Project on Middle East Democracy

Project on Middle East Democracy
The POMED Wire Archives


Category: Legislation

Senate Releases FY2011 Budget Text

December 14th, 2010 by Jason

The Senate Appropriations Committee has released the text of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2011 Omnibus Appropriations Act late Tuesday. Under the $1.1 trillion spending bill, $53.5 billion would be spent on State, foreign operations, and related programs, $3.1 billion less than requested. Should the language of the bill remain unchanged, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) would receive $128.5 million, $23.5 million more than requested and $10.5 million more than FY 2010 levels, while bilateral economic assistance would be funded at $22.97 billion, $1.6 billion below the requested amount and $1.12 billion above the FY 2010 level . Egypt, Israel, the West Bank/Gaza, and Jordan would be funded at the level requested, while Lebanon would be funded at the level requested, “subject to conditions.” The House and the Senate have until Saturday to either agree on an omnibus bill or pass a continuing resolution.


Posted in Congress, Foreign Aid, Legislation, US foreign policy, US politics | Comment »

Yemen: Change in Elections Law Provokes Sit-In

December 13th, 2010 by Jason

The Agence France Presse (AFP) is reporting that Yemen’s Parliament has passed an amendment to the elections law that would change the composition of the high electoral commission by “stipulat[ing] the high electoral commission be composed of judges rather than delegates from parties represented in Parliament as has been the case until now.” The opposition complained that the amendment was passed “unilaterally” by the General People’s Congress (GPC), President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s party. Parliamentary elections are scheduled to be held in April 2011. AFP also reported on Saturday that a leader of the supreme council of the Southern Movement was released after being arrested for “‘planning to hold unauthorized protests in a number of southern provinces.’” His arrest sparked several days of protests in which five people were injured. 


Posted in Judiciary, Legislation, Political Parties, Yemen | Comment »

Iran: A “Naked Power Struggle”

November 26th, 2010 by Jason

An Iranian member of parliament claims to have enough signatures to bring the motion to impeach President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “into force,” according to a report by Golnaz Esfandiari. The MP, Ali Motahari, says that he has collected “more than 50″ signatures, close to the one-fourth (73) of parliament needed to “question the president.”

Jamsheed Choksy writes at Foreign Policy that “[c]asual Iran observers tend to portray the country’s most prominent political division as that between fundamentalist hard-liners and secular moderates. In reality, however, the struggle for Iran’s future is a three-way fight waged by the different branches of conservatives that control the parliament, the presidency, and the theocracy.” He goes on to describe the situation as a “naked power struggle that has cloaked itself in ideology,” and that the “infighting is motivated by differences over pragmatic political strategy.”


Posted in Iran, Legislation | Comment »

Iraq: Walkout Threatens Tenuous Unity Government

November 12th, 2010 by Evan

Just hours into a parliamentary session on Thursday to approve Iraq’s new unity government, members of Ayad Allawi’s Iraqiya coalition staged a walkout.  Washington Post reporter Leila Fadel writes that while the walkout did not immediately scuttle the agreement, it is indicative of the “deep divisions and distrust that dominate the country’s political system.”  The New York TimesSteven Lee Myers adds that the incident is a foreshadowing of the serious difficulties Iraqi politicians will face in the coming months:  “The government — if it holds together — will be fractured and unwieldy, rife with suspicion, hobbled by a shaky grasp of the rule of law and prone to collapse, or at least chaos.”


Posted in Iraq, Legislation, Political Parties, Sectarianism | Comment »

POMED Notes: “Roads Not Taken: AKP Trajectories Since 2007”

November 11th, 2010 by Evan

On Wednesday, Dr. Nora Fisher Onar, professor of Politics and International Relations at Bahcesehir Unverisity in Istanbul and visiting research fellow at Oxford University’s Centre for International Studies, spoke on differing schools of thought within Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

To read full notes, continue below or click here for a pdf copy.

