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Please understand this BREXITERS This is not something that the EU is doing to the U.K., this is something that the U.K. has chosen to do to itself and to the rest of the EU they have opted to leave,

Posted on 7/19/17 | 12:26 AM CEST

Completely agreed all countries are better of the in the EU just look at a Greece. Right there is proof that EU wins at everything

Posted on 7/19/17 | 2:06 AM CEST

@Madhava Greece joined in 1981. Both GDP and GDP per capita are up since then. They are down since 2008, too. But the article was about how prepared the Brits are, or not, for negotiations.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 3:29 AM CEST

I am a veteran trade negotiator. he said

Yes a veteran for the EU which takes 10 years to do a deal. Nobody else in the world takes 10 years. And the EU has only done trade deals with economies much smaller than iteself, like Canada, and it still took 8 years.

Dont brag about EU incompetence. The rest of the world does not take so long.

@MLB nobody is thinking anything. We think the EU is incompetent which is why we left. We fully expect them to be incompetent whilst we are leaving.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 9:08 AM CEST

10 Years with WTO rules we will be able to rebuild our manufacturing base.

Then EU will want a Partnership Agreement with us.

Doesnt matter anyway Russia will take Kharkiv to Odessa very shortly and finally sink the EU they will sink quicker than the Bismarck as we say in Essex.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 9:38 AM CEST

Deals are always easy if you have a gun in hand and the other party not. They also dont last nor are they efficient. The Soviet bloc is a perfect example. If equal partners sit at a table you have to get to a consensus, a deal that everyone can live with. And that takes time. For Britain to say we are out but lets pretend that for those parts that suit us we are still in just doesnt work. Whitehall will find out that making decisions without consulting Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland will not work and I doubt that they will get it done in two years time. So they will have to take a hard exit and that will really let the dogs loose. Shooting off the hip may work in cowboy films but not in the real world just ask the USA.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 9:46 AM CEST

Actually, the EU is as responsible as others single market does not truly exist, as it is based on the EU definition that includes services, which does not truly exist. You only have to look at the single market to see that what has been in the interests of France and Germany has been taken into consideration. The current state no longer appeals to the UK as it is not in the UKs national interest, but rather than have a debate and make the EU stronger the EU refused to offer reform to DC and it subsequently led to the BREXIT vote. I wonder what will happen to free movement at the point that it is no longer of interest to France and Germany (remember the French are already putting limitations on French speaking for certain contracts and then there is the posted worker directive). Just think of the consequences when Austria close the Italian border and Turkey allow migrants to filter through just to ramp up the pressure for September all because of migrants (and in the Italy example, visa travel).

Posted on 7/19/17 | 10:18 AM CEST

Im not British, but very much a Brexiteer. Whatever deal is struck between Uk and EU, I demand a referendum on it. I will vote no.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 11:22 AM CEST

wow

Yes a veteran for the EU which takes 10 years to do a deal. Nobody else in the world takes 10 years.

Trans-Pacific Partnership Started negotiations in 2005, signed in 2016, eleven years, its main partner, the US, bails out in 2017 ASEANChina Free Trade Area Started negotiations in November 2000, came into effect in January 2010

And the EU has only done trade deals with economies much smaller than iteself, like Canada, and it still took 8 years.

Glad that you mention it, today Canada is running negotiations for FTAs with eight countries or associations, with India the negotiations started in 2010, no sign of a final deal, with Japan, thats five years now, with the Andean Community, well, that started out in 2007, with Singapore, those started out in wait 2001. And so on. Yes, a great big chunk of the planet does indeed take its time when negotiating trade.

Dont brag about EU incompetence. The rest of the world does not take so long.

Thats simply not true, examples of trade deals between two non UE countries taking a decade to be signed are legion. Whats impressive is that the European Union, twenty eight countries mind you, can actually behave like in such a way that those deals can be made and signed in roughly the same amount of time that takes the likes of China, the US or Japan.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 12:55 PM CEST

Thats fine, the EU gets its money settlement at the end of the process of agreeing the future arrangements. If it can wait, we can too.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 1:57 PM CEST

Sintra: the average time the US takes to agree an FTA is actually 8 months. Its actually easy when you try.

