World update: April 4-5 2020
Stories from Afghanistan, the United Kingdom, Brazil, and more
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THESE DAYS IN HISTORY
April 3, 1559: The Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis ends the Italian War of 1551-1559, the last in a series of Italian Wars between France and the Habsburgs, with a Habsburg victory. French King Henry II was forced to forfeit his claims on any Italian territory, but the war hadn’t been a total bust. The abdications (and then death, in 1556) of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V resulted in the Habsburg realm being split, with Philip II inheriting Spain and its empire while Ferdinand I inherited Austria and control of the Holy Roman Empire. This ended France’s primary concern about being encircled by a unified Habsburg Empire. For the Italians the wars wound up solidifying Habsburg control, first via Spain but later via Austria.
April 3, 1948: The United States government enacts the Foreign Assistance Act of 1948, AKA “The Marshall Plan,” earmarking $12 billion to the reconstruction of war-torn Europe. This helped quickly rebuild post-war European economies, though its impact has probably been overstated in subsequent American mythologizing. This in turn helped limit the kind of struggling that might have allowed dastardly leftists to gain political traction in Western Europe and laid part of the groundwork for NATO.
April 4, 1949: Speaking of which, it’s on this date that founding members Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States signed the North Atlantic Treaty, creating NATO (pending ratification by a majority of the signatories). Those original 12 states have grown to 30, so far, with the admission of the Republic of North Macedonia just a few days ago.
U.S. President Harry Truman signing the North Atlantic Treaty, surrounded by foreign dignitaries (National Archives and Records Administration via Wikimedia Commons)
April 4, 1959: The French government creates the autonomous Mali Federation, consisting of Senegal and French Sudan. Exactly one year later, French authorities agreed to grant the federation its independence, effective June 20, 1960. The aggregated state collapsed within two months, in August 1960, creating the independent nations of Senegal and Mali. Through all that, Senegal recognizes April 4 as its Independence Day—albeit April 4, 1960, not 1959.
April 5, 919: The Fatimid Caliphate, then based in Ifriqiya (modern Tunisia), invades Egypt for the second time. An initial Fatimid invasion in 914 had captured Alexandria but was defeated in its offensive against the Egyptian capital, Fustat. This invasion again captured Alexandria but then took a slower march toward Fustat, trying instead to conquer the rest of Egypt before making an attempt on the capital. It was so slow, in fact, that the Abbasids had time to send a fleet and reinforcements that destroyed the Fatimid fleet and retook Alexandria. The Fatimids were forced to retreat in 921. They held off making another attempt until 969, when the Abbasids were much weaker, and that invasion was successful. The Fatimids ruled Egypt from their new capital, Cairo, until they were removed from power by their vizier, Saladin, in 1171.
COVID-19
Worldometer’s coronavirus tracker for April 5 puts the pandemic at 1,272,861 confirmed cases worldwide (+71,408 over the previous day), 941,220 of which are still active, with 69,424 reported fatalities (+4737).
MIDDLE EAST
SYRIA
19 confirmed cases of COVID-19 (+3 since yesterday), 2 reported fatalities (unchanged)
Tragically, COVID-19 is beginning to take a toll on military escapades around the world, both current and future (see the United States entry below). The Turkish government says it has “minimized” the movement of its personnel in northern Syria, for example. Unfortunately this probably includes the medical personnel Ankara has sent to Idlib in preparation for a potential coronavirus outbreak there. So far Syria’s few confirmed cases have been confined to areas under government control, though given the challenges in monitoring cases in Syria right now there’s really no way to know the true extent of the pandemic’s spread there.
YEMEN
No confirmed cases as yet
Somebody attacked an unused oil pumping station in Yemen’s Marib province on Saturday, but at this point both the pro-government coalition and the Houthi rebels are blaming one another for the incident and neither has offered any details or evidence to back up their case. In Taiz, meanwhile, at least five women were killed on Sunday when the women’s section of the city’s prison was hit by artillery fire. The shelling reportedly came from an area under Houthi control. Incidents like this only serve to forestall the “coronavirus ceasefire” that Yemen’s warring parties insist they want to reach.
LEBANON
527 confirmed cases (+7), 18 reported fatalities (+1)
A group of attackers killed a Hezbollah member named Ali Mohammed Younes on Saturday in the Lebanese town of Nabatieh. There are no further details in terms of who did it or why. Iranian media says that Younes was a senior figure in Hezbollah but the organization itself hasn’t confirmed that.
