foreignpolicy--2020-11-12--Biden’s Priority in Africa Should Be Debt Relief

Biden ’ s Priority in Africa Should Be Debt Relief As U.S. President-elect Joe Biden starts to formulate his foreign policies , the list of regions and issues needing immediate attention is already long .
But one that should stand out is Africa ’ s debt .
Tipped into crisis territory by the economic knock-on effects of the COVID-19 pandemic , it threatens to push the region further into China ’ s hands .
Even before the pandemic hit , many African countries had enormous debt burdens , which grew heavier this spring when the value of their currencies fell @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the debt was denominated .
At the same time , the income necessary to make regular interest payments on the debt dried up .
Commodity-dependent African economies like Angola and Nigeria rely on oil ; demand had already been slumping since 2015 , and the sectors were hit again this year as global demand plummeted because of the COVID-driven economic downturn .
Those more service-oriented African countries not dependent on commodities fared no better , since tourism and foreign remittances cratered as well .
Facing an untenable situation , in March , Ethiopian @ @ @ @ @ @ @ letter with a plea for help .
He called for a two-year moratorium on debt repayments : from all creditors ( bilateral , multilateral , and private ) and for all African countries ( not just the poorest ) .
With the continent spending about 2 percent of its GDP just servicing its debt , he pointed out , there was little funding left to direct toward the pandemic response , for which he also requested an additional $ 150 billion in emergency financial assistance .
In the run-up to this spring ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ picked up by European and African leaders .
But the initiative that emerged from the G20—the Debt Service Suspension Initiative ( DSSI ) —covered only bilateral debt ( not all debt ) , only through the end of 2020 ( not for two years ) , and only for the poorest African economies ( not all of them ) .
A proposal to grant IMF Special Drawing Rights , which would have given the countries access to additional financing , also faltered .
The United States , it appears , had blocked such @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( SDRs ) would have been available to all countries—benefiting friend and foe alike including China , Iran , and Russia .
SDRs would have been game changing .
Last employed in response to the 2009 global financial crisis ( and backed by the Obama administration at that time ) , they offered far more in terms of fiscal breathing space—in the form of an injection of liquidity—than the DSSI , which just put a temporary hold on debt repayments .
Despite hopes that the DSSI would be extended for longer , in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ another six months .
G20 members sympathetic to Africa ’ s plight argue that the short time horizon is an attempt to improve the measure before locking it in over a longer period .
Namely , they want to secure the full participation of China and private creditors who between them hold two-thirds of Africa ’ s debt .
Failing to secure their buy-in risks relief intended for the pandemic response going instead to service Africa ’ s debt to China and private creditors .
In some ways , those figures represent a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , private credit .
Justifiably viewed as a hard-won achievement , private investment has opened up another major source of development financing .
Yet private debt falls outside of the DSSI , and some African countries , including Kenya , feared that accepting the agreement would lead private creditors to downgrade their credit ratings .
They have therefore opted out of the DSSI .
In the long run , they hope , doing so will preserve their access to private capital .
But in the short term , it represents a difficult fiscal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , there is China to consider .
To the extent that it , like the private sector , isn ’ t playing along fully with the DSSI , China is left with influence to try to renegotiate the debt it holds on its own terms .
And the question is not whether Beijing will renegotiate if asked .
The question is what it will want in return .
Arguably , it views advancing its global footprint as more valuable than immediate debt repayment .
The West should sit up and pay attention to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , but rather because the debt issue has exposed in dramatic fashion the degree to which it has failed to create alternatives to China ’ s model merging state power and the private sector .
This represents both a geopolitical loss and a real loss for Western business who might otherwise want to invest on the continent .
So what can be done ?
For now , efforts are underway to improve the DSSI to include the private sector and increase Chinese transparency and full participation .
Failing that , the Western powers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ DSSI assistance on recipient countries entering an IMF program , which would give the IMF a say into how countries manage their debt obligations .
But entering an IMF program would also imperil African countries ’ future access to private credit markets , so it would serve as a stick of last resort .
This situation highlights the role that the West needs to play in providing alternatives to Africa in financing and investment .
Debt relief now is firefighting .
Financing and private investment is a longer-term readjustment of the asymmetry with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ stirrings in this direction .
Working with the EU and others , France has called for a heads-of-state meeting slated for May 2021 , with the aim of generating alternative financing and private investment mechanisms for Africa .
President Emmanuel Macron has pointed out that the OECD rules have made Europe unable to compete in Africa on a level playing field against those—China—that do not abide by it .
In the United States , meanwhile , a Biden administration offers the opportunity to revisit the key SDR issue .
Already supported by the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could correct Trump ’ s SDR veto and unlock a major source of relief .

As U.S. President-elect Joe Biden starts to formulate his foreign policies, the list of regions and issues needing immediate attention is already long. But one that should stand out is Africa’s debt. Tipped into crisis territory by the economic knock-on effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, it threatens to push the region further into China’s hands.
As U.S. President-elect Joe Biden starts to formulate his foreign policies, the list of regions and issues needing immediate attention is already long. But one that should stand out is Africa’s debt. Tipped into crisis territory by the economic knock-on effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, it threatens to push the region further into China’s hands.
Even before the pandemic hit, many African countries had enormous debt burdens, which grew heavier this spring when the value of their currencies fell relative to the foreign currencies in which the debt was denominated. At the same time, the income necessary to make regular interest payments on the debt dried up. Commodity-dependent African economies like Angola and Nigeria rely on oil; demand had already been slumping since 2015, and the sectors were hit again this year as global demand plummeted because of the COVID-driven economic downturn. Those more service-oriented African countries not dependent on commodities fared no better, since tourism and foreign remittances cratered as well.
Facing an untenable situation, in March, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed wrote an open letter with a plea for help. He called for a two-year moratorium on debt repayments: from all creditors (bilateral, multilateral, and private) and for all African countries (not just the poorest). With the continent spending about 2 percent of its GDP just servicing its debt, he pointed out, there was little funding left to direct toward the pandemic response, for which he also requested an additional $150 billion in emergency financial assistance.
In the run-up to this spring’s G-20 meeting, his call was picked up by European and African leaders. But the initiative that emerged from the G20—the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI)—covered only bilateral debt (not all debt), only through the end of 2020 (not for two years), and only for the poorest African economies (not all of them). A proposal to grant IMF Special Drawing Rights, which would have given the countries access to additional financing, also faltered. The United States, it appears, had blocked such a measure since the Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) would have been available to all countries—benefiting friend and foe alike including China, Iran, and Russia. SDRs would have been game changing. Last employed in response to the 2009 global financial crisis (and backed by the Obama administration at that time), they offered far more in terms of fiscal breathing space—in the form of an injection of liquidity—than the DSSI, which just put a temporary hold on debt repayments.
Despite hopes that the DSSI would be extended for longer, in October it was renewed again for only another six months. G20 members sympathetic to Africa’s plight argue that the short time horizon is an attempt to improve the measure before locking it in over a longer period. Namely, they want to secure the full participation of China and private creditors who between them hold two-thirds of Africa’s debt. Failing to secure their buy-in risks relief intended for the pandemic response going instead to service Africa’s debt to China and private creditors.
Historically, African debt was principally held in the West. But today, China is a major player. At $143 billion, it has 20 percent of all African debt on its books. The remainder is split between the major multilateral international financial institutions, like the IMF and World Bank (which together hold 35 percent), and the private sector (32 percent).
In some ways, those figures represent a success—especially the diversification into that third sector, private credit. Justifiably viewed as a hard-won achievement, private investment has opened up another major source of development financing. Yet private debt falls outside of the DSSI, and some African countries, including Kenya, feared that accepting the agreement would lead private creditors to downgrade their credit ratings. They have therefore opted out of the DSSI. In the long run, they hope, doing so will preserve their access to private capital. But in the short term, it represents a difficult fiscal choice.
And then, of course, there is China to consider. To the extent that it, like the private sector, isn’t playing along fully with the DSSI, China is left with influence to try to renegotiate the debt it holds on its own terms. And the question is not whether Beijing will renegotiate if asked. The question is what it will want in return. Arguably, it views advancing its global footprint as more valuable than immediate debt repayment.
The West should sit up and pay attention to this issue. Not out of charity, but rather because the debt issue has exposed in dramatic fashion the degree to which it has failed to create alternatives to China’s model merging state power and the private sector. This represents both a geopolitical loss and a real loss for Western business who might otherwise want to invest on the continent.
So what can be done? For now, efforts are underway to improve the DSSI to include the private sector and increase Chinese transparency and full participation. Failing that, the Western powers could up the ante: condition further DSSI assistance on recipient countries entering an IMF program, which would give the IMF a say into how countries manage their debt obligations. But entering an IMF program would also imperil African countries’ future access to private credit markets, so it would serve as a stick of last resort.
This situation highlights the role that the West needs to play in providing alternatives to Africa in financing and investment. Debt relief now is firefighting. Financing and private investment is a longer-term readjustment of the asymmetry with China. In Europe, there are stirrings in this direction. Working with the EU and others, France has called for a heads-of-state meeting slated for May 2021, with the aim of generating alternative financing and private investment mechanisms for Africa. President Emmanuel Macron has pointed out that the OECD rules have made Europe unable to compete in Africa on a level playing field against those—China—that do not abide by it.
In the United States, meanwhile, a Biden administration offers the opportunity to revisit the key SDR issue. Already supported by the overwhelming majority of U.S. allies, Biden could correct Trump’s SDR veto and unlock a major source of relief.


