Crisis Relied

With the Russia-Ukraine conflict raging on our television screens and across the pages of our media every day, the world is exceptionally focused on Ukrainian migrants and their attempts to flee their homeland in search for safety. European nations, which have been famously closed towards migrants and refugees, have “thrown open” their borders to welcome Ukrainians into their homes and provide them with food, shelter, and a warm welcome¹. Meanwhile, however, migrants from countries in the Global South continue to be displaced more and more every day. Families and desperate individuals, mothers and children, are ignored or turned away at national borders, even though they’re no different from migrants from Ukraine: just searching for safety. The question of why their stories are ignored, buried in the latter pages of newspapers while Ukrainians take the headlines, remains to be answered. It is not as though one group of migrants, leaving home in hopes of safety, is inherently more deserving of help than any other- but why are they often treated as such?

In order to discover an answer to this puzzling paradox, we can begin by drawing a direct parallel with what the United Nations Population Fund has dubbed “the world’s largest humanitarian crisis”: the Civil War in Yemen, which has been raging since 2014 and has contributed to over 4.3 million Yemenis being displaced, either internally or abroad². The first reason as to why these people have been relatively unaided by the international population is surprisingly simple: most people have frankly never even heard of the Yemeni Civil War, as it’s kept out of headlines around the world³. This may be due to the fact that its causes and history are far more complex than the situation in Ukraine and in other places. Ukraine’s predicament, albeit disastrous, is fairly clear-cut: Russia wished to halt their “westernization” and prevent them from joining NATO, and invaded in an attempt to override Ukrainian national identity and reassert the control they once held. In contrast, the conflict in Yemen is more “messy”, involving several outside actors and a great deal of internal unrest.

In 2014, a group of rebels known as “Houthis” attempted to overthrow the incumbent president, Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, and take over his administration. Their reasons for doing so were a combination of economic concerns and tensions between their identification as members of the minority Islamic denomination (Shia Muslims) while most citizens in Yemen and the government consisted of the majority denomination (Sunni Muslims). The friction between Sunni and Shia Muslims has been a leading cause for much of the small-scale conflict occurring in Muslim countries and the Middle East and Africa, but goes relatively unnoticed by the rest of the world’s population. Regardless, the rebels’ attack and near-success in a coup did draw the attention of many world powers. Saudi Arabia and other Gulf States have backed the incumbent government as a show of Sunni solidarity, but Iran and its powerful navy have stood by the Houthis, thus prolonging the conflict⁴.

As a result of these networks of conflict, the people of Yemen have suffered greatly: over two-thirds of the population (especially women and children) has been forced to leave their homes and flee to different cities or to cross the national border entirely in order to avoid being caught up in rebel-military clashes or air raids². Many of these refugees are unable to be granted entry or citizenship into safer territories and are instead thrust into refugee camps with conditions so horrible that Human Rights Watch calls them “torture camps”⁵. Here, they face countless violations at the hands of camp officials who act with utter impunity, raping, extorting, abusing, and trafficking helpless Yemeni individuals as they see fit⁵. Those who cannot flee are also in a terrible predicament. Yemen’s healthcare infrastructure is lacking and inaccessible, meaning that they cannot seek the aid they need to survive.

Even so, the situation in Yemen feels much more detached from the public eye, unlike more prevalent instances of displacement, such as what’s going on in Russia and Ukraine or, for example, Mexican migrants trying to cross the United States border. This disconnect is not solely due to the complexity of the conflict, but due to secondary factors which set lesser publicized crises like the one in Yemen apart.

For one, the conflict takes place at the tip of the Arabian Peninsula, an area many inhabitants of the Global North may not feel as connected to, in comparison to Ukraine, where many Europeans have family ties; or Mexico, where Americans hear rhetoric about border walls and interact with Mexican immigrants on a daily basis. Yemen has long been considered a “backwater” in Western media, due to its limited contact with the world outside of the Arab Spring⁴. Even as the United States divests their own military resources to the area, American citizens stay blissfully unaware-or rather, uninformed- of where and how their tax dollars are being spent³.

Aside from this geographic disconnect, there is also a cultural barrier which prevents many citizens from more “developed” nations, especially those in Europe, from feeling inclined to pay any mind to the situation in Yemen. Ukraine, for instance, is undeniably European, despite its ties to Russia: since people in other countries can communicate with them clearly and relate to their customs and traditions, they feel far more comfortable opening their homes and offering aid to a refugee from Ukraine than they may to someone fleeing the fighting in Yemen. Humans naturally tend to feel comfortable with what is familiar, and for Americans, Europeans, and other rich “host” candidates for refugees, they are far more likely to relate to white, middle-class, Ukrainian migrants rather than lower-income Yemeni victims.

Despite all of these salient differences between the conflicts in Yemen and Ukraine they share a commonality that often goes unaddressed in international circles. Both conflicts are rooted in territorial disputes arising from past “Cold War” tensions between neighboring, far more powerful, states or organizations. In the situation with Ukraine, it’s rather clear how these events transpired: the end of the Cold War came with the fall of the Soviet Union, and the Russian Federation has resorted to violent means in an attempt to seize back power and derail the Westernization that began occurring in Eastern Europe after their fall from power. The story in Yemen is a tad more complicated, again, due to the lack of one clear hegemon–most of their tensions and the current military alliances have arisen as a result of another longstanding conflict– this one between the Saudi and Iranian governments. The interesting thing is, however, is that this conflict too is a remnant of the original Cold War, between the West and Russia; the fact that Saudi Arabia is backed by America and Iran is backed by Russian and Chinese communist powers shows why this conflict has been dubbed the “Middle Eastern Cold War”⁷. The Western-Russian proxy conflict in Iran and Saudi Arabia has recycled itself, as these powers side with different parties in Yemen and show how difficult it is to overcome historical grudges.

The conflict in Ukraine and the conflict in Yemen are, in the end, not so different after all. Both stem from long-lasting friction between the West and Russia, as these major world powers do their best to exert their influence over all parts of the world. Where they couldn’t be more different, however, is their treatment of refugees. Ukrainian refugees are lauded and embraced by the international community, while refugees from Yemen are subjected to inhumane conditions and ignored by the outside world. The reasons for this are countless, tragic, and somewhat unexplainable: racism, geography, and a general lack of worldly awareness all play a part, but the humanitarian violations the people of Yemen are subjected to are still horrifying and should not have gone ignored for as long as they have.