Posted on 7/19/17 | 1:59 PM CEST

@Sintra

It is not only the Brits that think this. Here are some headlines for you from around the world:

Canada walks out on European trade talks after impasse reached

If the EU cannot do trade, what can it do? The Economist

Canada is right to be furious about European Union trade negotiations

Whats the Matter With Europe? The New York Times

Francois Fillon blasts European Union as inefficient and useless

EU is inefficient, makes poor decisions: Shore Capital CNBC . com

Criticism mounts over the EUs inefficiency POLITICO

Decision-Making and Disarray in the EU Geopolitical Futures

Corruption across EU breathtaking says the EU Commission BBC News

EU covers up EU corruption Trade Union

Corruption costs EU up to 990 billion a year POLITICO

Is The European Union Too Big And Bound To Fail? Forbes

Cheerio then and start being a bit more sensible and stop being so over emotional for just one day will you please lovely europeans. Its getting tiring over here in the channel. Grow up maybe?

Posted on 7/19/17 | 2:26 PM CEST

Read the original post:
EU ambassador to US: UK doesn't understand Brexit - POLITICO.eu

PARIS (Reuters) - EU judges will have to decide whether Alphabet's Google has to remove certain web search results globally to comply with a previous privacy ruling after France's supreme administrative court referred the issue to the top EU court.

Google has gone head to head with CNIL, the French data protection authority, over the territorial scope of the so-called "right to be forgotten", which requires the world's biggest search engine to remove inadequate or irrelevant information from web results under searches for people's names.

Having been fined 100,000 euros ($115,000) by CNIL in March 2016 for not delisting across national borders, Google appealed to France's supreme administrative court, the Council of State, which on Wednesday passed the matter to the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ).

The tech giant has argued that a balance should be found between the right to privacy and freedom of expression, saying that such removals should not go beyond Europe and into countries with different laws on the subject.

French regulator CNIL, however, says that the removals must be global to uphold Europeans' right to privacy because experienced Internet users can circumvent the Google domestic domain where the delisting takes place.

"With today's decision, the Council of State believes that the scope of the right to be delisted poses several serious difficulties of the interpretation of European Union law," the French court said.

The dispute arose after the ECJ ruled in 2014 that search engines such as Google and Microsoft's Bing comply with the "right to be forgotten". Though Google did so, it only scrubbed results across its European websites such as Google.de in Germany and Google.fr in France, arguing that to do otherwise would set a dangerous precedent on the territorial reach of national laws.

Since 2014, weve worked hard to implement the right to be forgotten ruling thoughtfully and comprehensively in Europe," Peter Fleischer, Google's global privacy counsel, said in a written statement.

"Weve been defending the idea that each country should be able to balance freedom of expression and privacy in the way that it chooses, not in the way that another country chooses."

The CNIL declined to comment.

Last year Google also started delisting results across all its domains -- including Google.com -- when accessed from the country where the request came from.

Reporting by Mathieu Rosemain in Paris and Julia Fioretti in Brussels; Editing by David Goodman

View original post here:
French court refers 'right to be forgotten' dispute to top EU court - Reuters

wbur

Talk in the West Wing about using a private army of mercenaries to take over the war in Afghanistan. Blackwater founder Erik Prince is with us.

This fall will mark 16 years of U.S. troops in Afghanistan war in Afghanistan. Americas defense chief says were not winning. The Trump administration is looking for ways out of the box. One idea, with interest from Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner: hand the US Afghan operation off to private contractors. Mercenaries. Let them deal. Blackwater founder Erik Prince is all for it. Hes with us today. This hourOn Point: the mercenary option and Afghanistan. -- Tom Ashbrook

Joshua Smith,Afghanistan correspondent for Reuters. (@joshjonsmith)

Erik Prince, founder of the government services and security company Blackwater.Executive director and chairman of Frontier Services Group, a global private security firm. Head of the private equity firm Frontier Resource Group.

Sean McFate, senior fellow at The Atlantic Council.Professor at the National Defense University and Georgetown Universitys School of Foreign Service. (@seanmcfate)

New York Times:Trump Aides Recruited Businessmen to Devise Options for Afghanistan "President Trumps advisers recruited two businessmen who profited from military contracting to devise alternatives to the Pentagons plan to send thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan, reflecting the Trump administrations struggle to define its strategy for dealing with a war now 16 years old."