foreignpolicy--2020-11-14--Sudan Will Decide the Outcome of the Ethiopian Civil War

ADDIS ABABA , Ethiopia—While the world girded for the U.S. election in early November , Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched a war against the northern region of Tigray .
The region is home to the Tigray People ’ s Liberation Front—the party that dominated Ethiopian politics for decades and has since been displaced and sidelined as Abiy has sought to consolidate power and made peace with the TPLF ’ s archenemy , Eritrea .
But the TPLF has not gone quietly ; in September , the regional government it leads held local elections that the central government refused to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Nov. 3 , following provocations by Abiy , it took control of personnel , military hardware , and equipment from the federal army ’ s Northern Command , prompting Addis Ababa to declare war against a region that remains home to a sizable portion of the Ethiopian federal army ’ s arsenal and forces , given its position along the long-contested and still undemarcated border with Eritrea .
Abiy has long accused the TPLF old guard of seeking to sabotage his government and his purported reforms .
But now , facing all-out war @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will turn on the choices of Ethiopia ’ s neighbors—Sudan and Eritrea .
Since last week , the TPLF has taken control of half the soldiers from the five divisions of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces ( ENDF ) Northern Command that remain in Tigray—meaning it has gained 15,000 soldiers , according to three sources : a senior Ethiopian diplomat briefed on the latest developments , a senior retired intelligence officer in Tigray who continues to work for the TPLF , and a source in Tigray monitoring the situation .
But the seizure @ @ @ @ @ @ @ heightened the importance of logistical supplies for the TPLF , which will inevitably depend on Sudan ’ s stance .
Sudan has a number of strategic reasons to back—or at least to be perceived as supporting—the TPLF in the civil war against Ethiopia ’ s government .
While Sudan has officially closed the borders between Tigray and Sudan ’ s frontier states of Kassala and Gadaref—which are landlocked Tigray ’ s only logistical links to the outside world in terms of fuel , ammunition , and food—it could use the threat of support @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Addis Ababa on the contested Fashqa triangle .
Fashqa is an approximately 100-square-mile territory of prime agricultural land along its border with Ethiopia ’ s Amhara state , which Sudan claims by virtue of an agreement signed in 1902 between the United Kingdom and Ethiopia under Emperor Menelik II and subsequently reinforced by various Ethiopian leaders , including the TPLF .
The dispute over Fashqa remains a major grievance for Ethiopia ’ s ethnic Amhara farmers near the border , who seek to till the land , and is an obstacle in negotiations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ GERD ) .
Like Egypt , Sudan has rejected Ethiopia ’ s proposal for guidelines that would enshrine Ethiopia ’ s future ability to manage annual flow of the Blue Nile on a discretionary basis and Khartoum is already using the issue as leverage to pressure Abiy on Fashqa , where Ethiopia and Sudan continue to maintain a military presence .
But if Sudan supports Tigray , which also borders Eritrea , the civil war will certainly become a protracted affair , and the strategic fallout in Khartoum ’ s relations with Addis @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Indeed , the region could quickly revert to the state of proxy conflict that preceded the rise of Abiy and the collapse of former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir ’ s regime—or precipitate a wider regional conflagration .
Since last week , Sudan has already seen thousands of people flee from Ethiopia , including officers from the ENDF , according to a source who has spoken with Sudan ’ s civilian prime minister , Abdalla Hamdok , about the matter .
While Bashir allied himself with Ethiopia ’ s former TPLF-led regime , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has become limited since Bashir fell from power , and because it no longer controls the Ethiopian state .
Sudan ’ s condition is already fragile , and it wants to ensure that it has at least minimal relations with its neighbors .
For now , instructions from Khartoum have focused on not alienating either Addis Ababa or Asmara—a message that has trickled down in the Sudan Armed Forces , which has deployed to its borders with Ethiopia , said a senior Sudanese military officer .
Sudan is not the only neighboring country @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the civil war .
Envoys of Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki traveled to Khartoum on Nov. 11 to see the chairman of Sudan ’ s transitional Sovereign Council , Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan—presumably to ask Sudan ’ s military , which holds the real power , to cut off any potential logistical support to the TPLF .
The Northern Command comprises eight of the ENDF ’ s 32 divisions .
Three of them have been stationed outside of Tigray for two years , since Abiy expanded the operational area of the Northern @ @ @ @ @ @ @ north of Ethiopia ’ s Afar state and two divisions in Amhara .
Military maneuvers against Tigray are now underway on three fronts : from Eritrea , Afar , and Amhara , with Eritrea and Amhara being used in an attempt to cut the TPLF off from Sudan .
On Nov. 1 , a few days after Abiy created the new command , Burhan flew to see him in Addis Ababa with the director-general of Sudan ’ s intelligence service and the head of military intelligence .
It was announced that they would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ suggesting that Abiy was trying to completely encircle Tigray before a premeditated confrontation with the TPLF .
Both Abiy and Isaias—who went to war with the TPLF ’ s leaders two decades ago , leading to a bloody Ethiopian-Eritrean conflict that lasted , on and off , for 20 years—have a bloodlust for the TPLF .
This shared hostility toward Ethiopia ’ s former regime , rather than any brotherly love , was the principal motivation for their commencement of diplomatic relations two years ago , for which Abiy was feted with last @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ; the Norwegian Nobel Committee failed to see that the prize rewarded a peace process that really intended to end one war while laying the groundwork for another , as it has today .
According to sources in both Tigray and the Ethiopian government , soldiers in divisions of the ENDF Northern Command in Tigray have in the past week split into three groups : half aligned with the TPLF , one-quarter—Abiy loyalists and mostly ethnic Amhara officers—fled into Eritrea , and the rest refused to fight against the federal army and have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Tigray were able to speak with us intermittently over satellite Internet , circumventing the telecommunications shutdown Abiy has imposed there .
While the TPLF had considerable success last week in taking control of personnel , military hardware , and equipment held by the divisions of the ENDF ’ s Northern Command , continued success in a protracted civil war will ultimately depend on support from Sudan .
If Khartoum does so , it has much to lose .
Abiy could retaliate by supporting Sudanese rebel groups following unstable peace accords they signed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ October—for example , in Sudan ’ s Blue Nile state , which borders Ethiopia ’ s Benishangul-Gumuz state , the site of the GERD .
Isaias could also support subgroups of the Beja—a group of tribes living between the Red Sea and the Nile—in a tactical alliance with him against the Beni Amer ethnic group in eastern Sudan and Eritrea traditionally aligned with the ELF , as well as seek to enlist discontented Sudanese opposition figures who were previously based in Eritrea from the mid-1990s to 2006 .
Since the fall of Bashir @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Kassala , Gadaref , and Port Sudan—between groups aligned with Eritrea ’ s government and those opposed to it .
Meanwhile , Eritrea is getting involved ; it is hosting the ENDF on its territory although it remains unclear if Eritrea ’ s own forces are involved in fighting .
On Tigray state television , Tigray ’ s regional president Debretsion Gebremichael said forces aligned with Isaias bombed Humera—a strategic Tigrayan town on the triple frontier between Ethiopia , Eritrea , and Sudan on Nov. 9 with heavy artillery , that Eritrean @ @ @ @ @ @ @ border , and that ENDF forces have otherwise been restricted in their movements .
While Abiy ’ s government earlier claimed it had captured territory from Humera to Shire , about 160 miles east in Tigray , it quickly retracted that claim .
Despite initial successes , the TPLF may not have the backing of Sudan to keep going , especially if Abiy and Isaias can make compromises to enlist Sudan ’ s support .
Although everyone from Sudan ’ s Hamdok and the African Union to Pope Francis and the U.S. Senate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cease-fire and negotiations , Abiy will only call for talks if the ENDF and other security forces continue to fragment to a point of no return and fail on the battlefield .
Without Sudan , it seems that the TPLF ’ s only remaining hope would be to overthrow Abiy ’ s government or seek to assassinate him with the support of his many other enemies .
Sudan could always use its official border closures as a pretext to supply the TPLF and deny the ENDF and forces loyal to Abiy the ability @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Both Kassala and Gadaref states are awash with contraband weapons smuggling , which Sudan ’ s military could fully shut down—but only if it chooses to do so .
If Ethiopia grants Sudan the concessions it wants when it comes to sharing the waters of the Nile and returning the Fashqa triangle , Khartoum could tip the balance .
Officials privy to private talks between Abiy and Sudanese officials earlier this year told us Sudan sought during the GERD talks to seek implementation of the 1902 border demarcation treaty ; by that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ control over Fashqa .
These sources told us that Sudanese officials were perturbed by Abiy ’ s pusillanimous approach on the issue and subsequent exchanges of gunfire between Ethiopian and Sudanese soldiers on their border following Sudanese protests that armed Amhara farmers were making further incursions .
If Sudan makes the formal transfer of Fashqa an explicit condition for refusing logistical support to the TPLF , that could prove fatal for Abiy , but it would be a risky move ; several changes in regime over the last century in both countries pushed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ its unresolved status thanks to good relations with Ethiopia ’ s former TPLF-led government .
If Abiy were to concede , he would lose the expansive support he imagines he has among ethnic Amhara .
Much like so-called ancestral lands removed from Amhara and attached by the TPLF to Tigray in the 1990s , Fashqa is an issue for which Amhara will lay down their lives ; and if Abiy refuses , Sudan could respond by supporting the TPLF .
Since last week , scores of ill-equipped Amhara irregular forces along the Amhara-Tigray @ @ @ @ @ @ @ these ancestral lands , according to the senior Ethiopian diplomat .
He said such unpublicized failures have both triggered Abiy ’ s reshuffle of the Amhara regional president ( an Abiy loyalist who is now director-general of the National Intelligence and Security Service ) and could deepen discontent there , leading to another Amhara insurrection to install hard-line regional leaders which could be more serious than an internal convulsion last year .
It is evident from Abiy ’ s latest reshuffling of his military , intelligence , security , and foreign-policy establishment that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Amhara ostensible loyalists—and they could ultimately turn on him and take power for themselves if he does not continue to serve their interests against the TPLF and their designs to restructure the Ethiopian state in their image .
The TPLF would face the challenge of defeating both the Eritrean Defense Forces and the ENDF in Eritrea , which hosts a naval and air base for the United Arab Emirates , with whom Abiy has built close relations .
On Nov. 6 , the Emirati foreign minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” with “ friendly countries in their war against ” terrorism—suggesting alignment with Abiy and Isaias against the TPLF .
Abu Dhabi could use its significant clout with Burhan and other key figures in Sudan ’ s unstable government to achieve its objectives .
In Sudan , a retired senior officer who was a member of the ELF told us that Isaias has been drafting additional military conscripts since October in different parts of Eritrea .
He said some Eritrean soldiers—principally from the Beni Amer and related tribes—have refused to fight and defected @ @ @ @ @ @ @ may indicate the unreadiness of at least some groups in the Eritrean Defense Forces to fight .
In Kassala , Beni Amer—who are also present in Eritrea—are being roiled up to fight against Isaias ’ s regime .
Both the TPLF and Isaias see Kassala as their strategic backyard .
The TPLF built relations with anti-Isaias groups among the Beni Amer in Kassala after the 1998-2000 Eritrean-Ethiopian war , and Isaias knows that any challenge for control of western Eritrea can come from Beni Amer allied with the ELF .
But an overthrow @ @ @ @ @ @ @ happen if Sudan ’ s military provides support to Eritrean opposition groups in Sudan , and only if the TPLF simultaneously advances into Eritrea—also with tacit Sudanese support .
As the war intensifies , Abiy seems to be reading from the same script as his TPLF predecessors even as he seeks to depose them .
Although the previous governor in Kassala was a Beni Amer closely aligned with the TPLF as well as the Bashir regime ’ s army , Isaias may have already tilted the balance against the TPLF there .
After @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the new regime ’ s reforms , another Beni Amer , Saleh Ammar , was proposed as governor , but his appointment was abandoned following protests led by Beja subtribes linked to Isaias .
Meanwhile , in Ethiopia , Tigrayan officers are being disarmed and Tigrayans across government structures are being targeted ; in the federal police , serving officers told us , Tigrayans have been asked to take leave ; and even in the African Union Mission in Somalia , which fights al-Shabab , two senior officers said that more than 200 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As the war intensifies , Abiy seems to be reading from the same script as his TPLF predecessors even as he seeks to depose them—organizing state sponsored support rallies for the war , jailing journalists , and labelling myriad opponents lashing out against his hypocrisy as terrorists .
War is already underway on the Eritrean front , with Ethiopian military commanders appearing on the Tigray-Eritrea border .
And if the Ethiopian army fails to choke off the TPLF from the small slice of land between Tigray and Sudan—Abiy ’ s chief of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sources say the battle there is still unresolved—Sudan will determine the outcome of Ethiopia ’ s civil war .

