EU Leaders’ Summit, Biden Marks Abortion Ruling Anniversary, Guatemala’s Election, and More

Bob McMahon:
In the coming week, European leaders hold a packed summit meeting the Biden administration, marks the anniversary of the Supreme Court's abortion decision and Guatemalans head to the polls for their presidential election. It's June 22nd, 2023 and time for The World Next Week. I'm Bob McMahon.

Carla Anne Robbins:
And I'm Carla Anne Robbins. So Bob, it's great to see you. We are together in the studio.

Bob McMahon:
Great to be in person, Carla.

Carla Anne Robbins:
We're always people. So let's start in Brussels. Next Thursday, the heads of state of all twenty-seven members of the EU, as we said packed, will meet for the European Council's quarterly summit. The European Council decides the political direction and priorities of the EU and should not be confused with the Council of the European Union made up of government ministers, which creates EU legislations. You would've thought they could have come up with clearer titles, but the EU is a complicated place. 

So Russia's war in Ukraine remains a top EU priority. Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen surprised pretty much everyone yesterday when she proposed using the profits from 200 billion euros of frozen Russian government assets to help pay for reconstruction. I understand there's also going to be conversations in economic resilience, migration, and what they call external relations, their version of foreign relations. What are you watching for in these talks?

Bob McMahon:
Well, you touched on it, Carla. I'm anticipating packed because this week has been packed and actually recent weeks have packed with all sorts of issues that these leaders can dig into further. On the Russian front, as you mentioned, this issue of financing reconstruction of Ukraine, which was a big topic of a pledging conference in the UK earlier this week, which is not in the EU, but still has been very much involved with EU partners on trying to help Ukraine, that has raised issues about how to fund that. 

And so there are $200 billion or so in Russian Central Bank assets that can be tapped if they decided to do that. Of course, that's an extremely tricky step to take with all sorts of backlash and everything else, but they're talking about some sort of novel approach where profits from that 200 billion can perhaps be tapped. But even that is new territory and I think there's going to be kind of wary proceeding on that. But they've also been talking about, EU leaders and ministers, talking about trying to get rid of the leakiness of sanctions against Russia and shoring up that. 

As you referred to on the economic resilience front, they came out with some prepared findings this week that will call for economic resiliency on global supply chains and dealing with sensitive dual use technologies. They did not use the word China, but everybody sort of construed this as a message on China. It's not clear whether that is going to be further firmed up at the summit because a number of EU countries, especially some of its biggest ones, have extremely important economic relations with China, all of which they've been sort of dealing with a bit of turmoil over as well in terms of how much do you, if not decouple, de-risk in your relationship with China. Germany and France among others have had recent meetings with the visiting Chinese premier and they want to maintain relations, but by the same token, not be too dependent on China.

The dependence on Russia is still an issue for these countries that moved swiftly to condemn the Russia's invasion of Ukraine. And here we are a year and four or five months later from that invasion and they're still dealing with some of the fallout. Germany's dealing with a recession among other things. So there's a lot on these fronts. There's a migration issue. The EU countries have been talking about a new approach on migration that still needs to be, I think, fully fleshed out, but it's along the lines of helping the frontline countries which continue to receive many, many migrants coming across the treacherous Mediterranean path and other paths trying to get into the EU. The frontline countries have born a disproportionate burden. There is a measure that the EU, I believe, is going to try to implement and go forward on that would involve countries that do not take in migrants and process them will pay a per person fee that will then be delivered and distributed to these countries that are taking in, again, these disproportionately high numbers or countries to which people are being sent back to that are still in the EU.

So as you said, there is the external affairs front as well. Some of that could also include revving up trade relations with Latin American countries. So a lot to go on, Russia will be paramount and Ukraine relationships as well. This is a little bit of a tee up meeting for what will be two weeks later the NATO summit where many of these countries are NATO members. Ukraine membership is going to be a big issue in sort of how to deal or how to finesse, shall we say, Ukraine's desire to be a member of NATO. There's a process for Ukraine to be a member of the EU. How is that going to be addressed? How quickly are they ready to move forward on the various reform areas that Ukraine has to embark on before it can be considered on a serious path to EU accession?

Carla Anne Robbins:
So there's a lot in there. There are two particular topics I want to ask you about. So let's start with the Ukraine reconstruction. The estimates right now are more than $400 billion to rebuild the place, and that's not surprising, actually, it seems low when you look at how shattered Ukraine is. Why should American taxpayers, European taxpayers pay for what Russia's done? And however this ends, it's highly unlikely that Russia's ever going to follow through with reparations. If that 200 billion euros is sitting in European banks, why not take that money?

