How African Muslims Civilized Spain

Garikai Chengu

This week marks the anniversary of the end of nearly 700 years of African Muslim rule over Spain, Portugal and Southern France.

Four hundred and eight years ago today King Phillip III of Spain signed an order, which was one of the earliest examples of ethnic cleansing. At the height of the Spanish inquisition, King Phillip III ordered the expulsion of 300,000 Muslim Moriscos, which initiated one of the most brutal and tragic episodes in the history of Spain.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, it was ancient Africans that brought civilization to Spain and large parts of Europe and not the other way around.

The first civilization of Europe was established on the Greek island of Crete in 1700 BC and the Greeks were primarily civilized by the Black Africans of the Nile Valley. The Greeks then passed on this acquired culture to the Romans who ultimately lost it; thus, initiating the Dark Ages that lasted for five centuries. Civilization was once again reintroduced to Europe when another group of Black Africans, The Moors, brought the Dark Ages to an end.

When history is taught in the West, the period called the “Middle Ages” is generally referred to as the “Dark Ages,” and depicted as the period during which civilization in general, including the arts and sciences, laid somewhat idle. This was certainly true for Europeans, but not for Africans.

Renowned historian, Cheikh Anta Diop, explains how during the Middle Ages, the great empires of the world were Black empires, and the educational and cultural centers of the world were predominately African. Moreover, during that period, it was the Europeans who were the lawless barbarians.

After the collapse of the Roman Empire multitudes of white warring tribes from the Caucus were pushed into Western Europe by the invading Huns. The Moors invaded Spanish shores in 711 AD and African Muslims literally civilized the wild, white tribes from the Caucus. The Moors eventually ruled over Spain, Portugal, North Africa and southern France for over seven hundred years.

Although generations of Spanish rulers have tried to expunge this era from the historical record, recent archeology and scholarship now sheds new light on how Moorish advances in mathematics, astronomy, art, and philosophy helped propel Europe out of the Dark Ages and into the Renaissance.

One the most famous British historians Basil Davidson, noted that during the eighth century there was no land “more admired by its neighbours, or more comfortable to live in, than a rich African civilization which took shape in Spain”.

The Moors were unquestionably Black and the 16th century English playwright William Shakespeare used the word Moor as a synonym for African.

Education was universal in Muslim Spain, while in Christian Europe, 99 percent of the population was illiterate, and even kings could neither read nor write. The Moors boasted a remarkably high literacy rate for a pre-modern society. During an era when Europe had only two universities, the Moors had seventeen. The founders of Oxford University were inspired to form the institution after visiting universities in Spain. According to the United Nations’ Education body, the oldest university operating in the world today, is the University of Al-Karaouine of Morocco founded during the height of the Moorish Empire in 859 A.D. by a Black woman named Fatima al-Fihri.

In the realm of mathematics, the number zero (0), the Arabic numerals, and the decimal system were all introduced to Europe by Muslims, assisting them to solve problems far more quickly and accurately and laying the foundation for the Scientific Revolution.

The Moors’ scientific curiosity extended to flight and polymath, Ibn Firnas, made the world’s first scientific attempt to fly in a controlled manner, in 875 A.D. Historical archives suggest that his attempt worked, but his landing was somewhat less successful. Africans took to the skies some six centuries before the Italian Leonardo Da Vinci developed a hang glider.

Clearly, the Moors helped to lift the general European populace out of the Dark Ages, and paved the way for the Renaissance period. In fact, a large number of the traits on which modern Europe prides itself came to it from Muslim Spain, namely, free trade, diplomacy, open borders, etiquette, advanced seafaring, research methods, and key advances in chemistry.

At a time when the Moors built 600 public baths and the rulers lived in sumptuous palaces, the monarchs of Germany, France, and England convinced their subjects that cleanliness was a sin and European kings dwelt in big barns, with no windows and no chimneys, often with only a hole in the roof for the exit of smoke.

In the 10th century, Cordoba was not just the capital of Moorish Spain but also the most important  and modern city in Europe. Cordoba boasted a population of half a million and had street lighting, fifty hospitals with running water, five hundred mosques and seventy libraries, one of which held over 500,000 books.

All of these achievements occurred at a time when London had a predominantly illiterate population of around 20,000 and had largely forgotten the technical advances of the Romans some six hundred years before. Street lamps and paved streets did not appear in London or Paris until hundreds of years later.

The Catholic Church forbade money lending which severely hampered any efforts at economic progress. Medieval Christain Europe was a miserable lot, which was riffe with squalor, barbarism, illiteracy, and mysticism.

In Europe’s great Age of Exploration, Spain and Portugal were the leaders in global seafaring.  It was the Moorish advances in navigational technology such as the astrolabe and sextant, as well as their improvements in cartography and shipbuilding, that paved the way for the Age of Exploration. Thus, the era of Western global dominance of the past half-millennium originated from the African Moorish sailors of the Iberian Peninsula during the 1300s.

Long before Spanish Monarchs commissioned Columbus’ search for land to the West, African Muslims, amongst others, had long since established significant contact with the Americas and left a lasting impression on Native culture.

One can only wonder how Columbus could have discovered America when a highly civilised and sophisticated people were watching him arrive from America’s shores?

An overwhelming body of new evidence is emerging which proves that Africans had frequently sailed across the Atlantic to the Americas, thousands of years before Columbus and indeed before Christ. Dr. Barry Fell of Harvard University highlights an array of evidence of Mulsims in America before Columbus from sculptures, oral traditions, coins, eye-witness reports, ancient artifacts, Arabic documents and inscriptions.

The strongest evidence of African presence in America before Columbus comes from the pen of Columbus himself. In 1920, a renowned American historian and linguist, Leo Weiner of Harvard University, in his book, Africa and the Discovery of America, explained how Columbus noted in his journal that Native Americans had confirmed that, “black skinned people had come from the south-east in boats, trading in gold-tipped spears.”

Muslim Spain not only collected and perpetuated the intellectual advances of Ancient Egypt, Greece and Roman civilisation, it also expanded on that civilisation and made its own vital contributions in fields ranging from astronomy, pharmacology, maritime navigation, architecture and law.

The centuries old impression given by some Western scholars that the African continent made little or no contributions to civilization, and that its people are naturally primitive has, unfortunately, became the basis of racial prejudice, slavery, colonialism and the ongoing economic oppression of Africa. If Africans re-write their true history, they will reveal a glory that they will inevitably seek to recapture. After all, the greatest threat towards Africa having a glorious future is her people’s ignorance of Africa’s glorious past.

