Category Archives: US foreign policy

US decision not to punish crown prince puts us in grave danger, Saudi exiles say

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Dissidents decry lack of sanctions for Mohammed bin Salman over Khashoggi killing and warn of ‘permanent impunity’ for Saudi heir

Exiled dissidents who have been warned about threats against them by Saudi Arabia said they have been put in greater danger by the Biden administration’s decision to forgo direct sanctions on Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – even as US intelligence agencies acknowledged that he was complicit in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

The activists, including some who have previously been warned that they were possibly at risk of being hurt by agents of the kingdom, said in interviews with the Guardian that they believed the 35-year-old crown prince would be emboldened after the White House declined to sanction him.

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US refuses to say whether crown prince one of 76 Saudis hit by visa ban

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State department ‘not in a position to detail the identity’ of those on list as US under heavy criticism for failure to sanction Saudi heir

The US state department has refused to say whether Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is one of the Saudi officials subject to US visa restrictions under the new “Khashoggi ban”.

The ban is named after the Saudi dissident and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, whose murder and dismemberment in 2018 was approved by the crown prince, according to a US intelligence assessment declassified on Friday.

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Named, shamed but unscathed: Saudi crown prince spared by US realpolitik

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Analysis: The US has sanctioned 76 people linked to Khashoggi’s murder, but not Mohammed bin Salman, future king of a strategic Middle East ally

Friday was the day that Joe Biden’s vaunted drive to put human rights back at the centre of US foreign policy slammed, as such drives usually do, into the brick wall of great power realpolitik.

As it had promised, the new administration obeyed the law laid down by Congress and ignored by its predecessor. It published an unclassified summary of the intelligence assessment that the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, “approved” the murder and dismemberment of the Saudi reformer and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.

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Iran threatens to quit IAEA pact over censure from west

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US seeking resolution to express ‘deepening concern’ over Tehran’s cooperation with UN nuclear agency

Iran has threatened to pull out of a deal struck with UN weapons inspectors last weekend if western countries go ahead with plans to censure it over its failure to cooperate fully with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Western leaders are planning to table a motion at the IAEA next week condemning Iran for pulling out of the overarching agreement with the UN body giving inspectors access to its nuclear sites.

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Jamal Khashoggi: Biden faces calls to ‘strike a blow’ for Saudi human rights

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President Biden to call King Salman as his administration prepare to release intelligence report expected to implicate crown prince

Joe Biden is expected to call Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, as his administration prepares to release a declassified intelligence report that many experts expect will name the royal’s son and heir as complicit in the grisly murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

The White House confirmed on Wednesday that Biden’s call to the 85-year-old ruler would take place “soon” and that the declassified report on Khashoggi’s murder was being readied for release. Biden is insisting that he speak only to the king.

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IAEA and Iran strike three-month deal over nuclear inspections

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Agreement paves way for diplomatic talks between Tehran and the US over sanctions

The UN’s nuclear inspectorate has struck a three-month deal with Iran giving it sufficient continued access to verify nuclear activity in the country, opening the space for wider political and diplomatic talks between Tehran and the US.

Iran will go ahead with its threat to withdraw this week from the additional protocol, the agreement that gives inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) intrusive powers.

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Joe Biden to meet Justin Trudeau of Canada after Keystone pipeline order

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  • Allies seek to turn page on strains of Donald Trump era
  • Oil permit revocation and US goods order complicate picture

Joe Biden will hold his first bilateral meeting with the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, on Tuesday, the White House said on Saturday.

Related: Alberta leader says Biden's move to cancel Keystone pipeline a 'gut punch’

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Australia should resist the march of autocracy, but there will be consequences | Jonathan Pearlman

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The old world order is ending. The challenge for Australia is that the driving force behind the change is China, a country so crucial to our future in Asia

In June 1987, a group of world leaders met in Venice to plan global economic policy for the 21st century. The leaders represented seven of the eight wealthiest countries in the world; the Soviet Union was excluded.

Addressing the summit, US president Ronald Reagan described the Soviet Union as an example of “how not to run a country”. But he was less hostile towards China, which was then the world’s ninth-largest economy, just ahead of Spain.

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Biden assures US allies he will reverse Trump’s policies and legacy

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President says US will have to work to earn back the trust of its allies in video remarks to the G7 and Munich Security Conference

Joe Biden has pledged “unshakable” US support for the transatlantic alliance in what he portrayed as an epoch-defining struggle to safeguard democracy.

Biden used his virtual debut on the world stage on Friday, in videoconference remarks first to the G7 and then the Munich Security Conference, to assure America’s allies of his determination to bury the legacy left by his predecessor.

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Iran nuclear deal hangs in balance as Tehran turns screw on US

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Western foreign ministers to discuss response to Iranian plan to ban snap intrusive inspections

The future of the Iran nuclear deal is hanging in the balance as the west prepares its response to Iranian plans to increase pressure on Washington by banning snap intrusive inspections of its nuclear sites.

The German, French and British foreign ministers are to confer urgently with the US secretary of state, Tony Blinken, on how to respond to Iran’s plans, which it is expected to implement on Tuesday.

