PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron faced a major rebellion within his own party from left-leaning deputies on Tuesday in a crisis sparked by the backing of a toughened-up immigration bill by the far right under Marine Le Pen.
Macron swept to power in 2017 heading a broad centrist movement that rallied together the left and the right, but that fragile unity now risks cracking over the legislation.
Various amendments have seen the immigration measures further tightened from when the bill was originally submitted, with the left accusing the government of caving in to pressure from the far right.
Le Pen endorsed the new-look bill but key left-leaning members of Macron’s Renaissance Party and allied factions indicated they could no longer support it, with several ministers reportedly threatening to resign.
“We can rejoice in ideological progress, an ideological victory even for the National Rally (RN), since this is now enshrined into law as a national priority,” said Le Pen, a three-time presidential candidate who leads the RN’s lawmakers in parliament and is widely expected to stand again for president in 2027.
The RN had previously said it would vote against the bill or abstain.
Le Pen’s announcement came after a commission of upper-house senators and lower-house National Assembly MPs agreed a new draft of the bill, which had been voted down without being debated in the National Assembly last week in a major blow to Macron.
The legislation was, as expected, passed by the Senate but faces a far stiffer test in the National Assembly later Tuesday.
While on paper the government has the numbers for the legislation to be passed with the support of the right-wing Republicans, there are growing concerns within Macron’s camp.
Prominent left-leaning Renaissance MP Sacha Houlie said he would vote against the legislation and called on others to follow, with some sources saying that around 30 pro-Macron MPs could do so.
In a sign of the seriousness of the situation, Macron called a meeting of his ruling party at the Elysee palace ahead of the vote, party sources told AFP.
According to a participant at the meeting, Macron said he would submit the bill to a new reading rather than promulgate it if it were passed only with the help of the votes from Le Pen’s RN.
This means the government would not count the RN’s votes in support of the bill.
Health Minister Aurelien Rousseau, Higher Education Minister Sylvie Retailleau and Housing Minister Patrice Vergriete were meeting Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne and warned they could resign, sources told AFP.
Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, an ambitious 41-year-old who has spearheaded the legislation, had warned Sunday that Le Pen risked winning the 2027 presidential election if the bill were not passed.
The left and hard-left have reacted with horror to the prospect of the legislation being passed, with the head of Socialist lawmakers in the National Assembly, Boris Vallaud, calling it a “great moment of dishonor for the government.”
Passing the legislation is critical for Macron, who cannot stand again in 2027 after two consecutive terms and risks being seen as a lame duck with more than three years left of his term.
The government does not have a majority in parliament since the legislative elections that followed his re-election in 2022.
“The political crisis around the immigration bill is a moment of truth where all the fragilities of Emmanuel Macron’s mandate are coming together,” the Le Monde daily said in an editorial.
Dozens of NGOS slammed what they described as potentially the “most regressive” immigration law in decades.
It is “the most regressive bill of the past 40 years for the rights and living conditions of foreigners, including those who have long been in France,” around 50 groups including the French Human Rights League said in a joint statement.
A key element is now that social security benefits for foreigners be conditional on five years of presence in France, or 30 months for those who have jobs.
Migration quotas can also now be agreed and there are also measures for dual-national convicts being stripped of French nationality.
“With this text directly inspired by RN pamphlets against immigration, we are facing a shift in the history of the republic and its fundamental values,” French Communist Party leader Fabien Roussel said.
Macron facing rebellion after far-right backs French immigration bill
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Macron facing rebellion after far-right backs French immigration bill
- Various amendments have seen the immigration measures further tightened from when the bill was originally submitted, with the left accusing the government of caving in to pressure from the far right
Moscow warns the US over allowing Ukraine to hit Russian soil with longer-range weapons
KYIV, Ukraine: The Kremlin warned Monday that President Joe Biden’s decision to let Ukraine strike targets inside Russia with US-supplied longer-range missiles adds “fuel to the fire” of the war and would escalate international tensions even higher.
Biden’s shift in policy added an uncertain, new factor to the conflict on the eve of the 1,000-day milestone since Russia began its full-scale invasion in 2022.
It also came as a Russian ballistic missile with cluster munitions struck a residential area of Sumy in northern Ukraine, killing 11 people and injuring 84 others. Another missile barrage sparked apartment fires in the southern port of Odesa, killing at least 10 people and injuring 43, Ukraine’s Interior Ministry said.