ASIA
AFGHANISTAN
349 confirmed cases (+40), 7 reported fatalities (unchanged)
The Taliban issued a warning on Sunday that the peace deal they signed with the US in late February may be on the brink of collapse, due to difficulties in arranging a prisoner swap with the Afghan government and to alleged US drone strikes that have killed Afghan civilians. The Taliban says it’s upheld its part of the agreement, reducing the level of violence overall and limiting its attacks to Afghan security forces in areas that are away from major population centers. Its main complaint seems to be over Kabul’s unwillingness to speed up a prisoner swap envisioned under the US-Taliban agreement, which was negotiated without the Afghan government’s input but obliged it to release 5000 Taliban prisoners in exchange for 1000 government prisoners being held by the militant group. It seems unlikely that the Taliban would risk rolling back an agreement that was very much to their benefit, especially when Kabul’s reluctance to proceed with the prisoner swap has irritated the Trump administration enough to cause it to slash $1 billion from its support for Afghan security forces.
In non-Taliban news, Afghan security forces say they’ve arrested the leader of the Islamic State’s Khorasan Province, Abdullah Orokzai. It’s unclear what the circumstances were but this would be another in a series of blows to ISK, which has not weathered the US-Taliban rapprochement very well and is definitely at an ebb in Afghanistan.
KASHMIR
Trackers include Jammu and Kashmir’s COVID-19 figures, to the extent they’re available, with India’s overall total
Indian security forces say they killed nine Kashmiri militants over the weekend in two separate clashes. On Saturday, police and soldiers looking for militants house to house were allegedly attacked and wound up killing four attackers. On Sunday, Indian soldiers along Kashmir’s line of control killed five alleged militants who were attempting to cross from the Pakistani side. One Indian soldier was killed in that exchange.
INDIA
4288 confirmed cases (+700), 117 reported fatalities (+18)
The New York Times reports that the Indian government’s citizenship review process in Assam state is, despite official denials, very much about disenfranchising Muslims:
The New York Times interviewed one current and five former members of the Assam tribunals that review suspected foreigners. The five former members said they had felt pressured by the government to declare Muslims to be noncitizens. Three of them, including Ms. Rajkumari, said they were fired because they did not do so.
State and central government officials declined to comment.
Mr. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party has its roots in a Hindu nationalist worldview, and during last year’s national elections, party leaders vowed to apply the same type of citizenship checks used in Assam to the rest of India. Mr. Modi has recently denied he has any such plans.
Like Assam, India is majority Hindu, with a large Muslim minority. In December, India’s national government passed a sweeping new immigration law that gives a fast track to citizenship for undocumented migrants from nearby countries as long as they are Hindu or one of five other religions. Muslims are excluded.
The upshot is that any Hindus left off Assam’s citizenship lists after its broad review, or declared by tribunals to be foreigners, will likely be affirmed as citizens because of the new immigration law. Muslims may not.
CHINA
81,669 confirmed cases (+30), 3329 reported fatalities (+3)
Nobody could have predicted this, but the US military would like some more money please. Apparently the Pentagon needs just a few billion dollars more than the $700 billion or so it’s already getting in order to really do a super good job of containing China. Just about $20 billion will do the trick, so no biggie. It’ll pay for all kinds of cool gadgets and new buildings and exercises with our friends, and the Defense Department totally won’t be back later to say it still doesn’t have enough money to counter China and needs a few billion dollars more. Promise! I mean you can only pull that routine maybe 400 times or so before people are going to start getting wise to it, probably. Anyway Beijing is evilly trying to use the COVID-19 crisis to advance its sinister global agenda, which is bogus because that’s our thing and they’re copying it from us. So you can definitely see why we need the money.
AFRICA
LIBYA
18 confirmed cases (unchanged), 1 reported fatality (unchanged)
Forces aligned with Libya’s Government of National Accord say they struck a “Libyan National Army” cargo plane on Sunday that was carrying ammunition to support the LNA’s offensive on Tripoli. The LNA says that the aircraft, which was attacked at the LNA’s main forward operating base at Tarhouna, was carrying medical supplies for the COVID-19 effort. At least they didn’t go with “orphans,” I guess, but I find the medical supplies story stretches credulity a bit.
NIGER
184 confirmed cases (+40), 10 reported fatalities (+2)
The Nigerien army says it killed 63 Islamist militants in a battle near the Mali border on Thursday, losing only four of its soldiers in the process. It’s unclear which militant group was involved.
NIGERIA
232 confirmed cases (+18), 5 reported fatalities (+1)
Concern is growing over the threat that COVID-19 poses to hundreds of thousands of Nigerians displaced into camps by the Boko Haram conflict:
SOUTH SUDAN
1 confirmed case (+1), no reported fatalities
South Sudanese officials declared that country’s first confirmed case of COVID-19 on Sunday. As with Syria, Libya, Yemen, and other current or recent war zones, there’s no infrastructure in South Sudan for detecting or tracking the infection and so it’s reasonable to believe the virus has been there for some time now.
