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121. China Global Security Tracker

Author:
Helena Legarda
Publication Date:
02-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Institute for Strategic Studies
Abstract:
Europe has become a major target of China’s push to acquire advanced key technologies. These technologies support the development of dual-use products with civilian as well as military applications, a development that is in line with China’s efforts towards civil-military integration. The EU has been slow to wake up to this trend. Despite recent efforts, including those to set up a tighter investment screening mechanism, it still lacks strong coordinated regulations to protect its research and technologies. Even more importantly, the author of our newest China Global Security Tracker, MERICS researcher Helena Legarda, warns that Europe lacks a clear policy or strategy to keep up with China’s ambitions in this area. Joint European initiatives providing strategic guidance and adequate funding for innovation in dual-use technologies will be needed to not only preserve but to advance the EU’s scientific and engineering expertise. The China Global Security Tracker is a bi-annual publication as part of the China Security Project in cooperation between Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS) and the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). This issue also features the Trump administration’s tightened export controls in response to China’s civil-military integration efforts, and it tracks other security developments in China in the second half of 2018, from the launch of a number of new defense systems to an increase in China’s military diplomacy activities around the world.
Topic:
Security, Diplomacy, Regional Cooperation, Science and Technology, Military Strategy, and European Union
Political Geography:
China, Europe, Beijing, and Asia

122. Keeping the momentum in European defence collaboration: An early assessment of PESCO implementation

Author:
Yvonni-Stefania Efstathiou, Connor Hannigan, and Lucie béraud-Sudreau
Publication Date:
05-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Institute for Strategic Studies
Abstract:
Between March and November 2018, the 25 participating member states launched 34 projects, with the core aim of addressing the EU’s capability shortfalls. In May 2019, a call for a third round of project proposals will be launched. The IISS undertook an early assessment of how PESCO projects are carried out, to assess whether the momentum on the ground has continued since the projects were announced at the political level. A strong pace of implementation would require detailed timelines, deadlines and financial plans, as well as clear links with EU capability requirements. Questionnaires were sent to the projects’ country leads, and were complemented by interviews and secondary-source research. We looked at various dimensions of implementation: timelines, financial commitments, stakeholder involvement and the projects’ relation to strategic autonomy. The results are mixed. While some projects are off to a strong start, there are common challenges for all
Topic:
Defense Policy, Regional Cooperation, Military Strategy, European Union, and Military Spending
Political Geography:
Europe, Eastern Europe, Brussels, Central Europe, and Western Europe

123. European security in crisis: what to expect if the US withdraws from NATO

Author:
Lianna Fix, Bastain Giegerich, and Theresa Kirch
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Institute for Strategic Studies
Abstract:
Recent developments in transatlantic relations have reignited the debate about the need for Europeans to assume greater responsibility for their own security. Yet, efforts by European leaders to substantiate the general commitment to 'take their fate into their own hands' are so far lacking sufficient progress. Against this backdrop, the Körber Policy Game brought together a high-level group of senior experts and government officials from France, Germany, Poland, the UK and the US to address a fictional scenario that involves a US withdrawal from NATO, followed by multiple crises in Europe. How will Europeans organise their security and defence if the US withdraws from NATO? To what extent will future European security be based on mutual solidarity, ad-hoc coalitions or a bilateralisation of relations with the US? Which interests would the respective European governments regard as vital and non-negotiable? What role would the US play in European security after the withdrawal? The Körber Policy Game is based on the idea of projecting current foreign and security policy trends into a future scenario – seeking to develop a deeper understanding of the interests and priorities of different actors as well as possible policy options. The starting point is a short to medium-term scenario. Participants are part of country teams and assume the role of advisers to their respective governments.
Topic:
NATO, Regional Cooperation, Military Strategy, and European Union
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, North Atlantic, North America, and Brussels

