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DUBAI: Spain received the highest number of migrants in Europe with 37,900 registered arrivals in 2020. Yet that is only slightly higher than the number that Yemen recorded last year, 37,500, even though Yemen is in the midst of war, disease, economic crisis and is on the brink of famine.

By the end of 2019, Yemen was hosting an estimated 280,000 refugees and asylum-seekers, 96 percent of them from Somalia and 3.8 percent from Ethiopia.

Yemen has been unstable since mid-2014. War has raged between Houthi militia forces and the internationally recognized government of President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi, leading to what the UN has described as the worlds worst humanitarian disaster.

Yet thousands from the Horn of Africa continue to seek refuge in the war-torn country.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Representative Jean-Nicolas Beuze, who has been in the Yemeni capital Sanaa for the past 14 months, says these migration figures reflect the suffering of migrants.

This speaks to the tragedies and persecution and suffering they have back home. They see no hope and no light at the end of the tunnel by staying in Somalia or Ethiopia and therefore Yemen, in their view, becomes safer than their own home, Beuze told Arab News.

Beuze says that the international community should find ways to provide safer options for people to claim asylum because going from Somalia to Yemen is not a solution.

Migration between the Horn of Africa and Yemen has been common throughout history, with Yemen regarded as a center of routes linking Africa, Asia and Europe.

In recent years, due to political and economic instability and climate change that have caused deadly droughts in the Horn of Africa, the number of migrants traveling to Yemen has increased.

In 2019, with an average of 11,500 people boarding vessels each month from the Horn of Africa to Yemen, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) called it the busiest maritime migration route on earth.

Undeterred by the Gulfs strict immigration policies for undocumented migrants, according to the IOM, nearly 90 percent of those who arrived in Yemen intended to continue to Saudi Arabia.

The UN body for migration says that most are unaware of the security situation in Yemen where they face serious threats to their safety, including fighting or abuses such as kidnapping, torture, exploitation and trafficking.

Earlier this month, the Houthi militia admitted that tear gas fired by guards into a migrant detention center caused the fire that killed at least 45 people mostly Ethiopian and wounded more than 200.

Despite the incident with the migrants and the Houthis, Beuze says that the Yemeni population is welcoming of foreigners, both immigrants and refugees.

I must say, I am impressed by how hospitable the Yemeni people are, when they are themselves suffering, he said.

We dont see that kind of hospitality throughout the rest of the world anymore, and the rest of the world probably has far more capacity to host, assist, protect refugees than Yemen, one of the poorest countries on earth.

The surge in poverty across Yemen is driven by factors attributed to the war, according to a UN-sponsored report by the Pardee Center for International Futures entitled Assessing the Impact of War in Yemen on Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

A UN conference for aid to Yemen earlier this month appealed for $3.85 billion to address the impoverished Arab countrys needs. Only $1.7 billion was raised a result the UN chief called disappointing.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for countries to reconsider what they could do to stave off the worst famine the world has seen in decades.

Beuze said that the lack of aid support would hinder the progress made in Yemen over the past three years. The international community should instead capitalize on the progress made in order for Yemeni communities become self-reliant, he said.

It will take much more time and much more money and much more investment to continue keeping their heads above the water if they start drowning, Beuze said in reference to those living in Yemen.

This is really not the time to abandon Yemen, he said.

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Tripartite summit between Egypt, Iraq and Jordan postponed due to train accident - Arab News

This is the first installment of a three-part series of interviews with Archbishop Paul R. Gallagher, the Vaticans Secretary for Relations with States. You can read Part 2here.

Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher is the Secretary for Relations with States, sometimes referred to as the Vaticans foreign minister. Pope Francis appointed him to this important position in November 2014, 30 years after he first joined the Holy Sees diplomatic service. During that time he served in its diplomatic missions in countries on five continents.

Archbishop Gallagher accompanied Pope Francis on his historic visit to Iraq and, some days later, gave a wide-ranging interview to Americas Vatican correspondent. He responded to questions related to Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, the Holy Land, Saudi Arabia, China and Myanmar, as well as some of the things the Holy See hopes President Joseph R. Bidens new administration might act on at the national and international level.

America will present the interview in three parts this week. The first focuses on Iraq and conflicts in the Middle East.

