A bizarre, threatening statement from Trump's hawkish security adviser may have derailed the North Korea talks

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by Alex Lockie -- business insider -- North Korea appeared to flip on the US on Tuesday with a variety of complaints and statements that marked the first real backslide of a diplomatic push for peace in Korea — and much of it was pinned on a dark, threatening statement made by President Donald Trump's hawkish new national security adviser. North Korean media specifically targeted Trump's new national security adviser, John Bolton. "We shed light on the quality of Bolton already in the past, and we do not hide our feeling of repugnance towards him," wrote Kim Kye Gwan, North Korea's vice-minister of foreign affairs. Bolton, who has written extensively advocating that the US bomb North Korea, recently made a strange statement that appears to have provoked North Korea's anger. "I think we're looking at the Libya model of 2003, 2004," to denuclearize North Korea, Bolton told CBS' "Face the Nation" in late April. Shortly after the US invaded Iraq and deposed Saddam Hussein in 2003, Libya's Muammar Gaddafi agreed to have international inspectors visit his country to certify that his nuclear and chemical weapons programs had halted. In 2011, a popular uprising in Libya got backing from the US and some NATO countries, and a salvo of cruise missile strikes pummeled the Libyan government. Within months, Gaddafi was filmed being dragged out into the streets by rebels, who then violently killed him. Gaddafi's violent end and the parallels between Libya and North Korea appear to have been noted in Pyongyang. "World knows too well that our country is neither Libya nor Iraq which have met miserable fate," North Korea's vice minister wrote, responding to Bolton. "It is absolutely absurd to dare compare the DPRK, a nuclear weapon state, to Libya which had been at the initial stage of nuclear development," he continued, using North Korea's formal title.

What was Bolton thinking?

To be clear, the US did not kill Gaddafi; his own people did. Gaddafi enjoyed eight years of international prestige and acceptance before he met his violent end, but it's still a comparison Bolton could have easily steered clear of. It's unclear why Bolton would want to compare North Korea to Libya, as the countries are very different and Libya carries unsavory associations. Now, a much-awaited summit between Trump and Kim has taken a negative turn, with Pyongyang reconsidering its approach and the US likely considering appeasing Kim — and Bolton's Libya remark appears at the center of the setback.

Beirut Pride Canceled After Organizer Is Detained By Authorities

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BEIRUT (Reuters) - The organizer of Beirut Pride said he was detained overnight by Lebanese authorities who released him only when he signed a pledge to cancel the week’s remaining events. Lebanon last year became the first Arab country to hold a gay pride week, though the opening event was canceled because of safety concerns after threats of violence. This year’s pride week began on May 12 and was due to run until May 20. Lebanon is widely seen as more socially liberal than most other Arab countries, but lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people say they are still discriminated against by state and society.

In a statement on the Beirut Pride website, organizer Hadi Damien said that security services turned up late on Tuesday at a public reading of a theater play. Damien said he was taken to a police station overnight and questioned. Damien said he was asked to sign a pledge promising to cancel upcoming events and in return he would be released. The Interior Ministry said it was unable to provide immediate comment. Damien said he was told that if he refused to sign the pledge, he would be referred to the investigation judge for interrogation on the basis of articles pertaining to the incitement to immorality and to the breach of public morality for coordinating the activities. On legal advice, Damien signed the pledge, he said in the statement. Lebanon’s laws prohibit “unnatural” sex, without giving further definition, which has been used to criminalize gay sex. Last year a Lebanese judge said that same-sex relations do not contradict laws of nature, a move welcomed by rights activists.

Damien said the public prosecution had received an Arabic version of the Beirut Pride program that was “completely distorted, making Beirut Pride appear like events of debauchery and disrespect of general law,” while using derogatory terms to refer to LGBT individuals. Ghenwa Samhat, executive director of Lebanese LGBT rights organization Helem, said that many rights organizations in Lebanon experience such pressures. “These things are not new to us,” Samhat said. But in the 20 years since the LGBT rights movement began in Lebanon, progress has been made. “People can express themselves in public places, there are placers friendly to LGBTQ+, where they face no problems,” she said. Positive media coverage surrounding Beirut Pride and activities for the annual International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia on May 17 can also be counted as an achievement, Samhat said.

