Ideals of the revolution shape Tunisia’s approach to international diplomacy

Ambassador Tarek Ladeb, Tunisia's permanent representative to the UN, speaks during a conference on Jan. 4, 2021 at the UN office in New York. (Still image from UN Web TV video)
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Updated 30 January 2021
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Ideals of the revolution shape Tunisia’s approach to international diplomacy

  • In an exclusive interview with Arab News, the Tunisian ambassador to the UN reflects on his country’s month-long presidency of the Security Council
  • ‘We have no hidden agenda. We respect … the sovereignty and internal affairs of all other countries, and we are always trying to be constructive

NEW YORK: When Tarek Ladeb arrived in New York last year to take up his position as Tunisia’s permanent representative to the UN, he was looking forward to taking full advantage of all the opportunities the “fascinating city” has to offer.

A big fan of cycling, jogging and walking in the park, a museum lover and an admirer of cinema and the theater, Ladeb assumed that the Big Apple would have plenty of distractions to take his mind off any longing for Tunis when he inevitably felt homesick.

“I miss everything about Tunisia,” he said during an exclusive interview with Arab News. “My family, the people, the streets, our lifestyle — everything. I mostly miss that magical element that I cannot describe.”

Unfortunately, New York did not turn out to be quite the substitute he had hoped, as it was particularly badly hit by the coronavirus crisis, especially during the early stages last year. “The city that never sleeps” is unusually drowsy. With many of its greatest attractions closed for much of the past year the city remains, compared with its normal hustle and bustle, a ghost town: its famed theaters plunged into darkness, the shutters down at museums and art galleries, and innumerable concerts, exhibitions and book signings canceled or postponed.

“We hope that things get better soon so we get a chance to discover the city,” said Ladeb.

While New York city life has yet to return to its normal frenetic pace, activity at the headquarters of the UN in Manhattan has been anything but slow, especially for Ladeb. Tunisia held the rotating presidency of the Security Council this month, so his agenda has been packed. It included many of the key issues affecting the Middle East, including the wars in Syria, Libya and Yemen, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In his final speech to the security council in 2006, former UN Secretary-General Kofi Anan said that the issue of Israel and Palestine is “not just one regional conflict among many. No other conflict carries such a powerful symbolic and emotional charge, even for people very far away.” Fifteen years later, it remains a key issue.

“The Palestinian cause is a top priority in our foreign policy and our stint as the president of the Security Council,” said Ladeb.

He convened a ministerial-level meeting this month to discuss the Palestinian issue and, after many years of bitter divisions, the delegates united in calls for the revival of efforts to agree a two-state solution. They also joined together in urging the restoration of humanitarian assistance for Palestinian refugees, after US President Donald Trump pulled the plug on US financing for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which threatened the survival of the 70-year old agency.

“For a very long time, we hadn’t seen the security council united in one way or another over this issue,” said Ladeb.

“Now we are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel as we felt a real common and joint engagement for a just and lasting peace; and most importantly, agreement on the terms of reference of that peace: the UN resolutions, the two-state vision, and the 1967 borders.”

This, along with a proposal to hold a ministerial meeting of the Middle East Quartet — the UN, the US, the EU and Russia — in the spring or summer, has reinforced Ladeb’s conviction that “we are on a new path of peace.”

Tunisia’s stint as president of the Security Council coincided with celebrations for the 10th anniversary of the North African nation’s “revolution of freedom and dignity.” It began on Dec. 17, 2010 when 26-year-old street vendor Mohammad Bouazizi set himself on fire in protest against the constant harassment he was subjected to at the hands of local officials.

Within a month, popular pressure toppled President Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, who resigned in Jan. 14, and drove him into exile as the Arab Spring continued to bloom, from Beirut and Damascus to Cairo and Tripoli.

Although the 10th anniversary of the revolution was marred by continuing protests in Tunis against police brutality and unemployment, Tunisia remains the only real success story of the Arab Spring, with the only democracy to emerge from it. The ideals embodied by the revolution have informed the nation’s approach to international diplomacy in the past decade.

“The revolution has given Tunisia a new impetus and a new image that has strengthened our diplomacy, our action on the regional and international scenes in advocating principles of democracy, tolerance, cooperation and solidarity, and all the other universal values of the UN Charter,” said Ladeb.

“We feel confident when we represent our country and I am very proud to be Tunisia’s ambassador and defend the values of our foreign policy.

“We have no hidden agenda. We respect all our international engagements, the sovereignty and internal affairs of all the other countries, and we are always trying to be constructive — a positive, suggesting power, if I can describe it that way.”

