Civilians are the prime victims of Syrian civil war

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my articles (unedited) that first appeared in "Daily Times":
https://dailytimes.com.pk/488948/civilians-are-the-prime-victims-of-syrian-civil-war/

On September 23, the International Coalition to against ISIS entered its sixth year. Since the outset, it has been involved in supporting specific armed factions to expand its influence and to achieve its objectives. Now after five years of its military campaign against Daesh, the international coalition controls about 70% of the oil and gas reserves in Syria.

But as a result of civil war and international intervention in Syria, at least 560,000 people have been killed, 6.2 million have been internally displaced, and 5.6 million have forced to flee the devastated country. Syrian women are increasingly becoming victims of rapes and forced and temporary serial marriages throughout the country.

No less than 223,000 civilians including were killed 28,486 children and 27,464 women since the start of Syrian crisis in March 2011. Syrian regime forces and Iranian militias were responsible for about 90% of the civilian death toll in Syria.

Syrian Crisis Background

Stirred by Arab Spring in March 2011, thousands of Syrian people carried peaceful demonstrations across the country to demand personal freedoms and democratic reforms, which President Basahar al-Assad refused to offer.

The pacific rallies and marches quickly turned bloodstained and flared up into anti-regime protests after the ruthless Syrian regime forces conducted a crackdown and opened fire on the protestors – killing a few and detaining many.

Uprising further brewed after Syrian military arrested and tortured a group of teenagers for writing graffiti in support of Arab Spring and inhumanely killed a 13 years old boy, Hamza al-Khateeb.

In July 2011, defectors from the military formed an armed alliance – Free Syrian Army (FSA) – to fight Assad’s brutalities and to topple his government – and the civil war eventually broke throughout the country.

11% Assad-led Alawis Rule Syria

Syria is divided into a complex religious and ethnic divide. Originally the disturbances were non-sectarian but the prevalence of armed conflict gravely mined the religious dissent in the Arab Republic.

About 70% of the Syrian population is Sunni; however the country is ruled by 11% Alawites or Alawis – branded as an upshot of Shia sect – though they distance themselves from this Shia sect. Assad – an Alwai – gained power in July 2000, securing 99.7% in a controversial and uncontested presidential 2000 elections.

Assad is the son of Hafiz al-Assad who reigned Syria for 30-years. Besides Syrian president, Assad is also the commander-in-chief of Syrian armed forces and the General Secretary of ruling Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party.

Foreign Intervention

A number of regional and global players are involved in Syria to secure their ‘specific’ interests but foreign interventions have critically fueled the Syrian crisis. Whatever are the reasons behind foreign interventions in Syria – the cost is paid and paid heavily by the civilians of Syria.

Assad’s government is strongly backed by Shia-majority countries and Shiite armed organizations such as Iran, Iraq, and Lebanese Hezbollah while Sunni-majority countries such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar favor the revolts.

In September 2015, Russian military invaded into the Levant to support Assad’s regime in guise of bombing terrorist bases in Syria. The geopolitical gurus believed it as a Russian attempt to offload western pressure and bargain sanctions.

But Moscow’s stalwart support for Assad was additionally in wake of securing its strategic asset in Syrian – Tartus port. In 1971, Hafiz al-Assad handed over the port to Russia in return of providing advanced weapons to Syria. Through Tartus port, Moscow had a craving to ramp up its influence in region.

Although United States has repetitively reprimanded Assad’s serious human rights violations in Syria but it has been disinclined to involve directly into the crisis except for firing 59 Tomahawk missiles on Syrian air base in April 2017 over suspected use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime forces.

Civilians’ Death Toll

For more than eight years, Syrian citizens have suffered from a vast and terrible range of violations of staggering magnitude, which have reached the level crimes against humanity. Since March 2011, Syrian people have been exposed to horrific pattern of violations, including fatal torture, rape of men and women, and death by barrel bomb and Scud missiles and chemical weapons.

In its March 2019’s annual report, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated that 223,161 civilian were killed in Syria since the start the revolution on 15-March-2011. The death toll included as much as 28,486 children and 27,464 women.

Syrian regime forces and Iranian militias were responsible for about 90% of the total civilian death toll or 198,409 killings in Syria. In addition, at least 143,176 individuals were still detained or forcibly disappeared (largely by Syrian regime forces of about 90%) at the hands of the main parties to the conflict in Syria till March 2019.

In December 2018, the observatory group said that at least a total 560,000 people were killed including civilians, Syrian regime forces and their supporting militias, and the opposition factions. The death toll included104,000 people tortured to death in regime jails.

In the lowest death toll during the 102-month war, 272 people were killed in September. A total of 134 civilians including 14 children and 10 women lost their lives. The 59-month airstrikes by Assad’s regime have so far killed 13,645 civilians including 3,150 children while more than 19,000 people including about 8,300 civilians were killed by Russian war planes since they began their military operation in Syria at the end of September 2015.

Human Displacements

Despite reduction in violence in many parts of the country over the past year, an estimated of 11.7 million people in Syria require multi-sectorial humanitarian assistance. According to the UN Humanitarian Needs Overview (HNO) 2019, there were still 6.2 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the conflict-ridden country.

As of 03-October-2019, United Nations Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had registered more than 5.6 million Syrians who had fled their homes to seek asylum in the neighboring countries. Turkey, 65.1% or over 3.6 million people, was the largest host countries for Syrian refugees. Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, and Egypt were the other leading host countries.