Pope Francis in Iraq

I began by asking Archbishop Gallagher about his overall evaluation of Pope Francis visit to Iraq. He rated it as overwhelmingly positive and possibly the most significant trip of the pontificate. Indeed, emblematically, it expresses most of the objectives of the pontificate in terms of the wider mission and ministry of the pope.

He described Francis meeting with Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani as quite remarkable and said it seems that really these two men had an understanding, they shared much, and there were lots of gestures on the part of al-Sistani toward the pope, gestures of great respect and understanding.

He rated the meeting as a breakthrough not just with Shia Muslims in Iraq but also with the very significant and great Shia community around the world, including in Iran. He viewed it as equivalent to the meeting of Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar and the signing of the document on human fraternity in Abu Dhabi on Feb. 4, 2019.

In going to Iraq, he said, Pope Francis went to a country which almost incarnates human suffering historically at this time, after Syria and Yemen, and where you could see that on the faces of the people. His expressing the regret and the sorrow of the world for everything that had happened in Iraq in recent decades was very important, Archbishop Gallagher said.

He recalled that Francis expressed his support not only to the Christian communities of Iraq and of the region who have been persecuted and suffered but also to the other persecuted communities such as the Yazidis for whom he has enormous sympathy.

The archbishop noted that Francis also highlighted the migration crisis and the many people who have left Iraq for other parts of the world and expressed the hope that some might yet find their way to return to their homeland.

Embracing the Shia Muslim World

Asked whether he thought Francis embrace of both the Sunni and the Shia Muslims through his meetings with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar and Ayatollah al-Sistani, respectively, could contribute in some way to a resolution of the grave conflict in Yemen, Archbishop Gallagher replied: I doubt that. Yemen is a really intractable geopolitical problem. He noted that its a similar case to Iraq and recalled that the pope was very sensitive to the fact that Iraq is caught between two mega-regional powers, between the United States, which has long-standing interests in the region, and Iran, as well as Turkey.

Likewise, he sees Yemen trapped in a wider power struggle and said: I dont think Yemen is going to substantially improve anytime soon. Too many people and countries are interested in having geopolitical control of what Yemen represents. I think theres still an awful lot of work, an awful lot of pressure that needs to be brought to bear on that situation. So Im not terribly optimistic about the impact [of the popes embrace of the Sunni and Shia Muslims] on Yemen.

Religious leaders in Iran, including Ayatollah Alireza Arafi, the head of all Iranian seminaries, responded positively to the popes visit to Iraq and meeting with Ayatollah Sistani. When asked if he thinks Pope Francis may be able to visit Iran, Archbishop Gallagher replied: Yes, I certainly think there is this possibility. There is openness. And not just openness; there is desire. But we have to also be confident that the papal visit will benefit and strengthen the local Catholic community.

It is a work in process, he said, and I certainly think that would be on the cards in the future, but there are many factors to be evaluated before we can go forward.

The Vatican archbishop foresees a papal visit to Lebanon because the pope has committed himself to doing that and Im sure hell keep his promise. Its just a matter of when. As yet, there are no concrete plans for the visit. Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the secretary of state, visited the country last year, and its probable that I may go in the coming months, and this may prepare the way for a papal visit, Archbishop Gallagher said.

Hezbollah, an Islamist militia and political party backed by Iran, praised Pope Francis visit to Iraq, and the archbishop believes they would welcome him to Lebanon, too. Lebanon is in a pretty desperate situation, he added. The Holy See is also very concerned about the hemorrhaging of Christians, in particular, from Lebanon to their diaspora and elsewhere.

The Christian Exodus

The exodus of Christians from the Middle East region is a matter of grave concern, the archbishop said. Every time we ordain a titular bishop, very many of them receive titles of old dioceses in North Africa where the church flourished for many centuries. Now the church is a very small flock in all those countriesTunisia, Algeria, Morocco, etc.and there is a danger that the whole of the Middle East could become a replication of that. We could have a Middle East and the Holy Land without Christians; the holy places could become more museums than true places of pilgrimage, devotion and worship.

This is in many ways unthinkable, Archbishop Gallagher said. At the same time it is a not unrealistic prospect unfortunately. So, we have to work on this, and we have to try and make the conditions suitable for keeping the Christians weve got and possibly inviting people, who for very reasonable motives have left the region in these years, to come back.

