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NPR’s David Greene talks to Georgina Wright, a senior researcher with the Institute for Government in London, about British Prime Minister Boris Johnson asking the queen to suspend Parliament.
August 28, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg Opinion) — As Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy consolidates power after his party gained a majority in parliament, there’s a sense in Europe that conditions might be ripe for productive talks on resolving the festering conflict in eastern Ukraine. French President Emmanuel Macron says there’ll be a France-Germany-Ukraine-Russia summit on the subject next month, the first since 2016. Meanwhile, John Bolton, national security adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump, is asking Zelenskiy to take his time: the Europeans may not “have a solution that is readily apparent.”As ever, the Europeans want the war to end on any terms acceptable to the parties, and the Americans are worried about any possible concessions to Russia. But all this activity around a possible resolution goes right over the heads of the most important stakeholders: The people of eastern Ukraine who live on both sides of the front line – a total of about 6.2 million people, of which about 3.7 million are in the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics, the DNR and LNR respectively.The Berlin-based Center for East European and International Studies (ZOiS) has just published a report on how sentiment in both Ukrainian and separatist-controlled parts of eastern Ukraine has evolved in the last three years – coincidentally, the period without “Normandy format” meetings like the one Macron has announced. The report is based on in-person interviews with 1,200 residents of the Kyiv-controlled part of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions and telephone interviews with 1,200 people in the unrecognized “people’s republics” kept alive by Russian support. In that, the survey is unique – few researchers dare conduct any kind of field work in the DNR and LNR.The results show a remarkable diversity of opinion, but they indicate a path toward a reasonable settlement that all parties should aim to follow.The first, most striking result of this survey is that on both sides of the border, “Ukrainian citizen” isn’t the primary self-identification. In the Kyiv-controlled areas, only 26% of respondents identified primarily as Ukrainian citizens, down from 53% in 2016. But then, the “people’s republics” don’t inspire much enthusiasm, either. No identity dominates on either side of the separation line.That’s an important finding. The lack of a strong affiliation with Russia, Ukraine or even the home region, the Donbas, means, on the one hand, that none of the major players in the conflict have managed to offer anything attractive to the population. On the other hand, it shows that there should be a lot of flexibility in resolving the conflict – and not much entrenched, identity-based resistance of the kind one finds in the Balkans.Another important positive finding for Ukraine is that people in the “people’s republics” have been crossing the line into the Kyiv-controlled part of the country more often than in 2016: The percentage who do it once a month, for example, has increased to 14.8% from 7.9%. Residents of the Ukrainian-controlled part almost never travel to the DNR and LNR; a higher percentage of people in the separatist areas say they have friends and relatives across the line than the other way round.The direction and frequency of the traffic means the separatist experiment hasn’t succeeded in cutting off parts of the Donbas, even though almost 56% of the “people’s republics’” residents still say they never cross the line. The two parts of the Donbas have been subjected to conflicting propaganda streams since the war started, and their ideas about the region’s future have diverged accordingly. In the Kyiv-controlled parts, even though they voted for the pro-Russian opposition in this year’s elections, about two thirds of residents believe the “people’s republics” should rejoin Ukraine without any special status, and that proportion hasn’t changed much since 2016. In the DNR and LNR, only about a quarter agree – slightly more than in 2016, indicating that some people are tired of the uncertainty. At the same time, the share of those who want their region to become part of Russia also has increased, to 18.3% from 11.4%, another sign people want the conflict to end one way or another.And yet these differences don’t present a particularly daunting challenge to Ukraine. People in the separatist areas haven’t acquired a belief in their separate statehood, and only a minority wants them to join Russia. Autonomy or not, the people’s republics have a pro-Ukrainian majority, if the ZOiS