Read the rest of this entry »


Posted in DC Event Notes, Elections, Legislation, Political Islam, Turkey | Comment »

Lebanon: Reform Needed in Elections and Political System

October 28th, 2010 by Anna

Lebanon’s Daily Star reports today that Osama Safa, secretary general of the Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections (LADE), warned yesterday that the government has six months to implement a series of electoral law reforms. Among the reforms are giving soldiers the right to vote, lowering the voting age to 18, setting a quota for women candidates, and having independent oversight of electoral lists. Last November, the parliament stated that it would finish a draft law on election issues within 18 months. LADE and other organizations have called for changes to Lebanon’s “archaic” election laws, according to the Star, pointing to various types of irregularities in recent elections. Safa called on the government to prioritize electoral reform, saying: “The electoral law is considered the right gateway to any other reform.”

Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed concern yesterday over rising political tensions in Lebanon. In a report on the implementation of Security Council Resolution 1559 (2004),which calls for free and fair presidential elections in the country, he said: “Lebanon is currently experiencing a domestic climate of uncertainty and fragility” and called on leaders to work on strengthening institutions and to “transcend sectarian and individual interests and to genuinely promote the future and the interests of the nation.”


Posted in Elections, Lebanon, Legislation, Political Parties, Reform, Sectarianism | Comment »

Egypt: Are International Monitors only for Failed States?

October 19th, 2010 by Jason

Issandr El Amrani writes in Al-Masry Al-Youm today that “There’s an unusually virulent strand of political surrealism surging through Egypt at the moment […] And at the center of the debate is the question of whether raising Egypt’s practice of democracy–or lack thereof–is an infernal foreign plot.” He cites the recent comments of Mufid Shehab, the minister of parliamentary affairs, as an example: “This week he (Shehab) told the National Council of Human Rights that Egypt could not possibly envisage having foreign election monitors because that is something that is reserved for failed states.” As Amrani notes, the U.S. and Germany, among many other countries, allow international monitors to observe their elections. He goes on to mention the machinations surrounding S. Res. 586, and says that the U.S. State Department “has tried to make small changes in the bill to sweeten its language, perhaps in preparation for the unavoidable uproar at the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which in recent years has developed quite a knack in terrifying diplomats about ‘interfering in Egypt’s domestic affairs.’”

In related news,  Al-Masry Al-Youm reports that President Mubarak has ”ignored demands by the political opposition for free and fair elections by issuing a law on political rights that does not include a single reference to the need for judicial oversight of elections.” The new law does include an amendment that would create a 64-seat quota for women in the parliament, raising the overall number of seats from 454 to 518.


Posted in Civil Society, Egypt, Elections, Freedom, Legislation, US foreign policy | Comment »

Turkey: AKP to Control Judiciary?

September 23rd, 2010 by Evan

Adding to recent criticism of the AKP-backed constitutional referendum, Soner Cagaptay writes that the reforms will give the ruling party complete control over the Turkish judiciary: “One of the new amendments changes the court’s size, however, increasing the number of regular members to seventeen (three elected by parliament and fourteen appointed by the president). […] Seven members are already known to be pro-AKP, so the addition of Gul’s new appointees will make the court safe ground for the party for the first time since it gained power.” Cagaptay concludes that the referendum itself is not the real issue, the issue is how AKP will use the new amendments to consolidate its political position: “On paper, the new amendments promise to improve civil liberties in Turkey. In light of the AKP’s track record on these issues, however, Washington should monitor to what extent the party follows the spirit of the provisions in execution.”


Posted in Judiciary, Legislation, Turkey | Comment »

Turkey: Missing the Point of the Referendum

September 23rd, 2010 by Evan

At The New York Review of Books’ blog Can Yeginsu argues that enthusiasm for Turkey’s recent constitutional referendum is misguided: “I cannot share the view, espoused by some in Turkey and a great many abroad, that this referendum process has been good for Turkey in general or for the development of her democracy in particular.” According to Yeginsu, many of those in the West who have praised the referendum have a “fundamental misunderstanding” of what the vote actually means. In his view, the purpose of the referendum was to implement Prime Minister Tayyip Recep Erdogan’s “court-packing plan,” while the rest of the social reforms were simply the ruse AKP used to garner both international and domestic support.

