Sunday, April 29, 2018

Buddha introduced mental culture to humanity

2018-04-30

“What should be directly known is directly known

What should be developed has been developed

What should be abandoned has been abandoned

Therefore, Brahmin, I am a Buddha”

(Sela Sutta – Sutta Nipata)

Two hundred and sixty decades ago, the above mentioned unprecedented and unheard of words profoundly resounded and tremendously resonated in our human society. The Master and an extraordinary human being who indefatigably accomplished his incomparable spiritual aspiration firmly assured and resolutely confirmed true nature and the impeccable personality of the Buddha.

As the aspirant of the Buddha; the Bodhisatta, who enthusiastically sought the ultimate truth, an incomparable noble search was implemented and executed with indefatigable endeavour and indefinable determination till he reached the beacon of the conclusion of the aspiration of his spiritual purpose, the full enlightenment.
Inconceivable challenges and ineffable difficulties were enormous and excessively inundated in his life but he patiently overcame and assiduously conquered them with courage and perseverance. With his unique dedication and paramount persistence he conquered the battle of defilements and impurities; ultimately by treading the Noble Eightfold Path or Path of Purification he attained his spiritual accomplishment, the bliss of Nibbana.

“Through many a birth in Samsara, have I wandered in vain, seeking the builder of his house of life. Repeated and continual birth is indeed suffering!
O house-builder, you are seen!

You will not build this house again. For all your rafters broken and your ridge-pole shattered.

My mind has reached the unconditioned! I have attained the destruction of cravings.”

(Gouthama Buddha)

This is his foremost statement and profound confirmation soon after he accomplished his Full Enlightenment.

Though we live in a digitally-cultured global society, modern science and nano-technology have failed to make peace of the human mind in our human society. All these boasting achievements and developments have created competitive commercial culture and numerous discordances in our human society today. Profit-based multinational weapon manufacturing companies and multitudes of consumer products business sectors have directed innocent people into a quagmire of mental conflicts and struggles.

Nano technology and Digital Revolution along with proliferation of digital devices have created highly perplexing entanglements in our human society today.
26 centuries ago, the Blessed One explicitly emphasised thus:

“A tangle inside, a tangle outside,

This generation is entangled in a tangle”

(Samyutta Nikaya)

In his statement, the Blessed One firmly stated that the tangle was the network of craving.

We have encountered innumerable individuals who are infatuated with accumulation of wealth and intoxicated with pursuing treasures. Unfortunately most of them are mentally stressful and sometimes depressed. Some of them have no peace at all. Their marriage lives are in chaos and disorder. Their children are disobedient and insubordinate. Some parents complain about their poor performance of academic work and unruly behaviour. Now increasing of single parent digits are highly escalated. Some partners are terrified and tortured. The prime reason is that most people are mentally bewildered and topsy-turvy. Humane qualities are drastically degraded.

They think that the money, wealth, profit, treasures, status, power, amusement and so on are the life. They have no capacity and ability to understand the importance of humane inner qualities.

Once Gouthama Buddha said thus:

“One who, while himself seeking happiness, oppresses with violence other beings who also desire happiness, will not attain happiness hereafter.”

Today, emotional disturbances and mental traumas are overflowing.

Unfortunately some members in our human family come to an end with catastrophic conclusion due to their inconceivable agonies. Mental distress, frustration, stress, anxiety, grief, misery, sorrow, despair, depression are widely known and prominent maladies along with numerous afflictions which we daily experience and encounter around the globe today.

The significance of the Buddha Dhamma, the teaching of the Buddha is opening the gateway to find and scrutinize the underlying tendencies of the mind and removing the cloud of ignorance which tremendously covers the human mind. The great Master, the Buddha has prescribed many techniques to apply and train ourselves to win the battle of hidden tendencies. This is why the Buddha Dhamma is widely accepted and globally appreciated in our human society today.
Some may firmly believe that aggressively working and fighting to preserve and protect their nationality and culture is what the Goutama Buddha asked and encouraged us to practise, but none was included in his discourses at all. If someone can understand the fundamental teaching of the Buddha, they would be able to recognise who the Buddha is, and what the Buddha said.

Once, when his disciples assembled, the Buddha precisely emphasised thus;

“Bhikkhus, there are these four means of sustaining a favourable relationship.

What four? Giving, endearing speech, beneficent conduct, and impartiality. These are four means of sustaining a favourable relationship.”

Unfortunately, many people have completely forgotten the authentic approach to find the true peace and innermost happiness that the great Master, Gouthama Buddha compassionately asked to achieve. There are numerous unacceptable and disgraceful activities that are visible in the vicinity of the island of the Dhamma and political movements are gravely apparent and undeniable in our society today. These provocative pursuits will constantly lead and create a very violent and hostile environment in our peaceful society.

People speak and express their personal views about their own so called cultures. Some of them are in a battle field to make their own superior to another. Even some religious groups struggle to place the superior one’s own in some other part in the world today.

Unfortunately, they never focus on their own mentality and inward condition. After a long period of time, by achieving his ultimate spiritual aspiration the Blessed One declared that the best was the mental culture. Mentally cultured people never suffer from defilement and they are not shaken by any vicissitude of life.

Once the Goutama Buddha was asked by an earth-bound deity (deva) who dwelt in the forest, each day he would see monks who inhabited the forest sitting in meditation after their meal. As they sat their minds would become unified and serene, and the serenity of their minds would become manifest in their complexions. Puzzled that they could have such serene faces while living under these austere conditions, the deva came to the Blessed One to inquire into the cause.
“Those who dwell deep in the forest,

Peaceful, leading the holy life,

Eating but a single meal a day:

Why is their complexion so serene?”