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Biden seeks to sideline Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

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The new US administration has signalled it expects the desert kingdom to ‘change its approach’ in a break with Trump policy

The Biden administration has said it expects Saudi Arabia to “change its approach” to the US and signalled that it wants to minimise any direct contact between the president and the country’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

The stance marks an abrupt change compared with the Trump administration, which showered the young heir with attention and praise. It comes as intelligence officials are preparing to release – possibly as early as next week – a declassified report to Congress that will describe its assessment of the crown prince’s alleged culpability in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the US-based Washington Post journalist who was killed by Saudi officials in 2018.

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After rocket attack, Biden faces first real test on Iran

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Analysis: Fiery rhetoric of Trump era is gone, but flare-up in northern Iraq is a microcosm of tension to come

Joe Biden faces his first real test with Iran. A barrage of 15 rockets in northern Iraq that struck a US base, killing a military contractor and wounding a soldier, were likely aimed as much at testing the new president’s mettle as they were at causing damage.

In the hours after the attack on Erbil airport, where much of the remaining US presence in Iraq is based, a Shia group loyal to Iran felt emboldened enough to claim it. Although the boast was from a hitherto unknown group, it left no doubt who was behind the first such barrage since Biden’s inauguration.

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Erdoğan vows to expand fight against PKK after deaths of 13 hostages

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More than 700 alleged supporters of Kurdish militants held following failed attempt to rescue Turkish soldiers and police

The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has vowed to expand operations against the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) as the fallout from the deaths of 13 Turkish soldiers and police officers abducted by the militant group continued to reverberate at home and abroad.

The bodies of 13 victims, 12 shot in the head and one who died of a bullet wound to his shoulder, were discovered in a cave complex in Gare in Kurdish-run northern Iraq during a Turkish military operation designed to free them, officials said on Sunday. The PKK said the hostages had been killed in Turkish airstrikes.

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Rocket attack on US airbase in Iraq kills civilian contractor

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Eight others injured in blast that is expected to be first serious test of Joe Biden’s Iran policy

A rocket attack on a US airbase in the Kurdish region of Iraq has killed one civilian contractor and injured nine other people, sparking fears of escalation in the first serious test of Joe Biden’s policy towards Iran.

A volley of approximately 14 rockets was fired at the base hosting US troops next to the airport in the region’s main city of Erbil late on Monday, which witnesses told local television appeared to come from an area to the south.

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China hits back after US expresses ‘deep concerns’ over WHO Covid-19 report

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  • Biden administration requests data from early days of outbreak
  • China’s Washington embassy rejects accusations of interference

China has fired back at the US over allegations from the White House that Beijing withheld some information about the coronavirus outbreak from World Health Organization investigators.

The White House on Saturday called on China to make data from the earliest days of the Covid-19 outbreak available, saying it had “deep concerns” about the way the findings of the WHO’s Covid-19 report were communicated.

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The Good American review: Bob Gersony and a better foreign policy

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Robert D Kaplan’s outstanding book makes a strong case for US engagement based on human rights and helping refugees

What adjective should describe “the American” active in foreign policy? Graham Greene chose “quiet”, as his character harmed a country he did not understand. Eugene Burdick and William Lederer used “ugly”.

Robert D Kaplan, one of America’s most thoughtful chroniclers of foreign affairs, proposes “good” to describe Bob Gersony, who in “a frugal monastic existence that has been both obscure and extraordinary” has devoted his life to using the power and treasure of the US to serve others through humanitarian action.

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US government appeals UK ruling against Julian Assange’s extradition

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Justice department confirms Joe Biden intends to have WikiLeak’s co-founder stand trial in US

The US government has appealed a UK judge’s ruling against the extradition of the WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange, according to a justice department official.

The appeal made clear that Joe Biden intends to have Assange stand trial on espionage- and hacking-related charges over WikiLeaks’ publication of hundreds of thousands of US military and diplomatic documents.

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Biden raises Taiwan and human rights with Xi Jinping in first phone call

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The conversation came hours after the US president announced a new Pentagon taskforce on China

Joe Biden has affirmed the US’s tough line on China’s human rights abuses and regional expansionism in his first phone call with president Xi Jinping since taking office.

Xi defended China’s policies as matters of sovereignty, but told the US leader confrontation would be “a disaster”, and called for the two sides to re-establish the means to avoid misjudgments, according to state media.

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George Shultz obituary

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Secretary of state to Ronald Reagan who worked with Mikhail Gorbachev to help end the cold war

Many politicians and diplomats from the 1980s lay claim to a pivotal role in ending the cold war, but the former US secretary of state George Shultz, who has died aged 100, had a better claim than most. And he was not shy in letting people know, as he did at length in his 1,184-page account of his years at the state department, Turmoil and Triumph (1993).

When he became secretary of state in 1982 – a job he was to hold for seven years – relations between the US and the Soviet Union were at a dangerous low. The administration of US president Ronald Reagan was packed with anti-Soviet hardliners. Reagan himself in 1983 dubbed the Soviet Union “the evil empire”.

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