Global Dispatches -- World News That Matters

The challenge was immense About twenty years ago, India accounted for over 60% of all polio cases worldwide -- in fact it was considered a "hyper" endemic country. Then, the Indian government teamed up with the United Nations and other partners, including through the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, to tackle polio head on. India's vast population, its geographic diversity, and pockets of extreme poverty seriously complicated this effort. But the Indian government and its partners adapted, innovated and above all persisted until they could reach the very last child with the polio vaccine. In 2014, India was officially declared polio-free. There has not been a single case of wild polio in India in over eight years. Today, only three countries remain polio endemic. And as of October, there were fewer than 20 wild polio cases worldwide in 2018. The world is now tantalizingly close to the total global eradication of polio, and India's success in defeating polio within its borders is a big reason why total eradication is within reach Through interviews and archival material, this special episode of Global Dispatches tells you the story of how, against all odds, India eliminated polio. This episode is produced in partnership with the the United Nations Foundation as part of a series that examines successes in multilateral cooperation to tackle great global problems.  Previous episodes in this series include how the world closed the hole in the ozone layer, and how the UN Peacekeeping Mission in Liberia successfully completed its work  in 2015.   

On October 17 Canada became the second country in the world to legalize the recreational use of Cannabis. The first was Uruguay, which decriminalized Cannabis a few years ago. But Canada's move is arguably more significant to international relations for the fact that it is a member of the G7; and is a country that has a longstanding commitment to international law and the rules based international order    But, as my guest today Ambassador David Johnson explains, this move puts Canada squarely in violation of its international treaty obligations. David Johnson is a former US assistant secretary of state of international narcotics and law enforcement affairs. He is also currently a member of the UN's International Narcotics Control Board. As he explains, this is a body that oversees country's  compliance  with international treaties relating to drugs, including what is known as the 1961 Single Convention.    We discuss the implications of Canada's apparent violation of this treaty; and what it means for global efforts to control illicit drugs trafficking.    More broadly,though, we discuss what happens when progressive policies like the decriminalization of cannabis run afoul of the rules of the international system. And I think you can tell that I am kind tortured here. On the one hand, I strongly support the decriminalization of cannabis. On the other hand, I strongly support a rules based international order--and Canada's move puts these two in direct conflict.

An ongoing Ebola Outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has sickened over 250 people, and resulted in over 130 deaths as of October 18. Now, the DRC is experienced in handling Ebola outbreaks. A separate outbreak in the country's Equateur province was rather quickly and effectively contained. 33 people died, but it could have been much worse. That outbreak was declared over this summer.    What makes this current outbreak so potentially dangerous is the fact that it is occurring in a conflict zone. Ebola has been confirmed in two provinces, North Kivu and Ituri, that have long been a hotbed for various armed groups.  As my guest today, Heather Kerr of Save the Children explains, this insecurity is seriously undermining efforts to bring this outbreak under control.    Heather Kerr is the country director for Save the Children. I caught up with her from Kinshasa, the capitol of the DRC where she was just emerging from a meeting on the ebola outbreak.  Heather Kerr describes what Save the Children is doing in response to this outbreak, as well as the activities of other groups. She explains how insecurity in the city of Beni is disrupting the activities of health workers, such as contact tracing, to bring this outbreak to heel.

On October 2, Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, seeking to retrieve some marriage documents relating to his upcoming wedding.  He never came out. Turkish authorities believe he was tortured and murdered by Saudi intelligence officers sent to kill him.    This incident has profoundly shaken Saudi Arabia's relationship with the United States. Khashoggi was well known and well-liked by journalists and others in policy circles in Washington DC. He was a columnist for the Washington Post and had a residence in Northern Virginia. Yet, despite his connections, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammad Bin Salman apparently ordered a hit job.    On the line with me to discuss the international implications of this incident is Simon Henderson He is the Baker Fellow and Director of the Bernstein Program on Gulf and Energy Policy at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He was a friend of Khashoggi's and he explains who Khashoggi was, and how his murder may impact Saudi Arabia's relationship with both Turkey and the United States. This conversation does a good job of putting this incident in a broader context of Saudi Arabia's transitions under the leadership of Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman.    Details from the incident in the Saudi consulate are still emerging. We recorded this conversation on Friday oct 12. And I think that Simon Henderson provides some useful context that will help you understand how we reached a point where the Saudi government was willing to so brazenly murder a high profile critic of the Crown Prince.

My guest today Ivo Daalder served as the United States ambassador to NATO under President Obama from 2009 to 2013. He is now the president of the Chicago council on foreign relations and he is the co-author, with James Lindsey, of the new book, The Empty Throne: America's Abdication of Global Leadership.  The book offers a comprehensive accounting of the first two years of President Trump's foreign policy and in so doing, it offers an unsparing criticism of what the authors argue is a grand strategic failure of the Trump administration.    Now, for those of you who have been around the foreign policy world for a while, you may recall that Ivo Daalder and James Lindsey last teamed up for the 2005 book America Unbound: The Bush Revolution in Foreign Policy. This book won all sorts of awards and rightly so--it was the first book to really offer a full picture of the immense scope of the foreign policy failures of the first term of the George W Bush administration. So, we kick off this conversation comparing that era to the one we are currently in.