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia—While the world girded for the U.S. election in early November, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched a war against the northern region of Tigray. The region is home to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front—the party that dominated Ethiopian politics for decades and has since been displaced and sidelined as Abiy has sought to consolidate power and made peace with the TPLF’s archenemy, Eritrea.
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia—While the world girded for the U.S. election in early November, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched a war against the northern region of Tigray. The region is home to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front—the party that dominated Ethiopian politics for decades and has since been displaced and sidelined as Abiy has sought to consolidate power and made peace with the TPLF’s archenemy, Eritrea.
But the TPLF has not gone quietly; in September, the regional government it leads held local elections that the central government refused to recognize in October. Then, on Nov. 3, following provocations by Abiy, it took control of personnel, military hardware, and equipment from the federal army’s Northern Command, prompting Addis Ababa to declare war against a region that remains home to a sizable portion of the Ethiopian federal army’s arsenal and forces, given its position along the long-contested and still undemarcated border with Eritrea.
Abiy has long accused the TPLF old guard of seeking to sabotage his government and his purported reforms. But now, facing all-out war against a formidable foe, the outcome will turn on the choices of Ethiopia’s neighbors—Sudan and Eritrea.
Members of the Tigray region special police force parade during celebrations marking the 45th anniversary of the launching of the Armed Struggle of the Peoples of Tigray in Mekele, Ethiopia, on Feb. 19.
Although Tigray is small, it is well armed, and its forces are battle-hardened. Tigray’s regional special forces, which a senior Ethiopian diplomat estimates have grown to at least 20,000 commandos—led by senior Tigrayan officers forced into retirement by Abiy, plus a standing body of reserve special forces made up of military-trained militia and armed farmers—together have an estimated total of up to 250,000 armed fighters. Until recently, however, it lacked the heavy weaponry required to directly confront a fully-equipped division.
Since last week, the TPLF has taken control of half the soldiers from the five divisions of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces (ENDF) Northern Command that remain in Tigray—meaning it has gained 15,000 soldiers, according to three sources: a senior Ethiopian diplomat briefed on the latest developments, a senior retired intelligence officer in Tigray who continues to work for the TPLF, and a source in Tigray monitoring the situation. But the seizure of Ethiopian military hardware and equipment has heightened the importance of logistical supplies for the TPLF, which will inevitably depend on Sudan’s stance.
Sudan has a number of strategic reasons to back—or at least to be perceived as supporting—the TPLF in the civil war against Ethiopia’s government.
While Sudan has officially closed the borders between Tigray and Sudan’s frontier states of Kassala and Gadaref—which are landlocked Tigray’s only logistical links to the outside world in terms of fuel, ammunition, and food—it could use the threat of support to the TPLF to extract concessions from Addis Ababa on the contested Fashqa triangle.
Fashqa is an approximately 100-square-mile territory of prime agricultural land along its border with Ethiopia’s Amhara state, which Sudan claims by virtue of an agreement signed in 1902 between the United Kingdom and Ethiopia under Emperor Menelik II and subsequently reinforced by various Ethiopian leaders, including the TPLF.
The dispute over Fashqa remains a major grievance for Ethiopia’s ethnic Amhara farmers near the border, who seek to till the land, and is an obstacle in negotiations over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). Like Egypt, Sudan has rejected Ethiopia’s proposal for guidelines that would enshrine Ethiopia’s future ability to manage annual flow of the Blue Nile on a discretionary basis and Khartoum is already using the issue as leverage to pressure Abiy on Fashqa, where Ethiopia and Sudan continue to maintain a military presence.
But if Sudan supports Tigray, which also borders Eritrea, the civil war will certainly become a protracted affair, and the strategic fallout in Khartoum’s relations with Addis Ababa and Asmara could be too high. Indeed, the region could quickly revert to the state of proxy conflict that preceded the rise of Abiy and the collapse of former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir’s regime—or precipitate a wider regional conflagration.
Since last week, Sudan has already seen thousands of people flee from Ethiopia, including officers from the ENDF, according to a source who has spoken with Sudan’s civilian prime minister, Abdalla Hamdok, about the matter. While Bashir allied himself with Ethiopia’s former TPLF-led regime, the TPLF’s influence in Khartoum has become limited since Bashir fell from power, and because it no longer controls the Ethiopian state.
Sudan’s condition is already fragile, and it wants to ensure that it has at least minimal relations with its neighbors. For now, instructions from Khartoum have focused on not alienating either Addis Ababa or Asmara—a message that has trickled down in the Sudan Armed Forces, which has deployed to its borders with Ethiopia, said a senior Sudanese military officer.
Sudan is not the only neighboring country with a strong interest in the outcome of the civil war. Envoys of Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki traveled to Khartoum on Nov. 11 to see the chairman of Sudan’s transitional Sovereign Council, Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan—presumably to ask Sudan’s military, which holds the real power, to cut off any potential logistical support to the TPLF.
Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed meets with Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan of Sudan in Khartoum, Sudan, on June 7, 2019.
From the beginning, it was clear that Abiy was intent on provocation, but he did not anticipate the TPLF could supplant an entire military command. In late October, a week before the TPLF took control of the remaining Northern Command in Tigray, Abiy created a new regional command in Ethiopia’s Amhara state, with the two divisions of the Northern Command already stationed in Amhara slated to be transferred into its ranks.
The Northern Command comprises eight of the ENDF’s 32 divisions. Three of them have been stationed outside of Tigray for two years, since Abiy expanded the operational area of the Northern Command: a tank division in the north of Ethiopia’s Afar state and two divisions in Amhara. Military maneuvers against Tigray are now underway on three fronts: from Eritrea, Afar, and Amhara, with Eritrea and Amhara being used in an attempt to cut the TPLF off from Sudan.
On Nov. 1, a few days after Abiy created the new command, Burhan flew to see him in Addis Ababa with the director-general of Sudan’s intelligence service and the head of military intelligence. It was announced that they would strengthen control of the Ethiopia-Sudan border, suggesting that Abiy was trying to completely encircle Tigray before a premeditated confrontation with the TPLF.
Both Abiy and Isaias—who went to war with the TPLF’s leaders two decades ago, leading to a bloody Ethiopian-Eritrean conflict that lasted, on and off, for 20 years—have a bloodlust for the TPLF. This shared hostility toward Ethiopia’s former regime, rather than any brotherly love, was the principal motivation for their commencement of diplomatic relations two years ago, for which Abiy was feted with last year’s ill-judged Nobel Peace Prize; the Norwegian Nobel Committee failed to see that the prize rewarded a peace process that really intended to end one war while laying the groundwork for another, as it has today.
According to sources in both Tigray and the Ethiopian government, soldiers in divisions of the ENDF Northern Command in Tigray have in the past week split into three groups: half aligned with the TPLF, one-quarter—Abiy loyalists and mostly ethnic Amhara officers—fled into Eritrea, and the rest refused to fight against the federal army and have been contained in barracks. The sources in Tigray were able to speak with us intermittently over satellite Internet, circumventing the telecommunications shutdown Abiy has imposed there.
While the TPLF had considerable success last week in taking control of personnel, military hardware, and equipment held by the divisions of the ENDF’s Northern Command, continued success in a protracted civil war will ultimately depend on support from Sudan.
Sudanese protesters hold national flags of Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan, and Somalia as they gather for a march outside the army headquarters in Khartoum on April 25, 2019. Tens of thousands of protesters converged from all directions on Sudan's army headquarters after calls for a "million-strong" demonstration to demand the ruling military council cede power.
Sudan has a long history of involvement in Ethiopian and Eritrean affairs. Even before the TPLF and Isaias came to power in the 1990s, Sudan clandestinely supported both the TPLF and the Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) in allowing the passage of military and humanitarian logistics through its borders. (Isaias later split from the ELF, which has since formed a series of splinter groups). At the time, Sudan’s involvement was crucial to their success, but it would be difficult for Sudan to resort to the same tactics again.
