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Open Think Tank Articles
Anders Fogh Rasmussen: The international community has to ensure that the Arab Spring does not turn into a bleak winter. In Libya the question is not if Qadhafi goes, but when. NATO can help North Africa and the Middle East with its democratic transition - complementing support from other international actors, particularly the European Union and the United Nations.
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Memo 30: Focusing on societal engagement, economic reform, and military confidence building, we should break with our questionable past and respond to the Arab uprisings by taking bold action to improve our reputation.
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An Denise Jacobs: Developments in the METAL states (Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria and Libya) have shown that the EU’s ability to act has changed little – if anything – since the Yugoslav wars. The EU is smothered by incapacity, indecision, and fragmentation. Upcoming EU summits will fail because Europe is still lacking any political imagination as to what must really be done.
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Ioan Mircea Paşcu: Nobody can predict what the ultimate outcome of uprisings across North Africa will be. Nevertheless, a coherent response to turmoil in the region is required from Europe. Failure to contain unrest could see revolts spreading southward which would further strain the resource balance in the global economy.
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Olivier Guitta: Al-Qaeda has been raising its profile in North East Africa recently, mainly due to lucrative kidnappings of Westerners. However, a power struggle among various different offshoots in the region is at play. The consequences of this war of succession could threaten to destabilize the surrounding area.
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Antonin Tisseron: The connection between crime and terrorism within the Polisario Front, Western Sahara’s rebel national liberation movement, is becoming increasingly clear. Moreover, there is also increasing evidence of Al-Qaeda involvement in the organization.
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Olivier Guitta: There is intense debate among political leaders and government officials in Washington and Brussels on how to handle the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). A strategy of engaging the MB has recently been gaining currency.
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Rob Steer: There is an assumption that liberal democracy is the result of all political systems, despite detours they have taken along the way. However, the creation of regime types do not necessarily follow a simple trajectory
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Global Must Read Articles
The conflict in Libya has reached “zero hour”. ++ As rebels infiltrate Tripoli and celebrate Gaddafi’s imminent surrender, the “forward-thinking” Transitional National Council makes plans for post-conflict stabilization. ++ The most important task for the TNC is to ensure that all regions of Libya are adequately represented in the new government, whose seat could be moved
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Moammar Gadhafi, Libya’s erstwhile leader has begun sabotaging oil facilities in an effort to sow chaos. ++ Despite an increase in Saudi production to make up the shortfall, oil analysts are worried about what will happen in the mid term, as the writing is on the wall for many regimes across the region. ++ As we have seen, reform is often a catalyst for revolution rather than a substitute for it.
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Despite Mubarak’s internet blackout, Google has teamed up with Twitter to offer a service which allows Egyptians to have their voices heard offline. ++ Google’s “digital lifebuoy” does not need Internet access to function; users call a dedicated number and leave a voice mail, which is then translated and automatically displayed on Twitter. ++ Restricting internet access is now considered to be
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“Arabs are rebelling not just against decrepit autocrats but the foreign backers who kept them in power.” ++ Years of rule across the Arab world by faceless autocrats and ruthless generals, supported in many cases by the West, have caused entire populations to identify little with their own States. ++ The result has been a turning inwards toward narrow sectarian identities. ++ If it were not for
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Tunisia’s “jasmine revolution” is unlikely to lead to other revolts in the Middle East, but it may well set in motion a movement for greater political reform. ++ Events in Tunis shattered the myth that Arabs are too downtrodden to rise against their oppressors. ++ In today’s Middle East, a large number of youth are well educated and have high expectations. ++ Through social networks
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The ongoing Tunisian drama will be seen in retrospect like the Solidarity movement in Poland, as it marks the beginning of a slow process of change throughout the Arab world. ++ By standing up to their dictatorial leadership, Tunisians will almost certainly inspire renewed agitation for change in many sectors of Arab society. ++ “We have just witnessed the first stirring, genuine signs of an Arab
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A government campaign against journalists in Morocco provides ominous signs of rising autocratic sentiment among the country’s elite. ++ Journalists fear that the government is “attracted by the Tunesian model” of curtailing press freedom. ++ Journalists face prosecution based on trumped-up charges. ++ A human rights association allegedly sympathetic to the separatist cause of the Western
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Unlike
the countries on the Horn or in Central Africa, countries in North
Africa radiate stability. The rate of economic growth is on
average 5-6%. Abounding energy supplies and cooperation in the war on terror
have led to close partnerships with Europe and the US. But appearances can be deceiving.
In Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia
and Libya
socio-economic as wells as political tensions
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Economically speaking,
Arab states have developed at a strikingly slower pace in the last 20 years
than most other regions in the world. This is particularly true for the Arab Mediterranean, including Jordan, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria and
Morocco, which have failed to capitalize on their especially advantageous
geo-strategic position “at the crossroads of three continents, with
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