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Shramik trains saw migrant workers queue up at Chennai Central without proper information on schedule. Pic: Arokya Inian

As an extended lockdown was announced by the center and state to curtail the spread of COVID-19, little did I imagine that we would be witness to a humanitarian crisis of this scale, created by the Governments both state and centre. Agreed that this killer contagion was nasty but to use that as a cover to deny any assistance to the migrants is a sheer act of cruelty.

Having lost their livelihood and jobs, migrants, who power our cities, found themselves staring at an uncertain future, facing hunger, fearing disease and caught in an alien state with language issues. Under the circumstances, the least that the state could do was provide them reasonable assurance that they would be taken care of, or that safe passage to their homes would be ensured.

The first hurdle was that guest workers in Chennai were not eligible for cash or groceries provided by the state government as they did not possess valid ration cards. The Greater Chennai Corporation too made the decision to stop provision of cooked food by NGOs before going back on its decision after realizing the scale of the crisis.

Next came the travel crisis. With no support, no clear communication, no refuge, the migrants decided to go home. With all modes of transport banned and those available too expensive, they started walking in the searing heat of Chennai summer.

When the numbers swelled and accidents and deaths happened amongst those walking, hundreds of workers were stopped at the Andhra Pradesh state border by the police and sent back. The TN police too abandoned them by the side of highways, far away from any help. Much of this happened under the cover of dark.

Some workers tried hiring buses, with only 30 passengers allowed per bus. The charges, too, were exorbitant: a trip to Odisha cost Rs 5000 and one to UP was Rs 7500.Travel permits had to be obtained from both exit and destination states, making it an uphill task.

Even as they came close to home, a 14-day quarantine awaited before they could actually enter their village. Very soon, exit passes were reduced to 25 or even 20 passengers per bus, which made the already high cost unaffordable: Rs 7000 for Odisha and upwards of Rs 10000 for Uttar Pradesh.

As news of the issues faced by migrants blew up, the pressure from media, courts and civil society forced the government to run trains and to provide shelter to migrants stranded on roads. Under pressure, the Chennai Corporation started opening relief camps to accommodate the stranded, andensure food, water, sanitation and health.

But there was no proper communication on the camp locations and how to get in, leaving the workers in the dark once again. Accommodation in the camps was largely arbitrary.

Relying on NGOs

Rajesh Sharma, Pramod Kumar and their group of 40+ workers from villages near Nalanda, Bihar were living in Velachery. After they lost their jobs, they survived on meal handouts on the main road once a day. Desperate for help, they reached out to our volunteer group on May 19th. We were able to arrange groceries through NGO No Food Waste for a few days. They had sought help from local police and the Bihar association too, but to no avail. On May 23rd, about 30 people were lucky to get on a train and leave for Bihar, but 10 workers could not. Their wait continued until we were informed on June 26th that the group had finally managed to reach home three months after the lockdown began, after harrowing times in the city where they had hoped to secure their future.

The plight of those outside Greater Chennai Corporation limits was even more pathetic, with no relief centres in Chengalpet, Kancheepuram. For those who lost shelter provided by employers or their rented homes, there was nowhere to go. Thiruvallur was better off as there was plenty of outcry from NGOs and volunteers at the AP border.

Meanwhile special Shramik trains began to run, with uncertainty on who would bear the costs. Registrations (not reservations) were open, but there was no way to track when workers would get their chance, if at all they would.

There was no timetable or tickets. The lucky ones got a message and could board a train, most of the time it was those in relief camps who were rushed in buses and dropped off at railway stations. With all options closed, many workers started assembling at the station only to be driven away or bundled into the backroads, awaiting their destiny on footpaths for days at a stretch.

Even those who managed to get on a train could not breathe a sigh of relief, as many long-distance trains had no provision for food and drinking water. The delays meant two-day journeys were taking twice the amount of time, with plenty of diversions and redirections.

Slipping through the cracks

On May 17th two groups of about 30 migrant workers, mostly from Bihar and Jharkhand, were intercepted by the police from AP border late at night. Some of them were on GST Highway near Maraimalai Nagar while others were stranded on Bengaluru Highway near Sriperumbudur.