Washington is easing limits on what Ukraine can strike with its American-made Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMs, US officials told The Associated Press on Sunday, after months of ruling out such a move over fears of escalating the conflict and bringing about a direct confrontation between Russia and NATO.
The Kremlin was swift in its condemnation.
“It is obvious that the outgoing administration in Washington intends to take steps and they have been talking about this, to continue adding fuel to the fire and provoking further escalation of tensions around this conflict,” said spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
The scope of the new firing guidelines isn’t clear. But the change came after the US, South Korea and NATO said North Korean troops are in Russia and apparently are being deployed to help Moscow drive Ukrainian troops from Russia’s Kursk border region.
Biden’s decision almost entirely was triggered by North Korea’s entry into the fight, according to a US official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, and was made just before he left for the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Peru.
Russia also is slowly pushing Ukraine’s outnumbered army backward in the eastern Donetsk region. It has also conducted a devastating aerial campaign against civilian areas in Ukraine.
Peskov referred journalists to a statement from President Vladimir Putin in September in which he said allowing Ukraine to target Russia would significantly raise the stakes.
It would change “the very nature of the conflict dramatically,” Putin said at the time. “This will mean that NATO countries — the United States and European countries — are at war with Russia.”
Peskov claimed that Western countries supplying longer-range weapons also provide targeting services to Kyiv. “This fundamentally changes the modality of their involvement in the conflict,” he said.
Putin warned in June that Moscow could provide longer-range weapons to others to strike Western targets if NATO allowed Ukraine to use its allies’ arms to attack Russian territory. After signing a treaty with North Korea, Putin issued an explicit threat to provide weapons to Pyongyang, noting Moscow could mirror Western arguments that it’s up to Ukraine to decide how to use them.
“The Westerners supply weapons to Ukraine and say: ‘We do not control anything here anymore and it does not matter how they are used.’” Putin had said. “Well, we can also say: ‘We supplied something to someone — and then we do not control anything.’ And let them think about it.”
Putin had also reaffirmed Moscow’s readiness to use nuclear weapons if it sees a threat to its sovereignty.
Biden’s move will “mean the direct involvement of the United States and its satellites in military action against Russia, as well as a radical change in the essence and nature of the conflict,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry said.
President-elect Donald Trump, who takes office Jan. 20, has raised uncertainty about whether his administration would continue military support to Ukraine. He has also vowed to end the war quickly.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky gave a muted response Sunday to the approval that he and his government have been requesting for over a year, adding, “The missiles will speak for themselves.”
Consequences of the new policy are uncertain. ATACMS, which have a range of about 300 kilometers (190 miles), can reach far behind the about 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) front line in Ukraine, but they have relatively short range compared with other types of ballistic and cruise missiles.
The policy change came “too late to have a major strategic effect,” said Patrick Bury, a senior associate professor in security at the University of Bath in the United Kingdom.
“The ultimate kind of impact it will have is to probably slow down the tempo of the Russian offensives which are now happening,” he said, adding that Ukraine could strike targets in Kursk or logistics hubs or command headquarters.
Jennifer Kavanagh, director of military analysis at Defense Priorities, agreed the US move would not alter the war’s course, noting Ukraine “would need large stockpiles of ATACMS, which it doesn’t have and won’t receive because the United States’ own supplies are limited.”
On a political level, the move “is a boost to the Ukrainians and it gives them a window of opportunity to try and show that they are still viable and worth supporting” as Trump prepares to take office, said Matthew Savill, director of Military Sciences at the Royal United Services Institute in London.
The cue for the policy change was the arrival in Russia of North Korean troops, according to Glib Voloskyi, an analyst at the CBA Initiatives Center, a Kyiv-based think tank.
“This is a signal the Biden administration is sending to North Korea and Russia, indicating that the decision to involve North Korean units has crossed a red line,” he said.
Russian lawmakers and state media bashed the West for what they called an escalatory step, threatening a harsh response.
“Biden, apparently, decided to end his presidential term and go down in history as ‘Bloody Joe,’” lawmaker Leonid Slutsky told Russian news agency RIA Novosti.
Vladimir Dzhabarov, deputy head of the foreign affairs committee in the upper house of parliament, called it “a very big step toward the start of World War III” and an attempt to “reduce the degree of freedom for Trump.”
