One of the authors, Isabel Amaral, left on the photo, granted the honour to hand out a copy to Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, President of the Portuguese Republic, signed by all 5 authors.
Amsterdam University Press recently published the book âProtocol to Manage Relationships Today: Modern Relationship Management Based Upon Traditional Valuesâ, a book written by leading protocol experts from The Netherlands, Portugal and the United Kingdom and with contributions from protocol experts at the European Union, the British Royal Household, the military, Gucci, ABN AMRO Bank, the cities of The Hague and Meijerijstad, UEFA and many others.
The book describes the successful application of contemporary protocol to build strong relationships by, among others, the Dutch King, at the Royal Wedding of Prince Harry to Meghan Markle and at the World Press Photo awards show. In the book Dutch fashion and lifestyle expert Maik de Boer explains the value of protocol in the world of fashion as well as the protocol of the famous Berlin techno club Berghain is described.
Protocol to Manage Relationships Today: Modern Relationship Management Based Upon Traditional Values.
âProtocol to Manage Relationships Todayâ also describes the success of Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, the recently re-elected President of the Portuguese Republic, to balance the protocol between tradition and modernity. The book explains that if the rules of protocol are applied too strictly, a meeting will be too formal and uncomfortable. Too casual and too little focus is also not good and applying too few rules leads to chaos. Also, too much symbolism in protocol will make people laugh and if there is no symbolism, we will not be able to recognize the story and/or understand why we are attending the event.
Protocol is all about balancing between tradition and modernity.
âThe night before the state visit to the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Grand Duke Henri and the President of Portugal decided to go out for a few beers. The President felt right at home: an estimated 120,000 of the 550,000 people in Luxembourg are either born in Portugal or are of Portuguese ancestry. Even the Grand Duke himself has two Portuguese great-grandmothers. The President was welcomed with open arms and the unofficial and unorthodox start of the state visit was the beginning of a very good friendship between the two Heads of state.
âThis is a great example of how relations are built,â the Founder and director of The standard Companion, the Australian-based etiquette school, Retallack explains in an interview in our book. âBuilding diplomatic relations relies heavily on face-to-face interactions where true connections are made. I admire the approach of the Portuguese President.â The approach of the Portuguese President towards protocol is not about abolishing it but introducing small changes. It allowed him to achieve a lot and it is part of the reasons why he is so popular.
At the end of 2020 the authors of the book were granted the honour to hand out a copy to the President of the Portuguese Republic.
There is a widespread view that Germany’s policy towards Bosnia-Herzegovina has always been friendly. Also, that such a policy stimulated the European Union to adopt a positive approach to the Bosnian quest to eventually become a part of the Euro-Atlantic integrations. However, Stefan Schwarz, a renowned German politician, in his recent comment for Deutsche Welle, raised the question of the true nature of Germany’s policy towards Bosnia, from 1992 to the present day. Here we shall try to offer possible answers to this question, so as to present a brief history of that policy.
A history of (un)recognition
Germany officially recognised Bosnia-Herzegovina as an independent state on April 6, 1992. Prior to that, such recognition had been granted to two other former Yugoslav republics, Slovenia and Croatia, on January 15, 1992. Germany recognised these two states against the advice by Robert Badinter, a jurist delegated by the European Commission to arbitrate in the process of dissolution of the former Yugoslavia, to recognize all Yugoslav republics simultaneously.
Under the pressure by Germany, 12 members of the European Community (United Kingdom, Italy, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium, Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, Greece, Austria) recognized Slovenia and Croatia in January 1992. As Washington Post wrote on January 16, 1992,
The German government hailed today’s event as a historic development and immediately opened embassies in the two republics. But France and Britain, which still harbor doubts about the wisdom of early recognition, said they would wait to see if Croatia fulfilled its promises on human rights before carrying out an exchange of ambassadors.
There is a well-known myth, spread by the diplomats of Britain and France, that ‘early recognition’ of Slovenia and Croatia triggered the war in the former Yugoslavia. Such a claim is both absurd and obscene, bearing in mind that Serbia had already waged war against Slovenia and Croatia and was preparing a military attack on Bosnia for several months. However, the question that should be posed here is, why Germany recognised Slovenia and Croatia separately, instead of recognition of all the Yugoslav republics simultaneously, as advised by Badinter and strongly supported by the US? Does that imply that Germany practically left the rest of the republics to their fate, to be occupied and annexed by Serbia, which controled the former Yugoslav army and its resources? Was it a deliberate policy, or simply a reckless decision? In the same article, WP quotes the then German Minister of Foreign Affairs:
“The German policy on Yugoslavia has proved correct,” said German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher. “We’ve said for months that if the Community decided on recognition . . . that would initiate a process of rethinking, above all by the leadership of the Yugoslav army.”
Mr. Genscher probably offered a definite answer to that question. Also, the actual response of the Yugoslav army’s leadership to the German push for separate recognition of Slovenia and Croatia, counted in hundreds of thousands of dead and millions of ethnically cleansed in Croatia and Bosnia, testifies to the ‘correctness’ of such thinking. Yet, was it a momentary miscalculation by Genscher, the then Minister, or a long-term German foreign policy towards Bosnia, already projected to be the ultimate victim of the Yugoslav army’s agression?
An answer to this question is not very difficult to reach if we consider the German policy concerning the initiatives for ethnic partition of Bosnia, disseminated through the channels of the European Community. These proposals may have been initiated and instigated by the British Foreign Office and the French Quai d’Orsay; yet, partition along ethnic lines has always been the only European consensus about Bosnia, a consensus in which Germany participated with all its political will and weight.