“They do not sorrow over the past,

Nor do they hanker for the future,

They maintain themselves with what is present,

Hence their complexion is so serene.”

(Samyutta Nikaya)

Unfortunately, the deplorable and distressing fact is that individual branded credos and dogmas are proliferated and multiplied in the name of the Buddha Dhamma.

No authority in the community of the Buddhist monks or responsible government to take any decisive and conclusive action to protect and preserve true doctrine and discipline (Dhamma –Vinaya).

The quality and standard of the monk-hood has been drastically changed. Many monks have embraced and engaged in party politics. The life style, the way of life, behaviour as a disciple of the Buddha, deportment of monkhood, duties and responsibilities as a monk is completely disappeared and absent in certain individuals.
Unacceptable behaviour and disgraceful acts of so called monks lead drastically changed people’s respectful attitudes and deep rooted devotion. The way they speak and express their antagonistic ideas and inimical views is completely dangerous and catastrophic. Our future generation will be in vulnerable situation and true spiritual practice will dramatically disappear.

The Buddha declared that “Vinayo Naama Sasanassa Aayu” Discipline is the lifespan of the dispensation of the Buddha. Numerous well-disciplined and well trained monks have guided our Buddhist community with outstanding examples but now it is in topsy-turvy.

The current propensity and inconceivable proclivity in the Sinhala Buddhist community around the globe is indescribable. Listening to multitudes of sermons and taking part in meditation programmes are widely spread and fast growing cult of personality.

Antagonism and animosity is the burning issue in the globe today. World recognized organizations indefatigably work hard to implement and execute numerous programmes to resolve and to find the solid and long-lasting solution to this smouldering matter of contention.

Until we accept the inner failure and start with fresh thoughts of loving kindness and compassion, no one can reach the destination of unity and harmony.

Craving for political power is the virus in our country today. They horrendously and unwisely provoke innocent people towards violence, conflicts and discord. So called unwise leaders implant disharmony and hostility in the hearts of many people.

If the Buddhists cannot be harmonious and united, how will they be in harmony and in unison with other nationalities and races and what they preach others to do so?

Be wise to set aside disparity, diversity and differences. We should wholeheartedly appreciate and accept the similarities and conformities of others with compassion and understanding.

“He who is friendly

amidst the hostile,

Peaceful amidst the violent,

And unattached amidst the attached

Him do I call a Holy man”

(Gouthama Buddha)

Will boycotting Israel become a crime in Germany?

Repressive tactics have been used against some Palestine solidarity campaigners in Germany.
Anne PaqActiveStills

When attempts are made to prevent discussions from taking place, the allegation most often used is that organizers or participants are anti-Semites. This allegation is even applied to Jews who defend Palestinian rights. According to pro-Israel advocates, such Jews are “self-hating.”

The obstacles have been especially steep in Munich.

Ilan Pappe, an Israeli historian best known for his research into the 1948 ethnic cleansing of Palestine, was refused permission to speak at a Munich teaching center during 2009. The episode can be viewed as the first in a series of attempts made during the past decade to prevent people who criticize the official Israeli narrative from reaching a Bavarian audience.

Abraham Melzer, a well-known German-Jewish author and journalist, was the target of one such attempt.

In September 2016, Melzer was invited to speak at the One World House, a cultural center. A few days before the event was scheduled to take place, Munich’s city council intervened to forbid it.

The reason cited for the ban was that material promoting the event questioned Israel’s legitimacy. According to the council, the material crossed the line from criticism of Israel into anti-Semitism.

Charlotte Knobloch, former chair of the Central Council of Jews in Germany and a vocal pro-Israel advocate, smeared Melzer around that time, claiming he was “notorious for his anti-Semitic statements.”

Melzer sued Knobloch over the slur. He was initially successful.

In November 2016, a Bavarian court ordered Knobloch not to repeat her accusation. Yet Knobloch appealed against that ruling. She won her appeal in January this year, leaving her free to smear Melzer once again.

The efforts to muzzle Palestine solidarity activists received a boost in December last year, when Munich’s city council decided to ban events in publicly owned buildings if they promoted the Palestinian boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) call. Made in 2005, that call demands respect for international law and equality between Israeli Jews and Palestinians.

The council’s motion also asserted Munich’s “solidarity with Israel” and that Israel had an “unrestricted right to existence and self-defense.”

A similar decision has been taken by the municipal authority in Frankfurt.

Repression of refugees

The assault on free speech about Palestine has also been occurring at the federal level.

In January this year, Germany’s parliament, the Bundestag, approved measures with the stated goal of combating anti-Semitism “resolutely.” Yet a closer look at the measures indicates that a key target is the BDS movement.

The Bundestag motion recommended, for example, that the judiciary should examine to what extent a boycott of Israel is a “criminal offense.” It even suggested that such calls may amount to “sedition.”

The motion was adopted at a time when talks on establishing a new German government – following a general election in September last – were still underway. All bar one of the main political parties supported the motion. The exception was the left-wing Die Linke, which abstained.

The motion was drawn up following protests against the announcement by President Donald Trump that the US was recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

During one protest in Berlin, an Israeli flag was burned. The German press exaggerated the significance of that incident.

Although only one homemade flag was burned, newspapers and broadcasters gave the impression that there had been a large-scale destruction of Israeli symbols and the chanting of anti-Semitic slogans. Some Berlin newspapers printed corrections when it emerged that their reporting was inaccurate.

