Banking on Arab youth to turn Arab countries around – Bessma Momani’s Arab Dawn: Arab Youth and the Demographic Dividend They Will Bring

2015/11/30 Leave a comment

Interesting study and conclusion:

Is the Arab world a lost cause? You’d be forgiven for reaching that conclusion. At a moment when the world’s other once-poor regions have all experienced significant improvements, the 22 Arabic-speaking countries stretched between Oman and Mauritania, with few exceptions, are stuck with stagnant economies, backward strongman political systems and simmering threats – and that’s the luckier ones.

But imagine for a moment that the current chaos and unrest is only a period of turbulence between two eras. Imagine if, a century from now, we were to look back upon the Arab 2010s as something like the French 1790s or the American 1770s or the English 1640s – a terrible time that foretold the creation of a better time.

To imagine this, you’d have to conclude that the current Arab “youth bulge” – the extraordinary proportion of the region’s population (at least a fifth) who are between 17 and 25 and whose unemployment, disappointment and youthful zealotry are currently key sources of its violence, instability and chaos – largely come of age, in a few years, as a new generation of adults seeking better economic and political futures.

Once the civil wars, riots, coups and countercoups played themselves out and some uneasy semi-democratic détente was reached, that generation’s education and literacy, urbanized and connected aspirations and entrepreneurial outlook gave rise to a period of improvement and reform that, while far from utopian, put the Middle East and North Africa onto the same modernizing track as the rest of the world.

This is exactly the mind exercise performed by Bessma Momani, a political scientist based at the University of Waterloo (and frequent Globe and Mail contributor) who specializes in the economies of the Middle East, in a new book surprisingly titled Arab Dawn: Arab Youth and the Demographic Dividend They Will Bring.

She spent several years surveying and interviewing young Arabs in half a dozen countries. She finds plenty of troubles – staggering unemployment, rising religiosity, sexism – but beneath it an emerging generation who are modern, educated and unwilling to settle for the closed nationalist economies, authoritarian politics and enforced subservience their parents endured.

Arabs are young, but aren’t having huge families, so are in a demographic sweet spot. Dr. Momani foresees this combination of factors paying the dividend her subtitle suggests.

Source: Banking on Arab youth to turn Arab countries around – The Globe and Mail

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Canada’s new foreign policy: the end of ‘ideological fantasies’ – Michael Bell

2015/11/17 Leave a comment

One of the better pieces on the impact on foreign policy of the change in government, but neglects to mention some of the diaspora politics pressure given the large number of visible minority MPs:

We are at the beginning of a new era in Canadian diplomacy with the election of Justin Trudeau as Prime Minister. Our place in the international community is about to undergo a dramatic and positive change. The appointment of Stéphane Dion as the Minister of Foreign Affairs is a harbinger.

Although there will be many challenges, often insurmountable, and mistakes will inevitably be made, the new Prime Minister’s world view and his commitment to international norms could not be more different than that of his predecessor.

Stephen Harper, the world’s last neo-conservative leader, is no longer with us. His modus operandi in foreign affairs viewed the international community, most markedly characterized in his eyes by the United Nations, as a threat to his deeply held but exclusionist ideology. For him, the very concept of accommodation with others constituted moral relativism: a sellout.

The result: Canada was viewed abroad as an outlier, as a contrarian, as a force for disruption. Mr. Harper’s colleagues abroad found him most often difficult, if not impossible, to deal with. For the first time in our history, and to our great shame, Canada was voted down for a seat on the UN Security Council, so much had we lost the respect of others.

Life was miserable for Canadian diplomats at home and abroad, including those charged with UN affairs; we lost the chairmanship of UN committees traditionally ours for asking; we lost any role in its consultative processes. Mr. Harper and his long-time foreign minister, John Baird, snubbed the institution. Their political staffs: “The boys in short pants” were the enforcers.

