WBEZ | Yemen

Just one month after taking power, Yemen’s new president faces strong challenge from secessionist movement in the South

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 15:58:00 -0500

It seems the more things change in Yemen, the more they stay the same. One month into the presidency of Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, former long-time Yemeni leader Ali Abdullah Saleh remains the head of the leading party.

Saleh's sons continue to hold prominent cabinet positions. As a military offensive rages on in southern Yemen, more than 150,000 Yemenis have been displaced. Clashes between Hadi and Saleh supporters are prevalent. Daniel Varisco, professor of anthropology at Hofstra University, discusses the challenges Hadi faces.

Worldview 3.26.12

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 13:51:00 -0500

Yemen's new president, Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, has been in power nearly a month. He's facing trouble in the southern province of Abyan. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the fighting has displaced more than 150,000 people since militants seized several cities in the province last May. Worldview will discuss the humanitarian crisis with Daniel Varisco, professor of anthropology at Hofstra University. Also, Turkey’s Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has condemned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but has shown little action. One main reason is the Kurdish situation. Kurds make up only about 10 percent of Syria’s population, but they’re crucial to understanding the potential for more regional instability. Worldview discusses the Syrian-Kurdish role in the conflict with Ali Ezzatyar, a Kurdish-American attorney and director of the Berkeley Program on Entrepreneurship and Democracy in the Middle East. And, it’s been more than six decades since WWII’s end, yet Germany still battles the ghosts of its Nazi past. A recent spat of public crimes committed by neo-Nazis has made it clear the problem may be growing. Worldview talks with David Köhler, analyst and research consultant for the German non-profit, Exit-Deutschland. It run programs to help right-wing extremists leave the movement.

Attorney General Eric Holder speaks about targeted killings of U.S. citizens

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 15:33:00 -0600

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder broke the Obama administration’s silence on the legal justification for its decision to kill American-born al Qaeda operative Anwar al-Awlaki yesterday. In a speech at Northwestern University Law School, Holder said the decision to kill al-Awlaki in Yemen five months ago "is among the gravest that government leaders can face.” He justified the action as legal and sometimes necessary in the war on terror. Holder accused al-Awlaki of concocting plans to kill Americans, but he never explicitly acknowledged how the administration responded by targeting the cleric for death. Instead, the attorney general outlined a three-part test to determine the legality of killing targeted U.S. citizens. Worldview takes a closer look at Holder’s speech with our human rights contributor, Doug Cassel.

Along with change, Arab Spring brought violence, uncertainty

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 18:58:00 -0600

The developments of the Arab Spring keep on coming. In addition to change, the pro-democracy movement has created uncertainty in an already explosive region.

Yesterday, the U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights said Syria was headed for civil war and called on the international community to protect civilians. With a first round of parliamentary elections, Egyptians took another step toward establishing a civilian government. So far, the Muslim Brotherhood's political party handily beat the liberal bloc that dominated Tahrir Square.

Rashid Khalidi, a professor at Columbia University who follows Arab politics, tells Worldview about the Arab Spring's aftermath.

Yemeni leader steps down, but little has changed

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 17:11:00 -0600

Last week, Ali Abdullah Saleh’s 33-year rule over Yemen came to an end…sort of. In a deal brokered by the Gulf Cooperation Council, Saleh agreed to step down, handing over the reins to the country's vice president, who's tasked with fostering the creation of a national unity government.

While the moves are a positive step toward reform, President Saleh retains his title for up to 90 days. Nothing bars him or his son from a future in politics.

And the violence continues. Last week, security forces allegedly killed several protesters who demanded that the president not only step down but appear before an international criminal court. Today, the streets remain restive.

Charles Schmitz, president of the American Institute for Yemeni Studies and professor of geography at Towson University, provides analysis.

Worldview 11.29.11

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 15:30:00 -0600

After 33 years of rule, Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, handed over power to his deputy. Charles Schmitz, president of the American Institute of Yemeni Studies, says the move won't change much. This week, millions of Congolese voters headed to the polls despite widespread violence and reports of ballot stuffing, bribery and fraud. Worldview gets an update from Kambale Musavuli, student coordinator and spokesperson for Friends of the Congo. Also, Indonesian domestic workers in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other countries around the world often face horrific working conditions. Anis Hidayah, director of Jakarta-based Migrant Care, tells Worldview what's needed to protect Indonesians who cross borders to support themselves and their families.

Was the targeted assassination of American citizen Anwar Al-Awlaki legal?

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 16:29:00 -0500

Last Friday, U.S. forces killed Al Qaeda leader Anwar al-Awlaki in a drone attack in Yemen, along with U.S.-born propagandist Samir Khan. The State Department just issued a travel alert to Americans, warning of a heightened risk of violence in the wake of al-Awlaki’s assassination.

A dual Yemeni-American citizen, al-Awlaki was instrumental in spreading Al Qaeda’s message throughout the Arabian Peninsula through religious sermons and savvy online outreach. His death marks the most significant milestone in the war on terror since the killing of Osama bin Laden by a special operations unit in Pakistan.

But the manner in which al-Awlaki was killed raises questions. Has the Obama administration's armed drone program become the new standard for U.S. military campaigns? And is it legal? Does President Obama's decision to execute a U.S. citizen without judicial process set a precedent that will transcend his administration? And how will this assasination change relations between the U.S. and Yemen? The government has already accused the U.S. of disrespect for its repeated calls for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down. As Yemen's deputy information minister Abdu al-Janadi told Reuters, "The Americans don't even respect those who cooperate with them."

Mary Ellen O’Connell, a legal scholar at Notre Dame University and the vice president of the American Society of International Law, discusses the ramifications of al-Awlaki's assassination.