Appeasement, from Munich to Lisbon
Prior to the 1992-1995 war, the European Community delegated the British and Portugese diplomats, Lord Carrington and Jose Cutileiro, to design a suitable scheme for ethnic partition of Bosnia, and in February 1992 they launched the so-called Lisbon Conference, with the aim of separating Bosnian ethno-religious communities and isolating them into distinct territories. This was the initiation of the process of ethnic partition, adopted in each subsequent plan to end the war in Bosnia. However, at the Lisbon Conference such a ‘solution’ was imposed by Carrington and Cutileiro as the only available when there was no war to end, indeed, no war in sight; and, curiously, it has remained the only concept the European Community, and then the European Union, has ever tried to apply to Bosnia.
Contrary to the foundations of political theory, sovereignty of the Bosnian state was thus divided, and its parts were transferred to the chiefs of three ethnic parties. The EC recognised these usurpers of the state sovereignty, having promoted them into legitimate representatives of their respective ethnic communities. The Carrington-Cutileiro maps were tailored to determine the territorial reach of each of these communities. What remained to be done afterwards was their actual physical separation, and that could only be performed by war, genocide and ethnic cleansing. For, ethnically homogenous territories, as envisaged by Carrington and Cutileiro, could only be created by a mass slaughter and mass expulsion of those who did not fit the prescribed model of ethnic homogeneity. In this way, the European Community created a recipe for the war in Bosnia. Yet, ever since the war broke out, the European diplomats have never ceased claiming that the ‘chaos’ was created by ‘the wild Balkan tribes’, who ‘had always slaughtered each other’.
No one ever noticed German opposition to the Lisbon principles of ethnic separation and territorial partition, clearly leading to war and bloodshed. Is it, then, possible that German foreign policy was truly surprised by the Lisbon’s bloody outcome? Or the Lisbon Agreement was tailored in the best tradition of the Munich Agreement, as a consensus on another country’s partition between the three leading European powers â Great Britain, France, and Germany â again, in the name of peace?
Mostar Bridge, Bosnia Herzegovina
Landgrab rewarded
In the following ‘peace plans’ for Bosnia, the European Community was represented by Lord Owen, accompanied by the representatives of the Organization of United Nations, Cyrus Vance and Thorwald Stoltenberg. Although the British diplomacy was clearly dominant in these attempts to find a ‘proper’ model for Bosnia’s ethnic partition, Germany’s Foreign Ministry was always fully present there through its Director of Policy Planning Staff, Wolfgang Ischinger. In the structure of the German Ministry, this position is occuppied by the most senior career diplomat, so that there can be no doubt about Ischinger’s capacity to articulate Germany’s strategic interests. During the process of negotiations under the Vance-Owen and Owen-Stoltenberg plans, Ischinger coordinated German policy towards Bosnia together with Michael Steiner, the head of âSoBosâ (Sonderstab Bosnien), a special Bosnian unit established within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.[i]
During the war in Bosnia, from 1992 to 1995, Germany and the European Community never abandoned the concept of Bosnia’s ethnic partition. In 1994, Germany took a more active role in its implementation within the (informal) International Contact Group, consisting of the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Russia and the US, where Germany was represented by both Ischinger and Steiner. The Contact Group Plan defined the final model of ethnic separation, having led to the ultimate breakup of the Bosnian territory into two ethnically cleansed and homogenised ‘entities’, tailored in accordance with an arbitrary proportion of 51:49%, which was subsequently implemented in the Dayton Peace Accords.
The entire struggle within the Contact Group was fought over the percentage and disposition of territory granted to particular ethnic communities, two of which served as Serbia’s and Croatia’s proxies. The principle of ethnic partition was never put in question. In this process, Germany became the exclusive advocate of Croatian interests, in Croatia’s attempts to cede the south-western part of Bosnia, whereas Britain and France advocated the interests of Serbia in its efforts to cede eastern and western parts of Bosnia. To some people’s surprise, the United States was the sole defender of Bosnia’s territorial integrity within the Contact Group. However, under the pressure by the European Community, the US was forced to make concessions, so as to eventually accept the prescribed 51:49% territorial distribution as an ‘internal reorganisation’ of Bosnia.
The US thus tacitly accepted the European initiatives to reward the landgrab of Bosnia’s territory, performed by Serbia and Croatia, against the UN Charter and international law. The European Community’s leading powers â Great Britain, France, and Germany â claimed that there was no other option but to accept such a landgrab, because the status quo, caused by the neighbours’ military aggression, could not possibly be altered. To strengthen this argument, the European Community also played the main role in imposing an arms embargo on the ‘warring parties’. This embargo effectively deprived the landlocked Bosnian army of the capacity to purchase weaponry and thus alter the status quo and liberate the country’s territory. Here the EC acted as a whole, again, without any dissent on Germany’s or anyone else’s part.
Whose responsibility?
The Dayton Peace Accords is commonly perceived as an American political project. The partition of Bosnia is thus being interpreted as a concept that emerged for the first time during the Dayton negotiations, and its authorship is ascribed exclusively to the American negotiator, Richard Holbrooke. However, it is not so. The history of Bosnia’s partition clearly demonstrates that this very concept has persistently been promoted by the European Community, and then by the European Union, from the 1992 Lisbon Conference to the present day. Even the notorious partition proportion of 51:49% was determined by the Contact Group, well before the Dayton Conference.
A clear responsibility of the US negotiators is that they caved in to the pressures by the EC within the Contact Group. Still, the consistent striving to impose ethnic partition as the sole appropriate concept for Bosnia should definitely be attributed to its real advocates â the members of the European Community. Since Italy and Yeltsin’s Russia certainly played a minor role in the Contact Group, the lion’s share of responsibility for the final outcome, verified in Dayton, belongs equally to three EC powers, Great Britain, France, and Germany. The fact that the British policy-makers conceived the very principle of ethnic partition, that their French colleagues were so enthusiastic about its implementation, while the Germans accepted it as the best available mode of appeasement, abolishes neither of them of gigantic moral and political responsibility for all the suffering the Bosnians have had to go through.    Â
[i] As consequent advocates of the German foreign policy in the Bosnian episode, both Ischinger and Steiner have continuously enjoyed upward promotion within the ranks of the German foreign policy establishment. Thus Ischinger first took the position of the Ministry’s Political Director under Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel, and then of the StaatssekretĂ€r (deputy foreign minister) under Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer. Ischinger also represented Germany at numerous international and European conferences, including the 1999 G8 and EU summit meetings in Cologne/Germany and the 2000 Review Conference of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty at the United Nations, New York. He was also appointed as the European Union Representative in the Troika negotiations on the future of Kosovo in 2007. Since 2019, Ischinger has been co-chairing on the Transatlantic Task Force of the German Marshall Fund and the Bundeskanzler-Helmut-Schmidt-Stiftung (BKHS) and, finally, has become the Chairman of the Munich Security Conference (!). During his mandate in the Contact Group, Steiner was awarded the position of head of the Ministry’s co-ordination unit for multilateral peace efforts. After the war, he served six months (JanuaryâJuly 1997) as a principal deputy to Carl Bildt, the first high representative in Bosnia-Herzegovina. In 1998, he was selected by Chancellor Gerhard Schröder to work as the Chancellor’s foreign and security policy adviser.
About the authors:
Dr. Zlatko HadĆŸidediÄ is the founder and director of the Center for Nationalism Studies, in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina (www.nationalismstudies.org).
Adnan IdrizbegoviÄ, Independent Researcher, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina
We often hear stories about captivating and fascinating diplomatic life, but how is it experienced by those who are behind the scenes? This month, we begin our new article column dedicated to sharing diverse life stories of diplomatic offspring.
R: âYes, definitely. What shocked me the most was the national development of the country and overall quality of life. Compared to our home country, Australia has great infrastructure and availability of public facilities.â
K: âI was younger than Regi, so my memories are very childish. However, I was amazed to find out Australians to be very welcoming and genuine; everyone was willing to help. Indeed, most surprisingly, I experienced actual culture shock when I returned to my home country, Indonesia.
It might sound paradoxical but adapting to life back in my country was harder than I imagined. The mentalities are different. This does not only refer to the overall surroundings and lifestyle but also language confusion. I often unintentionally code-switched English and Indonesian, which caused giggles of my fellow students. At that time, it seemed to be a struggle.â
Smiling, Kiky and Regi answered: âA lot! Indonesian is our mother tongue, and English can be considered as the first foreign language. In Australia, we learned some Arabic in the Islamic school and French in a public school. After returning to Jakarta, we had to take language German classes and Mandarin. Then, before moving to The Netherlands, we completed intermediate Dutch. This might be astonishing, but we donât have any solid knowledge of languages, with the only exception being Indonesian and English, which we use on a regular basis.â
Two years ago, Kiky (18) moved with the parents to The Netherlands, whereas Regi (21) decided to stay and undertake his undergraduate studies in Indonesia. Kiky finished Indonesian school in The Hague and also enrolled in the same university as Regi. However, they chose different career paths.
Do you see your future career related to the diplomatic sphere?
K: âNot at all. Iâm proud to be the first generation of doctors in my family. I always have been passionate about the field of medicine. Thus, when it was time to decide on the degree, without any doubt, it was dentistry. I havenât regretted it.â
R: âMy career interests diverge from Kikyâs. Iâm specializing in economics, similar to my momâs profession. In the future, I would like to improve the quality of life for Indonesians, and I believe that economy plays a fundamental part in it. Living in Australia and The Netherlands have just convinced me even more that Indonesia needs good economic policy implemented.â
During the pandemic, Kiky and Regi reunited with their parents in The Hague and have followed online classes since then. They acknowledge that being family members of a diplomat is tough with continuous life on the go, but it always brings adventures, the aspect they enjoy the most.
During the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence from the 25th of November to the 10th of December, the Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens contributes to the Orange the World Campaign globally and in Austria, calling for the elimination of violence against women and girls.
Five years ago, in 2015, the member states of the United Nations (UN) agreed on 17 global goals to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. Since then, these Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have evolved into a guiding roadmap for finding long term solutions to global challenges. âLeaving No One Behindâ has become the key message of this agenda, as the global community emphasised that the SDGs can only be achieved if peace and prosperity holds true for everyone.
Women make up half of the worldâs population, but they still struggle to even exercise their fundamental human rights. A staggering one in three women experiences physical or sexual violence in their lifetime.[1] Violence against women and girls is, thus, one of the most pervasive human rights violations and perhaps the most obvious manifestation of the deeply rooted imbalances in power in our societies. How will we ever reach the SDGs if such inequalities still exist?
In 2008, the UN, under the leadership of its 8th Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, pushed for a multi-year effort aimed at preventing and eliminating violence against women and girls around the world, called UNiTE to End Violence against Women. The campaign called on governments, civil society, womenâs organizations, young people, the private sector, the media and the entire UN system to join forces in addressing the global pandemic of violence against women and girls. It has, for example, worked to adopt and enforce national laws to address and punish all forms of violence against women and girls, in line with international human rights standards.[2]
In 2015 UN Women became the agency entrusted to lead the UNâs efforts to advocate the elimination of violence against women and girls. To strengthen UNiTE, UN Women announced the âOrange the Worldâ campaign, to take place annually during the period between the 25th of November, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, and the 10th of December, Human Rights Day. During these 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, the worldâs most prominent monuments and buildings are illuminated in orange, representing a future free from violence against women and girls.
Hosting the United Nations and located in the heart of Europe, Austria plays a key role in boosting the campaign on a local and international level. UN Women Austria, Soroptimist International Austria, HeForShe Austria and the Ban Ki-moon Centre are working in close partnership on the Austrian contribution to Orange the World. In 2019, the partners counted over 130 Austrian buildings in monuments illuminated in orange during the 16 Days of Activism. In 2020, the aim is to surpass this number and to shed light on current challenges regarding gender-based violence with the support of the Austrian actress Ursula Strauss as the campaignâs spokesperson.
2020 has been rattled by the Covid-19 pandemic and emerging data has shown that the lock-down measures around the world were accompanied by a spike in reported domestic violence cases. This alarming development demonstrates that action must be taken to prevent the aggravation and contribute to the elimination of what UN Women has named âThe Shadow Pandemicâ.[3]
To spread the message of the campaign to a wider audience and discuss the issues of the Shadow Pandemic with high-level actors, two online events will take place during the Orange the World timeframe.
At a virtual high-level roundtable on November 26th titled âTackling the Shadow Pandemic â Violence Against Women During COVID-19 Timesâ, Executive Director of UN Women Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, former Prime Minister of New Zealand Helen Clark, Regional Director of UN Women Asia and Pacific Mohammad Naciri, CEO of Avon Angela Cretu, and womenâs rights activist Trisha Shetty will discuss what steps can be taken to address the spike in violence against women during COVID-19. The event will be hosted by the Co-chairs of the Ban Ki-moon Centre, 8th UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and 11th President of Austria Heinz Fischer.
On December 1st, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Ban Ki-moon Centre will host a Virtual Expo called âEducation, Empowerment, and Effective Policies: Innovative Initiatives Preventing Gender-Based Violenceâ. As part of UNODCâs Education for Justice Global Dialogue Series, changemakers from around the world will come together and present how they take action to prevent violence against women and girls.
To make the world a safer and better place for all, we must all do our part to eliminate violence against women and girls in all its forms. We encourage you to get active in the Orange the World campaign by hosting an event, sharing its messages, and becoming part of this global movement!
About the Ban Ki-moon Centre:
In 2018, Ban Ki-moon and Heinz Fischer founded the Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens (BKMC), to empower women and youth to become global citizens within the framework of the SDGs. Acknowledging that gender-based violence restricts, if not prevents individuals to be a part of and contribute to the 2030 Agenda, the BKMC, based in Vienna, Austria, also advocates for the elimination of violence against women and girls. The Ban Ki-moon Centre has been an active contributor to the Orange the World Campaign in Austria since 2018. (www.bankimooncentre.org)
About the author:
Text by:
Viola Christian, Program Officer Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens (advocacy, empowerment)
In the picture Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
By Tomislav JakiÄ.
After almost unanimous assessment of the Western media and analysts (one would be inclined to conclude they are âgleichgeschaltetâ, modeled on the methods of Nazi master of propaganda Goebbels), a visit to Moscow of the EU High Commissioner for Foreign Affairs, Joseph Borrell, was â depending on the author â a failure, a fiasco, a disgrace.
And it was, indeed. But not by the criteria applied by Western propaganda; it is difficult, when reading these “analyzes”, to avoid the conclusion that their authors are neither journalists nor political analysts, but just – propagandists, harnessed, consciously or unconsciously – this could be discussed – in the circle of politics that the West applies in dealing with Russia for years. It is the policy of “containment” which is only a weak, but no less dangerous copy of the policy that the West practiced towards the Soviet Union. Worthwhile to note: apparently none of these so well-informed “journalists” and “analysts” take into account that Putin is not Stalin and that today’s Russia is not the former Soviet Union.
The problems, if that’s even the right term, in relations between the West and Russia begun after at the helm of Russia Vladimir Putin replaced Boris Yeltsin. Of course, Yeltsin, known for his alcoholic escapades, was to the liking of the West. Russia under his leadership was rapidly declining and not only was it no longer any, even potential, threat to the West, but it could not be its competitor in any area, even in its influence in Third World countries.Â
At the same time, no one in the West resented Yeltsin for using even the most brutal force to stay in power. We are thinking of the order to “subdue” the Russian parliament, which resisted the unconstitutional dissolution, with tank shells . On the contrary, the Western media rejoiced at every hit of a tank grenade in the building where the seat of the Russian parliament was, and from which the parliamentarians allegedly offered armed resistance.Â
When asked by a foreign journalist why is he reporting about gunshots from the parliament building, when it is obvious that there were none, a Wastern correspondent offered the following answer: “So it was decided!” Those grenades didn’t bother anyone, neither then nor later. But, those shots which were not fired, were âinventedâ, because they were needed for having the wanted picture. A hint of the “objective” reporting we are witnessing in recent weeks and months, relating to Alexei Navalny and the Russian vaccine Sputnik V.
With the arrival of Putin on the scene, however, another Russia emerged; Russia, which had the ambition to be a relevant factor in international relations and which not only wanted, but expected to be treated as a great power, and with respect. Since then everything goes downhill. The West did not want to accept the fact that Russia refuses to be treated as defeated and submissive. So the accusations started, so the sanctions started, some after obviously staged occasions, some evidently without any basis.