If Khartoum does so, it has much to lose. Abiy could retaliate by supporting Sudanese rebel groups following unstable peace accords they signed with Sudan’s transitional government in October—for example, in Sudan’s Blue Nile state, which borders Ethiopia’s Benishangul-Gumuz state, the site of the GERD. Isaias could also support subgroups of the Beja—a group of tribes living between the Red Sea and the Nile—in a tactical alliance with him against the Beni Amer ethnic group in eastern Sudan and Eritrea traditionally aligned with the ELF, as well as seek to enlist discontented Sudanese opposition figures who were previously based in Eritrea from the mid-1990s to 2006. Since the fall of Bashir, tensions have erupted in eastern Sudan—including in Kassala, Gadaref, and Port Sudan—between groups aligned with Eritrea’s government and those opposed to it.
Meanwhile, Eritrea is getting involved; it is hosting the ENDF on its territory although it remains unclear if Eritrea’s own forces are involved in fighting. On Tigray state television, Tigray’s regional president Debretsion Gebremichael said forces aligned with Isaias bombed Humera—a strategic Tigrayan town on the triple frontier between Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Sudan on Nov. 9 with heavy artillery, that Eritrean and Tigrayan forces are fighting on the border, and that ENDF forces have otherwise been restricted in their movements. While Abiy’s government earlier claimed it had captured territory from Humera to Shire, about 160 miles east in Tigray, it quickly retracted that claim.
Despite initial successes, the TPLF may not have the backing of Sudan to keep going, especially if Abiy and Isaias can make compromises to enlist Sudan’s support. Although everyone from Sudan’s Hamdok and the African Union to Pope Francis and the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee is calling for a cease-fire and negotiations, Abiy will only call for talks if the ENDF and other security forces continue to fragment to a point of no return and fail on the battlefield. Without Sudan, a cornered TPLF—which is no stranger to ruthless and violent tactics—might attempt to overthrow Abiy’s government or seek to assassinate him with the support of his many other enemies.
Both Sudan and Egypt remain at odds with Ethiopia on the filling and operations of the GERD, which could eventually upend preexisting allocations of water resources to Egypt and Sudan. For now, Sudan is continuing to exploit its leverage in the Tigray conflict and the dam negotiations to secure official demarcation from Abiy of the Fashqa triangle—a formal transfer of a significant amount of territory to Sudan. Since the civil war began, Sudan’s transitional Sovereign Council has already announced that it will not compromise “on any inch of Sudanese territory” with Ethiopia, according to the Sudan News Agency.
Sudan could always use its official border closures as a pretext to supply the TPLF and deny the ENDF and forces loyal to Abiy the ability to attack the TPLF from Sudanese territory. Both Kassala and Gadaref states are awash with contraband weapons smuggling, which Sudan’s military could fully shut down—but only if it chooses to do so. If Ethiopia grants Sudan the concessions it wants when it comes to sharing the waters of the Nile and returning the Fashqa triangle, Khartoum could tip the balance.
Officials privy to private talks between Abiy and Sudanese officials earlier this year told us Sudan sought during the GERD talks to seek implementation of the 1902 border demarcation treaty; by that agreement, Sudan continues to seek full control over Fashqa. These sources told us that Sudanese officials were perturbed by Abiy’s pusillanimous approach on the issue and subsequent exchanges of gunfire between Ethiopian and Sudanese soldiers on their border following Sudanese protests that armed Amhara farmers were making further incursions.
If Sudan makes the formal transfer of Fashqa an explicit condition for refusing logistical support to the TPLF, that could prove fatal for Abiy, but it would be a risky move; several changes in regime over the last century in both countries pushed Fashqa to the back-burner and Bashir tolerated its unresolved status thanks to good relations with Ethiopia’s former TPLF-led government.
If Abiy were to concede, he would lose the expansive support he imagines he has among ethnic Amhara. Much like so-called ancestral lands removed from Amhara and attached by the TPLF to Tigray in the 1990s, Fashqa is an issue for which Amhara will lay down their lives; and if Abiy refuses, Sudan could respond by supporting the TPLF.
Since last week, scores of ill-equipped Amhara irregular forces along the Amhara-Tigray border have died fighting seeking to reclaim these ancestral lands, according to the senior Ethiopian diplomat. He said such unpublicized failures have both triggered Abiy’s reshuffle of the Amhara regional president (an Abiy loyalist who is now director-general of the National Intelligence and Security Service) and could deepen discontent there, leading to another Amhara insurrection to install hard-line regional leaders which could be more serious than an internal convulsion last year.
It is evident from Abiy’s latest reshuffling of his military, intelligence, security, and foreign-policy establishment that he depends increasingly on a small network of Amhara ostensible loyalists—and they could ultimately turn on him and take power for themselves if he does not continue to serve their interests against the TPLF and their designs to restructure the Ethiopian state in their image.
If the TPLF is able to drain personnel away from a war it is already fighting on three fronts—Amhara, Afar, and Eritrea—and invade Eritrea and bring regime change there, that could give it access to additional territory as well as logistics through the Red Sea. Tigray already hosts several Eritrean opposition groups as well as small military bases for them, but it’s a tall order.
The TPLF would face the challenge of defeating both the Eritrean Defense Forces and the ENDF in Eritrea, which hosts a naval and air base for the United Arab Emirates, with whom Abiy has built close relations. On Nov. 6, the Emirati foreign minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan noted the UAE’s “solidarity” with “friendly countries in their war against” terrorism—suggesting alignment with Abiy and Isaias against the TPLF. Abu Dhabi could use its significant clout with Burhan and other key figures in Sudan’s unstable government to achieve its objectives.
In Sudan, a retired senior officer who was a member of the ELF told us that Isaias has been drafting additional military conscripts since October in different parts of Eritrea. He said some Eritrean soldiers—principally from the Beni Amer and related tribes—have refused to fight and defected into Kassala state in Sudan. This may indicate the unreadiness of at least some groups in the Eritrean Defense Forces to fight. In Kassala, Beni Amer—who are also present in Eritrea—are being roiled up to fight against Isaias’s regime.
Both the TPLF and Isaias see Kassala as their strategic backyard. The TPLF built relations with anti-Isaias groups among the Beni Amer in Kassala after the 1998-2000 Eritrean-Ethiopian war, and Isaias knows that any challenge for control of western Eritrea can come from Beni Amer allied with the ELF.
But an overthrow of Isaias in Eritrea could only realistically happen if Sudan’s military provides support to Eritrean opposition groups in Sudan, and only if the TPLF simultaneously advances into Eritrea—also with tacit Sudanese support.
As the war intensifies, Abiy seems to be reading from the same script as his TPLF predecessors even as he seeks to depose them.
Although the previous governor in Kassala was a Beni Amer closely aligned with the TPLF as well as the Bashir regime’s army, Isaias may have already tilted the balance against the TPLF there. After Sudan removed military governors as part of the new regime’s reforms, another Beni Amer, Saleh Ammar, was proposed as governor, but his appointment was abandoned following protests led by Beja subtribes linked to Isaias.
Meanwhile, in Ethiopia, Tigrayan officers are being disarmed and Tigrayans across government structures are being targeted; in the federal police, serving officers told us, Tigrayans have been asked to take leave; and even in the African Union Mission in Somalia, which fights al-Shabab, two senior officers said that more than 200 Tigrayan officers have had their guns confiscated.
As the war intensifies, Abiy seems to be reading from the same script as his TPLF predecessors even as he seeks to depose them—organizing state sponsored support rallies for the war, jailing journalists, and labelling myriad opponents lashing out against his hypocrisy as terrorists.
There is more at stake in Ethiopia’s civil war than a Tigrayan rebellion. At worst, officers throughout Ethiopia’s ethnically based military will join a chaotic rebellion, and the military will find itself increasingly enmeshed in an already cataclysmic web of interethnic fighting across Ethiopia and at its borders—a regional catastrophe that will ensnare both Eritrea and Sudan, and possibly more actors.
War is already underway on the Eritrean front, with Ethiopian military commanders appearing on the Tigray-Eritrea border. And if the Ethiopian army fails to choke off the TPLF from the small slice of land between Tigray and Sudan—Abiy’s chief of staff claims it has, but senior sources say the battle there is still unresolved—Sudan will determine the outcome of Ethiopia’s civil war.


foreignpolicy--2020-11-14--Our Top Weekend Reads

Our Top Weekend Reads

U.S. President Donald Trump is not the first world leader to try to steal an election , but he may be the leader who has received the least international pushback .
As Trump works to erode American democracy , most of the world ’ s leading pro-democratic bodies—from the European Union to the United Nations—have remained silent .
Meanwhile , as Switzerland becomes one of the world ’ s worst COVID-19 hot spots , staffers and diplomats at the United Nations ’ headquarters in Geneva worry that the organization will struggle to keep the coronavirus at bay amid in-person peace @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Chinese Americans are fighting back against the racism and fake news that have dominated Chinese-language social media this U.S. election cycle .
Much more worrying than President Donald Trump ’ s refusal to concede the U.S. election is the world ’ s failure to condemn Trump ’ s actions and call him out for what he is—a sore loser and an angry autocrat , Nic Cheeseman writes .
2 .
U.N. Peacemaking in the Age of Plague COVID-19 cases are soaring in Geneva , the site of the European headquarters of the United @ @ @ @ @ @ @ forging ahead with plans for peace conferences , fueling concerns about a bigger outbreak , Foreign Policy ’ s Colum Lynch reports .
Too often , Washington seems to want better relations with Moscow than Moscow wants with Washington .
Come January , U.S. President-elect Joe Biden shouldn ’ t make that mistake , David J. Kramer writes .
Liberal Chinese American voices have taken up the WeChat battleground to counterbalance right-wing conspiracy content , engaging a minority bloc that has become increasingly influential in U.S. elections , Shen Lu writes .
5 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Should Be Debt Relief Tipped into crisis territory by the economic knock-on effects of the COVID-19 pandemic , Africa ’ s debt threatens to push the continent further into China ’ s hands—unless Western powers step in , Theodore Murphy writes .

U.S. President Donald Trump is not the first world leader to try to steal an election, but he may be the leader who has received the least international pushback. As Trump works to erode American democracy, most of the world’s leading pro-democratic bodies—from the European Union to the United Nations—have remained silent.
U.S. President Donald Trump is not the first world leader to try to steal an election, but he may be the leader who has received the least international pushback. As Trump works to erode American democracy, most of the world’s leading pro-democratic bodies—from the European Union to the United Nations—have remained silent.
Meanwhile, as Switzerland becomes one of the world’s worst COVID-19 hot spots, staffers and diplomats at the United Nations’ headquarters in Geneva worry that the organization will struggle to keep the coronavirus at bay amid in-person peace conferences later this month.
And liberal Chinese Americans are fighting back against the racism and fake news that have dominated Chinese-language social media this U.S. election cycle.
Here are Foreign Policy’s top weekend reads.
Representative Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) stands with dozens of people calling for stopping the vote count in Pennsylvania due to unfounded charges of fraud on the steps of the State Capitol on Nov. 5 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Much more worrying than President Donald Trump’s refusal to concede the U.S. election is the world’s failure to condemn Trump’s actions and call him out for what he is—a sore loser and an angry autocrat, Nic Cheeseman writes.
United Nations Special Envoy to Syria Geir Pedersen puts on his face mask
COVID-19 cases are soaring in Geneva, the site of the European headquarters of the United Nations. But the organization is still forging ahead with plans for peace conferences, fueling concerns about a bigger outbreak, Foreign Policy’s Colum Lynch reports.
A mask of Russian President Vladimir Putin on sale at a souvenir stall in Saint Petersburg on Jan. 29, 2020.
Too often, Washington seems to want better relations with Moscow than Moscow wants with Washington. Come January, U.S. President-elect Joe Biden shouldn’t make that mistake, David J. Kramer writes.
Supporters of President Donald Trump gather outside the governor's mansion to protest the results of the U.S. presidential election in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Nov. 7.
Liberal Chinese American voices have taken up the WeChat battleground to counterbalance right-wing conspiracy content, engaging a minority bloc that has become increasingly influential in U.S. elections, Shen Lu writes.
Kenyan daily newspapers with the headlines “Donald Trump fired” and “Biden wins” in Nairobi on Nov. 8.
Tipped into crisis territory by the economic knock-on effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, Africa’s debt threatens to push the continent further into China’s hands—unless Western powers step in, Theodore Murphy writes.


foreignpolicy--2020-11-16--The World’s Largest Trade Agreement Doesn’t Include the United States

Welcome to While You Weren ’ t Looking , Foreign Policy ’ s weekly update on emerging global stories .
Here ’ s what we ’ re watching this week : Fifteen countries—not including the United States—sign the world ’ s largest trade agreement , Islamic State-aligned insurgents step up their attacks in northern Mozambique , and Peru sees three presidents in one week .
If you would like to receive While You Weren ’ t Looking in your inbox on Mondays , please sign up here .
On Sunday , 15 countries in the Asia-Pacific region signed the world @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is expected to accelerate a shift in global trade toward East Asia and away from the West .
Negotiations for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership ( RCEP ) , spearheaded by China , began with a slow start in 2012 but gained new urgency as the Trump administration pursued a protectionist trade policy .
The United States is not party to the new deal .
The RCEP will reduce tariffs over a 20-year period , streamline customs procedures , and replace a number of bilateral trade agreements in the region with one set @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Asia-Pacific as the world ’ s largest trading bloc , bigger than the European Union or North America , accounting for $ 26.2 percent of global output—some 30 percent of the global economy .
The Peterson Institute for International Economics estimates that by 2030 the deal could increase global GDP by $ 186 billion , although China , South Korea , and Japan are expected to benefit more than other signatories .
Other parties to the deal include Australia and New Zealand , as well as the 10 members of the Association of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Indonesia , Laos , Malaysia , Myanmar , the Philippines , Singapore , Thailand , and Brunei .
India withdrew from the negotiations this year over concerns that its domestic market would be supplanted by Chinese imports , and Beijing pushed back against New Delhi ’ s efforts to make the deal more ambitious in scope .
Analysts note that the deal ’ s impact on trade is likely to be incremental , as existing regional trade deals have already driven down tariffs .
But its geopolitical significance should not be underestimated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the Asia-Pacific .
“ The diplomatic messaging of RCEP may be just as important as the economics—a coup for China , ” Citi Research wrote in a report on Sunday .
The Trump administration has spent the past four years backtracking on decades of U.S. trade policy , ripping up international agreements and imposing tariffs .
In 2017 , President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership ( TPP ) , set to become the world ’ s largest free trade deal and part of the Obama administration ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ countries involved in the TPP forged ahead and signed the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership ( CPTPP ) deal , which China is not party to , in 2018 .
U.S. President-elect Joe Biden has not indicated whether his administration would join the CPTPP .
But the signing of the RCEP , which comes as a blow to Washington , is likely to refocus attention on the issue .
Militant surge in Mozambique .
The United Nations has called for urgent measures to protect civilians in the Cabo Delgado region of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Islamic State have stepped up their attacks in recent weeks , killing dozens of people and forcing hundreds more to flee .
Local media has reported that militants decapitated more than 50 men and boys in Muidumbe district .
While the Islamic State has been beaten back in Iraq and Syria , affiliated groups have surged in parts of Africa , from Niger to Mozambique .
In Cabo Delgado , violent unrest fueled by local grievances and led by the group al-Sunna wa Jamaa has displaced over 350,000 people since 2017 .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Islamic State last year .
In August , it seized the port of Mocímboa da Praia , signaling its growing sophistication .
Spiraling conflict in Ethiopia .
An investigation by Amnesty International published last Thursday revealed that dozens , if not hundreds , of people were stabbed or “ hacked to death ” in the town of Mai-Kadra ( May Cadera ) in Ethiopia ’ s embattled Tigray region on Nov. 9 .
The organization was unable to confirm who was responsible for the killings , but eyewitnesses pointed to forces loyal to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ People ’ s Liberation Front ( TPLF ) .
On Nov. 4 , Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched military operations in Tigray after months of tensions with the leaders of the restive province , alleging that the TPLF had attacked a federal military base .
The acting U.N. special advisor on the prevention of genocide issued a statement on Thursday expressing deep concern about the mounting ethnic tensions .
Abiy has repeatedly rebuffed international efforts to mediate , as Ethiopian troops close in on the regional capital , Mekelle .
On Saturday @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at Asmara , the capital of neighboring Eritrea , accusing the country of sending troops to support the Ethiopian central government—allegations denied by the Eritrean government .
Eritrea and Ethiopia fought a bloody border war between 1998 and 2000 that only officially ended with a peace accord signed two years ago , and the rocket attacks risk drawing Eritrea into the escalating conflict .
War in Western Sahara .
The leader of the Western Sahara independence movement declared war on Morocco on Saturday , jeopardizing a 29-year-old cease-fire agreement .
Brahim Ghali , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the disputed and sparsely populated territory , accused Morocco of breaching the agreement by launching a military operation in the U.N.-controlled buffer zone in Western Sahara .
Both sides confirmed that they had exchanged fire on Friday evening , but they did not release details of injuries or fatalities .
In the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s , the socialist Polisario Front waged a war for independence , establishing the partially recognized Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic , which controls around 20 percent of Western Sahara .
Third time ’ s the charm @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Martín Vizcarra was impeached over corruption allegations .
His replacement , congressional leader Manuel Merino , was appointed interim president last Tuesday but has already stepped down .
The resignation comes after a week of protests that erupted following the killing of two people in a brutal police crackdown on a pro-democracy rally in the capital , Lima .
Vizcarra was popular among voters , and many Peruvians regard his removal as a congressional coup .
On Monday , Peruvian lawmakers chose the respected economist Francisco Sagasti to lead the country until the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Protesters undeterred in Belarus .
Over 1,000 people were detained across Belarus on Sunday , the largest number of arrests in a single day since the protests against rigged presidential elections began in early August .
Undeterred by beatings and torture at the hands of the police , protesters were further outraged last week by the killing of Roman Bondarenko , a 31-year-old art teacher who was pummeled by plainclothes officers last Wednesday and died in the hospital the next day .
German suspects charged in far-right terrorist plot .
German prosecutors announced @ @ @ @ @ @ @ first arrested in February have been charged with belonging to a far-right terrorist group and plotting deadly attacks on Muslims with a view to stoke social unrest and eventually overthrow the German government .
Far-right attacks are on the rise in Germany , increasing by almost 10 percent between 2018 and 2019 .
That ’ s it for this week .
For more from FP , visit foreignpolicy.com , subscribe here , or sign up for our other newsletters .
Send your tips , comments , questions , or corrections to newsletters @ @ @