Two others, Arjun Kumar and Mohan Singh were stranded without help for three days, with only assistance from a passerby for food and stay at a roadside eatery. Arjun managed to walk from there, take trucks, cycle, and use other modes of transportto finally reach Bihar.Mohans whereabouts are still not known to those who tried to assist him.

The second group of 18 (including workers Deepak Chauhan, Anu Kumar, Jitender Kumar) from Jharkhand had no jobs anymore and had to vacate their rooms. On May 24th they managed to reach Central Station, upon hearing that there was a train for Jharkhand. But that was not to be and they ended up waiting in the streets. With the help of volunteers they were directed to a relief centre near Elephant gate police station

Similar issues were faced by the group stranded in Maraimalai Nagar. The current status of many of these workers is not known to the volunteer groups that aided them. The sheer number of workers in need of help has been overwhelming.

There were no stops along the way and the few shops where the migrants could look for food or water were all closed. There was no assistance from NGOs either during the journey. Most of the migrant workers we spoke to seemed to be overpowered by emotions triggered by hunger and the fear of death.

What was the crime committed by these migrant workers? That they were not a vote bank? That they moved in search of livelihoods? And why did their native states, and even the centre, display such careless, callous and often sadistic attitude towards these lives?

The truth remains that this nation, which prides itself on modernization and self sufficiency, failed to help its most-needy citizens making them feel unwelcome in their own country. If not for the many NGOs, civil society and volunteer groups and kind hearted donors, the situation would have been much worse.

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Comment: COVID-19 aside, migrant crisis in city has exposed the huge gaps in governance - Citizen Matters, Chennai

Danny Glover was recently a juror and mentor at Turkeys virtual International Migration Film Festival, for which he took a deep dive into films tackling the plight of migrants around the world from his home in San Francisco, just as protests over the death of George Floyd escalated in the U.S.

The actor-writer-producer and passionate political activist spoke to Variety about how hes been associating the current global migrant crisis with the historical roots of violence against African Americans in the U.S. The screen icon, known for classics such as Places in the Heart, The Color Purple and the Lethal Weapon franchise, also discussed his parallel career as a producer of socially relevant films by global auteurs, such as Cannes Palme dOr winner Uncle Boonmee who can Recall his Past Lives, and why Lethal Weapon 5 should come back within the political framework that we are in.

As an American citizen, we see glimpses of it on the news, and we know that there is a crisis happening. We see the actual reporting. But we dont understand the entire stories that are engaged, and the historic nature of those stories, particularly in Afghanistan, which weve heard so much about. So (in Just Like My Son, by Costanza Quatriglio), the story of a young man trying to find his mother after not seeing her for years and years, its a touching personal story. And it has its own power, with respect to seeing it in a much larger context. That personal story has a much stronger impact in understanding the crisis that we are inYou see the magnitude of the crisis, yet we are immune to it in this country. In America, there is a kind of certainty of expectations that the government is able to protect you, to some extent. Except in some neighborhoods, in some communities.

There is an outcry after the murder of George Floyd or there is an outcry after Eric Garner which in some sense is expecting resolution in this country. But the question of migrants has existed internally in this country.

As an African descendant from enslaved Africans who either escaped as migrants, and after the Civil War and after they were freed became constitutional citizens they still were forced to migrate to various places in the country to escape the violence that they themselves experienced. The emotional and physical violence; the lynchings and murders. They were internal migrants within the country itself. Even though the country posed this certainty for other citizens, it didnt pose this kind of certainty for them.

So when I saw these different stories they made me think about this. You think about mothers sending their daughters away once they became 13 and [when] white men and white boys started looking at them. They sent them from the South somewhere North or somewhere else where they could be safe. This is something that is not often expounded upon in our historical narratives. Or parents of young boys having them leave the South because of the possibility of their being lynched. Or escaping the violence that is unscripted in the 400 years of this countrys history towards enslaved Africans, or formerly enslaved Africans.