Endnotes

Fallon, Katy. “’No Place to Go’: Ukraine’s Neighbours Open up for Refugee Influx.” Al Jazeera, 26 Feb. 2022, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/26/european-countries-open-borders-for-ukrainian-refugees.
“Yemen: The World’s Largest Humanitarian Crisis.” United Nations Population Fund, https://www.unfpa.org/yemen.
Greene, David. “Why Yemen’s Nearly 3-Year-Old Civil War Remains Mostly out of Headlines.” NPR, 19 Mar. 2018, https://www.npr.org/2018/03/19/594839325/why-yemens-war-remains-mostly-out-of-news-headlines.
“War in Yemen | Global Conflict Tracker.” Council on Foreign Relations, 4 May 2022, https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/war-yemen.
“Yemen: Migrants Held at ‘Torture Camps’.” Human Rights Watch, 6 Nov. 2020, https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/05/25/yemen-migrants-held-torture-camps.
Slemrod, Annie. “Why Does No One Care about Yemen?” The New Humanitarian, 16 Apr. 2019, https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/analysis/2016/02/11/why-does-no-one-care-about-yemen.
Gause, F. Gregory. “Beyond Sectarianism: The New Middle East Cold War.” Brookings, 9 Mar. 2022, https://www.brookings.edu/research/beyond-sectarianism-the-new-middle-east-cold-war.

June 3, 2022 0 comment

Africa Crisis Relied Featured Human Rights Print Article Security and Conflict Women's Rights

As the Anglophone Crisis Worsens in Cameroon, Women Continue to Organize for Peace

written by Annabelle Werner

Annabelle Werner’s article is additionally featured in The Generation’s Spring 2022 Digital Print Edition: Women. Coming June 2022.

While the Anglophone Crisis rarely surfaces in the international news cycle, millions of Cameroonian civilians are caught in a deadly stalemate between the armed separatist groups and national security forces. 765,000 people have been displaced since the conflict began nearly five years ago.¹ Terrible atrocities are being committed by both sides, including the burning of villages, school shootings, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), sexual violence, and extrajudicial killings.² Schools were shut down for nearly three years for fear of attacks and are only now hesitantly reopening.

To aggravate this quagmire, water scarcity due to climate change in the Far North region has invigorated intercommunal tensions. Herders and farmers as well as various ethnic groups are vying for dwindling resources. This past December, the UNHCR declared a level 2 (out of 3) emergency in the region when 112 villages were burned to the ground, 15,000 people became internally displaced, and 85,000 people fled to Chad;³ a state that already hosts nearly a million refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs).⁴ This violence compounds the Far North’s existing suffering from a war against Boko Haram that has killed over 3,000 people and displaced nearly 250,000.⁵

Scholars such as Henry Ngenyam Bang and Roland Azibo Balgah have predicted that the state will devolve into a “Complex Disaster Emergency”(CDE), or a type of disaster scenario that is of a “multi-causal nature…[and holds] the propensity to interrelate political, economic, social, and environmental factors including internal armed conflict”.⁶

It can be difficult to find hope when the region faces a litany of such complex and devasting violence. However, a shred of optimism may be found in one marginalized group that is organizing for peace and rebuilding community relations at the grassroots level: women may be the peacebuilders Cameroon so desperately requires.

But to further understand the recent violence Cameroon faces and how women may be able to facilitate desperately needed local reconciliation, specifically in regard to the Anglophone Crisis, let’s return to the beginning of the active conflict. In 2016, dissonance over language and political autonomy stirred peaceful protests headed by lawyers and teachers. The unrest was rooted in the repression of the Anglophone minority and an unsolved question of autonomy that began under colonization. The British had carved out 20% of Cameroonian land while the French occupied the other 80%. The smaller Anglophone regions were demarcated from the other eight Cameroonian provinces as the British and the French established differing legal and education infrastructures consistent with these separate metropoles. The clearest difference was language.

In the decolonization process of 1961, the two Anglophone regions were quasi-autonomous but were eventually joined under the same state, the “Republic of Cameroon”. There were decades of “Negative Peace”⁷ rife with tensions between the Anglophone regions and the French majority, with the Northwest and Southwest regions arguing that Yaoundé was employing repressive tactics and erasure of their culture, such as requiring there to be solely French-speaking teachers at schools where no one spoke French. In 2016, the state security forces met peaceful protestors with violence in an attempt to quash dissent against the government. About a year later, a militant secessionist group called the Ambazonia Defense Force was formed. Civilians are now caught in the crossfire between militant groups who burn villages and enforce “ghost town” protests in order to gain power through terror, and the government that has used state security forces to commit crimes against civilians. The state also continues to ignore and minimize the conflict with the secessionists, thus perpetuating the crisis.

Across Cameroon and humanitarian crises elsewhere, it holds true that women and girls are affected differently by armed conflict than men. They are always at risk of gender-based violence in times of peace, but sexual violence can be turned into a weapon in times of war. Women and children also make up the displaced at high rates, making the gender distribution among adults at refugee and IDP camps almost all women. For example, during intercommunal violence in Cameroon last December, 98% of the adults in IDP camps were women.

This gender distribution reflects the terrible realities of conflict and survival. As men leave their families to fight, women take on the responsibility for both economic stability and childcare. They must make difficult decisions to flee, or even to stay in dangerous conflict zones to assume the burden of caring for vulnerable persons in the community who can’t relocate such as the elderly, disabled, and sick. Further, if a woman’s village is destroyed and she flees to the bushes, she would be subject not only to the dangerous natural elements and hunger but also to sexual violence by warring parties. If she flees to the city, her vulnerable position may make sex work the only viable option for survival. Thus, women suffer from conflict differently and typically assume the responsibility for the survival of the family and community during war.

But these burdens do not equate to a decrease in agency or their ability to affect political outcomes. Because while the Cameroonian cultural context has entrenched patriarchy, and women have typically been conceptualized solely as nurturing mother figures (like many cultures), these views of women as motherly and peaceful have allowed them to “organise undisturbed”.⁸ For example, in 2019, “more than 700 women from different cultural groups gathered in the Yaoundé Conference Centre to urge the government to put an end to the killings in the Anglophone regions”.⁹ Scholar Ivoline Kefen Budji describes how women utilized “sounds of mourning” to create stress and move peace talks forward.¹⁰ As they “wept, screamed, ululated, and sang dirges”, one woman explained to the media:

“These are the women of the North-West region who have been in pain for the past three years, and because we heard that the prime minister is coming here today we decided that we should come out and cry aloud because the flow of blood has been too much. There is pain! We don’t sleep! There are incessant killings every day. We think that as women we have to do our own part of the job by coming out to cry, to tell the powers that be that they should try to put an end to this.’”¹¹

Women have also organized diplomatic groups comprised of representatives from across the entire country. These reconciliation strategies include the formation of the Southwest and Northwest Women’s Task Force (SNWOT) which is a women-led group in Cameroon that fights against all forms of violence and the Cameroon Women’s Peace Movement (COWPEM) which is an assembly of women from all ten regions of Cameroon and various diasporas aimed at advocating for women’s right to participate in decision-making at all levels.