Bob McMahon:
I think that's why that issue has started to resonate. Again, even though this is a new territory to act against the country in this way, partly because there's quid pro quo aspects for other countries that could find themselves cross purposes with the international community and whether or not this is something that they're going to face and what it does to the way in which countries distribute assets and share assets and so forth.

Carla Anne Robbins:
Well, is it just protecting the banking sector? The banking sector is going to say, "Oh no, all these oligarchs are not going to put their money in our banks just in case something really bad happens, our governments invade someplace else." Is that what it really is?

Bob McMahon:
That's one we were looking at. I think it's also, we continued to cross red lines in dealing with Russia on all sorts of ways in terms of both how to support Ukraine and what kind of weapons. We've talked about it before in the podcast, Carla, can you give them certain ballistic missile capacity or certain anti-aircraft weaponry? Can they have fighter jets? Can they have certain tanks with certain capabilities? Many of these have been approved and are now making their way towards Ukraine, but there is still a concern about going too far. In this case, it's taking too aggressive action on the financial front and whether or not the reprisals from Russia go into another level. It's hard to imagine things getting worse than they are right now, Carla, but they could get worse. So it's the new territory aspect.

But I agree with you, I think we're in this space now because countries are looking at the situation, the ongoing assault of Russia on Ukraine, on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, on Ukrainian civilians, on Ukrainian hospitals. There's a long and growing rap sheet and every day it gets added to. Why would you put commitment of Western funding to rebuild cities that are continuing to be destroyed by Russia and why not direct Russian money towards that? And so I think they're looking for creative ways to do that. That's one of the things I think would be really interesting to watch coming out of this meeting. There are leaders at this meeting who will argue vehemently against this. Probably you can expect the Hungarian leadership to do so, but it might be something that gets further initial support and continues to grow momentum.

Carla Anne Robbins:
So we can't finish up this part of our conversation without talking about this horrible sinking of a migrant ship off of Greece last week. There were 600 people may have drowned, and I know they're going to be talking about migration policy, but this is just awful. There are serious questions about the willful failure of the Greeks to come to their aid. Has the political attitude toward migration in any way changed in Europe or has it just hardened?

Bob McMahon:
I think whether it's hardened or become numb, I'm not sure what the right phraseology is, but I think there has been a concern or there may be a raising of barriers because these countries are feeling more and more threatened and set upon that, just like you're seeing in the debate in the United States that migrant numbers are reaching unmanageable levels and they are sort of getting to a point where they can't handle this. But when it comes to sort of the proper care for people who are in harm's way, people in the high seas and so forth, you would hope that there would be sort of norms that they can continue to abide by. And we're only going to see more of this. 

And some of this has a bit of a whiff of deja vu, frankly, in terms of what we saw a number of years ago. We saw the photo of the young Kurdish boy washed up on the beach in Turkey, the devastating photo. That triggered all sorts of actions and all sorts of moves, including opening up of Germany to a number of migrants from Syria and Germany took in a large number of them. But the numbers are growing relentlessly, just look across the swath of the world where they're coming from, the countries that are still in harm's way. Syria is still a problem even though its civil war has sort of reached the status quo period. There's still a lot of people who never want to return to Syria. Sudan is the newest one that's adding to the outflow of people. Sudanese are not seem to be among these people in the current passages in the Mediterranean, but that's something we might talk about later that could grow and on and on. Climate refugees and other refugees from war and failed states and so forth. So it's going to continue and I think Europe needs to get ahold of it. 

One of the things they're also doing in addition to trying to come up with a new policy for helping frontline countries is also helping the countries of origin, or at least the initial staging countries in Africa. You're starting to see increasing moves towards providing money for countries like Tunisia to improve their infrastructure for housing. Migrants, whether they're from Tunisia and they're usually not, they are usually passing through or from elsewhere. So again, Carla, it's one of these really tough issues and I think we're going to continue to have these quarterly summits where they're going to continue to try to wrestle with this. And especially as the weather opens up for more such passages and even with the tragedy, the latest one that you cited, there's going to be more attempts. There's desperation and there are people out there who are willing to try to traffic people and take advantage of that desperation.

Carla Anne Robbins:
I know the European Union won't do it, but somebody should be condemning the Greek government for what they've done because there's just no excuse. This is a fundamental violation of international humanitarian law as well as just unacceptable.