EUROPE
FRANCE
92,839 confirmed cases (+2886), 8078 reported fatalities (+518)
A knife attack in which two people were killed on Saturday in the southeastern French town of Romans-sur-Isère is being treated as a possible terrorist incident by authorities. The attacker was a Sudanese refugee who wounded five other people before being arrested without much difficulty by police. He does not appear to have been on anybody’s radar in terms of radical affiliations or activities.
UNITED KINGDOM
47,806 confirmed cases (+5903), 4934 reported fatalities (+621)
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is now being hospitalized because his COVID-19 symptoms have failed to diminish 10 days after he tested positive for the pathogen. Barring something unforeseen it sounds like he’ll be held overnight and released on Monday.
AMERICAS
BRAZIL
11,254 confirmed cases (+894), 486 reported fatalities (41)
Has Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro been sidelined by the military in a behind the scenes coup? That’s apparently a rumor making the rounds in Latin American media:
President Jair Bolsonaro’s excesses in the face of the novel coronavirus outbreak in Brazil have irritated the Armed Forces’ high command, which now appears to have “elected” Chief Minister of the Casa Civil, Walter Braga Netto, as the country’s new “operational president”.
According to the Argentine investigative journalist Horacio Verbitsky, a high ranking official of the Brazilian Army communicated to their Argentine counterpart that President Jair Bolsonaro is not being heard by the authorities when making decisions.
“There was a telephone communication from a high ranking Brazilian army official with one from Argentina, in which the Brazilian informed them that they had taken the decision to circumvent President Bolsonaro in all important decisions,” said the journalist on the program “Habrá Consecuencias”, from Radio El Destape.
Verbitsky affirms that Bolsonaro is acting as a “monarch without effective power” and who now commands the country is General Walter Braga Netto.
This story carries a whiff of plausibility but no actual supporting evidence. Braga Netto’s public profile has been growing of late, while Bolsonaro spends most of his time making paranoid rants about regional governors who are imposing pandemic lockdowns mostly, I guess, to make him look bad. Don’t get me wrong, Bolsonaro still makes for a truly inspiring public figure:
But he really doesn’t appear to be doing very much. As the article linked in that tweet makes clear, much of the functions of the Brazilian government appear to be proceeding almost without his involvement. So it would not be a huge surprise to learn he’s been shunted off to the side somehow. Why wouldn’t the Brazilian military just move him out altogether? Probably because Bolsonaro is on the whole good for the Brazilian military, when he’s not being a completely inept doofus at a time of serious crisis. And there’s also the fact that most Brazilians don’t want him to resign, even as a growing number think he’s done a terrible job under these circumstances.
But again, there’s no evidence other than this circumstantial stuff.
UNITED STATES
336,673 confirmed cases (+25,316), 9616 reported fatalities (+1165)
The Trump administration is proceeding with a plan to withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty, which went into effect in 2002 and currently has 35 participants. The OST gives signatories the right to conduct unarmed reconnaissance flights over the territory of any of the other signatories and all information is shared among the group of signatory states. The intent is to ease concerns about potential military buildups and reduce the chances of conflict. Former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton was, as you might imagine, not a fan, but even now that he’s gone Secretary of State Mike Pompeo seems to be pushing for an exit.
The administration says it’s unhappy with Russia’s efforts to exclude parts of its territory from the overflights, which is a legitimate concern. But in reality pulling out of the treaty is simply in keeping with this administrations “us against the world” mentality, and the Pentagon would rather take the money it spends on OST surveillance flights and give it to an arms manufacturer to buy more weapons for the wars that the US withdrawal from this treaty will make more likely to happen.
Finally, and along these same lines, Transparency International’s Colby Goodman looks at the Trump administration’s latest effort to undo export controls on US overseas weapons sales:
Despite the continued objections by some congressional members and civil society, the Trump administration’s final regulatory change went into effect on March 9, 2020 with minimal amendments. While the changes are not bullish on unauthorized firearms sales, they are bearish on some key earlier approaches to curbing illegitimate U.S. firearms exports. For instance, it appears the Commerce Department will not regularly conduct the more detailed pre-export checks on arms export applications that the State Department does. These checks aim to verify the real end-users, sometimes with in-person visits, and dig deeper to identify any other risky anomalies.
There are also key administrative and congressional checks missing that can help prevent the diversion of U.S. firearms. Companies do not have to register before exporting, which can help U.S. officials identify risky affiliates and subsidiaries. In most cases, companies do not have to provide written certification from the perspective end-user that the firearms will not be re-exported or misused as part of their export application process. The administration is also no longer required to notify Congress of proposed sales of firearms valued at $1 million or more and provide an annual report on firearms exported to every country.
Donald Trump gets a lot of grief for being insular, but frankly I think this shows that he’s truly an internationalist at heart. He’s not content to just let the United States itself conduct violent attacks around the world. No, Donald Trump is committed to providing the rest of the world with the tools it needs to make its own violence, and the lack of oversight to enable those tools to find their appropriate use. Because we’re all in this together.