| | | | How Kim Can Score a Win-Win | | North Korea seems determined to continue pursuing its nuclear weapons program. Fine, but if it wants to avoid war it should can it, suggests Jongsoo Lee in the Korea Herald.
"Pyongyang can learn from Israel, India and Pakistan regarding how to make its nuclear and missile program more acceptable to the international community: Israel, India and Pakistan have become nuclear weapons states in a discreet fashion," Lee writes, in contrast with North Korea's threats "to attack the US homeland with nuclear-tipped missiles."
"Pyongyang must realize that being discreet about its nuclear and missile program gives it more security than openly flaunting such a program. Pyongyang must understand, for example, that it has more to lose by openly flaunting its intercontinental ballistic missiles in military parades such as the one scheduled for the day before the opening day of the upcoming winter Olympics in South Korea. Acting like a responsible nuclear power means Pyongyang also needs to stop engaging in illicit behavior such as its diplomats trafficking in drugs and counterfeit currency. Such behavior raises concerns that Pyongyang will sell its nuclear and missile know-how to enemies of the United States for cash." "While the possibility that South Koreans may be drawn into North Korea's honey trap cannot be ruled out, most Koreans, including young people, have had their fill of the North's provocations, and are highly unlikely to be seduced by Kim's charm offensive. Moon himself made it clear last month that no improvement in the South's relationship with North Korea will be possible without denuclearization. Indeed, his efforts to open a dialogue with the North seem to be driven by cool diplomatic realism, not naïve idealism."
| | America's Latest Middle East Mission Creep? | | | A clash Wednesday night involving air and artillery strikes by the US-led coalition against pro-Assad regime forces in Syria has underscored how isolated the United States has become in the country, notes Liz Sly for the Washington Post. Another problem? Mission creep might be setting in.
"The Syrian government and its ally Iran have repeatedly called for US troops to leave Syria now that the fight against the Islamic State is over, and they have regularly threatened to wage war to push the Americans out if they do not leave," Sly writes.
"With no sign of a peace deal in sight, the US military is now committed to a potentially indefinite presence in Syria that is opposed by all the region's powers.
"The prospect that US troops will remain in Syria while shoring up Kurdish efforts to secure self-rule has provoked a convergence among countries opposed to any form of Kurdish autonomy, uniting Turkey, Russia, Iran and the Syrian government in a de facto alliance against the US presence." | | | Britons may not have taken up arms, but the continuing battle over the future of Brexit Britain should leave little doubt that the country is in the midst of a civil war, argues Martin Wolf in the Financial Times.
"The conflict this time is over the UK's destiny: over whether it is just another European country; over who determines laws binding on British people; over who decides who may live here; and over whether the European project is the path to a better future, or a socialist plot, a capitalist plot, or merely a plot against democratic sovereignty," Wolf writes.
"The most fascinating feature of the debate is that the far left and far right agree against the center. They may agree on little else. But they concur that the EU is a conspiracy against parliamentary sovereignty — against the right of a temporary parliamentary majority to do as it pleases with the people. For a leftwing socialist, the aim is to create a socialist paradise. For a rightwing free-marketeer, it is to create a capitalist one. Either way, the EU is the enemy."
"How will this end? The answer is that anything is possible. Could there still be a 'no-deal Brexit'? Yes. Could there be another referendum? Yes. But the likelihood is that the UK will exit on terms laid down, in detail, by the EU. When a country is this divided and its political processes are in such disarray, someone else has to sort things out. The EU will do so, because that is in its interests." | | Will Saudi Arabia Spark Arms Race in the Middle East? | | Saudi Arabia has ambitious nuclear plans, and the Trump administration seems unlikely to stand in the way of an American suitor, The Economist writes. But nuclear projects seem to make little economic sense – and could spark a dangerous arms race.
"In a country with vast deserts, it would make more sense to use gas and invest in solar energy. Today the kingdom generates almost none: its largest solar farm, at the headquarters of the state oil company, powers an office building," The Economist says.
"The government is building a solar-panel factory near Riyadh, the capital. On February 6th ACWA Power, a Saudi firm, announced that it had won the contract for a new 300-megawatt solar farm in the northern desert. ACWA promises to produce electricity for 2.3 cents per kilowatt-hour, a record-low tariff. Though costs for nuclear power vary with reactor design, even the most efficient ones are more expensive. And whereas nuclear is a mature technology, costs for solar fall each year.
"For the Saudis, though, a nuclear program is a way to keep pace with Iran. It is also a step towards nuclear proliferation in the world's most volatile region."
| | Iran's Hijab Protests Aren't Just About Headscarves | | Recent protests involving Iranian women removing their hijabs in public places to protest the rule requiring them to wear headscarves are about more than just a single law, writes Robin Wright in the New Yorker. Indeed, this new "civil-disobedience campaign…gets at the heart of what has been a fundamental division in Iranian society since the 1979 revolution."
"The broader political debate has always been about a revolutionary society's core identity: Is the Islamic Republic first and foremost Islamic, dedicated to imposing the rigid strictures of Islamic law? Or is it first and foremost a republic, in which people's individual rights take priority over religious law? The question triggered the early split between dedicated hard-liners and the country's reformers and centrists. It has spilled over into political, social, and economic life for four decades. Now Iran's feisty young women have stepped into the debate," Wright says. - Per CNN: "In 2014, decades after the law was enforced, the Iranian Student's Polling Center took to the same streets to ask men and women whether wearing the Islamic veil was a personal issue and if the government should not interfere.
"The poll, which is at the heart of [a report released this month by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani] found that 49.2% of 1,167 respondents said it was a private matter." | | | | | | |
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