Women have taken up such roles as organizers and peacebuilders across the country, but they also face barriers to further leadership roles that could further thwart Cameroon’s chances for stability. One scholar, Zoneziwoh Mbondgulo-Wondieh, began her research to discover if/how gender operated during the Anglophone crisis, and if the substantial amount of women’s participation in the protest movement brought gender inequality into the agenda.¹² Ultimately, Mbondgulo-Wondieh concluded that while human rights issues were discussed during this period of social reflection, gender equality was not an issue that was highlighted.¹³ If Cameroon pushes gender equality into the agenda, it could serve as a life raft for ensuring the survival of entire communities.

Thus, while women experience marginalization and are caught in a terrible crossfire between separatists, national forces, and intercommunal conflicts, they have continued to organize and demonstrate their agency in facilitating community and regional reconciliation. They have communicated and negotiated between large, militarized actors, and could be the best diplomats to reduce intercommunal tensions at the grassroots level. The problems Cameroon faces are sobering, but women could play an important role in putting out “small fires” as well as shaping long-term solutions.

Endnotes:

1. International Crisis Group. “Cameroon”. (n.d.). Accessed May 6, 2022. https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/central-africa/cameroon

2. Jess Craig. “Violence in Cameroon’s anglophone crisis takes high civilian toll”. Al Jazeera. April 1st, 2021. Accessed May 6, 2022. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/4/1/violence-in-cameroon-anglophone-crisis-takes-high-civilian-toll

3. United Nations. “Cameroon: Intercommunal clashes continue to displace thousands”. UN news. December 17, 2021. Accessed May 6, 2022. https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/12/1108242

4. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. “Clashes in Cameroon’s far north displace more than 100,000 people”. December 17, 2021. Accessed May 6, 2022. https://www.unhcr.org/news/briefing/2021/12/61bc54734/clashes-cameroons-far-north-displace-100000-people.html

5.International Crisis Group. “Cameroon”. (n.d.). Accessed May 6, 2022. https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/central-africa/cameroon

6. Henry Ngenyam Bang & Roland Azibo Balgah. “The ramification of Cameroon’s Anglophone crisis: conceptual analysis of a looming ‘Complex Disaster Emergency’”. Int J Humanitarian Action 7. January 24th, 2022. Accessed May 6, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1186/s41018-022-00114-1

7. Gladys M Ashu. “The Impact of the Anglophone Conflict on Women and Children and Their Advocacy For Peace in Cameroon”. Gender & Behaviour Vol. 18 Issue 1. January 1st, 2020. Accessed May 6, 2022. p 14830. https://eds.p.ebscohost.com/eds/detail/detail?vid=2&sid=4d24cd5b-d71f-4df4-8492-d193a6f07555%40redis&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU%3d#AN=144348065&db=a9h

8. Comfort Ero & Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. “Women are suffering in Cameroon’s war, but they also hold the key to peace”. International Crisis Group. March 9, 2022. Accessed May 6, 2022.https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/central-africa/cameroon/women-are-suffering-cameroons-war-they-also-hold-key-peace

9. Gladys M Ashu. “The Impact of the Anglophone Conflict on Women and Children and Their Advocacy For Peace in Cameroon”. Gender & Behaviour Vol. 18 Issue 1. January 1st, 2020. Accessed May 6, 2022. 14842. https://eds.p.ebscohost.com/eds/detail/detail?vid=2&sid=4d24cd5b-d71f-4df4-8492-d193a6f07555%40redis&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU%3d#AN=144348065&db=a9h

10. Ivoline Kefen Budji. “Utilizing Sounds of Mourning as Protest and Activism: The 2019 Northwestern Women’s Lamentation March within the Anglophone Crisis in Cameroon”. Resonance: The Journal of Sound and Culture, 1(4). December 1, 2020. Accessed May 6, 2022. 443. https://doi.org/10.1525/res.2020.1.4.443

11. ibid.

12. Zoneziwoh Mbondgulo-Wondieh. “Women and the Anglophone Struggle in Cameroon. In Gender, Protests and Political Change in Africa”. July 4th, 2020. Accessed May 6, 2022. 144. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-46343-4_7

13. ibid.

June 2, 2022 1 comment

Crisis Relied Featured Freedom of Speech Geopolitics History Security and Conflict South America Terrorism

Colombia’s Tumultuous Summer in Review

written by Annabelle Werner

Earlier this year, surreal images poured out of major Colombian cities and into international news headlines. Videos emerged of thousands gathered in the streets, draped in Colombian flags and carrying posters composed of mismatched materials and biting phrases. Dramatic photos of collisions with policemen dressed in layers of black armor depicted dystopian-like scenes. These dramatic images are evidence of a nearly seven weeklong, nationwide protest that initially began as a resistance to a tax hike amidst the state’s economic crisis. The government’s security forces had countered the initial demonstrations with a militarized police response, and tales of abuse at the hands of officials escalated the situation. The protests soon evolved into a mass movement against police brutality as well as a cry for social and economic reform. It is important to note that 88.5% of the protests were peaceful, but it was these instances of excessive force that drew international condemnation from human rights groups, leaders of international organizations, and other governments alike. The National Protests called into question the taboo attached to peaceful protest in Colombia’s post conflict society.

As of July 20^th, the National Strike Committee has technically resumed these protests, although the initial movement between April 28^th to June 15^th of 2021 was an exceptional period of mass mobilization. The world will watch and anticipate any new reforms announced by the new Congressional session, and wonder if the relationship between security and the right to peaceful protest in Colombia will be reconceptualized. Until then, this article will review the timeline of the initial protests, highlight the findings of various human rights reports, and provide an update of the latest political and legislative outcomes.

In late April of 2021, President Iván Duque Márquez proposed a new tax reform policy that would have lowered the salary threshold that could be taxed, eliminated many current tax exemptions, and increased the amount of goods included in Value Added Tax (VAT). This anticipated financial burden catalyzed massive resistance. Colombians were already suffering from exorbitant poverty rates and rampant income inequality that is only being exacerbated by the pandemic: 3.6 million people have been pushed under the poverty line in just a year while the state’s three richest men own more than 10% of Colombia’s GDP. Protests broke out all over the country, and the National Strike Committee formed in order to represent a multitude of subgroups within the protest movement including unions, indigenous organizations, civil society, and student groups.

While a large majority of the protests were peaceful, demonstrators were met with violent force from the state security forces including Colombia’s police riot unit, ESMAD. According to an Atrocity Alert in early June by the Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect, “Colombian human rights organizations have identified almost 3,500 cases of abuse, including killings, excessive use of force, torture, disappearances and sexual violence”. Types of excessive use of force include tear gas, water cannons, rubber bullets, and even live ammunition. The abuses committed by the police perpetuated and escalated the situation.

