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NewSecurityBeat

The blog of the Wilson Center's Environmental Change and Security Program
Showing posts from category Iraq.
  • Environmental Security in Times of Armed Conflict

    ›
    Guest Contributor  //  November 6, 2018  //  By Wim Zwijnenburg
    Iraq Refugee Camp

    This summer, Iraqi citizens in Basra demonstrated in the streets to protest a serious public health crisis caused by polluted water. The condition of their water infrastructure was deplorable after years of devastating wars, corruption, and droughts and regional hydropolitics. More than 100,000 people have reportedly been poisoned by polluted water, while recent estimates warn that some 277,000 children are at risk of diseases, such as cholera due to rundown water and sanitation facilities at schools.

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  • Lessons from Post-Conflict States: Peacebuilding Must Factor in Environment and Climate Change

    ›
    Guest Contributor  //  October 18, 2018  //  By Karolina Eklöw & Florian Krampe
    36311753461_24bb9c40e2_k

    The original version of this article, by Karolina Eklöw and Florian Krampe, appeared on the blog of Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

    The challenge of peacebuilding missions is not only to stop violence and prevent a rekindling of conflict, but also to help societies and governments reset their internal relations on a peaceful path towards sustaining peace.

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  • A Watershed Moment for Iraqi Kurdistan: Subnational Hydropolitics and Regional Stability

    ›
    Guest Contributor  //  May 22, 2018  //  By Marcus King
    Water-Tank-Iraq

    Iraqi Kurdistan is blessed with abundant water resources, but these resources are under increasing stress. Changing demographics, dam building in neighboring countries, and drought have driven Kurdish hydropolitics to a critical juncture where two distinct water futures are possible—and both have implications for regional stability and for U.S. interests.

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  • New Global Analysis Finds Water-Related Terrorism Is On the Rise

    ›
    Guest Contributor  //  May 8, 2018  //  By Jennifer Veilleux & Shlomi Dinar
    Water Collection Somalia

    In 2014, after losing a number of Somalian cities it had captured to African Union and Somali troops, the terrorist group Al-Shabaab changed its tactics. To demonstrate its continued power and presence, Al-Shabaab cut off water supplies to its formerly held cities. Residents from these cut-off cities were forced to fetch water from nearby towns, many of which Al-Shabaab controlled. But the terror group prevented anyone living in government-controlled territory from entering, which increased people’s frustration with the government.

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  • The New Middle Eastern Wars: To Protect Civilians, Protect Environmental Infrastructure

    ›
    Guest Contributor  //  October 24, 2017  //  By Jeannie Sowers, Erika Weinthal & Neda Zawahri
    Yemen-Clinic

    Six years of brutal warfare have destroyed basic infrastructure in Yemen, Libya, and Syria.  While U.S. and European governments have been largely preoccupied with providing immediate assistance and dealing with refugees, international humanitarian organizations—such as the International Committee of the Red Cross and Doctors without Borders—are focusing on how to repair, maintain, and safeguard the facilities that provide essential services like clean water, sanitation, and electricity.  Yet these efforts are hindered by lack of resources, protracted violence, and—most insidiously—by the warring parties’ intentional targeting of humanitarian actors and environmental infrastructure. Just as the extensive damage from hurricanes in the Caribbean and southeastern United States has underscored the need for more resilient infrastructure, the wars of the Middle East show that protecting infrastructure is key to protecting civilians caught up in conflict.

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  • 8 Rules of Political Demography That Help Forecast Tomorrow’s World

    ›
    Guest Contributor  //  June 12, 2017  //  By Richard Cincotta
    Venezuela-Protest

    In a world rapidly churning out unpredictable political shocks, intelligence analysts occasionally need to clear their heads of the daily barrage of newsworthy events and instead work with simple theories that discern the direction and speed of trends and help predict their outcomes. Political demography, the study of population age structures and their relationships to political trends and events, has helped some analysts predict geopolitical changes in a world that, from time to time, appears utterly chaotic.

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  • Water and the Rise of Insurgencies in the “Arc of Instability”

    ›
    From the Wilson Center  //  April 12, 2017  //  By Azua (Zizhan) Luo
    Displaced-family

    Water scarcity has contributed to an “arc of instability” characterized by conflict and displacement that stretches from West Africa to the Middle East, said a panel of experts at the Wilson Center on March 1. Two authors from an upcoming compilation of case studies on water security and violent conflict by World Wildlife Fund gave overviews of challenges in Nigeria and Iran and recommendations for U.S. engagement.

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  • A Survey of the “War on Wildlife”: How Conflict Affects Conservation

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    Guest Contributor  //  April 3, 2017  //  By Bethany N. Bella
    Kuwait

    Over the last 60 years, more than two-thirds of the world’s remaining biodiversity hotspots have experienced armed conflict. The effects have been myriad, from destruction as a result of military tactics to indirect socioeconomic and political changes, like human migration and displacement. This so-called “war on wildlife” has important implications for conservation and peacebuilding efforts, according to a recent literature review published in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.

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