With Mr. Trudeau’s election, those days are now past. For instance, after a single day in office, he called on Canadian ambassadors abroad to engage fully with the governments, civil society and media in their countries of accreditation.

In retrospect, it is astounding that the Canadian government’s aversion to evidence-based decision-making lasted as long as it did. It is astounding that diplomacy (most often a backstage craft) was confined to the dustbin. It was depressing that truth could never speak to power. It was intolerable that bureaucrats felt it necessary to ensure that analytical assessments were censored so that the ire of the man in power was not brought down on them.

With Mr. Harper’s electoral defeat, it now seems obvious that Canadians need engagement in a very complex world in which effective policies depend on a deep understanding of foreign cultures and reliable barometers of impending difficulties. We need more reliable eyes and ears out there, not fewer. My hunch is that Mr. Trudeau and Mr. Dion will give us just that.

…A self-confident, socially adept and thoughtful Prime Minister with a feel for issues and a commitment to socially enlightened change. An intelligent, erudite Foreign Minister with a compelling, Cartesian intellect.

What a change.

Source: Canada’s new foreign policy: the end of ‘ideological fantasies’ – The Globe and Mail

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Pentagon’s take on ISIS fight nothing like Canada’s campaign rhetoric

2015/09/25 Leave a comment

Contrast between measured and political language, the latter used to install fear and division:

The leaders of the Liberal and New Democratic parties, Stephen Harper tells his election rallies, are such a couple of timorous wet smacks that they can’t possibly be trusted to shield Canadians from the evil that constantly bears down upon us all.

“Justin Trudeau and Thomas Mulcair are so wrapped up in some form of twisted form of political correctness that they won’t even call jihadist terrorism what it is,” Harper told cheering supporters in Sault Ste. Marie this month.

“If you cannot even bring yourself to call jihadist terrorism what it is, then you cannot be trusted to confront it, and you cannot be trusted to keep Canadians safe from it.”

So, to summarize, and I’m using the words of the prime minister here, ISIS is a barbaric, fanatic, radically violent bunch of jihadist terrorist murderers. And they threaten Canadians every single day. And fighting them begins with calling them all those things, and if you can’t call them those things, you aren’t a fighter.

Now, here are the words of Christine Wormuth, the under-secretary of defence at the Pentagon, in testimony to Congress last week:

“While not 10 feet tall,” she told the Senate armed services committee last week, ISIS “remains a thinking enemy that adapts to evolving conditions on the battlefield.”

Wormuth, of course, is not running for office, and it is her job to take a clear-eyed view of her adversary.

She is tasked by President Barack Obama to help lead the military offensive in which Canada has been a proud participant, to use Stephen Harper’s words again.

Wormuth and the two top American generals who flanked her in the hearings tried to focus on the coalition’s meagre gains, but couldn’t obscure the utterly bleak reality that has emerged in the year since Obama announced the offensive.

Just a few days earlier, the outgoing chairman of the joint chiefs, Gen. Martin Dempsey, described the situation as “tactically stalemated.”

Senator John McCain, former naval commander, chairman of the armed forces committee and easily the Republican party’s reigning expert on war, used more pungent language.

“It seems impossible to assert that ISIL is losing and that we are winning. And if you’re not winning in this kind of warfare, you are losing. . . It’s an abject failure.”

McCain, like Wormuth and the generals, didn’t bother with any of the jihadist-murderer-terrorist-barbaric-fanatic-radical references Stephen Harper says a leader must make in order to protect the nation.

Source: Pentagon’s take on ISIS fight nothing like Canada’s campaign rhetoric – Politics – CBC News

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Foreign funds promoting ‘extreme Islamic jihadist’ views in Canada, Evolving terror threat justifies need for Bill C-51, national security advisor says

2015/04/29 Leave a comment

Always uncomfortable, given that some of our current allies in the fight against ISIS such as Saudi Arabia are a source of funding of fundamentalists and extremists:

Richard Fadden said the money often goes through religious institutions, which helps to shield it from further scrutiny.