Russian newspapers offered similar predictions of doom. “The madmen who are drawing NATO into a direct conflict with our country may soon be in great pain,” Rossiyskaya Gazeta said.
Some NATO allies welcomed the move.
President Andrzej Duda of Poland, which borders Ukraine, praised the decision as a “very important, maybe even a breakthrough moment” in the war.
“In the recent days, we have seen the decisive intensification of Russian attacks on Ukraine, above all, those missile attacks where civilian objects are attacked, where people are killed, ordinary Ukrainians,” Duda said.
Easing restrictions on Ukraine was “a good thing,” said Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna of Russian neighbor Estonia.
“We have been saying that from the beginning — that no restrictions must be put on the military support,” he told senior European Union diplomats in Brussels. “And we need to understand that situation is more serious (than) it was even maybe like a couple of months ago.”
But Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, known for his pro-Russian views, described Biden’s decision as “an unprecedented escalation” that would prolong the war.
EU top diplomat has ‘no more words’ on Mideast suffering
- Borrell said a majority of the 27 European Union states had — as expected — rejected his call to suspend political dialogue with Israel over the Gaza war
BRUSSELS: The EU’s outgoing top diplomat Josep Borrell said Monday he had “no more words” to describe the crisis in the Middle East as he delivered a bleak assessment at his swansong foreign ministers’ meeting.
At a somber press briefing after the Brussels talks, Borrell said a majority of the 27 European Union states had — as expected — rejected his call to suspend political dialogue with Israel over the Gaza war.
Barely concealing his frustration at the EU’s failure to weigh on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during his five-year mandate, Borrell earlier said he had “exhausted the words to explain what’s happening.”
“This is a war against the children,” the 77-year-old foreign policy chief told reporters after the talks. “The most frequent age of the casualties in Gaza is five years old.”
He described an “apocalyptical situation in Gaza, where 70 percent of the death toll is being paid by children and women,” with two million people displaced. He also acknowledged the suffering of Israeli hostages held by Hamas and other militant groups since the October 7, 2023 attacks on Israel.
The Hamas attack resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures. The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says that 43,922 people, mostly civilians, have been killed there since October 7.
Borrell’s proposal to suspend the EU’s political dialogue with Israel — part of a wider agreement governing trade ties — had been expected to hit opposition from numerous member states including key powers France and Germany.
“Most of the member states considered that it was much better to continue having diplomatic and political relationship with Israel,” Borrell confirmed.
But he said his services had “at least put on the table” all the information produced by UN bodies and international organizations on the ground “in order to judge the way the war is being waged.”
Since Israel unleashed its devastating retaliatory offensive in Gaza, EU states have been deeply divided over the conflict — with Borrell often an outlier in denouncing what he views as Israel’s excesses.
On Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Borrell likewise voiced frustration at the shortcomings in Europe’s response as the conflict reaches its 1,000th day.
“It’s not only 1,000 days. It is 4,000 days since Putin attacked Ukraine the first time,” Borrell said.
“Maybe our response should have been firmer, stronger since the beginning,” he said.
“It’s clear that each step that is being left without reaction encourages Russia to escalate further,” he warned — pointing at Russia’s use of drones from Iran, weapons and troops from North Korea, and dual-use goods from China.
Moscow’s all-out assault in February 2022 upended European security and came to dominate Borrell’s time at the helm of the bloc’s diplomacy.
Since then the EU has spent billions of dollars on arming Ukraine and Russia has been hit by repeated sanctions despite regular obstacles from reluctant EU states such as Hungary.
But Borrell leaves the stage at a perilous time — with the re-election of Donald Trump in the United States heralding challenges for Europe and Russia advancing in Ukraine.
“If we want to be a geopolitical player, if we want to use the language of power, we have to be more united,” warned Borrell, who is to hand over to former Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas in December.
“It’s time for Europe to take their strategic responsibilities,” Borrell said. “It’s time for Europe to step up.”
Phone documentary details Afghan women’s struggle under Taliban govt
- Taliban authorities have banned post-secondary education for girls and women, restricted employment and blocked access to parks and other public areas
LOS ANGELES, United States: A rare inside account of the Taliban authorities’ impact on Afghan women hits screens next week with the smartphone-filmed documentary “Bread & Roses.”
Produced by actress Jennifer Lawrence (“The Hunger Games“) and Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, this feature-length film immerses the viewer in the daily struggles endured by half the population of Afghanistan since the withdrawal of US troops paved the way for Taliban leaders to seize power.
