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The Weekly GAB Friday, December 7, 2018
U.S. Global Leadership Coalition | www.usglc.org
http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=Owh0EfaSjdqP4tGw_4nrQA

USGLC in the News

DEVEX
USAID Chief Lays Out a Trump Development Doctrine |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=tB1XPw96raactqtsSZasWw

Michael Igoe

In the absence of a clear development vision from the president
- and at a time when other Trump appointees are trying to put
their own stamp on American "soft power" through channels
such as the foreign assistance review - U.S. Agency for
International Development Administrator Mark Green faces a difficult
task: to advocate for his own mission, and on his own terms, but in a
way that will appeal to a skeptical boss... Speaking at the U.S.
Global Leadership Coalition's tribute dinner on Wednesday
- at which he was honored - Green harkened back to his
experiences as a teacher in Kenya three decades ago, and to his
students' desire for educational opportunity.

Who's in the News

POLITICO
Trump Picks State Department Spokeswoman for Top U.N. Post |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=BrjfgzwTVRjL6Hz9-H6UEA

Eliana Johnson, Nahal Toosi, Gabby Orr and Daniel Strauss

President Donald Trump has tapped State Department spokeswoman Heather
Nauert to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Trump chose
the former Fox News anchor to replace Nikki Haley, who is leaving her
post at the end of the month... Nauert accepted the position under the
condition that it would be downgraded from its current Cabinet rank, a
senior White House official confirmed on Friday, meaning Nauert will
report to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Pompeo "wanted
somebody he could work closely with and trusted," said a person
familiar with the issue. "Heather was that person."

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Congress Gets Tough on the Saudis

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=1lrsPmGkB5eF-nbthaAH2g

Sen. Lindsey Graham, (R-SC)

Last week the Senate voted to advance a resolution ending U.S. support
for Saudi Arabia's military campaign in Yemen. Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo warned against the action, saying the U.S. ought not
rebuke the Saudi government because doing so would threaten our
alliance and empower Iran. But the vote wasn't even close.
Sixty-three senators felt we couldn't remain silent while
America's interests and values are at stake. Regardless of
whether this resolution passes, it is important for Congress to signal
that there is no excuse for recent Saudi behavior.

THE HILL
Water Wars Won't Be Won on a Battlefield

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=DYAuvKiAYQFIT_n8lgMl1Q

Sen. Bill Frist, former U.S. Senate Majority Leader

Currently, 2.1 billion people lack access to safe drinking water at
home, and six in 10 lack safe sanitation globally. On the anniversary
of the launch of the first-ever U.S. Global Water Strategy, we must
actively engage water security as a strategic path for U.S. foreign
policy... I know from my 12 years in Congress that water is a place
where conservatives and liberals, Republicans and Democrats in both
houses, can and do come together. In fact, bipartisan congressional
efforts are the root of the U.S. Global Water Strategy.

Development & Diplomacy

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Renewed Hope for Peace in Yemen

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=qyTcgxnPR7dQMQD63QUh9g

Martin Griffiths, Special Envoy of the United Nations Secretary
General for Yemen

The people of Yemen have had enough. More than three years of war have
killed thousands, displaced more than 500,000, created a deadly
cholera epidemic and brought about 14 million Yemenis to the brink of
starvation... Over the past eight months, in my capacity as the United
Nations mediator in this conflict, I have repeatedly warned that it is
war that takes peace off the table. Peace has stronger prospects
today, and it is time to push forward initiatives to put out the
flames of the fighting.

DEVEX
High-Level Support for PEPFAR, with Budget Cut Proposals Looming |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=WEyF4lS2rDUzGhIb9yW6pw

Adva Saldinger and Michael Igoe

The United States Congress passed a bill to reauthorize the
President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and its mandate will
be extended through 2023 when President Donald Trump signs the
legislation into law, which is expected to happen soon. Despite a busy
end-of-year schedule, the U.S. Senate passed the bipartisan PEPFAR
Extension Act of 2018 late Wednesday... However, it does appear there
will be changes for PEPFAR. In his speech Thursday, Pence announced a
new commitment to increasing funding through PEPFAR to faith-based
organizations. The new investment of $100 million will increase
funding by one-third to faith-based organizations working on the
treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS, he said.