Moreover, he said, We believe that Christians play a very important geopolitical role in the region, also being that rather flexible mortar which exists between massive and different contrasting communities of Islam throughout the region. We hope and we pray that that will be possible, but it will require a lot of hard work, both diplomatically and politically, and also in terms of solidarity by the wider Christian church to support and encourage Christians to stay in the biblical lands.

Saudi Arabia: A Thaw in Relations?

Saudi Arabia is one of a small number of countries that do not have diplomatic relations with the Holy See, even though King Abdullah visited Benedict XVI in 2007, and an official delegation met with Pope Francis in 2017. I asked the archbishop how he would describe the current state of relations between the Holy See and Saudi Arabia.

Its pretty distant, he remarked. He recalled that Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran made what many considered a historic visit to Saudi Arabia in April 2018 when he was president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, and that office still engages in the dialogue. Beyond that, he said, we have occasional contacts with the Saudi authorities, but at the moment there is no formal process of improving those relations, which we would like.

Its obviously a complex situation because of the composition of the society and of the delicate relation of religion to the monarchy. Moreover, as everybody knows at this particular time Saudi Arabia is going through a lot of difficulties and questions from the international community, he said. Nevertheless, our door is always open, and in particular because we have great concern for the large numbers of Catholics who do work in Saudi Arabiathe Filipinos, the Indians, the Sri Lankansand therefore we would like to see greater religious freedom and freedom of assembly to be granted to them to express and live their faith, and we will continue to work at that.

Asked if he thought the document on human fraternity that Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar signed in Abu Dhabi on Feb. 4, 2019, could facilitate a thaw in relations with Saudi Arabia, the archbishop responded positively.

I think potentially yes, he said. But like anything where you have particular interests at play you need the political will to make something work. Certainly, I think the document on human fraternity provides a platform and a new almost sort of language with which to engage people, and I think that is what the pope is trying to do.

Obviously, he said, religion is a deep part of human experience but clearly when you get differing traditions and experiences of religion there is a potentialwe know that from history and even nowof great sensitivity and potentially of contrast. I think what the pope has tried to do with the whole notion of fraternity is to go deeper into our humanity to try and find common ground with people. And, as you say, it seems to be working. It seems to have provided a nonthreatening approach, and I think potentially lots of others could come into it and maybe ultimately Saudi Arabia will be possibly one of them.

Syria: A Decade of War

I asked the archbishop if he saw any immediate solution for Syria, where the Holy See has a nuncio who is a cardinal.

No, sadly I dont see much hope, he replied. We try to encourage principled realism, realism in the sense there are things that we cannot change as things stand at the moment. Obviously, you cannot abandon your principles, the things that are important, the values that drive you. At the same time, after 10 years of war in Syria we have to be realistic about what wethe international community, the regioncan achieve.

Were very concerned about the extreme poverty that prevails in the country, Archbishop Gallagher said, the fate of the young people who now after 10 years of war, [face a] lack of schooling, lack of adequate nourishment. Again youre facing a future generation that is going to be very much handicapped in nearly every sense of the word. But I dont see a miracle for Syria on the horizon, sadly.

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Pope Francis' trip to Iraq was a historic breakthrough. But will it lead to greater peace in the Middle East? - America Magazine

Researchers at Yale School of Medicine and the VA Connecticut Healthcare System, in a pair of complementary studies, investigated eating disorders in Iraq and Afghanistan war-era veterans, a group thought to be at high risk for eating disorders.

New eating disorders Atypical Anorexia Nervosa, Night Eating Syndrome, and Binge-Eating Disorder -- were included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) when it was last updated. Experts thought those disorders might be relevant for older adults, men, a range of racial and ethnic groups, and people who are overweight.

The Yale and VA research team, led by Robin Masheb, PhD, Professor of Psychiatry, examined the prevalence, gender differences and correlates of new and revised DSM-5 eating disorders in the first study, published in the International Journal of Eating Disorders.

Over 1,110 veterans completed a survey of measures studying longitudinal gender differences in healthcare utilization and health outcomes. While the investigators found no cases of Anorexia Nervosa (AN) they were surprised to find that 14 percent of women and 5 percent of men met criteria for probable Aytpical AN.