Syria: Beyond Western Myths and Half-Truths

Ron Jacobs

Recent and not so recent events conspire to keep the Middle East in the news. Wars against terrorism and the terrorism of war leap from newspaper pages and the screens of computer devices. Television talking heads put forth their version of events; versions mostly dependent on the corporate and financial masters they serve. Truth is lies and lies are truth. Most recently, bloody attacks on civilians by US forces in Iraq and Syria have been dismissed by most western media as mistakes while an equally bloody attack on Al-Qaeda linked forces in the Idlib province of Syria that resulted in several dozen deaths from some kind of poison gas has been used as a rationale by the Pentagon to launch fifty million dollars worth of missiles at a Syrian air base. In other words, despite the lack of objective non-partisan evidence, the US used this bloody incident as a rationale to attack a Syrian military base, aware that such an attack could lead to a longer and even deadlier war. It is another case where the truth might well get in the way of US dreams of hegemony; two other such examples include the fabricated Gulf of Tonkin incident that led to greater US military involvement in Vietnam and the falsification of WMD evidence that ultimately led to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

The overwhelming sentiment of most westerners regarding the Syrian conflict seems to be this: the Assad regime is bad, but the options are not much better and may be worse. The overwhelming sentiment of most western politicians and much of the media seems to be this: Assad needs to go and we are willing to put Arab and western populations at risk to achieve that goal. When considering this latter sentiment and the positions of those who endorse it, one has to question why they are so intent on removing Assad and his government. A new book by Stephen Gowans does a good and thorough job providing answers to this question. Given the current perception of Syria’s President Assad as the reincarnation of the devil and Saddam Hussein (a perception based on the actions of his military in the current conflict and fanned by western media), reading this book with an open mind may be out of the question for many people. However, its contents provide a historic and political context to the murderous war currently destroying the nation of Syria.

Titled Washington’s Long War on Syria, Gowans’ text begins with the observation that the conflict between Damascus and the West (led by Washington) did not begin in 2011 with the events known as the Arab Spring. To substantiate this observation, Gowans offers a perspective on Arab history and reasons for that history rarely considered by most US citizens, either because of ideological stubbornness or ignorance. That history began decades earlier with a declaration from various pan-Arabists across the Arab world who were fed up with western colonialism and wary of Islamic sectarianism. He discusses the creation of the Ba’ath parties in Iraq and Syria: their nationalization of industry and oil, their wealth re-distribution and modernization efforts and their demand for a political system based on politics and Arabism, not religion, tribe, or ethnicity. Furthermore, he points out how Washington (and those colonizers that came before) tried to exacerbate those differences. The point, as the current situation in Iraq makes crystal clear, was to divide and conquer.

In the chapter titled “Regime Change,” Gowans notes Palestinian scholar Edward Said’s 2003 comment that the US would not stop its intervention in the Middle East until the entire Arab World was ruled by pro-American regimes. He then details a little known anecdote about US attempts under President Eisenhower to assassinate communist and Ba’athist politicians in the Syrian government. The person assigned to carry out this plan was none other than Kermit Roosevelt, one of the masterminds behind the US-orchestrated overthrow of Iranian president Mossadegh and his replacement with the US client Shah Pahlavi in 1953. Roosevelt’s plan was eerily similar to the events which unfolded in 2011 in Syria. Internal uprisings fomented by CIA money and Muslim Brotherhood organizers were to work in tandem with armed paramilitary groups to start an uprising in Syria—an action which would bring the force of the Syrian military into the streets. In the mayhem, it is assumed that the CIA’s assassination targets would be taken care of. Although the plan fell through, there is a reason US citizens are not aware of this history. If they did know, it is perhaps less likely that they would support their government in its interventions in Syria and elsewhere around the world.

The reasons the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists are opposed to the Baathists lies primarily in their opposition to the party’s secularism. Although Islam is also opposed to socialist-type economies, whose principles Baathists have historically tried to emulate within the context of their philosophies, it is the Baathist insistence on secularism that is the defining difference between the groups. When the Syrian regime tried to change the requirement that the Syrian president had to be Muslim, the Brotherhood rioted for days. In the aftermath of those riots, no reconciliation ever occurred. In addition, the fact that the Assad governments have been perceived as primarily Alawite (whom fundamental Sunni Muslims consider to be heretics) is another reason the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafist groups are opposed to the Ba’ath regime. Naturally, the US and other western governments intent on weakening Ba’ath rule have attempted to use these differences to their advantage.

One aspect of the conflict in Syria that Gowans comes back to quite frequently is the matter of perception. For example, although many socialists would have difficulty considering the Baathist economy as being socialist in nature, that has been the guiding interpretation of many in the Washington political establishment. Consequently, the free market capitalists in the US circles of power have responded in the manner they reserve for those opposed to their mythology and intrusion. When it comes to the nature of the protests against the Baathists in the 1970s and in 2011, it is their questionable portrayal as both massively popular and originally peaceful that permeated western media. This portrayal led to a perception among many if not most westerners that the Syrian government’s military were overreacting, when in fact they were responding to what would be termed open rebellion in any western nation in which similar protests occurred. Indeed, many Syrians would have a hard time recognizing their country as described by the western media and those in the government who feed them their reports.

Gowans provides a reasoned, at times quite partisan, defense of the pan-Arabism project that once represented the hopes of millions across the Middle East. As his history tells it, it was a project founded on principles that included anti-imperialism, the ownership of the region’s resources by the people of the region and the fair distribution of those resources amongst all the people, and a secular approach in the realm of politics. As Gowans also points out, the desires embodied in this project were counter to the designs of Washington and its allies in Europe and the Middle East (esp. Saudi Arabia). Consequently, it was doomed to be in the bombsights of those governments almost since it began. Syria remains the only nation left of the original nations that made up the pan-Arabist project. This explains why the Syrians who support Assad’s defense of his regime against Islamist and imperial enemies are so adamant in that defense. They know that if he loses, their fate will be as bad, if not worse than, that endured by the people of Egypt and Iraq. Washington’s Long War on Syria not only provides a counter-narrative to the popular western version of the Syrian protests, but more importantly, a history and discussion of western intervention rarely heard in western media. If there is only one lesson learned from reading this book, it is that Washington decided decades ago that its plans for Pax Americana would be better served if the government in Syria was one that did its bidding. Once that decision was made, Damascus would be the seat of a government with a target on its back.