“Without commenting on a particular country of origin, there are monies coming into this country which are advocating this kind of approach to life,” Mr. Fadden said on Monday before the Senate Committee on National Security and Defence. “Finding out where it all goes in the end, and for what purpose, is in fact quite difficult. A lot of these funds are directed through religious institutions, quasi-religious institutions, and it’s very difficult in this country to start poking about religious institutions, because of the respect that we have for freedom of religion.”

Mr. Fadden was answering a question from Conservative Senator Daniel Lang, who asked about the government’s response to funding from countries such as Saudi Arabia that promotes an “extreme jihadist” interpretation of the Koran.

Mr. Fadden said the federal government is aware of the problem, but noted that his discussions with allies have shown that “nobody has found a systemic solution.”

“The difficulty in most cases is that the monies are not coming from governments, they are coming from fairly wealthy institutions and individuals, which makes it doubly difficult to track,” he said.

In his appearance, Mr. Fadden argued that the evolving terror threat helps to justify the need for Bill C-51, the proposed anti-terrorism legislation.

“Our enemies have continued to refine their methods and adapt; so must we.”

Mr. Fadden said the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) needs new powers to disrupt potential terrorist activities, in addition to collecting intelligence on the threats facing Canada.

He said the goal of the new disruption measures is to allow CSIS to take action before criminal activities take place, arguing that the RCMP should not be called in these events.

“The police cannot get involved, by the nature of their work, if they cannot see something concrete in terms of criminal activity,” Mr. Fadden said. “Otherwise, we are living in a police state.”

The new disruption powers would allow CSIS to advise family members that someone is being radicalized to violence or take actions to neutralize a terrorist plot.

Mr. Fadden added the public and the media’s concerns over Bill C-51 are exaggerated, referring specifically to the notion that non-governmental organizations will become the target of counterterrorism agencies.

“A number of people in the media and elsewhere have been reported as saying, ‘The Girl Guides will be hit next.’ Well there has to be an actual threat to national security,” he said.

Too bad no question regarding Fadden’s views on the need for oversight (although he would not be in a position to speak other than the government line). His comments “otherwise we are living in a police state” are ironic given his silence on the oversight issue.

Evolving terror threat justifies need for Bill C-51, security adviser says – The Globe and Mail.

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Hopes high for Modi’s arrival in the Lower Mainland

2015/04/11 Leave a comment

Likely correct assessment of how Modi’s visit will be received but nevertheless will be interesting given the large Sikh population in the Vancouver area:

While protests are promised, many in B.C.’s Indo-Canadian community appear to be enthusiastically looking forward to only the third official visit of an Indian prime minister to Canada.

And it doesn’t seem to matter that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will be accompanied by Prime Minister Stephen Harper at April 16 events in the Lower Mainland, is the controversial leader of a Hindu nationalist party coming to a region where Sikhs dominate the Canadian diaspora.

The son of a tea vendor in a society with limited social mobility, Modi’s political rise, his anti-corruption stance, and his economic record as chief minister of Gujarat state from 2002-14 have impressed Indians around the world.

That has some analysts suggesting India holds enormous potential for Canadian exporters, including those in the LNG sector. “He has an image of a person who is able to do things and make decisions,” said Kwantlen Polytechnic University political scientist Shinder Purewal. “And people like the fact that personally he’s not corrupt. Not even his enemies can accuse him of taking a cup of tea.”

One of his B.C. hosts, Khalsa Diwan Society president Sohan Singh Deo, brushed aside suggestions B.C.’s history as a breeding ground for Sikh separatism during the turbulent 1980s might cool Modi’s West Coast reception.

