BEIRUT, Sept 13 — The European Union’s commissioner for crisis management yesterday called for the urgent formation of a “credible” government in Lebanon before a second phase of financial support for the crisis-hit country can be released.

Janez Lenarcic said the EU had mobilised €64 million (RM314.9 million) for the emergency response to a devastating port blast that killed more than 190 people and wounded thousands in Beirut on August 4.

The next round of funding would be for reconstruction, he said, but warned it would have to go hand in hand with reforms because the international community was not willing to support practices “that led to financial collapse and economic crisis”.

The tragedy occurred when hundreds of tonnes of ammonium nitrate fertiliser that had been left unattended in a port warehouse exploded.

It came as the Lebanese people were already reeling from the country’s worst economic crisis in decades and rekindled smouldering rage over official neglect and a political class accused of corruption.

The government resigned in the wake of the disaster, but Lebanon has rejected an international investigation, saying it would carry out its own probe aided by foreign experts.

“We need a credible government that enjoys the confidence of the Lebanese people and is determined to take the country in the right direction,” Lenarcic told AFP after arriving in Lebanon on board a humanitarian aid flight.

“Lebanon’s political class has to provide what people demand and this is also what the international community expects. I’m talking about governance, not only economic reforms. There has to be a change in the way this place is governed,” he said.

Lebanon’s worst economic crunch since the 1975-1990 war has seen the local currency plummet against the US dollar and poverty double to more than half of the population. The government has blamed central bank governor Riad Salameh for the crisis, though he has rejected all charges.

Lenarcic said reaching an agreement with the IMF should also be an early priority for the next government.
The IMF said on Thursday it was ready to “redouble its efforts” to help Lebanon “overcome the social and economic crisis” once a new government was in place.

“The EU commission supports reaching an agreement with the IMF because that would unlock substantial resources that Lebanon desperately needs to revive its economy,” Lenarcic said.

Referring to the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, he said it was a “reality in Lebanon”, adding that “we would like to see the entire Lebanese political class unite behind the task”.

Hezbollah has long been targeted by US sanctions and blacklisted as a “terrorist” organisation, but the Shiite group is also a powerful political player with seats in Lebanon’s parliament

“We believe it should play its part in this effort,” he said. — AFP

There was a consistent message from business leaders to international trade secretary Liz Truss’s claims that she had signed a “historic” deal with Japan to lower tariffs and gain access to previously restricted markets.

Thank you, they said, but could you please sign a deal with the EU because that is our most important export market.

Truss is not a minister to be moved by such demands. The former chief secretary to the Treasury has a mission to bolt together as many trade deals with non-EU countries as she can while No 10 takes on the task of signing a comprehensive agreement with Brussels. Officials at the signing ceremony with Japan confirmed that the deal was expected to boost UK trade with the world’s third-largest economy by an estimated £15.2bn, though there was no date by which this figure would be achieved.

It would also add only 0.07% to UK gross domestic product, which compares with forecasts by government economists of a 5% loss of GDP from leaving the EU customs union and single market.

No wonder Mike Hawes, the boss of car lobby group the SMMT, and Adam Marshall, head of the British Chambers of Commerce, were quick to point out that a deal with the EU was far more important.

Truss was undaunted, though her attempts so far to sign other significant deals, and especially with the US, have proved fruitless.

Under normal circumstances, a deal with the US is not a priority. It might be the largest economy in the world and the single largest destination for UK goods and services exports outside the EU, but it is an open market characterised by low import tariffs. That was the situation until Donald Trump began his bruising battle with China over what he claimed were trade barriers damaging to US companies. In the last couple of years this trade war has expanded to take in the EU.

Importantly for Truss, the UK has been one of the biggest losers. In particular, single malt Scotch whisky has suffered from a 25% import tariff, pricing it out of the US market.

