Iran, IAEA Chief Say Talks in Tehran Were 'Constructive'

Iran

August 25th, 9:37am

Asharq Al-Awsat

Head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization Ali-Akbar Salehi and IAEA chief Rafael Grossi meet in Tehran. (Reuters)

Talks with the UN nuclear watchdog's chief were constructive, Iran's top nuclear official Ali Akbar Salehi was quoted as saying on Tuesday, after meeting Rafael Grossi during a visit to seek access for inspectors to two suspected former atomic sites. Grossi's trip comes after Washington last week pressed the UN Security Council to reimpose sanctions on Tehran that were lifted under Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, from which the United States has withdrawn. Iranian authorities said Grossi's visit was not related to US moves to reimpose sanctions. "Our conversation today was very constructive. It was agreed that the agency will carry out its independent and professional responsibilities and Iran will fulfil its legal commitments," said Salehi, head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, according to the Students News Agency ISNA. "A new chapter of cooperation between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency will start." The IAEA Board of Governors passed a resolution in June putting pressure on Iran to let inspectors into the sites because they could still host undeclared nuclear material, or traces of it. Grossi said on Saturday he would address "the outstanding questions, in particular, the issue of the access". "There is no political approach towards Iran ... There are issues that need to be addressed ... this does not mean a political approach towards Iran," Grossi said after meeting Salehi. Tehran said on Monday that Grossi's visit would "strengthen ties and build trust" between Tehran and the IAEA, "as long as the IAEA moves based on impartiality, independence and distances itself from political pressure of another countries". "The IAEA will not let third countries impact its relations with any other country," Grossi said, according to Iranian media. Grossi will meet President Hassan Rouhani, the foreign minister and other senior officials during his visit.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468361/iran-iaea-chief-say-talks-tehran-were-constructive

Germany on 'Road to Recovery' as Business Morale Brightens Further

Business

August 25th, 9:32am

Asharq Al-Awsat

A worker walks on scaffoldings at an apartment building near former Tempelhof airport in Berlin, Germany, January 25, 2016. REUTERS/Fabrizio Bensch

German business morale improved more than expected in August as both manufacturing and services picked up steam, a survey showed on Tuesday, boosting hopes that Europe's largest economy is set for a strong recovery following the massive coronavirus shock. The Ifo institute said its business climate index rose to 92.6 from a downwardly revised 90.4 in July. This was the fourth monthly increase in a row and came in better than economists' expectations for 92.2. "The German economy is on the road to recovery," Ifo President Clemens Fuest said in a statement, adding that firms assessed their current business situation much more optimistically than in the previous month. The Ifo survey recorded the strongest gains in business morale among manufacturers and service providers while sentiment among construction firms was also improving further. Ifo economist Klaus Wohlrabe said he expected the economy to grow by almost 7% on the quarter in the July-September period after it posted a record plunge of 9.7% in the previous three months at the height of the pandemic. "The upswing is still fragile. We have not yet reached the pre-crisis level," Wohlrabe told Reuters, adding that the latest spike in new infections underlined the risk of a second wave which could derail the recovery again. But Wohlrabe also pointed out that export expectations had fallen again slightly as doing business abroad remained difficult for many German companies. "In view of the fragile situation in other European countries, the German export industry is doing relatively well," he said.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468341/germany-road-recovery-business-morale-brightens-further

Pompeo Flies to Sudan from Israel

Arab World

August 25th, 9:24am

Asharq Al-Awsat

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. (Reuters)

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was due to land in Sudan from Israel on Tuesday, on what he said was the first official non-stop flight between the two countries, as the United States promotes stronger Sudan-Israel ties. His visit is part of a regional tour following an accord between Israel and the UAE this month to forge full relations, and comes as Israel and the United States push more Arab countries to follow. “Happy to announce that we are on the FIRST official NONSTOP flight from Israel to Sudan!” Pompeo said on Twitter. Pompeo will meet Sudan’s prime minister and the head of its ruling council during a brief stopover in Khartoum to discuss US support for the civilian-led government and for “deepening the Sudan-Israel relationship”, according to the State Department. Sudan has been restoring its own ties with the United States following the ouster of former president Omar al-Bashir in April 2019, and is pushing to be removed from the list of countries that Washington considers state sponsors of terrorism. Asked if Pompeo would announce a breakthrough in Sudan like normalization of ties with Israel or a removal of US sanctions, a US official on board Pompeo’s flight said: “It’s possible that more history will be made.” The official said Sudan had offered the direct flight, dropping the requirement “that such a flight make a cosmetic stop en route”. In February, ruling council head Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Uganda, but cast doubt on any rapid normalization of relations. Sudan announced on Aug. 19 it had sacked its foreign ministry spokesman after he called the UAE decision to become the third Arab country to normalize relations with Israel “a brave and bold step”.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468326/pompeo-flies-sudan-israel

