The Bush administration has forfeited legitimacy and credibility in the eyes of most of the world, crippling its capacity to engineer a breakthrough on the gravest problems on the international agenda, a senior German official argued yesterday.
In an unusually robust public critique of US foreign policy, Wolfgang Ischinger, the German ambassador to Britain, said the widespread collapse in confidence in the Bush administration offered Europe an opportunity to step up to the plate, setting a new agenda on the Middle East, global warming, the spread of nuclear weapons and other pressing matters.
Writing in the Guardian newspaper, Ischinger, a former ambassador to the US and ex-political director of Germany's foreign ministry, said a "European moment" was needed over the next several months, a period that coincides with Germany's presidency of both the EU and the G8 group of industrialized countries.
"Through the invasion and occupation of Iraq, Washington's international legitimacy and credibility have suffered," he said. "It does not make for pleasant viewing to see US leadership damaged and questioned. But expectations are low today regarding the ability of the United States to lead the international community toward solutions of the most pressing international issues."
He singled out the nuclear dispute with Iran, the challenges posed by global warming and the Middle East conflict as key policy areas where the US had been discredited and the EU can make a difference.
However, he also warned against EU "hubris" and made plain that the EU could not succeed by challenging or seeking to rival the US.
A ship that appears to be taking on the identity of a scrapped gas carrier exited the Strait of Hormuz on Friday, showing how strategies to get through the waterway are evolving as the Middle East war progresses. The vessel identifying as liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier Jamal left the Strait on Friday morning, ship-tracking data show. However, the same tanker was also recorded as having beached at an Indian demolition yard in October last year, where it is being broken up, according to market participants and port agent’s reports. The ship claiming to be Jamal is likely a zombie vessel that
Japan is to downgrade its description of ties with China from “one of its most important” in an annual diplomatic report, according to a draft reviewed by Reuters, as relations with Beijing worsen. This year’s Diplomatic Bluebook, which Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government is expected to approve next month, would instead describe China as an important neighbor and the relationship as “strategic” and “mutually beneficial.” The draft cites a series of confrontations with Beijing over the past year, including export controls on rare earths, radar lock-ons targeting Japanese military aircraft and increased pressure around Taiwan. The shift in tone underscores a deterioration
LAW CONSTRAINTS: The US has been pressing allies to send warships to open the Strait, but Tokyo’s military actions are limited under its postwar pacifist constitution Japan could consider deploying its military for minesweeping in the Strait of Hormuz if a ceasefire is reached in the war on Iran, Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Toshimitsu Motegi said yesterday. “If there were to be a complete ceasefire, hypothetically speaking, then things like minesweeping could come up,” Motegi said. “This is purely hypothetical, but if a ceasefire were established and naval mines were creating an obstacle, then I think that would be something to consider.” Japan’s military actions are limited under its postwar pacifist constitution, but 2015 security legislation allows Tokyo to use its Self-Defense Forces overseas if an attack,
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) yesterday faced a regional election battle in Rhineland-Palatinate, now held by the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD). Merz’s CDU has enjoyed a narrow poll lead over the SPD — their coalition partners at the national level — who have ruled the mid-sized state for 35 years. Polling third is the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which spells a greater threat to the two centrist parties in several state elections in September in the country’s ex-communist east. The picturesque state of Rhineland-Palatinate, bordering France, Belgium and Luxembourg and with a population of about 4 million,
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