124. The Union for the Mediterranean Ten Years After Its Foundation - How to Overcome the Frustrated Ambitions

Author:
Inès Abdel Razek and Claudia Del Prado Sartorius
Publication Date:
02-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Fundación Alternativas
Abstract:
It is a busy diplomatic period among the Heads of State and Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the European Union and the Mediterranean countries. On the 24 and 25 February 2019, the EU and the League of Arab States (LAS) are set to hold their very first Euro-Arab Summit at the level of heads of state. The two regional blocks are meant to focus on “stability” and “migration”, going back to prioritising the security and stability agenda over the promotion of democracy and human rights. The aim is also to forge a new European-African Alliance, where Arab countries must play a necessary bridging role. This goal already questions whether the centre of gravity of EU-Arab cooperation is moving away from the Mediterranean to Africa. A few months back, the Conference of Mediterranean Ministers of Foreign Affairs – that includes all EU countries and 10 Arab countries – marking the tenth anniversary of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), was held on the 8th of October 2018. However, it passed almost unnoticed on mainstream media. The event could be considered as an achievement in itself given that it gathered the 43 UfM countries, with their divergent and sometimes antagonistic geopolitical agendas – including Israel, Turkey, alongside the European and Arab countries – and allowed to reaffirm a rhetorical commitment to this regional partnership that focuses more on the socioeconomic issues. The Conference did not manage to produce a formal conclusive document, but just a mere declaration signed by the co-presidents1 . The UfM Conference was followed more recently by the Meeting of Foreign Affairs Ministers of the 5+5 dialogue (Western Mediterranean Forum2 ) on 18 and 19 January 2019, where parties adopted a declaration focused on reinforcing western Mediterranean ties focusing on “sustainable development, youth, migration and mobility”3 . The more “Mediterranean” format of this dialogue only composed of riparian states in the western part of the Mediterranean is attractive to its member countries as more manageable than the UfM, composed of 43 countries, including countries that are remote from the Mediterranean itself. 1 https://ufmsecretariat.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Conclusions-of-the-Co-Presidency.pdf 2 Malta, Italy, France, Spain and Portugal, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Mauritania, 3 http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2019-01-18/local-news/5-5-Western-MediterraneanDialogue-Foreign-Ministers-meeting-held-in-Malta-6736202278 Memorandum Opex Nº 239/2019. The Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) ten years after its foundation - How to overcome the frustrated ambitions 2 In that regard, France is pushing for its initiative of the “Summit of the two shores”, announced by President Macron, that will take place on the 24th of June 2019 in Marseille. It aims to revive the 5+5 Dialogue format, with 10 of the 43 countries of the UfM, while making it more inclusive and less government-driven, including civil society and all actors of the “voices of the Euro-Mediterranean dialogue”. It proposes a new “Mediterranean policy”, hinting on the existing failures of the UfM formula4 . In this paper, the authors zoom in the UfM, today considered, within the Mediterranean countries political and diplomatic circles, as a positive forum for formal political dialogue among its 43 member-states. However, throughout the past ten years, none have passed without analysts or politicians asking for revitalisation and necessary changes in the partnership, which lacks depth and vision. If you address the 43 capitals of the UfM, you are likely to find at least 20 different interpretations of the value and meaning of this somehow forgotten partnership. The EU, on a discursive level, presents the UfM as a model for regional integration complementing its Neighbourhood policy. Southern Mediterranean countries, on their end, continue to maintain low profiles, showing their moderate interest in an organisation which has failed to become a partnership based on equal footing – one country, one vote- that would increase regional economic integration with the EU. Critical security and geopolitical issues are put on the discussion table outside the UfM’s realm, through the League of Arab States or 5+5 Dialogue. The partnership’s lack of coherence and articulation with the other forums and partnerships (Neighbourhood Policy, 5+5, EU-Arab League) contributes to its weakening. At a time when multilateralism is vilified all around the world, when the EU is internally divided and marked by the rise of nationalist populist forces and securitydriven agendas; at a time when the Arab world, all the more divided, stands far from the short-lived optimism brought by the Arab Springs, is the Mediterranean agenda going to be central to its member states’ international cooperation? Will the UfM hold a central place in the Mediterranean agenda and more broadly EU-Arab relations, or just be one of many actors? Despite all its shortfalls, the authors believe in the added value of the UfM forum to advance people-centred socioeconomic models. We argue for reinforcing its 4 Foreign Policy Speech at the « conférence des Ambassadeurs » http://www.elysee.fr/declarations/article/discoursdu-president-de-la-republique-a-la-conference-des-ambassadeurs/ Memorandum Opex Nº 239/2019. The Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) ten years after its foundation - How to overcome the frustrated ambitions 3 existing institutions in order for all Mediterranean countries to advance a progressive socio-economic agenda, whether in the North or the South.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Migration, Regional Cooperation, European Union, and Political stability
Political Geography:
Europe, Mediterranean, and Southern Europe