Scientists Say Hong Kong Man Got Coronavirus a Second Time

World

August 25th, 9:18am

Asharq Al-Awsat

People wear protective masks as they walk through the financial central district, following the outbreak of the new coronavirus, in Hong Kong, China February 10, 2020. (Reuters)

University of Hong Kong scientists claim to have the first evidence of someone being re-infected with the virus that causes COVID-19. Genetic tests revealed that a 33-year-old man returning to Hong Kong from a trip to Spain in mid-August had a different strain of the coronavirus than the one he’d previously been infected with in March, said Dr. Kelvin Kai-Wang To, the microbiologist who led the work. The man had mild symptoms the first time and none the second time; his more recent infection was detected through screening and testing at the Hong Kong airport. "It shows that some people do not have lifelong immunity" to the virus if they've already had it, To said. "We don’t know how many people can get re-infected. There are probably more out there." The paper has been accepted by the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases but not yet published, and some independent experts urged caution until full results are available. Whether people who have had COVID-19 are immune to new infections and for how long are key questions that have implications for vaccine development and decisions about returning to work, school and social activities. Even if someone can be infected a second time, it’s not known if they have some protection against serious illness, because the immune system generally remembers how to make antibodies against a virus it’s seen before. It’s not clear how different a virus needs to be to trigger illness, but the new work suggests that "COVID patients should not be complacent about prevention measures" and should continue social distancing, wearing masks and other ways to reduce infection, To said. Two experts with no role in the work agreed. "We’ve always known reinfection was a possibility and I think this is highly suggestive" that it occurred in this case, said Dr. Jesse Goodman, a former US Food and Drug Administration chief scientist now at Georgetown University. "If there is a reinfection, it suggests the possibility there was residual immunity ... that helped protect the patient" from getting sick again, Goodman said. However, "if immunity wanes from natural infection, it could be a challenge for vaccines" and may mean booster shots are needed, he added. Julie Fischer, a microbiologist at CRDF Global, a nonprofit health group in Arlington, Virginia, said the study gives convincing evidence that reinfection can happen. "The real question is what this means for severity of disease" if that occurs, and whether such people can infect others, she said. One expert saw the report as good news. Dr. Paul Offit, a vaccine expert at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, said it’s encouraging the reported reinfection was without symptoms. "That’s a win as far as I’m concerned" because it suggests a first infection may protect a person from moderate to severe disease the second time around, he said in an interview streamed by the Journal of the American Medical Association. A mid-May survey by the doctors’ information-sharing site Sermo found that 13% of the 4,173 doctors responding believed that they had treated one or more patients who were re-infected. Among the respondents, 7% of those in the US and 16% in other countries thought they’d seen such a case. However, health officials have also wondered whether people who tested positive long after their initial illness were simply showing signs of not completely clearing the virus rather than being infected anew.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468321/scientists-say-hong-kong-man-got-coronavirus-second-time

GERD: Egypt Adheres to Negotiations, Ethiopia Once Again Proposes to Share Waters

Arab World

August 25th, 9:13am

Cairo- Mohammed Abdu Hassanein

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam as it appears in a satellite image taken on July 20, 2020 (AFP)

