Sanctions on Iran: Mike Pompeo on Tuesday claimed that Iran’s nuclear deal, JCPOA, has gone in the history and requested European countries and other states to join the United States for imposition of ‘Strong Sanctions’ against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
He showed reaction to the increase of Iran’s enriched uranium reserves to 10 times more than that of authorized limit as set in JCPOA.
In his twitter account, Pompeo wrote, “According to reports, Iran’s uranium reserves have reached more than 10 times the limits set in JCPOA. The three European countries and others must turn their eye to the fact that Iran’s nuclear deal has gone in the history and they should accompany US for imposition of strong and tough sanctions against Iran.Comprehensive dialogues and pressure is the only way forward.”
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), in its latest report to members of the Board of Governors last Friday, had confirmed that Iran’s enriched uranium reserves had reached more than 10 times the limits set in the nuclear deal.
After withdrawing from JCPOA in May 2018, Washington has resorted to provocative and tense measures against Iran in line with the so-called “maximum pressure” policy.
In its reaction to this move, Islamic Republic of Iran put a year of “strategic patience” on the agenda and gave the parties to the nuclear deal, especially European countries, that promised to compensate for the withdrawal of the United States, to fulfill their obligations under the nuclear deal.
One year after the lack of fulfillment of Europe‘s promises under JCPOA, Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) warned the parties in a statement on May 7, if European parties involved in the talk fail to fulfill their obligations in the field of oil and banking within 60 days, Islamic Republic of Iran will reduce its commitments under JCPOA.
The Islamic Republic of Iran has reduced its obligations under the nuclear deal in five steps. Iran’s first step in reducing its obligations was to exceed 300 kg limit of 3.67% enriched uranium reserves, lack of selling heavy water and a surplus of enriched uranium which was announced on May 7.
The announcement last week of a landmark agreement between Israel, Serbia and Kosovo to normalize economic relations drew no condemnation from Arab nations, but the European Union has criticized the deal because the two Balkan states will move their embassies to Jerusalem.
Serbia will become the first European nation to open an embassy in Israel’s capital city, a step that only the United States and Guatemala have taken. The EU has made the city’s disputed status a part of its Middle East policy, creating new tension with the Serbs as they try to join the 27-nation trade and economic bloc.
Although Palestinians claim East Jerusalem as the capital of their own future sovereign nation, and oppose all efforts to legitimize Israel’s control of the entire city, the rest of the Arab world has taken a wait-and-see approach.
“This deal is not really thought about much in the Arab and Muslim world at all,” said Luke Coffey, a national security and foreign policy expert at The Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. “Even though Kosovo is a Muslim majority country, it is not an Islamic state like most are across much of the Middle East. Most in the region see this as a very niche European matter.”
President Donald J. Trump participates in a signing ceremony with Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and Kosovo Prime Minister Avdullah Hoti Friday, Sept. 4, 2020, in the Oval Office of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian)
Most people in Arab countries “do not care one way or the other where these two relatively small Balkans countries have their embassies in Israel,” he said.
Turkey, traditionally a bridge between Europe and the Middle East, quickly condemned the agreement. Turkey’s foreign ministry expressed “deep concern” over the future Jerusalem embassies.
The Trump administration, with one foot in governing and another in re-election campaigning, is already emphasizing the president’s acumen brokering deals between nations. The fundamentals of the agreement, which the president calls a “major breakthrough,” include cooperation to bolster investment and job opportunities.
Serbia and Kosovo now also say they will make an effort to follow Israeli law and decriminalize homosexuality in their jurisdictions, a move that is unlikely to meet with approval from conservative Arab governments.
Richard Grenell, the openly gay former ambassador to Germany, is pushing to overturn laws in nations that make homosexuality illegal. The Human Rights Campaign, America’s most prominent LGBTQ lobby group, has condemned Grenell for serving Trump, whom it accuses of being hostile to the gay community.
The new accord follows a separate Trump-brokered diplomatic deal between the United Arab Emirates and Israel.
Serbia has long pointed with pride to Israel’s refusal to recognize Kosovo, which declared independence from Serbia in 2008. Belgrade deployed troops into the territory in the late 1990s to quell unrest by ethnic Albanian separatists, and the two countries have since been at odds.