The relationship between India’s dominant Hindu majority and the tiny Sikh minority hit a tragic low point in 1984 when then-prime minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in retaliation for the Indian army’s assault on armed Sikh separatists in the Golden Temple in Amritsar. Her assassination led to deadly pogroms involving Hindu mobs targeting Sikhs, and was followed by the Air India bombings orchestrated by B.C.-based Sikh terrorists in 1985 that left 331 dead.

“It means nothing,” Deo, who will greet Modi and Harper at the Ross Street Temple on April 16, told The Vancouver Sun. “The whole community — Hindus, Sikhs — they’re all excited to welcome (Modi) with open hearts.”

And Modi, if the hopes of many are realized, will return the warmth by announcing that foreign visitors from Canada will be able to apply online for travel visas and obtain them at the airport upon arrival in India.

Ujjal Dosanjh, who as a former premier and federal cabinet minister has been the most successful South Asian politician in Canadian history, said the 1984-85 “aberration” can’t erase long-standing goodwill between Sikhs and Hindus in Canada. “I think that the sense of connection Indians have with India makes almost everyone, even the critics, have a sense of pride.”

Canadian Government, of course, views visit on both substantive and diaspora politics grounds.

Hopes high for Modi’s arrival in the Lower Mainland.

Terry Glavin focusses on the Komagata Maru, historical recognition and the broader historical context:

Compounding the awkwardness of just who should be apologizing here, and to whom, and for what, is that the story India tells itself about the Komagata Maru has undergone some significant revision as well. It was not long ago that the 1914 voyage was widely regarded in India as something of an embarrassment, an ill-conceived operation put up by Sikh militants and other Indian radicals who were rather too rash in their patriotism.

The since-revised Indian version, which formally acknowledges the voyagers of 1914 as heroes, is closer to the mark than the contemporary Canadian telling of the Komagata Maru story. It’s not just because Canadians tend to leave out all the revolutionary and counter-revolutionary intrigue, the spies, the provocateurs and double-agents, the terror and counter-terror of the time. Most conspicuously absent in the Canadian version of the Komagata Maru tragedy are the villains of that ethno-religious foreign constituency that was most fervently determined to insinuate its belligerent chauvinisms into Canadian affairs at the time. I refer of course to the British.

For all the racist hysteria animating Canadians in 1914 (in the preceding year, roughly 500,000 immigrants had arrived in Canada, a number not exceeded in any year since) the larger drama that determined the pivotal events in the story of the Komagata Maru arose from the brutal, global reach of the British Empire. Its Canadian champions and shadowy agents were already busy manipulating Canadian immigration law and its enforcement in cunning anticipation of the Komagata Maru long before the ship’s arrival in Burrard Inlet.

It was a time when the British Empire was acutely vulnerable to insurrections among its subject populations. Only weeks after the Komagata Maru was barred from docking in Vancouver, the First World War broke out. To the Indian patriots behind the Komagata Maru expedition, the voyage was a win-win proposition.

… Modi’s problem is that the Punjab Assembly resolution was accompanied by a motion demanding that he apologize to the Punjab Assembly, on behalf of the Government of India, for its bloody 1984 Operation Bluestar campaign in Punjab which so brutally rooted out Khalistani Sikh separatists from Amritsar’s Golden Temple.

Should Canada then turn around and demand that the Punjab Assembly apologize to us for the 1985 murder of 329 people, mostly Canadians, in the bombing of Air India Flight 182? That operation was orchestrated by the Khalistani Sikh terrorist leader Talwinder Singh Parmar, whose Babbar Khalsa organization enjoyed refuge in the Golden Temple prior to Operation Bluestar.

History does not lend itself to being abused and apologized for, especially not at the same time. The endearing Canadian custom of sanitizing history and putting it to innocently uplifting and inclusive purposes, too, is bound to go sideways sooner or later.

Having been involved in the Community Historical Recognition program and some of the community outreach with the Indo-Canadian and other communities (as well as attending the PM’s community picnic apology), it is the recognition part, and the greater awareness that it engenders, more than apologies, that is more important.