Ethiopia has once again disputed Egypt’s hegemony over the Blue Nile waters. It wants a recently formulated final agreement to include sharing the Nile waters, affirming that Egypt receives the biggest share. Ethiopian Foreign Minister Gedu Andargachew stressed that downstream countries reject Egypt’s hegemony over the use of the Nile waters. “Ethiopia needs to build the mega-dam and must reflect the realism about the use of the Nile River,” his country’s official press agency quoted him as saying. GERD is a slogan for all Ethiopians, he noted, expressing pride that his country is working to complete such a mega project with its own capabilities. Addis Ababa could generate up to 30,000 megawatts of hydroelectric power from the Nile River, the FM stressed, adding that “this tremendous potential will enable the country to deliver electricity to all Ethiopians, expand industrial complexes, and create job opportunities, as well as improving services.” Meanwhile, Egypt affirmed its adherence to the course of negotiations taking place among Addis Ababa, Cairo, and Khartoum on the rules for filling and operating the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). Spokesman of Egypt's Ministry of Irrigation and Water Resources Mohamed al-Sibai said the African Union (AU)-sponsored talks are ongoing. He pointed out that the three countries exchanged proposals for the final text of the agreement and chose both “legal and technical representatives from each country to participate in the merging of the three texts.” Sibai noted that the unified final agreement is expected to be handed over to the AU Chief and South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, on Friday. In a statement published on Monday, the spokesman refused to speak about the talks taking place. Cairo fears the potential negative impact of GERD, which Addis Ababa is constructing on the Nile River, on the flow of its annual share of the Nile’s 55.5 billion cubic meters of water especially that it relies on it for more than 90 percent of its water supplies. Addis Ababa, however, says the dam is not aimed at harming Egypt or Sudan’s interests, stressing that the main objective is to generate electricity to support its development.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468316/gerd-egypt-adheres-negotiations-ethiopia-once-again-proposes-share-waters

Weeks after Blast, Lebanon Patronage System Immune to Reform

Features

August 25th, 9:05am

Asharq Al-Awsat

In this Aug. 16, 2020 file photo, a man uses his phone to take a picture of the site of the Aug. 4 explosion that hit the seaport of Beirut, Lebanon. (AP)

Three weeks after a catastrophic explosion ripped through Beirut, killing nearly 200 people and rendering thousands homeless, the change many hoped for is nowhere in sight. Instead, activists said they are back to square one. The same politicians whose corruption and negligence the public blames for the disaster are negotiating among themselves over forming a new government. Calls for early elections have petered out. To devastated Beirutis, still sweeping shards of glass and fixing broken homes, the blast revealed the extent to which an entrenched system of patronage remains impervious to reform. In fact, the tools that the ruling elite have used to ensure a lock on power the past 30 years are only more powerful. Rising poverty amid a severe economic crisis gives them greater leverage, with more people desperate for the income their patronage provides. Their grip on electoral politics was made tighter by an election law they passed in 2017, making it harder for independents to win seats. And there are armed groups affiliated with political parties. "Basically, we have no way to force them out," said Nizar Hassan, a civil activist and an organizer with LiHaqqi, a political movement active in the October mass anti-government protests. Lebanon’s political parties are strictly sectarian, each rooted in one of the country’s multiple religious or ethnic communities. Most are headed by sectarian warlords from Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war - or their families - who stand at the top of powerful local business holdings. The factions pass out positions in government ministries and public institutions to their followers or carve out business sectors for them, ensuring their backing. Opposition parties that cross sectarian lines with a reform agenda struggle to break that barrier. They are divided and lack grassroots support. They have also increasingly been met with brute force by security agencies. Street protests have been dramatic. But the array of anti-government movements were not sizable enough to push for sea-change reforms, Hassan said. "To seize the moment, you need people on grassroots level that are ready to announce they support it, and this doesn’t really exist in Lebanon," he said. Civic movements like LiHaqqi are not well-financed, face intimidation and can hardly afford to book airtime on mainstream channels, where elites are regular talking heads. A sliver of hope is found in growing support from businessmen who once financed elites but have become increasingly frustrated, Hassan and other activists said. Business owners began having a change of heart around the beginning of the year, as the economy deteriorated, hyperinflation flared and many people fell into poverty, said Paul Abi Nasr, a member of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists. "The business community used to stay out of this from fear of retribution on their businesses," he said. "But with the situation so dire already, a lot are now much more forthcoming." That has translated into a small stream of money to civil groups, though limited to covering organization and lobbying. Industrialists and businessmen have helped prop up the patronage system, but most "were forced to play along," Abi Nasr said. Politicians helped businesses in return for kickbacks and political support when needed. Those in government who have witnessed the system from the inside maintain it cannot reform itself. "People like me, after years in the world of government, basically feel that the system is immune to reform," said Khalil Gebara, who left his job as an adviser to the Interior Ministry. "But at the same point, the total collapse of the system will unleash a Pandora’s box of all kinds of sectarian conflicts," said Gebara, now a consultant to the World Bank. "I don’t know what I should hope for." The wake-up call for Lebanon’s activists came not during the October uprising, when tens of thousands took to the streets in protest against the corrupt political class, but four years ago when Beirut held municipal elections. It was the first time that a candidate slate emerging from a protest movement, Beirut Madinati, won in an electoral district. The small victory emboldened activists to look to polls to bring change. It also spooked elites. The following year, they passed a new electoral law. It created a proportional representation system that ostensibly aimed to address demands of civil society and improve representation for minority sects. But they "gerrymandered every aspect of the law in order to ensure that all political parties in power will be re-elected and none of the voices in the opposition could be," said elections expert Amal Hamdan. Under the law, a special formula determines the minimum threshold of votes for candidates to win seats. The factions worked to ensure those thresholds were high - ranging from 8% to 20% - and difficult for independents to gain, lawmakers and advisers with knowledge of the drafting of the law said. In the south, for example. Hezbollah rejected proposals for a 5% threshold and arranged one as high as 20%, said Chantal Sarkis, an expert in political affairs and former adviser to Samir Geagea’s Lebanese Forces throughout negotiations over the law. Activists like Hassan said the core problem lies with lack of grassroots support to initiate real political change. "When it comes to actual political dominance over the social fabric - everything is really manifest on local level." In his home district in the Chouf, where former warlord and Druze leader Walid Jumblatt is dominant, LiHaqqi supporters faced intimidation on the ground during the 2018 general election, Hassan said. The father of one activist was sacked from his government job; mothers begged their activist children to stop canvassing in case powerful politicians got wind; others said they would vote for establishment parties because they wanted jobs. Not a single village allowed them to hold public events. In the wake of the Aug. 4 explosion, when nearly 3,000 tons of improperly stored ammonium nitrate ignited at the Beirut port, political parties have set up field offices offering humanitarian and other assistance to victims. Now with the falling Lebanese pound, Hassan fears establishment parties have more clout than before. "It’s even cheaper for them to buy people."