Murr Tower in Beirut decorated by Lebanese street artist with sun clothes

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The Murr Tower in Beirut is decorated by the Lebanese street artist Jad Khoury with sun clothes in Beirut, Lebanon, May 14, 2018. The Tower is a famous symbol of the Lebanese civil war (1975-1990). Its construction began in 1974, a year before the beginning of the civil war, and until now this about 40-storeys building is still being abandoned. (Xinhua/Bilal Jawich)

Lebanese press for accountability after claims of election fraud

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wagingnonviolence.org -- Rayyan Dabbous -- Following Lebanon’s parliamentary elections on May 6, more than a thousand Lebanese gathered in front of the Ministry of Interior to challenge its official electoral results. According to the Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections, an election monitoring group, there were approximately 7,300 legal complaints, including the removal of its monitors from electoral polls during the counting of votes. Few media outlets, national or global, have focused on these electoral violations, covering instead the unexpected victories of Hezbollah in several districts and the severe losses for the pro-West Future Movement party. Nevertheless, Lebanese civil society groups are continuing to push for accountability. “We would have accepted the results if the electoral process was fair,” said Gilbert Hobeich, a member of the new political party Sabaa. “But there have been all kinds of violations even before election day, from buying votes to threats.” Civil society groups like Sabaa, LiBaladi, and You Stink have been organizing in recent years and are beginning to catch the country’s attention. The latter only recently got involved in elections, having initially formed during Lebanon’s 2015 trash crisis — a political stalemate that resulted in the piling up of trash all over the country’s streets. The group first gained attention for organizing a protest on August 29, 2015, which attracted 250,000 Lebanese from all sides of the political spectrum. More peaceful protests followed, but they were met with violence from police forces when, according to You Stink, infiltrators sent by the regime vandalized several commercial properties.

Since then, You Stink has been unable to protest in public spaces, forcing its members to build a strong online presence, with a Facebook page that has amassed more than 250,000 followers. The group posts cartoons mocking party leaders as well as memes that add ironic captions next to politicians’ tweets, which regularly go viral in Lebanon. Other actions have reached more of a global audience, including one that involved the use of drones to spoof a film made by the Ministry of Tourism. You Stink juxtaposed the picturesque beaches and mountains of the country in the official video with shots of “rivers of trash,” some of which were real footage from locations the original film had intentionally left out of the frame. Sabaa is another political party born shortly after the trash crisis. Described on their website as “modern” and “cross-sectarian,” Sabaa is considered to be one of the more organized and better funded new parties. As a result, the traditional parties have accused it of being a “foreign export.” Sabaa’s candidate, Paula Yacoubian, a famous television host, won the party’s only parliamentary seat, although Hobeich insists they should have won “at least two or three more seats.” Despite having a smaller online presence than Sabaa, LiBaladi is another new political party gaining momentum. It has reached a wide audience in its campaigning by partnering with celebrities — like award-winning director Nadine Labaki and actor Fouad Yammine — who often have more followers on social media than the average Lebanese TV channel. Even TV host Dima Sadek dedicated the last show of her popular program to LiBaladi’s Naila Geagea and Ziyad Baroud, a former Minister of Interior who doesn’t affiliate himself with any of the traditional parties.

Despite the three groups’ intense campaigning in the last few months, Lebanon’s traditional parties have created a united front against them to limit their rise through methods used by totalitarian regimes. Sabaa, LiBaladi and You Stink have all received limited coverage from the country’s main TV channels, which are affiliated with the mainstream parties. They have also faced difficulty hosting their campaigning activities in private spaces. For example, Sabaa had to cancel an event at a restaurant last year because its host received pressure from local officials to close. Meanwhile, around the same time, more than 10 members from You Stink were arrested for hanging posters in Beirut that depicted the faces of the country’s leaders with a caption, saying, “Report them to 112 [911 in Lebanon], those who raped the power of the state.” Despite the renewed shunning of these groups following claims of election fraud, the nonviolent fight is far from over. While Sabaa and LiBaladi intend to appeal several electoral results, You Stink asked its followers via a Facebook poll if it should “move to the streets.” The results showed resounding support.