The Atlantic:The 'Blackwater 2.0' Plan for Afghanistan "Heres a crazy idea floating around Washington these days, outlandish even by todays outlandish standards: The United States should hire a mercenary army to fix Afghanistan, a country where weve been at war since 2001, spending billions along the way. The big idea here is that they could extricate U.S. soldiers from this quagmire, and somehow solve it."

Wall Street Journal:The MacArthur Model for Afghanistan "Afghanistan is an expensive disaster for America. The Pentagon has already consumed $828 billion on the war, and taxpayers will be liable for trillions more in veterans health-care costs for decades to come. More than 2,000 American soldiers have died there, with more than 20,000 wounded in action. For all that effort, Afghanistan is failing. The terrorist cohort consistently gains control of more territory, including key economic arteries. Its time for President Trump to fix our approach to Afghanistan in five ways."

This program airs on July 19, 2017.

Read this article:
Privatizing The War In Afghanistan - WBUR

Wai Yan Htun, 18, a member of Myanmars team who stopped to get the Afghans signatures on his shirt, said: We love them. Theyre like superheroes in this competition.

Colleen Elizabeth Johnson, 18, one of three teenagers representing the United States, said: Theyre celebrities here now. Theyre getting the welcome they deserve.

Before their first match Tuesday morning, the six Afghan teenagers were paired with the United States and four other all-female teams for a demonstration match for Ivanka Trump, the presidents daughter and adviser. Ms. Trump then spoke briefly to the crowd, applauding the students work and dedication.

For many of you who have traveled great lengths to be here, we welcome you, she said, turning to smile at the six Afghan girls. Its a privilege and an honor to have you all with us.

In the competition, teams of three, equipped with kits that included wheels, gears and two video game controllers, chased down blue and orange balls, which represented clean and contaminated water. In two-and-a-half-minute rounds, teams guided the robots to sweep the balls into openings based on their color.

Its way more fun, way more exciting than bouncing a ball, said Dean Kamen, one of the organizations founders and inventor of the Segway. Thats not a competition out there. Thats a celebration.

It was certainly a celebration for Roya Mahboob, a renowned Afghan technology entrepreneur who interpreted for the teenagers and came on behalf of her company, Digital Citizen Fund, a womens empowerment nonprofit that sponsored the Afghan team.

The six students were chosen from an initial pool of 150 applicants. They built their robot in two weeks, compared with the four months some of their competitors had, because their kits shipment was delayed.

Im just proud that we show the talent of the women, Ms. Mahboob said. We see that there is change.

The Afghan robot, named Better Idea of Afghan Girls, lurched across the terrain for the first round and skirted out of bounds, but 15-year-old Lida Azizi, a teal-colored braid dangling from under her white head scarf, flashed her teammates a thumbs-up as they cheered in Dari and applauded. As the competition progressed, they continued to make adjustments as they got used to driving their robot, an Afghan flag carefully attached.

While the team did not place in the top ranks overall, their final performance, they agreed, was better than they had hoped for. Team Europe took the gold, while the Polish and Armenian teams took silver and bronze, respectively.

I am so happy and so tired, Alireza Mehraban, an Afghan software engineer who is the teams mentor, said after the competition concluded.

Mr. Mehraban said the contest had been an opportunity to change perceptions about the girls country. Were not terrorists, he said. Were simple people with ideas. We need a chance to make our world better. This is our chance.

Yet with more than 150 countries represented in the competition, the Afghan teenagers were not the only students who overcame bureaucratic and logistical challenges to showcase their ingenuity. Visa applications were initially denied for at least 60 of the participating teams, Mr. Kamen said.

On Monday, with the news media swarming the Afghan girls, a team from Africa five Moroccan students who also got their visas two days before the competition huddled in a downstairs corner to repair their robot, which had been disassembled for last-minute shipment. An American high school built a robot on behalf of the Iranian team when sanctions on technology exports stopped the shipment of their materials kit. And on Sunday, the Estonian team built a new robot in four hours before the opening ceremony, the original lost in transit somewhere between Paris and Amsterdam.

But it was the Afghan team and Team Hope, which consists of three Syrian refugee students, that ensnared the attention of the competitors, the judges and supporters.