The End of Democracy in Turkey?

Patrick Cockburn

In the final days before Turks vote in a referendum on 16 April on whether or not to give President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dictatorial powers and effectively end parliamentary government, the mood in Turkey is prone to conspiracy theories and suspicion of foreign plots.

A sign of this is the reception given to a tweet that might have seemed to the sender to be exceptionally benign and non-controversial. It was sent in Turkish and English by the British ambassador to Ankara, Richard Moore, and read: “Tulips in Istanbul heralding spring. Hooray!” Accompanying it was a picture of a bank of tulips blooming outside the Dolmabahce Palace in Istanbul.

But for television sports anchor Ertem Sener the message had a much more menacing significance according to the Turkish Daily News. He tweeted to his 849,000 followers that the words were intended to show support for the failed military coup against Mr Erdogan in July 2016 and as an encouragement to “No” voters in the referendum. “This is how they are giving a message to Turkey,” said Mr Sener. “They are saying: ‘If we had prevailed [in the coup attempt] these tulips would have bloomed earlier. British dog. These tulips have been washed in [martyrs’] blood.”

Mr Moore replied dismissively to this rant, by tweeting in Turkish: “Oh dear! Who is this fool?”

But Mr Sener is not alone when it comes to hysterical denunciations. On the same day as the sports anchor was unmasking the secret agenda of the British embassy, Mr Erdogan was expressing his thoughts about Europe at a referendum rally in the west of Turkey. He said that, in the eyes of billions of people, “Europe today is no longer the centre of democracy, human rights and freedoms, but is one of oppression, violence and Nazism.”

It takes a good deal of cheek to accuse European states of lack of respect for democracy, human rights and freedoms when 134,000 people in Turkey have been sacked, including 7,300 academics and 4,300 judge and prosecutors in the nine months since the failed coup in which there is little evidence that any of them knew anything about or were otherwise involved. Some 231 journalists are in jail and 149 media outlets have been shut down, while 95,500 people have been detained and 47,600 arrested under emergency laws.

The multi-party democracy that has existed in Turkey since 1946 is being gutted by a mix of imprisonment, intimidation and interference in party affairs. Turkey has had military coups in the past, but the current restructuring and purge look far more radical. Even if the political parties were not being crippled by the assault, they would have difficulty in getting their message across. Their media outlets have been taken over or closed down and one television personality who said that he was voting “No” was immediately fired from his job.

Time allocated to the different parties on television tells the same story with Mr Erdogan and his ruling AKP (Justice and Development Party) receiving 4,113 minutes of airtime up to 30 March and the CHP (Republican Peoples’ Party), which received 25 per cent of the vote in the last election, getting just 216 minutes. This is still better than the mainly Kurdish HDP (Peoples’ Democratic Party), that won over 10 per cent of the vote and got just one minute of airtime. Twelve of its 59 MPs are in jail and expect long sentences.

Mr Erdogan says he would put “No” voters in a symbolic political museum, though many of them must fear a more traditional form of incarceration. But just in case there should be too many potential residents of this museum, the police and local officials have been refusing the opposition permission for rallies and ripping down flags, banners and posters advocating a “No” vote.

Despite the enormous advantages enjoyed by the “Yes” campaign, opinion polls were last week showing that voters were evenly divided or even that the “Nos” were a little ahead. But opponents of Mr Erdogan and the “executive presidency” he intends to establish are not optimistic about their chances of winning, arguing that whatever voters may do in the polling booth the outcome is likely to be a convincing majority for establishing the new authoritarian system.

This may be too cynical, but, if it is not, then Turkey will soon resemble neighbouring states in the Middle East such as Syria and Egypt where parliament and the judiciary are no more than closely monitored supporters’ clubs for the regimes. It is a depressing end to the modern Turkish secular state that Kemal Ataturk partly succeeded in establishing and which led Turkey to more closely resemble southern European states like Spain and Italy than regimes in the wider Middle East. Ten years ago, Istanbul and other Turkish cities had one of the most interesting medias in the world – not to speak of a vibrant intellectual life in general – which is now being extinguished. Any expression of critical opinion can now be interpreted as witting or unwitting support for terrorism or the attempted coup.

Of course, many leaders in the world have assumed supreme power only to find that they are at the mercy of events. Whatever the outcome of the referendum, Turkey will remain a deeply divided country along political, ethnic and sectarian lines. Mr Erdogan has for the moment crushed the Kurdish insurgency in the south east of the country, leaving many of the cities in ruins. But the Kurdish rebellion is not going to end and will look for support in the two Kurdish quasi-states across the border in Syria and Iraq. Overall, Mr Erdogan’s strategy of demonising and seeking to eliminate all his opponents as traitors and terrorists makes Turkey a much more fearful place than it has been in the past. Differences with foreign countries like Germany and the Netherlands have been exaggerated and exploited so Mr Erdogan and his party can present themselves as the heroic defenders of an embattled Turkish people.

It seems to be working, though Turkish elections have brought surprises in the past. Control of the media means that failures can be presented as successes. Overall, Operation Euphrates Shield, whereby the Turkish army entered Syria last year, has not been very successful and has now been ended. It is difficult for Turkey to exert strong influence when it is vying with powerful states like Russia and the US. But these failings and limitations will not count for much if Mr Erdogan and the AKP know that Turkish media coverage will be overwhelmingly positive.

Turkey might stabilise under the under authoritarian rule by Mr Erdogan if it was situated in another part of the world than the Middle East. But its southern border runs along the northern lip of the great cauldron of violence and conflict in Iraq and Syria whose poisonous influence has already seeped into Turkey. It is a measure of this instability that when there are bombings and killings, it is often a moot point whether they have been carried out by Isis, Kurdish separatists or some other dissident group. Mr Erdogan may win the referendum, but how far this will enhance his power is another matter.

Escalation in Syria

Alice Donovan 

According to the Syrian media sources, the Russian government has taken measures to guarantee more security for its forces in case of possible attack regarding the recent U.S. Tomahawk air strikes on the Shayrat air base on April 7.

