to life. In the words of the singer-composer Father Zezinho: ‘Today I became a pilgrim, with no illusions and no utopia! I went to visit the house built for Mother Mary! And, I did so with my simple understanding of this devotion! To the Black Lady I said: Lead my people to freedom’.

Fernando Altemever Jr.

Pelargonium sidoides. An Effective Medicinal Plant Against Respiratory Diseases.

Monday, 1 January 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

Pelargonium sidoides is a small geranium-like plant which is commonly referred to as ‘South African geranium’ or Umckaloabo in the Zulu language. It is highly regarded by traditional healers as one of the major curative plants.

The plant grows in a rosette pattern and forms thick and very dark brown underground roots that grow up to 15 cm in length. Sparsely branched stems grow from the base and the species is distinguished from others by its long stalks, greyish-green crinkled leaves which are mildly aromatic, heart-shaped and velvety.
It bears lots of characteristic reddish-purple flowers with a distinctive yellow pollen throughout the year.
The plant grows in places where the climatic conditions range from arid to dry. Although Pelargonnium sidoides has the ability to endure frosts, the plants become dormant during prolonged periods of drought or when they are grown in places having extremely cold climatic conditions.

Pelargonnium sidoides is endemic to Lesotho and South Africa. It is harvested from the wild for the manufacture of traditional medicine (phytomedicines) by local and international pharmaceutical industries. It usually grows in short grassland and sometimes with occasional shrubs and trees on stony soil varying from sand to clay-loam and is found at altitudes ranging from near sea level to 2,300m.Ethnomedicinal records show that traditional practitioners and local communities have been using the roots of Pelargonnium sidoides for centuries for treatment of many diseases and disorders within the framework of their therapeutic settings, a variety of illnesses including coughs and upper respiratory infections, dysentery, diarrhoea, hepatic complaints, colds, fatigue, fevers, dysmenorrhea and infections of the respiratory tract including tuberculosis. In fact, the plant’s name ‘umckaloabo‘ is derived from two Zulu words; umkhuhlane, meaning ‘fever- and cough-related diseases’, and uhlabo which means ‘chest pain’.

Indeed the Pelargonnium sidoides plant is highly regarded by traditional healers as one of the major curative plants. Considered one of the mainstream traditional medicinal plants especially in South Africa and surrounding areas, Pelargonnium sidoides is also used in Germany, England and other western countries in form of a syrup as well as a cough drop or tablet. In fact, its remedy as a treatment especially for tuberculosis was popularised in England and Europe by the British mechanic Charles Henry Stevens in the 19th century. The primary purpose for using Pelargonnium sidoides as a home herbal remedy is to first and foremost shorten the period of sickness and to relieve the affected person’s symptoms. The remedy also breaks up mucus, fights bacteria, and works as an antiviral agent.
The main medicinal part of the plant is the fleshy dark brown rhizomes which are dried and formulated into powders, tinctures and infusions. Its potent antibacterial and antiviral properties are ideal in the treatment of chronic respiratory tract infections such as sore throat, sinusitis, colds and flu. The plant is very effective for treating acute bronchitis and has great ability in increasing the body’s natural healing ability from a myriad of diseases and disorders.

Pelargonnium sidoides decoction is used in some communities to treat stomach ulcers. Indeed scientific studies show that Pelargonnium sidoides extracts are effective against Helicobacter pylori bacteria, the main causative agent of stomach ulcers. In addition, Pelargonnium sidoides is also effective in treating acute as well as chronic throat, nose and ear infections.
The plant is used to treat upper respiratory infections, and common cold. It is also used to treat sexually transmitted diseases including gonorrhoea and herpes. Infusion of the roots of Pelargonnium sidoides has been orally administered to treat coughs, and gastrointestinal disorders such as diarrhoea and dysentery. In addition, the plant has also been used to provide a cure for hepatic disorders and dysmenorrhea. Its upper parts are ground into powder form and used as a wound healing agent.
The plant is also used to invigorate the body’s immune system, thereby helping to put off the spread of microbial infections. This is the main reason why many people use this herbal remedy as a substitute for various antibiotics.