“When Kabul fell in 2021 all women lost their very basic rights. They lost their rights to be educated, to work,” Lawrence told AFP in Los Angeles.
“Some of them were doctors and had high degrees, and then their lives were completely changed overnight.”
The documentary, which debuted at Cannes in May 2023, was directed by exiled Afghan filmmaker Sahra Mani, who reached out to a dozen women after the fall of Kabul.
She tutored them on how to film themselves with their phones — resulting in a moving depiction of the intertwined stories of three Afghan women.
We meet Zahra, a dentist whose practice is threatened with closure, suddenly propelled to the head of protests against the Taliban government.
Sharifa, a former civil servant, is stripped of her job and cloistered at home, reduced to hanging laundry on her roof to get a breath of fresh air.
And Taranom, an activist in exile in neighboring Pakistan, who watches helplessly as her homeland changes.
“The restrictions are getting tighter and tighter right now,” Mani told AFP on the film’s Los Angeles red carpet.
And hardly anyone outside the country seems to care, she said.
“The women of Afghanistan didn’t receive the support they deserved from the international community.”
Since their return to power, Taliban officials have established a “gender apartheid” in Afghanistan, according to the United Nations.
Women are gradually being erased from public spaces: Taliban authorities have banned post-secondary education for girls and women, restricted employment and blocked access to parks and other public areas.
A recent law even prohibits women from singing or reciting poetry in public.
The Taliban authorities follow an austere brand of Islam, whose interpretations of holy texts are disputed by many scholars.
“The Taliban claim to represent the culture and religion while they’re a very small group of men who do not actually represent the diversity of the country,” Yousafzai, an executive producer of the film, told AFP.
“Islam does not prohibit a girl from learning, Islam does not prohibit a woman from working,” said the Pakistani activist, whom the Pakistani Taliban tried to assassinate when she was 15.
The documentary captures the first year after the fall of Kabul, including moments of bravery when women speak out.
“You closed universities and schools, you might as well kill me!” a protester shouts at a man threatening her during a demonstration.
These gatherings of women — under the slogan “Work, bread, education!” — are methodically crushed by Taliban authorities.
Protesters are beaten, some are arrested, others kidnapped.
Slowly, the resistance fades, but it doesn’t die: some Afghan women are now trying to educate themselves through clandestine courses.
Three years after the Taliban fighters seized power from a hapless and corrupt civilian administration, no countries have officially recognized their new government.
In the wake of Donald Trump’s re-election to the US presidency, Taliban leaders have made it known that they hope to “open a new chapter” in relations between Kabul and Washington, where a more transactional foreign policy outlook is expected to prevail.
For Mani, that rings alarm bells.
Giving up on defending the rights of Afghan women would be a serious mistake — and one the West could come to regret, she said.
The less educated Afghan women are, the more vulnerable their sons are to the ideology that birthed the Al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001.
“If we are paying the price today, you might pay the price tomorrow,” she said.
“Bread & Roses” begins streaming on Apple TV+ on November 22.
Australian writers send Middle East reading list to MPs to boost understanding of region
- Initiative, named Summer Reading for MPs campaign, aims to encourage wider and more nuanced reading on Middle East conflicts
LONDON: More than 90 Australian authors and literary figures have sent a list of books to every federal parliamentarian in a bid to foster a deeper understanding of the Middle East among political leaders, it was revealed on Monday.
The initiative, named the Summer Reading for MPs campaign, aims to encourage wider and more nuanced reading on the history and complexities of the region’s conflicts.
Each of Australia’s 227 MPs and senators will receive the same set of five books, encompassing nonfiction, fiction, and reference works, The Guardian reported.
Notable writers such as Tim Winton, Charlotte Wood, Michelle de Kretser, and JM Coetzee are among the campaign’s supporters. The book selection has also received endorsements from the Jewish Council of Australia and the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network.
The five chosen books are: “Balcony over Jerusalem” by journalist John Lyons; “A Very Short History of the Israel-Palestine Conflic by Jewish historian and political scientist Ilan Pappe; “The Hundred Years’ War” by Palestinian-American historian Rashid Khalidi; “Palestine A-Z,” an alphabetized reference by Irish author Kate Thompson; and “The Sunbird,” a novella by Lebanese-Australian writer Sara Haddad.