The Bundestag motion relies on a dubious definition of anti-Semitism, approved by a 31-country grouping called the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. That definition and an accompanying memorandum suggest that decrying Israel’s racism is tantamount to a hatred of Jews.

The effects of such conflation could be far-reaching. The Bundestag motion urges Germany’s 16 states to take action – including deportations – against foreign residents if they “propagate anti-Semitic hatred.”

Given that the motion treats BDS activities as criminal, it may pave the way for repression against refugees who express support for Palestinian rights.

Crackdown on dissent

The Bundestag’s motion could have chilling consequences for free speech. It forms part of a wider crackdown on dissent within Germany.

One worrying trend is that courts have been assessing charges of “psychological support” against people arrested at the time of the G-20 summit in Hamburg last July. An Italian who took part in protests against that grouping of world leaders was held in jail for a number of months, even though it was clear that he had not rioted. Yet because he was present at a riot scene, he was accused of “psychological support” for violence.

“Psychological support” is not yet a recognized crime. But some politicians are pushing for it to become one.

Most German politicians are reluctant to speak out against the Israeli government’s policies and human rights violations, lest they be accused of anti-Semitism. That explains why the political parties are generally acquiescing in a huge attack on civil liberties.

Die Linke has made a major mistake by not loudly criticizing the close military cooperation between Germany and Israel. The peace movement and other progressive associations such as trade unions have also failed to protest adequately against this cooperation.

It is particularly disturbing that some of Die Linke’s elected representatives have not contested strongly the military cooperation with Israel. Die Linke is against Germany’s planned purchase of Israeli drones, but has been soft-spoken in its opposition.

Bombs have been dropped from military drones during Israel’s three major offensives against Gaza since December 2008. Over the past few weeks, Israel has sprayed tear gas – a toxic weapon – from drones as it massacred Palestinians taking part in the Great March of Return.

This action has highlighted how drones are one of Israel’s weapons against unarmed demonstrators. If the current crackdown on dissent continues in Germany, it is not inconceivable that drones bought from Israel will be turned against German demonstrators.

Annette Groth was a member of the German Parliament and spokesperson on human rights for Die Linke, a left-wing party, from 2009 to 2017.

I'm Syrian, and I will not give up hope for justice

Syrians have seen their lives destroyed as the international community stood by and watched, but they still cling to the hope that one day justice will be served

Razan Saffour

Thursday 26 April 2018

Several years ago, I remember asking a friend who worked in research why he didn’t choose to focus on Iraq, given that he was from there and would probably have more nuanced insights than others. His response was that he couldn’t - it struck too close to his heart for a day-to-day job.

I didn't fully understand that at the time, archiving his response as an afterthought that I didn't know existed until I began working in research myself. The pain of monitoring events in Syria, zooming into the gruesome with little time to focus on the hopeful, has weighed my heart down, and perhaps even rendered me unproductive, as I desperately seek hopeful angles or topics from which I am the most emotionally removed, in order to avoid breaking down every other day.

A duty to speak out

How does a Syrian approach a piece on Syria? I've spent the last 48 hours writing and deleting, trying every approach I know to tackle my own reflections about Syria today. I wrote questions, arguments and rebuttals; at one point, I wrote a personal narrative, until imposter syndrome reared its head and convinced me to discard it - because who am I to speak in the name of those back home?

I rebutted this point in my head, assuring myself that I had just as much right - a duty, in fact - to convey the voices of those I still know in Syria, and to express my own opinion as a Syrian. This, I realised, was the core of my problem: expressing my opinion as a Syrian.

I remember the day my father received news that three members of his family, all over 55, were killed with axes for no reason

So what does it mean to be Syrian? What does it mean to have lived through the past seven years, experiencing the development of breaking news, from "live shots fired at protesters", to "one person killed by a sniper", to full on-massacres - until breaking news no longer existed as a concept?

What does it mean to have survived in silence to avoid imprisonment, never being able to build trust with neighbours to discuss issues pertaining to your very survival, for fear of being disappeared forever as a political dissident? What does it mean to have lived through the horror and barbarity of the shabiha, to have received news of your own family being killed with butcher knives and axes, and then to have to convince the rest of the world that this level of monstrosity actually exists?

Merciless slaughter

I remember the day my father received news that three members of his family, all over 55, were killed with axes for no reason. Their neighbourhood was raided by Bashar al-Assad’s shabiha in Homs, and they were slaughtered mercilessly. For someone who has escaped death, and seen it in all its forms threatening his existence at so many points in his life, words failed my father as he sat there, reading the news over and over in disbelief.

Nor will I ever forget the time I asked him whether he knew a name I had come across in a list of martyrs in 2012. His face lit up as I uttered the name to him: “Yes, that’s my cousin – he and I used to always be together in our childhood. Did he get in touch with you?”

Syrians run for cover following Syrian government air strikes on the Eastern Ghouta rebel-held enclave of Douma, on the outskirts of the capital Damascus, on 20 March 2018 (AFP)

His face fell as the realisation dawned that the news probably wasn’t what he had hoped for. I showed him a video of his dead cousin on the streets of Homs, with a packet of bread next to him. A bakery was targeted just as he was buying food to feed his family.

So what does it mean to meet your family members over YouTube, through videos of their dead bodies? What does it mean to have tried every single peaceful method of shedding light on the crimes of the Assad regime for seven years and been ignored repeatedly? What does it mean to have a voice that isn’t heard?

Pawns in a game

What was missing most from the conversations on the air strikes last week were Syrians. I was approached numerous times by people and organisations who wanted me to express my Syrian opinion, but what got to me the most was the way in which I was approached.

It's difficult to articulate in words just how disheartening it is to know that you won't be taken seriously because you’re already viewed as either a victim or an opinionated activist, or to be hosted beside a self-proclaimed “Middle East expert” who will speak with a seemingly more reasonable and objective voice, given their lack of emotional attachment to the situation.

READ MORE ►

Syria's war is far from over

So allow me to answer the question, what does it mean to be Syrian?

To be Syrian is to know that the world isn’t black and white, that the US never intended to serve us, and that the air strikes weren’t going to have much of an impact on the Assad regime.

To be Syrian is to know what it means to be abandoned, and to understand that state interests will always trump those of actual Syrians.

To be Syrian is to know just how much has been destroyed over the past seven years; to have seen Assad act with impunity, as nobody stood up to him, beyond empty rhetoric.

To be Syrian was to revolt, protest and demonstrate peacefully until the revolution was forced to take up arms.

To be Syrian is to know what it means to be played with, to know how it feels to be a reluctant pawn in a game, and to force oneself to sometimes play by its rules to reach a temporary safe haven.

Understanding the struggle

To be Syrian is to know that there will be many practical jokes in this process, all played on us. But to be Syrian is also to be a realist, and to go along with them, because we know what justice means.

Above all, to be Syrian is to be a human being who deserves the right to a life

And justice will be served. Because to be Syrian is to hope. To be Syrian is to see death, and to still have hope that one day, justice will be served. To be Syrian is to merge experience, expertise and opinion – to offer all three for a discounted price, because we are desperate to stem the tide of uninsightful, unintelligent, non-Syrian voices.

Above all, to be Syrian is to be a human being who deserves the right to a life.

And if that needs deliberation and debating among the leaders of this world, to be Syrian is to try very hard not to wish for death to come upon them, too, to enable them to better understand the struggle of being Syrian.

- Razan Saffour is a British Syrian, currently working as a researcher at the TRT World Research Centre. She has completed a masters in history at SOAS, University of London and is active on Syrian matters.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.

Photo: A Syrian man holds a child as buses carrying Jaish al-Islam fighters and their families arrive from their former rebel bastion of Douma at a checkpoint in northern Aleppo province, on 13 April 2018 (AFP)

At the White House correspondents’ dinner, the buzz was reduced to a snore — until Michelle Wolf showed up

Here's what you missed from comedian Michelle Wolf's routine at the 2018 White House correspondents' dinner. (Nicki DeMarco/The Washington Post)

By Paul Farhi April 29 at 12:05 AM

There were no sitcom actors. No Olympians or supermodels or Real Housewives, either. Even some of the usual high-profile media names were missing, too. And for the second consecutive year, so was the president.

The White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday attracted about 3,000 journalists, random plus-ones and curious hangers on, but the usual buzz around the event was reduced to something more like a snore.

The annual social rite of spring in Washington was less the government-meets-Hollywood-meets-the-press glitzfest of yore and more like a dressed-up Kiwanis Club dinner, albeit one televised live by CNN, MSNBC and C-SPAN.

This may have been President Trump’s intent when he turned down an invitation to the dinner, making him 0 for 2 since his inauguration last year. Trump — who distilled his signature hostility toward the news media by branding them “the enemy of the people” — arranged to be out of town while the journalists and their guests partied.

As he did last year, Trump staged a campaign-style rally, this year in Michigan, timing it to begin just as the salad was being served in the Washington Hilton ballroom. Many of the people at the Hilton read that as more than a coincidence. At one point in the speech, Trump eviscerated the media for being “very, very dishonest people.”

Fifteen presidents have attended the correspondents’ dinner since it began in 1921, which has made the event a hot ticket long before the likes of Bradley Cooper and Scarlett Johansson began showing up. The presidents-in-the-house streak ran to 36 consecutive years until Trump pooped out on the party last year. The last time Trump attended, in 2011, he sat stoically as the evening’s entertainer, Seth Meyers, dropped comic bombs on him. The prospect of it happening again seems to have deterred him from returning.

Trump did make one gesture toward press-administration glasnost, encouraging current and former members of his administration to attend (the White House announced last year that no staff employees would attend in “solidarity” with the president’s snub). And so Kellyanne Conway, Sean Spicer and Reince Priebus showed up. Omarosa Manigault-Newman came, too (accompanied by a fellow who tended to the train of her gown). Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders occupied a seat at the head table at the invitation of the White House Correspondents’ Association.

The celebrity cadre was small and not quite A-list: comic and Trump controversialist Kathy Griffin, Comedy Central host Jordan Klepper, Baltimore Orioles legend Brooks Robinson, Stormy Daniels attorney and ubiquitous TV presence Michael Avenatti.

The political contingent was modest as well. Among the pols in attendance were former Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe (D), former New Jersey governor Chris Christie (R), Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) and Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.).

Tech luminaries? Titans of business? TV network chiefs? Not so many.

It was possible, one guest quipped, that Trump had done something he doesn’t usually do: He made an event more normal.

The sedate and earnest nature of the event was disrupted by comedian Michelle Wolf, the evening’s entertainer, who predictably went after Trump in a routine that swerved from raunchy to downright nasty. She began by saying, “Like a porn star says when she’s about to have sex with a Trump, let’s get this over with.”

Wolf vowed to get under Trump’s skin by questioning his wealth, issuing a call and response with the audience (“How broke is he?”). Her punchline included such quips as, “He’s so broke . . . he has to fly failed business class” and “he looked for foreign oil in Don Jr.’s hair.”