Bob McMahon:
Well, Carla, let's move over to DC. In the coming week, members of the Biden administration are going to be taking part in several events marking the anniversary of the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which declared a constitutional right to abortion nearly a half century ago. The Supreme Court's decision allows U.S. states to ban abortion and more than one third have moved to do so. How is this echoed internationally?

Carla Anne Robbins:
Well, first let's start with the mismatch between public attitudes and politics here in the U.S. According to a recent Pew poll, a year after the overturn of Roe v Wade, 62 percent of Americans say they support abortion rights, a percentage that really hasn't wavered much over the last twenty-five years, and as you said, even as a growing number of Republican dominated state legislatures seek to either ban or severely curtail women's access to abortion. Fourteen U.S. states now ban most abortions. Five states have had bans blocked by the courts. Six U.S. states have very severe gestational limits. And that's sort of this mismatch. And to a certain extent we see this mismatch around the world. As for international attitudes, a Pew poll this spring of twenty-four countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America found that a median of 71 percent of adults believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Although in some countries, notably Brazil, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria, there was a fierce opposition.

But when it comes to rolling back abortion rights, the U.S. is in much smaller ranks here. Since 1995, only five other countries have done that. El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Hungary, and Poland. I'm not sure that's a group I really want to be hanging out with. Over that same time period, sixty countries have actually liberalized access to abortion. And most recently in France, in response to the rollback of Roe, both houses of their parliament have voted to enshrine the right to an abortion in their constitution, though it still has some hoops to go through. 

Still, there's a lot more work that needs to be done internationally to guarantee a woman's right to choose. According to the Center for Reproductive Rights, 41 percent of women of reproductive age globally live in countries with restrictive abortion laws. And some 91 million women of reproductive age are living in two dozen countries where abortion is banned. That's a lot of numbers, but you see this gap that exists between public attitudes and what the actual governments are doing.

Bob McMahon:
Yeah, as you parse into the different laws that are in place, it's also interesting, even as you compare what U.S. states are doing, but also what other countries are doing that have expanded access. There are still, if you review European laws, for example, in a country like Germany, there's still restrictions that kick in after twelve weeks of pregnancy, for example. There are mandatory waiting periods that many countries require, and then there are countries like the Netherlands that allow abortion up to twenty-four weeks. So there's a real range even in Europe on what it means to have abortion rights. But also I wanted to seize one thing you mentioned, Carla, which is you mentioned the French legislature getting involved and this is something that has been discussed periodically in the U.S. but I think it's something in which you've see more countries that deal with abortion legislatively than say the U.S., even though the U.S. Roe v Wade ruling sort of open the way towards countries to expand, right to abortion. I'm wondering whether, you see the U.S. moving towards any possibility of this because it's this state by state breakdown, it seems to be coming more and more divisive.

Carla Anne Robbins:
Certainly after Roe was overturn, there was a lot of commitments from Democrats that that's what they wanted to do, legislatively, but didn't go anywhere even when the Democrats controlled both the Senate and the House, they couldn't get the numbers in the Senate for this. And now with Republicans controlling the House and all of these GOP candidates going into a presidential election vowing that they will never do this and celebrating the overturning of Roe, I don't see this happening. There are lots of American states that have put in more protections for abortion as well since the overturning of Roe. So it's one more sign of the profound partisan divide in this country.

Bob McMahon:
You could say it's starting to have an impact in national security debate because you're seeing moves by the Biden administration that maybe move the space command out of Alabama because of Alabama's policy on abortion. And you have an Alabama senator, Tommy Tuberville, who is in a battle with the Pentagon over abortion policy as well, and basically saying he's going to block the promotions of generals because of the Pentagon policy involving abortion access. It's become this sort of really bitter fight that made its way into Pentagon process. And part again is this issue of it not being legislated nationally and so that it's gotten this breakdown that's really starting to become even further divisive. It's always been a divisive issue, but it's even become more divisive.

Carla Anne Robbins:
But maybe we should finish with something a little bit more upbeat here. What we have seen is just a remarkable number of women and men coming out in the streets and countries across Latin America. There's this green wave movement separate from any political party and that have pressed for abortion rights through referenda and from court decisions, and these are Catholic countries. In 2021 Argentina legalized abortion after years of green wave protest. Last year, Columbia's high court decriminalized abortion after rights groups sued and they now have gestational limits of twenty-four weeks. In Mexico, the Supreme Court unanimously agreed that penalizing women who underwent abortions was unconstitutional and leaving the decisions to states. And I think there are eight states in Mexico that now have decriminalized abortion. And so people power, not just women's power, but women and men's power for this green movement has brought people out there pushing for a woman's right to choose. So yes, divided countries all around the world over this. Interestingly enough, very, very strong public opinion and support of it, but still these battles in governments.