Truss needs to win over the US to push trade tariffs back down to more normal levels, or better still to zero. However, there is a high price to be paid for favours in Washington. Farmers are an especially powerful lobby group in the US and want full access to foreign markets as the price of any trade deal. They expect Congress to abide by this maxim, and it usually does.

Before the US pulled out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal that included Australia, Vietnam and Japan, Washington had extracted concessions for US beef and other farm produce that were effectively banned in many TPP countries up to that point.

The former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott, who last week officially joined Truss’s advisory board, has long wrestled with criticism that his determination to sign trade deals meant that many domestic industries were thrown overboard, including agriculture and manufacturing.

Truss is under pressure to protect UK agriculture from being steamrollered by cheap US produce. If she is to uphold farming standards – ones that would allow the continued export of livestock and food to the EU – Truss must not lower UK rules in order to give access to industrial-scale farmers in the US who use growth hormones on their beef and chlorine washes on their chicken.

Whether to comply with the US or the EU rules is not a question that troubles business leaders. It is the EU every time.

This makes sense when you consider the numbers. If you include services industries, imports and exports between Britain and the EU were worth a total of £672.5bn last year, more than 20 times the value of UK-Japan trade and three times the £200bn sent back and forth to the US. A deal with the EU will be the historic prize.

A woman has got to the top of Wall St. But others still face a climb

The appointment this week of the first female leader of a Wall Street bank was greeted with a roar of approval. Jane Fraser, the Scottish-American banker from St Andrews who will lead Citi, is “a pioneer”, declared David Solomon over at Goldman Sachs.

It is indeed a landmark moment. But, now that a breakthrough has finally happened on Wall Street, a bastion of corporate maleness, should we expect a rush of female appointments? Don’t bet a cent on it. That hasn’t been the wider experience in the US or the UK.

The first woman to become chief executive of a FTSE 100 company was Dame Marjorie Scardino in 1997, and her appointment at Pearson was similarly hailed as groundbreaking. Almost a quarter of a century later, one can say the predicted rush of female FTSE bosses was a trickle. The highest number within the 100-strong club at any one time has been seven. Within banking, the first female chief executive of a UK top-four firm was Alison Rose at NatWest Group, appointed as recently as last year.

It’s true that the UK’s top boardrooms overall have become less male over the years. A third of board positions at FTSE 100 companies are held by women, the Hampton-Alexander Review found this year.

Yet the review also highlighted a “concerning lack of female representation in senior leadership and key executive roles” in FTSE 350 companies: only 15 female finance directors among FTSE 100 firms, for example.

In the US, the picture is similar: progress, but painfully slow. Only 31 women lead S&P 500 firms. On Wall Street, there are two men for every woman on banks’ operating committees, according to Bloomberg. Fraser’s success is a personal triumph, but the corporate world has not undergone a revolution.

Rio resignations signal the end for profit without accountability

When Rio Tinto announced last week that its chief executive, Jean-Sébastien Jacques, would be stepping down, it marked a new low for the mining giant – but potentially also an inflection point in corporate accountability.

Jacques resigned, alongside two other senior bosses, after investors lined up to condemn the company’s leadership for overseeing the destruction of an Australian heritage site of importance to Indigenous communities.

The world’s biggest iron ore miner destroyed two ancient caves in Pilbara, Western Australia, after blowing up the Juukan Gorge rock shelters, which held irreplaceable artefacts.

The executive clearout was by “mutual agreement”, according to a statement, but it should send a clear signal to others culpable for environmental destruction in the pursuit of corporate profit.

Environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) may once have been regarded as a box-ticking exercise for company executives, but growing public intolerance of shoddy ESG standards can no longer be ignored. Investors, too, are unwilling to turn a blind eye to poor practice.

If the 2015 Samarco dam disaster, which resulted from a joint venture between miners BHP Billiton and Vale, had happened today it is difficult to imagine that executives would be let off as lightly as they were at the time.