She was particularly harsh on the women associated with Trump. At one point, she compared Ivanka Trump to a diaper pail, and said Kellyanne Conway has “the perfect last name” because “all she does is lie.” Several cracks about Sarah Huckabee Sanders landed poorly, such as her alleged confusion over how to refer to Sanders’s full name: “Is it Sarah Sanders? Is it Sarah Huckabee Sanders? . . . What’s ‘Uncle Tom’ but for white women who disappoint other white women? Oh, I know: ‘Aunt Coulter.’ ”

Groans and cold silence followed.

In place of celebrity glitz, the correspondents’ group has tried to rebrand its party as a celebration of the First Amendment, a fundraiser for journalism scholarships and an awards ceremony. Winners of White House reporting awards this year included: the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman, whom Trump disparaged in a tweet last week; a CNN team consisting of Jake Tapper, Evan Perez, Jim Sciutto and Carl Bernstein; Washington Post reporter Josh Dawsey, recognized for his work at Politico; and a team from Reuters.

And maybe that’s how it should be, Tapper indicated during a pre-dinner cocktail party.

“This might be a precedent that the president is setting that is good,” he said. “We in the media have constantly for years been accused of being too cozy with power — during the Bush years, during the Obama years. Maybe no U.S. president should ever feel comfortable in a room full of White House reporters. I know that’s not why he’s taking a stand, but maybe it’s a good thing.”

The WHCA’s current president, Bloomberg News’ White House reporter Margaret Talev, called the president’s absence “unfortunate.”

But she added, “Our tradition of inviting U.S. presidents, vice presidents and their staffs exists not because of the individual president but because of the office. Those who accept the invitation are signaling that they support the constitutional principles at stake and the role of the press and free speech in our republic.”

News organizations seemed to get that, quickly snapping up all of the available tables within the first week they were on sale.

That meant that more than the usual number of actual journalists got to attend, lending the affair a kind of industry reunion vibe.

“Maybe ultimately this should be more about the First Amendment, and about recognizing good journalism and about recognizing student journalists,” Tapper said. “Maybe this is not as glamorous and fun, but ultimately maybe this is what this event should be more like.”

A Trump U.N. Pick Tries to Make Up for Anti-Muslim Tweets

Ken Isaacs once proposed building a wall in the Alps to keep out migrants. Trump wants him to lead the world’s principal migration agency.

Ken Isaacs, the U.S. candidate to head the International Organization for Migration, at a press briefing in Geneva on March 19. (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP/Getty Images)

BY COLUM LYNCH-

APRIL 26, 2018, 7:41 AM

If there were ever a candidate for Twitter purgatory, it would have to be Ken Isaacs, who upended his White House-backed campaign to lead the U.N. migration agency with a series of tweets denigrating Islam.

For the past few weeks, Isaacs has been traveling to foreign capitals in Europe and Africa in the company of White House and State Department escorts, seeking forgiveness as he tries to rescue his bid by persuading foreign dignitaries, including Pope Francis, that he is not the sum of his tweets and that he can be trusted to lead the International Organization for Migration (IOM) without religious bias. In a sign of the importance of his candidacy, Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, will host a reception on May 3 to introduce U.N. ambassadors to Isaacs in New York.

The State Department declined to make Isaacs available for an interview. But Isaacs agreed to respond to written questions.

“I have apologized publicly for social media comments that have caused hurt,” he writes. “I ask people to judge me on my professional record and the decades of work I have done to help people in need around the world.”

Despite persistent misgivings about the U.S. candidate’s temperament, Isaacs maintains the edge as the front-runner because key powers, particularly in Europe, are unwilling to challenge the Americans’ traditional hold on the job out of concern that it might provoke the United States to pull IOM funding or cost them Washington’s support for other national priorities, several diplomatic sources say.

The United States is the single largest donor to IOM, contributing more than 30 percent of the some $1 billion the organization receives in voluntary donations each year.

“We are not going to take the fight [to the United States] out of fear of pushing the U.S. away and [damaging] our bilateral relations,” one senior European diplomat says. That view, the diplomat says, is “fairly widely held” among European governments.

The nomination of such a controversial candidate will serve as a test of the United States’ ability to maintain its leadership position on the multilateral stage at a time when the White House has expressed disdain for international institutions from the International Criminal Court to the World Trade Organization. It will also determine whether the United States will be forced to pay a diplomatic cost for imposing sharp budget cuts on key agencies, including the U.N. Population Fund and the U.N. Relief and Works Agency.

More than a year ago, the White House budget office proposed steep cuts on U.N. humanitarian programs, including UNICEF. But when the White House put forward a candidate, Henrietta Fore, to lead the children’s agency, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres quickly appointed her.
Likewise, the White House’s threat to hollow out U.S. funding for humanitarian programs had little impact on Guterres’s decision to appoint its chosen candidate, former South Carolina Gov. David Beasley, as executive director of the World Food Program (WFP).

In a sense, fear of such cuts has strengthened the U.S. argument for placing loyalists of President Donald Trump in key agencies on the grounds that they could do a better job of convincing the White House to keep paying the bill. And in the end, some of the most draconian calls for cuts have been rejected by the U.S. Congress, which favors a more robust foreign aid program.

“It can help to have old Republican hands acting as bridges between the U.N. and Washington in the current climate,” says Richard Gowan, a U.N. expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations.

Beasley’s and Fore’s tenure so far has “turned out better than expected,” he says. “Beasley actually got the U.S. to raise its contributions to WFP last year.”

But the race to lead the U.N. migration agency presents a tougher challenge. The IOM director-general will be chosen by the organization’s 169 member states, some of which are predominantly Muslim countries likely to be offended by an evangelical Christian who has made disparaging remarks about Muslims on social media.