And now Borrell is coming to Moscow with the proclaimed goal of re-establishing dialogue, but most likely too with the task of examining the extent to which the Russian vaccine against covid19 can help Europe, which has found itself in an awkward situation due to drastic reductions in deliveries or delays from manufacturers of the vaccine it has ordered. But even before going to Moscow Borrell announced his intention to visit in prison Navalny who was sentenced to 3.5 years for violating probation. Let us remember: Navalni, an activist and blogger was transferred, with the “blessing” of the Kremlin to hospital in Germany after he was taken ill on an internal flight in Russia. It was immediately “clear” to everyone that he was poisoned and that, of course, the government, and Putin himself, was behind the assassination attempt.Â
In Germany, poisoning was promptly confirmed, but only with the “assistance” of a military doctors, poisoning with NoviÄok, an extremely lethal means from the Soviet arsenal of chemical weapons. To make things more convincing, the findings from Berlin were also confirmed by laboratories in Paris and Stockholm. No one from those around Navalny had the slightest symptoms of poisoning (everybody apparently forgot the spectacle with protective measures and decontamination, staged by the British after the alleged poisoning of Skripalâs). Navalni quickly recovered and, although the Germans now claim that he could not leave to Russia because he was undergoing medical treatment, it is documented that he traveled around in Germany, with the assistance of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND), and that he worked on a film which, as soon as he returned to Russia and was arrested, would “revealed” Putin’s glamorous âsecret residenceâ.
Russia persistently asked to get the findings that confirm the poisoning, but – it did not get them. And with a laconic “explanation”, that the Russians anyhow know everything. The Russian findings made before Navalny left for Germany were simply ignored.
Navalny, like Khodorkovsky at a time, is clearly the West’s choice in the role of Putin’s opposition leader and his possible successor. The scenario is known from all the so-called colored revolutions in Eastern Europe. To what extent he is “the puppet on the string”, and to what extent he has his own agenda, is a matter for discussion. But it is undeniable that he has the full support, both financially and logistically, of Western services in everything he does (including the production of sensational discoveries that the Russians will immediately unmask as a montage, but that will remain largely or completely ignored by the Western media).
However, although the Russians have shown that “Putin’s secret residence” is not who Navalny claims, but the site of a super-luxury hotel still in construction, owned by a few oligarchs, although they show how in the animation of the entrance door the Russian emblem (eagle) was replaced by the Montenegrin, although there are recordings that show how “peaceful” demonstrators for Navalny physically attack Russian policemen, in the West every average citizen today “knows” that Moscow poisoned Navalny, that Putin has a secret residence, and that Russian police across the country is beating peaceful demonstrators who only want Putin’s removal (although they, young people in the first place, are invited to demonstrate by promising that it will be a “good party”).
The same type of âblindnessâ prevailed until a few days ago in relation to the Russian vaccine against covid19. Despite the fact that it is for weeks applied in Russia, that it is exported to a dozen countries, some of which take on the production (such as for example Serbia, or Iran), in the Western media Sputnik V, the world first registered vaccine against Corona simply did not exist. And even after the UN Secretary-General explicitly cited Sputnik V as a significant tool in the fight against the pandemic, this vaccine was nonexistent in the Western media. Until Europe was confronted with the fact that the favored AstraZeneca drastically reduced the promised delivery and until a prestigious British medical journal did not “discover” that the Russian vaccine was both effective and harmless. And now suddenly all those who have kept silent or ignored the vaccine, not because it is suspicious, but because and only because it came from Russia, and was â above all â the worldâs first, seem to compete in writing and speaking about Sputnik V.
In such circumstances Joseph Borrell went to Moscow. And, of course, he disappointed all those Western propagandists who still live in the “Trump film”, who are still prisoners of the policy of “containing Russia”, because – instead of hammering with his fist on the table, instead of threatening and blackmailing – he mostly silently listened to the remarks of the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, including the one describing the European Union is an “unreliable partner.” But now analysts and journalists, both of whom does not deserve to be called as such, compete in attacking Borrell, saying that his performance was shameful and that he disgraced European Union, that his trip to Moscow was a “failure” and wishing in his place Mike Pompeo, Trumpâs foreign minister (yes, so far we have fallen!).Â
And the Russians, to show how the time had passed when they silently received blows from the West, just at the time of Borrell’s visit to Moscow, announced the expulsion of three Western diplomats for “participating in illegal demonstrations by Alexei Navalny’s supporters.” The West does not accept this, ignoring the fact that the demonstrations did take place without the permission of the authorities and that the job of diplomats is not to be “in demonstrations”, but to report on them. But very significantly, the German chancellor did not fail, in condemning the Russian step, to add that stopping the completion of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline is out of the question.
And that is exactly the core of today’s problems in the relations between the West and Moscow. If the West start using common sense in achieving its interests in relations with Russia, if it stops playing on this or that potential successor of Putin (which would be more acceptable to the West, which means more compliant, not to say more obedient), if it stops treating the dissolution of the Soviet Union as a unique victory of one, its, system over another (liberal capitalism over the idea of socialism, because socialism as a system presented itself in many different forms, of which the Yugoslav was the most liberal), it will create conditions for a new, open dialogue. A dialogue in which neither Moscow will have to listen to the “lectures” from Brussels, nor the EU will be forced to “swallow” unpleasant Russian responses.
But it must be a dialogue of equal, because the crucial Russian ambition is to be accepted as an equal partner and not treated as defeated and subordinate. As long as the politicians and the so-called journalists in their service do not understand this, failures and shames will continue. But whose? Not Europeâs, not Russiaâs. Any further failure in the effort to put Russian-European relations on a new, different and healthy foundation will be a failure and a shame for common sense, but also for the interests of the citizens of both Russia and the countries of the European Union. We are consciously not mentioning America in this context, because Europe should be able to act in its own name and in defense of its interests. But, judging by the reactions to Borrell’s visit to Moscow, we are still very, very far from that.