While protests broke out over the entire nation, the majority of the violence against protestors was centered in the city of Cali. This is most likely due to a culmination of factors such as the ongoing economic recession and instances of social inequality, but also structural racism against the large Afro-descent and indigenous populations within the city. Further complicating the situation and contributing to the social unrest is the region’s history of conflict with internal armed groups. One prominent lens of explaining why so much of the violence occurred in Cali is that the security forces in this region are equipped to fight against paramilitaries, and were not trained to handle peaceful protestors. In regard to such conflicts, the police have been regarded as a “critical player in a counterinsurgency strategy” which was key to holding territory and bringing about the 2016 Peace Agreements. Yet many are calling for a paradigm shift in use of the police, particularly how they view peaceful political protest: as a human right exercised by fellow citizens, not as an act of armed rebellion.

Throughout the first seven weeks of protests, Amnesty International found three major human rights violations that were committed in Cali, including an attack on the Indigenous Minga community, an attack near Valle University, and a joint incursion known as “Operation Siloé”. These violations were characterized by excessive and lethal force by National Police Officials or by armed citizens with the acquiescence of police officials.

Amnesty International published a recommendation that the Colombian authorities should not respond to peaceful protests by trying to “stigmatize” protestors as criminals. One could conclude that by painting such a narrative over the seven week period, the government incited enough fear to drive counter protests, enable armed civilians, and publicly justify the deployment of military troops. The situation seemed to be increasingly escalating as protestors responded to the troops by blockading roads and bridges trying to cause economic damage and block the flow of goods.

The situation deescalated when the National Strike Committee announced the pause of protests after nearly seven straight weeks in order to allow for political negotiations. While the initial negotiations for a pre-agreement failed, the National Strike Committee developed a 10-point plan of demands to propose at the next congressional session on July 20^th. Some of these asks included the dismantling of ESMAD (the riot police unit), health care reform, and universal income. Protestors also promised to restart the protests during the next legislative period to further pressure government officials for these demands.

So far into the new legislative period, President Duque’s administration has asked Congress to implement human rights training for police and measures such as visible QR codes on police uniforms, but has not called to dismiss ESMAD. Rather, Duque has said that Colombia “will seek international expert advice on best practice for the ESMAD”. Currently, three police officers are facing murder charges and seven will be tried for “failing to uphold their duties” when they allegedly stood by while civilians opened fire at protestors.

During this new session, the Duque administration has presented a $3.95 billion tax reform bill to congress. The bill is supposed to raise 15.2 trillion pesos per year, which is significantly less than the 23.4 trillion pesos per year that was defined by the tax reform bill back in April.

“‘The social investment law, which we will build between all of us, is the largest jump in human development in recent decades’” Duque said on July 20^th. His administration also spoke on how important the new bill is to ensuring social programs. Yet, do the reforms represent a meaningful shift in how the state views the right to protests and the role of security forces, or are these reforms just designed to be enough to placate domestic and international pressure?

Some Colombians worry that the reforms in the new bill are superficial. Journalist Mario Murillo describes one particular example of this outcome in an interview by Democracy Now. He referenced one component of the 10 reforms, the demand to move the National Police from the Defense ministry into the Interior Ministry, which was hoped to bring about the demilitarization of the police and to encourage a paradigm shift to thinking of protestors as citizens, not as combatants. Yet, instead of removing the National Police from the military, the new reform bill simply gives them new, different color uniforms that are supposed to be less threatening.

The international community spoke out throughout the summer about the right to peacefully protest in Colombia, and recently human rights groups and international organizations have compiled and published reports on the violence that occurred during this period. The Inter-American Court on Human Rights (IACHR) released its reports and recommendations in July, finding human right violations and urging social reconciliation. Furthermore, the Inter-American Commission will be conducting a Special Monitoring Mechanism for Human Rights in Colombia “to support the consolidation of peace within the various sectors of Colombian society”(OAS).

While these protests and political movements and reforms are still unfolding, the international community envisions a Colombia where the rule of law, security, and the human right to peacefully protest all coexist.

August 24, 2021 0 comment

Crisis Relied Featured Geopolitics History Human Rights Middle East Security and Conflict

What Biden’s Recognition of the Armenian Genocide Reveals About Turkey and the Future of Relations With Ankara

written by Andreas Papoutsis

Fourteen American presidents have come and gone since the term “genocide” was coined in 1944, nearly 30 years after the Ottoman Empire committed unfathomable atrocities against ethnic Armenians during World War I, yet not a single commander-in-chief acknowledged the violence as genocide. For decades, the Armenian diaspora in the United States passionately advocated for recognition of an ethnic cleansing that left an estimated 1.5 million people dead, many of whom perished through massacres and death marches. Prior to Joe Biden’s presidency, a mere 30 nations formally recognized the massacres as genocide, while many other countries have been cautious in maintaining good relations with Turkey. Most historians acknowledge the genocide while the UN has demonstrated limited recognition. Even the small group of historians who disagree with a formal declaration of genocide concede that ethnic Armenians faced forced expatriation under the duress of violence.

Many American presidents have traditionally tiptoed around the subject. President Reagan, on a singular occasion, briefly referred to the a genocide in a speech, but neither he nor or any of his successors formally recognized the genocide. For decades, the United States has viewed Turkey as a critical ally in the Eastern Mediterranean, for geographical, military, and economic purposes. Its position as a gateway between the Middle East and Europe has enabled the United States to station troops and launch offensives into neighboring Syria. Its close proximity to the Soviet Union and Russia has made the deployment of American nuclear weapons a strategic headache for the Kremlin. Likewise, its control over the Bosphorus Strait has given NATO smooth accessibility to the Black Sea for the purpose of conducting military exercises on Russia’s doorstep.

For more reasons than can be listed, upsetting a nation whose government staunchly denies the occurrence of a genocide has historically been viewed as ill-advised foreign policy. That does not seem to bother Joe Biden, however, who promised on the campaign trail that he would break with previous Presidents – including his former boss – and officially recognize the Armenian Genocide. His decision, which came on the 106th anniversary of the atrocity, garnered immediate backlash from Ankara. President Recep Tayip Erdogan, who is currently juggling the volatility of runaway inflation in his own country, promptly rebuked the recognition by referring to this new era in American relations as being damaged by a “deep wound.” The Turkish president is now coming to terms with the realization that American policymakers no longer view Turkey’s strategic importance in the same light. Its military capacity is still the second largest in NATO and its GDP remains upwards of $700 billion, yet its deterioration into an authoritarian society has restrained its ability to maintain strategic influence or act in a manner that is serviceable to its allies. For Biden, there has been no better time to announce recognition of the genocide.