As part of the accord announced September 4, Kosovo agreed for one year to halt its campaign to join significant international organizations. Serbia agreed, also for one year, to curb its efforts to coerce countries into “derecognizing” its former territory.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has embraced the new ties with Kosovo, but the Jewish state has more at stake in its alliances with other Muslim-majority and Arab countries.
The new accord’s stated intention is to focus on economic cooperation, but Israel stands to gain in other ways. For example, the agreement calls on Serbia and Kosovo to officially designate the Lebanon-based Hezbollah a terrorist organization and block its economic activities in their countries.
The deal represents the end of the Kosovo war, “which was really the last major security crisis for the U.S.” before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and is “an important symbolic win for the Trump administration,” said Matthew Schmidt, a political science professor at the University of New Haven in Connecticut.
President Donald J. Trump participates in an expanded bilateral meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday, Jan. 27, 2020, in the Oval Office of the White House. (White House)
Beyond the opening of embassies, additional details are “still to get worked out,” he said.
Coffey, of the Heritage Foundation, said that “some points in the agreement were concrete proposals and others are merely aspirational.”
“Both countries have a long way to go before they fully normalize relations,” Coffey said. “Overall, these talks were a significant foreign policy success.”
(Edited by Judy Isacoff, Stephen Singer and David Martosko.)
The European Union and WHO today handed over 100 oxygen concentrators, 20 electrocardiographs and 10,000 PCR tests for COVID-19 to the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Armenia, the EU Delegation to Armenia reported in a press statement.
The supplies, procured by WHO with EU support, will help increase testing capacity and help patients recover from severe illness due to COVID-19. Oxygen concentrators are a non-invasive way of providing oxygen to patients hospitalized with COVID-19. Such supplemental oxygen is the first essential step for the treatment of patients with low blood oxygen levels due to severe COVID-19.
Electrocardiographs help health professionals listen to and monitor a patient’s heart for complications. ECGs are especially important for patients being treated in intensive care units.
The 10,000 tests delivered will ensure timely detection, isolation and management of patients, which is important both for patient care and for containing the epidemic in the country. The tests are of a type included in WHO’s list of quality-assured supplies and are capable of producing accurate results in just 75 minutes. This short processing time saves healthcare workers’ time and energy, helps decrease the probability of human error and allows a larger number of tests to be carried out per day.
Head of the Delegation of the European Union to Armenia, Ambassador Andrea Wiktorin, WHO Representative in Armenia, Egor Zaitsev, RA Deputy Minister of Health, Lena Nanushyan were at the Republican Center for Humanitarian Aid SNCO to receive the shipment of tests and equipment.
The EU Ambassador and WHO Representative handed over the tests and equipment to the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Armenia as part of a larger assistance package to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the country. The tests and equipment will be provided to the national laboratory and healthcare institutions.Type a message
Speaking at an in-person meeting in the Assembly hall, Tijjani Muhammad-Bande recounted some of the important initiatives the 74th session had conducted throughout the coronavirus pandemic.
“The General Assembly successfully organized socially distanced elections for the General Assembly Presidency, the Security Council, and the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). Furthermore, we employed virtual methods to gather stakeholders from around the world on Charter Day, and once again at the multi-stakeholder hearing on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women”, he detailed.
Mr. Muhammad-Bande also applauded the World Health Organization (WHO) for “leading the response from the outset”.
“Today’s meeting takes place as many people suffer and bear great losses due to the COVID-19 pandemic”, he said. “The entire UN system has rallied to address the needs of the people we serve”.
The UN official gave “particular thanks” to humanitarian workers in the field as well as UN Peacekeepers, “who continue to protect communities in the most complex environments around the world”.
Moreover, he acknowledged the leadership of the Secretary-General and the ECOSOC president .
SDGs: Full speed ahead
The Assembly president underlined that these efforts are “critical” as we begin the Decade of Action and Delivery to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), “or as it is likely to become, the decade of recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic”.
He closed by urging everyone to “galvanize multilateral action now” and fulfill the UN’s financing for development and other commitments.
“We remain in this together”, Mr. Muhammad-Bande concluded.
Looking forward
At an end-of-session press conference, Muhammad-Bande told journalists that he was working with his successor Volkan Bozkir in the preparation of high-level week as well as upcoming events.
The UN official noted that Mr. Bozkir would be presiding over the opening of the 75th session of the Assembly, which will be convened on 22 September.