Bulimia Nervosa was reported in 6 percent of women and 3.5 percent of men; at least three times more common than in civilians. In Binge-Eating Disorder and Night Eating Syndrome prevalence estimates ranged from 3 to 6 percent.

All together one-third of women and one-fifth of men met criteria for a likely DSM-5 eating disorder, and the eating disorders were associated with mental health concerns such as trauma, depression, and insomnia, the researchers found.

In the second study, published in Eating Behaviors, the investigators wanted to gain a better understanding of Atypical Anorexia given the prevalence in the surveyed veterans was so unexpectedly high, and that few research studies had been published on the disorder.

Atypical Anoreixa is characterized by an intense fear of weight gain and restrictive eating minus the dangerously low weight found in AN. In place of the very low body weight criterion, for the diagnosis of Aytpical Anorexia, these individuals must be at a body weight that is at least 10 percent below their highest adult weight.

The investigators found that at their highest weight, those with Atypical Anorexia were in the obese range, had lost on average 18 percent of their body weight, and were currently in the overweight range (average BMI was 28.8). Those with Atypical Anorexia weighed similarly to those with no eating disorder, but less than those with Bulimia or Binge-Eating Disorder.

On measures of mental health, they functioned worse than those without an eating disorder, similar to those with Binge-Eating Disorder, and only slightly better than those with Bulimia.

Masheb said there may be physiologic factors involved in aging and military fitness at odds with holding unusually low weights. Thus, Atypical Anorexia may be a variant of Anorexia more appropriate for capturing eating disorders in a wide range of adult populations including men and people who are overweight or in middle age and beyond, she said.

We need to better understand how eating disorders present in this and other diverse populations so that we can begin to dispel myths and misconceptions among providers and patients that eating disorders only occur in young, low weight girls and women, said Masheb, Director of the Veterans Initiative for Eating and Weight (The VIEW at VA Connecticut Healthcare System).

Recognizing the growing need for eating disorder care among male and female Veterans, the VA is enhancing treatment and expanding provider training for eating disorders.

Mashebs Yale School of Medicine co-investigators were Sally Haskell, MD; Cynthia Brandt, MD, MPH; Christine Ramsey, PhD; and Suzanne Decker, PhD.

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Yale, VA Researchers Investigate Eating Disorders in Iraq and Afghanistan War-Era Veterans - Yale School of Medicine

Nassau County will construct a memorial honoring residents who died serving the United States in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, officials said Monday.

Officials said they will break ground in the fall, nearly two decades since the start of the Afghanistan conflict. The monument will be located in Eisenhower Park in East Meadow, near the Veterans Memorial, officials said. It will join the memorial honoring the veterans who served in World War II, the Korean War and Vietnam along with the memorial that honors all the armed forces in Eisenhower Park.

Nassau County Executive Laura Curran said the decision to construct the monument was made primarily to honor those from Nassau who served their nation oversees and to educate younger and future generations.

We must ensure that present and future generations continue to appreciate the sacrifice that our veterans in all wars have made to protect our freedoms, our very precious freedoms, that when you consider them are very rare throughout the course of human history, Curran said.

The county, Curran said, entered into a public-private partnership with Heroes Among Us, a non-for-profit organization based in Nassau County, to aid in erecting the monument. The organization already committed $10,000 of the roughly $100,000 needed for the memorial, Curran said.

Heroes Among Us was started by Virginia Cervasio after her 24-year-old son, Angelo, took his life in 2006 after battling post-traumatic stress disorder from serving the Air Force in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf in the communications management field.

Cervasio told Newsday, This memorial has a very special place in our hearts, acknowledging that veterans who died from suicide after returning home will also be included in the monument.

According to U.S. census statistics, more than 4,200 Nassau County residents served in the Iraq or Afghanistan wars since Sept. 11, 2001. According to Newsday statistics, 16 county residents died in Iraq and five died in Afghanistan.

Curran said roughly 50,000 military veterans reside in Nassau County.