It has to be seen. We dont know whats going to happen in this particular moment. The resources and the allocations that are going to be thrown at this; the choices that are going to be made are going to be numerous. But the violence that we see whether its the toxic places where they (black people) live; the inadequacy of health care for them; whether its the lack of affordable housing; the absence of jobs at living wages; all those things thats basically going unseen. We see the actual violence because the police is what it is. Its the last line line of defense for white supremacy. Thats what the police represents. They dont protect African Americans. You can make an argument that the institutional violence has its roots in so many different ways. The violence that we see now that is acted out on the physical body of George Floyd has been the kind of violence that is engrained within the American idea of its culture, in its own subtlety, since the first Africans were brought here. So its 400 years of violence. Its not just now!

As James Baldwin said: when we cannot tell ourselves the truth about our past, we become trapped in it.This country has been trapped in its past and continues to be. Its even trapped in its past in terms of First Nations people. We never hear about the violence on First Nations people.

What does real change look like? Thats the question at a moment in time when we shape the images of change, and they might not be the kind of substantial changes, qualitative changes and transformative changes that are necessary.

It may be a democratization of what I call cultural production. Cultural production looks at: how do people live? How do we understand each other? What are the elements that bring us together and form the whole idea of the responsibilities that we have to each other as human beings? How do those kinds of stories evolve? It must not only happen within my business. It has to happen in concert with all the kinds of relationships that we have. We have to be honest about that. As I said before, we cant be honest about what we are. We fantasize about what we think should be changed. What does that mean?

I think we started having a different sense of African Americans [on screen] when the civil rights movement came about. The new images of African Americans presented by Hollywood came through avenues that were opened because of singular artists at the time. Sidney Poitier changed the whole image of African Americans. Every one of us: me, Morgan [Freeman], Denzel [Washington], Sam [Samuel Jackson] we are descendants of the images presented by Sidney Poitier!

I think there has to be some sort of sound way, because we cant go back to just anythingIn terms of saying: we are going back to the past. We cant go back.

Those people who are white and Black and brown and gay and LGBTQ all of them are saying, as they march in the streets: we cant go back! Thats the message thats on the street right now.

I had the advantage when I started out of doing the plays of the great South African writer Athol Fugard as my foundation for looking at cultural production. And that was in the midst of the Anti-Apartheid movement and the Free Mandela movement. Ive also had this fascination about world cinema. When I was working, I would often go to arthouses and watch world cinema.

So the idea that came around with Joslyn Barnes started by talking about the Haitian Revolution. Now somebody might have thought that was a rock band, but there was a Haitian Revolution [led by Toussaint Louverture]. Haiti was the first nation ever to be formed by formerly enslaved Africans who defeated the Spanish, defeated the French, defeated the British. Thats how the conversation started.

Then we talked about our interest in world cinema. And we began to say: how do we put emphasis on this issue? So we put emphasis on storytellers. Elia Suleiman, Palestinian, one of the great filmmakers in the world. How do we get involved in that?

Apichatpong [Weerasethakul] from Thailand, Uncle Boonmee who can Recall his Past Lives. Brilliant. I could have shown that movie to my grandmother, who was born in 1895, and she would have gotten it! My grandparents, they would talk about past lives; about visions. They would sometimes scare the hell out of me as kid! And so those are the kind of things that we were able to do.

There are things that Ive done that are no doubt important. The Beloved is an important film; an extraordinary film. The Color Purple is an important film. Places in the Heart, with Sally Field, is an important film for me. They moved my career in a lot of ways, but they were important for me to do. Because they were also expressions of part of that psychic history thats in my bones, that comes from my great-grandmother, who was born in 1858. All that history is a part of me. So being able to do those films is a way of exploring that part of myself.

But also the opportunity to have a franchise film, and to try to do something with that franchise film. And thats basically what Richard Donner and the creators of Lethal Weapon did. One [film] was about drug proliferation; one was about arms proliferation. One focused on South Africa. Theres value in that as well.