125. 2019 ASEAN Defense Ministers’ Meeting-Plus: Enhancing Bilateral and Regional Cooperative Security for India and Japan in the Indo-Pacific

Author:
Monika Chansoria
Publication Date:
12-2019
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Japan Institute Of International Affairs (JIIA)
Abstract:
Since the end of the Cold War, cooperative security became a catchphrase term used generally to describe a more peaceful approach to security through increased international cooperation. The cooperative security model essentially embraced four concentric and mutually reinforcing “rings of security”: Individual Security, Collective Security, Collective Defense, and Promoting Stability. In 1992, American strategists — Ashton Carter, William Perry, and John Steinbruner discussed cooperative security in terms of providing new avenues toward world peace, and argued, “Organizing principles like deterrence, nuclear stability, and containment embodied the aspirations of the cold war… Cooperative Security is the corresponding principle for international security in the post– cold war era.” Two years later, in 1994, former Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans described cooperative security as tending “… to connote consultation rather than confrontation, reassurance rather than deterrence, transparency rather than secrecy, prevention rather than correction, and interdependence rather than unilateralism.”
Topic:
Security, Regional Cooperation, Bilateral Relations, and ASEAN
Political Geography:
Japan, India, Asia, and Indo-Pacific

126. Development of Sri Lanka’s East Container Terminal Port: Japan & India’s Regional Cooperation in South Asia Shaping Up

Author:
Monika Chansoria
Publication Date:
06-2019
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Japan Institute Of International Affairs (JIIA)
Abstract:
Signing the Japan-India Vision Statement in Tokyo on 29 October 2018, the Prime Ministers of Japan and India reviewed cooperation on development of connectivity via quality infrastructure and capacitybuilding carried out bilaterally, as well as, with other partners. More so, the need to do this in an open, transparent and non-exclusive manner based on international standards, responsible debt financing practices, and in alignment with local economic and development strategies and priorities was highlighted.1 The synergy finds embodiment in collaborative projects between Japan and India in the Indo-Pacific region, especially in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Bangladesh, and Africa. In slightly over six months since this statement, Sri Lanka recently announced on 28 May 2019, its decision of entering into a trilateral partnership with India and Japan to develop a deepsea container terminal. The state-run Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) said a Memorandum of Cooperation (MOC) had been signed between the three countries to jointly develop the East Container Terminal (ECT) of the Colombo Port next to a $500-million Chineserun container jetty in Colombo harbor.
Topic:
Development, Regional Cooperation, Infrastructure, and Trade
Political Geography:
Japan, South Asia, India, and Sri Lanka