Adding to the uncertainty over the outcome, delegates will vote in a secret ballot, raising the possibility that Isaacs could still fall short of the two-thirds majority he needs. Countries disinclined to openly challenge Isaacs in public may quietly register their protest at the ballot. “We won’t vote for him,” one European diplomat confides.

“It would be a watershed if the American-nominated candidate doesn’t fill this position,” says Keith Harper, a former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. “We should see that as extremely problematic. It would be a barometer of where we are in our diplomacy.”

Isaacs is facing challenges from a Portuguese candidate, António Vitorino, and a Latin American candidate from Costa Rica, Laura Thompson, who currently serves as the deputy director-general of IOM.

In a recent visit to Portugal, the Arab League’s secretary-general, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, said he is sure that “the Arab nations will join in support of the Portuguese candidate.” But he stopped short of endorsing Vitorino.

In any event, the Islamic bloc in IOM is weaker than in other international institutions because several influential Muslim countries — including Indonesia, Iraq, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates — are not members of the migration agency and therefore cannot vote.
Portugal has struggled to rally European support for its candidate, according to diplomats. Other European countries with track records promoting migration, including Germany and Ireland, have also decided not to mount a challenge to the United States.

Other countries sounded out Germany about the prospect of committing to a European candidate, but it demurred on the grounds that challenging the Americans on migration could undercut its own priorities, including its long-standing effort to convince the United States to support Berlin’s bid for a permanent U.N. Security Council seat, according to two diplomatic sources.

IOM was established in 1951 to handle the resettlement of millions of Europeans displaced by World War II, with a mandate to promote “humane and orderly migration.” With the exception of a brief period in the 1960s, when a Dutch national ran the agency, an American has led IOM, and the United States has provided the largest contributions.

Isaacs is a veteran humanitarian worker who has overseen all international relief projects for Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian aid organization run by Franklin Graham, the son of the evangelist Billy Graham. He has managed virtually every major relief operation for the organization since the early 1990s, from the Rwandan genocide to the Ebola crisis in Liberia. He also served as the director of the Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance, leading the U.S. response to the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and the 2005 earthquake in Pakistan.

But he has often viewed humanitarianism as part of a broader mission of converting people to Christianity. He once characterized the African AIDS crisis as an unprecedented “evangelism opportunity.” Isaacs says the remarks were delivered as part of an effort that led to the distribution of antiviral drugs to HIV/AIDS patients around the world, “saving millions of lives. The call for Christians to come to action is one of my greatest accomplishments.”

The U.S. case for the leadership position at IOM took a hit in early December 2017 when the White House decided to pull out of international negotiations on the creation of a global pact on migration.

About two months later, the Washington Post reported that Isaacs, a vice president of Samaritan’s Purse, had produced a series of tweets suggesting that Islam was an intrinsically violent religion and that Christians should be granted special treatment.

Last summer, after terrorists attacked London, CNN International tweeted an interview with a Catholic bishop who insisted that Islam did not condone such acts. “This isn’t in the name of God, this isn’t what the Muslim faith asks people to do,” the bishop said.

In response, Isaacs quote-tweeted CNN, writing, “Bishop, if you read the Quran you will know ‘this’ is exactly what the Muslim faith instructs the faithful to do.”

CNN, meanwhile, unearthed some other damaging tweets, including one suggesting building a wall in the Alps to keep migrants out.

Still, those revelations would have been enough to derail most candidates. But Isaacs, backed by a team of White House and State Department officials, has campaigned actively in Europe and Africa, two vote-rich regions, visiting Algeria, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Switzerland, where he met with scores of delegates at the U.N.’s Geneva headquarters.

Isaacs says his interactions with foreign delegates, including those from Muslim countries, have been “very positive” and that his remark about the Alps was simply meant as “sarcasm.”

He also says he bears no ill will against Muslims.

“As a person of faith, I have deep respect for people of all faiths, including followers of Islam,” he writes. “My faith will not conflict in anyway with leading IOM. I treat all people equally.”

The administration has also faced outside criticism for its choice. The Anti-Defamation League, which fights anti-Semitism, and Emgage Action, a political advocacy group that champions the civil rights of Muslim Americans, urged former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to withdraw his nomination.

Isaacs is “literally one of the worst people you could put for this job of trying to address the unprecedented problem of refugees and migrants — a good chunk of them are Muslims,” says Wa’el Alzayat, a former State Department Middle East expert who heads Emgage.

“You need a neutral, compassionate advocate who is genuinely seeking to do what is right irrespective of religious or ethnic considerations, not somebody who comes in with such stated biases,” he says. “He has gone out of his way to denigrate them in public undisciplined ways. I mean, ‘Let’s build a wall in the Alps.’”

The State Department has produced a video depicting his on-the-ground relief efforts in South Sudan and Bangladesh, where he is operating a program to provide relief to Rohingya Muslims. “I will support governments to safeguard humane migration management without sacrificing security and national sovereignty,” he says with a musical track playing in the background.

And he has received support from aid workers who worked with him in Africa. His personal website opens with a quote from the New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof saying,

“He has been tireless in fighting for oppressed and desperate people of every faith and complexion.”

Mukesh Kapila, a former U.N. relief official who worked closely with Isaacs in Sudan and South Sudan, defends him. “He is not a person who is anti-Muslim or anti-anyone, except those who have committed crimes,” he says. “I have been an admirer of the humanitarian programs Samaritan Purse did in South Sudan and the Nuba mountains where no one else would tread.”

Others maintain that Isaacs’s remarks should make him unelectable.