A man whose vindictive personality often translates into policy, Erdogan has explicitly indicated that there will be some semblance of retaliation for the recognition. The question now becomes, what can he actually do? There has been speculation by foreign policy analysts that intelligence sharing with the United States could become restrained by Ankara. In the past, Turkey has expelled diplomats and cancelled trade deals with countries that have recognized the genocide. Ankara has previously threatened to block American use of early-warning missile radars in the southeastern area of Kurecik, which is home to military installations that play a pivotal role in NATO’s ballistic missile defense systems. The United States also operates tactical nuclear weapons and other critical military assets at the Incirlik air base, the likes of which could be removed if Turkey were to force their departure. Such actions have the support of various Turkish protesters.

There are not many economic actions that can be taken against the United States considering the weakness of the Turkish economy and the disproportionate response that would be levied by Washington. One unintended manner in which Turkey has struck back, however, relates to its removal from the F-35 program; replacing engine parts that were slated to be manufactured in Turkey will now raise the price of the program for the United States.

Other forms of retaliation would be equally detrimental for Erdogan, not just because of American retaliation but because of possible self-inflicted damage. Turkey could respond by reducing its cooperation with American sanctions, specifically as they relate to Iran and China. Ankara could also decide to act more sporadically in the Eastern Mediterranean, particularly as it relates to Libya, Cyprus, Israel, and Greece. While all of the aforementioned actions may constitute responsive measures taken against the United States, they will foster proportionate troubles for Turkey. When Trump took actions against Turkey early on in his term, the Turkish Lira suffered significantly; a deteriorated relationship with the United States will only exacerbate the hardship of a Turkish economy in freefall.

If Erdogan were to unexpectedly reverse course and seek warmer relations with the United States, he would enter a separate dilemma, since there is little that can be done by Ankara to reverse course and detach themselves from the Kremlin. Withdrawing from the Russian S-400 program could result in harsh retaliatory sanctions against Turkey, measures that could target and deal devastating blows to its economy and tourism industry which typically sees 50 million visitors per year. Putin could also exact revenge by spurning Russian-backed forces to attack the Turkish-held Idlib province in Northern Syria, thereby troubling Erdogan with hundreds of thousands of more refugees. The Kremlin could inflict further damage by spoiling Erdogan’s strongman image — the foundation of his domestic support — by intervening in Libya and demonstrating Ankara’s inability to handle several regional crises at once. Erdogan thus finds himself in a conundrum.

It should be noted, however, that Erdogan’s retribution doesn’t necessarily need to be directed towards the United States. The contempt for ethnic Armenians spurred by Erdogan’s nativist rhetoric decisively outweighs any disdain for America. The Turkish President’s revenge could culminate in harsh actions taken against the nation that has lobbied for genocide recognition for decades. It was not long ago that Ankara made its support abundantly clear in the Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict by supplying arms to the Azeris and minimizing diplomatic relations with Yerevan. Any aggressive actions taken against Armenia, especially those out of spite, might garner backlash from regional powers such as France – who has been at odds with Turkey for years over Libya, Greece, and Cyprus – but will likely generate a modest response from Washington lawmakers wary of Armenia’s close security ties with Moscow. If there is any unscrupulous course of action that Erdogan could take in response to the recognition, it would likely involve aggression displayed towards Armenia. While harsh actions taken against Armenia would be morally repugnant, they would do little to inflict damage to the United States.

Prior to the November election, Biden was an outspoken critic of his Turkish counterpart, boldly suggesting that the United States support his political rivals, a highly unorthodox stance to take towards a NATO ally. The rhetoric has not changed much since. Remarkably, the President spoke with the Greek Prime Minister on a phone call a month before his first communication with Erdogan. Even before Biden took office, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo broke traditional protocol by traveling for a diplomatic visit to Greece without making the customary stop in Ankara. In many ways, Biden’s recognition of the Armenian Genocide is more of a reflection of Turkey’s diminishing strategic influence than it is of personal contempt between the American President and Erdogan.

Regardless of how much Turkey lobbies Washington, or how often Turkish leaders voice emphatic disagreement, American recognition of the Armenian Genocide is now official. Only a wildly unconventional move by a future President could revoke it. With recognition being cemented, there is very little Turkey can do to exact revenge on the United States and forge a new era of relations on its own terms. If Erdogan were to act in his nation’s best interests, he would bear the brunt of recognition and strive to maintain warm relations with Washington. Unfortunately for the United States and the Eastern Mediterranean as a whole, a diminished strongman will likely lash out instead.

May 21, 2021 1 comment

Swedish police officers observe as refugees arrive at a tram station in Malmö, Sweden. Source

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A closer look at refugee integration in Europe (Part II)

written by Sarah Wyman

The first part of this article addresses integration policies in France and may be read in full here.

Sweden: A multicultural model

Sweden has struggled with sub-replacement fertility since millions of Swedes fled poverty and religious persecution during the great emigration, a wave of migration which endured between 1850 and 1939. The process of accepting and integrating refugee and immigrant populations in Sweden has therefore been a mutually-beneficial one. In exchange for asylum, refugees augment Sweden’s dwindling population of young laborers. As highlighted in a 2015 article about a hospital in Gävleborg where around 10% of doctors are refugees, their contribution has been significant.

Sweden is developing a reputation abroad for being particularly hospitable to immigrants and received over 160,000 individuals in 2015 alone. In many ways, Sweden’s response to the refugee crisis has been exemplary. The country has instituted a number of integration programs aimed at easing immigrants’ transitions into Swedish society by teaching them about Swedish culture and instructing them in the language. The government extends a multitude of benefits to refugees including welfare and housing. Progressive legislation demonstrates Sweden’s commitment to “diversity, multiculturalism, and international cooperation” and communicates to immigrant populations that their cultural traditions are welcome and valued by the Swedish population.

Despite these victories, Sweden too has experienced social turmoil as a result of immigration. According to an annual survey conducted by Gothenburg University this year, 53% of Swedes identify immigration and integration as the most pressing social issue facing their country, marking a nearly twofold increase from last year’s result of 27%. This rising concern is likely correlated to the dramatic increase in the volume of immigrants entering the country, many of whom Sweden is struggling to acommodate.

Like France, Sweden is home to a number of densely populated, urban, and largely immigrant-inhabited cities riddled with poverty and violence. For example, Malmö, Sweden’s third largest city—where 32% of the population is foreign-born (the national average hovers around 14%)—made international headlines last year for its sudden spike in violent crime, and the community remains unstable. Sverigedemokraterna, Sweden’s right-wing conservative party, is responding in full force with xenophobic rhetoric and anti-immigration policy.