The therapeutic attributes of Pelargonnium sidoides are due to the various phytochemicals contained in the plant especially the presence of a remarkable series of simple coumarins, phenolic acids, flavonoids, gallic acid and the gallic acid, methyl ester, which greatly contribute to the herb’s antibacterial, antifungal, anti-mycobacterial and immuno-modulatory properties which make it highly curative. It also contains calcium and silica which are essential minerals in the body.
The greatest threat to Pelargonnium sidoides currently is the over harvesting of its tubers for local and export purpose, habitat transformation and degradation. Loss of the plant population to habitat transformation as a result of urban development and agricultural activities has occurred in most of the historic sites, leading to mass reduction in the wild population of the plant. Therefore, a lot has to be done to conserve this highly valuable medicinal plant and prevent it from future extinction.

Richard Komakech

The Kurds, Which Future?

Monday, 1 January 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

The big winner in the Middle East is Russia. Thus, it will be Russia that will play the biggest role in its post-Islamic State organization.

It was Russia that turned Turkey into an ally even after the latter’s air force shot down a Russian Sukhoi-24 jet in November 2015. Then in 2017, Russian backed Syrian forces took back Aleppo, as the various Islamist militias that occupied the Eastern part of the city were pushed out. Erdogan, who faced off a coup attempt in July 2015 while dealing with a series of bombings claimed by the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) realize that it would be fruitless to support the anti-Asad militias in Syria.

It was more important for Turkey to contain Kurdish ambitions to set up an enclave on its southern border than to overthrow the government of al-Asad. Preserving the integrity of the Syrian State became as much of a goal for President Erdogan – at least in the short term – as it was for Putin. Now, Turkey sits at the winners’ table and can help decide just what kind of independence the Kurds can aspire. Having already persuaded the Americans to relinquish Kurdish nation building in Iraq – supported by Israel no less – Erdogan can thwart any hope that the Syrian Kurds can set up an independent territory, led by the PKK’s allies and capable of unsettling Turkish sovereignty. However, the Russians have also reached agreements with the Kurdish forces in Syria, who are expecting rewards for having contributed to smash the Islamic State, reducing them to a fragmented guerrilla force at best.

The Russians want stability in Syria above all, thus they are prepared to ‘persuade’ their Syrian allies in Damascus to concede a much greater degree of autonomy for the Kurds, who make up some 11.0% of the population. Ultimately, had Damascus failed to regain Palmyra, Aleppo, parts of the capital while steadily weakening the various militias and ISIS, the Turks would have prepared contingencies for a fragmentation of Syria and the end of the Sykes-Picot agreements, which marked the map of the present Middle East 100 years ago. A Kurdish independent political entity could have taken root in such a scenario, which would have resulted in undermining Turkey’s stability. But, as with so many of the Middle East’s current complexities, explanations must be sought in the post-World War I scenario. Perhaps, Kurdish nationalist dreams will have to wait until the entire Middle East rearranges itself. Until then, The Kurds are resigned to living stuck between the various States and can at most expect to win self-rule within these.

Alessandro Bruno

The War In Syria Is Over, The West Will Give Up On The Kurds.

Monday, 1 January 2018 8:00
Written by: Fr.Carmine

The West will always choose Turkey over the aspirations of the Kurds. This is one area where The Americans and the Russians agree, allowing Rojava to separate from Syria. Russia has no desire to compromise relations with Turkey even as it tries to capitalize on success in Syria to strengthen its military presence. The Americans have withheld their backing for the Kurdish referendum in Iraq and they’re not likely to encourage the PYD. In Iraq, Turkey has established good relations with the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) led by Barzani, until recently, and the Iraqi Kurdish Party (KDP). Turkey has even invested heavily in KRG controlled areas. If the Kurds gave up their ambitions peacefully after the Iraq army occupied the area after the September 25 referendum, it’s because Barzani used it to revive the fortunes of the PDK (Democratic Party of Kurdistan) within Iraq itself.