Posted in Judiciary, Legislation, Turkey | Comment »

Egypt: Gabr Arrives in DC to Fight Resolution

September 23rd, 2010 by Jason

The president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Egypt, Shafik Gabr, arrived in Washington yesterday to lobby members of Congress to “refrain from issuing a resolution demanding that Egypt ‘hold fair elections, allow international monitoring of elections, and respect democracy and human rights.’” Al-Masry Al-Youm reports that Gabr was sent “expressly for this purpose by the Egyptian government.” S.Res.586, introduced in July by Senators Feingold (D-WI) and McCain (R-AZ), “Reaffirms that respect for human rights is a fundamental U.S. value and that providing unconditional support for governments that do not respect human rights undermines U.S. credibility and creates tensions, including in the Muslim world, that can be exploited.”


Posted in Egypt, Legislation | Comment »

Saudi Arabia: Using Anti-Terror Law to Target Reformers

August 31st, 2010 by Evan

In the Wall Street Journal, Margaret Coker reports on Saudi Arabia’s use of anti-terror laws to persecute political reformers and human rights activists: “The government is using its security forces to silence a growing group of Saudi political activists seeking liberal reform inside the authoritarian kingdom. Saudis who simply hold political views different from those of their rulers have been arrested and detained as security suspects under the counter-terror efforts, according to human-rights advocates, family of the detained and U.S. officials.” One of the most prominent cases is that of the imprisonment of Suliman al-Reshoudi, a prominent activist and critic of the regime. Saudi officials imprisoned Reshoudi on charges that he financed terrorism and was a member of an illegal group. The Saudi activist’s case caught the attention of the U.S. State Department which cited the incident in its annual human rights report.


Posted in Human Rights, Judiciary, Legislation, Saudi Arabia | Comment »

Jordan: New Cyber Crime Law a Tool for Repression

August 30th, 2010 by Evan

Writing at Black Iris, Jordanian blogger Naseem Tarawnah highlights issues with Jordan’s new cyber crimes law. According to Tarawnah, the law gives the Jordanian government new legal tools to repress free speech online including the ability to prosecute anyone sending information that “involves defamation or contempt or slander” and broad powers to search the homes and offices of those suspected of being involved in cyber crime. “Given the precedence of infringements on free speech in Jordan, one can safely assume that intent will be used more as a subjective legal tool to prosecute and convict, rather than protect the defendant,” writes Tarawnah. The cyber crime law is one of 34 temporary laws the Rifai government has attempted to pass since the Jordanian parliament was abolished in November 2009.


Posted in Jordan, Legislation, Reform, Technology | Comment »

Iran: Rep. Sherman on Sanctions and Hurting the Iranian People

August 17th, 2010 by Farid

Representative Brad Sherman (D-CA) argues in a piece at The Hill’s Congress Blog that the new sanctions against Iran are necessary, saying, “Critics… argued that these measures will hurt the Iranian people. Quite frankly, we need to do just that.” In his assessment, he compares sanctioning Iran to U.S. sanctions against apartheid South Africa, concluding, “Ultimately, Nelson Mandela thanked us for the sanctions.”

In response to Rep. Sherman’s assertion that policymakers “need to tighten the screws further, and I will soon introduce legislation to do just that,” Jamal Abdi, Policy Director at the National Iranian American Council, argues that Sherman’s remarks indicate Congress’ “sanctions addiction” and “may explain why the Iranian pro-democracy activists are distancing themselves from the US.” Abdi states, “Sherman is wrong,” arguing that Mandela did not thank the U.S. for sanctions, and adding that the opposition in South Africa actually supported sanctions, while the opposition movement in Iran has “unequivocally condemned sanctions as destructive to their movement and harmful to the most vulnerable Iranians.” According to Abdi, Sherman neglects the Iranian people’s struggle for democracy and human rights, adding that “the sanctions only impede that struggle.” Additionally, Abdi draws on recent remarks made by Mehdi Karroubi, senior figure in the Green Movement, calling sanctions “a gift to the Iranian regime.” Karroubi added that “isolating Iran would not bring democracy. Look at Cuba and North Korea, have sanctions brought democracy to their people? They have just made them more isolated and given them the opportunity to crack down on their opposition without bothering themselves about the international attention.”