survey is accurate. Based on the German think tank’s findings, Zelenskiy’s strategy in any negotiations going forward should be to insist on a popular vote, ideally in both parts of eastern Ukraine, arranged and observed by a credible international organization, such as the United Nations or the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Based on the ZOiS findings and the population distribution between the Kyiv-controlled and the separatist-held areas, such a referendum should return a plurality (about 40%) for the region’s reunification within Ukraine without any special autonomous status; the second most popular result (with about 31%) would be autonomy within Ukraine.That latter option wouldn’t necessarily win in a run-off either, depending on what kind of economic revival package Ukraine and its Western allies would be able to offer the people of the Donbas. Russia won’t be offering any such package, at least not credibly. It’s had its chance to pump the rebel republics full of infrastructure investment, as it did with Crimea, but the Kremlin decided against it.Even if a vote were held in the separatist areas only, an international effort to secure it and allow Zelenskiy to campaign there (his prowess at it is well-known by now) could end in Ukraine’s favor, without the need to change the constitution to give the Donbas a special status. But even a vote for an autonomous status wouldn’t be the end of the world. It would merely set the stage for more detailed negotiations on what autonomy should entail and exactly what constitutional change would be needed. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s entire rhetoric since the conflict in eastern Ukraine began has been about protecting the country’s Russian-speaking minority and, specifically, the residents of the “people’s republics.” Insistence on a fair, internationally recognized vote would defang that rhetoric and give Putin an honorable way out of the expensive mess. The Kremlin would, of course, bargain, put forward impossible conditions, demand security guarantees for its most active supporters and insist on autonomy for the Donbas as a condition of any progress. But a compromise could be reachable with an amnesty for all combatants.After five years of war and more than 13,000 deaths, it’s finally time to ask the people of eastern Ukraine how they’d like to proceed. The ZOiS findings show they’ll probably make a reasonable decision. Germany, France and the U.S. should help Ukraine and Russia agree on a democratic solution to the crisis.To contact the author of this story: Leonid Bershidsky at [email protected] contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephanie Baker at [email protected] column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Leonid Bershidsky is Bloomberg Opinion’s Europe columnist. He was the founding editor of the Russian business daily Vedomosti and founded the opinion website Slon.ru.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
August 28, 2019Read More
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson wants to renegotiate the terms of the country’s divorce from the European Union but whether he succeeds or not, he has pledged that Brexit will happen “do or die” on Oct. 31. 3 – Parliament is scheduled to resume f…
August 28, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg) — A court in Ukraine ordered the release from pre-trial detention of Russian journalist Kirill Vyshinsky on Wednesday, amid signs the two countries are preparing a wider exchange of detainees.The Kyiv Court of Appeals freed Vyshinsky, who …
August 28, 2019Read More
People fleeing Kashmir describe what it’s been like to live under a three-week communications blockade. The Himalayan territory is split between India and Pakistan.
August 28, 2019Read More
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced Wednesday that parliament would be suspended until October 14 — just two weeks before the UK is set to leave the EU — enraging anti-Brexit MPs. The pound slid on the surprise news, which opponents brand…
August 28, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg) — Follow @Brexit, sign up to our Brexit Bulletin, and tell us your Brexit story. The U.K. Parliament will be suspended for almost five weeks ahead of Brexit, as Prime Minister Boris Johnson sets up a showdown with lawmakers who want to blo…
August 28, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg) — Tanzania agreed to repatriate Burundian refugees who have been sheltering in two major settlements, the Burundian Interior Minister Pascal Barandagiye told the national broadcaster.Tanzania estimates it has more than 220,000 Burundian re…
August 28, 2019Read More
Boris Johnson describes the suspension as a normal thing for a new government to do. Opponents say Johnson is staging a coup to ensure Brexit happens by Oct. 31.