However, contrary to what critics of immigration in Sweden are suggesting, the rise of violence in major metropolitan areas like Malmö is not evidence of the failure of multicultural integration programs. The fact that violence and crime perpetrated by immigrants occurs almost exclusively in isolated urban communities instead speaks to the success of integration programs operating in small villages. The meaningful, one-on-one interactions taking place in rural communities are simply less feasible in rapid-pace city environments where etiquette demands less from people to begin with.

Sweden would do well to implement the sort of one-on-one, community-led mentorship efforts which have been successful in smaller towns and cities in urban areas. In order to prevent the formation of socially isolated immigrant communities, genuine channels of communication between native and immigrant populations must be open from the start, and they must remain so throughout the integration process.

A European model for integration

When the EU begins—as it must—to design European guidelines for integration, it should consider the strengths and weaknesses of existing models. Like Sweden, it should encourage mentorship programs that allow native and non-native individuals to get to know one another. However, it also should improve the efficacy and reach of these programs by ensuring that they are successfully implemented in urban environments as well as villages. In the French vein, the EU must ensure that its legal systems are prepared to serve individuals of all ethnic and cultural backgrounds equally. However, it must also be wary of assimilationist policy and prepared to accept that the process of integration will involve reciprocal cultural exchange. If Europe fails to take these steps, poorly-integrated immigrant communities will continue to grow in size and scope and social isolation will increase accordingly.

Europe’s plan to redistribute refugees and asylum seekers proportionally across Europe is a good one. As the success of small-scale programs in Sweden has demonstrated, integration is most successful where the ratio of immigrants to native population is low enough to allow for meaningful interaction between the two groups. However, if, like in France, enough is not done to facilitate this sort of cross-cultural exchange in the first place, the EU’s redistribution plan will do little to resolve the social turmoil unleashed by the inundation of refugees into Europe and will further deteriorate inter-cultural relations moving forward.

The urgency of the refugee crisis demands an immediate response from Europe. However, it also presents an excellent opportunity for countries like France and Sweden to reconsider their models of integration, identify their weaknesses, and construct the foundation for societies richer in empathy and culture.

June 24, 2016 0 comment

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A closer look at refugee integration in Europe (Part I)

written by Sarah Wyman

In 2015, over 1.3 million people displaced by war and conflict sought asylum in Europe. Of this number, only 292,540 were refugees—individuals approved for asylum and guaranteed protection by the European Union (EU)—and one million were migrants—individuals who have not completed the legal process of claiming asylum. This massive wave of forced migration has proved a challenge for the EU, whose member states have responded with varying commitments to accepting displaced people. Thus far, Greece and Italy have borne the burden of processing applications for asylum, and the vast majority of refugees have settled in Germany, Hungary, and Sweden.

When David O’Sullivan, Ambassador of the European Union to the United States, spoke at UCLA earlier this month, he emphasized the need for a unified European response to the refugee crisis. According to O’Sullivan, the solution to what many Europeans perceive as an insurmountable problem is the proportionate redistribution of refugees and asylum seekers between the European member states. This perspective is the driving force behind recent EU legislation outlining redistribution procedures and controlling the safe and legal arrival of refugees by land and sea.

However, the EU has failed to address a third, equally necessary response to the refugee crisis: integration. Europe does not currently have an integration plan for the millions of people resettling across the continent, a fact which is made more disconcerting by Europe’s long history of unsuccessful immigrant integration.

Over the course of the past few decades, isolated and predominantly immigrant communities have become an increasingly common feature of European suburbs. One such community, Molenbeek St. Jean—the so-called “jihadi capital of Europe” in western Brussels—has been under scrutiny in the wake of terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels. Five individuals involved in November’s Paris attacks were tied to the community, and it was implicated again during the investigation of the Brussels attacks in March. Molenbeek St. Jean and its association with a violent and poorly-integrated immigrant population represents a larger European problem: the social segregation of native and non-native populations.

While the refugee crisis differs from Europe’s tradition of immigration in many respects, the process of refugee integration will face many of the same challenges. Namely, in order for successful integration to take place, native and non-native communities must overcome the profound socio-cultural divides which separate them. There is no apparent answer for how to address this problem. However, there are lessons to be learned from legislation and policies already implemented by European nations.

Two particularly interesting targets for comparison are France and Sweden, which have adopted opposing methodologies with respect to immigration. France, commanding a clearly-defined and longstanding national identity, expects immigrants and refugees to assimilate to French culture and traditions. Meanwhile, the Swedish government has adopted a multicultural approach, incorporating the customs of refugees and immigrants into a broader Swedish identity. Neither strategy has been wholly successful in producing social harmony, and closer study reveals why: both models fail to produce organic social interaction between native and immigrant populations. Without this crucial ingredient, Europe will not arrive at a sustainable solution for the refugee crisis.

France: An assimilationist model

Any discussion about immigration in France must begin with the French tradition of laïcité. The term, which was coined during the French Revolution and ultimately formalized in a 1905 law, can be loosely summarized as an equivalent to the United States’ separation of church and state. However, its definition relies on a different set of principles which, in practice, render its implementation problematic on a social scale.

While the American tenet of separation of church and state seeks to protect freedom of religion and individual liberty, laïcité’s end goal is to achieve social equality by preventing religiously-motivated discrimination. It draws a sharp distinction between private and public life and decrees that while individuals are free to practice whichever religion they choose in their private life, religion shall in no capacity infringe on the public sphere. Unlike the separation of church and state in the United States—which seeks to grant equal religious liberty to all US citizens—laïcité promotes equality by preventing anyone from practicing their religion in the public sphere. The strategy here is to achieve equality by removing religion from the social equation. Laïcité privileges French identity over other cultural and religious identities so as to ensure that all French citizens are viewed as French first and foremost and that their status in the eyes of the law is protected from religious bias.

Laïcité achieved international controversy following a March 2004 law banning students from wearing symbols or clothing denoting religious affiliation in schools. Other laws apply this precedent to all public institutions, ranging from government offices to post offices. This legislation has proved particularly problematic for French Muslim women who wish to wear headscarves in accordance with their religious values, making laïcité’s incompatibility with current societal truths clear.

Laïcité is a system designed for a mono-cultural, Catholic—or Christian at best—French society. It was not conceived during a time in which multiculturalism was prevalent, nor has it evolved to match the needs of France’s diversifying population. Instead, it is reinforcing a narrow definition of French national identity which does not include the multi-faceted racial, cultural, and ethnic dimensions of modern France.

