By David Stanway
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Delegations from hundreds of countries will meet in New York this week in an attempt to hammer out a new legally binding ocean protection treaty that green groups believe will decide whether efforts to safeguard global biodiversity can succeed.
By Ana Mano
SAO PAULO (Reuters) -Heavy rains in coastal areas of Brazil's southeast have caused flooding and landslides that killed 36 people and dislodged hundreds of others, according to a statement from Sao Paulo state authorities on Sunday.
Rescue workers continue to look for victims, reconnect isolated communities and clear roads, some of which remain blocked, trapping an undetermined number of tourists who traveled for Brazil's Carnival celebrations.
Weather forecasts show heavy rains will continue in Sao Paulo's coastal area, challenging civil defense and fire department rescue teams and raising the prospect of a higher death toll.
The federal government determined the mobilization of several ministries to assist victims, restore infrastructure and start reconstruction work. Sao Paulo state declared a 180-day state of calamity for six cities after what experts described as an unprecedented, extreme weather event.
On Monday, Sao Paulo Governor Tarcisio de Freitas will meet federal officials as they coordinate the response to the tragedy, the statement said.
Operations at the port of Santos, Latin America's largest, were interrupted amid wind gusts exceeding 55 kpm (34 mph) and waves over one meter high on Saturday, according to a local news outlet.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who was spending carnival in Bahia state in Brazil's northeast, is set to visit the main affected areas on Monday, his office said.
(Reporting by Ana Mano in São Paulo and Lisandra Paraguassu in Brasília; Editing by Diane Craft)
New York (AFP) - Two 16th-century sculptures, jewels of French Renaissance art, have been on display since 1908 at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.
But thanks to modern technology and an unusual agreement, precise 3D copies will be made and installed in the French castle where the originals long resided.
SEOUL (Reuters) -North Korea fired two ballistic missiles off its east coast, South Korea's military said on Monday, as the powerful sister of leader Kim Jong Un warned of turning the Pacific into a "firing range," heightening tensions in the region.
Japan's Coast Guard said North Korea launched three projectiles that could be ballistic missiles shortly after 2200 GMT, all of which fell within minutes. All three landed outside Japan's EEZ, public broadcaster NHK said.
By Soo-hyang Choi
SEOUL (Reuters) - The United States held joint air exercises bilaterally with South Korea and Japan involving strategic bombers on Sunday, a day after North Korea fired a Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in a "sudden launching drill".
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said the exercise, in which South Korea's F-35A, F-15K and U.S. F-16 fighters escorted American B-1B bombers, demonstrated the allies' "overwhelming" defence capabilities and readiness posture.
"(The exercise) strengthened the combined operation capability and affirmed the United States' ironclad commitment to the defence of the Korean Peninsula and the implementation of extended deterrence," the South's military said in a statement.
Japan flew F-15s over the Sea of Japan with the U.S. Armed Forces' B-1 bombers and F-16s in tactical exercises, Japan's Defense Ministry said in a statement, calling the security environment "increasingly severe" after the latest North Korea missile landed within its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
"This bilateral exercise reaffirms the strong will between Japan and the United States to respond to any situation, the readiness of (Japan's Self Defense Forces) and U.S. Armed Forces, and further strengthens the deterrence and response capabilities of the Japan-U.S. Alliance," the ministry said.
The air drills come a day after North Korea launched a long-range ballistic missile into the sea off Japan's west coast, following a warning of a strong response to upcoming military drills by South Korea and the United States.
North Korea's state media KCNA said the country conducted a "sudden launching drill" on Saturday in an "actual proof" of its efforts to turn the "capacity of fatal nuclear counterattack on the hostile forces into an irresistible one".
Leader Kim Jong Un's sister, Kim Yo Jong, issued yet another warning and accused the United States of trying to turn the U.N. Security Council into what she called a "tool for its heinous hostile policy" toward Pyongyang.
"I warn that we will watch every movement of the enemy and take corresponding and very powerful and overwhelming counteraction against its every move hostile to us," she said in a statement.
Saturday's missile launch, the North's first since Jan. 1, came after Pyongyang threatened on Friday an "unprecedentedly persistent, strong" response as South Korea and the United States geared up for their annual military exercises as part of efforts to fend off the growing nuclear and missile threat that the North poses.
North Korea's state news agency said its missile had flown for 1 hour, 6 minutes and 55 seconds, as high as 5,768 km (3,584 miles), before accurately hitting a pre-set area 989 km (614 miles) away in open waters. It first test-fired a Hwasong-15 in 2017.