At this moment, two Russian all-purpose jets capable of spotting and intercepting cruise missiles are barraging in the Eastern Mediterranean. Moreover, the Russian forces are ready to carry out retaliatory strikes on the U.S. ships that launch cruise missiles if they attack the Russian military objects (including Khmeimim and Tartus bases).

Meanwhile, the Russian military advisors have arrived at the Syrian bases equipped with the anti-aircraft defense systems to assist Assad’s forces to counter cruise missiles strikes.

The United States fired dozens of cruise missiles at a Syrian air base on Friday from which it said a deadly chemical weapons attack had been launched earlier in the week, escalating the U.S. role in Syria and drawing criticism from Assad’s allies including Russia and Iran.

“What America waged in an aggression on Syria is a crossing of red lines. From now on we will respond with force to any aggressor or any breach of red lines from whoever it is and America knows our ability to respond well,” said the statement.

The joint command center also said the presence of U.S troops in northern Syria where Washington has hundreds of special forces helping the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to oust Islamic State was “illegal” and that Washington had a long-term plan to occupy the area.

The regional alliance said the U.S. cruise missile strikes on a Syrian base killed dozens of civilians would not deter their forces from “liberating” all of Syrian territory.

It’s notable that the British paper Daily Mail has removed an article titled “The United States supported the plan to carry out a chemical attack in Syria and blame Assad regime” dated January 29 2013.

Meanwhile, thousands had taken to the streets to protest against the U.S. airstrikes against Syria yesterday. Protesters from all across the country made it clear that they will not stand for U.S. aggression in Syria, in a direct clash with the recent actions ordered by the Trump administration.

As the U.S continues to intervene in Syria, the majority of protesters expressed their concerns saying that money spent on these weapons of mass destruction, should rather go towards funding, “jobs, schools and healthcare.” The tomahawk missiles that struck Syria in the first wave of airstrikes reportedly cost $60 million USD in total as one tomahawk missile is valued at approximately $1 million USD.

Racially Motivated Attacks On Africans In India Rooted In Casteism

Subramani Mani

Over the last 2-3 years there have been a surge in targeted attacks on African nationals living in India, people from the North-Eastern provinces settled elsewhere in our country, people belonging to minority communities and members of backward castes particularly Dalits. Last year alone a Congolese teacher was attacked and killed in Delhi, a group of six Africans—two women, a priest and his family including a baby walking home was attacked with cricket bats in Delhi and a woman student from Tanzania was beaten and stripped in Bangalore simply because another African was involved in a car accident in the city. Much more recently there has been a spate of brutal attacks on Africans in Noida near Delhi. Also the killings of Muslims based on the mere suspicion of possession of beef or simply for transporting cows across state borders is fast becoming a sport and pastime for some Hindu fanatics. Likewise, the harassment and caste discrimination that pushed scholars Rohith Vemula and Muthu Krishnanbelonging to the Dalit community is still green in our memory.

Many African students have spoken out about the racism they face in their daily life in India but the Indian authorities including the extern affairs minister Sushama Swaraj are in denial mode.In Western societies racism gets manifested as white supremacy and hence white racism and the minorities are stereotyped and assigned an inferior role and status in society. For example, US as a country did not welcome immigration from Asian and African countries before the sixties of the last century. In India the racism being manifested against Africans and people of the North-East are an extension of the entrenched caste system of India.

The dominant forces of the independence movement in India under the leadership of Gandhi had religious revivalist overtones and failed to carry forward the secularization and democratization of Indian society. When Dr. Ambedkar proposed annihilation of the caste system Gandhi opposed it and instead propagated tolerance which boils down to providing equality before the law while preserving the caste hierarchy intact in social relations thereby perpetuating caste discrimination in society. There is a stunning similarity here to what the white supremacists and the Jim Crow south in the US preached during the civil rights movement—equal but separate and segregated spaces in society for education and civil relationships including marriages for blacks. When the BJP leader and former Member of Parliament Mr. Tarun Vijay talks about tolerating the black people from South India in his society the same supremacist and savarna (upper caste) mindset is exposed. Supremacists consider themselves superior but if cornered they will agree to tolerate or accommodate people of other races or castes even though they consider them inferior. The approach taken here is that of doing a favor to the disadvantaged folks.

The role of the Indian community in South Africa in the anti-apartheid struggle there was also convoluted. Though there were stalwarts such as Ahmed Kathrada who joined the anti-apartheid struggle along with the blacks as a teenager and spent 26 years in prison including 18 years in Robben Island, the majority of Indians were not active in the anti-apartheid struggle accepting the privileges offered to them in the classification of mixed-race and tried to remain in good graces with the apartheid regime. It is unfortunate that many in the Indian community embraced this pecking order and did not identify with the struggle of the black South Africans and join their struggle against the unjust white supremacist system of apartheid.

This is a time to introspect and ask ourselves the pertinent question—am I willing to accept a person as a full human being without any reservation as my friend, brother or sister not just in the eye of the law but from the heart irrespective of his or her skin color, facial features or country of origin. Am I ready to engage with him or her wholeheartedly not just professionally or for business purposes but socially, intellectually and in my personal day to day life and activities. Till that happens the prejudices, the mindset and the stereotyping will persist and get manifested in different ways including unleashing mindless attacks on innocent members of communities simply because they look different, have other food items on their plate, worship another god, play some other sport or listen to another type of music.

About 50,000 international students come to India for education every year while the number of Indian students going out of the country seeking educational opportunities is ten times more. There have been racially motivated attacks on Indian students in the US, UK, Australia and New Zealand and Indians have rightly condemned these attacks. Can we all rise up similarly to strongly raise our voice against the attacks on the African people living in India and reach out to them embracing them as brothers, sisters, friends and fellow human beings. That is the need of the hour.

Having said that the Government can and should take a stand recognizing these types of incidents as hate crimes and prosecute the perpetrators to the full extent of the law setting a standard of deterrence. This will help create an environment where members of other communities feel encouraged to pursue their profession, vocation and other activities of life without fear.

Operation Twilight: A Turning Point in Bangladesh

Angshuman Choudhury

On 28 March, the Bangladesh Army officially drew the curtains on ‘Operation Twilight’ – the longest and most complex counter-terror (CT) operation in the country’s history. The five-day episode took place from 24-28 March in a 30-apartment residential building in Shibbari neighbourhood in Sylhet city, northeastern Bangladesh. 

