CND Press Round-Up - 16th October 2019
Posted: 2nd March 2021
Please find today’s press round up below. I’m particularly keen to get your feedback on what issues and what outlets you feel should be covered in it. I hope you’ll forgive the slight delay in receiving it today, which should be rectified over the coming week.
North Korea
The leadership of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has said North Korea’s nuclear programme remains ‘a cause for serious concern’ in the context of rhetorical posturing from Kim Jong-un and the testing of a cooling water facility at a light water reactor in late 2020. The UN’s sanctions monitor for North Korea said last month that North Korea was funding renewed expansion of its nuclear capabilities through international ‘cyber-crime’. More details of today’s story can be found here.
India-Pakistan
Foreign Policy carries a balanced piece today on the new agreement reached by the governments of India and Pakistan for a cease-fire along the Line of Control, their de-facto border. Sumit Ganguly places the retrenchment in the context of changes within the apparatus of American foreign policy, with the BJP regime worrying about over-extension along its northern borders, having come off the worse in skirmishes with China in 2020 and the Imran Khan government’s desire to reset security co-operation with the Biden administration after years of relative hostility under Donald Trump. This is caveated by a recognition that border conflict between the two nuclear-armed states is often driven by extra-state and local actors, leaving often the potential for escalation. The full piece can be found here.
Chernobyl
The television presenter Ben Fogle is engaged in pre-broadcast publicity for a programme he has made about the disaster at Chernobyl, which is being screened on Channel Five tomorrow. Whilst the show will surely not share CND’s campaigning and political perspectives, it will feature Ukrainian people displaced by it and experts on the harmful impact of radiation.
U.S-Saudi Relations
The new Blinken-led U.S. State Department has doubled down on its refusal to sanction the Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, according to Al Jazeera, after a report conducted by American intelligence agencies attached to him personal responsibility for the assassination of Washington Post columnist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul in 2018. The justification given by the State Department is quite openly one of realpolitik, but this has to be placed in the context of the end of support for the Saudi-Emirati coalition’s war in Yemen amidst the highest degrees of domestic opposition to America’s alliance with the Saudi autocracy, including from both Democratic and Republican legislators, since the agreement concluded with King Abdulaziz on the Great Bitter Lake in 1945.
Additionally, the Guardian is reporting that an NGO has filed a criminal complaint accusing MBS of Mr. Khashoggi’s murder through a court in Germany. Reporters without Borders has taken this action in Germany because German domestic law incorporates a variation on the doctrine of universal jurisdiction, though German prosecutors have not yet commented further.
British aid to Yemen
Amongst British political correspondents, the decision by the FCDO to cut year-on-year aid to Yemen (worth c.£140 million) has generated substantial attention, including coverage by the BBC. The move has attracted condemnation by the UN Secretary-General, who called it a ‘death sentence’ and, perhaps more surprisingly by some Conservative MPs, including former Cabinet members Andrew Mitchell and Jeremy Hunt. An Urgent Question will be asked in the chamber by the former in regards to Yemeni aid today. Labour is also opposing the cut.
COP26
The website POLITICO features an in-depth report on the tensions between the UK government’s long-term carbon net-zero target and its international trade policy as its lead story today. In particular, it points to the difficulties involved in creating an Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which the UK now must do after leaving the EU’s own ETS. Whilst Boris Johnson has previously talked of a ‘Green Brexit’ and is keen to bolster international credibility on this issue ahead of November’s COP26 summit in Glasgow, it will face intense lobbying from powerful carbon-polluting interests, some of whom rank amongst major Conservative Party donors. The Scottish Government, which will play a substantial role in the summit, has had own climate emergency plans have also drawn criticism from campaigners today.
This is in addition to the further worrying news that carbon emissions, after dipping during the forced curtailment of production during East Asian and European lock-downs, are once again above their pre-pandemic peak, according to the International Energy Agency.
With best wishes,
Michael Muir
Press and Communications Officer
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament