Victors and Spoils
NEED TO KNOW
Victors and Spoils
KIRIBATI
The Tobwaan Kiribati Party (TKP) holds a sufficiently large majority in the parliament of Kiribati, a low-lying atoll nation of about 130,000 people, that every candidate allowed to run for president is a member of that party.
Under the central Pacific Ocean country’s laws, parliament picks which candidates can run for president called a “beretitenti” on Oct. 25. A maximum of four are allowed to run. As a result, the TKP did nothing illegal when it didn’t allow an opposition candidate on the ballot.
That doesn’t mean it isn’t controversial, however.
“Over the past eight years under the TKP, we have seen Kiribati rapidly decline into authoritarianism and isolationism,” opposition leader Tessie Lambourne told Radio New Zealand. “It seems that Kiribati is now a one-party state, and her people are suffering as a result.”
Lambourne elaborated by saying that basic public services like schools, utility infrastructure and hospitals have “deteriorated to the point of near collapse.” During that same period, the country has experienced strained relations with its Pacific neighbors, tensions with traditional ally Australia and a continuing constitutional crisis, noted Al Jazeera.
Still, observers at Nikkei Asia wrote that incumbent Kiribati President Taneti Maamau, a former ambassador to Taiwan who is considered pro-China, was in pole position to land a third term in office. Maamau’s TKP defeated Lambourne’s Boutokaan Kiribati Moa Party in parliamentary elections in August, Reuters added.
Now Maamau is running against other members of his own party who presumably have few reasons to mount a rival campaign to their sitting president and party’s titular head. His confidence as polls open might reflect why the president has promised to cut taxes, invest in infrastructure, and improve the country’s welfare system but neglected to offer details on funding these policies, Islands Business noted.
Perhaps China could fund that construction. In 2019, Kiribati severed ties with Taiwan and adopted a pro-China foreign stance, explained CNN. Its decision was part of a trend of sovereign Pacific islands switching allegiances in part because China promised aid and commerce to help them develop prosperous economies and combat climate change, especially rising sea levels.
Before the parliamentary elections in August, the Chinese ambassador to Kiribati, Zhou Limin, wrote a public letter to Kiribati’s citizens. “In the past year, I have observed an increase in the number of cars on the roads, a wider range of goods in supermarkets, and new entertainment equipment at playgrounds, which are strong proof of the improvement of (the) Kiribati people’s life quality,” he wrote, according to the Guardian.
Chinese police officers also work in Kiribati, their presence concerning US and Australian officials because the country is considered strategic: It is relatively close to Hawaii and controls one of the biggest exclusive economic zones in the world, wrote Reuters.
Meanwhile, American, Australian, Japanese, and other Western countries have sought to counter this Chinese support, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute wrote. That will be difficult, however – Kiribati recently instituted a ban on foreign officials in the country until 2025 to stop “checkbook diplomacy” and counter foreign influence – as well as international scrutiny.
That ban won’t hurt China’s influence, either, say analysts: Chinese money appears to have already fostered a state with one party – just like China – that favors it.
THE WORLD, BRIEFLY
Sore Losers
MOLDOVA
Moldova has narrowly voted to join the European Union in a referendum and an election marked by allegations of heavy-handed interference by Russia, even as the Kremlin complained Monday of election fraud, reported CNN.
With 99.4 percent of votes counted in the EU referendum, the “Yes” vote took 50.4 percent and the “No” vote won 49.6 percent, according to the Central Electoral Commission. The referendum on Sunday specifically asked voters whether to enshrine a path toward EU membership in the country’s constitution.
President Maia Sandu, who wants to steer the country away from Russia since being elected in 2020, said the results symbolized Moldova’s first step toward joining the bloc.
The former Soviet Republic began talks to join the bloc in June, propelled by Russia’s invasion of neighboring Ukraine. Surveys ahead of the referendum showed that around 55 percent of Moldovans would support joining the EU while 34 percent were against it, according to Deutsche Welle.
However, the win for “yes” was razor thin, with votes from Moldova’s large and mostly pro-EU diaspora trickling in at the last moment, reported the Associated Press.
Sandu also failed to receive enough votes to win in the presidential election held the same day. A second round of voting will be held on Nov. 3.
Meanwhile, Sandu accused “criminal groups” of engaging in election fraud. She added that these groups were backed by foreign forces trying to “undermine (the) democratic process.”
Earlier this month, Moldovan police foiled an “unprecedented” Russian plot to meddle in the elections, raiding numerous locations where they discovered $15 million that they allege Russia was using to buy 100,000 votes, the Moscow Times reported.
Police have also said that Russian gangs have damaged government buildings in an effort to destabilize the democratic process, Euronews wrote. Vandals spraypainted the country’s Supreme Court, the state-run broadcaster, and the Ministry for Labor and Social Protection, for example.
The Kremlin has denied such allegations. Meanwhile, Russian officials on Monday said the election was “not free” and pointed suspicion over to “a hard-to-explain” rate of increase of votes in favor of Sandu and in support of the “yes” campaign, Reuters reported.