Welcome to While You Weren’t Looking, Foreign Policy’s weekly update on emerging global stories.
Here’s what we’re watching this week: Fifteen countries—not including the United States—sign the world’s largest trade agreement, Islamic State-aligned insurgents step up their attacks in northern Mozambique, and Peru sees three presidents in one week.
If you would like to receive While You Weren’t Looking in your inbox on Mondays, please sign up here.
New Asian Trade Deal Pushes West to Margins
On Sunday, 15 countries in the Asia-Pacific region signed the world’s largest trade agreement, which is expected to accelerate a shift in global trade toward East Asia and away from the West. Negotiations for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), spearheaded by China, began with a slow start in 2012 but gained new urgency as the Trump administration pursued a protectionist trade policy. The United States is not party to the new deal.
The RCEP will reduce tariffs over a 20-year period, streamline customs procedures, and replace a number of bilateral trade agreements in the region with one set of rules. The pact establishes the Asia-Pacific as the world’s largest trading bloc, bigger than the European Union or North America, accounting for $26.2 percent of global output—some 30 percent of the global economy.
The Peterson Institute for International Economics estimates that by 2030 the deal could increase global GDP by $186 billion, although China, South Korea, and Japan are expected to benefit more than other signatories. Other parties to the deal include Australia and New Zealand, as well as the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations: Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Brunei.
India withdrew from the negotiations this year over concerns that its domestic market would be supplanted by Chinese imports, and Beijing pushed back against New Delhi’s efforts to make the deal more ambitious in scope.
Analysts note that the deal’s impact on trade is likely to be incremental, as existing regional trade deals have already driven down tariffs. But its geopolitical significance should not be underestimated as Beijing seeks to increase its influence in the Asia-Pacific. “The diplomatic messaging of RCEP may be just as important as the economics—a coup for China,” Citi Research wrote in a report on Sunday.
The Trump administration has spent the past four years backtracking on decades of U.S. trade policy, ripping up international agreements and imposing tariffs. In 2017, President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), set to become the world’s largest free trade deal and part of the Obama administration’s pivot to Asia. The remaining countries involved in the TPP forged ahead and signed the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) deal, which China is not party to, in 2018.
U.S. President-elect Joe Biden has not indicated whether his administration would join the CPTPP. But the signing of the RCEP, which comes as a blow to Washington, is likely to refocus attention on the issue.
What We’re Following
Militant surge in Mozambique. The United Nations has called for urgent measures to protect civilians in the Cabo Delgado region of northern Mozambique, as insurgents aligned with the Islamic State have stepped up their attacks in recent weeks, killing dozens of people and forcing hundreds more to flee. Local media has reported that militants decapitated more than 50 men and boys in Muidumbe district.
While the Islamic State has been beaten back in Iraq and Syria, affiliated groups have surged in parts of Africa, from Niger to Mozambique. In Cabo Delgado, violent unrest fueled by local grievances and led by the group al-Sunna wa Jamaa has displaced over 350,000 people since 2017. The group pledged its allegiance to the Islamic State last year. In August, it seized the port of Mocímboa da Praia, signaling its growing sophistication.
Spiraling conflict in Ethiopia. An investigation by Amnesty International published last Thursday revealed that dozens, if not hundreds, of people were stabbed or “hacked to death” in the town of Mai-Kadra (May Cadera) in Ethiopia’s embattled Tigray region on Nov. 9. The organization was unable to confirm who was responsible for the killings, but eyewitnesses pointed to forces loyal to the regional ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF).
On Nov. 4, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched military operations in Tigray after months of tensions with the leaders of the restive province, alleging that the TPLF had attacked a federal military base. The acting U.N. special advisor on the prevention of genocide issued a statement on Thursday expressing deep concern about the mounting ethnic tensions.
Abiy has repeatedly rebuffed international efforts to mediate, as Ethiopian troops close in on the regional capital, Mekelle. On Saturday, TPLF military forces fired two rockets at Asmara, the capital of neighboring Eritrea, accusing the country of sending troops to support the Ethiopian central government—allegations denied by the Eritrean government. Eritrea and Ethiopia fought a bloody border war between 1998 and 2000 that only officially ended with a peace accord signed two years ago, and the rocket attacks risk drawing Eritrea into the escalating conflict.
War in Western Sahara. The leader of the Western Sahara independence movement declared war on Morocco on Saturday, jeopardizing a 29-year-old cease-fire agreement. Brahim Ghali, the head of the Polisario Front in the disputed and sparsely populated territory, accused Morocco of breaching the agreement by launching a military operation in the U.N.-controlled buffer zone in Western Sahara.
Both sides confirmed that they had exchanged fire on Friday evening, but they did not release details of injuries or fatalities. In the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, the socialist Polisario Front waged a war for independence, establishing the partially recognized Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, which controls around 20 percent of Western Sahara.
Third time’s the charm. On Nov. 9, Peruvian President Martín Vizcarra was impeached over corruption allegations. His replacement, congressional leader Manuel Merino, was appointed interim president last Tuesday but has already stepped down. The resignation comes after a week of protests that erupted following the killing of two people in a brutal police crackdown on a pro-democracy rally in the capital, Lima. Vizcarra was popular among voters, and many Peruvians regard his removal as a congressional coup.
On Monday, Peruvian lawmakers chose the respected economist Francisco Sagasti to lead the country until the next presidential election in April 2021.
Keep an Eye On
Protesters undeterred in Belarus. Over 1,000 people were detained across Belarus on Sunday, the largest number of arrests in a single day since the protests against rigged presidential elections began in early August. Undeterred by beatings and torture at the hands of the police, protesters were further outraged last week by the killing of Roman Bondarenko, a 31-year-old art teacher who was pummeled by plainclothes officers last Wednesday and died in the hospital the next day.
German suspects charged in far-right terrorist plot. German prosecutors announced on Friday that 11 men who were first arrested in February have been charged with belonging to a far-right terrorist group and plotting deadly attacks on Muslims with a view to stoke social unrest and eventually overthrow the German government. Far-right attacks are on the rise in Germany, increasing by almost 10 percent between 2018 and 2019.
That’s it for this week.
For more from FP, visit foreignpolicy.com, subscribe here, or sign up for our other newsletters. Send your tips, comments, questions, or corrections to newsletters@foreignpolicy.com.
Augusta Saraiva contributed to this report.


foreignpolicy--2020-11-16--Trump Administration Plans to Designate Yemen’s Houthis as Terrorists