The dam’s collapse left 19 dead, hundreds homeless and is considered the single worst environmental disaster in Brazil’s history. For Andrew Mackenzie, BHP’s then boss, it meant sacrificing a short-term bonus, even though hundreds living near the dam are still without homes.

The past loss of life and natural heritage at the hands of mining companies can never be replaced. But the swift condemnation of reckless corporate greed today could help safeguard the future.

Scenes of devastation and desperation at the burnt-out refugee camp at Moria, on the Greek island of Lesbos, are powerful reminders that Europe’s migrant crisis never really ended. The response of EU member states and close neighbours such as Britain has, with some exceptions, once again been shamefully inadequate. The fact that these failures are familiar does not lessen the immediate, dreadful human impact of this latest tragedy, nor does it obviate the urgent need to find lasting solutions.

If fire had not destroyed most of the Moria camp last week, leaving up to 13,000 people without food, water and shelter, it’s a safe bet most of Europe would have continued to turn a blind eye to what was already a scandal on its doorstep. Repeated pleas by local people and the Greek government for more EU support and solidarity would have continued to be ignored. Pictures of small children and bereft families, deprived of all they own, squatting by the roadside or in filthy doorways, have pricked consciences – at least for now.

Charities hope the disaster will prove a permanent turning point. “The Moria camp was already unfit for humans before the fire, with four times as many people than it was built for,” said Francesco Rocca, head of the Red Cross and Red Crescent. “Enough is enough. Now is the time to show some humanity and move these people to a healthy, safe and humane place. There are 4,000 children in Moria and no child should have to endure this.”

Germany has again taken the lead in offering help, as it did during the 2015 refugee crisis. Plans have been made to transfer 400 unaccompanied minors to 10 European countries, with about 150 going to Germany. The EU commission said about 1,600 people would be given temporary shelter aboard a ferry. After visiting the area, commission vice-president Margaritis Schinas promised a larger, more modern facility would be built at the same location.

These are mere stop-gap measures and many locals and migrants oppose replacing the destroyed camp at all. But, as in the past, political obstacles at the national level are preventing a more comprehensive response. Several German regions and cities have offered to take in refugees. In Berlin, about 3,000 people took to the streets last week to demand a more generous attitude. “We have room!” they shouted. Moria was a “camp of shame”.

Yet Germany’s interior minister, Horst Seehofer, a critic of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s now-revoked 2015 open-door policy, said the focus should be on providing “help on the ground”. Such caution reflects continuing Europe-wide concern about a resurgence of the anti-immigrant sentiment that has boosted far-right populist and ultra-nationalist groups. It also reflects a divided EU’s repeated failure to agree a common migration and asylum policy based on shared responsibility, though it says new proposals are imminent.

Britain’s reaction to Moria is even more deeply unsatisfactory. Priti Patel, the home secretary, has yet to respond to a letter from the Labour peer Lord Dubs urging admission of unaccompanied children. “The government cannot keep dodging the issue,” he wrote. But it seems determined to try. When the Médecins Sans Frontières charity asked Patel in March to accept more children from Moria and other overcrowded Greek camps threatened by Covid-19, she did not deign to reply.

Quite how Boris Johnson hopes to establish a leading role for “global Britain” when it ducks its share of responsibility for tackling international migration, one of the great global problems of the day, is hard to fathom. Patel pretends to care about the safety of relatively small numbers of migrants crossing the Channel, over which rightwing bigots and xenophobes have kicked up an enormous fuss. Yet she and other ministers have nothing to say about the catastrophe in Moria and no help to offer. How small minded. How demeaning. How very un-British.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh led the Vietnamese delegation to the meetings.

At the ASEAN-EU Ministerial Meeting, both sides emphasised the importance of the relationship between the two regional organisations that are considered the most successful. The two sides acknowledged the positive progress in the bilateral cooperation in recent years, especially in the active implementation of the ASEAN-EU Action Plan for the 2018-2022 period.

For many years, the EU has been the most important partner of ASEAN, especially in economic and development cooperation. The EU is currently the third largest trading partner of ASEAN with a two-way trade reaching US$280 billion in 2019 and the third largest source of foreign investment of ASEAN with a total volume of FDI hitting US$16.2 billion last year.

The ministers affirmed their strong commitment to strengthen the ASEAN-EU comprehensive cooperation relationship in the coming time, and continue promoting their “Partners in Integration” relationship. The two sides welcomed the 22nd ASEAN-EU Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Belgium in January 2019. They shared the view in principle on upgrading ASEAN-EU relations to the level of strategic partnership and agreed to formalise the upgrade soon.

The two sides agreed to continue effectively cooperating in areas of mutual interest and strengths, including economy-trade, connectivity, transport, counter-terrorism, fighting transnational crime, cyber security, marine security and health care. Amid the complicated developments of the COVID-19 pandemic, the two sides agreed to work closely to support capacity building and response to the COVID-19 pandemic and promote recovery.

The EU is one of the first partners to coordinate with ASEAN to successfully organise the ASEAN-EU Ministerial Online Conference on COVID-19 Epidemic Response on March 20, 2020. ASEAN highly valued the EU’s announcement to mobilise a 800 million EUR assistance package for the ASEAN region to prevent and mitigate impacts of COVID-19.

Addressing the event, Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh affirmed that as ASEAN Chair 2020, Vietnam supported efforts to deepen ASEAN-EU relations, towards officially upgrading the bilateral relations to the level of strategic partnership.

Strengthening connectivity plays an important role in promoting economic recovery and maintaining growth, Minh said, and welcomed the EU’s proposal on the ASEAN-EU Joint Ministerial Statement on Connectivity and supported promoting connectivity and complementary to the implementation of the Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity 2025 and the EU Connectivity Strategy.

Deputy PM Pham Binh Minh at the ASEAN-India Ministerial Meeting (Photo: VGP)

At the ASEAN-India Ministerial Meeting, the ministers noted that despite complicated and unpredictable developments, especially the challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the ASEAN- India relations continue to make significant progress across all fields, including the implementation of the ASEAN-India Action Plan 2016-2020.

India affirmed its relationship with ASEAN, emphasising that ASEAN plays a central role in India’s Act East policy. ASEAN highly appreciated India’s commitment and active participation in ASEAN-led mechanisms such as the East Asia Summit (EAS), ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting (ADMM +) and the Expanded ASEAN Maritime Forum (EAMF) as well as India’s support for regional cooperation and ASEAN community building.

The two sides agreed to promote cooperation in the areas of economy, trade and investment; maritime cooperation; counter-terrorism and fighting transnational crime; connectivity; science-technology and innovation; natural disaster prevention, control and mitigation; climate change response, cultural and people-to-people exchange, and narrowing development gaps.

Regarding response to COVID-19, India affirmed to support ASEAN in overcoming the pandemic’s consequences and promoting sustainable recovery and work closely with ASEAN in research and production of COVID-19 vaccines and treatment medicines.

ASEAN appreciated India’s active support for regional cooperation, including capacity building, narrowing the development gaps, and earmarking one billion USD in credit to support projects connecting the two sides.

Addressing the event, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh emphasised the importance of the ASEAN-India strategic partnership and affirmed India as a reliable partner and friend of ASEAN.

ASEAN and India should make efforts to strengthen economic and trade connectivity, and maritime cooperation, while coordinating to fully exploit the 1.8 billion-people market, and strengthening cooperation to achieve two-way trade turnover of 200 billion USD by 2022, Minh said.

He also affirmed the importance of India’s participation in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and emphasised that the RCEP Agreement is always open to India.

In both events, the ministers exchanged views on world and regional issues of common interest. Regarding the East Sea/South China Sea, the ministers continue emphasising the importance of maintaining peace, stability, security, safety, freedom of navigation and aviation; not militarising; avoiding acts that further complicate the situation, and settling disputes in line with international law, including the 1982 UNCLOS.