Posted in Democracy Promotion, Human Rights, Iran, Legislation, Reform, US foreign policy, sanctions | Comment »

Lebanon: Time to Move Forward on Human Rights

August 3rd, 2010 by Jennifer

Lebanese MP Fouad Siniora, head of the Future Movement parliamentary bloc, chaired the first of a series of planned meetings yesterday in an effort to reach a unified stance among the parliamentary majority regarding the draft law to grant Palestinian refugees greater rights and improve their humanitarian situation. March 14 Secretariat Coordinator Fares Souaid, representatives from the Lebanese Forces, and several members of the Future Movement, as well as a number of experts on Palestinian issues, all attended the meeting

Meanwhile, the Beirut Bar Association (BBA) forwarded a report to the UN Human Rights Council arguing that Lebanon should work toward a number of reforms on broader human rights issues. The report covered six topics: equality, right to life, public safety, treatment of human beings, status of the judiciary, and private and public freedoms. On women’s rights, the report called for gender equality in taxation, penal codes, nationality and citizenship, social protection laws, judicial rights, and personal status code. It also highlighted the need for encouraging expanded participation of women in politics and decision-making processes. Regarding the judiciary, the report pointed to a need to strengthen the unity, independence, and organization of the judicial authority. On public and private rights and freedoms, the findings emphasized the need for reform of electoral laws to ensure fair representation; urged the abolishment of capital punishment and torture, and suggested that Lebanon should adopt a “health and social safety network” for its citizens. It also called for setting up a special fund to provide such services to Palestinian refugees. The report concluded with a call for the state to sign all relevant international agreements relating to human rights. The Lebanese government is scheduled to discuss the report in September.


Posted in Freedom, Human Rights, Judiciary, Lebanon, Legislation, Publications, Reform, United Nations | Comment »

Lebanon: Heading in the “Wrong Direction” on Freedom of Speech

July 12th, 2010 by Jennifer

Human Rights Watch issued statements late last week calling on Lebanese authorities to drop criminal charges against Naim Hanna, Antoine Ramia and Cherbel Kassab for authoring comments on Facebook criticizing President Michel Sleiman. The three men were charged under statutes in Lebanon that treat vaguely-defined offenses such as “libel,” “defamation,” and “insult” of the president, public officials, and private individuals, as criminal offenses. Nadim Houry, Beirut director at Human Rights Watch, called the use of such laws to prosecute government critics an “embarrassing step in the wrong direction,” saying, “These charges undermine Lebanon’s reputation as the country with the greatest tolerance for free expression in the Arab world.” The accused have been released on bail, but could face up to two years in prison if convicted.


Posted in Freedom, Lebanon, Legislation | Comment »

Iran Sanctions Bill Passed

June 25th, 2010 by Farid

Yesterday, the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability and Divestment Act (H.R.2194) was passed unanimously in the Senate , 99-0, and the House, 408-8. The final version of the bill can be found here in a pdf version. Josh Gorbin writes at Foreign Policy that a few changes have been made to the bill, including a request that the President address the impact of ethanol on Iran’s nuclear capacity and Iranian energy “know-how” through joint ventures that could potentially “aid Iran’s energy sector.”

Gorbin reports that both the House and the Senate are confident that President Obama will sign the bill into law, but some are worried about its implementation. “So lawmakers and staffers are planning to keep a close watch to see how the law is carried out,” says Gorbin. The U.S. administration has been reluctant to address the impact of these sanctions, as uncertainty still exists over their effect.


Posted in Congress, Iran, Legislation, US foreign policy, sanctions | Comment »

Congress to Vote on “Crippling Sanctions” on Iran

June 24th, 2010 by Farid

The latest version of the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act of 2010 (H.R.2194), more popularly known as “crippling sanctions,” was introduced in Congress on Monday.  The Senate now appears likely to pass the bill this afternoon, with the House aiming to pass it by the end of the week.  The policy Director for National Iranian American Council (NIAC),  Jamal Abdi, describes these as sanctions “that would ‘cripple’ Iran’s economy by cutting off gasoline to Iran that is used by ordinary Iranians for everything from heating their homes to producing food and transporting medicine.” According to Abdi, the newly passed sanction bill means that the U.S. has missed an opportunity to support the Iranian people.