Bob McMahon:
It's worth noting also as we have in an explainer we have on abortion laws internationally.

Carla Anne Robbins:
So one other thing is that this Mexico City rule or this global gag rule in the United States, this is between Republican and Democratic administrations that bars U.S. foreign aid going to health providers overseas that has any part of their care for women are for abortion services. And so the money's cut off in Republican administrations and restored in Democratic administration. So President Biden, second week in office, restores this aid. So under U.S. law, the money still can't be used to pay for abortions, but clinics no longer, right now at least, have to choose between receiving foreign aid and providing abortion services. And so they can now provide the full spectrum, all sorts of maternal health and gynecological health and all of that. But it's hard to plan because the U.S. is a very unreliable provider of support for any sort of family planning aid because of this profound political fight in the United States.

Bob McMahon:
And so back to what's taking place this weekend, there's a reason why, among the reasons why the Biden administration is taking up this issue is the role it is likely to play in the 2024 elections. So stay tuned and we'll see how the candidates that emerge take on this issue, Carla.

Carla Anne Robbins:
So Bob, this Sunday, Guatemala will hold its own general election. The incumbent, Alejandro Giammattei is term limited and there are several candidates in the race, although many others were disqualified in very questionable rulings. Washington has a particular interest in this election given the worsening human rights situation in the country and the large number of Guatemalans seeking entry to the U.S. Do we have any handicapping for what's going to happen and what the stakes are there?

Bob McMahon:
Carla, the status quo seems to be what's going to happen in terms of the same kind of roster of elite or status quo candidates seem to have emerged. There were moves to ban candidates that had seemed to be in opposition. And so I walked through who's seen to be in the forefront at the moment. There is Edmond Mulet, who's a former diplomat and member of Congress; however, he's also sort of facing charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice and his candidacy might even be challenged in the course of this campaign, so stay tuned on that front. There is Zury Ríos who is the daughter of former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt.

Carla Anne Robbins:
I remember him, I covered him.

Bob McMahon:
She previously ran for president in 2015, finishing third. She was actually disqualified in the 2019 presidential election. And so she's running again. And there's also a former First Lady, which is Sandra Torres and she was the first lady alongside President Alvaro Colon. She ran for president also in 2015 and 2019 and she's supported by the largest party in Guatemala. So we'll see if anyone gets the 50 percent needed to win outright. There is high expectation that there's going to be a runoff which would take place in August, August 20th. And in terms of these three leading candidates among the multiple candidates who've been cleared to run, there's not a great expectation that Guatemala's going to take on its considerable problems. This is a country, the most populous in central America, with almost 50 percent poverty levels. It has got high level corruption. It was a poster child for a few years of countries dealing with corruption.

It was a UN-backed agency that was going heavily into the various networks of corruption and was so effective that candidates ran to run against it and oust it, and that's what they did. This body no longer exists. So one of the consequences and what should be of interest to U.S. listeners as well is that many Guatemalans vote with their feet and leave the country and they head north. And so there are a large number of Guatemalans who have been among those migrants crossing through Mexico and across the border into the U.S. And it is why the U.S. has a great deal of interest in this election. It is why the U.S. has a great deal of interest in working with an administration that hopefully sets its sights on some sort of adequate governance so that it can try to put its house in order and provide for its own people so that do not feel like they need to flee. But there is a great deal of cynicism that is going to be the case after these elections, Carla.

Carla Anne Robbins:
So what are they pushing? What's the number one issue in the campaign?

Bob McMahon:
It is about issues of governance. They're raising issues of corruption. Believe it or not, they're trying to show that they're can invest in government infrastructure and basic services and providing for the people and so forth that these are the things that come up. They're kind of platitudes towards that. But you're seeing a great deal of citizen, and in terms of the reports I've seen quoting voters and possible voters that they just don't see any kind of serious debate going on about the real problems facing the country, which is the distribution of wealth, which is the economic opportunity, which is stopping the graft and the problems that are there and providing any alternative to what people see as the main path, which is getting remittances from their relatives who were able to make the arduous journey to the United States. And that still seems to be the path that has the most confidence.

Carla Anne Robbins:
So the human rights situation has gotten incredibly worse in the days when, I'm dating myself, the days in which I worked in Central America in the eighties. Guatemala was one of the scariest places I ever worked. And there is a growing trend of attacks on journalists, human rights defenders, women, the indigenous, LGBTQI people. Do we know where these attacks are coming from? Are they government sanctioned? Does this have to do with the drug trade? And are any of these candidates running on human rights issues?