Before the reports of his tweets emerged, Anne Richard, a former assistant secretary of state for population, refugees, and migration, said she viewed Isaacs as a “legitimate” candidate who brought an impressive record of field work. “But in my view,” she adds now, “the tweets should disqualify him, and that hasn’t happened.”

Will America go to war ?

2018-04-28

A speech by General George Patton, a famous World War 2 warrior, has an uncanny resemblance to the philosophy of Donald Trump. “All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle. Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser -- Americans despise cowards. Americans play to win -- all the time. That’s why Americans have never lost, nor ever will lose a war, for the very thought of losing is hateful to Americans.”

Then came the Korean War (a stalemate), Vietnam (a loss), Afghanistan (mired in unconquerable mountains), Iraq 2 (a quagmire).

Never mind the failures, with Trump in the saddle a new toughness is apparent. He’s in the middle of conflicts with North Korea, Russia, Iran, Syria, China, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, and in Niger and Mali. “Fire and Fury”, aimed at North Korea, is in danger down the road of becoming his mantra.

Recall that the US commander in Korea, General Douglas MacArthur, advocated using 34 nuclear weapons on targets in Korea and China. Polls today show that a majority of Americans would think it right to use them if America were attacked. Obama would never have pressed the button. I wouldn’t be so sure about Trump sometime over the next few years.

Never mind the failures, with Trump in the saddle a new toughness is apparent. He’s in the middle of conflicts with North Korea, Russia, Iran, Syria, China, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, and in Niger and Mali

Where are the risks?

Russia -- Trump has pushed for a fast build up of America’s military might, including nuclear weapons, even though America has a military expenditure as high as the combined total of Russia, China, Japan, Britain, France, Saudi Arabia and India. He has no plan to discuss arms cuts, to take missiles off hair-trigger alert nor to take up ex-president Dmitri Medvedev’s important proposal for a new European Security Treaty. This would deal with Russia’s anger at the expansion of Nato up to its borders, while getting Russia’s soldiers out of Ukraine and ending its military manoeuvers in and around the Baltic.

Ukraine needs to be de-militarised but Trump has decided to arm the government with sophisticated weapons. To deal with rebel demands the reasonable request for decentralization - as practised in Britain - should be met.

China -- Trump has provoked China unnecessarily over Taiwan. This small island which has provided much of China’s investment is claimed by Beijing to be part of China. It is not. But it should not, as a counter move, declare independence, a policy that Trump seems to lean to. Rather it should realize the quiet status quo is the only policy worth its weight.

Trump is aggravated by Chinese claims to islands in the South and East China seas. US warplanes already cross the borders of China’s Air Defence Identification Zones. In the 1950s the US nearly went to war with China over the off-shore islands of Quemoy and Matsu, owned by Taiwan. President Dwight Eisenhower considered using nuclear weapons. Eventually China did pull back.

These days no one in their right mind wants to provoke a major war fought over tiny uninhabited islands. If this be true then the Pentagon should be ordered to take its military far away, so war cannot happen. On the economic front there is a danger that Trump is initiating a trade war which in the long run will lead to a US defeat. China has most of the cards. The total size of its economy is fast catching up with the US. It could buy its planes from Airbus rather than Boeing etc. It can start selling its vast savings in US Treasury bonds.

Iran- To Trump Iran is the source of all the problems of the Middle East: “From Lebanon to Iraq to Yemen, Iran funds, arms and trains terrorists, militias and other extremist groups that spread destruction and chaos across the region”. Trump has gone to great lengths to make sure Saudi Arabia benefits politically and militarily from his views, even though for years its government has permitted funds to be sent to Al Qaeda. Such an attitude undermines the job of making ISIS and Al Qaeda the primary targets, as they should be. It is Iran, Iran, Iran, even though Iran is a force for defeating extremists. Yet Iran can be negotiated with as the US discovered when it succeeded in sealing a highly important de-nuclearisation agreement. Trump wants to rip that accord open, even though he should know that North Korea will never trust a US deal if that’s what happens two years later.
North Korea -- Negotiations are now underway between the North and the US. If they work then that should be an example for how to deal with other problems. If they fail, then we should worry that Trump might lead us into a nuclear war.

With Obama, even though he made grave mistakes, one felt there was a momentum towards peace. With Trump it just seems to be, North Korea excepted at the moment, a momentum to war.

For 17 years, the writer was a foreign affairs columnist and commentator for the International Herald Tribune/New York Times.

Reasons for Modi’s unprecedented foray into China

Saturday, 28 April 2018

In an unprecedented move welcomed by all sections in India and China, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Chinese President Xi Jinping decided to have an unstructured, informal, one-on-one meeting with each other in Wuhan spread over two days beginning on Friday 27 April.

Through such unconventional diplomacy, the two leaders hope to thrash out all issues dividing the Asian giants and put them on a path of peace, cooperation and progress.

The attempt will be to look beyond the exigencies of the present and work out a “shared future” (to use Xi’s expression) in a world which is rapidly changing in direction not conceived before.

The dominant power in the region and the world since World War II, the United States, is confused under the stewardship of Donald Trump. At any rate, the US appears to be a declining power in the face of China’s unparalleled rise, and Russia’s resurgence.

And, as Tang Lu, Research Fellow at Xinhua’s Think Tank points out in her recent article, Modi has not got what he expected from the Trump Administration, despite having good personal vibes with Trump himself.

The American policy of using economic sanctions and military action to cow down Third World countries has been driving the latter into the waiting arms of China, the rising power.

China, and not the West, is now the aid giver and development financier of the world, and countries wanting to pull themselves out of poverty and under development by their bootstraps, are now eagerly accepting China’s largesse running into billions of dollars, disregarding the West’s dark warnings of a debt trap.