Children are the prime victims of Syrian war

Unicef says that children are paying the heaviest price of Syrian crisis. After eight years of conflict, every Syrian child has been impacted by violence, displacement, severed family ties, and lack of access to vital services. An estimated of 2.6 million children remain displaced inside Syria, while some 2.5 million children are living as refugees in adjacent countries.

2018 was the deadliest single year for children since the start of the war. Grave violations of children’s rights – recruitment, abductions, killing, and maiming, continue unabated. Unexploded ordnance is a lethal threat to the millions of Syrian children as about five million children still need humanitarian assistance, including nearly half a million in hard-to-reach areas.

Sexual Exploitation

Women in Syria are exposed to greater risks of sexual exploitation and sexual harassments as the Syrian civil war prolongs. Syrian women are increasingly becoming victims of rapes and forced and temporary serial marriages throughout the country.

UN Gender-based Violence Area of Responsibility (GBV AoR) Whole of Syria 2019 reconfirmed that GBV particularly sexual violence and sexual harassment, domestic violence, family violence against girls and women, and early-enforced marriages continues to pervade the lives of girls and women, especially adolescent girls.

The major types of sexual violence were rape, sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, requests in return for aid, child marriage, forced marriage, and serial temporary marriage. Population from all the Syrian districts of Aleppo, AlHasakeh, Ar-Raqqa, As-Sweida, Damascus, Deir-ez-Zor, Hama, Homs, Idleb, Lattakia, Rural Damascus, and Tartous were affected by various types of violence.

BRI is instrumental to realizing 'no poverty' vision

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)":
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-10-18/BRI-is-instrumental-to-realizing-no-poverty-vision--KSPWk1HvKE/index.html

Poverty alleviation is the topmost goal of the 17-Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) or the Global Goals (GGs) that were adopted by all the member states at the annual session of UNGA in 2015 as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the plant, and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030.

While October 17 marks the 27th anniversary of the United Nations’ International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, the world can rejoice the moment as a great success after wilting down the scourge of poverty from 36% in 1990 to 8.6% in 2018.

One country, which has truly aided the UN to volubly dash towards its top-priority ambition, is China. The Chinese phenomenal achievements in curbing poverty are the textbook lessons for the developing countries.

Sometimes, the poor in the developing or underdeveloped countries are presumed to be a liability or burden on their national economy. But for China, they were its strength.

China diverted all available resources and provided training to its poor people who were largely located in the country’s rural areas. The unique financial and technical investment on poor repaid China as the same population transformed the Chinese economy in the coming few years.

Through the unprecedented growth that continues to last, China shaken off 850 million people out of extreme poverty and thus was alone responsible for three-quarters of reduction in the global poverty since 1980s till to date.

Meanwhile, Beijing not only doubled the global GDP in purchasing power parity (PPP) to $121.062 trillion between 1990 and 2018 but also upturned its own GDP-PPP by a staggering over 1200% to $22.544 trillion. Chinese economy at GDP-PPP now accounts for about 19% of the global economy after superseding the United States in 2013.

As of 2018, Beijing’s economy was 25% bigger than the America’s $18.217 billion. And at the same time by the end of 2018, the number of people below poverty in Chinese rural areas had decreased to 16.6 million only from 770 million in 1978.

With this substantial contribution of over 70% to the global cause, Beijing is set to deliver on the top UN goal 2020, 10 years ahead of the scheduled 2030.

The miracle of purging poverty wasn’t restricted to China as it continued to emerge as the leading contributor to the global poverty reduction. In the past three decades, the unrivaled Chinese triumph against poverty enormously helped the world to pull more than one billion out of extreme poverty (below the income of $1.90).

Because of China’s success in poverty eradication, the poor headcount ratio in its region East Asia and Pacific was dropped from 73.1 million in 2013 to 47.2 million in 2015 – that was more than 35.4%, the largest in the regions across the globe.

While according to the most recent estimate, in 2015, 10% of the of the world population was still living below the poverty line – Vice President of the World Bank’s East Asia and Pacific Victoria Kwakwa sought China’s support to build group’s knowledge and capabilities and to transfer China’s magical development lessons to other countries.

China, as a key driver of the declining global poverty, is always inclined to share its expertise and experience with the international financial bodies and the global countries world so that more than 700 million people worldwide could be lifted out of absolute poverty.

Since 629.7 million people or about 86% of the global poor live in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa and while extreme poverty has almost doubled in Middle East and North Africa (MENA), China’s Belt and Road Initiative could critically slice down the poor headcount in these regions, which are threatening to be wedged in extreme poverty.

More than half of the extreme poor live in Sub-Saharan Africa and their number is expected to increase by 9 million, adding to 413 million already living at less than $1.90/day in 2015. If the trend continues, nearly 9 out of 10 extreme poor will be in Sub-Saharan Africa.

As Chinese BRI projects in Pakistan would potentially see additional reductions in extreme poverty by 1.1 million people and by 200,000 people in Bangladesh, Sub-Saharan African countries could cut their rolling poverty crisis through Chinese infrastructure and transport projects in the region.

The World Bank’s report in June noted that BRI could speed up economic development and reduce poverty in dozens of developing countries. The analysis further found that the initiative’s transport project alone has the potential to lift 7.6 million people from extreme poverty and another 32 million even from moderate poverty (those earning less than $3.2/day), mostly in the BRI corridor economies.

BRI projects unleash a vast opportunity to the nations in MENA, Central Asia, and Sub-Saharan Africa to increase their exports. The increased trade would inevitably result in higher job opportunities and would add thrust to the downfall of poverty in the regions.

China’s mega drive of regional connectivity and shared growth aims to promote global economy, creating new trade routes, establish of infrastructure, and ramping up trade relations – the paybacks will be grossly experienced by all the countries of the world, particularly in the form of reduced poverty in the developing countries.

