by Alex Evans | Jan 14, 2011 | South Asia
Some very plain speaking on Afghanistan from David Miliband in the Telegraph yesterday, in a piece written to coincide with the commemoration of Richard Holbrooke’s life in DC.
While international forces are “suppressing” the insurgency, he notes reports that “unpublished UN security assessments [show] a marked deterioration in security. That, he continues, “tallies with extremely worrying reports of the insurgency spreading into the far north of the country”. He suggests the need for a twin-track approach:
Track one is an internal political settlement. Western influence is currently limited to ineffective and unspecified “pressure” on President Karzai. We need to be far more up front about our end game: a decentralised series of political settlements in the villages and valleys of Afghanistan, with security forces limited to holding the ring and keeping al-Qaeda out.
But this track will never get going unless track two – the track of regional political engagement – has real legs. This means agreements which recognise the divergent interests of the different neighbouring countries, from Pakistan to Iran. At the moment, it is a free-for-all – a recipe for the slide to ethnic enmity that Yvette Cooper, the shadow foreign secretary, has highlighted, and even renewed civil war that would be the most awful epitaph to Western engagement.
by Alex Evans | Jan 13, 2011 | Climate and resource scarcity, Economics and development
So much for my observation a week ago that the new record high on the FAO Food Price Index hadn’t led to widespread unrest yet – almost immediately afterwards, Algeria erupted in rioting, as was widely reported at the time. But two other developments in the past week are worth noting too:
First, the major dust-up underway in Argentina between farmers’ organisations and the government, over the charged issue of export restrictions. The government wants to limit wheat exports to only 8 million tonnes of the country’s 14 million tonne total. Farmers are furious, as they want to export more. As the FT’s Beyond BRICs blog notes, “The breakdown in talks heralds the end of an uneasy peace that has existed between the two sides since a bitter conflict in 2008 over taxes levied on soya exports. That led to farmers blocking roads, food shortages in Argentina’s major cities, a drastic fall in exports and a subsequent price rise on world grain markets.”
Second, the US government just cut stock forecasts dramatically for key grain crops, pushing corn and soya to their highest level since the price spike – so much for my observation that so far, the new price spike wasn’t afflicting grains all that much. Here’s the money quote, again courtesy of the FT:
Dan Basse, president of AgResource, a Chicago-based forecaster, added: “There’s just no room for error any more. With any kind of weather problem in the upcoming growing season we will make new all-time highs in corn and soy, and to a lesser degree wheat futures.”
by Alex Evans | Jan 12, 2011 | Cooperation and coherence, UK
Here’s the webcast of our appearance in front of the UK Foreign Affairs Select Committee earlier today – you’ll need to have MS Silverlight installed on your PC.
by Richard Gowan | Jan 12, 2011 | Influence and networks, Off topic, UK
Do you live in London? Do you have plans for Tuesday 8 February? Does this event at the Southbank Centre sound like your idea of a good time?
Following the success of the 2010 sell-out Think Tank Clash we’ve invited the UK’s leading think tanks including Demos, IPPR, ResPublica, Policy Exchange, Reform, the Fabian Society and others to compete in Think Tank Clash II hosted by writer, broadcaster and comedy scriptwriter John O’Farrell, author of The Best a Man Can Get.
Based on the model of a sound system clash, some of the leading minds of the UK’s think tanks compete to persuade the audience with the power of their ideas. Calling on star witnesses to support their arguments, Think Tank Clash II examines notions of truth, justice, respect and community in a series of tightly timed sessions. No jargon allowed, no rambling and no abstentions as the audience decides who wins.
Ideas are the new house music! Policy geeks are the new Chemical Brothers!!
I despair.
by Alistair Burnett | Jan 12, 2011 | Conflict and security, Europe and Central Asia
I’ve written on the BBC Editors site about whether the Kosovo intervention is being reassessed in the light of allegations against Prime Minister Thaci
Kosovo has been back on the front pages in recent weeks with lurid allegations against its Prime Minister and dominant politician, Hashim Thaci, accusing him of involvement in organised crime and even harvesting human organs for sale for profit. Mr Thaci has denied the allegations.
Mr Thaci has also been in the news as his party was accused of vote rigging in last month’s parliamentary elections which were the first organised by the Kosovo government. This week, the vote had to be rerun in some of Mr Thaci’s strongholds and a new government should be formed in the next few weeks.
Why is this interesting to people who don’t follow affairs in south east Europe closely? Read More
