U.S. and Russian negotiators are close to hammering out a new nuclear arms-control deal, but it is unclear whether President Barack Obama will leave Copenhagen with an agreement. The U.S. president met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on the sidelines of the UN climate talks. While a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman said an agreement was imminent, the Kremlin’s top foreign policy adviser then said a nuclear arms deal would not be reached until next year. The two countries are trying to agree on a replacement for the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START-1), which expires December 5. Russia has said it wants simpler verification procedures for any planned cuts in nuclear arms. Both countries’ leaders agreed at a Moscow summit this summer to cut the number of nuclear warheads each possesses to between 1,500 and 1,675, within seven years.
In the highest-level meeting between the two countries since the 2008-09 war in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli and Turkish presidents met in Copenhagen and “agreed to return to normal, positive, and stable routine in relations,” according to a statement from Israeli President Shimon Peres. Turkey, which had once been one of Israel’s closest allies in the region, heavily criticized Israel over its offensive against Hamas in Gaza. Relations cooled further in October, when Turkey banned Israel from participating in a joint air force drill involving both the United States and NATO. On the sidelines of the UN climate summit, President Peres thanked Turkish President Abdullah Gul for Turkey’s “efforts to advance peace in the Middle East” and invited him to visit Israel. The Turkish president accepted. President Gul said Turkey was interested in promoting peace in the region and that the historically strong ties between Israel and Turkey would continue. Whether Turkey will once again attempt to mediate indirect peace talks between Syrian and Israel is, for now, still and open question.
The UN Security Council found itself engaged in a war of words with the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo over the issue of security sector reform in the country. Over the past several months, the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Congo has come under increased criticism for financial and logistical support for an ill-trained national army whose members have been accused of participating in gross human rights violations against Congolese civilians. The current verbal tête à tête between the UN and Congolese leadership has its roots in a joint military campaign between the international body’s peacekeeping forces and the Congolese army, which began in early 2009 with the goal of rooting out a prominent rogue militia that has done much to wreak havoc in eastern Congo. The UN-Congolese partnership, however, broke down after human rights groups began highlighting the Congolese army’s own atrocities in eastern Congo. In the wake of this criticism, the UN recently ended its joint military operations with Congo, and the Security Council is considering a resolution aimed at mandating the Congolese government to “immediately take appropriate measures to protect civilians.” The potential resolution, however, has stoked the fury of the Congolese government in Kinshasa, whose U.S. ambassador told reporters yesterday, “The Security Council has no right to do this. This is totally unacceptable. We will reject this resolution and we will have a crisis.” The draft UN resolution, however, may already be having some benign effects: Congo’s president, Joseph Kabila, just concluded a multi-day tour of eastern Congo on Wednesday, which focused entirely on security issues and the army’s ongoing fight against rebel militias in the region.