'WITHOUT WARNING'
Last year nuclear-armed North Korea fired an unprecedented number of missiles, including ICBMs capable of striking anywhere in the United States, while resuming preparations for its first nuclear test since 2017.
South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin said Saturday's launch "clearly" signals the North's intent to conduct further provocations.
"If North Korea conducts the seventh nuclear test, which could happen at any time, it will be a game changer in a sense that North Korea could develop and deploy tactical nuclear missiles," Park told the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
KCNA said the North's latest launch, guided by the Missile General Bureau, was conducted on an "emergency firepower combat standby order" given at dawn, followed by a written order from Kim Jong Un at 8 a.m. (2300 GMT on Friday). South Korea's military said it detected the missile at 5:22 p.m. (0822 GMT).
"The important bit here is that the exercise was ordered day-of, without warning to the crew involved," said Ankit Panda, a missile expert at the Washington–based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "The amount of time between the order and the launch is likely going to be decreased with additional testing."
Analysts say North Korea is likely to conduct more weapons tests, including a possible new solid-fuel missile which could help the North deploy its missiles faster in the event of a war.
North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programmes are banned under U.N. Security Council resolutions, but Pyongyang says its weapons development is necessary to counter "hostile policies" by Washington and its allies.
(Reporting by Soo-hyang Choi and Josh Smith in Seoul, Chang-Ran Kim in Tokyo; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Daniel Wallis, William Mallard, Michael Perry and Hugh Lawson)
By Jonathan Landay
MUNICH, Germany (Reuters) - Ukrainian officials have urged U.S. Congress members to press President Joe Biden's administration to send F-16 jetfighters to Kyiv, saying the aircraft would boost Ukraine's ability to hit Russian missile units with U.S.-made rockets, lawmakers said.
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia on Sunday scolded Emmanuel Macron over remarks about wanting to see Russia defeated, saying Moscow still remembered the fate of Napoleon Bonaparte and accusing the French president of duplicitous diplomacy with the Kremlin.
Macron told paper Le Journal du Dimanche France wanted Russia to be defeated in Ukraine but had never wanted to "crush" it.
"About 'Never': France did not begin with Macron, and the remains of Napoleon, revered at the state level, rest in the centre of Paris. France - and Russia - should understand," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.
"In general, Macron is priceless," she said, adding that his remarks showed the West had engaged in discussions about regime change in Russia while Macron had repeatedly sought meetings with the Russian leadership.
Macron has drawn criticism from some NATO allies for delivering mixed messages regarding his policy on the war between Ukraine and Russia, with some considering Paris a weak link in the Western alliance.
On Friday, Macron urged allies to step up military support for Ukraine, but also said he did not believe in regime change and that there would have to be negotiations at some point.
"Let’s be clear, I don't believe for one second in regime change, and when I hear a lot of people calling for regime change I ask them, 'For which change? Who’s next? Who is your leader?'"
Clarifying those comments, he said in the paper that he did not believe a democratic solution from within civil society would emerge in Russia after years of a hardening of Moscow's position and conflict. He added that he saw no alternative to Putin, who had to be brought back to the negotiating table.
"All the options other than Vladimir Putin in the current system seem worse to me," Macron said.
(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow and John Irish in Munich; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
Critics have described Carter’s foreign policies as “ineffectual” and “hopelessly muddled,” and their formulation demonstrated “weakness and indecision.”
As a historian researching Carter’s foreign policy initiatives, I conclude his overseas policies were far more effective than critics have claimed.
President Jimmy Carter listens to Sen. Joseph R. Biden, D-Del., as they wait to speak at fund raising reception in Wilmington, Del. on Feb. 20, 1978.
The criticism of Carter’s foreign policies seems particularly mistaken when it comes to the Cold War, a period defined by decades of hostility, mutual distrust and arms buildup after World War II between the U.S. and Russia, then known as the Soviet Union or Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).
By the late 1970s, the Soviet Union’s economy and global influence were weakening. With the counsel of National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, a Soviet expert, Carter exploited these weaknesses.
During his presidency, Carter insisted nations provide basic freedoms for their people – a moral weapon against which repressive leaders could not defend.
Carter soon openly criticized the Soviets for denying Russian Jews their basic civil rights, a violation of human rights protections outlined in the diplomatic agreement called the Helsinki Accords.
Carter’s team underscored these violations in arms control talks. The CIA flooded the USSR with books and articles to incite human rights activism. And Carter publicly supported Russian dissidents – including pro-democracy activist Andrei Sakharov – who were fighting an ideological war against socialist leaders.