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Nassau plans memorial honoring those who served in Iraq, Afghanistan - The Island Now

As seenrecently,intermittentaltercationspersistin Iraqand Syriabetween American forces and various Iran-backed militias. These, however,stem from, andare a continuation of,a fundamental error in the design of the war. Thisshould have beenapparentto its instigators even beforethe warwas launched in 2003,andit isalmost breath-taking in its naivet.

An extensive U.S.Armystudyof the warcontendsthat the overwhelming majority of decisions in the Iraq War were made by highly intelligent, highly experienced, leaders. However, it concludesthat the failure to achieve our strategic objectivesderived from reasoning that contained systemic failures, and high among these was that U.S. leaders seemed to believe that other regional nations would not react.

In the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States,President GeorgeW. Bush, whohadcome into office proposing a humble foreign policy,abruptlyreversed course. He nowproclaimedthat the countrys responsibility to history wasnowto rid the world of evilquite the boast given human history.

Then, a few months later, Bush specified ina major speech that, while evil presumablylurkedeverywhere,a special axis of evil existed,and it wasprimarily located inNorth Korea, Iran, and Iraq.

Iranfully realized it was in trouble, as didSyria,which alsosometimesappearedon the target listprovided almost daily by Bush and his coterie of cheer-leadingneoconservatives.If they needed further confirmation,defense advisorRichardPerle exultantlysuggestednot longafter the invasion of Iraq that a short messageshould now bedeliveredto other hostile regimes in the area: Youre next.

It was accordinglyclearly in the best, even supreme,interest of theregimes running North Korea and Syriatowork closely with, andtoprovide sanctuary for, friendlyShiasinIraq to make the American tenure inIraq as miserable as possible.Meanwhile, similarly threatenedNorth Koreaformally withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty andworkeddedicatedly to obtain nuclear weaponsto deter an American attack.

In addition to Iran and Syria, otheroutsiders weredrawn to Iraq anddedicated to sabotaging theoccupierspeace and to killingitsoccupyingforces.Inparticular,a Jordanian,Abu Musab al-Zarqawi,a Sunniwho sympathized with al-Qaedas ideology and agenda,becamethe leader of a small army of dedicated and brutal terrorists numbering perhaps in the thousands.

Zarqawisconnection toal-Qaeda may have helpedtoattract recruitsandtogeneratefinancial and logistical support, andhe wasfurther benefited by the tendency of the Americans to credithis forceswith a far larger portion of the violence inIraq than they probably committed,a process that also helped to burnish Zarqawis image in much of the Muslimworld as a resistance hero.

However,themindless brutalitiesof Zarqawis forcesstaging beheadings at mosques, bombing playgrounds, taking over hospitals,executing ordinary citizens, performing forced marriageseventually provedto be self-destructive, turning Iraqis against them, including many of thosewho had previously been fighting the American occupation either on theirown or in connection with Zarqawi.

Helped enormously by the alienation between jihadist marauders and Iraqitribes, the U.S.military was ableto bring civil warfare under somedegree of control in Iraq by 2009. However, the campaign to do sothe surge,it was calledcostover 1,000 American lives, seven times greaterthanthe United Stateshad lost in the 2003 invasion.

Zarqawis Sunni forces were thus eventually defeated,butthis came aboutonly aftertheyhad visited considerable destruction upon the occupiers.

On the other hand, Iran continued, and continues, to be a harassing element,impelled as wellnowbyresentment overthe sanctions leveled against it. Indeed, the Army study strikingly, if dismally,concludes in its assessment of the warin Iraqthat Iran appears to be the only victor.

In2010,brieferspointedoutto topAmericangeneralsin Afghanistanthat no counterinsurgencyefforton record had succeededwhen the insurgents had access to adeep cross-border sanctuary.Although they added thatthattheyhopedthe situation inAfghanistan would prove to be an exception, it has not proven to beonemore thana decade later.

The related experience in Iraq suggests that the briefers had it essentially right. Unless the United States wants directly to go to all-out war with Irancreating yet another disaster in the Middle Eastthe Iranians can keep this up forever.

John Mueller is a political scientist at Ohio State University and a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. His book, The Stupidity of War: American Foreign Policy and the Case forComplacency,has justbeen publishedby Cambridge University Press.

Image: Reuters.

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The War in Iraq Exposed Huge Flaws in American Strategic Thinking - The National Interest