THE MARITIME BORDER DISPUTE BETWEEN LEBANON AND ISRAEL EXPLAINED

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This article does not necessarily represents khazen.org 

BY: MONA SUKKARIEH

The comments made by Israel’s Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman at a Tel Aviv conference on January 31 sparked outrage in Lebanon. It brought the issue of the maritime border dispute between Lebanon and Israel back into the spotlight and managed to catch Washington’s attention once again. Little was happening on this front after the change of Administration in the U.S. After a few months, Lebanese officials stopped announcing that a resumption of mediation efforts was imminent. Then, in October, the decision, by a Total-led consortium to place a bid for Block 9 (which includes a disputed area) in Lebanon’s first licensing round, rekindled interest once again in the topic. But the buzz was discreet, confined to experts and diplomatic circles, until it was out in the open when Liberman described Lebanon’s offshore tender as “very provocative” and urged international companies not to bid, about a month and a half after licenses were awarded. The dispute unfolded in December 2010, when Cyprus and Israel signed a maritime border agreement that was denounced by Lebanon because it encroached on parts of its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). On July 10, 2011, the Israeli cabinet approved a map of Israel’s northern maritime border, and two days later, the Israeli mission to the United Nations submitted a list of geographical coordinates for the delimitation of the northern limit of Israel’s territorial sea and EEZ. Some of the points defined in the Cypriot-Israeli agreement and submitted later to the U.N. overlap with the Lebanese EEZ.

But to understand how we got here, we must go back to 2007. On January 17 of that year, Lebanon signed a maritime border agreement with Cyprus. It followed standard procedure outlined in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), marking a series of points that are equidistant from Cyprus and Lebanon (median line). Point 1 was used to mark the southernmost point along this line, while Point 6 marked its northernmost point. The agreement included a standard clause specifying that the geographical coordinates of the first and last markers, in this case Point 1 in the south, and Point 6 in the north, may be adjusted in light of future delimitation of the EEZ with other neighboring States, since a bilateral agreement cannot pretend to define the borders of third states. The agreement was never ratified by the Lebanese Parliament, largely because of pressure from Turkey, which denounces all maritime border agreements signed by the Republic of Cyprus with its neighboring countries. As such, the agreement never entered into force.

But it wasn’t until April 2009 that a Lebanese commission tasked with defining the coordinates of Lebanon’s EEZ completed its work, identifying Point 23, 17 km south of Point 1, as the southernmost point of the EEZ. The coordinates were approved by the cabinet on May 13, 2009, and by the Parliament on August 4, 2011. In accordance with UNCLOS, Lebanon submitted the relevant charts and lists of coordinates to the U.N. in July and October 2010 and in November 2011. Just like the Israeli submissions mentioned above, these are unilateral submissions and do not amount to border delimitation. Israel objects to the southernmost coordinates submitted by Lebanon. Less known is the fact that Syria also objected to the delineation provided by Lebanon in a letter transmitted to the U.N. Secretary-General on 15 July 2014, saying that it does not have “any binding legal effect on other States. It remains only a notification, and one to which the Syrian Arab Republic objects”.

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More Lebanese tourists expected to visit Greece, travel agencies say

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by lebaneseexaminer.com --Greece is expected to welcome more tourists from Lebanon in 2018, according to travel agencies that participated in the recent ‘Greek Tourism Workshop‘ held in Beirut. Organizers believe the number of Lebanese tourists in Greece is expected to rise by at least 20 percent. “Greek culture has a lot in common with the culture of the Lebanese people — who love Greece and consider the country an exceptional tourism destination that provides them with happy moments and memories,” said Katerina Mousbeh, general manager of Mideast Travel.Travel agents say Lebanese tourism in Athens and Central Macedonia is already gaining popularity. Charter flights to Crete and the South Aegean islands are set to increase this year. The Greek Aegean Airlines is also planning to launch direct flights from Beirut to Heraklio on Crete, Rhodes and Mykonos this summer, according to the Greek Travel Pages. The ‘Greek Tourism Workshop’ in Beirut was held by the Greek National Tourism Organization to attract more tourists from the Arab market. The workshop was also held in New Delhi, Kuwait, Riyadh and Dubai.