Four militants – three male and one female – belonging to the ‘Neo Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen (Neo-JMB)’ faction were neutralised during the operation jointly conducted by the 1st Para Commando Battalion and 17th Infantry Division of the Bangladesh Army with assistance from the paramilitary and the police. 78 civilians were successfully rescued from the building without any casualties. However, six (including two police officers) lost their lives in a diversionary suicide blast close to the operation site.

The template of the operation, including the armed response accorded by the militants, is indicative of two things: a qualitative progression of Bangladesh's CT agenda; and an apparent evolution of the militant profile in the country.  A closer look is imperative.

Tactical Restraint in a Difficult Situation

Operation Twilight was an unprecedented raid-and-rescue operation in itself, with respect to scope and design. Despite facing an extremely delicate scenario of heavy civilian presence in and around the operational area, the security forces managed to complete the operation without any civilian or troop casualties. This is notwithstanding the six people who died in a suicide attack on a crowd of onlookers standing near the target building.

Unlike in the previous raids, this time, the militants put up an aggressive response to the Bangladeshi security forces. The highly-trained militants had rigged the entire building with explosives, wore suicide vests, and were in possession of a vast cache of ammunition. This delayed the overall response time of the raid, which remained focused on avoiding a hostage situation and collateral damage.

It is notable that the core command of the operation was given to the army, and not the CT Police or the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) – two units that have been involved in CT operations since July 2016. This was done due to the heavy civilian presence in the building. Furthermore, media personnel who arrived at the scene were barred from moving close to the building to restrict uncontrolled broadcast of operational details.

In meting out a graded and calculated response, the Bangladeshi authorities showed appreciable tact and strategic restraint. Crucially, by not resorting to an indiscriminate assault design, they made sure that no civilian lives were put at risk in a situation where overkill were a firm possibility.

What Does the Operation Indicate?

Since the July 2016 Gulshan attack, Bangladeshi security forces – particularly the CT Police and the RAB – have conducted approximately 24 raids in ‘hideouts’ across the country, resulting in deaths of nearly 60 suspects and arrests of 25 others. These raids can be divided into two phases: mid-July-23 to December 2016 and December 2016-April 2017. 

There are three notable aspects about the first phase:

First, they were all conducted in the central and western parts of the country, mostly in and around Dhaka. Second, the militant suspects/targets either surrendered without a fight or mounted a weak counter-assault. Third, they were largely reactive and single-tier, i.e. the targets were selected on the basis of specific intelligence on the Gulshan attack and acted upon by either the CT Police or RAB.

However, the situation appears to be rapidly changing within the second phase:

First, a tactical escalation in the overall militant response appears emergent. The suicide blasts during a 23 December raid in Dhaka; the two failed suicide attacks on 17 and 24 March in a RAB facility and a police post near Dhaka International Airport; and the intricate counter-assault during Operation Twilight reflect this new prognosis. 

From a purely defensive posture, the militants seem to have moved to an offensive-defence calibration, wherein suicide attacks and Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) are being employed for a dual purpose of proactively attacking security forces and evading capture during raids. This counter-aggression is somewhat reminiscent of other high-intensity conflict theatres like Mosul (ongoing) and Grozny (1999-2000), but entirely new for Bangladesh.

Second, the Neo-JMB faction appears to be expanding to the northeastern and southeastern parts of the country. Since 8 March, there has been a sudden uptick in CT raids in and around Sylhet and Chittagong districts (six raids as of 1 April), with the latest being Operation Maximus in Moulvibazar district that ended with the eight militants and their kin blowing themselves up. Large amounts of IEDs, explosives, and ammunition have been recovered during these raids, some of which bear similarities with material found after the recent attacks in Dhaka. The Neo-JMB’s territorial expansion is a clear attempt to evade detection by the security apparatus, which has been largely focused on the central and western parts. However, the militants appear to be using their new bases in the east purely as strategic hideouts to plan attacks in Dhaka and other major cities westward.

Third, the Bangladeshi state’s response appears to be taking on a more sophisticated and proactive quality. This is reflected in the multi-tier, broad-spectrum nature of recent raids that have focused on flushing out the core leadership of the Neo-JMB from all quarters of the country through precision intelligence gathering and case-specific operational tactics, including use of drones for pre-assault surveillance. In this, Dhaka’s CT response has become far more comprehensive and contextual than it was a year ago.

For now, Bangladesh's security forces appear to be instrumentalising their experience of the past eight months in CT ops rather effectively. However, given the progressive adaptability and resilience demonstrated by militant groups like the Neo-JMB, Dhaka needs to constantly evaluate its CT agenda and tactics.

Trump's Strike Against Syria: International Implications

KP Fabian

Within 63 hours of reports about a chemical weapons attack on the rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhoun in the Syrian province of Idlib which killed approximately 80 people including children, on 4 April, US ships in the eastern Mediterranean sent 59 Tomahawk missiles aimed at the Shayrat air base from which, the US claims, the aircraft that carried out the attack took off. The Syrian government has claimed that six soldiers and nine civilians, including four children, were killed by the missiles.

The Pentagon, in accordance with the October 2015 ‘de-confliction’ agreement between the two militaries, had given warning to the Russian military about the attack. No Russian was hurt. It is logical to assume that Russia would have shared the information with Syria in which case it is difficult to explain why the Syrians, especially the children, were in the base or near about. The ‘deconfliction’ agreement to prevent collision between the aircraft of the two sides followed Russia’s military intervention, primarily air attacks, beginning on 30 September 2015.

US President Donald Trump’s action was a surprise as he deviated from his ‘America First’ policy. He had made it clear that it was not Washington's business to get involved in the quarrels elsewhere unless there was a direct threat to the US. The official line is that Trump acted because he was morally outraged when he saw the images of the children in pain.  “No child of God,” he said, “should ever suffer such horror.” However, such outrage alone cannot explain the strike, even given Trump’s reputation to act on instinct.

The key advisers were three generals and, of course, Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner. The generals are: Defense Secretary Gen (Retd) James Mattis, affectionately known as the Mad Dog among his friends and admirers; US Secretary of Homeland Security, Gen (Retd) John Kelly; and serving general and National Security Adviser, Lt Gen HR McMaster. The advisers would have known that such a strike would have spoilt the chances of ‘re-set’ of relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin that Trump wanted. Trump admires Putin who helped him to get elected by cracking into the emails of the Democratic Party to the embarrassment of the Democrat's presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton. Perhaps, the advisers wanted to prevent or at least delay a ‘re-set’.