The Trump administration is preparing to designate Yemen ’ s Iran-backed Houthi insurgents a terrorist organization before leaving office in January , fueling fears the move will disrupt international aid efforts and upend United Nations-brokered peace efforts between the Shiite movement and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government , according to several diplomatic sources .
The U.N. and international relief agencies have tried to dissuade the Trump administration from designating the Houthis a foreign terrorist organization , but the apparently imminent decision would give U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo another victory in his anti-Iran strategy as he visits Israel , Saudi @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this week .
Riyadh , which has been at war with the Houthis for over five years , has already designated the Houthis a terrorist organization and has been urging Washington to do the same .
“ They have been contemplating this for a while , but Pompeo wants this fast-tracked , ” said one diplomatic source .
“ It ’ s part of the scorched-earth policy the sour grapes in the White House are taking.
” In recent weeks , the U.N. special envoy for Yemen , Martin Griffiths , has been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and appealing to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres to intervene with Pompeo , according to diplomatic sources .
Last month , Guterres urged Kelly Craft , the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. , to reconsider plans to list the Houthis as a terrorist organization .
Germany and Sweden have also pressed the United States to back down .
But the effort has apparently foundered , and the U.N. has begun preparing the groundwork for a U.S. decision to list the Houthis .
The U.S. Department of Defense and career experts in the State Department @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
A coalition of international charities , meanwhile , are preparing a joint statement anticipating the designation , comparing the potential impacts to the famine in Somalia after the U.S. designated al-Shabab as a terrorist group in 2008 .
“ It is a mistake .
This is an inflammatory move from Secretary of State Pompeo and the Trump administration to take , ” said Gregory Johnsen , a nonresident fellow at the Brookings Institution .
“ It would basically box in the new president when he wants to take a new approach to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ back on the Saudi war.
” Diplomats opposing the move have also tried to sway Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham , a powerful ally of outgoing President Donald Trump who heads up the Senate Appropriations Committee ’ s foreign affairs panel , to come out against the designation .
But Democrats in Congress who have long been calling for the Trump administration to hold Saudi Arabia accountable for its role in the war are worried that the label could undermine fragile peace talks in the war-torn nation .
Sen. Chris Murphy , a Democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , said any such designation would be a “ clear attempt by the Trump administration to hamstring future peace negotiations.
” “ The Houthis and their financial supporters are already subject to U.S. sanctions , so the practical impact of the designation would be exclusively to make it more difficult to negotiate with Houthi leaders and to deliver aid to Houthi-controlled areas , where the majority of Yemenis still live , ” Murphy said .
“ There is no doubt that the Houthis have led a brutal military campaign that has starved , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Murphy added .
“ But if the U.S. government is going to designate international actors for intentionally harming civilians in Yemen , the Saudi-led coalition should also be at the top of that list.
” The move appears to be part of a broader push by the White House and Pompeo to ratchet up pressure on Iran and its Middle East allies in the administration ’ s final months in office , a development that is likely to complicate efforts by President-elect Joe Biden to reopen talks with Iran over its nuclear program @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pledged to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal negotiated in 2015 by the Obama administration but abandoned by Trump two years ago .
The Trump administration , acting in coordination with Israel and several Gulf sheikdoms , intends to impose a flood of new sanctions on Iran and its backers before Biden ’ s Jan. 20 inauguration , according to a report in Axios .
“ [ T ] he move is being framed in internal deliberations as an expansion of the Trump administration ’ s ‘ maximum pressure ’ campaign against Tehran , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ Others say discussions of a designation were prompted by direct requests from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates , the two Gulf monarchies leading the coalition that has intervened against the Huthis.
” The Trump administration has been mulling plans to designate the Houthi movement , formally called Ansar Allah , as a terrorist organization for well over a year .
But that effort has gained momentum in recent months .
In September , U.S. officials told the Washington Post that the administration had launched a terrorism review of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whether to declare them a foreign terrorist organization and to name Houthi leaders as “ global terrorists , ” an action that would lead to a freeze of Houthi assets and bar members of the group from traveling to the United States .
Officials and other people familiar with the matter said the Trump administration could also designate Houthi leadership as Specially Designated Global Terrorists , rather than designating the entire movement as a foreign terrorist organization .
Of the policy options , the broader terrorism designation is seen as harder-line , as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the group but would subject anyone who provides support to the group to criminal penalties .
This could be a significant complicating factor for humanitarian organizations trying to help civilians in Houthi-controlled territories .
The deliberations come after Washington ’ s Gulf allies declared the Houthis a terrorist organization .
Recently , U.S. diplomats floated the idea of adding the Houthis to a U.N. list of individuals and entities subject to U.N. sanctions .
But the United States failed to secure sufficient support for the initiative and dropped it .
The U.N. sanctions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ senior Houthi officials on its list of individuals subject to an asset freeze and travel ban .
But like most of the Houthi leadership , they don ’ t travel often or use the international banking system .
The Houthis seized power in Yemen in January 2015 , following months of protests over fuel subsidies , and now control a significant portion of Yemeni territory .
But the Houthis have never been recognized by the international community , and their ouster of Yemen ’ s government set the stage for a U.S.-backed , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ starting a protracted war that has pushed the country into the world ’ s worst humanitarian crisis .
During the presidential campaign , Biden had made it clear he wanted to pursue a diplomatic outcome in Yemen .
In a statement marking the second anniversary of the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents , Biden vowed to reassess the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia and end support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen .
Griffiths , the U.N. ’ s third Yemen peace envoy , has been laboring since @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a peace deal between the Houthis and the Saudi-backed government of Yemen ’ s exiled president , Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi .
Six years of U.N. mediation have not brought peace to Yemen , but Griffiths last month brokered a major prisoner swap between the country ’ s warring factions , a deal that is expected to result in the release of some 1,000 detainees .
The United States has expressed alarm over the Houthis ’ growing reliance on Iran , which has supplied the movement with missiles , drones , and training @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and other critical infrastructure .
The move to designate the Houthis a terrorist organization comes a year after the Trump administration designated Iran ’ s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a foreign terrorist organization .
“ The legal bar for designating the Houthis has been made lower since the designation of the IRGC , ” said Elana DeLozier , an expert on Yemen at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy , a think tank .
“ Since the U.S. now considers the IRGC a terrorist group , any group they support—including the Houthis—is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ added , though she stressed that many Yemen experts opposed the decision because it could hamper peace talks and complicate humanitarian relief .
Backing Saudi Arabia and the UAE in Yemen has been a key pillar of the Trump administration ’ s overarching strategy to contain Tehran ’ s regional ambitions , even though its policies have sometimes run afoul of Congress .
An unusual coalition of progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans banded together in recent years to try to force the Trump administration to halt military support for Yemen , making limited @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
U.S. policy on Yemen throughout the Trump administration has been filtered through the lens of the maximum pressure campaign against Iran , with too little regard for the impact it has on Yemen ’ s stability , diplomats and other officials say .
“ The worry—among many Yemen watchers and stakeholders—is that the negative consequences for designating the Houthis will outweigh any attempt at gaining leverage and that our Yemen policy is being overly driven by an Iran lens , ” DeLozier said .
Pompeo drew sharp criticism from lawmakers for expediting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Congress through an emergency declaration last year in what became the source of an internal State Department watchdog investigation .
Tensions over how to handle Yemen policy continue to simmer within the administration , people familiar with the matter said , with some career experts at the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development sharply opposing the potential decision to designate the Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization .
“ What ’ s tragic is it ’ s a political and messaging issue for the Trump administration , but it ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people [ in Yemen ] , ” said one humanitarian expert on Yemen who spoke on condition of anonymity .
“ It ’ s going to be really hard to make rolling this back a day-one action and by the time [ the Biden administration ] takes office a lot of the damage will already be done.
” “ We do not publicly discuss deliberations regarding designations or potential designations , ” a State Department spokeswoman said when asked for comment .
In recent months , senior U.N. officials have warned that dozens @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of being shut down due to lack of funding .
Major donor countries , including Saudi Arabia and the UAE , pledged billions of dollars of support , but by September only $ 1 billion of the funds required for humanitarian programs had been transferred .
“ That ’ s the backdrop we ’ re up against—a worsening humanitarian crisis , a funding shortfall , an economic collapse , and fighting along multiple fronts , ” said a nongovernmental organization official not authorized to speak to the press .
“ You really can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ already.
” The NGO community has already begun to think about a general license or humanitarian exemption to soften the blow of the designation , which could also make it difficult for a number of countries and institutions to fund the humanitarian operation .
Depending on what the designation looks like , the Treasury Department that oversees the implementation of sanctions can issue licenses to carve out exceptions for humanitarian organizations to deliver food , medical supplies , and other life-saving assistance to Yemen .
But even issuing those licenses can take time @ @ @ @ @ @ @ work in Yemen or with humanitarian organizations may not be willing to cooperate .
“ Designating the Houthis is a decision that could deprive some of the most vulnerable Yemenis of the aid they need to survive , ” said Scott Paul , Oxfam America ’ s humanitarian policy lead .
“ A major funding shortfall is already forcing lifesaving programs to close , and this decision would discourage even more donors and banks from working in Yemen.
” The heads of top humanitarian organizations—Oxfam America , Save the Children , Mercy Corps @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rescue Committee—sent a letter to Pompeo on Nov. 16 in a last-ditch attempt to urge him to reconsider the decision .
“ A designation of Ansar Allah could cause even greater suffering , given the number of people under its jurisdiction , its control over state institutions , and the already frightening levels of food insecurity and humanitarian need across Yemen , ” they wrote in the letter .