Abdi expresses his disappointment with the new bill, saying that there were additional bills introduced that would not only support the Iranian people and allow them to be directors of their own  future, but would also declare a solid American stance for human rights and provide opportunities for American human rights organizations to work in Iran. “Most Americans do not even realize that current policies make it illegal for U.S. NGOs to work in Iran without special permission, unless they have searched for ways to help Iranians and realized that there are few avenues to provide such support,” Abdi explains.

While Abdi points out positive elements of the Congressional sanctions package, such as H.R.4301, the Iranian Digital Empowerment Act (IDEA) — enabling software to reach Iranians in order to effectively communicate and access information — he argues that the shortcomings of the sanctions package are overwhelming and “will ultimately impose further pain on Iranians and do more damage than good.”

UPDATE: The Senate has just unanimously passed the increased sanctions on Iran, as the House prepares to deliberate the bill. If the act also passes the House, it will be sent on to President Obama to sign into law.


Posted in Human Rights, Iran, Legislation, US foreign policy, sanctions | Comment »

Legislation: New House Resolution on Human Rights in Iran

June 11th, 2010 by Jennifer

Yesterday, Rep. Filner (D-CA) introduced H.Res.1431, a resolution “Calling for an end to the violence, unlawful arrests, torture, and ill treatment perpetrated against Iranian citizens, as well as the unconditional release of all political prisoners in Iran.” The resolution calls on the administration to support democracy and human rights in Iran, to apply sanctions against individuals affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and to remove the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (MEK) from the State Department’s list of terrorist organizations.  The resolution is co-sponsored by Rep. Jackson-Lee (D-TX) and Rep. Rohrabacher (R-CA).


Posted in Human Rights, Iran, Legislation | Comment »

Jordan: Judging the New Electoral Law

May 24th, 2010 by Josh

At the Middle East Channel, Curtis R. Ryan discusses Jordan’s new electoral system and what it demonstrates about the Jordanian regime’s “commitment to liberal reforms.” While the new law does accede to some of the demands of reformists, Ryan believes that “it is not at all transformative and at most makes some minor adjustments to the status quo.” In an effort to mollify reformists — a community increasingly tossed aside in favor of the “more reactionary traditional elite” — the regime puts a good deal of effort into slogans and marketing campaigns that merely present a superficial layer of change. One reformist complained to Ryan that the monarchy’s “words are with the reformers, but its actions are for the status quo.”

Conspicuously absent from the new legislation is one of the primary recommendations from the 2005 National Agenda commission — a group appointed by King Abdullah to create the “architecture for political and economic reform in the kingdom for years to come.” The commission had called for amending Jordan’s existing Single Non-Transferable Vote system (SNTV) by adding elements of proportional representation and party lists. As things currently stand, however, “the 2010 elections will be contested in a way that, despite the minor reforms, should minimize the development of political parties and encourage localized rather than national voting,” meaning that the “regime will therefore get the conservative, traditional, tribalistic, and pro-regime parliament that it wants.”


Posted in Elections, Jordan, Legislation, Political Parties, Reform | Comment »

Iran: Are Sanctions and Engagement Compatible?

May 21st, 2010 by Josh

Echoing the frustrations of others earlier this week, Roger Cohen uses his most recent New York Times op-ed to question the wisdom of the Obama administration’s “bristling” response to the trilateral nuclear fuel swap deal. Cohen believes that the president should have exclaimed, “Pressure works! Iran blinked on the eve of new U.N. sanctions. It’s come back to our offer. We need to be prudent, given past Iranian duplicity, but this is progress. Isolation serves Iranian hard-liners.” Instead, the administration not only distanced itself from the deal, but also insisted “on a prior suspension of enrichment that was not in the October deal.”

Over at World Politics Review, Nikolas K. Gvosdev asks “Where does this process go from here?” One possibility, he says, is that “the Obama administration could run up against a growing domestic U.S. consensus that both a U.N. resolution and congressional legislation are needed — that having one without the other is insufficient.” Gvosdev predicts that such a scenario may complicate diplomatic overtures in the future. But Time’s Tony Karon isn’t so sure, writing that a “two-track” complementary approach of punitive pressures and diplomatic engagement “may be Washington’s answer to Iran’s strategy of negotiating while steadily adding to its stockpile of nuclear material.”


Posted in Congress, Diplomacy, Iran, Legislation, US foreign policy, US politics, sanctions | Comment »