The high school students exchanged buttons and signed shirts, hats and flags draped around their shoulders. The Australian team passed out pineapple-shaped candy and patriotic stuffed koalas to clip on lanyards, while the Chilean team offered bags with regional candy inside.

God made this planet for something like this, all the people coming together as friends, said Alineza Khalili Katoulaei, 18, the captain of the Iranian team, gesturing to the Iraqi and Israeli teams standing nearby. Politics cannot stop science competitions like this.

During Tuesdays awards ceremony, judges awarded the Afghans a silver medal as part of an award for courageous achievement, giving gold to the team from South Sudan.

The crowd roared and waved flags as the teenagers accepted their medals and waved.

It was the first medal Fatemah Qaderyan, 14, of the Afghan team had ever earned, and through a translator, she explained that she planned to hang it in her room and show it to all of her friends.

I am so excited, and very, very happy, she said, turning the medal over in her hands. I still cant believe this happened.

Even after the team changed into traditional dresses and scarves for a reception at the Afghan Embassy, they kept their medals on. On Wednesday, they will tour Capitol Hill before returning Thursday to Afghanistan.

We dont have the words to say how happy we are, said Rodaba Noori, 16. So proud of ourselves.

Get politics and Washington news updates via Facebook, Twitter and in the Morning Briefing newsletter.

A version of this article appears in print on July 19, 2017, on Page A6 of the New York edition with the headline: Afghan Girls, Once Denied Visas, Win Limelight at Robotics Contest.

Original post:
Afghan Girls' Robotics Team Wins Limelight at Competition - New York Times

DARA-I MAZOR, NURGAL, KUNAR, AFGHANISTAN It is only a short drive into a side valley just off the busy main road between Jalalabad and Asadabad, the capitals of Afghanistans eastern provinces of Nangarhar and Kunar. The narrow dusty road passes fields of golden blades of wheat that slightly sway in the light breeze. Beyond the fields and the scattered verdant trees, barren craggy hills frame the valley called Dara-i Mazor in Kunars district of Nurgal. Across the small river, some of the traditional mud houses resemble tiny bulky castles, hinting at the fact that Afghanistans violent past dates much further back than the U.S. or Soviet-led invasions.

Behind a low farm house that lies quietly in the shadows of surrounding trees, there is yet another wheat field. But next to it several patches of land are covered in other plants whose single green stems topped by golf-ball sized pods rise above the bushy leaves at their roots. It is opium-yielding poppy.

Opium has an analgesic effect and is the base for morphine, heroin, and other opioids that are used for medical purposes, but also for illegal drug consumption. Afghanistan accounts for some 70percent of the global opium production, according to the World Drug Report 2016 of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Although poppy cultivation is concentrated in southern Afghanistan, it can be found throughout the country. And while opium production is more prevalent in ungoverned areas like Dara-i Mazor, it also exists in government-controlled zones, as security forces, often struggling to keep insurgents at bay, are hardly able to prevent poppy cultivation.

In Kunar, early May was the end of the short harvest season, which takes places right after the white or dark pink poppy flowers have withered and only the green capsules remain. This can be earlier or later in other regions of the country, depending on the local conditions.

The harvest itself is a labor-intensive task. Every single poppy pod has to be lanced with a tool with several tiny blades at its end. Once lanced, the opium latex immediately leaks out of the razor-thin scratches (in Dara-i Mazor the sap is a light pink, but experts say that it is usually white at first before it oxidates in the air, quickly turning to a pink and later dark brown color). The valuable latex is just liquid enough to drip out, but still gooey enough to stick to the pod and to not drop to the ground. Normally, the capsules are then left until the next day. However, given my short visit, the locals showed me right away how they skim the leaked-out opium from the pod with another tool that looks like a broad sickle.

Skimmed opium latex in a field in Dara-i Mazor (May 2017). Photo by Franz J. Marty.

One farmer, a young man with a neatly trimmed beard and pitch black, greasy hair, stated that about 60 percent of his fields are poppy. And this is not an exception. Asked for his reason to plant poppy, he said that he is forced to do it because other crops would yield little profit. This was also asserted by other farmers in Nurgal and Shigal, another district of Kunar. However, they dont claim that other crops would yield noprofit, raising the questionof whether they are only engaging inpoppy cultivation for the higher profits that no licit crop can possibly generate.