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468296/weeks-after-blast-lebanon-patronage-system-immune-reform

Sudan to Receive USD25.5 Million Funding to Address Climate Change

Arab World

August 25th, 8:59am

Khartoum- Mohammed Amin Yassine

Sudan to Receive USD25.5 Million Funding to Address Climate Change

The Green Climate Fund approved USD25.5 million in new funding for an innovative climate resilience project in Sudan, designed to promote agriculture, health, and food and water security. "Addressing the impact of climate change is a collective responsibility. We as a Government recognize this global responsibility and are committed to protecting the people of Sudan from the risks we are currently facing,” said Sudan’s Prime Minister Dr. Abdalla Hamdok. “Left unchecked, climate change will derail our nation’s efforts to end poverty and conflict across the country,” Hamdok added. Crop failures, the death of livestock, drought and other climate-related impacts are deepening poverty and reducing the capacity of people, communities, and authorities to deal with other interconnected risks, such as COVID-19 and conflict. The five-year project will provide delivering training and equipment, rehabilitate land for sustainable use, introduce new climate-resilient practices, and construct infrastructure such as wells, dams, and water storage. “This project will improve health, food, and water security for 3.7 million people in Sudan, safeguarding them against the worsening, life-threatening impacts of a changing climate,” said UNDP Resident Representative Selva Ramachandran. “At the same time, together we will ensure institutional and community capacity is improved, vulnerable groups like women and youth receive targeted support, and Sudan’s natural resources are protected,” Ramachandran added. Professor Rashid Hassan, secretary-general of the Higher Council for Environment and Natural Resources, said: “We are proud to launch this project, supporting the Sustainable Development Goals and Sudan’s Nationally Determined Contribution to the Paris Agreement.” Hassan added, “The people and areas receiving support, and the needs being addressed, were identified after a comprehensive consultation process involving Federal and State authorities, communities, NGOs, the private sector, research institutions, and relevant unions.” In protecting life on land, the project will establish communal reserves used for grazing, rehabilitate 4,500 hectares of rangelands, and introduce sustainable livestock, agroforestry, and land-management practices. Under the project, approximately 211,000 households will benefit from enhanced food production. This will include the introduction of climate-resilient seeds, training on the use and management of water resources, and the introduction of women’s farms and home gardens. The project leverages USD15 million in co-finance from Sudan’s Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources, and a USD540,000 grant from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). UNDP’s support for the initiative is part of its efforts to drive a new ‘Green Deal’ in Sudan, ensuring climate protection and mitigation, including the introduction of renewable energy in agriculture, health and rural communities, and reducing reliance on fossil fuels. Part of the new GCF grant will support sustainable and clean water access for drinking, livestock, and irrigation, reaching 200,000 households, in areas facing severe climate and weather change challenges, like this existing UNDP project in North Darfur.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2468286/sudan-receive-usd255-million-funding-address-climate-change