127. The Role for Middle Powers in the Free and Open Indo-Pacific: Looking at Opportunities for Canada and Australia

Author:
John Berkshire Miller and Thomas S. Wilkins
Publication Date:
06-2019
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Japan Institute Of International Affairs (JIIA)
Abstract:
The Indo-Pacific, as a geographic concept that connects the vast oceans of Pacific and the Indian along with the states in between, is not a new idea. Indeed, the idea of a broader geographic region – rather than more traditional subsets such as East Asia, South Asia, or the more expansive Asia-Pacific – has been used for more than a decade by scholars and practitioners in the region. An Indian naval captain began using the concept in geopolitical terms more than a decade ago, but the terminology has not been limited to scholars in Delhi. Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, back during his first stint as Prime Minister in 2007, spoke to India’s parliament about his country’s vision for Indo-Pacific noting a “confluence of the two seas” and pressed for a need to transcend beyond traditional frameworks that often separated or minimized the geopolitical connections between South Asian and the Indian Ocean region with that of East Asia and the Pacific.
Topic:
Regional Cooperation, International Affairs, and Geopolitics
Political Geography:
Canada, Australia, Asia-Pacific, and Indo-Pacific

128. Weaponizing Interpol

Author:
Edward Lemon
Publication Date:
04-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
Interpol, the world’s leading police-cooperation body, aims to “connect police for a safer world.” Although the organization’s constitution states that Interpol cannot engage in “any intervention or activities of a political, military, religious or racial character,” it is increasingly being subverted by autocratic regimes seeking to pursue their exiled political opponents. The number of Red Notices (a type of arrest request issued through Interpol) has increased tenfold in the past fifteen years. Those targeted face the risk of arrest if they travel across borders; have difficulties obtaining visas and open bank accounts; and suffer reputational damage. Interpol remains opaque and lacks accountability for its actions. Recent reforms have started to address some of these issues. But more needs to be done to prevent the hijacking, repurposing, and weaponizing of Interpol by today’s globalized authoritarian regimes.
Topic:
Regional Cooperation, Law Enforcement, Transparency, and Interpol
Political Geography:
Europe

129. Energy security in the Baltic Region: between markets and politics

Author:
Marc Ozawa
Publication Date:
01-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
NATO Defense College
Abstract:
NATO addresses energy security concerns in three ways, through strategic awareness, infrastructure protection and energy efficiency measures. However, what may be a concern for NATO is potentially a problem for member states with conflicting views on the issue, the politics of which impact their interactions within the Alliance. Nord Stream 2, the trans-Baltic pipeline connecting Ust-Luga (Russia) to Greifswald (Germany), is one such example because it is so divisive. This Policy Brief advocates a role for NATO as a constructive partner with the European Union (EU), the governing body for energy security issues in tandem with national governments, while avoiding the divisive politics of direct involvement. NATO and the EU have complementary perspectives on energy security. The Alliance’s view is directed at broad security implications and the EU’s Director- General for Energy (DG Energy) is more focused on market matters. In this complementarity of perspectives NATO could indirectly assist DG Energy in making better energy policies and help to avoid the politicization of projects that create friction within the EU, the type that can spill over into NATO. The strife around Nord Stream 2, for example, works against both EU unity and cohesion within NATO such that, what may not have originally been perceived as a problem for NATO, becomes one.
Topic:
Security, NATO, Energy Policy, Regional Cooperation, and European Union
Political Geography:
Europe, North Atlantic, and North America

130. Vostok 2018: ten years of Russian strategic exercises and warfare preparation

Author:
Dave Johnson
Publication Date:
02-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
NATO Defense College
Abstract:
The visibility, scale and scope of Russian military exercises have been a focus of the Western media and specialist literature since 2014. Of most recent interest, Russia conducted Vostok 2018, the latest it- eration of its annual strategic1 exercises, from early July to 17 September 2018. Vostok (meaning East) is part of a system of strategic exercises that the Russian Armed Forces have been developing since 2009. It is one of the four named annual strategic exercises conducted on a rotating basis among four of Russia’s five military districts. It should be noted that these visible events represent a small fraction of Russia’s nationwide whole-of-Government effort to develop the ability to conduct large-scale operations against a major military power, and to influence po- tential adversaries.
Topic:
NATO, Regional Cooperation, Military Strategy, and Conflict
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, North Atlantic, and North America