Moscow’s response was sharp.  It called Trump’s action “an act of aggression against a sovereign state,” and based on “a far-fetched pretext.” It has suspended the ‘deconfliction’ agreement and strengthened air defence in the areas controlled by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Though Russia’s call for an international investigation to determine who carried out the attack is reasonable, it has poorly argued its case to absolve Damascus. The Russian military's Facebook page says that an aerial attack by the Syrian Air Force between 11.30 and 12.30 am (local time) on a rebel ammunition depot that contained chemical weapons might have released the toxic stuff. There is a clear discrepancy in the timing as the chemical weapons attack occurred in the morning around 6.30 am.

The US has accused Russia of incompetence or complicity as it maintains that Assad on his own would not have taken the decision without Russia's consent. That argument is plausible as Assad is virtually on a life-support system provided by Russia and Iran. However, it is difficult to figure out as to why Assad would have chosen to use chemical weapons when he was winning militarily, and especially after the US publicly said that its priority was to go after the Islamic State (IS) and not to topple Assad. Is it possible that Assad got emboldened with such a change in Washington’s position? Only a proper international investigation led by The Hague-based Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) can bring out the facts. Truth is the first casualty in war.

As expected, Washington got support from the West, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, and a few others. China’s reaction was equivocal and Egypt urged Washington and Moscow to work together for a negotiated end to the crisis in Syria.

The key question is what as to the US will do next. Was it a one-off strike not to be repeated unless there is another nerve-agent attack? Or is there a willingness to get engaged in Syria, militarily too, if necessary, and seek an end to the crisis leading to the emergence of a Syria with its territorial integrity restored? One does not know, but it is difficult to believe that Trump will get engaged in Syria in a serious manner, especially given the limits to what the US can do even if it wanted to. If it supplies sophisticated weapons to rebels supported by it, the IS and other rebels might get hold of them eventually. Long drawn-out negotiations carried out by former US President Barack Obama’s then Secretary of State John Kerry with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov proved to be utterly fruitless. It is good that incumbent Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is going ahead with his 12 April visit to Moscow. Perhaps, this shows that Trump has not given up on a ‘re-set’. Will the neo-cons let him?

Trump’s strike is unlikely to be a game-changer; Syria’s agony will, alas, continue. The country is de facto divided and any settlement might make the division virtually de jure. Assad is pursuing a mirage if he plans to recover militarily the territory he has lost.

Though Tillerson has hinted that a similar strike against North Korea is not to be ruled out, the situation there is far more complicated given the risk of the fall out of radiation on South Korea, and not to mention, China’s reaction.

Australian government revokes Palestinian activist’s visa

Oscar Grenfell 

The Liberal-National government of Malcolm Turnbull last week revoked the visa of Bassem Tamimi, a well-known Palestinian activist, in a flagrant attack on democratic rights aimed at preventing him from addressing public meetings in Australia.

Tamimi was granted a visa on April 4, but it was cancelled by the Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) within hours. He was about to begin a speaking tour at the end of this week, organised by the Friends of Palestine, the Social Research Institute, the Palestine Action Group and Socialist Alternative.

In its decision, the DIBP explicitly confirmed that Tamimi had been blocked from entering Australia because of his political views. It stated: “The department has recently been made aware of information that indicates there is a risk that members of the public will react adversely to Mr Tamimi’s presence in Australia regarding his views of the ongoing political tensions in the Middle East.”

When questioned by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) about the specific grounds for withdrawing the visa, the DIBP refused to provide any details of the “information” it had “been made aware of.”

Instead, the DIBP elaborated on a deeply anti-democratic rationale for the ruling. Invoking draconian provisions of the Migration Act, it asserted: “The exercise of this freedom [of speech] does involve a responsibility to avoid vilification of, inciting discord in, or representing a danger to, the Australian community.”

In other words, voicing opposition to Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians is illegitimate, as it could “incite discord.”

The decision underscores the reactionary character of immigration laws set in place by successive Labor and Liberal-National governments.

The ruling, however, has broader implications. The logic of the government’s position is the suppression of dissenting and anti-war views, whether voiced by foreign nationals or Australian citizens. The grounds for the exclusion of Tamimi could be used against any opponents of Australia’s central role in the US wars in Syria and Iraq, Washington’s military build-up in the Asia-Pacific, or virtually any other government policy.

In comments to the Guardian on Saturday, Tamimi denounced the government ban, stating that it was an attack on freedom of speech. He pointed to the support of the Australian political establishment for Israel’s attacks on the Palestinians, and the influence of the pro-Israel lobby in Australian politics. “The decision is disappointing, [it] means that the Israeli occupation and the Zionist lobby succeed and their allies dominate the decision in all the world countries,” Tamimi said.

Petitions have been launched opposing Tamimi’s exclusion, with a number of Palestinian, Jewish and other political and civil liberties organisations opposing the ban.

Tamimi and the organisations that sponsored his tour, including the pseudo-left Socialist Alternative, are proponents of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel. The nationalist BDS perspective is for a boycott of Israeli companies and citizens to pressure Israel to recognise the unviable capitalist mini-state in the Palestinian territories, which has proven to be incapable of resolving any of the social or democratic issues facing the Palestinian masses. The BDS campaign cuts across the fight to unify the Jewish, Palestinian and Arab working class in a common struggle against imperialist domination and the ruling classes of the Middle East.

Tamimi has been particularly targeted for persecution by Israeli and US authorities for opposing Israel’s ongoing illegal expansions of Jewish settlements on Palestinian territory.

The activist has been arrested over a dozen times by Israeli authorities for his role in organising demonstrations, including in Nabi Saleh, a small West Bank village that has been subjected to years of Israeli police raids and attacks because of its residents’ opposition to the expansion of settlements.

In 2011, Tamimi was arrested by Israeli authorities and charged with “crimes” including “holding a march without a permit” and “incitement.” Detained for 13 months, he was labelled a “prisoner of conscience” by Amnesty International, which said he was being held solely for “organising peaceful protests.” Tamimi was again arrested for protesting in 2012 and detained for a number of months.

In March 2016, US authorities cancelled a visa for Tamimi, preventing him from addressing audiences there.