The BRI is fully aligned with the UN sustainable development agenda 2030 as well and hence could accelerate its SDGs in the given timeframe. If all countries would participate in the joint advancement of BRI, the dream of “no poverty” won’t remain an illusion anymore.

Is Chinese international trade plummeting?

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)":
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-10-15/Is-Chinese-international-trade-plummeting--KOJIFzAL0k/index.html

Going through “psychoanalysis” of the foreign economists about the Chinese economy, it appears as if China’s exports and imports were horribly cowed amidst the growing China-US trade tensions albeit the latest lull between the two sides after US President Donald Trump outlined the first phase of the trade deal and suspended the looming tariff hike on Chinese goods.

No doubt, China’s exports and imports have witnessed a decline in US dollar terms by 3.2% and 8.5% respectively for September from a year earlier; however the fall especially of exports in yuan terms were far lower at 0.7%. Noticeably for the nine-month period of 2019, export figures in US dollar were roughly flat at -0.1% while they actually picked up the pace in yuan terms by 5.2%.

In addition beating all the analysts’ forecasts, China trade surplus was inflated by 1.8% or $4.82 billion to $39.65 billion in September as compared to August, taking the year’s trade glut to $298.43 billion. It was 34.8% or $77.05 billion more than January-September 2018 trade surplus. Chinese economy, therefore, still was resilient enough to absorb the trade war shocks.

While the assessment by the USB economists expected “potentially significant job losses” in China’ market from December this year until March 2020, the impact is unlikely to hit the Chinese manufacturers as total trade and export of the second-largest economy in yuan terms rose considerably for January to September period.

In a news conference on Monday, Chinese customs spokesperson Li Kuiwen confirmed that China’s stable domestic economy had provided a strong cushion against external challenges however warned that the trade development in future is still “complicated and severe.”

Moreover, though China’s exports to the United States plunged by double digits (10.7%) in US dollars for January-September but its imports from its largest exports destination also fell by more than a quarter (26.4%). So the retaliatory tariffs on billions of dollars of each other’s goods, if harmed, should have battered both Chinese and American manufacturers and farmers and disrupted the global supply chains simultaneously.

China is a great contributor to the US economy. For the January-August period of 2016, China became the largest goods trading partner of the US surpassing Canada. But for the same period of 2019 when China was pushed down to become third-largest US trading partner, American economy failed to report a trade growth.

Instead the US economy suffered a significant blow as its eight-month total trade and exports withered for the first time since 2016. Thus, the strong China-US trade ties are a guarantee to more burgeoning American economy.

US trade data authenticates that China was not the only country that endured a decline in the US dollar-angled trade. Likewise, the impact was not circumscribed to Beijing and Washington alone as in its updated projection on October 1, the World Trade Organization (WTO) slashed its global merchandize trade growth forecast by more than a half, to just 1.2% from its prior April’s prediction of 2.6% over escalating trade war and weakening global growth. The updated trade forecast was based on consensus estimates of world GDP growth of 2.3% for both 2019 and 2020, down from 2.6% previously.

Since Bloomberg’s global GDP tracker anticipated that the pace of expansion has relaxed to 2.2% in the third quarter of 2019, down from 4.7% at the start of 2018 and IMF is also likely to cut its global growth forecast on Tuesday from 3.2%, seeing a “serious risk” and “synchronized slowdown” – attributing the downfall to the Chinese economy and trade only vitally lacks the wisdom and weight. If occurred, the worldwide economic go-slow will affect all the countries of the world without fail.

As Financial Times and Brookings Institution’s co-produced Tracking Indexes for the Global Economic Recovery (TIGER) underscores that Chinese economy hasn’t suffered as much as the trade war was likely to, China has shown greater pliability to withstand the shudders by posting impressive growth in yuan-based trade.

Report added that the global economy is giving way to a “synchronized stagnation” and could slide into first recession since 2009, which again would not limited to China. It further said that the U.S. economy is presenting a “dichotomous picture.”

TIGER underscored that the activities of manufacturing and services sectors in the US were visibly going down over US trade tensions with China and the European Union (EU) and uncertainties about trade deal with Canada and Mexico. The US tussles worldwide altogether had “sapped business confidence, hurt corporate profits, and led to a contraction of business investment” on its land itself.

Accordingly, the diverse forecasts about the global trade and economy are not a threat to China only but to the entire world including the US and EU. These are the consequences of the needless trade frictions, China has been warning since long to avoid a potential global economic meltdown.

If the trade war continues, neither China nor the US will be the beneficiary of the arising outcomes. As the economies of the two countries are largely interdependent, any upswing in the trade relations will challenge the economic interests of both Beijing and Washington and the global growth, which is threatening to accelerate the slowdown and sliding into yet another recession.

CPEC hasn't slowed down, isn't a debt trap or sovereignty threat

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)":
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-10-12/CPEC-hasn-t-slowed-down-isn-t-a-debt-trap-or-sovereignty-threat-KJ3EIzBFT2/index.html

Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan hailed from an affluent family background and spent most of his peak years in Australia and England, however his vision to pull the millions out of poverty fascinated many Pakistanis to guide him through the top constitutional position in the country.

Khan is a great admirer of China, particularly the way Beijing lifted over 700 people out of poverty. He has always extoled Chinese President Xi Jinping’s provident Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and its Pakistani limb China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that aims to enhance regional connectivity, shared growth, and deepen the bilateral relationship.