Mr. Muhammad-Bande told the journalists that it had been a privilege to serve as the President of the 74th session of the Assembly, expressing his confidence that the targets set out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development would be realized if everyone continues to strive together, and deliver for all.
UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe
Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, President of the the 74th session of the UN General Assembly.
Finance Ministers meet to refine ‘single ambitious menu’ for COVID-19 recovery and beyond
Amina Mohammed addressed ministers from UN Member States, and representatives from international institutions, during a virtual meeting on Tuesday to solidify a “menu” of policy options for post-pandemic recovery and beyond, which will be presented to world leaders later this month.
Although the crisis has affected everyone, Ms. Mohammed said the consequences will be worse for the world’s most vulnerable citizens.
Finance Minister’s Mtg @UN: Let’s seize policy options for the immediate economic relief we need—a people’s vaccine for #COVID19, to tackle deep injustices, inequalities & governance. And together to rethink a global financial system that works for these unprecedented times. pic.twitter.com/a04V2CJMmT
“Between 70 to 100 million people could be pushed into extreme poverty; an additional 265 million people could face acute food shortages by the end of this year, and an estimated 400 million jobs have been lost: disproportionately, of course, affecting women”, she said.
Moreover, “some 1.6 billion learners have had their studies disrupted and may never return to school,” she continued, adding “finding immediate and lasting solutions is our responsibility”.
The aim is to present what the organizers described as “a single ambitious menu of policy options” to address recovery in the short term, but also to mobilize the resources needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, and to create a resilient global financial system over the long term.
As Chrystia Freeland, Canada’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, pointed out, “this crisis has hit women and young people particularly hard and our response must take that into account”.
‘Worst recession in decades’ looms
Over the past three months, ministers formed six discussion groups to address issues critical for economic survival and recovery, with the imperative of building back better.
The challenge is immense. Globally, there have been more than 27 million cases of COVID-19, and nearly 892,000 deaths, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The UN further estimates that the world’s gross domestic product will suffer a nearly five per cent drop this year, while foreign direct investment and remittances are set to decrease by 40 per cent and 20 per cent, respectively.
“With lockdown measures continuing, borders closed, debt skyrocketing and fiscal resources plunging, the pandemic is pushing us towards the worst recession in decades, possibly even a depression, with terrible consequences for the most vulnerable”, said Ms. Mohammed.
Invest in resilience
The head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) reported that although some advanced economies are doing “somewhat less bad” at the moment due to strong policy response by their finance authorities and Central Banks, most emerging markets are still in trouble, including those which rely on tourism revenues or that have high debt levels.
IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva emphasized the need for greater social investment as an important lesson from the pandemic.
“We need to recognize that this crisis is telling us we have to build resilience for the future by investing in education and digital capacity everywhere, in human capital, the health systems, the social protection systems in countries, by making sure that the other crises in front of us, like the climate crisis, are well-integrated”, she said. “And last, but technically not least, by preventing inequalities and poverty raising their ugly heads again”.
Action amid unprecedented times
The discussions sought to further refine policy that will be presented to Heads of State and Government at a UN meeting on 29 September.
For Nigel Clarke, Jamaica’s Minister of Finance and the Public Service, the event was an opportunity to “act with dispatch” and “to scale up measures that have already been implemented”.
Noting that “the world is yet to show the unity and solidarity required for a global response to a crisis unparalleled in recent history,” Ms. Mohammed urged Finance Ministers to take action amid the current uncertainties.
“I hope you will join us in seizing this initiative to consolidate a menu of options to support your work for the immediate economic relief people need, a people’s vaccine for COVID-19, and to tackle the deep injustices, inequalities and governance challenges while we stand ready together to rethink a global financial system that works for these unprecedented times”, she said.
At a regular press briefing on Tuesday, Rupert Colville, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, (OHCHR), quoted Agnes Callamard, the UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions, in saying, “they came at the end of a process which was neither fair nor just, or transparent”.
#JamalKhashoggi: 1.The Saudi Prosecutor performed one more act today in this parody of justice. But these verdicts carry no legal or moral legitimacy. They came at the end of a process which was neither fair, nor just, or transparent. https://t.co/nt4n2CqS21
In October 2018, the 59-year-old columnist for The Washington Post was killed and dismembered at the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. Saudi prosecutors in Riyadh had convicted eight people for the brutal murder.