Human rights were a cornerstone of President Jimmy Carter’s foreign policy. Here, a billboard with his picture on it in Liberia.
Carter adviser Stuart Eizenstat argues that the administration attacked the Soviets “in their most vulnerable spot – mistreatment of their own citizens.”
This proved effective in sparking Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s social and political reforms of the late 1980s, best known by the Russian word “glasnost,” or “openness.”
In December 1979, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in response to the assassination of the Soviet-backed Afghan leader, Nur Mohammad Taraki. The invasion effectively ended an existing détente between the U.S. and USSR.
Beginning in July 1979, the U.S. was providing advice and nonlethal supplies to the mujahideen rebelling against the Soviet-backed regime. After the invasion, National Security Advisor Brzezinski advised Carter to respond aggressively to it. So the CIA and U.S. allies delivered weapons to the mujahideen, a program later expanded under Reagan.
Afghan rebels examine a Soviet-built armored personnel carrier and scores of other military vehicles left behind when the Mujahedeen fighters overran a Soviet-Afghan garrison.
Carter’s move effectively engaged the Soviets in a proxy war that began to bleed the Soviet Union.
By providing the rebels with modern weapons, the U.S. was “giving to the USSR its Vietnam war,” according to Brzezinski: a progressively expensive war, a strain on the socialist economy and an erosion of their authority abroad.
Carter also imposed an embargo on U.S. grain sales to the Soviets in 1980. Agriculture was the USSR’s greatest economic weakness since the 1960s. The country’s unfavorable weather and climate contributed to successive poor growing seasons, and their heavy industrial development left the agricultural sector underfunded.
Economist Elizabeth Clayton concluded in 1985 that Carter’s embargo was effective in exacerbating this weakness.
Census data compiled between 1959 and 1979 show that 54 million people were added to the Soviet population. Clayton estimates that 2 to 3 million more people were added in each subsequent year. The Soviets were overwhelmed by the population boom and struggled to feed their people.
At the same time, Clayton found that monthly wages increased, which led to an increased demand for meat. But by 1985, there was a meat shortage in the USSR. Why? Carter’s grain embargo, although ended by Reagan in 1981, had a lasting impact on livestock feed that resulted in Russian farmers decreasing livestock production.
The embargo also forced the Soviets to pay premium prices for grain from other countries, nearly 25 percent above market prices.
For years, Soviet leaders promised better diets and health, but now their people had less food. The embargo battered a weak socialist economy and created another layer of instability for the growing population.
In 1980, Carter pushed further to punish the Soviets. He convinced the U.S. Olympic Committee to refrain from competing in the upcoming Moscow Olympics while the Soviets repressed their people and occupied Afghanistan.
Carter not only promoted a boycott, but he also embargoed U.S. technology and other goods needed to produce the Olympics. He also stopped NBC from paying the final US$20 million owed to the USSR to broadcast the Olympics. China, Germany, Canada and Japan – superpowers of sport – also participated in the boycott.
Historian Allen Guttmann said, “The USSR lost a significant amount of international legitimacy on the Olympic question.” Dissidents relayed to Carter that the boycott was another jab at Soviet leadership. And in America, public opinion supported Carter’s bold move – 73% of Americans favored the boycott.
In his 1980 State of the Union address, Carter revealed an aggressive Cold War military plan. He declared a “Carter doctrine,” which said that the Soviets’ attempt to gain control of Afghanistan, and possibly the region, was regarded as a threat to U.S. interests. And Carter was prepared to meet the threat with “military force.”
Carter also announced in his speech a five-year spending initiative to modernize and strengthen the military because he recognized the post-Vietnam military cuts weakened the U.S. against the USSR.
Ronald Reagan argued during the 1980 presidential campaign that, “Jimmy Carter risks our national security – our credibility – and damages American purposes by sending timid and even contradictory signals to the Soviet Union.” Carter’s policy was based on “weakness and illusion” and should be replaced “with one founded on improved military strength,” Reagan criticized.
In 1985, however, President Reagan publicly acknowledged that his predecessor demonstrated great timing in modernizing and strengthening the nation’s forces, which further increased economic and diplomatic pressure on the Soviets.
Reagan admitted that he felt “very bad” for misstating Carter’s policies and record on defense.
Carter is most lauded today for his post-presidency activism, public service and defending human rights. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for such efforts.
But that praise leaves out a significant portion of Carter’s presidential accomplishments. His foreign policy, emphasizing human rights, was a key instrument in dismantling the power of the Soviet Union.
This is an updated version of a story that was originally published on May 2, 2019.