There has been a conversation about that in January. I dont want to give away the plot on the script that I read, but I found the plot had very strong relevance to some of things that are happening today. I can say that. But that was in January. History changes so fastBut yes, theres been talk about it. There is something of a plan.

Yes, I liked it. I can only tell you, if it does happen, there is something extraordinary in it. If Lethal Weapon gives us some sort of contribution to understanding a little bit moreIt would be interesting to do. It would be interesting to see how we take this within the political framework we are in; the economic framework that we are in. And especially that framework as opposed to the communities that have been affected by the kind of police violence, the kind of police standards, and the power that they exert as well. And what would be interesting from that vantage point is what that attempt could be like at this particular moment.

And maybe it will attempt to confront the issue head on, within whatever script comes out.

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Danny Glover on George Floyd and Possibly Reviving Lethal Weapon (EXCLUSIVE) - Variety

Written by C Rangarajan, S Mahendra Dev | Updated: July 3, 2020 9:40:02 am The first proposal of providing cash transfers to women above 20 costs Rs 1.72 crore (0.84 per cent of GDP). (Illustration by C R Sasikumar)

In the post corona crisis situation, India has to address many problems, of which two stand out. First, the improvement of our healthcare system and second, the need for the institution of a scheme to provide minimum income support to the weak and vulnerable groups. In this article, we address the second issue.

There has been considerable discussion on universal basic income (UBI) in recent years. It is true that a universal scheme is easy to implement. Feasibility is the critical question. The Congress had suggested NYAY to help the poor. The problem with non-universal targeted programmes is the problem of identification. Narrowly-targeted programmes will run into complex problems of identification and give rise to exclusion and inclusion errors.

In order to avoid the identification problem, we have three proposals which meet the objective of providing a minimum basic income to the poor and vulnerable groups in both rural and urban areas. These are: One, give cash transfers to all women above the age of 20 years; two, expand the number of days provided under MGNREGA and three, have a national employment guarantee scheme in urban areas. In all the three proposals, there is no problem of identification. A combination of cash transfers and an expanded employment guarantee scheme can provide a minimum basic income.

On the proposal of cash transfers, one way of doing it will be to give it to all women say above the age of 20. This is an easily identifiable criterion because the Aadhaar cards carry the age of the person. The female population above the age of 20 is around 42.89 crore. Making available a minimum of Rs 4,000 annually as a cash transfer to all of them will cost Rs 1.72 lakh crore 0.84 per cent of GDP. This is in addition to the income from an expanded MGNREGA as given below. The cost of the scheme to the government will be less if the well-off women choose not to take the cash transfer.

The second and third approaches are expanding MGNREGA in rural areas and introducing an employment guarantee programme in urban areas respectively. At present, MGNREGA is availed of only for 50 days of employment, although the Act guarantees 100 days of employment. One way to help the poor and informal workers is to strengthen it. We have two proposals here. The first is to increase the number of days under the scheme from 100 to 150 in rural areas. The second is to introduce an Employment Guarantee Act in urban areas and provide employment for 150 days. In 2019-20, the government spent Rs 67,873 crore for providing 48 days of employment to 5.48 crore of rural households. Out of this, the wage expenditure was Rs 48,762 crore.

The government has increased the per day wage rate from Rs 182.1 in 2019-20 to Rs 202.5 in 2020-21. Using this wage rate, we estimate the expenditure for 150 days of employment to 5.48 crore households in rural areas and 2.66 crore households in urban areas together they account for 33 per cent of total households in the country. As shown in the table, the total wage expenditure for 150 days is Rs 2.47 lakh crore (1.21 per cent of GDP) while total expenditure (wages and materials) is Rs 3.21 lakh crore (1.58 per cent of GDP) in 2020-21. It may be noted that this estimate includes the current expenditure of generating around 50 days of employment in rural areas which is already committed by the government. Therefore, the proposed additional expenditure for 150 days of employment in both rural and urban areas would be Rs 1.91 lakh crore (0.94 per cent of GDP) as wage expenditure and Rs 2.48 lakh crore (1.22 per cent of GDP) as total expenditure on wages and materials. In other words, the additional expenditure needed for our proposal is Rs 1.9 to 2.5 lakh crore, around 1 to 1.22 per cent of GDP.