ABC NEWS

2nd Deadliest Ebola Outbreak in History Spreads to Major City, Raising
New Challenges for Containment |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=rkQrhFwEVUpwjHycy7ltUA

Morgan Winsor

The second-largest, second-deadliest Ebola outbreak in history has
spread to a major city. Butembo, a bustling city of almost a million
people in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, is reporting an
increasing number of cases of Ebola virus disease in the country's
current epidemic. There has been a "significant increase" in
infections there over the past three weeks, with a total of 25
confirmed cases thus far, according to Thursday's bulletin from the
country's health ministry... The health ministry said the "high
density and mobility" of Butembo's population presents new challenges
to containment efforts, already complicated by sporadic rebel attacks
on remote villages in and around Beni.

REUTERS
African Migrants Turn to Deadly Ocean Route as Options Narrow |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=pCP9LDxPae7kUzLaXLguig

Edward McAllister and Alessandra Prentice

Many migrants see the chain of islands off the Moroccan coast as the
only viable option left as the European Union spends millions of
dollars cutting off land routes through north Africa. They consider it
a launchpad for asylum in mainland Europe... Over 1,200 migrants
arrived in the Canary Islands between Jan. 1 and Nov. 14, Spanish
Interior Ministry data show, the highest in nine years and a four-fold
increase over the same period in 2017... "Managing... migratory
flows is very much like squeezing a balloon. When one route closes,
the flows increase on another," said Izabella Cooper,
spokeswoman for EU border agency Frontex. "The only solution to
migration is to eliminate the root causes: wars and poverty."

FOREIGN POLICY
U.S. Mulls End to Remaining Aid Programs for Palestinians |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=GjCTblgiwyQWq_xemvc3uw

Robbie Gramer and Colum Lynch

The U.S. Agency for International Development could shutter all of its
operations in the West Bank and Gaza by early 2019, a move that aid
workers and former officials warn could have devastating humanitarian
consequences and risk derailing the Trump administration's
long-awaited peace plan. The drawdown, described to Foreign Policy by
four U.S. officials and congressional sources, follows the Trump
administration's broad crackdown on support and assistance to
Palestinians as top officials led by White House senior advisor Jared
Kushner try to pressure the Palestinian Authority to strike a peace
accord with Israel.

THE NEW YORKER

A Year After the End of ISIS Control in Raqqa, a Ruined City Looks to
Rebuild |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=kcRhSt2oHhZkVUnM_cw9Mg

Seth Harp

For the past year, the State Department has overseen an effort to
clear Raqqa of mines and other unexploded ordnance through the Raqqa
Reconstruction Committee, part of the Raqqa Civil Council, a
provisional municipal government under the S.D.F.'s protection.
The work has been limited to infrastructure like dams, bridges, and
electric and water facilities, as well as hospitals and schools, but
progress has been slow... But work on the ground is largely
subcontracted to companies in Iraqi Kurdistan, which have the
wherewithal to clear the State Department's bureaucratic
hurdles... Local Syrians, mostly former S.D.F. fighters, do the dirty,
dangerous work of clearing rubble and defusing explosive remnants of
war, or E.R.W., as they're called in State Department parlance.

THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
U.S. Foreign Aid Is Small but Powerful |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=18g7h4MMJV4HeSQtPTElOg

Aleksandra Sirakova

You might think that the U.S. is already doing too much and spending
way too much money on foreign aid given to unknown countries in the
developing world. Why should you care about the world's poor
when there are so many problems at home? And even then, what can you
do? It may seem so overwhelming... The truth is, when everyone is
better off, everyone benefits. And investing in foreign aid
doesn't mean that domestic issues are overlooked. On the
contrary, aid is beneficial to the U.S. in the long term. Almost all
of the top countries that the U.S. trades with are former aid
recipients.

Politics & Foreign Policy

OMAHA WORLD-HERALD

Trade Conflicts Have Cost Nebraska Economy More Than $1 Billion, Farm
Bureau Says |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=8ohem1qHY1M-Dl9jbMITRA

Joseph Morton

Nebraska farmers have lost upward of a billion dollars in revenue from
ongoing trade conflicts, according to a new report issued Monday by
the Nebraska Farm Bureau. The hit to agriculture from the ongoing
tariff wars has been clear for some time, but the new report uses some
eye-popping numbers to illustrate the pain... "The total loss in
Nebraska farm revenues due to the retaliatory tariffs ranges from $695
million to $1.026 billion so far in 2018," Rempe said.
"That's roughly 11 to 16 percent of the export values of
Nebraska agriculture goods in 2017."