The meetings supported the full and effective implementation of the Declaration on Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC), and early finalisation of an effective and efficient Code of Conduct in the East Sea (COC) in accordance with international law, including the 1982 UNCLOS.

The EU emphasised the need to respect international law, refrain from tense actions and militarisation, and support efforts to build laws governing behaviour in the region.

India informed the ASEAN countries of the Indo-Pacific Oceans Initiative. The EU welcomed ASEAN to play its role in promoting cooperation, dialogue, building trust in the region, supporting efforts to seriously and fully implement the DOC and develop an effective COC in accordance with international law and the 1982 UNCLOS.

At the meetings, Minh highly appreciated the support of the partners for ASEAN’s efforts to participate in ensuring peace, security, stability and navigation and aviation in the East Sea.

He reaffirmed ASEAN’s principled position and emphasised the need to strengthen trust building, avoid militarisation and acts that erode trust and complicate the situation, and settle disputes in line with international law, including the 1982 UNCLOS, continue the full and effective implementation of DOC, and early finalisation of an effective and efficient Code of Conduct in the East Sea (COC) in accordance with international law, especially the 1982 UNCLOS, contributing to peace, security, stability in the East Sea and the region.

Following the two meetings, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh chaired an international press conference, announcing the outcomes of AMM 53 and Related Meetings. ASEAN Secretary-General Lim Jock Hoi attended the online press conference.

LONDON: Boris Johnson has said his controversial legislation to override parts of his Brexit deal is needed to end EU threats to install a “blockade” in the Irish Sea.

The Prime Minister said Brussels could “carve up our country” and “seriously endanger peace and stability” in Northern Ireland if Conservative MPs rebel to block his Bill. Johnson is working to quell a plan to amend the legislation from senior Tories who are incensed that it could break international law by flouting the Withdrawal Agreement.

The EU criticised the plan as a serious breach of trust that jeopardises peace in Northern Ireland and has threatened legal action if ministers do not alter the UK Internal Market Bill by the end of the month. But the Prime Minister has doubled down and argued it is “crucial for peace and for the Union itself” and said voting it down would reduce the chances of a trade deal with the EU.

Writing in the Telegraph, Johnson said the EU would use an “extreme interpretation” of the Northern Ireland Protocol to impose “a full-scale trade border down the Irish sea” that could stop the transport of food from Britain to Northern Ireland.

“I have to say that we never seriously believed that the EU would be willing to use a treaty, negotiated in good faith, to blockade one part of the UK, to cut it off; or that they would actually threaten to destroy the economic and territorial integrity of the UK,” he added. Johnson said that “in the last few weeks” he learned his negotiators had discovered there “may be a serious misunderstanding about the terms” of the Withdrawal Agreement he signed in October.

He argued it was agreed during “torrid” days with the deadline for a deal fast approaching while “negotiating with one hand tied behind our back” because Parliament blocked a no-deal. “If we fail to pass this Bill, or if we weaken its protections, then we will in fact reduce the chances of getting that Canada-style deal,” he wrote.

“Let’s remove this danger to the very fabric of the United Kingdom. Let’s make the EU take their threats off the table. And let’s get this Bill through, back up our negotiators, and protect our country.” Both Ireland and the EU, however, have warned that Johnson’s plans pose a serious risk to the peace process rather than protecting the Good Friday Agreement.

The Prime Minister on Friday evening held a conference call with around 250 MPs to try and drum up support for the Bill, and warned them against a return to the “miserable, squabbling days of last autumn”. But during the call in which there were connection issues and no questions taken by Mr Johnson further fall-out emerged from the EU. Leaders in the European Parliament said they would “under no circumstances ratify” any trade deal reached if “UK authorities breach or threaten to breach” the Withdrawal Agreement.