Apart from expanding rural MGNREGA, we are proposing a nation-wide urban employment guarantee scheme to improve livelihoods. The design can be slightly different from MGNREGA. In urban areas, employment can be provided to both unskilled and semi-skilled workers as there is demand for the latter workers also.

The first proposal of providing cash transfers to women above 20 costs Rs 1.72 crore (0.84 per cent of GDP). The total cost on MGNREGA for providing 150 days of employment in rural areas and the cost for 150 days of work for the Urban Employment Guarantee Scheme is around Rs 3.21 crore in a year (1.58 per cent of GDP). The total cost of the three proposals would be Rs 4.9 lakh crore or 2.4 per cent of GDP. A person working in MGNREGA and in the urban programme can get Rs 30,000 if 150 days are provided.

It may be noted, however, that the total expenditure of the proposals could be lower due to two reasons. First, the number of days availed by the employment guarantee programmes could be lower as it is a demand-based programme. This is happening even now. Second, on cash transfers, some women, particularly from richer classes, may voluntarily drop out of the scheme or alternatively, we can provide that everyone receiving cash transfer must declare that her total monthly income is less than Rs 6,000 per month. In addition, it may be noted that the government is already incurring a total expenditure of Rs 67,873 crore on MGNREGA.

The feasibility of raising an additional Rs 4.2 lakh crore is not an easy one. Some analysts have suggested that we can remove all exemptions in our tax system and that would give enough money. Apart from the difficulties in removing all exemptions, tax experts advocate removing exemptions so that the basic tax rate can be reduced. Perhaps, out of the Rs 4.2 lakh crore which is needed, Rs 1 lakh crore can come out of phasing out of some of the expenditures, while another Rs 3 lakh crore must come out of raising additional revenue. Some of the non-merit subsidies, another item of expenditure, can be eliminated.

To conclude, in the post-COVID-19 situation, we need to institute schemes to provide a minimum income for the poor and vulnerable groups. For this purpose, we propose here cash transfers for women, increasing MGNREGA from the present 100 days of work to 150 days in rural areas and the introduction of 150 days of work as an urban employment guarantee scheme. This will cost around 2 per cent of GDP and will help the poor, informal workers, including the migrant workers, significantly reducing poverty.

This article first appeared in the print edition on June 3, 2020 under the title A safety net, post Covid. Rangarajan is former chairman, Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister and former Governor, RBI. Dev is director and vice-chancellor, IGIDR, Mumbai.

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A safety net, post Covid: We need to provide minimum income for poor and vulnerable - The Indian Express

Amir Asmar is a Department of Defense analyst and CFRs 2019-20 national intelligence fellow. Throughout his intelligence career, his primary area of focus has been the Middle East. He has held a wide range of analytic, senior analytic, and leadership positions for the Department of the Army, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the National Intelligence Council. The statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed in this blog post are strictly those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of Defense (DoD) or the U.S. government.Review of the material does not imply DoD or U.S. government endorsement of factual accuracy or opinion.

Jacob Ware is a research associate for CFR's counterterrorism and studies program.

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With Iranian and Russian support, the Bashar al-Assad regime will succeed in capturing the last opposition stronghold and de-escalation zone in SyriaIdlib provinceunless all parties to the conflict can negotiate a solution to the civil war and prevent the upcoming battle. If a political resolution is not found, the regime will likely kill, wound, or displace hundreds of thousands of civilians as it seizes control over the rest of the province. Although the U.S. military has begun to pull back from the region, the outcome of the fight for Idlib should be a national security concern, particularly as the United States seeks to contain Iranian adventurism, Russian influence, and Turkish unilateralism in the region; combat terrorism; prevent a humanitarian disaster; and alleviate Syrian instability before it spreads. U.S. inaction could allow the Assad regimes Idlib campaign to continue and could be viewed as a green light by malefactors searching for any sign of U.S. intent to intervene before proceeding with their plans in Idlib and for Syria more broadly. Moreover, should the battle for Idlib continue, the coronavirus pandemic will amplify the tragedy.