But I agree that if a government wishes to issue an apology, the only place for it is in Parliament, not at community events as PM Harper did with Indo-Canadians, or former PM Mulroney did with Italian Canadians.

Terry Glavin: Narendra Modi is coming to Canada. Things might get awkward

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The Iran deal is our best possible option. Let’s not spoil it: Heinbecker

2015/04/08 Leave a comment

Paul Heinbecker analyses the Iranian draft nuclear deal and concludes with the following sharp and pointed comment:

Finally, what can and should Ottawa do? Not much in Tehran, because with our embassy closed by the Harper government, we are blind, deaf, and dumb there. And as for Washington, we should just “zip it.” It would be an error in substance, and destructive of our wider interests, if we undermined the Obama administration vis-a-vis Iran, Israel or Congress. As regards Israel, we should not succumb to the temptation to play diaspora politics, even in an election year in Canada. We should, therefore, do nothing overtly to support Mr. Netanyahu, whose own election tactics destroyed whatever credibility he still had outside of Israel and the Republican side of Capitol Hill.

The Harper government has said little, but has announced a contribution of $3-million to support the IAEA’s efforts to monitor Iranian compliance. On an issue so fraught with dangers, such constructive circumspection is the beginning of wisdom. May it continue.

The Iran deal is our best possible option. Let’s not spoil it – The Globe and Mail.

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Canada’s foreign policy invites retaliation: Lawrence Martin

2015/04/01 Leave a comment

Lawrence Martin puts the Charles Taylor comments in broader perspective:

Charles Taylor issued a warning on the weekend, cautioning that Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s anti-niqab rhetoric helps terrorist recruiters.

Mr. Taylor, the well-known philosopher who headed up a Quebec commission on cultural and religious minorities, suggested that the federal Conservatives are surfing on Islamophobic sentiment, which makes alienated Muslim Canadians easier targets for recruitment by radical Islamist terrorists.

Mr. Taylor is no slouch. Immigration Minister Chris Alexander has called him “one of the world’s greatest living philosophers,” although the minister might well be revising that appraisal now.

But the Montreal professor makes a valid point, and one that should be seen in a broader context. It’s not just anti-Muslim rhetoric that puts Canada high on the radar list of enemies, or the upping of the ante by extending the Islamic State mission to Syria. It’s also how Ottawa has resorted to provocative rhetoric and incendiary statecraft elsewhere: With Russia by way of unsubstantiated accusations, the latest being that they confronted us in the Black Sea. With Iran in shutting down our embassy in Tehran. With the Arab world through unconditional support for Israel.

… Mr. Alexander has had experience as a diplomat – in Afghanistan, no less. But you’d never know it. Last week, he listed the hijab as a face covering that has no place in the citizenship ceremony. The problem? It’s a head scarf, not normally used to cover the face. “Hey, before you send a race-baiting e-mail,” tweeted Liberal strategist Gerald Butts, “at least know the difference between a hijab and a niqab.”

 Canada’s foreign policy invites retaliation 

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David Mulroney warns Canada should apply Afghanistan’s lessons to Iraq

2015/03/25 Leave a comment

Sound advice:

A former top official on Canada’s work in Afghanistan is warning against getting too involved in Iraq without clear and realistic objectives.

David Mulroney, who served as the deputy minister in charge of the Afghanistan Task Force, said Canada hasn’t looked closely enough at its experience in Afghanistan.

“When I recently saw Foreign Minister [Rob] Nicholson musing that we’d apply some of the lessons of Afghanistan to our engagement, I kind of sat bolt upright because I think one of the problems is we haven’t spent much time learning the lessons of Afghanistan,” Mulroney said in an interview to air Saturday at 9 a.m. on CBC Radio’s The House.

Mulroney said a newly released audit shows “how hard it was to get that development assistance and humanitarian assistance right in a place where none of the officials were really clear about what Canada’s objectives were.”