Colum Lynch, Robbie Gramer and Jack Detsch

The Trump administration is preparing to designate Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi insurgents a terrorist organization before leaving office in January, fueling fears the move will disrupt international aid efforts and upend United Nations-brokered peace efforts between the Shiite movement and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government, according to several diplomatic sources.
The Trump administration is preparing to designate Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi insurgents a terrorist organization before leaving office in January, fueling fears the move will disrupt international aid efforts and upend United Nations-brokered peace efforts between the Shiite movement and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government, according to several diplomatic sources.
The U.N. and international relief agencies have tried to dissuade the Trump administration from designating the Houthis a foreign terrorist organization, but the apparently imminent decision would give U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo another victory in his anti-Iran strategy as he visits Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates this week. Riyadh, which has been at war with the Houthis for over five years, has already designated the Houthis a terrorist organization and has been urging Washington to do the same.
“They have been contemplating this for a while, but Pompeo wants this fast-tracked,” said one diplomatic source. “It’s part of the scorched-earth policy the sour grapes in the White House are taking.”
In recent weeks, the U.N. special envoy for Yemen, Martin Griffiths, has been pressing the United States to back down and appealing to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres to intervene with Pompeo, according to diplomatic sources. Last month, Guterres urged Kelly Craft, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., to reconsider plans to list the Houthis as a terrorist organization. Germany and Sweden have also pressed the United States to back down. But the effort has apparently foundered, and the U.N. has begun preparing the groundwork for a U.S. decision to list the Houthis.
The U.S. Department of Defense and career experts in the State Department are said to be against the move. A coalition of international charities, meanwhile, are preparing a joint statement anticipating the designation, comparing the potential impacts to the famine in Somalia after the U.S. designated al-Shabab as a terrorist group in 2008.
“It is a mistake. This is an inflammatory move from Secretary of State Pompeo and the Trump administration to take,” said Gregory Johnsen, a nonresident fellow at the Brookings Institution. “It would basically box in the new president when he wants to take a new approach to the war in Yemen, and cut back on the Saudi war.”
Diplomats opposing the move have also tried to sway Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, a powerful ally of outgoing President Donald Trump who heads up the Senate Appropriations Committee’s foreign affairs panel, to come out against the designation. But Democrats in Congress who have long been calling for the Trump administration to hold Saudi Arabia accountable for its role in the war are worried that the label could undermine fragile peace talks in the war-torn nation.
Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democratic member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said any such designation would be a “clear attempt by the Trump administration to hamstring future peace negotiations.”
“The Houthis and their financial supporters are already subject to U.S. sanctions, so the practical impact of the designation would be exclusively to make it more difficult to negotiate with Houthi leaders and to deliver aid to Houthi-controlled areas, where the majority of Yemenis still live,” Murphy said.
“There is no doubt that the Houthis have led a brutal military campaign that has starved, imprisoned and killed many civilians,” Murphy added. “But if the U.S. government is going to designate international actors for intentionally harming civilians in Yemen, the Saudi-led coalition should also be at the top of that list.”
The move appears to be part of a broader push by the White House and Pompeo to ratchet up pressure on Iran and its Middle East allies in the administration’s final months in office, a development that is likely to complicate efforts by President-elect Joe Biden to reopen talks with Iran over its nuclear program. During his presidential campaign, Biden pledged to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal negotiated in 2015 by the Obama administration but abandoned by Trump two years ago.
The Trump administration, acting in coordination with Israel and several Gulf sheikdoms, intends to impose a flood of new sanctions on Iran and its backers before Biden’s Jan. 20 inauguration, according to a report in Axios.
“[T]he move is being framed in internal deliberations as an expansion of the Trump administration’s ‘maximum pressure’ campaign against Tehran,” according to the International Crisis Group. “Others say discussions of a designation were prompted by direct requests from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, the two Gulf monarchies leading the coalition that has intervened against the Huthis.”
The Trump administration has been mulling plans to designate the Houthi movement, formally called Ansar Allah, as a terrorist organization for well over a year. But that effort has gained momentum in recent months. In September, U.S. officials told the Washington Post that the administration had launched a terrorism review of the Houthis, and that it was weighing whether to declare them a foreign terrorist organization and to name Houthi leaders as “global terrorists,” an action that would lead to a freeze of Houthi assets and bar members of the group from traveling to the United States.
Officials and other people familiar with the matter said the Trump administration could also designate Houthi leadership as Specially Designated Global Terrorists, rather than designating the entire movement as a foreign terrorist organization. Of the policy options, the broader terrorism designation is seen as harder-line, as it would not just sanction individuals in the group but would subject anyone who provides support to the group to criminal penalties. This could be a significant complicating factor for humanitarian organizations trying to help civilians in Houthi-controlled territories.
The deliberations come after Washington’s Gulf allies declared the Houthis a terrorist organization. Recently, U.S. diplomats floated the idea of adding the Houthis to a U.N. list of individuals and entities subject to U.N. sanctions. But the United States failed to secure sufficient support for the initiative and dropped it. The U.N. sanctions committee has already listed a handful of senior Houthi officials on its list of individuals subject to an asset freeze and travel ban. But like most of the Houthi leadership, they don’t travel often or use the international banking system.
The Houthis seized power in Yemen in January 2015, following months of protests over fuel subsidies, and now control a significant portion of Yemeni territory. But the Houthis have never been recognized by the international community, and their ouster of Yemen’s government set the stage for a U.S.-backed, Saudi-led invasion of Yemen in 2015, starting a protracted war that has pushed the country into the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
During the presidential campaign, Biden had made it clear he wanted to pursue a diplomatic outcome in Yemen. In a statement marking the second anniversary of the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents, Biden vowed to reassess the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia and end support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen.
Griffiths, the U.N.’s third Yemen peace envoy, has been laboring since his appointment in February 2018 to broker a peace deal between the Houthis and the Saudi-backed government of Yemen’s exiled president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi. Six years of U.N. mediation have not brought peace to Yemen, but Griffiths last month brokered a major prisoner swap between the country’s warring factions, a deal that is expected to result in the release of some 1,000 detainees.
The United States has expressed alarm over the Houthis’ growing reliance on Iran, which has supplied the movement with missiles, drones, and training, allowing the group to target airports and other critical infrastructure. The move to designate the Houthis a terrorist organization comes a year after the Trump administration designated Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a foreign terrorist organization.
“The legal bar for designating the Houthis has been made lower since the designation of the IRGC,” said Elana DeLozier, an expert on Yemen at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank. “Since the U.S. now considers the IRGC a terrorist group, any group they support—including the Houthis—is low-hanging fruit for designation,” she added, though she stressed that many Yemen experts opposed the decision because it could hamper peace talks and complicate humanitarian relief.
Backing Saudi Arabia and the UAE in Yemen has been a key pillar of the Trump administration’s overarching strategy to contain Tehran’s regional ambitions, even though its policies have sometimes run afoul of Congress. An unusual coalition of progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans banded together in recent years to try to force the Trump administration to halt military support for Yemen, making limited progress against the president’s opposition.
U.S. policy on Yemen throughout the Trump administration has been filtered through the lens of the maximum pressure campaign against Iran, with too little regard for the impact it has on Yemen’s stability, diplomats and other officials say.
“The worry—among many Yemen watchers and stakeholders—is that the negative consequences for designating the Houthis will outweigh any attempt at gaining leverage and that our Yemen policy is being overly driven by an Iran lens,” DeLozier said.
Pompeo drew sharp criticism from lawmakers for expediting arms sales to the UAE and circumventing Congress through an emergency declaration last year in what became the source of an internal State Department watchdog investigation.
Tensions over how to handle Yemen policy continue to simmer within the administration, people familiar with the matter said, with some career experts at the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development sharply opposing the potential decision to designate the Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization.
“What’s tragic is it’s a political and messaging issue for the Trump administration, but it’s a matter of life and death for people [in Yemen],” said one humanitarian expert on Yemen who spoke on condition of anonymity. “It’s going to be really hard to make rolling this back a day-one action and by the time [the Biden administration] takes office a lot of the damage will already be done.”
“We do not publicly discuss deliberations regarding designations or potential designations,” a State Department spokeswoman said when asked for comment.
In recent months, senior U.N. officials have warned that dozens of international humanitarian programs are at risk of being shut down due to lack of funding. Major donor countries, including Saudi Arabia and the UAE, pledged billions of dollars of support, but by September only $1 billion of the funds required for humanitarian programs had been transferred.
“That’s the backdrop we’re up against—a worsening humanitarian crisis, a funding shortfall, an economic collapse, and fighting along multiple fronts,” said a nongovernmental organization official not authorized to speak to the press. “You really can’t get much worse than that already.” The NGO community has already begun to think about a general license or humanitarian exemption to soften the blow of the designation, which could also make it difficult for a number of countries and institutions to fund the humanitarian operation.
Depending on what the designation looks like, the Treasury Department that oversees the implementation of sanctions can issue licenses to carve out exceptions for humanitarian organizations to deliver food, medical supplies, and other life-saving assistance to Yemen.
But even issuing those licenses can take time, and banks and insurance companies that work in Yemen or with humanitarian organizations may not be willing to cooperate.
“Designating the Houthis is a decision that could deprive some of the most vulnerable Yemenis of the aid they need to survive,” said Scott Paul, Oxfam America’s humanitarian policy lead. “A major funding shortfall is already forcing lifesaving programs to close, and this decision would discourage even more donors and banks from working in Yemen.”
The heads of top humanitarian organizations—Oxfam America, Save the Children, Mercy Corps, CARE USA, and the International Rescue Committee—sent a letter to Pompeo on Nov. 16 in a last-ditch attempt to urge him to reconsider the decision.
“A designation of Ansar Allah could cause even greater suffering, given the number of people under its jurisdiction, its control over state institutions, and the already frightening levels of food insecurity and humanitarian need across Yemen,” they wrote in the letter.