As the Sri Lankan developmental expert Prof. H.M.S.K. Hennayake put it: “The West comes with a bag full of advice and but not a cent.” In short, the West does not address the felt needs of the developing world.

Ironically, the original apostle of free trade and globalisation, the US, is now a practitioner of protectionism, and China, a classic case of a closed economy, is now an advocate of free trade and globalisation through its Belt and Road and other initiatives.

For Modi to solve some of the problems India faces, such as funding for infrastructural development, tackling terror-sponsoring Pakistan, and entering the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group, (NSG) a friendly China is a sine qua non.

Firstly, it is only China which can infuse huge funds into infrastructural development in India, which is a crying need of the hour. And if India is to join the Nuclear Suppliers’ Club, and get the UN to list the Pakistan-based terrorist Masood Azhar as a global terrorist, it has to get China on board through an attractive deal.

It makes sense to develop a new synergy with China so that these hurdles are crossed and India is put on the path of development to satisfy the yearnings of its ever burgeoning, aspirational and vocal middle class.

Past efforts have paid off

In the past, Indian leaders have broken the ice with China by making path breaking visits. But Modi’s effort has been different, at once secretive and dramatic, in keeping with his political style. Secondly, as Tang Lu, pointed out, the Modi-Xi meeting will be the longest informal interaction between an Indian and a Chinese top leader. It will be over two days. This is why so much is expected of the “Wuhan moment,” Tang Lu says.

Every earlier move towards rapprochement between India and China has paid off. It was Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi who broke the ice with China by his visit to Beijing in 1988, the first by an Indian PM after the 1962 military conflict. Rajiv’s foray resulted in the two sides pledging adherence to the Five Principles of Co-existence worked out by Jawaharlal Nehru and Chou-En-Lai in 1954.

The push factor in Rajiv Gandhi’s case was his commitment to putting India on a path of development through a combination of economic liberalisation and settlement of political disputes by entering into Agreements.

Then came Prime Ministers P.V. Narasimha Rao and A.B. Vajpayee, both of whom sought a détente with China to further their liberalised economic agendas at home. Narasimha’s Rao visit resulted in the signing of the very successful ‘Peace and Tranquillity Agreement’ on the India-China border in 1993. The pact opened the door for bilateral trade which was abysmally low at that time. Thanks to the opening up, China has now become India’s single largest trading partner.

Vajpayee’s visit to China, which took place in 2003, obtained “equal security” for India and China on the border, and ensured the continuity of the 1993 pact. The brief Vajpayee had given to his diplomats was that they should improve bilateral relations and do whatever it took to get there. This encouraged out-of-the-box thinking.

The net result of these efforts is that, till date, and even during the Doklam standoff in 2017, not a shot has been fired by either side on the 1,400 km long Sino-Indian border since 1962. Contrast this with the situation on the border with Pakistan, where not a day passes without firing across the border.

With trade came investment, but this did not go up to the levels desired because of India’s security considerations.

However, according to Forbes, there is a lot of Chinese investment and these are under the radar because they come via third countries. But what is worrying is the burgeoning trade deficit caused by China’s barriers and its policy of buying primary and intermediate goods from India and selling manufactured goods.

Even as trade was booming India-China relations kept seeing setbacks at the political level. China was supporting Pakistan’s nuclear armament and turning a blind eye to its cross border terrorism. China built the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) across Gilgit-Baltistan over which India has a claim.

Above all, in 2017, China tried to seize Doklam in Bhutan, which India considered a dangerous encroachment. However, despite war cries from both sides, a military confrontation was deftly avoided by quiet diplomacy.

Need for peace

Given the possibility of a war adversely affecting the Indian economy and upsetting his chances of coming back in the 2019 elections, Modi initiated deft moves for peace. At the BRICS summit in Xiamen, China, in September 2017, Modi is said to have hinted to the Chinese side that he would like to have a one-on-one with Xi at the earliest. Though the Chinese did not explicitly commit themselves, they did send positive signals.

China signed the ‘Xiamen Declaration’ which mentioned the dangers posed by Pakistan-based Islamic terror groups and emphasised that “those responsible for committing, organising, or supporting terrorist acts must be held accountable.”

Modi and Xi met on the sidelines of the summit. Commenting on it, China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Geng Shuang said the Xi and Modi were for “sound and stable” China-India relations. She pointed out that Xi emphasised that China and India are “each other’s important neighbour” and should focus on “seeking common ground while shelving differences and upholding peace and tranquillity in our border areas” to bring the bilateral relationship “on a right track,” under the “guidance of Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence”.

The reference to the “Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence” drafted by Nehru and Chou En Lai in 1954 during the heyday of the India-China friendship was significant.

India joins China-led institution

Shedding its reserve about being in an organisation led by China, India joined the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). India now has many projects funded by the AIIB. India did this despite the fact that it was opposed to China’s One Belt One Road (OBOR) Initiative on the grounds that it abridged India’ sovereignty over undivided Kashmir.

India is also part of BCIM (Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar Economic Corridor) where China is a key player. But India and China are locked in conflict in the BCIM over India’s trade deficit with China which accounts for 45% of its overall trade deficit.

However, there is light at the end of the tunnel here. At the recent economic forum at Bauo, Xi unveiled plans to further open up the economy for foreign investment and spoke passionately for free trade. This should open the door to exports from India.

In his meeting with Xi, Prime Minister Modi is expected to seek certain assurances in this regard. And Xi is expected to respond favourably. India in turn may open up for Chinese investments. There is already an offer to China to build a fast rail link between Bengaluru and Chennai.