About the author:
Tomislav JakiÄ, one of the most influential journalist and publicist from East-southeast Europe, writing on politics and international affairs for over 6 decades. He was a Foreign Policy adviser to the Croatiaâs President Mesic (2000-2010)
Most of us were appalled to see what happened in Washington ten days ago when a âmobâ, incited by Donald Trumpâs address, stormed the Capitol building to prevent the presentation of Joe Biden as the next President. He gave voice to a possible fraudulent (in his mind) election, by putting suspicion on the postal ballot long before the election took place, and tried to âengineerâ the ballot by putting his âownâ man in control of it. He tried to manipulate the Supreme Court by replacing vacancies with people he expected to follow his lead and must have been disappointed, if not shocked, to find that the court unanimously rejected his claim that the votes had been rigged and should be thrown out. His unruly term of office saw the greatest turnover of people of any previous presidential term as staff could only hack the unusual behaviour of a disordered mind for so long. And so on and so on. Much will be written about the 4-year aberration that was Donald Trump. On a lighter note, his escapades in golf have given rise to a book, âCommander in Cheatâ!
Concerned people have written and spoken about the state of democracy today. Those of us who have spent some time stateside appreciate the immensity of the country, how one is made welcome, but also the prejudices that one finds and the general unknowing of the world we live in by large swathes of the population. Some are still steeped in attitudes that pre-date the civil war. Donald Trump played to all of those and gave them voice.
That is a big challenge facing Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to get America back on track and if not âgreat againâ to stand up and join the rest of us and share and appreciate that there are billions of other people that are working away with hopes and dreams and looked to the US as a beacon.
That should be the meaning of âgreat againâ, and if they can look up and truly be the land of the free and welcome the weak and downtrodden who are fleeing war and violence, as was once the way, then we can say that once more âyou have earned the right to be the leader of democracyâ, and democracy, for all its imperfections, is still the least bad form of government. It is well that the US re-joins the world as totalitarianism, in all its forms and at all levels, is on the rise again. Countries that espouse democracy and heed its precepts need to speak up loudly and be heard once again.
In November of this year is the World Climate Meeting, COP21, in Glasgow, Scotland at which the latest news on climate will be debated. Hopefully, the coronavirus will be on the decline and the US election will no longer be an issue. We can then get together on the one matter that should concentrate all our minds and separate the wheat from the chaff because there is some said that is wrong that muddies the waters, and leads the politicians to make incorrect decisions. But change is around us.
Climate is a highly complex issue, arguably the most complicated, that not all the modelling can get right, but study must go on. It is strange that it has only come to our notice since the population of the world over the past 60 years, has increased dramatically from approaching 3 billion to 8 billion. Mankind has thus significantly increased breeding himself, and thus his use of natural resources, for example cutting down trees, which need carbon dioxide to live, and vastly increased the pollution of the seas and the seas cover 70% of the planet. It has only been in comparatively recent times that we have started to pay attention to the seas and are alarmed at what we see.
However, we have the tools to put things right. We just need the will and ability to spend money wisely.
About the author:
Dr J Scott Younger
President Commissioner of Glendale Partners
and member of IFIMES Advisory Board
Dr J Scott Younger, OBE, is a professional civil engineer, he spent 42 years in the Far East undertaking assignments in 10 countries for WB, ADB, UNDP. Â He published many papers; he was a columnist for Forbes Indonesia and Globe Asia. He served on British & European Chamber boards and was a Vice Chair of Intâl Business Chamber for 17 years. His expertise is infrastructure and sustainable development and he takes an interest in international affairs. He is an International Chancellor of the President University, Indonesia. He is a member of IFIMES Advisory Board. Â The views expressed in this article are the authorâs own and do not necessarily reflect IFIMES official position.
The first address of the European Commission since the pandemic was one highly anticipated by all the citizens of the EU block. On September 16, President Ursula van der Leyden took it upon herself to reveal the EUâs roadmap for a post-Covid world following the approval of the recovery funds last July which constituted a breakthrough and sent a welcome signal in terms of cohesion and solidarity on the part of the 27 members.
Aside from paying tribute to our frontline workforce and praise the courage and human spirit showed by all in the face of virus spread, van der Leyen set out what she called NexGenerationEU; a movement to breathe new life into the EU but also and most importantly to adapt and lead the way into shaping tomorrowâs world. Through her speech, the president highlighted roughly 8 key themes which will be at the centre of this new European eraâs agenda for the next 12 months, in accordance with the cardinal principles of trust, tolerance and agility. In other words, the 750 billion recovery funds raised extra-ordinarily will be directed towards the following areas:
1° Economy: the Union members must all breed economies that offer protection, stability and opportunities in the face of the continuous health crisis with a specific wish expressed for a stronger Health union â and thereby an extension of the Unionâs competencies on the matter â but also the advent of European minimum wages.
2° Green Revolution: the Union will adopt more radical attitudes towards mitigating climate-change and safeguarding our planet, starting with the ambitious aim of becoming the first climate-neutral continent by 2050 through the EUâs Green Deal. So called âlighthouseâ high-impact and hydrogen-based projects will become an additional focus.
3° Technology: Europe has to step up its game and become a digital leader through securing industrial data and using it to support innovation. Delineating the use of AI by regulating the field, creating a secure EU e-identity and ensuring connectivity deployment so as to fully cover rural areas are also high on the list.