Johnson appeared not to have ended the disquiet within his party during the call, with senior backbencher Sir Bob Neill saying he was not reassured by the speech. Sir Bob, who chairs the Commons Justice Committee and is tabling an amendment to the Bill which he says would impose a “parliamentary lock” on any changes to the Withdrawal Agreement, said he still contends it contains “objectionable” elements.

“I believe it is potentially a harmful act for this country, it would damage our reputation and I think it will make it harder to strike trade deals going forward,” he told Channel 4 News.

Amid the worsening atmosphere between London and Brussels, it emerged the EU had even raised the prospect that it could block exports of animal products from the UK once the current Brexit transition period comes to a close at the end of the year.

In a statement following the latest round of talks on Thursday, the EU’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier said there were “many uncertainties” about the UK’s animal hygiene regime. He said “more clarity” was needed if Britain was to receive the “third-country listing” entitling it to export animal products to the EU.

Meanwhile, Gordon Brown joined fellow former prime ministers Theresa May and Sir John Major in condemning the government’s plan, describing it as “a huge act of self-harm”.

On Friday, King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa of Bahrain officially agreed to recognize the State of Israel in a trilateral phone conversation with US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“The EU welcomes the announced establishment of diplomatic relations between the Kingdom of Bahrain and Israel,” the statement, released by the European Council, read.

Brussels acknowledged the role of the United States in facilitating this and a similar landmark agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, describing it as a “positive contribution to peace and stability in the Middle East.”

“The EU recalls its Declaration of 15 August 2020 and its longstanding position that a comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict requires a regional inclusive approach and engagement with both parties. In this regard, the EU remains firm in its commitment to a negotiated and viable two-state solution built upon the internationally agreed parameters,” the statement added.

The European Union reasserted its readiness to support Israel and Palestine in their efforts to resume “meaningful negotiations on all final status issues.”

Bahrain became the fourth Arab country to recognize Israel. The first two were Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994.

On 13 August, Israel and the United Arab Emirates agreed to normalize ties, which among other things entailed Israel giving up its annexation plans in the West Bank. The two countries are planning to sign a variety of agreements for cooperation in investments, tourism, security and other areas in the coming weeks. The US expects other countries of the region to follow the lead.

Palestine has called on fellow Arab nations to reconsider recognizing Israel, which, in turn, has not recognized the Palestinian state.

The United Nations stands by the so-called two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which means a peaceful coexistence of two sovereign states within mutually acceptable borders.

PARIS — The UN secretary general urged European Union members on Saturday to take in thousands of migrants and asylum seekers who have been left homeless and destitute in Greece after a devastating blaze at a camp.

The Moria facility on the Greek island of Lesbos, which previously housed up to 12,000 people, was destroyed overnight on Tuesday after an apparent arson attack by migrants who have long complained about conditions there.

“It’s an immense tragedy,” UN chief Antonio Guterres told French channel TV5monde in an interview broadcast on Saturday. “In my opinion the only solution is transferring these refugees to the continent and I hope there will be European solidarity.”

The former Portuguese prime minister continued: “You can’t expect the country [Greece] on the frontline to resolve everything. There needs to be shared responsibility within the European Union.”

Tensions rose on Lesbos on Saturday after hundreds of asylum seekers protested after a third night of sleeping rough in doorways and by roads.

Police fired teargas when some of them began throwing stones, an AFP reporter at the scene said.

Efforts in the past to create a quota system for refugees in the EU, which would have seen all members agree to take in migrants from frontline countries such as Greece and Italy, have foundered due to divisions.

Right-wing governments in many member states, particularly in Poland and Hungary, refused to sign up to the scheme.

Ten European Union member states have agreed to take in a total of 400 unaccompanied minors from Lesbos, but rights groups say the response so far has been insufficient.

Guterres welcomed a Franco-German initiative to distribute the minors, but said “we need to go further.”