The attacks on Tamimi by the US and Israeli governments raise a number of questions about the Australian government’s revocation of his visa. The most obvious is whether US or Israeli authorities, or the intelligence agencies of the two countries, were involved in the backroom machinations that led to the rapid cancellation of Tamimi’s travel rights.

The government decision coincided with a marked escalation of the war drive in the Middle East by the US and its allies, including Australia.

Since being inaugurated in January, the US administration of Donald Trump has called into question the previous framework for the ongoing oppression of the Palestinians, the so-called “two-state solution.” The Trump administration’s move, accompanied by ever-closer ties between the US and Israel, was a signal of Washington’s unalloyed support for stepped-up attacks on the democratic rights of the Palestinians, including through the expansion of illegal settlements.

At the same time, the US has escalated its criminal wars in Iraq and Syria. Just days after the ruling against Tamimi, Washington launched airstrikes on a Syrian air base, in a reckless act of aggression that was also directed at Russia, Syria’s closest ally in the Middle East.

The Australian political establishment unanimously endorsed the US attack, with Turnbull declaring his “strong support” for the strikes and his government’s backing of plans for “regime-change” in Syria. Labor Party opposition leader Bill Shorten likewise labelled the missile attack as “appropriate and proportionate.”

The response was in line with Australia’s role as a central partner in all American imperialism’s wars and military preparations around the world, including in the Middle East, and in the Asia-Pacific region, against North Korea and China.

Tamimi’s exclusion is part of a broader attempt to suppress anti-war sentiment. Tim Anderson, an academic at the University of Sydney, is being subjected to a vicious witch-hunt by the Turnbull government and the Murdoch media for pointing to the fraudulent character of the official pretext for the US attack on Syria.

Anderson, a supporter of the nationalist Syrian regime, referred to the highly dubious character of claims that the Syrian government was responsible for chemical weapons attacks in Idlib last Tuesday. He suggested it was the Al Qaeda linked opposition forces, backed by the US, who had the most to gain from the attack, and the capabilities to orchestrate it.

Today, the Murdoch-owned Daily Telegraph published a front-page article attacking Anderson, while the federal government’s education minister, Simon Birmingham, called for the University of Sydney to “investigate” his posts—a signal that opposition to the predatory US operations in the Middle East will come under ever greater persecution.

Eleven percent of Chile marches against for-profit pension scheme

Armando Cruz & Cesar Uco

On March 26, approximately two million Chileans—over 11 percent of the country’s total population—took to the streets around the country to participate in a national day of protest against the system of privatized pension funds, known as Pension Fund Administrators (Administradoras de Fondos de Pensiones, AFP). AFPs, similar to 401k investment schemes in the US, are a cornerstone of the free-market measures imposed by the US-backed fascist dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, which ran Chile from 1973 to 1990.

According to the organizers, 800,000 marched in the capital Santiago, while the police gave a far lower estimate, with over a million demonstrating elsewhere across the country. The wide turnout is a reflection of the opposition and anger towards not only the current Michelle Bachelet government (whose approval rating is 22 percent), but the maintenance of the Pinochet-era framework.

The march followed three other mass demonstrations late last year that attracted mostly young people who are clearly concerned over the news that those who gave contributions to AFPs in their youth are getting a pension equivalent to only 22 percent of their wages during their last decade of work, according to the Fundacion Sol NGO.

Though last month’s march was peaceful, the November 2016 demonstration expressed the anger towards Bachelet´s socialist-led government’s refusal to comply with the Chilean people’s demand to scrap Pinochet´s AFPs, going beyond the cosmetic changes she implemented in the past trying to appease the frustration of AFP beneficiaries.

The November demonstration was marked by violent confrontations with the police, who responded by using tear gas and water cannon. Students occupied schools, and two buses were burnt by the demonstrators who also set up road blocks in Santiago and several other Chilean cities. The Santiago subway suspended service for several hours affecting the transport of millions of people.

Santiago and Valparaiso were the centers of the most violent acts, which have been increasing in size over several years of confrontations between students, workers and Chileans economically affected by the still prevailing Pinochet policies.

In spite of having a relatively high annual per capita income of US$ 22,000, Chile remains one of the most economic unequal countries in the region.

After violently overthrowing the bourgeois regime of Salvador Allende with the help of the CIA, Pinochet's reign of terror served as a testing ground for imperialism’s free market measures that, in the following decades, would be implemented in other countries in the region.

As with most of the economic measures enacted by Pinochet on behalf of his imperialist patrons, no government after the “transition to democracy” has had any serious intention of reforming, let alone eliminating, the AFP system. It is a major source of revenue for the Chilean bourgeoisie and, as one of the march organizers described it as, “covert banks for the wealthy and the multinationals so that they can expand their investments (…) and build real monopolies on assorted economic sectors.”

Luis Mesina, leader of the largest organization behind the marches, which is known as No+AFPs (No more AFPs), made statements regarding a possible alternative to the existing privatized AFPs. Mesina declared that No+AFPs – which orbits around the Nueva Mayoria coalition of Bachelet – would not support any candidate in the coming November elections that does not address the AFP problem. Other members of No+AFPs have voiced their support for a return to the pre-Pinochet system of state pensions that lasted until 1981.

“The demand is to turn towards a ‘Solidarity-based Sharing System’ with tripartite contributions, that is, with money from workers, the employers and the state, leaving behind the model of individual capitalization imposed by Finance Minister Jose Piñera and the “Chicago Boys”—followers of Milton Friedman—during the dictatorship,” declared Mesina.

The Spanish daily El País cited Fundacion Sol's findings on the present status of the AFP business: “In the century's last quarter AFPs paid in pensions just a third of its earnings (...) while in 2015, their earnings rose 68 percent.”

How do AFPs function?

Chileans deposit 10 percent of their monthly earnings into an AFP of their choice, in addition to paying an administrative cost. The amount workers will receive at retirement will depend on how well AFPs investment did in the national and world financial markets.

Under the pre-Pinochet system, workers made contributions deducted from their monthly pay to finance the pensions of retirees. The monthly pensions were constant and guaranteed. Today, retirement payments are at the mercy of the capitalist world finance markets, mainly stocks and bonds.

In 2015 Chileans savings in the AFP system were more than US$ 160 billion, most of which were reinvested in the national financial markets. In essence, the original idea was to use the savings of the Chilean workers and employees to fuel the so-called “Chilean miracle.”