By subscribing to those universal principles and international laws, Tunisia has been able to smoothly navigate the complex dimensions of its own identity “while taking into account our own interests, but without offending any party,” said Ladeb.

“The African, Arab, Muslim, Mediterranean: all of these dimensions are very important for our identity,” he added. “So all the issues on the Security Council agenda are a priority for us. But as we represent mainly the Arab region and the African continent, we are very sensitive to all the crises in these two regions, and we feel responsible for defending their views and pushing toward a settlement for their conflicts.”

If the Security Council seemed to agree on ways to move efforts to address the Palestinian-Israeli conflict forward, other virtual meetings descended into bickering as the permanent members, particularly the US and Russia, traded accusations and tried to settle scores. Washington demanded the end of the Assad regime, for example, while Russia defended it with rhetoric that placed all the blame for the Civil War and the resultant humanitarian disaster on the West.

However, the fifth round of talks of the Small Body of the Syrian Constitutional Committee this week has given Ladeb cause for optimism:

“Things can move if the two parties continue, in a constructive way, their talks about principles and foundations of the new constitution,” he said. “Because the constitution, if it can be adopted, can pave the way toward a political settlement of the crisis.

“But on the other hand, the humanitarian situation is still dire in Syria and Yemen. In the two countries, the situation is exacerbated by the economic difficulties. We hope that things get better and the suffering of these two brotherly populations comes to an end.”

Perhaps the biggest challenge facing the Security Council is its own waning credibility, and this, according to Ladeb, can only be rectified by “implementing its own decisions and resolutions.”

He said: “Whether it’s the resolutions related to the Palestinians or, for example, the arms embargo on Libya, if they are properly implemented, things can get better, especially in terms of security and ceasefire.”

As the Tunisian presidency of the Security Council comes to an end, Ladeb paused to consider the future.

“The most important message is faith and hope,” he said. “Many of our brothers in the Arab world and Africa have suffered for a long period.

“I think with hope, faith, patience — and of course cooperation and solidarity of all our countries and the international community and the UN system and the Security Council — these crises must have an end.

“Because we cannot keep silent as people suffer for decades, like our brothers the Palestinians. More than seven decades of suffering, of pressure. The international community, the Security Council, must assume its responsibility. Its moral, political and legal responsibility.”


Helicopter carrying Iran's President Raisi makes rough landing, Iranian media say

Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi and his Azeri counterpart Ilham Aliyev meet at the site of Qiz Qalasi.
Updated 4 min 47 sec ago
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Helicopter carrying Iran's President Raisi makes rough landing, Iranian media say

  • IRNA said the helicopter in question had been carrying Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and local officials

DUBAI: A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his foreign minister made a rough landing on Sunday as it was crossing a mountainous area in heavy fog on the way back from a visit to Azerbaijan, Iranian news agencies said.
The bad weather was complicating rescue efforts, the state news agency IRNA reported. The semi-official Fars news agency urged Iranians to pray for Raisi and state TV carried prayers for his safety.
IRNA said the helicopter in question had been carrying Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and local officials.
Interior Minister Ahmed Vahidi told state TV only that one of the helicopters in a group of three had come down hard, and that authorities were awaiting further details.
Raisi, 63, was elected president at the second attempt in 2021, and since taking office has ordered a tightening of morality laws, overseen a bloody crackdown on anti-government protests and pushed hard in nuclear talks with world powers.
In Iran’s dual political system, split between the clerical establishment and the government, it is the supreme leader rather than the president who has the final say on all major policies.
But many see Raisi as a strong contender to succeed his mentor, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has strongly endorsed Raisi's main policies.


Israel war cabinet minister says to quit unless Gaza plan approved

Updated 19 May 2024
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Israel war cabinet minister says to quit unless Gaza plan approved

  • Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu dismisses comments as "washed-up words"
  • Broad splits emerge in Israeli war cabinet as Hamas regroups in northern Gaza

JERUSALEM: Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz said Saturday he would resign from the body unless Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved a post-war plan for the Gaza Strip.

“The war cabinet must formulate and approve by June 8 an action plan that will lead to the realization of six strategic goals of national importance.. (or) we will be forced to resign from the government,” Gantz said, referring to his party, in a televised address directed at Netanyahu.

Gantz said the six goals included toppling Hamas, ensuring Israeli security control over the Palestinian territory and returning Israeli hostages.