In an accompanying letter to MPs, the group underscored the importance of these “authoritative, highly readable books” in addressing what they see as a deficit in the public’s and politicians’ understanding of the conflict.
“The political debate in Australia and internationally rarely touches on the issues, events, and historical analyzes that these books reveal — despite their direct relevance to what is happening today,” the letter highlighted.
The writers stressed that the campaign was not about shifting opinions but broadening perspectives.
“We’re not asking anyone to change their personal opinions or public positions. We just ask that politicians consider reading one or more of these books in the hope that they might inform and illuminate discussion on the ghastly situation we have been watching unfold across the Middle East,” they said.
Melbourne architect Marcus O’Reilly, one of the campaign’s initiators, said frustration over the quality of political discourse and media reporting on Middle Eastern issues spurred the project.
“It just occurred to me that if people were reading some of these books, people’s responses might be amped up a bit more,” O’Reilly said. “They’re not pushing a particular direction and that was the whole idea.”
Aviva Tuffield, a publisher and fellow originator, highlighted the role reading plays in fostering empathy and understanding.
“The summer is for reading. There’s well-known summer reading lists like Obama’s, and the Grattan Institute’s. It might be good for politicians who aren’t engaged (on this issue) and only get the talking points to do some reading (of their own),” she said.
In recent weeks, campaign organizers have met with a cross-section of MPs and senators from all parties, delivering the books in person where possible.
Many MPs expressed a degree of caution when addressing the Middle East conflict publicly, with one regional MP noting it was the issue that drew the most constituent correspondence. Despite this, the initiative has been welcomed.
“All, so far, had been receptive to receiving history books and literature as a measured way to learn more about the issues,” Tuffield confirmed.
The campaign has also garnered support from a wide range of Australian authors, including Kim Scott, Anna Funder, Nam Le, Chloe Hooper, Anita Heiss, and Trent Dalton.
New Senegalese president to face key challenges
- Former president Macky Sall, who headed an opposition coalition, on Monday congratulated Pastef on its win
DAKAR: A likely absolute majority for President Bassirou Diomaye Faye’s Pastef party in Senegal’s legislative election would empower him to pursue his ambitious 25-year agenda, though his first challenge will be coming up with a budget amid a fiscal crisis.
Faye sought a clear parliamentary majority in Sunday’s vote to implement the reform agenda that helped sweep him to power in a landslide election victory in March.
But analysts say creating a budget catering both to his voters’ needs and to the International Monetary Fund, with which his government is currently in talks, will be challenging.
Former president Macky Sall, who headed an opposition coalition, on Monday congratulated Pastef on its win. Former Prime Minister Amadou Ba, who ran against Faye in the presidential election, also conceded defeat, as did other opposition leaders.
SPEEDREAD
President Bassirou Diomaye Faye sought a clear parliamentary majority in Sunday’s vote to implement the reform agenda that helped sweep him to power in a landslide election victory in March.
Senegal’s sovereign debt rose in price on Monday, Tradeweb data showed, while most other African nations’ bonds lost ground. The yield on its 2033 dollar bond was down about 10 basis points at 9.28 percent.
“If confirmed by the electoral bodies, Pastef’s victory could give a free hand in passing budgets and implementing its programmatic reforms,” said Wendyam Lankoande, a consultant at Africa Practice.
But, he noted, voters are “looking for quick solutions to unemployment, rising cost of living, and limited reach of public services in remote rural areas in the hinterland.” In September, a government audit revealed that Senegal’s debt and budget deficit were much wider than the previous administration had reported. A $1.9 billion IMF program agreed in June 2023 has been on hold since. Negotiations with the IMF to restart disbursements could last until mid-2025.
“We see Pastef’s majority as a positive development as it clears the path for President Faye and (Prime Minister Ousmane) Sonko to begin work on a budget for 2025 that aligns broadly with IMF requirements,” said Leeuwner Esterhuysen, senior economist at Oxford Economics Africa.
“That said, some of these requirements won’t necessarily go down well with Senegalese citizens.”
He said the Fund was likely to show some leniency, as it appears to have good relations with the new administration.
“We think the government may be able to delay the implementation of harsh measures such as removing VAT exemptions on farming inputs or increasing household electricity prices, while energy subsidies will be phased out gradually to limit the impact on consumers,” Esterhuysen said.