However, on Monday, a Saudi court overturned five death sentences in a final ruling that jailed eight defendants for between seven and 20 years, according to Saudi State media.
Asked by a journalist from the Anadolu Agency if the UN would condemn the Saudi court’s decision, Mr. Colbert said, “this was a very severe and gruesome crime, a horrendous crime”.
“This is a case where there hasn’t been proper transparency in the justice process and clearly those responsible should be prosecuted, and, and given sentences commensurate with the crime”, he continued.
Recalling the UN’s position against the death penalty, he said that in such cases, “very lengthy jail sentences” would be appropriate.
Twitter firestorm
The press briefing came on the heels of a series of tweets from the independent UN expert who reacted disparagingly to Monday’s verdict.
“The five hitmen are sentenced to 20 years imprisonment, but the high-level officials who organized and embraced the execution of Jamal Khashoggi have walked free from the start – barely touched by the investigation and trial,” Ms. Callamard tweeted.
“As for the individual responsibility of the person on top of the State”, the independent UN expert upheld, “the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, he has remained well protected against any kind of meaningful scrutiny in his country”.
She stated that “the Saudi Prosecutor performed one more act today in this parody of justice”, adding “but these verdicts carry no legal or moral legitimacy”.
Special Rapporteurs and independent experts are appointed by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council to examine and report back on a specific human rights theme or a country situation. The positions are honorary and the experts are not UN staff, nor are they paid for their work.
The European Parliament President has decided to cancel all travel to the second seat in Strasbourg next week.
The move comes after discussions with the French authorities after the city was declared a red zone following a spike in COVID-19 cases.
Parliament President David Sassoli lamented the situation, reiterating that the monthly session held in Strasbourg is written into European treaties.
“While we are very disappointed about this decision, we have to consider that the transfer of the administration of the European Parliament would entail quarantine for all staff upon their return to Brussels,” Sassoli said in a statement.
The next session slated for 14-17 September will take place in the Brussels seat of the European parliament.
The question of moving thousands of MEPs and staff members from Brussels to Strasbourg has often been the subject of controversy over both the financial and environmental cost.
The Macfrut Digital Trade Show to be held online for the first time from September 8-10 will offer businesses the opportunity to meet hundreds of global suppliers of fresh, safe and quality fruits from Europe.
Macfrut Digital’s online platform Natlive will bring together businesses in agricultural production, trading, machinery, greenhouses and irrigation systems, nurseries and seeds, fertilisers and bio-stimulants, logistics and storage, and others.
The event has attracted over 600 exhibitors from 30 countries.
Visitors can register for free at macfrutdigital.com. After signing in, they can see an interactive map of products on display, visit virtual booths to learn about products, ask for information from the organisers, and hold exchanges with exhibitors.
There will be conferences livestreamed for free on topics such as renovation in gardening, greenhouses and watering, and forums on bio-stimulation.
The organisers said the exhibition will offer a chance for Vietnamese enterprises, distributors and importers to seek tie-ups in the context that the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement with preferential tariffs took effect last month.
Businesses in the field of agro-products and fruits could explore a market of nearly 500 million consumers and learn about their tastes, they said.
European experts have said Vietnamese agricultural produce such as cashew, coffee, vegetables, dragon fruit, lychee, coconut, fig, pineapple, avocado, guava, mango, and mangosteen are favoured in the EU.
Some of Vietnam’s organic products have entered this demanding market after meeting criteria set for organic, Rainforest Alliance and Fairtrade certification among others.
The organisers said conventional exhibitions and trade shows have to be postponed or cancelled, thus limiting the trade exchange of businesses around the globe.
“In this context, online exhibitions and trade shows are the best way for businesses to meet their partners internationally.”
Robert Spano, President of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), visited Turkey last week at the invitation of the Turkish Justice Minister. Spano also met with Pres. Erdogan and give a lecture at the Turkish Justice Academy.
While the President of ECHR has the right to visit any country he wishes, it is highly inappropriate that he accepts an Honorary Doctorate in law from Istanbul University. Several prominent Turkish human rights activists wrote lengthy columns criticizing Spano for his visit and his acceptance of the Honorary Doctorate.
Former Turkish diplomat Aydin Selcen stated that Spano “is not fit to preside [over] the ECHR.” Cenkiz Aktar, a political scientist and academic, called Spano’s visit “scandalous” and urged him to resign. Exiled Turkish journalist Can Dundar wrote that Spano “destroyed the 30-year reputation of the ECHR in three days.” Ahval News quoted several other critical comments from prominent Turks regarding the unfortunate Spano’s visit to Turkey.