My guest today, Nicola Banks, is a lecturer in global urbanism and urban development at the University of Manchester. She has conducted some pioneering research on the role of the NGO sector in global development. Some of her findings, including that development NGOs be more politically engaged, are being adopted and tested by some major aid agencies. Dr. Banks is also undertaking an ambitious project, along with Professor Dan Brockington of the University of Sheffield, of mapping the UK's NGO sector and we discuss some of her findings from that study.     This episode is part of a new content partnership between the podcast and the Global Development Institute at the University of Manchester. For the next several months we will be featuring from, time to time, experts from the Global Development Institute who will discuss their research and also the pressing news of the day as it relates to global inequalities and development. If you’d like to learn more about the Global Development Institute you can go to GDI.Manchester.ac.uk or click on the add on globaldispatchespodcast.com   

I met the Foreign Minister of Kosovo Behgjet Pacolli in a hotel lobby not far from the United Nations where the foreign minister had spent several days during the UN General Assembly last week.    I was interested in learning from the foreign minister both some of the substantive issues on his plate--that is, what are Kosovo's foreign policy priorities today, and also just what life is like during UN week for the foreign minister of a small state like Kosovo. So, the conversation you about to hear veers between those two threads.    Kosovo is in a unique diplomatic situation. About 116 countries recognize Kosovo as an independent state. This includes major powers like the United States and most of Europe. Russia and many other countries however, do not consider it an independent country, but rather a breakaway region of Serbia. The quest for formal and full admittance to the United Nations hits a roadblock at the Security Council, where Russia holds a veto.    As you'll see from our conversation Foreign Minister Pacoli's paramount is to gain full status for Kosovo at the UN and secure bi-lateral recognition from as many states as possible and it was interesting to hear from him how he goes about doing that.

If you want a glimpse of a dystopian future in which authoritarian leaders harness the power of social media to carry out human rights abuses and suppress their political opponents, you need to look no further than the Philippines today.   There are few countries in the world as hyper connected on Facebook as the Philippines. And here, President Rodrigo Duterte and his allies are using Facebook to advance their so-called war on drugs which has resulted in the deaths of thousands of people, mostly through extra-judicial killings. All the while, so called Facebook "influencers" are spreading false information -- even a faked pornographic image to undermine leaders in the Philippines who are critical of Duterte. It is a nightmare situation and one in which Facebook is an accomplice.    On the line with me to discuss the deleterious effect of Facebook on democracy in the Philippines is Davey Alba. She is a reporter with Buzzfeed who wrote a deeply reported longform article examining the mechanics of how Duterte and his allies have harnessed Facebook to advance an authoritarian agenda while undermining domestic political opposition. Facebook has very much become a tool of Duterte's drug war and what is happening in the Philippines right now should serve as a warning about Facebook's potential to undermine democracy.

Every year during UN Week there are a number of substantive and important issues discussed, new initiatives launched and new partnerships formed, typically around some big important global issues. It is a week in the diplomatic calendar in which a lot of problem solving gets done. The problem is, this aspect of UN Week rarely gets covered by the mainstream media, which so often chases the big headlines in general--and Donald Trump in particular. But there is so much happening beyond Trump, so today I wanted shine a spotlight one particular initiative launched this week to help the international community and countries of the developing world collect better data around agricultural productivity.  The initiative is called 50x2030, the 50 refers to 50 countries from the developing world which will participate in this data collection initiative and 2030 refers to the end date in which the Sustainable Development Goals are due. Key partners on the initiative include the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, United States Agency or International Development (USAID), Government of Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), Government of Germany’s Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), World Bank, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and International Fund for Agricultural Development.  It was launched at the United Nations this week. I attended the launch and it included something very different. In advance of a panel discussion, two individuals told powerful personal stories that helped make this discussion very real. These individual were trained by the Moth Global Community Program. So to kick off this episode, we are going to hear a seven minute personal story from Edward Mabaya, a development economist from Zimbabwe who told his story from the floor of the Trusteeship Council of the United Nations. That story provides important grounding for my longer conversation about strengthening the quality if data around agricultural productivity with Claire Melamed, who is the CEO of the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data.

All eyes turn to the New York and the United Nations as world leaders gather for the opening of the United Nations General Assembly, better known UNGA. This is always the busiest week of the diplomatic calendar and on the line the help make sense of it all is Richard Gowan. He is a Senior Fellow at the UN University Centre for Policy Research, and a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. This year, like last year, much of the oxygen in Turtle Bay and beyond will be sucked up by the Donald Trump, who is scheduled to be in New York for three consecutive days. We discuss some of the key moments to watch, including a scheduled Security Council meeting over which Donald Trump will preside. We also discuss some of the other events and issues that probably wont make headlines, but are nonetheless important outcomes of this year's UN summit. This includes a key high level meeting on UN Peacekeeping, which we discuss at length. If you have 20 minutes and want to learn the key stories to follow this UN Week, have a listen. Links mentioned Action For Peace Delta8.7