4° Vaccine management: The Union praises the open approach followed up until now in facing the virus whilst many others have opted for withdrawal and undercutting of cooperation. Having served as an example regarding vaccines research and funding, the EU must uphold its policy all the way to the finish line and ensure its accessibility for every citizen around the world.
5° Multilateralism: the current international order system needs some rethinking and international institutions need reform in order to de-paralyze crucial decision-making in urgent situations. This starts with the EU taking faster univocal positions on global issues (Honk-Kong, Moscow, Minsk, and Ankara) and systematically and unconditionally calling out any HR abuses whilst building on existing partnerships with EUâs like-minded allies.
6° Trade: Europe will be made out as a figure of fair-trade by pushing for broker agreements on protected areas and putting digital and environmental ethics at the forefront of its negotiations. Global trade will develop in a manner that is just, sustainable, and digitized.
7° Migration: A New Pact on Migration will be put forward imminently as to act on and move forward on this critical issue that has dragged for long enough; in that regard every member state is expecting to share responsibility and involvement including making the necessary compromises to implement adequate and dignifying management. Europe is taking a stand: legal and moral duties arising from Migrantsâ precarious situations are not optional.
8° Against hate-inspired behaviours and discriminations: A zero-tolerance policy is reaffirmed by the Union by extending its crime list to all forms of hate crime or speech based on any of the sensitive criteria and dedicating budget to address de facto discriminations in sensitive areas of society. It is high time to reach equal, universal and mutual recognition of family relations within the EU zone.
Granted, the European âpriorities forecastâ feels on point and leaves us nearly sighing in relief for it had been somewhat longed for. The themes are spot on, catch words are present and the phrasing of each section is nothing short of motivational with the most likely intended effect that the troops will be boosted and spirits lifted subsequently. When looking closer to the tools enunciated for every topical objective, there seems however to be nearly only abstract and remote strategies to get there.
This is because a great number of the decisive steps that the Union wishes to see be taken depend on the participation of various instruments and actors. Not only does it rely for most on the converging interests, capabilities and willingness of nation States (inside and outside the euro zone), but it is also contingent on the many complex layers and bodies of the Union itself. And when a tremendous amount of the proposed initiatives for European reconstruction is reliant on such a far-reaching chain of events, it simply calls into question the likelihood for the said measures and objectives to be attained â or at the very least in which timeframe.
One might then rightfully wonder whether good and strong willpower coupled with comprehensive projections can be enough.
Whilst van der Leyenâs announcement was promising and efficient in that it sent an important message â the EU is wanting to get in the driverâs seat â only the follow-up with radical motions such as the creation of a readily available tool to implement fast and impactful changes can lend support to a claim that Europe is in a position to resolve current internal and external EU challenges, and more generally to bounce back from conceded decline suffered in the most recent decades.
As a matter of fact, Diplomat Ali Goutali and Professor Anis Bajrektarevic were the firsts to make an analysis in that sense as they articulated their proposal for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) earlier this year. Faced with similar challenges and need for sharper thinking and tools in order to be at the forefront of the economic and technologic challenges ahead, the OIC had relied heavily on its Committee on Scientific and Technological Cooperation and agenda reform to reinforce its cooperation and innovation capabilities as a global player.
Nevertheless, Goutali and Bajrektarevic already felt months ago that additional steps ought to be taken for the OIC to be able to respond swiftly and reaffirm further its mandate of facilitating common political actions. To that end, it was suggested that a mechanism for policy coordination in critical times â the Rapid Reaction Capacitation â in charge of, primarily, vaccines management and AI applications should be introduced. Furthermore, the stakes behind the urgent need of strengthening our international order through cohesive endeavours are evidently the same for both the EU and the Arab World. That is to permanently leave behind a pseudo-competitive nation-based attitude that is nothing but a relic from the past and has achieved little in the context of the Covid outbreak.
Hence, if such an independent body was to be established, all three authors agree that it could gather the indispensable political power and resources to carry out the desired reforms on multilateralism, cyber and digital infrastructures, Covid recovery measures or geopolitical partnerships. Necessarily streamlined in order to avoid undue blockades, these new regional bodies could be composed of energetic forward thinkers across the private and public sectors empowered to map out and act on adequate strategies for a post-Covid world. This is because we all share the same goal: achieving solidarity not only on paper or as a conceptual motto but in real life and in real time. And after all, didnât von der Leyen herself concur with that line of thinking as she enjoined Member states to move towards qualified majority voting to avert slow and cumbersome decision-making processes?
It seems pretty clear to me that such discussions in relation to the aggressiveness in actions and potential bureaucratic barriers might raise an old-as-the-world yet still very important questions: Should we, Europe, be ready to risk losing some of the legitimacy or democratic aspects of our political bodies in order to gain in speed and efficiency in times of crisis? And if not, considering the embracement of some of our supra-national entity’s actions is already on shaky grounds, how can we ensure that such bold measures may still be reconciled with maximal legitimacy given our equally urging need for unity?
About the author :
Nora Wolf
Nora Wolf, of the Kingston and of University of Geneva is an International Politics & Economics specialist. Her expertise includes Human Rights, Humanitarian Law and International Criminal Law in an inter-disciplinary fashion for the EU and the UN-related think-tanks and FORAs. Currently is attached with the IFIMES Permanent Mission to the UN Geneva as the second alternate.
Luxury lifestyle and VIP service Concierge Amsterdam launched a new label this week: Dutch Uncle. This service to unburden, is specialized in Lifestyle Services for diplomats and Home Management Services and focuses on wealthy households and foreigners in the Netherlands.