THE ATLANTIC
Can Nikki Haley Emerge from the Trump Administration Unscathed? |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=e2YLaj7hp2UZhlqRIcJCVQ

Uri Friedman

Who, exactly, is Nikki Haley? With just weeks left in her role as the
ambassador to the United Nations, I wanted to ask her one of the big
questions naturally prompted by her departure: Does she share Donald
Trump's iconoclastic, transactional, über-nationalist vision of
America's role in the world? ... Her reflection on her tenure at
the UN, and the moral calling that she felt underpinned it, was a
vivid reminder that the president's America First vision
isn't necessarily the settled future of the Grand Old Party. It
was also an object lesson in how Haley, perhaps more skillfully than
any other top administration official, has navigated major differences
with Trump while cultivating common ground.

AXIOS
Warnings Sound About Trump's Wobbly Truce with China |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=CFCw-vRY1ljHblJtxexkxQ

Jonathan Swan

Michael Pillsbury is worried Trump's negotiations with China are
unraveling. The hawkish former Pentagon official - who Trump has
called "probably the leading authority on China" and who reportedly
huddled with Trump in the Oval the day before Trump left for his G20
meeting with President Xi - said "there's a risk the deal will
come undone." Pillsbury said he's "getting warnings from knowledgeable
Chinese about the American claims of concessions" that the Chinese
have said they never made. These contradictions include U.S. claims
that the Chinese agreed to "immediately" address their most egregious
industrial behavior, to "immediately" restart purchases of U.S.
agriculture, and to slash tariffs on American cars.

THE WASHINGTON POST

Despite Pause in Trade War, U.S. and China's Economic
Relationship Is Forever Changed |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=e4UJC0mLZHEqFJDhT6LH8Q

David J. Lynch

The trade talks that President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping
launched this weekend have raised hopes for a peaceful resolution of
the trans-Pacific tariff war - but the economic relationship
between the U.S. and China has been permanently altered. Over dinner
following the Group of 20 summit Saturday, Trump agreed to cancel a
planned Jan. 1 tariff increase in return for increased Chinese
purchases of American farm and industrial goods... But almost a year
of heated U.S. rhetoric, escalating tariffs and tighter investment and
export controls have shaken Chinese government officials and global
business executives.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
China's Vow to Curb Fentanyl Won't End US Opioid Crisis: Experts |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=YD_L9xj0_OJi2JSRJ8Mu_A

AFP Staff

The US-China trade war truce includes a pledge by Beijing to tackle
another lucrative - and deadly - export: fentanyl, a potent opioid
ravaging US communities. The United States has pressed Beijing to do
more to crack down on the drug, as smugglers from China are suspected
of being the main suppliers of the narcotic, which is 50 times
stronger than heroin. At the weekend G20 summit in Argentina, China
agreed to designate any type of fentanyl as controlled substances,
with the US saying this would expose offenders to the maximum penalty
under Chinese law - capital punishment... But experts doubt it will
make a major difference.

THE WASHINGTON POST

Trump Sends Letter to Pakistan Asking for Help with Afghan Peace
Process |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=jXAqtm6psMhQ0OjVVt1CYg

Pamela Constable

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said Monday that he has received a
letter from President Trump asking for his government's help and
cooperation in advancing peace talks with the Afghan Taliban
insurgents. Both the Foreign Ministry and Information Minister Fawad
Chaudhry confirmed that the letter has been received. Chaudhry said
the U.S. president told Khan that relations with Pakistan were
"very important" to solving the Afghan conflict,
especially in helping to bring the insurgents to the negotiating
table... The Trump administration is eager for the peace talks to move
forward and the conflict to end after 17 years.

THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Senate Heading for Historic Vote to Pull US Military Aid to Saudi
Arabia |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=Wz0mo71xueiJjPBwWRIsYQ

Susan Ferrechio

The Senate could begin debating a measure as early as Monday that
would override the Trump administration and force the withdrawal of
U.S. support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen. The effort is fueled in
large part by a strong sense among lawmakers in both parties that the
United States needs to rebuke Saudi Arabia over the murder of
dissident Jamal Khashoggi. The Senate has never considered a measure
to withdraw U.S. military forces from an overseas conflict, and the
resolution would compel them to take such a vote. Many think the
Senate will take it up.


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