In November 2018, the former cricketer and chancellor of University of Bradford, an author, a philanthropist, and finally a politician made his pioneer trip to China and expressed his desire to learn from the Chinese poverty alleviation model. During his visit, both the sides reviewed CPEC projects and uttered their satisfaction on its rapid progress.

Earlier this year, Khan again reached Beijing to participate in the 2nd Belt and Road Forum (BRF) and accentuated that BRI was a model of partnership, connectivity, and shared prosperity. Adding that Pakistan was one of the earnest and aflame BRI proponents, Khan piquantly endorsed CPEC and conceded that the fate-changer project had critically plugged the energy and infrastructure gaps in his country.

Just before he was set to make his third ride to Beijing in less than a year, a systemic campaign was deliberately launched to malign China-Pakistan relations by spreading the forged news about slowing down of CPEC by Pakistan to placate the US or China had halted its mega development plan’s headway over frustration of corruption allegations.

While Pakistan straightforwardly repulsed the murmurs that CPEC projects were decelerated over its alleged renewed engagements with the US and IMF, Chinese ambassador to Pakistan Yao Jing also derided the media reports avowing that CPEC was laid on solid foundation and “there is no slowdown in it.”

Prime Minister Khan forcefully toned down the libeled campaign by instituting a CPEC Authority that was purely meant for speeding up the CPEC-related activities in Pakistan. The establishment of an exclusive authority followed another landmark decision that granted 23-year tax concessions to the Chinese operators of Gwadar port and its free zone.

Amid thawing economic conditions and drying-up foreign exchange reserves, CPEC is the rare hope for Pakistan’s economy that has derived the largest foreign investments in the annals of country’s history. While it was entering into new phase of socio-economic development, poverty alleviation, agricultural cooperation, and industrial development – Khan’s ultimate China dream – accusing Pakistan for putting brakes on the momentous project was categorically farcical.

Job creation and poverty mitigation were two of the vital promises Khan had pledged to his nation while he was making inroads into Pakistan’s power corridors. During his fierce election canvassing, he had frequently quoted China as his role model for jettisoning poverty and opening-up new employment opportunities in Pakistan. So it was highly implausible for him to hold up the CPEC when it was getting onto a stage where Khan could have effectively realized his ambition.

The indictment stands annulled also because China has vowed to make Gwadar more valuable than Karachi – Pakistan’s premier industrial and financial hub – by making the coastal city the single largest contributor to the country’s national economic output.

Within the next seven years, Gwadar will provide roughly 47,000 jobs for the locals and would charm billions of dollars in investments whereas independent international organizations have also estimated that CPEC could create hundreds of thousands of jobs in Pakistan by 2030.

Fears about Pakistan suspending CPEC projects are out of question at this time, even if it was to appease US. In fact, Khan has recurrently ruled out any doubts about Pakistan getting into Chinese “debt trap”, being challenged its sovereignty, and slowing down of BRI’s crown jewel.

When provoked in his recent conversation with Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) to speak up against Chinese “debt trap” and how Pakistan would “retain its full sovereignty” after allowing China to operate on such a large scale – Khan bluntly said when we rose into power “China really helped us when we were right at the rock bottom.”

“They (China) helped…supported…by giving us fund for foreign exchange reserves…China has given us a preferential trade agreement where we can export to China at the same terms as the ASEAN countries.” Khan further stressed that China have never, ever interfered in Pakistan’s foreign policy and it was one country which the world could learn from.

During Khan’s recently concluded tour to Beijing, Chinese president rebranded the China-Pakistan relations “rock-solid and unbreakable” irrespective of regional and international environments. This was a renewed China’s willingness to push the unique relationship between the two countries to the new heights.

The Pakistan-China Joint Press Release, in which China reiterated that Kashmir issue is a dispute left from history and reciprocally Pakistan’s reaffirmation that Hong Kong is China’s internal matter and no country should intervene in internal affairs of China, tells how deeply the two nations are tied into an one-off and profound relationship.

Above all, Pakistan’s emphasis that CPEC was a transformational project, thorough assurance to the expeditious implementation of its projects, bilateral agreement to promote industrial and socio-economic development in the second phase of CPEC, underscoring the grant of various facilities to Gwadar port, and the common vision to speedily execute CPEC into a high-quality demonstration project of BRI completely deactivated the vile campaign that strived to scar the shatterproof China-Pakistan relations.

China-US technology war is around the corner

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared in "The Express Tribune":
https://tribune.com.pk/story/2075115/6-china-us-tech-war-around-corner/

While the Finance Committee of Chinese state council was deliberating on the importance to accelerate the opening of financial industry, encourage overseas financial institutions and funds to enter into the domestic financial market, and enhance the viability and competitiveness of Chinese financial system – Trump administration was reportedly mulling over the option to block small Chinese firms to enter into the US capital markets.

Although US treasury official Monica Crowley refuted the reports that Washington is considering such measures to prevent the initial public offerings (IPOs) of Chinese startups but the part of her statement “at this time” explicates a cloaked US intent to use the move as leverage in near future.

At a time when the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is rejoicing the 70th anniversary of its founding, it indeed wasn’t a gesture of goodwill from the United States and again implied a preemptive attempt to pile up pressure on China ahead of the looming trade talks.

But the shocks were strong as the major US stocks immediately stumbled after the news about delisting of small Chinese companies shook the markets. The technology-driven Nasdaq was hit the hardest that plunged by 1.18 percent.

Since the shares of Chinese digital conglomerates – Alibaba, JD.com, and Baidu –also dove 5.15%, 5.95%, and 3.67% respectively – the US intent apparently leaked its intent to take market feedback and to anticipate the potential repercussions of if it pursues the path of stopping the rapid growth of Chinese giants in the area of artificial intelligence (AI).