“Along with maintaining Israeli security control, establish an American, European, Arab and Palestinian administration that will manage civilian affairs in the Gaza Strip and lay the foundation for a future alternative that is not Hamas or (Mahmud) Abbas,” he said, referring to the president of the Palestinian Authority.

He also urged the normalization of ties with Saudi Arabia “as part of an overall move that will create an alliance with the free world and the Arab world against Iran and its affiliates.”

Netanyahu responded to Gantz’s threat on Saturday by slamming the minister’s demands as “washed-up words whose meaning is clear: the end of the war and a defeat for Israel, the abandoning of most of the hostages, leaving Hamas intact and the establishment of a Palestinian state.”

The Israeli army has been battling Hamas militants across the Gaza Strip for more than seven months.

But broad splits have emerged in the Israeli war cabinet in recent days after Hamas fighters regrouped in northern Gaza, an area where Israel previously said the group had been neutralized.

Netanyahu came under personal attack from Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Wednesday for failing to rule out an Israeli government in Gaza after the war.

The Gaza war broke out after Hamas’s attack on October 7 on southern Israel which resulted in the deaths of more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

The militants also seized about 250 hostages, 124 of whom Israel estimates remain in Gaza, including 37 the military says are dead.

Israel’s military retaliation against Hamas has killed at least 35,386 people, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run Gaza’s health ministry, and an Israeli siege has brought dire food shortages and the threat of famine.


US, Iranian officials met in Oman after Israel escalation

Updated 19 May 2024
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US, Iranian officials met in Oman after Israel escalation

  • Washington called on Tehran to rein in proxy forces
  • Officials sat in separate rooms with Omani intermediaries passing messages

LONDON: US and Iranian officials held talks in Oman last week aimed at reducing regional tensions, the New York Times reported.

Through intermediaries from Oman, Washington’s top Middle East official Brett McGurk and the deputy special envoy for Iran, Abram Paley, spoke with Iranian counterparts.

It was the first contact between the two countries in the wake of Iran’s retaliatory missile and drone attack on Israel in April.

The US officials, who communicated with their Iranian counterparts in a separate room — with Omani officials passing on messages — requested that Tehran rein in its proxy forces across the region.

The US has had no diplomatic contact with Iran since 1979, and communicates with the country using intermediaries and back channels.

Since the outbreak of the Gaza war last October, Iran-backed militias — including Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and armed groups in Syria and Iraq — have ramped up attacks on Israeli and American targets.

But US officials have determined that neither Hezbollah nor Iran want an escalation and wider war.

After Israel struck Iran’s consulate in Damascus at the beginning of April, Tehran retaliated with hundreds of ballistic missiles and drones.

The attack — which was intercepted by air defense systems from Israel, the US and the UK, among others — was the first ever direct Iranian strike on Israel, which has for years targeted Iranian assets in Syria, whose government is a close ally of Tehran.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said in a news conference this week that the “Iranian threat” to Israel and US interests “is clear.”

He added: “We are working with Israel and other partners to protect against these threats and to prevent escalation into an all-out regional war through a calibrated combination of diplomacy, deterrence, force posture adjustments and use of force when necessary to protect our people and to defend our interests and our allies.”


Death toll from Israeli strike on Nuseirat rises to 31: Gaza officials

Updated 19 May 2024
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Death toll from Israeli strike on Nuseirat rises to 31: Gaza officials

  • Rescue workers continuing to search for missing people under the rubble
  • Heavy Israeli bombardments have been reported in the central Nuseirat camp

GAZA STRIP, Palestinian Territories: Gaza’s civil defense agency said Sunday that an Israeli air strike targeting a house at a refugee camp in the center of the Palestinian territory killed at least 31 people, updating an earlier toll.

“The civil defense crew were able to recover 31 martyrs and 20 wounded from a house belonging to the Hassan family, which was targeted by the Israeli occupation forces in the Nuseirat camp,” Gaza civil defense agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told journalists.

He said rescue workers were continuing to search for missing people under the rubble.

Earlier on Sunday the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital had said it had received the bodies of 20 people killed in the strike which witnesses said occurred around 3:00 am local time.

The Israeli army when contacted by AFP asked for specific coordinates of the strike.

Palestinian official news agency Wafa reported that the wounded included several children.

Fierce battles and heavy Israeli bombardments have been reported in the central Nuseirat camp since the military launched a ground operation on the southern city of Rafah in early May.

Palestinian militants and Israeli troops have also clashed in north Gaza’s Jabalia camp for days now.