However, EU officials backed the Moldova president. “This vote took place under unprecedented interference and intimidation by Russia and its proxies, aiming to destabilize the democratic processes in the Republic of Moldova,” said Peter Stano, a spokesperson for the European Commission.
Brute-force Politics
PAKISTAN
Pakistan approved new constitutional amendments to allow lawmakers to appoint the Supreme Court’s top justice on Monday, in a bid by the government to rein in the judiciary but also sparking controversy about the move’s erosion of democratic principles, Al Jazeera reported.
President Asif Ali Zardari signed into law the 26th Constitutional Amendment Bill, giving a parliamentary committee the power to appoint the nation’s top judge who will now serve a fixed term of three years.
Previously, the senior-most judge would become the chief justice without the government or parliament’s interference, Bloomberg wrote.
The move is said to be the result of tensions between the government and the top court following the elections in February, which were plagued by allegations of irregularities. The Supreme Court’s rulings have often backed the jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, which won the most votes in that election.
The amendment is seen as a way for parliament to sideline the court after favoring Khan, who is still widely popular in Pakistan.
Meanwhile, the amendment was passed just days before the current Supreme Court Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa is due to retire. Isa would have been replaced by the next most senior judge, Mansoor Ali Shah, who has frequently issued verdicts deemed favorable to Khan and his party, wrote Al Jazeera.
The ruling coalition government passed the bill in both chambers of parliament on Sunday night, after facing challenges and backlash to the amendment. The move has faced criticism from opposition parties and legal analysts who argued the bill is an attempt to undermine the power of the judiciary, that it will exacerbate tensions between the different branches of the government, and is undemocratic, the Arab News reported.
Derailed
ITALY
The first group of migrants sent to newly opened processing centers in Albania was returned to Italy over the weekend, following a ruling by a Rome court that observers said marked a major setback for the Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s ambitious new migration policy, Politico reported.
Last week, an Italian ship carried 16 Bangladeshi and Egyptian migrants from Italy to northwestern Albania to have their asylum claims processed. But shortly after their arrival, center staff rejected four migrants because screenings identified two as children and two as vulnerable, both forbidden by the migration offshoring agreement.
Then on Friday, a Rome court found that the remaining 12 migrants should be returned to Italy because they were from countries considered unsafe to be returned to.
The decision was based on a European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling earlier this month that countries outside the European Union cannot be considered safe for migrants unless their entire home territory is deemed free from persecution or inhumane treatment, the BBC noted.
The ruling dealt a significant blow to a five-year agreement signed in 2023 between Albania and Italy that would have seen up to 36,000 male migrants intercepted in international waters being processed at two centers in Albania.
The Italian government has touted the plan as a model for Europe to combat the migration crisis and the scheme has attracted the attention of many EU leaders, as some governments are looking into similar offshore processing centers.
However, the court’s verdict is expected to cause a dispute between the Italian government and the judiciary. Meloni and other officials vowed to appeal the decision.
On Monday, the government adopted a decree aimed at overruling the court’s verdict, according to Reuters. Officials amended the legal status of Italy’s list of safe countries – which includes Egypt and Bangladesh.
The list is included in an act of law, instead of a lower ministerial decree.
Still, legal analysts questioned if it would work, adding that European law could still challenge the revised legislation.
DISCOVERIES
A Taste for Everything
In the late 19th century, two male lions terrorized workers building a railroad near the Tsavo River in what is now modern-day Kenya.
Within nine months, the ferocious predators claimed the lives of around 35 workers before a British Army officer killed them.
Their reputation lived on and they became known as the “Tsavo man-eaters” because of their taste for human flesh.
But a new study found they were not very picky eaters.
Researcher Thomas P. Gnoske of the Fields Museum – which houses the lion’s skulls – and others recently conducted an analysis of the animals’ teeth to confirm if the infamous big cats preferred humans to other animals.
Gnoske previously contributed to a 2001 paper that suggested the lions targeted soft human flesh because they had damaged teeth, according to the New York Times.
However, the team extracted DNA from hair fragments found in their dentures and discovered that the creatures consumed a wide variety of prey.
“Our analysis showed that the historic Tsavo lions preyed on giraffe, human, oryx, waterbuck, wildebeest and zebra, and we also identified hairs that originated from lions,” explained lead author Alida de Flamingh in a statement.
While some of the species found were native to the Tsavo region, it was the DNA from wildebeest that surprised researchers because the species were not that common in the area at the time.
“It suggests that the Tsavo lions may have either traveled farther than previously believed, or that wildebeest were present in the Tsavo region during that time,” added de Flamingh.
The authors are eager to delve deeper into the findings, as the layered hair samples may allow them to trace the lions’ diet over time and shed light on human-lion conflicts that persist in African communities where lions prey on both wildlife and domestic animals.
“What strikes me about the Tsavo story is that it is almost incomprehensible to a 21st-century Western mindset,” paleogeneticist Ross Barnett, who was not involved in the study, told the Times. “The terror that the night must have brought is unimaginable.”