August 28, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg) — Want to receive this post in your inbox every day? Sign up for the Balance of Power newsletter, and follow Bloomberg Politics on Twitter and Facebook for more.Prime Minister Boris Johnson is on a collision course with U.K. lawmakers with…
August 28, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg Opinion) — Of all people, you wouldn’t expect President Donald Trump to be shy about taking credit for his achievements. When it comes to China’s role in America’s opioid crisis, though, he’s been uncharacteristically modest. Mail carriers including FedEx Corp., Amazon.com Inc., United Parcel Service Inc., and the U.S. Postal Service were ordered to search for and refuse deliveries of the synthetic opioid fentanyl from China in a tweet-storm last week. “President Xi said this would stop – it didn’t,” Trump wrote, echoing a theme from earlier this month:That’s not the case, the head of China’s narcotics regulator Liu Yuejin told Bloomberg News. Since the country listed all fentanyl-style drugs as controlled substances April 1, in accordance with a December agreement between Trump and President Xi Jinping, there’s been no evidence of new underground fentanyl production and no legitimately produced drugs have ended up in illicit channels, Liu said.One could be tempted to doubt his assertion, after the Chinese government failed to halt such exports since a crackdown brokered under the Obama administration in 2015. But if President Trump listened to his own officials, he’d hear a similar story.“The numbers have dropped precipitously this year, so we’re talking about only pounds of fentanyl that we have encountered so far this year” coming by post from China, Thomas Overacker, an official at Customs and Border Protection, told a Congressional hearing last month. That compares with close to 2,000 pounds of fentanyl cut with other ingredients coming over the U.S. border with Mexico, he said. Traditionally, much of the fentanyl coming from Mexico has been manufactured there using precursor chemicals imported from China – but that, too, appears to be changing.The newest challenge for drug enforcement appears to be Mexican drug cartels moving into the void left as China’s crackdown efforts have halted shipments, Matthew Donahue, a regional director with the Drug Enforcement Administration told the hearing. The administration “is continuing to see a shift from importation of precursor chemicals for the production of fentanyl and fentanyl-like substances to the manufacturing of precursor chemicals within Mexico itself,” he said. “This is an alarming development.”That’s echoed by the U.S. Postal Service, too. Some 153 of 185 seizures of synthetic opioids this fiscal year were mailed from domestic post-boxes, rather than sent from foreign countries such as China, Gary Barksdale, chief inspector of the USPS, said in testimony.Why should Trump’s deal with China be succeeding where previous efforts have failed? As we’ve written, the problem in the past has been that China designated individual chemicals as controlled substances. That meant that as soon as a new formula was registered, Chinese drug labs came up with another one to skirt the regulations, leaving officials there and in the U.S. caught in a game of Whac-A-Mole. The December deal, on the other hand, scheduled the entire class of fentanyl-type substances, ensuring a much more comprehensive ban.It’s certainly too soon to roll out the “mission accomplished” banner. As my colleague Shuli Ren has written, China was almost entirely ignorant of its role in America’s opioid-addiction crisis until the Trump-Xi deal was announced last year. Previous breakthroughs have turned into squibs, too: More than half of U.S. deaths from synthetic opioids have occurred since China’s initial crackdown in 2015. In addition, the migration crisis on the southern U.S. border has diverted funding and personnel, and complicated the role of drug enforcement. So it’s possible that even with a diminished Chinese role, America’s opioid crisis persists, with the entire supply chain controlled by Mexican cartels.Still, the early indications of success in reducing shipments across the Pacific count as a significant policy win for the Trump administration. That should be receiving more attention, especially at a time when a proposed $11.5 billion settlement from the Sackler family and its drugmaker Purdue Pharma LP is promising a way to help cover the fallout from addiction to the company’s opioid OxyContin.It could be that 2019 is the year when the U.S. finally started to turn the tide in the opium war ravaging the Trump-voting heartlands of the Midwest and Appalachia. What’s more, the success may be coming as a result of that most improbable activity, cooperation between the U.S. and Chinese governments.That may not fit President Trump’s narrative of an ever-escalating great power contest with Beijing, but it should still count as an unlikely victory for his diplomacy. He should try boasting about it.To contact the author of this story: David Fickling at [email protected] contact the editor responsible for this story: Rachel Rosenthal at [email protected] column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.David Fickling is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering commodities, as well as industrial and consumer companies. He has been a reporter for Bloomberg News, Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and the Guardian.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
August 28, 2019Read More
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