In July 2017, State Council released a three-step roadmap (by 2020, 2025, and 2030) to make China the world leader in AI by 2030. With the aim of expanding the AI industry to one trillion yuan, Beijing planned to set up an initial funding of 100 billion yuan alongside 10 public platforms for AI innovation, six demonstration zones, and 60 AI applications.

Last month, China choreographed the 2019 World Artificial Intelligence Conference that witnessed 500 global guests and more than 300 domestic and international companies to showcase their AI applications in the technology festival.

In the exhibition area of the conference, the “chip wall” not only demonstrated the most advanced chips and indigenously-built chips from Huawei but it was also draped with chips from several other Chinese unicorn startups such as YITU Technology, Cambricon, Horizon Robotics.

Since Beijing is largely reliant on US Qualcomm and Intel to meet its massive semiconductor demand, the Chinese pursuit of self-sufficiency in chips is hard for the US to swallow. Trump administration would, therefore, would try to root out any Chinese company that could challenge the US dominance in global chip market.

US concerns levitated last week after Alibaba followed Huawei and unveiled its chip Hanguang 800 for artificial intelligence. In addition, Alibaba is keenly focusing on using AI across the areas from shopping to healthcare while Baidu runs a research lab in the Silicon Valley to explore driverless cars.

Alibaba, Baidu, Huawei, and Tencent all are investing heavily on AI – something worrisome for the US technology companies and the Trump administration. US frights with the hefty funds allocation to research and development on AI, Beijing is rapidly narrowing the technology gap with Washington.

The panic was obvious when earlier this month the US technology chief Michael Kratsios warned the US President Donald Trump that China is speeding up its AI race to catch up America and could soon threat its dominance in global artificial intelligence.

Kratsios was speaking on a forum organized by Center for Data Innovation (CDI). It is the same non-partisan, non-profit research organization that previously found that the US is currently leading in four out of six categories of AI metrics (talent, research, development, and hardware, with China leads in two (adoption and data). China was nearly at par with the US on talent as well so both the sides were almost tied in the study conducted by CDI.

Trump’s tech head remarks coincides with another report by Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) which stressed that China is a major threat in emerging technologies including AI. It further noted that China is closing the technology gap with the US and it will soon be one of the leading powers in technologies such as AI, robotics, energy storage, fifth-generation cellular networks (5G), quantum information systems, and possibly biotechnology. The paper feared that Chinese rapid growth in the field of AI could quickly concede Washington’s leadership position to China.

While US Department of Defense (DOD) asserted in its AI strategy that China is making significant investments in AI for military purposes, there seems to be a broad consensus among all US State’s departments and research organizations to put brakes on Chinese AI boom.

Although global analysts agree “China’s ambition is unstoppable to become a global leader in tech” with or without trade war, Beijing still needs to be vigilant rather should be well-prepared for US-waged technology war.

Envious US attempts to clog China's path to technological advancement

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)":
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-10-09/Chinese-technological-advancement-has-matured-enough-to-be-clogged-KDbzMJhdy8/index.html

Courtesy of post-World War II devastation and high-skilled immigrants, US became undisputed global leader in innovation. From transistors to personal computers, from the development of internet to the evolution of smart phone, America was the frontrunner in worldwide technological transformation – Aspen Cybersecurity Group said in its recent report.

Although the successful launch of Soviet Union’s Sputnik-I on 04-October-1957 dropped “bombshells” on the US administration and shook the Americans as they witnessed a “red baby moon” orbiting the earth, however it eventually won the space race to ensure its technological dominance.

But the unrivaled US technology ascendancy is now fading quickly. Due to Trump’s restrictive and protectionist policies, the US has mislaid its technological leadership as it is not more a favorite destination of the highly-skilled and highly-educated immigrants who have been the beacon of the American technological advancement.

American physical infrastructure is aging and would need about $10 trillion in the next decade to restore its integrity, the study further said. In the proposed budget of FY2020, the Trump administration has sliced the foundational research funding by 10% and applied research by 14%. In contrast, China has doubled its research & development (R&D) spending to in the last five years and poured a record $254 billion in 2017 only.

The Findings by the non-partisan organization comprising former US government officials, Capitol Hill leaders, and industry experts distinctly emphasized that the United States has fallen way behind in technological race with other countries, especially China.

US has reached to the sort of embarrassing situation mainly as a consequence of unnecessary foreign military engagements in the aftermath of 9/11. Nonetheless, Trump has been trying to shroud the US failures by slating the Chinese economic “model” that is based on “intellectual property theft, state subsidies, currency manipulation, and forced technology transfer.”

But the history outrightly snubs the claims made by the US president. The fact remains since China never had any aggressive military ambitions or expanding its hegemony across the world, it diverted all its investments and resources on impoverishment elimination and forthcoming future opportunities in the fields of science and technology.

Years of the insistent Chinese labors paid off and China, with 22%, surpassed the US (10%) in producing science, technology, engineering, and technology (STEM) graduates. The increased number of STEM-educated employees allowed China to rapidly excel in the area of science and technology.

By capitalizing on producing highly-educated employees, increased spending on R&D of about $278 billion in 2018, and investments on future technologies – China’s has transformed itself from an agrarian economy to industrial dynamo in very short span of time, with hi-tech manufacturing up by 11.7% in 2018 as compared to the prior year.

The US now fears to concede its decades-old technology dominance to China. Nevertheless, Beijing has never claimed to pursue the global dominance though has emphatically implemented Made in China 2025 plan that continue to transform its transportation, telecommunications, and communications sectors, which has yielded world-class conglomerates such as Huawei and ZTE.

