US President Joe Biden, with Vice President Kamala Harris, at Arlington National Cemetery, is vying for a rejuvenated and more inclusive Nato. AP Photo
US President Joe Biden, with Vice President Kamala Harris, at Arlington National Cemetery, is vying for a rejuvenated and more inclusive Nato. AP Photo
US President Joe Biden, with Vice President Kamala Harris, at Arlington National Cemetery, is vying for a rejuvenated and more inclusive Nato. AP Photo
Stand by for a barrage of claims that the Nato summit on June 14 sets down a marker for a new and more effective alliance.
The always important imagery will certainly be better than the last two summits. US President Joe Biden will unite the meeting as a change for good from his predecessor Donald Trump. Mr Biden's warm personal exchanges will stand in contradistinction from Mr Trump's shoulder barging of one of his peers at the family photo in 2017.
Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has given a series of briefings ahead of the gathering. The communique is set to address a wider set of challenges than ever before, including the rise of China. It will launch work on a new strategic concept that will replace the discredited document of 2010. A line has been drawn in the sand with the withdrawal from Afghanistan by the 20th anniversary of 9/11 attacks on the US. And finally a new military domain of cyber has been integrated into Nato structures.
Mr Biden will travel from the Brussels meeting to Geneva for a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. With 29 nations behind him, the US president enters the room with an invaluable solidarity that should open up a more amenable attitude from Mr Putin. Put on the spot on what it is that Nato offers, Mr Stoltenberg says the US is not always number one on its own. With Nato, it has an expanded source of influence.
Thus Nato is an indispensable forum for all aspects of north Atlantic security, an interpretation that stretches beyond its borders to the Syrian conflict, Iran’s missile threats and freedom of navigation from the Strait of Hormuz to the South China Sea, according to Mr Stoltenberg’s comments.
The danger is that, the broader the canvas, the more difficult it is to see where the hard choices necessary in security have been made.
In a new book titled Hard Choices, Peter Ricketts, the UK's former national security adviser, examines Nato's rise and recent struggles, from the perspective of an insider. Mr Ricketts illustrates how the UK's post-Second World War leaders were adept at recognising America's openness for an international alliance and tying this to an agenda of rebuilding Europe's defence capability.
The new body combined a commitment to collective defence, though as he points out that the famed Article 5 is far more nuanced than widely perceived, with an effectiveness in achieving political goals in areas such as arms control. He cites the example of the now forgotten Mutual and Balanced Force Reduction negotiations in Vienna in the 1970s. These were useful to then US president Richard Nixon, who wanted to head off then US senator Mike Mansfield’s efforts to introduce cuts in US troop numbers unilaterally. In return, the Soviet Union got the Europe-wide security talks it had craved for more than a decade.
Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg welcomed US President Biden's desire to strengthen alliances. WPA Pool/Getty Images
As the talks dragged on, Nato's most effective tool was to organise a weekly dinner and an evening of folk songs involving its ambassadors and those of the Warsaw Pact. It can truly be said that Swanee River and other show-stoppers helped keep the peace at the height of the Cold War.
Mr Stoltenberg's job is to continue to prove that Nato is useful. The headquarters itself can often seem to be spending as much time averting internal rifts as addressing the outside challenges. He can cite instances such as the deconfliction mechanisms that helped Turkey and Greece to cope with the eastern Mediterranean tensions so far. The recent deal that saw Turkey agree to take on the security of Kabul airport after the Nato withdrawal is an under-appreciated diplomatic gain for the alliance, as it seeks a smooth pathway out of the Central Asian theatre.
It is also important for Nato to show that it is alive to emerging threats. During a visit last week to the British aircraft carrier, The Queen Elizabeth, Mr Stoltenberg reviewed the Steadfast Defender exercise, which included wargaming hacking attacks on the carrier group as it performed its mission.
What Nato should offer to policymakers in Mr Ricketts's view is an avenue to exercise real influence on the structures of international relations without the transfer of sovereignty. At its best, it offers members the ability to maintain and develop their individual and collective capacities to resist armed attack, across a series of domains.
US President Donald Trump, centre, at the Nato summit in London commemorating the alliance's 70th anniversary last year. AFP
The prospect of a relaunch of Nato as a universal alliance is doomed
The tendency towards splits is not going away. After internal divisions undermined the last review of the alliance’s Strategic Concept, all eyes will be on next week’s summit communique on how the next framework will be thrashed out in 2022.
French President Emmanuel Macron has already made clear his doubts, damning the alliance as "brain dead". The challenge of getting the Europeans to take more of their own defence burden is the number one concern in Paris. That is closer to the optics of the Trump era than anything Mr Biden needs.
With European strategic autonomy prioritised by one camp, the prospect of a relaunch of Nato as a universal alliance is doomed. While Mr Stoltenberg promises that the summit will have something to say on China, it does not see Beijing as an adversary. Florence Parly, Minister of the French Armed Forces, has warned that Nato cannot be automatically involved in a US-China confrontation.
As Mr Ricketts observes, the “changing geometry of power” in the world into competing blocks creates perilous pressures for the rest. Just as for Britain and France as countries, there are big risks for Nato in not making the right decisions as it defines its future.
Damien McElroy is the London bureau chief at The National
The insured employee may still file an ILOE claim even if a labour dispute is ongoing post termination, but the insurer may suspend or reject payment, until the courts resolve the dispute, especially if the reason for termination is contested. The outcome of the labour court proceedings can directly affect eligibility.
- Abdullah Ishnaneh, Partner, BSA Law
RESULTS
2pm: Maiden Dh 60,000 (Dirt) 1,400m. Winner: Masaali, Pat Dobbs (jockey), Doug Watson (trainer).
2.30pm: Handicap Dh 76,000 (D) 1,400m. Winner: Almoreb, Dane O’Neill, Ali Rashid Al Raihe.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
What is cyberbullying?
Cyberbullying or online bullying could take many forms such as sending unkind or rude messages to someone, socially isolating people from groups, sharing embarrassing pictures of them, or spreading rumors about them.
Cyberbullying can take place on various platforms such as messages, on social media, on group chats, or games.
Parents should watch out for behavioural changes in their children.
When children are being bullied they they may be feel embarrassed and isolated, so parents should watch out for signs of signs of depression and anxiety