Mulroney also served as secretary to the Independent Panel on Canada’s Future Role in Afghanistan, which was led by former foreign affairs minister John Manley, and as foreign and defence policy adviser to the prime minister.

He said the lack of discussion about Afghanistan toward the end of the 10-year mission has kept Canadians from learning key lessons, which include being realistic about how much Canada doesn’t know about a region and setting “often very modest” goals.

Mulroney also said Canada needs an exit strategy.

“When does it happen for us and who’s around to pick up the pieces of what we’ve put in place. Until we’ve really talked honestly about that, I’d be very worried about our ability to pull something off in a place that’s as challenging as that nexus of Iraq and Syria.”

He also warned the government has to think about how the humanitarian, military and diplomatic pieces fit together.

“If it’s being done now, this is the time to tell Canadians that people have thought about that. Because if it hasn’t been done, we’ll get the same ultimately disappointing results that audit points to on Afghanistan.”

David Mulroney warns Canada should apply Afghanistan’s lessons to Iraq – Politics – CBC News.

And a good short interview with him in the Globe:

 How would you characterize the tension between diplomats and political staffers nowadays?

The truth is that public servants now serve a concierge function. They get difficult things done on the basis of careful instruction. So you focus on managing events, like visits, and then you report back to headquarters, but then you feel increasingly bullied. By the end of my career I’d written the same report on Sino-Canadian relations a dozen times. It was time to go.

In what specific way did Ottawa make you feel discouraged?

On the [Chinese social media site] Weibo we hosted a discussion about the case of Lai Changxing, [a fugitive to whom Canada gave refuge].

The other was about the official car I drove, which generated a real discussion about how what kind of accountability officials should be held to.

But there was complete silence from Ottawa, the kind that indicates disapproval. There was nothing they could hold against us because there were too many positives, including two editorials in The Globe. In the end though we turned the way embassies communicate on their head.

David Mulroney on pandas, the PM and Chinese-Canadian relations

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From Afghanistan to Iraq, the perils of overconfidence – Brian Stewart

2015/03/20 Leave a comment

Brian Stewart’s commentary on the recent audit on the aid program in Afghanistan and a reminder for the need for greater policy modesty:

My own view, shared by many others, is that central to Canada’s problem was an overconfident, relentless boosterism around this mission that was encouraged, even demanded, throughout by Ottawa.

“We went into a complex country without a proper strategy and this was a major problem. And there was over-optimism so we were not looking at the status of the insurgency,” Nipa Banerjee, who ran our aid there between 2003 and 2006, told Canadian Press this week.

In later years, the sunny Canadian outlook often astonished even NATO allies.

Chris Alexander, then our senior diplomat in Kabul and now the minister of citizenship and immigration, is remembered in one British memoir as “among the most persuasive of the optimists, and in many ways the golden boy of the effort in Afghanistan … a formidable operator who never let much check his unquenchable optimism.”

For many of Canada’s allies, our military and aid officials in Afghanistan simply ignored a trilogy of inconvenient facts: that the West didn’t have the military or civilian capacity necessary for the challenge at hand; that the Afghans were in no position to take over any time soon; and that the Taliban grew stronger thanks to sanctuaries in neighbouring Pakistan.

Some may be asking themselves if these elements, including overconfidence, apply to what looks to be our expanding war against ISIS in Iraq and possibly Syria.

One dark irony of this period was that the Conservative government and other ardent supporters of the war often criticized the media for being too pessimistic in its Afghan coverage.

The reality is most media were far too pliant and unquestioning of a military-civilian mission that, with rare exceptions, hid behind the false-confidence curtain dictated by Ottawa.

Understandably, many Canadians want to put that far-off war behind us and forget. But we simply can’t ignore the lessons learned about the cost of our simplistic over-optimism if we’re to avoid similar mistakes in Iraq or other campaigns to come.

From Afghanistan to Iraq, the perils of overconfidence – World – CBC News.

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