Strength Through Peace

CFR experts explore how the United States can avoid war, stay strong, and keep the peace.Monthly.

Rather than treating Syria as a discrete policy objective, the United States seems to have contextualized the Syrian conflict within two non-Syria military priorities that predate the civil war: combating terrorism and containing Iran. Indeed, sustained U.S. military involvement in the war occurred at only two junctures. First, Washington offered military assistancewhich ultimately proved inadequate to gain the upper handto the opposition early in the conflict. Second, when the Islamic State invaded eastern and northern Syria some three years into the conflict, Washington funded, trained, and armed Syrian rebels, including Kurdish forces, and supported their ground battles with air strikes against the Islamic State. Beyond these two instances, U.S. air strikes targeted convoys and bases of Irans Shia proxies in Syria to protect U.S.-allied forces and retaliate for Iranian-sponsored attacks against U.S. personnel in Iraq. However, even though the United States had begun looking for an exit before the Islamic State lost all its Syrian territory in 2019, Washington should consider leading a concerted, diplomatic effort to reach a negotiated agreement to end the war for the following reasons.

First, instead of allowing a lopsided victory for Assad and his supporters, a U.S.-led negotiation could limit Iranian, Russian, and Turkish gains and their tendency to interfere in the region. Iran, a decades-long ally of the Assads, entered the conflict early, helping the regime gain momentum by providing training, weapons, and intelligence. Tehran also arranged for Shia militias from across the region, including its strongest ally, the Lebanese Hezbollah, to support Assads forces. Absent an interruption in the conflict, Iran is on the verge of being more entrenched in Syria than ever before. Russia is using Assad to secure its military influence in the region, including an airbase in Latakia and a naval base in Tartus, both Syrian coastal provinces. Moscows intervention began in fall 2015 with airstrikes against rebel targetsand did not distinguish between Islamist terrorists and moderate oppositionists. Now, absent U.S. diplomatic intervention, Russia could remain emboldened to intrude in hot spots in the Middle East and elsewhere. Finally, although Turkey has backed opposition elements, its primary objective has been to block Syrian Kurdish territorial and political gains, and to exclude the Kurds from a safe zone along its shared border with northern Syria. Ankara carried out unilateral air and ground attacks against Kurdish forces in northern Syria, and a deconfliction agreement with Russia and Iran permitted Turkish troops to move into Idlib province, where they remain today. The current trajectory of the conflict could encourage Turkey to continue interfering in Syria and unilaterallypursue its interests outside of NATO.

Second, Idlib province remains the largest safe haven for al-Qaeda fighters since pre-9/11 Afghanistan, with several thousand fighters packed into an area smaller than Connecticut. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, an umbrella organization that includes thousands of al-Qaeda fighters led by Abu Mohammad al-Julani, has long dominated the region; its fighters and allies remain capable and likely intent on striking the West. Moreover, Idlib is complicated by a fractured landscape with moderate opposition groups that seek Assads overthrow competing with al-Qaeda and other opportunistic extremists who have transnational ambitions. The Syrian opposition today is still led by Free Syrian Army factions, but the ongoing marbling of terrorists and insurgents, and their geographical proximity, makes targeting extremists and distinguishing between groups challenging.

Third, beyond foreign intervention and the concentration of dangerous terrorists, the intensification of the humanitarian crisis is clearly concerning. Idlibs pre-war population of one and a half million has swelled to more than three million. Civilians in regime-conquered areas throughout Syria often fled because they faced arrest, torture, and conscription; thus, in addition to thousands of fighters and their families, hundreds of thousands of civilians relocated to Idlib. Should fighting resume, these peoplewill find themselves trapped against a closed Turkish border. With refugee camps already full, local, unofficial facilities run by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), rather than the United Nations, have dotted up along the border; these facilities are already stretched thin as they struggle to accommodate the approximately nine hundred thousand refugees displaced by the latest fighting. Any worsening of the humanitarian conditions in Idlib could prove devastating: either a second migrant crisis results, further challenging and polarizing Washingtons European allies, or thousands more die from hunger, exposure, or bullets and bombs, with the United States looking the other way.