But according to Dr. David Mansfield, a senior researcher for the London School of Economics and the Afghan Research & Evaluation Unit who has worked on opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan for almost two decades, profit-maximization is not the driving force behind the decision. Afghan farmers would rather try to balance their livelihoods, secure a certain degree of food self-sufficiency, use their soil sustainably (which also means changing or rotating different crops), and mitigate risks of crop failures. Thus, the monetary profit is only one of many factors in the farmers decisions.

In any event, Mansfield asserted that in his years of experience across Afghanistan and despite allegations to the contrary he has never met a single farmer that was physically coerced into cultivating opium. Reports also often suggest that farmers are de facto forced to sow poppy as they are dependent on advance payments that they can obtain for the future opium harvest or have no other choice than to produce opium to repay loans. However, sources explained that the system of advance payments on future harvests has dramatically decreased in past years and also exists for other crops. And although economic pressure plays a role, according to UNODC, having outstanding loans did not emerge as a differentiating factor for cultivating opium since the percentage of farmers under debt or with outstanding loans were similar [whether they grew poppy or not].

Hence, the often-portrayed image that insurgents or mafia-like groups exploit the farmers weaknesses, forcing them to cultivate opium, does not match the reality. The decision to sow poppy is rather sometimes more, sometimes less freely taken by the farmers themselves.

Man skimming opium latex from a poppy capsule, Dara-i Mazor(May 2017). Photo by Franz J. Marty.

In the subsequent sale of raw opium the farmers are far from being at the mercy of a cartel. Farmers in Nurgal and Shigal stated that numerous merchants come separately to the farms to buy opium and that they would usually only buy a very few kilograms which is, even for a small farmer, only a fraction of his whole yield (according to the UNODC Afghanistan Opium Survey, in 2016 the average opium yield amounted to 23.8 kilograms per hectare). This makes opium even more attractive for farmers, as contrary to other crops they dont have to transport their harvest over often underdeveloped and sometimes dangerous roads to a market.

Asked about the merchants, farmers described them as independent actors that try to make a profit by reselling the narcotic for a higher price, but assert that they do not belong to any specific group or cartel. This was confirmed by an opium trafficker who asked to not be identified. It was also confirmed by two experts, who added that while there are certain regional differences the sale of small portions of the opium yield to several independent merchants is the norm across Afghanistan.

This does not exclude the involvement of some larger, more powerful dealers or even criminal networks. But they dont control the market and are just some among many actors. In this regard, the opium trafficker even asserted that bigger networks would usually only play a larger role once the raw opium is processed to heroin. This is, however, further down the chain and does not affect the farmers directly.

Given the above, the fluctuating price of opium at the farm-gate is not unfairly dictated by the buyers, but set according to various conditions of a rather free market. And even though it is a fraction of heroin prices on the end markets, it is still a small fortune by Afghan standards. UNODC put the average price of one kilogram of dry opium at the farm-gate in eastern Afghanistan in 2016 at $239. Farmers in Nurgal and Shigal as well as the opium trafficker claimed to sell dry opium even for 25,000 to 35,000 Pakistani rupees (about $240 to $335) per kilogram (the indication of Pakistani rupee is not out of the ordinary, as in parts of eastern Afghanistan, Pakistani rather than Afghan currency is the norm).

Raw opium from Dara-i Mazor (May 2017). Photo by Franz J. Marty.

Such prices are hard to verify though and might be flawed. Moreover, setting this into perspectiveis difficult. Compared to the monthly salary of an average Afghan worker in the capital Kabul, which amounts to around $200, opium sales prices appear very high. However, it has to be taken into account that those prices are qualified by significant production costs and that the farmers live in a different socioeconomic setting.

Be that as it may, farmers sometimes even hold back raw opium, which does not spoil, in order to wait for better sales prices yet another sign of a free market.

In view of all this and contrary to common perception, the opium sale at the Afghan farm-gate is not in the iron grip of the Taliban or powerful cartels, but rather a loose open market in which numerous independent farmers and racketeers try to get their share of this profitable illicit trade.

This article has been originally published in Swedish by Blankspot.

Read the original:
Afghanistan's Opium Trade: A Free Market of Racketeers - The Diplomat