Robert C. Donnelly, Associate Professor of History, Gonzaga University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
More than 100,000 people in Israel took to the streets on Saturday in a show of opposition to planned judicial reforms, the organizers said.
It was the seventh consecutive week that people have protested against the government's controversial legal plans to deliberately weaken the Supreme Court.
The aim of the reforms is to give parliament the power to overturn Supreme Court decisions with a simple majority. Politicians are also to be given more influence in the appointment of judges.
Critics see this as a threat to the democratic separation of powers. They also fear that the reforms could allow Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to escape conviction in his corruption trial.
In the absence of a written constitution in Israel, the Supreme Court has a special role to play in upholding the rule of law and human rights. However, the extreme right religious government argues that the court currently exerts too much political influence.
In Tel Aviv, demonstrators gathered in the city centre, with many waving Israeli flags and carrying signs that read, "Israel must not become a dictatorship" or called for support from the international community, saying "Biden, Macron - help us."
Officials closed several streets earlier in the day due to the rally.
Protests were also held in Jerusalem, Haifa and Beersheva.
The first reading of the controversial reform is scheduled in parliament for Monday, though it could be postponed.
Three readings are needed to amend the law. A judicial committee approved the reform on February 13, sparking angry and loud protests in the Knesset and on the street.
Strikes and a large demonstration in Jerusalem are planned for Monday, in a repeat of last week's industrial action.
Israel's police chief, Kobi Shabtai, meanwhile, warned against political violence as tensions rise.
Some people are writing things without considering the consequences, Shabtai told Channel 12, calling instead for dialogue. The current situation is very worrying, he said.
By Humeyra Pamuk and Ryan Woo
MUNICH/BEIJING (Reuters) -China's top diplomat Wang Yi on Saturday accused the United States of violating international norms with "hysterical" behavior, as a running dispute over a suspected Chinese spy balloon moved to the forefront of a global security conference in Munich.
Hours after the comments, which further weighed on the already strained U.S.-China relationship, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken left his hotel in Munich for an undisclosed location amid expectations of a meeting with his Chinese counterpart.
As Blinken entered his vehicle in his hotel's garage, he did not answer a shouted question from a reporter on whether he was going to meet with Wang, pool footage from CNN showed.
The U.S. State Department declined to say whether the top American diplomat was holding talks with Wang. Asked earlier by a Reuters reporter on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference about the possibility of a meeting with Blinken, Wang smiled and declined to comment.
The dispute over the balloon - which flew over the United States and Canada before being shot down on President Joe Biden's orders, hurt bilateral relations and came at a time when the West is closely watching Beijing's response to the Ukraine war.
"To have dispatched an advanced fighter jet to shoot down a balloon with a missile, such behavior is unbelievable, almost hysterical," Wang said on Saturday.
"There are so many balloons all over the world, and various countries have them, so is the United States going to shoot all of them down?" he said.
"We ask the U.S. to show its sincerity and correct its mistakes, face up and resolve this incident, which has damaged Sino-U.S. relations."
The balloon's flight this month over the U.S. mainland triggered an uproar in Washington and prompted Blinken to postpone a planned visit to Beijing. That Feb. 5-6 trip would have been the first by a U.S. secretary of state to China in five years and was seen by both sides as an opportunity to stabilize increasingly fraught ties.
Washington had been hoping to put a "floor" under relations that hit a dangerous low in August with China's reaction to a visit to Taiwan by then-U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
China reacted angrily when the U.S. military shot down the 200-foot (60-meter) balloon on Feb. 4, saying it was for monitoring weather conditions and had blown off course. But Washington said it clearly was a surveillance balloon with a massive undercarriage holding electronics.
On Thursday, Biden gave a speech focusing on the balloon incident. He said he expected to speak with China's President Xi Jinping about it and hoped to get to the bottom of the affair.
In his most extensive remarks to date about the Chinese balloon and three unidentified objects downed by U.S. fighters, Biden did not say when he would speak with Xi, but said the United States was continuing to engage diplomatically with China on the issue.
"We are not looking for a new Cold War," he said.
(Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk, Ryan Woo, Trevor Hunnicutt, Sabine Siebold, Andrew Gray, Alexander Ratz, John Irish, Andreas Rinke, Jonathan Landay; writing by Matthias Williams; Editing by Alex Richardson, Diane Craft and Jonathan Oatis)
By Dawit Endeshaw
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - A senior Israeli diplomat was on Saturday removed from the African Union's annual summit in Ethiopia, as a dispute over Israel's accreditation to the bloc escalated.