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Finally, the ongoing coronavirus pandemic presents a dangerous new threat in Idlib. Years ofwar have decimated the regions health care infrastructure. More than eighty hospitals arealready out of action and those that remain have extremely limited capacity to provide intensivecare. Health officials in the region have warned of as many as one hundred thousand deathsnearly as many civilians as have already died in the entire conflict. The regions overcrowdedrefugee camps are particularly under threat given the difficulty in maintaining social distancing and proper hygiene. Though the risk of outbreak may be delaying a return to hostilities, thepandemic could magnify the grave humanitarian conditions resulting from any continuation ofthe conflict.

Nearly twenty years into the global war on terror, exhaustion is understandably wearing on Western policymakers and publics. However, the conflict in Idlib demands a response, and the United States could take the lead on proposing a largely non-military solution. The United States could propose the following notional planor something similarto end the war: Assad could remain in power, but he would have to consult with a newly-elected legislature, demand that Iran and its proxies withdraw, and permit NGOs to conduct humanitarian relief activities. Syrian refugees could be allowed to return to their home provinces, and oppositioniststhose who do not belong to terrorist groupscould receive amnesty and be admitted into the political process. U.S. sanctionsincluding a prohibition on the delivery of oil to Syriacould remain in effect, but would be terminated if Assad implemented agreed-upon commitments. Russia could keep its bases, but would have to gradually withdraw combat troops from Syria. The Syrian Kurds could gain some autonomy in a region away from the border, and Turkey would then withdraw from Syria and refrain from further interference. Iran and Hezbollahboth of whom are resource challenged could be warned that their continued activities in Syria would be subject to increasing Israeli and possibly U.S. strikes. And, Russia and the United States could collaborate to gradually degrade the already fractured terrorism landscapethe one area where the two powers agreeworking together to kill or capture and return foreign fighters to their home countries for prosecution. This may be the only part of the initiative that cannot be conducted purely through diplomacy.

Irrespective of the terms of a proposed peace agreement, U.S. diplomatic involvement is necessary for a chance at a positive outcome. No other state can exercise the leadership needed to implement the diplomatic and political solutions necessary to avoid broadening, regional instability and the consequent need for more military involvement. An unstable Syria threatens to trigger regional volatility for another generation, opening the door for more Iranian interference and greater radicalization and terrorist activity.

The appearance of external hyperlinks do not constitute endorsement by the United States Department of Defense (DoD) for the linked websites, the information, the products, or the services contained therein. The DoD does not exercise any editorial, security, or other control over the information you may find in these locations.

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US Retrenchment Will Intensify Crisis in Idlib - Council on Foreign Relations

A floating barrier in the Aegean Sea to prevent refugees reaching Greeces islands from Turkey, will be installed in the next few days.

The 2.7 km project will be made of netting and flashing lights.

According to reports, the barrier will be built north of the island of Lesvos, where migrants often attempt to cross due to the short stretch of water.

Greeces Defence Ministry had invited private contractors to bid on supplying the long floating fence.

Tens of thousands of undocumented migrants have landed on several eastern Aegean islands since the crisis erupted in 2015, mainly ferried onto Greek territory by migrant-smuggling rings operating from Turkey.

The floating barrier is a part of efforts by the Greek government in dealing with an explosive increase in refugee flows over the summer as the favourable weather sets in.

At the same time, Greek Police in Evros are ready to face a new wave of tens of thousands of immigrants, who will try to illegally enter Greece, as reported by Greek City Times.

Turkeys (failed) asymmetric invasion attempt in March sounded the alarm to prepare intensively for any new attempts.

Greek police have stockpiled a huge supply of arsenal and logistical equipment to arm the forces taking part in the border protection operation.

With these necessary, and albeit expensive upgrades, Greek border forces are far more prepared for the next Turkish-induced border migration crisis that they have promised to restart.

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Floating Dam To Be Installed In The Next Few Days - GreekCityTimes.com