Today, the system has 10 million beneficiaries, a very large number for a country with a population of 17.6 million – that is, an astonishing 60 percent of Chileans have their retirement money in the hands of AFP financial speculators. The military—which played a role in writing the law under the dictatorship of Pinochet—exempted itself and state officers from being forced onto the AFP scheme in 1981 when the law was enacted.

The modest returns to beneficiaries, meanwhile, are at risk due to Chile subservient position as a commodity exporter on the world market. With the recent drop of commodity prices in world markets, as well as transnational mining shares trending downward, AFP returns on investment are diminishing.

At retirement, the military today receive generous pensions, which are quite near to their monthly earnings while on active duty. In contrast, an unskilled worker on an AFP receives US$ 233 per month, just over half the US$ 400 minimum wage, while the companies in AFP portfolios are reaping large profits. According to researcher Gonzalo Duran of Fundacion Sol, AFP year-on-year profits grew by 71.4 percent in the first nine months of 2015.

The Bachelet government seeks to protect the Pinochet-era scheme and the Chilean stock market. With lower share returns due to the economic downturn, raising the retirement pay above the minimum wage would force the AFP to sell assets. As most portfolio assets are invested in the Chilean stock market, which by international standards is small, thus lacking the necessary liquidity, these assets would be sold at a heavy discount. The result is that AFP returns would collapse—with results not too different from those of the US housing bubble crash in 2008.

This could massively hurt the share value of Chilean companies, an outcome that goes against the purpose for which the AFPs were created in the first place. The “Chilean miracle” was established by draining the retirement savings of the Chilean workers through the AFPs to transfer billions of dollars to the Chilean capitalists.

Subprime auto loans threaten new crisis

J. Cooper

On April 3, the Detroit Free Press reported the liquidation of Valley State Credit Union, a small community credit union serving state employees in Saginaw, Michigan. The collapse of the credit union highlights the growing problem of ballooning auto debt and subprime vehicle loans that are rattling the banking and finance markets. This growth of auto loan debt is also an indication that the auto sales surge of recent years is heading for a collapse, threatening further layoffs in the industry.

The Saginaw credit union was acquired by ELGA Credit Union of Burton. Valley State had been taken into conservatorship last August, as it became clear that delinquent used-vehicle loans had caused it to be “operating in an unsafe and unsound condition.” In July 2015, delinquent vehicle loans between 30 and 59 days overdue at Valley State had mushroomed to $1.59 million from $57,222 the year prior.

Automotive industry analysts are expressing concern that the mushrooming of auto-related debt and the preponderance of subprime vehicle loans, fueled by investors looking for high yields, could be the next financial bubble. As of the fourth quarter of 2016, auto loan debt in the United States had reached $1.16 trillion—an increase of $93 billion over 2015—rivaling the enormous sums of student loan debt that now stands at $1.31 trillion.

Following the financial crash of 2008 and the subsequent recession, auto sales plummeted. But with the government bailout of Wall Street and interest rates near zero, by 2012 the banking industry saw their opportunity in the unregulated field of auto financing. The subprime mortgage debacle brought mortgage lending under federal regulation, but no one was looking at vehicle financing. Bankers seeking quick profits began offering products to less-qualified borrowers, much as they had done with mortgages prior to 2007. Sales of both new and used vehicles hit record numbers in 2016 for the seventh straight year. However, since the beginning of this year, sales are tumbling, heading for an annual decrease of more than 12 percent.

Additionally, auto leasing has reached record numbers, from 13.2 percent of the market in 2009, to 28 percent in 2015. While this has helped boost the sales and profits of the car manufacturers, those leased vehicles have begun flooding the used-car market, as most leases are between two and four years. The market glut is expected to drive down used car prices, cutting into new-car sales and corporate profits.

For both manufacturers as well as lenders, the future looks grim. According to the April 7 Automotive News, “With both bad loans and interest rates on the rise, financial institutions are becoming more selective in doling out credit for new-car purchases, adding to the pressure for automakers already up against the wall with sliding sales, swelling inventories and a used-car glut. ‘We’ve been having a party for a few years and it was fun,’ said Maryann Keller, an industry consultant in Stamford, Connecticut. ‘Now lenders are getting back to basics.’”

Wall Street is concerned that what happened to Valley State Credit Union could spread throughout the banking industry. Delinquencies on car loans over 30 days were up in December by 14 percent over 2015. By the end of 2016, over 6 million borrowers were more than 90 days late with their vehicle payments, also a new record.

Auto loan delinquencies of 30 days or more reached $23.27 billion in the fourth quarter of 2016, or 3.8 percent of all auto loan debt. The seriously delinquent portion, those more than 90 days past due, reached $8.4 billion.

Predatory lending practices relating to auto loans are now coming under some scrutiny. Santander Bank, known as the largest packager of subprime auto loans, just agreed to a settlement of $26 million with the states of Massachusetts and Delaware for issuing “unfair and unaffordable” loans, knowing the borrowers would default. According to AP, Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey said, “These predatory practices are almost identical to what we saw in the mortgage industry a few years ago.”

Recognizing that millions of auto loans may default this year, lenders are now looking to cast a wider net for struggling borrowers. According to a recent New York Times article, the credit bureaus that provide the scores that determine a borrower’s interest rate and credit limits are now looking at “alternative” criteria, such as cell phone payments, to entice those who have no credit history, or have previously defaulted on loans, to become the new victims of the predatory banks.

Auto finance companies are alarmed about looming defaults, but not to the extent they were with the collapse of mortgages in 2007 and 2008. The vehicles of borrowers with low credit scores and higher risk are often fitted with GPS technology and “kill switches” that can be activated if a loan is even one day past due. There are more than 2 million of these devices on the roads. The practice of “ignition interruption” has now become so widespread that the Federal Trade Commission is investigating the abuse of these tracking devices relating to privacy violations.

Tightening credit, swelling inventories and the glut in the used-car market point to more plant closures and layoffs on the horizon. Ford has already threatened layoffs in both Michigan and Mexico, while General Motors has announced 4,600 permanent job cuts since December.

Sales for Detroit-based US automakers made a weak showing in March. Fiat Chrysler sales were down 5 percent while Ford showed a 7.2 percent decline. GM sales were up just 1.6 percent. Meanwhile, Nissan sales rose 3 percent while Toyota sales fell 2.1 percent. Overall auto sales increased at an adjusted annual rate of 16.63 billion, lower than projections of 17.3 billion.