Congo Research Group director Jason Stearns spoke to The New York Times the arrest of President Felix Tshisekedi's chief of staff Vital Kamerhe on corruption charges.
Stearns noted that the arrest might jeopardize the coalition between Tshisekedi and Kamerhe's parties. "The coalition was important ahead of the elections, but ever since he was inaugurated, there have been people around Tshisekedi pushing him to get rid of Vital," he said.
The New York Times quoted CIC Senior Fellow Hanny Megally in coverage of a new U.N. report on war crimes in Syria.
Megally is a member of the United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Syria, which has determined that recent attacks on civilians by Russian and Syrian forces amount to a “crime of intentionally terrorizing the population.” “We are seeing that picture emerging very clearly, for example, in Idlib,” Megally told reporters in Geneva.
In an essay for The New York Times Sunday Review, Non-Resident Fellow James Traub asks whether liberalism has a future in a United States beset by populist politics.
Traub argues that "forty years of swelling illiberalism on the right—and some reciprocal illiberalism on the left—have deeply corroded" public faith in political institutions, and a Democratic victory in 2020 will be insufficient to restore that faith without a new commitment to liberal values.
Jason Stearns, Senior Fellow and Director of the Congo Research Group argues that recent presidential election results underscores the Congolese people's commitment to building a democracy.
Non-Resident Fellow James Traub reflects on the former Secretary-General Kofi Annan's idealism and the vision he had for the United Nations. For a system where "norms mean nothing without the political will to enforce them", a day when Mr. Annan's ideals prevail over political maneuvers is yet to come.
Along a quiet cease-fire line in Cyprus, U.N. peacekeepers handle an increasingly old-fashioned job: actually keeping the peace. The last deadly incident was in 1996. Today's challenges include keeping poachers and rogue farmers out of no man's land. "Most of the time we don't wear weapons," said the force commander, Maj. Gen. Kristin Lund.
Congo President's Chief of Staff Arrested Amid Graft Probe
Congo Research Group director Jason Stearns spoke to The New York Times the arrest of President Felix Tshisekedi's chief of staff Vital Kamerhe on corruption charges.
Stearns noted that the arrest might jeopardize the coalition between Tshisekedi and Kamerhe's parties. "The coalition was important ahead of the elections, but ever since he was inaugurated, there have been people around Tshisekedi pushing him to get rid of Vital," he said.