In global cities such as New York, London, Paris, The Hague busy business people and internationals make eager use of home managers and personal concierges when moving or while traveling. This fact is fairly new in the Netherlands, even though there is a market for it.
Dutch Uncle provides a soft landing in the Netherlands âWe are responding to this,â says Stephanie Broeke, co-founder of Dutch Uncle. âMany diplomats who settle here can feel lost. The first step, such as first accommodation or a hotel reservation is often arranged by the embassy. But then it really starts. What are the best places to decorate your home? What insurance is needed, what is the best school for your children and how do you arrange other practical matters such as the dentist? Where can you find a nanny, a personal trainer or a private driver? but often they have no idea where to start and start a search on the internet, whereby trial and errors.
This detour is no longer necessary with Dutch Uncle. Thanks to our powerful network and years of experience in providing services for VIPS, we have the direct entrances and with our Expat Lifestyle Services we ensure a soft landing so that this target group feels at home faster and saves a lot of time.â
Home Management Services takes care of practical matters in and around the house. In addition, Dutch Uncle also provides clients with personal services in a higher segment. âThink of industrialists, dignitaries and people working in the high-end entertainment industry,â Broeke continues. âThere is often no shortage of budget, but there is a shortage of time – that has become a luxury good. With our Home Management Services we ensure that practical matters are taken care of. This can range from furnishing a pied-Ă -terre to arranging the post mail and cleaning when someone is traveling.â
Bojana Duovski, co-owner of Dutch Uncle and founder of Concierge Amsterdam adds: âAlthough Concierge Amsterdam mainly focuses on diplomats and international VIPS who stay here for a short time, we increasingly received requests for structural support in the field of home management and concierge services.â
Itâs been more than a year now since our lives changed, the whole world, as we knew it, turned into something different⊠a pandemic, like nothing any of us had lived before, changed the way we interact to each other, slowed down the pace of our hectic lives and proved to us that we are so small, powerless and fragile as human beings.
One year ago I was frenetically preparing to launch my first book, âJust a diplomatic spouseâ, I was making travel plans (like I always did, several months in advance) and I was fully enjoying the benefits of an active social diplomatic life in Berlin.
Little did I know of what was about to come and how our entire universe was going to be challenged, our inner strength tested and our nerves stretched to the max.
Day by day, the disease came closer and closer, we had to give up our travel plans, the list of guests got erased and the first lockdown in our lives came upon us and our families. Luckily, Berlin and Germany imposed quite mild restrictions at first. We were still able to go out freely and take long walks in the many parks and forests around the city, and, although social contacts were severely narrowed, we had the great comfort of our family of four.
I guess we are lucky because we greatly enjoy each otherâs company. That was sadly not the case for many others. I heard many stories of breakups and divorces post- COVID lockdown. Spending all day long with the same few people can be tricky sometimes. But, as I often advised others too, I tried to establish some kind of lockdown routines in our daily schedule, in order to find balance and lower the pressure of the whole situation. As we all know by now, when you constantly read and hear news about raising infection numbers, crowded IC units, exhausted medical staff and dear people around you getting sick, itâs only inevitable that your stress level will go high.
I will never forget the staggering images of empty streets, ghost cities, famous landmarks all over the world completely alone, people singing together, each from their own balconies, rounds of evening applause supporting the effort of tireless doctors and nurses fighting to keep sick people alive.
The world stood still and what we had left was hopeâŠthat maybe it was just a bad dream, that maybe this whole disaster would pass soonâŠ
One of the most impressive images that come now to my mind is one from Easter 2020, when I watched online Andrea Bocelli, the famous Italian tenor, singing in front of the Milan Dome, in an empty square⊠just him, the majestic building and his marvelous voice echoing into the air. Beautiful image, but equally terribly emotional!
Online meetings, online concerts, online schooling⊠as if we tried to move our entire lives into the online⊠but we are social creatures, human beings will always crave for social contact. We miss terribly meeting our friends for lunch and dinner, going out to the cinema, having a night out clubbing, celebrating big days with our extended families, New Yearâs Eve big parties and fireworks, travelling worry-freeâŠ
Oh, yes⊠travelling⊠a painful subject⊠empty airports are another weird image of these days. We managed to travel a bit, but I confess that the feeling was different. From the luggage, half full of disinfectants and face protection masks, to all the additional precautions, tests, delayed or cancelled flights, quarantine conditions and changed holiday destinationsâŠ2020 had it all⊠and sadly, 2021 doesnât seem much different.
A year has gone already and the news of several effective vaccines, available at global scale, offers now a glimpse of hope for a better near future. But I know the way back to normality is going to be long and hard and the scars will be with us for years to come.
Some countries went through this pandemic maybe a bit softer and wiser; others paid a much bigger price. Economic recession showed its teeth to all and the cruel statistics, which worsen daily, are really frightening: worldwide close to a hundred million people infected, more than two million deaths, millions of lost jobs, countless bankrupt businesses, billions of lives affected.
Have we learnt anything out of the present experience? I certainly hope so⊠This pandemic offered us the chance to maybe reinvent ourselves, to discover new hobbies and forgotten talents, new personal ways of expression. And, above all, I hope we learnt to appreciate more our closest ones, to value our time more and to guard our health.
I would like to believe that we will no longer take for granted our liberties, our freedom, nature, friends and family. Please, take time to call people you love, express your feelings, promise yourself that you will spend more time doing the things you really enjoy, that you will visit the countries you long planned to visit, that you will be grateful for each healthy day you are given and will show gratitude for all the good in your life.
No matter how difficult the situation is, how long the pandemic lasts, kindness and solidarity must prevail.