US frights about China’s replacing it as a global technology leader bared when the Trump administration slapped curbs on China’s technology giants, Huawei and ZTE. Thus, Trump’s antagonism and harsh rhetoric as well as the subsequent sanctions on these conglomerates had more of political repercussions than the so-called national security risks.

As the European, Japan, Korea, and some other emerging nations have also invested heavily in their modern infrastructure and India was the leading country that was producing STEM graduates – targeting the Chinese hi-tech companies only described how serious is the US is about perceiving China as its strategic competitor.

For Trump, it is his legitimate economic strategy to coerce Apple to manufacture its Mac Pro computers’ production in the US to rescue American jobs or direct $28 billion in aid to American farmers hurt by trade war. But if China subsidizes its industry to save jobs of millions of Chinese, Trump gives lame excuse that Chinese “model” was relying on state subsidies, currency manipulation, and forced technology transfer.

It was also quite surprising to accuse China – that is gearing up to lead the global innovation and future technologies – for intellectual property theft from the US, which now has an outmoded technology infrastructure. In fact, Trump is making all-out attempts to impede Chinese technological growth by preventing its tech companies from operating in the US.

But US acrimonious restrictions on Chinese companies are not stopping their sensational growth. As Huawei and other Chinese unicorn startups are lessening their reliance on the US and started to develop their own chips, Huawei founder and CEO Ren Zhengfei said that the company will soon start the production of US-free components 5G base stations after initial trials in August and September.

SO, Trump’s tech war on China is backfiring as the tactic has forced Beijing and Moscow to bolster their sci-tech cooperation. During Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visit to the Kremlin last month, both sides announced to upgrade their scientific and technological innovation cooperation.

In a joint communiqué signed by the two sides, China and Russia agreed to scale up cooperation in a wide range of areas from technology and innovation to trade and investment. As the top diplomats from Beijing and Moscow agreed to increase compatibility and interoperability of their satellite navigational systems BeiDou and GLONASS, the sides further agreed to better protect the intellectual property.

The deliberations about protection of intellectual property points the precedence Chinese technology has achieved now. Nevertheless again, China did not seek any dominance or pursue to catch up America but expects the US as well not to gratuitously sanction its companies in an effort to clog Chinese technological advancement.

The US role in fueling violence in Hong Kong

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)":
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-10-06/The-U-S-role-in-fueling-violence-in-Hong-Kong-Kz94MrCOGc/index.html

Western media is roasting Carrie Lam for activating “sweeping colonial-era” emergency law after the chief executive of Hong Kong invoked Prohibition on Face Covering Regulation in the Chinese Special Administrative Region (SAR).

In other words, the prejudiced western mouthpieces backed the violent protestors’ acts of using face masks to conceal their identity while they hurl petrol bombs against life and property; attack police officers, police stations, and vehicles; and vandalize MTR stations and government offices.

On Friday, the months-long outbreak of violence forced MTR Corporation to suspend its operations in Hong Kong as the public transport giant announced to shut down its Mass Transit Railway (MTR) services involving the Heavy Rail, Light Rail, and MTR bus.

Courtesy of violent protests in the Chinese autonomous state, MTR ridership has taken a severe toll as it became one of the biggest casualties. The patronage of its High Speed Rail (HSR) was sadistically downed by 30% to 36,900 per day in August as compared to last month.

MTR’s other services such as domestic, airport express, cross-boundary, and inter-city light rail and bus services have also plunged significantly. This would inevitably mean that Hong Kong’s tourism sector, one of the largest job providing industries, will be harshly wedged, resulting in enormous job losses to the local Hong Kongers.

As MTR is the most common source of transportation in Hong Kong with about 90% of the population travels through it, targeting the mass railway system alongside wide use of inflammable materials for protests show the radicals’ malevolent approach to trigger bedlam in the city.

Latest round of protests opposing the mask ban are absurd over the fact that if the protestors were peacefully organizing the rallies and assemblies (which they aren’t), they should have welcomed the newly imposed law to isolate the radicals from ordinary protestors.

But because the rioters have plans to wreak havoc in Hong Kong, they are differing with the proscription. Additionally, the raids and splinters of public properties and trains by dozens of black-clad protestors in August give a glimpse of where the fanatics are heading gradually.

The United States is certainly banking on the opportunity to coin angsts among the people of Hong Kong towards the Mainland China. Last month, two of Hong Kong-based “pro-democracy activists” Joshua Wong Chi-fung and Denise Ho Wan-see testified before US Congressional-Executive Committee on China (CECC) to seek support by passing the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act.

Republican senator Rick Scott’s recent accusation on Lam and establishment leaders “who are nothing more than puppets for Beijing and President Xi (Jingping)” – in response to Lam’s letter that conveyed her grievances about the controversial Act as an amendment to US-Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992 - spells out more profounder doubts about US intervention in Hong Kong.

Scott’s remarks were outrageous as Lam invited his attention to the fact that the amendment would hurt the US interests as well given that US had trade surplus of $297 billion with Hong Kong over the past decade as well as there were about 1,400 American firms and 85,000 US citizens in the city.

Earlier in July, the US sent a defiant signal to Beijing by arranging several high-level meeting of media tycoon and “democracy advocate” Jimmy Lai with US top officials. Lai met national security advisor John Bolton (now sacked), vice president Mike Pence, secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and Republican senators Ted Cruz, Cory Gardener, and Rick Scott. He is now pushing the Hong Kongers to trigger further chaos by chanting “They are determined to fight and some of them are prepared to die for it (dream of universal suffrage).”

While Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi also welcomed Wong and Ho to the Capitol in September, lauded them “for challenging the conscience”, and urged the US government not to let “commercial interests” to drive foreign policy in the region – the series of the events strongly ratifies China’s claim of foreign intervention in its internal matters.

However despite all these provocative steps, the Hong Kong campaign lacks the legitimacy that is fundamentally required for a popular movement. For any rights movement to succeed, it requires an upright leadership, support from broad segment of the society, and peaceful pursuance of the cause.

But the Hong Kong “pro-democracy” campaign gravely lacks all the three crucial and basic components. While protests have never been peaceful and a large majority of the people has rebuffed the violent calls – the “pro-democracy activists” have largely relied on foreign countries, which for the people of Hong Kong is no less than an act of treachery. In the given conditions, the movement for democracy is largely counterfeited and evil-driven with foreign interference hence its fate is bound to nosedive.

After arrived back in late September, Ho accused police for turning down his requests even though “it is in our rights to peacefully assemble” but the subsequent incidents and the retrieval of inflammable and dangerous explosives wholly described their subversive veiled intents.

While the supposed “pro-democracy activists” insisted that their plea was neither a petition for a foreign interference nor was it for Hong Kong independence but for human rights, democracy, and freedom to choose – flinging of petrol bombs, interruption of Mass Transit Railway stations, and injuries to at least 25 policemen enlightened the plan that was devised in Washington to trigger mayhem in Hong Kong.

Foreign handlers of “pro-democracy activists” are desperate to fuel the violence in Hong Kong so that they could openly meddle in China’s internal affairs. The latest recovery of explosive weapons and dangerous implants by the city police tells their veiled plans to disrupt the Chinese national day celebrations.

Wang’s nimble response to Trump’s belligerence

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my articles (unedited) that first appeared in "Daily Times":
https://dailytimes.com.pk/479551/wangs-nimble-response-to-trumps-belligerence/

The state councilor and foreign minister of China Wang Yi exhibited his diplomatic brilliance at United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) and smartly rebuked Trump’s prior rhetoric against China in addition to touching several other global issues ranging from development to protectionism and unilateralism, peace and justice, and climate change.

While reiterating that China will not ever be cowered by threats and or subdued by pressure when facing headwinds of protectionism, the top Chinese diplomat flabbergasted the attending countries and the global community by declaring to sign up with the UN Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), which regulates the global transfers of small arms, missile launchers, and warship.

Wang’s announcement for China’s accession to ATT contradicted Trump’s ricochet that his country would never ratify the pact. In April, the United States had officially withdrawn from ATT – a global conventional arms market of about $70 billion.

Earlier in August, the US president had also retracted from Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) and had expressed his intent to deploy such weapons in Asia to counter any possible threat from China and Russian. Wang warned “China is opposed to the deployment of land-based intermediate-range missiles in the Asia-Pacific.”

As a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and fifth-largest arm exporter and one of the five-largest arms importers in the world, China pledge to sign the ATT would help UN to curb irresponsible and illicit global arms trafficking.

It would also give impetus to UN drive of peace and security, one of the global issues for which UNGA was originally established for and now serves as one of the major organs of the UN.

Insightfully reacting to Trump’s belligerence over China-US trade frictions that have inflicted losses largely to the US, Wang underscored that through Chinese unique economic system – “850 million Chinese have been shaken off poverty and hundreds of millions have joined the middle-income group.”

On Tuesday, the US President Donald Trump niffed the aromatic world stage by rekindling his attacks on China’ economic model accusing it was “dependent on massive market barriers, heavy state subsidies, currency manipulation, product dumping, forced technology transfers and the theft of IP, and trade secrets on a grand scale.”

Wang’s remarks were backed by some palpable evidence. China has made remarkable achievements in social development, particularly poverty alleviation. As the numbers amount to about three-quarters of the global poverty, China has contributed significantly in meeting United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be realized by 2030. In just five years from 2012 to 2017, 70 million people were rooted out of poverty.

As Chinese poverty alleviation statistics are validated by many international financial organization, Trump should had admired China’s efforts for lifting millions of people out of poverty but since the US president is suffering from Sinophobia, he exploited the global podium for decrying Chinese economic system.

Trump’s rancor towards China is not new. Several times in the past, he has expressed his antipathy for Beijing. While economic and political gurus believe that he mainly addressed his domestic audience in the speech rather the global issues, the US president also used the deliberation dais to bully countries with which he is pursuing a trade deal.

The US president further championed that Beijing wants to make a deal badly because they are losing their jobs, their supply chains are going to “hell” and companies are moving out of China.

Indeed, he lashed hard at China in an attempt to build pressure on China before next round of talks but he was intimidating to other countries as well to expedite a trade covenant with him or he would hit them hard with his tormenting speechifying.

China, at least, did not seem impressed at all from Trump’s onslaught. Beijing’s decision to waive off tariffs on some of the US goods and increase purchases from Washington was a good will gesture to pave the way of reconciliation in the worsening trade war between the two largest economies of the world.

By reaffirming Chinese commitment to resolve all trade disputes with Washington “in a calm, rational, and cooperative manner” – Wang, in fact, neatly watered-down Trump’s harsh tone and brushed away his bombasts at China by his elegant diplomatic skills. His comments showed that China is still pliant to hearing the US gripes that is why it is willing to buy more US products.