Witnesses said several other houses were targeted in air strikes during the night across Gaza, and that strikes and artillery shelling also hit parts of Rafah during the night.

The Israeli military said two more soldiers were killed in Gaza the previous day.

The military said 282 soldiers have been killed so far in the Gaza military campaign since the start of the ground offensive on October 27.


Houthi missile strikes China-bound oil tanker in Red Sea

Updated 19 May 2024
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Houthi missile strikes China-bound oil tanker in Red Sea

  • The vessel and crew are safe and continuing to its next port of call: UKMTO
  • The incident occurred 76 nautical miles (140 kilometers) off Yemen’s Hodeidah

AL-MUKALLA: Yemen’s Houthi militia launched an anti-ship ballistic missile into the Red Sea on Saturday morning, striking an oil tanker traveling from Russia to China, according to US Central Command, the latest in a series of Houthi maritime strikes. 

CENTCOM said that at 1 a.m. on Saturday, a Houthi anti-ship ballistic missile struck a Panamanian-flagged, Greek-owned and operated oil tanker named M/T Wind, which had just visited Russia and was on its way to China, causing “flooding which resulted in the loss of propulsion and steering.”

Slamming the Houthis for attacking ships, the US military said: “The crew of M/T Wind was able to restore propulsion and steering, and no casualties were reported. M/T Wind resumed its course under its power. This continued malign and reckless behavior by the Iranian-backed Houthis threatens regional stability and endangers the lives of mariners across the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.”

Earlier on Saturday, two UK naval agencies said that a ship sailing in the Red Sea suffered minor damage after being hit by an item thought to be a missile launched by Yemen’s Houthi militia from an area under their control.

The UK Maritime Trade Operations, which monitors ship attacks, said on Saturday morning that it received an alarm from a ship master about an “unknown object” striking the ship’s port quarter, 98 miles south of Hodeidah, inflicting minor damage.

“The vessel and crew are safe and continuing to its next port of call,” UKMTO said in its notice about the incident, encouraging ships in the Red Sea to exercise caution and report any incidents.

Hours earlier, the same UK maritime agency stated that the assault happened 76 nautical miles northwest of Hodeidah.

Ambrey, a UK security firm, also reported receiving information regarding a missile strike on a crude oil tanker traveling under the Panama flag, around 10 nautical miles southwest of Yemen’s government-controlled town of Mokha on the Red Sea, which resulted in a fire on the ship.

The Houthis did not claim responsibility for fresh ship strikes on Saturday, although they generally do so days after the attack.

Since November, the Houthis have seized a commercial ship, sunk another, and claimed to have fired hundreds of ballistic missiles at international commercial and naval ships in the Gulf of Aden, Bab Al-Mandab Strait, and Red Sea in what the Yemeni militia claims is support for the Palestinian people.

The Houthis claim that they solely strike Israel-linked ships and those traveling or transporting products to Israel in order to pressure the latter to cease its war in Gaza.

The US responded to the Houthi attacks by branding them as terrorists, forming a coalition of marine task forces to safeguard ships, and unleashing hundreds of strikes on Houthi sites in Yemen.

Local and international environmentalists have long warned that Houthi attacks on ships carrying fuel or other chemicals might lead to an environmental calamity near Yemen’s coast.

The early warning came in February when the Houthis launched a missile that seriously damaged the MV Rubymar, a Belize-flagged and Lebanese-operated ship carrying 22,000 tonnes of ammonium phosphate-sulfate NPS fertilizer and more than 200 tonnes of fuel while cruising in the Red Sea. 

The Houthis have defied demands for de-escalation in the Red Sea and continue to organize massive rallies in regions under their control to express support for their campaign. On Friday, thousands of Houthi sympathizers took to the streets of Sanaa, Saada, and other cities under their control to show their support for the war on ships.

The Houthis shouted in unison, “We have no red line, and what’s coming is far worse,” as they raised the Palestinian and militia flags in Al-Sabeen Square on Friday, repeating their leader’s promise to intensify assaults on ships.

Meanwhile, a Yemeni government soldier was killed and another was injured on Saturday while fending off a Houthi attack on their position near the border between the provinces of Taiz and Lahj.

According to local media, the Houthis attacked the government’s Nation’s Shield Forces in the contested Hayfan district of Taiz province, attempting to capture control of additional territory.

The Houthis were forced to stop their attack after encountering tough resistance from government troops.

The attack occurred a day after the Nation’s Shield Forces sent dozens of armed vehicles and personnel to the same locations to boost their forces and repel Houthi attacks.