In this regard, Abdullah Ocalan may have a bigger role in the specific Kurdish context. Ocalan, leader of the PKK has been in jail since 1999. He has led the guerrilla war against the Turkish state and until a few years ago maintained good ties to the Syrian government. Ocalan offers Kurds nationalism but also a vision in which to shape it. Ocalan appears favorable to a Syria organized as a democratic speaks of a democratic confederation emerging in Syria. Ocalan proposes something that appears to be a socialist utopia, marked by popular Assemblies, equal right for all, (not just the Kurdish), social welfare, a fair distribution of resources, the end of violence against women and care for the environment: these are what the pillars of the ideal Kurdish society.

But so long as Kurds remain autonomous, they remain problematic, if not dangerous, to their ‘host’ States. Depending on the state of their relations with the respective governments, Kurdish loyalty varies considerably to the point where superpower or regional interests can exploit this weakness into collaboration to the detriment of the host Country. In Iraq, the Kurds welcomed the American invasion in 2003 and supported it. From 1991 to 2003, Iraqi Kurdistan, protected by a UN No-fly zone resolution, has come the closest to achieving de-facto independence.

The Iraqi Kurds managed to unite to obtain the constitution of a federal statute and a separate ruling body, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), chaired by Massoud Barzani. The KRG could also boast a substantial fighting force of almost 200,000 before ISIS, the Peshmerga. The Iraqi army is not allowed to enter Kurdish territory. But, much to the anger of Baghdad authorities, foreign oil companies have secured oil contracts with foreign companies independently, exporting crude oil to Turkey, but also securing more exploration and export agreements.

In Syria, the Kurds promptly abandoned Damascus as soon as the revolts of southern Syria spread to Damascus and beyond. Therefore, when Kurds are repressed, they threaten national security and unity. The inclination for Kurds to associate with ‘outsiders’ with designs has exposed Kurdish nationalism to exploitation. That is also their undoing, as the various Kurdish factions are being reminded once again. Foreign interests will always take precedence over those of the Kurds. The Americans did not back the Kurdish referendum and they won’t back one in Syria either, even if they played a significant role in fighting ISIS.

In the current Sykes-Picot arrangement of the Middle East, the Kurds must always be prepared to be disappointed. The concept of an independent Kurdistan, attempted through the project known as ‘Rojava’ remains a chimera. It was always bound to fail, because no superpower, given the interests with Turkey, could impose a Kurdish State to rise along the Turkish border. Such a State would always be under fire from Turkish artillery to the north and under pressure from an Arab majority to the south. There may be no stronger incentive for an alliance of Syria, Turkey, Iraq and Iran than the pursuit of Kurdish independence.

The risk exists, however, that after the various parties in the Syrian war reconcile (other than the most extreme factions), the softening of confessional dissonance of Sunni vs. Shiite and no more common ISIS enemy to pursue, could result in Kurdish-Arab ethnic discord against a more pressing Kurdish nationalism. Moreover, tensions have also developed among the different Kurdish organizations, for they don’t all have the same vision. The emergence of a proto-Kurdish State in the Syrian region – Rojava – governed according to Ocalan’s Marxist principles clashed with the Iraqi Kurds and the more tribal interests pursued by the government of Mas’ud Barzani. This is not unusual of course. For years, the prospect of a Palestinian State has suffered because of contrasts between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.

But, the Kurds can at least count on the viability of achieving autonomy first. The KRG has given Kurds the hope and the experience that in spite of all the difficulties, independence does not have to be the only desirable outcome. The autonomy of each separate Kurdish minority within their respective states can work, even if the prospects of a future union may have to be shelved or considerably delayed. Still, Autonomy can work better for some. The Kurds of Iraq can use independence as a card to play against the Iraqi central government, should the latter cease making concessions to the KRG. They have leverage in the form of control over rich oil and gas resources, giving them a few cards more with which to negotiate with Baghdad. (A.B.)

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