Inopportunely, Trump painted Chinese tensions-moderating move as its faintness. Since long, Beijing has been trying to make US realize that the trade war would not errand either of the two countries or the global economy. It is Trump himself who is inconsistent in his approach as he has a legacy of first pleading trade deals and once China is agreed, he disrupts the whole resolution process by his hardnosed tendency.

It is not just China which is the “punching bag” of Trump’s pomposities. In order to vindicate his “America first” mantra, he has not spared even the US closest allies such as Japan and the US partners in Europe.

Trump hasn’t yet understood that making America great again does not necessarily mean that he must force the economies of other countries to spoil. Trump can still transpire his MAGA rhyme into reality by embracing the conformist diplomatic and political channels.

Wang’s nimble reaction had some diplomatic tutorial for the US president who is frantically looking to dominate the world through his coercive economic and military policies. By calling for revival of Iran nuclear deal, urging the Gulf countries to carry out dialogue and consultation, peaceful resolution of Kashmir dispute, and pressing to bolster the political settlement of Korean peninsula – Wang truly represented China and the global community, the noble cause that was partially spoiled by Trump’s pessimistic linguistic.

Patriot’s discomfiture swarms Trump to call for a diplomatic solution with Iran

By: Azhar Azam

*This is one of my articles (unedited) that first appeared in "Daily Times":
https://dailytimes.com.pk/477799/patriots-discomfiture-swarms-trump-to-call-for-a-diplomatic-solution-with-iran/

Pentagon avers that the Patriot air and missile defense system, Patriot Advance Capability-3 (PAC-3), has a proven combat record as it demonstrated its effectiveness and the lethality during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003.

Shortly after Operation Desert Storm in 1991, the US had made such an assertion about an earlier version of Patriot, claiming that it had intercepted 95% of Iraqi Scuds. But US army latter shredded its forecast to 79% and 40% about Saudi Arabia and Israel respectively. US GAO report found an even lowlier success rate and concluded that Patriot could destroy only 9% of the targets while Israeli Defense Force gauged its efficacy at barely 2%.

That was the same war when a conventionally-armed Iraqi Scud missile shirked the ‘cutting edge’ Patriot defense systems to strike a US barrack in Saudi Arabia, killing 27 US service members – a single greatest loss of life during first Gulf war.

History echoed as on September 14, Patriot again abashed Washington after several drone and cruise missiles sneaked through the rich US missile defense systems’ net to hit the world’s largest oil infrastructure in Saudi Arabia, suspending more than a half of the Saudi crude production.

While the US sticks at laying the responsibility on Iran despite the Houthis has assumed the responsibility of the abysmal assault – Washington is yet to delineate how exactly Houthis or even their Iranian backers were able to rush through the most advanced American defense shields.

Riyadh is the largest buyer of American weapons and only in 2018, it spent an estimated of $67.6 billion on arms purchases from the US including six battalions of US-made Patriot missiles and associated radars. In two separate deals in October 2014 and July 2015, Saudi Arabia had agreed to buy Patriot (PAC-3) for a total of $7.15 billion.

When asked why Saudi forces, shrouded with Patriot missiles, could not deter the ordinary drone attacks – US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo failed to come up with a valid argument and he stooped the critical inquiry stating “We have seen defense systems all around the world have mixed success.”

Pompeo perhaps overlooked that Patriot is an unrivaled and top-notch defense system with ‘near-perfect accuracy and peerless capability’ around the world. And Patriot’s failure to protect the principal strategic asset of a US ally and world’s largest energy supply sorely exposes its vulnerabilities against the orthodox unarmed aerial vehicles (UAVs).

As Patriot had botched to detect and destroy a Houthi-fired missile at Riyadh airport two years ago and Aramco pipeline in May, Saudi Arabia should court and probe US how can it entrust Patriot the responsibility of sheltering Aramco and other strategic facilities that serve the role of spine in its economy and defense.

In order to defy Riyadh’s intense displeasure over pitiful Patriots’ performance, the US could classify the blitzes in the weaknesses in Saudi domestic defense system. But such an effort would litter since the US 2019 Missile Defense Review has already endorsed that Saudi Arabia alongside Kuwait and UAE have successful combat experience with the Patriot system.

So, the blame of Saudi recent oil infrastructure upheaval has to be placed on Patriot missile defense system. Patriot was always susceptible against cruise missiles and drones that can fly closer to earth and the curvature of earth makes them harder to spot unless the radar is elevated.

The dismal Patriot’s recital would additionally dull the US bid to vend its THAAD systems to the several countries in Gulf including Saudi Arabia. THAAD has a longer-distance radar than Patriot but since it is more expensive and the fact that it can engage only from small to intermediate-range ballistic missiles, Riyadh will now definitely reconsider its decision to but THAAD.

Patriot fiasco derives a crucial outcome that in the event any future conflagration, the armed forces of Iran can seriously damage the gas and oil installation in Gulf, disrupting the global energy supply. As any military retaliation against Iran could trigger massive military firestorm in the region, the consequences would be too momentous to fathom.

Tehran is extremely irked by Trump administration’s ‘maximum pressure’ campaign that aims to bring its oil exports down to zero and with the newest US sanctions on its central bank, Iran has nothing to lose in a thinkable war. Therefore, Iranian vexation coupled with its impressive military strength could kindle a full-blown war in the event of any US military aggression on Iran.

That is why the US has pulled back from its prior hostile stance about a potential military retaliation against Iran and the US President Donald Trump is now saying that he “would like a diplomatic solution’” with Iran.

Diplomatic solution is emphatically the right solution that could impede the Persian Gulf to engulf in another military conflict and Patriot’s discomfiture has played a vital role in swarming Trump for a peaceful resolution.