Bob McMahon:
One way of answering that, Carla, is just looking at how the government has cracked down on press freedom. So just this month respected veteran journalist Jose Ruben Zamora was sentenced six years in prison for what was considered a trumped up charge on money laundering because his newspaper, El Periódico had been investigating corruption and his newspaper had also been the type of place where you'd see reports on human rights problems and the interweaving of corruption in human rights. There are entrenched interests that have an interest in maintaining their networks, whether it's related to extraction industries or what have you. And this has been Guatemala's problem, this has been Guatemala's curse. And so I think that's going to continue to be a concern. And keep a lookout for the messaging that comes out in this election period about anything that has to do with corruption and whether or not it actually reaches into any networks involved in areas where Guatemala has some murky dark business going on.

Well, Carla, I think we've talked ourself into the audience figure of the week portion of the podcast. This is where listeners can vote on every Tuesday and Wednesday @CFR_org's Instagram story. This week, Carla, our audience selected, "$1.5 Billion in Aid Promise to Sudan." Will this money reach the right people if conflict continues?

Carla Anne Robbins:
Once again, the audience has chosen a very sad, scary number. So the first thing to consider is that 1.5 billion is only half of what the UN asked for before the meeting. It estimates that Sudan needs 2.5 billion just to relieve the humanitarian crisis, which is affecting 25 million people, more than half the country's population. The fighting has driven two and a half million people inside Sudan from their homes. It's just completely shattered Khartoum and it unleashed particular desperation in Darfur, a place that really can't afford to have any more desperation than it's had. And the UN says it also needs $470 million to support neighboring countries which are sheltering half a million Sudanese refugees. So 1.5 billion sounds like a lot, but it's nowhere near what they need. And then there's the question that you posed, if countries produce what they promised, is the aid actually going to get to the people who need it?

There are serious problems with distribution in the midst of this war. Warehouses are being looted, trucks are being hijacked. Aid workers threatened and detained. In early June, Reuters reported that at least eight aid workers had been killed. And there are terrible bureaucratic problems with visas and permits. Aid groups are saying that the Sudanese government, as it unravels, is just not letting people in or letting aid convoys in that they really need to arrive. So while the donors were gathering for the pledging conference, the warring side, Sudan's army and the paramilitary RSF, agreed to another seventy-two hour ceasefire, mediated again by the U.S. and Saudi Arabia. But fighting resumed minutes before the ceasefire ended, so delivering aid in the midst of a war and this chaos is really a hard thing to do.

Bob McMahon:
Carla, is there any sense that these two main sides that triggered this whole thing, if one side is getting the upper hand or not, or is it kind of playing out as some of the experts had feared, which is some control parts of Sudan and one side controls the other part, whether it's rural or urban areas or whatever.

Carla Anne Robbins:
There's no sight that this is even burning out yet. They just seem to be battling and there's hope of international pressure. They go through these ceasefire, I thought it was really interesting that they were willing to stop for the pledging conference and then the second it was over with, they were back at it. So far, we don't see much of an end coming out here, either burning out or some sort of a negotiated settlement.

Bob McMahon:
And we had hoped we had heard the last of abuses in Darfur, but the reports coming out are extremely disturbing and showing some of the same kind of ethnic based attacks that we had heard about more than a decade ago.

Carla Anne Robbins:
And the stories that are being told by these aid workers are incredibly gutsy, whether it's MSF or anybody else, and they just talk about the impossibility of even getting into the country, getting the aid into the country right now. So we're talking about a desperate humanitarian crisis.

Bob McMahon:
And that's our look at the troubled world next week. Here are some other stories to keep an eye on. South Korea's President Yoon visits Vietnam, Sierra Leone holds its presidential election, and millions take part in the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia.

Carla Anne Robbins:
Please subscribe to The World Next Week on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And leave us a review while you're at it, we really do appreciate the feedback. The publications mentioned in this episode, as well as a transcript of our conversation are listed on the podcast page for The World Next Week at cfr.org. Please note that opinions expressed on The World Next Week are solely those of the hosts, not of CFR, which takes no institutional positions on matters of policy.

Today's program was produced by Ester Fang, with the Director of Podcasting Gabrielle Sierra. And special thanks to Sinet Adous and Jiwon Lim for their research assistance. Welcome Jiwon. Our theme music is provided by Miguel Herrero and licensed under Creative Commons. This is Carla Robbins saying so long and let's hope for better news next week.

Bob McMahon:
And this is Bob McMahon saying goodbye.