The ideology which shaped laïcité is a deeply-ingrained component of the French identity. Although its ramifications on the reception of immigrants in France are complex and far-reaching, they may be condensed broadly into two categories:

Firstly, the restrictive cultural norms imposed by laïcité make little room for immigrants’ diverse religions and cultures. While studying in France, I asked a French person I knew well to explain to me what one had to do to “be French” in modern France. His answer was simple: “you just have to obey our laws.” That’s precisely the problem. French laws, as they stand, are not feasible for segments of the population that don’t resemble the sort of French people they were designed for. This is especially true for France’s growing Muslim population, which continues to challenge France’s cultural norms. Most recently, a Muslim student in Northwestern France was sent home for wearing a long skirt—a choice which her school’s administration interpreted as a religious statement. There has also been controversy surrounding French schools’ refusal to serve Halal food in cafeterias. These incidents stand in sharp contrast to the norm of institutionalized Catholicism in France, where many schools hold mass daily and nearly all Roman Catholic holidays are observed by the French state.

However, those aspiring to earn the social status of citizen in France have no choice but to assimilate to French cultural and religious norms. This is made difficult by the popular disdain of many native French for immigrant communities, perpetuating a vicious circle of social isolation. The French are inclined to distrust and disapprove of growing immigrant neighborhoods like those in Seine-Saint-Denis and Marseilles because they perceive their failure to integrate as an affront to French tradition and hospitality rooted in immigrants’ lack of interest in integrating. This attitude contributes to the stigma which makes it difficult for immigrants and refugees to integrate in the first place, widening the social gap between these populations and attesting to the inefficacy of laïcité as a strategy for integration.

Secondly, because religion—and, by extension, religious and cultural differences—are taboo in France, relations between the ethnically French and the multicultural “new French” are plagued by a fundamental lack of mutual understanding. Lines of communication between these increasingly isolated populations are cut in part because their social spheres do not overlap, but also because dialogue about the issues which separate them is made uncomfortable by prevailing cultural norms.

France’s policies, built around the notion of laïcité, reinforce the ideological divide between native and non-native populations before they have an opportunity to interact. The sociocultural repercussions of this method have already posed a problem in ethnically-divided France, and the addition of hundreds of thousands of refugees and asylum seekers is likely to escalate existing tensions within France if efforts are not made to bridge these polarized communities.

The second part of this article details Swedish integration policy and proposes a model of integration for Europe. Visit The Generation website later this week to read more.

June 21, 2016 1 comment

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyT9F6g5PAM

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An Interview with Mubin Shaikh: Former Jihadist Turned Counter-Terrorism Operative

written by Madison Weil

In light of recent radical Islamic terrorist attacks worldwide, individuals everywhere are feeling uneasy and unsafe. The topic of national security has moved to the forefront of political agendas and has become an integral part of international discussions. In the United States, 49% of citizens are worried that they, or someone in their family, will become a victim of terrorism. This percentage is the highest it has been since the year following 9/11. According to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, “Over three-quarters of Americans doubt the nation’s ability to stop ‘lone wolf’ terrorist attacks by individuals acting on their own.” Additionally, 59% of Republicans, 38% of Independents, and 15% of Democrats support a ban on all Muslims wishing to enter the United States. For a nation that prides itself on freedom and equal opportunity for all, these are surprising numbers, which reveal the success of radical extremists in their ability to create widespread fear and anti-Muslim sentiment.

In an effort to learn more about the goals and recruitment strategies of ISIS, a colleague and I recently interviewed Mubin Shaikh—an ex-extremist turned counter-terrorism operative, and author of the book Undercover Jihadi. Born in Canada, Shaikh was raised Muslim and became influenced by the radical ideas of the Taliban and al-Qaeda. He began actively recruiting other young Muslims for the cause of jihad. After the events of 9/11, however, he questioned Islamic extremism and travelled to Syria, where he underwent deradicalization—a process he defines in his interview as “a full cognitive shift away from extremist thinking.” Upon his return home, he began working undercover with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service in the “Toronto 18” case, in an effort to prevent extremist attacks. Today, he works to stop radicalization using social media to directly engage Islamic State sympathizers, while also speaking out against Islamophobia, which he believes only fuels and encourages radicalization.

What many people do not understand is that the fulfillment of ISIS’ agenda is actually dependent upon worldwide discrimination against Muslims—all Muslims, even moderate, peaceful, law-abiding Muslims. According to Shaikh, “It would be laughable if it wasn’t so serious how easily people are falling into that trap. ISIS has actually written a document in which they wrote and said ‘we will commit these attacks so as to create retaliation on Muslims to make them feel so isolated and marginalized that they will be pushed into our waiting arms.’”

Shaikh is referring to both a manifesto called “The Black Flags from Rome,” as well as the February edition of ISIS’ online magazine, Dabiq, in which the Islamic State warned, “Muslims in the West will soon find themselves between one of two choices.” This statement was published in the weeks following the massacre at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris—an abhorrent act that only heightened the pre-existing tension between French Muslims and their fellow citizens. The group boasted that the attack had “further [brought] division to the world,” and “eliminated the grayzone,” representing the coexistence between Muslims and their non-Muslim neighbors. The text further explains that Muslims living in the West will soon feel so isolated and marginalized, they will be forced to “either apostatize … or [migrate] to the Islamic State, and thereby escape persecution from the crusader governments and citizens.” The term “crusader” is the title given by ISIS to every Western soldier, civilian, and politician, regardless of party or nation.

In the weeks following the most recent attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California, ISIS has seen their goal come to fruition—innocent Muslims everywhere have been experiencing acts of violence, hatred, and discrimination at the hands of angry, fearful Western citizens. Many in the West believe that Islam is a religion that promotes violence, without understanding that the majority of Muslims are peaceful. Shaikh explained that ISIS manipulates the Quran, “cherry-picks” verses, and uses phrases out of context in order to piece together an outline for their violent mission.

In a more recent interview with VICE, Shaikh reemphasizes that widespread Islamophobia provides a major advantage to ISIS recruiters: “The sad reality is, you have people on the right who might as well directly take the marching orders from ISIS because they’re doing the work for them.” ISIS targets individuals who feel isolated and rejected. Youths are an easy target given their desire to formulate their own identity and find a community to which they belong. Shaikh comments, “Your brains are still developing until your mid-twenties. That’s a time when you’re susceptible to influences from adults, community members, and religious members.” ISIS preys on the vulnerability of ostracized youths, reaching out to them via social media platforms such as Facebook, Skype, Twitter, Instagram, etc. “They’ll take screenshots and continue to engage you until they feel like they can successfully recruit you,” says Shaikh. He also solemnly discusses the impossibility of quitting ISIS once an individual has been recruited: “Their lives are destroyed. And it will be very, very difficult for them to leave that place. Some of them have been executed because they were creating ‘too many problems’ because they wanted to go home.”

While widespread fear and anger might seem inevitable in light of current events, Shaikh encourages individuals to educate themselves on the goals and strategies of extremists, and to resist the temptation to perpetuate the anti-Muslim sentiment which only further fuels radicalization and polarization.