Video of Mary Ellen O’Connell discussing the drone strikes:

American professor gets rare glimpse inside Syria

Tue, 16 Aug 2011 16:02:00 -0500

A Syrian scholar, who is a long-time U.S. resident, says time appears to be running out for Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

Omar Dahi, who was born and raised in Damascus and currently teaches economics at Hampshire College in Amherst, MA, recently returned from a month-long visit to Syria and is one of the few western observers to report on conditions inside the country during the string of recent protests and government crackdowns there.

Syria has banned western journalists from the nation, and fear of government reprisal has made it difficult to get accurate information about what's happening on the ground.

“It’s not that easy to get information when you’re outside the country, because it’s widely presumed that all international phone calls might be tapped, so people are especially fearful of saying things over the phone," Dahi told WBEZ's Jerome McDonnell during an interview on Worldview. He noted those fears are present under normal circumstances, but even more so now.

That fear has also extended to difficulties among the organizers themselves. According to people Dahi met and spoke with, "part of the problem with organizing in Syria is the ubiquitous presence of the security apparatus," he said. "It's hard to know whom to trust." So most of the organizing among the protestors thus far has been taking place at the neighborhood level.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad remains in power, despite five months of his Baathist regime’s well-documented violence against pro-democracy protestors. Dahi still has friends and family in Syria, but given the government imposed media blackout, he wanted to travel to the country to see first-hand to see what is going on inside.

Across the region, Syria’s Arab neighbors are increasingly criticizing the government crackdown. The United Nations Security Council recently added their voice to the chorus, with its 15 member states unanimously condemning the regime’s human rights violations. Now, the world waits to see whether President al-Assad will fall under increasing international pressure or somehow survive Syria’s extended Arab Spring.

"The government is getting more and more isolated internationally," said Dahi. "They seem to think that if they can stall outside intervention, they can subdue the population into silence and then find a way later to deal with the fallout from the events.”

But Dahi notes that while the uprisings have largely been absent from Damascus and Aleppo thus far, there are signs of increasing protests in the neighborhoods and small towns around the capital city.

Mixed feelings, mixed results

In Damascus, Dahi found that, on the surface, city life appeared to be proceeding as normal. Markets remain open, and people are still going to work.

"It’s easy to get the idea that this is perhaps all blown out of proportion," said Dahi. But those daily routines masked a sense of unease, heightened by the widespread presence of security forces and security buses stationed throughout the city.

The Syrian regime has pointed to counter demonstrations in favor of President Assad as evidence that he still retains popular support among a majority of Syrians. And Dahi noted there's some truth to the claim.

"One of the things that was said about the pro-regime rallies is that everyone there was forced to go to those rallies," Dahi said. "That’s not quite correct."

While civil servants are encouraged to attend pro-government demonstrations - and are even given paid days off to participate - they're not the only individuals attending.

"There are many people who go there willingly, people who are fearful of change and, out of that fear, have developed a callous disregard for the crackdowns by the regime," said Dahi.

Even some people, who aren’t beneficiaries of the regime, feel that the best way to get out of the crisis is to let the government end these riots and support peace and tranquility.

"They are genuinely fearful of a chaotic civil war," he says. "It's the lesser of two evils. The people who would be identified as pro-reform [I spoke with] were very much fearful of the protests and felt that nothing good could come out of them for themselves or the country as a whole."

Inequalities raising fears, divisions

These fears have also extended to questions about the rights of minorities in Syria, as pro-government forces drum up fear that minority rights will be curtailed if another regime takes power. Assad himself is a member of the minority Muslim Alevi sect.

Dahi says he's seen little evidence of that, but noted that the fears are real enough among the population as a whole that "there needs to be a serious move by the opposition to show there's no room for sectarian tensions."

In recent years, Syria's economy has opened, creating more opportunity for some but also severe inequalities. That's given rise to opulent displays of wealth that previously were kept hidden. Both the real and perceived wealth disparities are a factor in the protestors' calls for reform.

“Domestically, the economic situation is very difficult," Dahi said. "When the protests started, the government announced a series of economic measures aimed at placating certain constituencies. And so the government has incurred a huge spending bill, while also spending on military and security forces."

Dahi also pointed out that since the protests began, Syria's tourism industry has been decimated, and the number and geographic size of the protests have increased.

"Time is not on the government's side," he said.

Dahi recently returned to the United States and blogged about his experiences. You can read Omar Dahi’s guest blog post on Syria Comment here.

With Saleh in Saudi Arabia, uncertainty clouds Yemen’s future

Tue, 07 Jun 2011 20:46:00 -0500

Four months of peaceful protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s government have become violent on both sides, and over 160 people have died. After President Saleh was injured and fled to Saudi Arabia, many thought it was time to turn the page, but now Yemen’s political future is unclear.

In Saleh’s absence, opposition groups are setting up a transitional government, and clashes continue to kill dozens in provinces outside of Sana’a. At the same time, new reports have Saleh more injured than previously reported. Clive Jones, chair of Middle East studies at the University of Leeds and co-editor of the journal Civil Wars, discusses the uncertainty in Yemen.

Analysis of President Obama’s speech to Arab world

Thu, 19 May 2011 17:27:00 -0500

Earlier today, President Obama gave a speech outlining US policy toward a changed Middle East. It was his first comprehensive response to the Arab Spring. He said the US would dole out fresh aid to countries in the region that support democracy. Additionally, he chastised Syrian President Bashar Assad for violently clamping down on protesters. We get analysis from DePaul University’s Laith Saud. Plus, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh rejected the US-backed Gulf Cooperation Council proposal that called for a transfer of power. Yemen expert Sheila Carapico discusses what's next for US policy in Yemen.