Mehmet Altan, one of those critics, is among the 192 professors of Istanbul University who was fired at the instigation of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Altan, jailed for his non-existent membership in the banned Gulen religious group, filed a lawsuit against Istanbul University to reverse his firing. Erdogan also dismissed over 150,000 civil servants from state jobs and investigated close to 600,000 Turkish citizens, arresting 100,000 of them under the false pretext of belonging to the Islamist Gulen movement which was accused of orchestrating the coup attempt against Erdogan in 2016.
The Turkish Ahval News website posted on August 31, 2020, an article titled, “ECHR chief may receive controversial honorary doctorate from Istanbul University.”
ECHR chair Robert Spano with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey
Ahval reported that Altan, in an open letter addressed to Spano and published on the website of Turkish journalism platform P24, urged him not to accept the Turkish invitation. “I do not know how much pride there is to be an honorary member of a university that condemns hundreds of lecturers to unemployment and poverty by unjustly expelling them from school,” Altan wrote.
Altan told Spano: “The University from which you will receive a doctorate is included as the ‘defendant institution’ in the lawsuit of academics, like me, who were dismissed by decree…. These cases are still ongoing and it is likely that they will come before the ECHR, which you preside over.”
Altan continued: “On March 2018, the second section of ECHR, presided over by you, set a precedent in universal law and ruled that my right to personal liberty and security and my freedom of expression had been violated. Turkey was convicted…. Ergin Ergul, who was appointed on behalf of Turkey to that case and was the only judge dissenting, put forward such arguments that you wrote ‘a dissenting vote’ against a dissenting vote, for the first time in the history of ECHR, if I am not mistaken. And the other members followed you.” Ahval reported that there were over 60,000 individual complaints at the ECHR for violations of rights and freedoms in Turkey.
Yavuz Aydin, who was also dismissed from his profession along with 4,500 judges and prosecutors, wrote an article titled, “ECHR president faces a test of honor in Turkey,” which was published in Ahval on Sept. 2, 2020. Aydin wrote: “President Spano is certainly aware of the deterioration of rule of law in Turkey. As a man of honor who has been adjudicating on Turkey-related files at the ECHR for years, the purpose of his visit cannot be thought of as anything other than openly and courageously shouting out facts in the faces of government authorities.”
Aydin continued: “The ECHR president knows very well that the government in Turkey translated to one-man rule by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan since the constitutional amendment of 2017. As openly criticized by the Venice Commission, Spano knows that the separation of powers and judicial independence no longer exist in Turkey. Besides this, he cannot be unaware of Resolution 2156(2017) of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, which downgraded Turkey to the league of countries under monitoring status for the first time in European history. This decision implies that Turkey no longer meets the famous Copenhagen Criteria, and thus cannot be regarded as eligible for accession negotiations with the EU [European Union].”
Aydin then made a series of suggestions that he hoped Spano would follow during his visit to Turkey:
Call on Erdogan to return to democracy and restore the rule of law in the country.
Remind the Turkish leaders of the decision to remove from the Turkish Council of Judges and Prosecutors their observer status in the European Network of Councils for the Judiciary. He should also remind the candidate judges at the Turkish Judiciary Academy [TJA] why the European Judicial Training Network expelled the TJA from observer membership status in 2016.
Tell them that the existing judges as well as the 10,000 new judges appointed after the coup attempt are often politically biased in applying the law, and call on them to ignore political pressure from the Palace, Constitutional Court and other high courts.
Remind them that for the first time in history Turkey was found in breach of Article 18 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Tell the leaders in Turkey that they should immediately release the hundreds of judges still in solitary confinement and reinstate all 4,000 of their purged colleagues.
Aydin urged Spano “to decline the honorary doctorate even before stepping onto Turkish soil, conveying a very strong message to all parties before meeting with them in person. Otherwise, the good will exerted through Spano’s visit would not only be wasted, but serve as a trump card for the government and Erdogan, who will use the gesture as a sign of appraisal and legitimization of the illegalities taking place in the country under his rule.”
Regrettably, Spano ignored all the good advice provided by Turkish human rights activists and thus undermined his own reputation as well as that of the European Court of Human Rights!