December 28, 2015 1 comment

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Expediting Aid in Rural Nepal

written by Lillianne Thomas

On April 25th, 2015, an earthquake the size of Everest struck just outside Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal. As the number of days grew since the catastrophe occurred, so did the count of victims killed or injured. The 7.8 magnitude earthquake devastated almost a quarter of Nepal and the surrounding areas in China and India, and triggered an avalanche on Mount Everest that would have made international headlines in itself.

As with any natural disaster of this caliber, international aid poured in. The handful of U.N. agencies dealing with these types of crises responded immediately, as did governmental organizations and NGOs from several countries. Yet somehow, victims in the rural parts of Nepal ⎯ an already small country relative to surrounding giants China and India ⎯ suffered from a lack of aid. Is it because the various responding agencies knew where these people are, but had trouble accessing them due to the difficulty of destroyed roads, collapsed infrastructure, and ruptured ground? Were they able to access these rural areas only to find that they came with too few provisions to meet the needs of the droves of victims? Or, is it simply because these agencies were experiencing trouble locating these people?

I contend that the responding agencies were challenged by a combination of all three possibilities. Although scientists had predicted this earthquake would occur for the past ten years and despite the Nepali Government’s earthquake preparation efforts, the poor state of the country’s infrastructure challenged response teams in reaching rural areas outlying Kathmandu. The capital served as an air base for helicopters transporting aid throughout the affected area. However, unlike the Haiti Earthquake in 2010 where a U.S. Naval ship carrying an immense supply of aid arrived directly offshore, Nepal is landlocked and requires land and air-based shipments of aid⎯both of which take much more time to match the supply of sea-based shipments.

As anyone might expect when a natural disaster strikes, the situation presents complications concerning gas and electricity, and few homes in the rural areas outside Kathmandu have access to clean water. What’s more, lack of clean water in rural areas could force victims to rely on polluted water⎯a situation that almost guarantees a cholera epidemic. In this case, trucks and helicopters were the only alternative lifeline the victims had. In order to speed up the distribution of aid in the rural areas, two things needed to change. First, responding teams needed to better plan their deployments with more accurate and timely information. Second, they needed to consider alternative means of transportation that can augment existing means.

In the immediate aftermath of an earthquake, the best way to visualize the physical impact is oftentimes not the most commonly consulted. High resolution, timely satellite imagery is our greatest asset for identifying exactly what was damaged, destroyed, where victims are located, and where responding teams can effectively deploy personnel and set up relief sites. Some of the biggest satellite earth observation commercial companies in the world (DigitalGlobe from the U.S., CNES from France, and Airbus Defense and Space from several European countries) harness the capabilities of their spaceborne satellites to capture imagery of affected areas immediately following a crisis. Subsequently, they share this imagery with that captured before the crisis (for purposes of comparison) to crowdsourced web-based mapping platforms, such as OpenStreetMap. The motivation behind this publicization of high-quality satellite data is to enlist as many people as possible in the effort to build a detailed picture of what was damaged and where the victims are. These efforts resulted in digitally demarcated satellite images that indicate damage as detailed as remote mountain roads. Below is a picture of the user interface for Tomnod, a service from DigitalGlobe that has engaged a global community of volunteer mappers to digitize damaged structures near Kathmandu.

In turn, crowdsourced mapping agencies distribute the imagery they receive from the commercial satellite providers to their networks of volunteer cartographers who may download and digitize the data on their wireless communication devices while on the ground in the affected area. Their input is immediately fed into the digital imagery which can be re-shared with countless humanitarian agencies, thus activating a rapid information sharing environment in the aftermath of the crisis. Although this had been done for Nepal, the service was not nearly as well-known as it should have been. These tools are revolutionary and need greater marketing on behalf of the humanitarian agencies that respond to crises such as the Nepal earthquake. If agencies are to use these tools, then they logically benefit from greater public awareness and participation in the associated services.

Although the Google Person Finder and Facebook Safety Check services received much publicity for their use in locating victims of the earthquake in Nepal, it is important to remember that these services require the victims to have access to smartphones in a devastated environment in which even clean water and food are out of reach. Although obviously well-intentioned, these services face a disjuncture in their actual utility in a situation such as post-earthquake Nepal, especially when it comes to the rural areas. Instead of relying on the victims in the affected region to respond to SMS text messages (as in the case of Facebook Safety Check) or reference images of lost loved ones on Google.com (Google Person Finder), efforts should be directed at encouraging responding agencies and the broader global community to use their access to technology to help assess the damage and identify where the victims are located.

Finally, responding agencies should consider alternative means of transporting aid to and from the remote areas. One method for bypassing the limited manpower needed to operate helicopters and drive trucks is adding unmanned aerial systems as a third means to transport aid to and from the remote areas, such as the outlying territories around Kathmandu. These UASs, more popularly referred to as “carrier drones” , would need to be flown in formation with helicopters whose pilots should follow flight paths informed by the crowdsourced satellite imagery. The pilot operating a helicopter would control the drones flown in formation. This is necessary to overcome the complications associated with air traffic control that come with autonomously flying unmanned aerial systems. Therefore, the drones would serve a complementary role to the helicopters, and when taken together, they could create a synthetic aircraft carrier. The drones and helicopters could be loaded with food, medicine, and clean water that would either be airdropped or unloaded upon landing. Effectively, the fleet of drones with the helicopters would rapidly speed up the transport of aid to remote areas.

Where will these drones come from? The Indian military launched Operation Maitri immediately following the earthquake, supplying soldiers, helicopters, and trucks to distribute aid throughout Kathmandu and the outlying areas. Yet with the shortage of helicopters, the Indian military realized that its existing means of transporting aid were not adequate to handle the demand. In addition to helicopters and ground vehicles, the Indian military operates a fleet of long-endurance medium size Searcher II and Heron drones that could have potentially assisted with humanitarian aid in Nepal. The Indian military should have used this resource if soldiers and other military infrastructure were being used.

Theoretically, the Nepal Earthquake could serve as a testing ground for a revolution in the way aid is delivered following natural disasters or humanitarian crises. New technologies should always be considered for improving response to these situations, especially when they encourage participation from the global community (e.g. Tomnod) and when they can be used to augment existing methods (e.g. carrier drones). There is no doubt that future events such as the Nepal earthquake would benefit from greater awareness of crowdsourced web-based services such as Tomnod and OpenStreetMap, and from the application of unmanned aerial systems for maximizing rapid delivery of aid. These proposed solutions may be more complicated to operationalize than they appear at face value, but at minimum, they can serve as a fundamental concept for improving the ways in which agencies respond to natural disasters and/or humanitarian crises.

October 24, 2015 5 comments

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