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1. The Venezuela-Guyana Dispute over the Essequibo

Author:
Rafael Ramírez
Publication Date:
02-2024
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Istituto Affari Internazionali
Abstract:
The Essequibo[1] is a territory located in the North-East of South America, between Venezuela and Guyana, with a maritime projection towards the Atlantic. It has been part of Venezuela since 1777[2] under the rule of the Spanish Empire and then as the Republic of Venezuela since 1810. The United Kingdom illegally occupied it in 1814,[3] while Venezuela was going through a long and bloody war of independence. The UK tried to formalise the dispossession of the territory with the Paris Arbitral Award of 3 October 1899,[4] in a flawed process in which Venezuela was represented by the United States. The British Empire exercised its power to obtain a ruling in its favour. After the death of the lawyer Severo Mallet-Prevost in 1949, who represented Venezuela in this process, these irregularities became public knowledge.[5] In 1962, Venezuela denounced the nullity of the process before the United Nations and insisted on its historical claim.[6] On 17 February 1966, Venezuela and the UK signed the Geneva Agreement,[7] whereby the parties recognised the nullity of the Paris Arbitral Award and agreed to search for a negotiated solution. During this process, Guyana (independent since May 1966) would administer the Essequibo but without carrying out any activity that would modify the legal situation of the territory as established in Article V of the agreement, which states that “No acts or activities taking place while this Agreement is in force shall constitute a basis for asserting, supporting or denying a claim to territorial sovereignty in the territories of Venezuela or British Guiana or create any rights of sovereignty in those territories”. After four years, no progress was made in the negotiation, so on 18 June 1970, the two parties signed the Port of Spain Protocol,[8] to suspend the meetings for twelve years and to possibly use as an alternative one of the means of peaceful settlement provided for in the UN Charter.
Topic:
Oil, Territorial Disputes, History, and Borders
Political Geography:
South America, Venezuela, North America, Guyana, and United States of America

2. CTC Sentinel: July 2023 Issue

Author:
Matthew Levitt, Lauren Von Thaden, Don Rassler, and Tore Hamming
Publication Date:
07-2023
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
CTC Sentinel
Institution:
The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:
In this month’s feature article, Matthew Levitt and Lauren von Thaden examine the recent heightened smuggling challenge at Israel’s borders with Jordan and Egypt. They write: “The guns and drugs that are flowing into Israel are creating societal problems and public safety issues. The influx of weapons is also a major counterterrorism concern. Smuggled weapons have been a contributing factor to the surge of violence that has plagued the West Bank and Israel.” Building on the assessments of Israeli, Jordanian, and Egyptian officials, their study draws on a dataset they compiled of “105 cases of identified, thwarted, or disrupted weapons or drug smuggling attempts into Israel from March 2021 through April 2023 across all of Israel’s borders.” Our interview is with Ravi Satkalmi, the director of intelligence of the United States Capitol Police. He describes the post-January 6 security challenge as “fundamentally different than that posed by 9/11. The risk is fundamentally different when we’re discussing this kind of normalization of political violence against each other—an erosion of our civic norms—rather than a terrorist organization seeking to launch an attack from overseas.” He says that “our goal is essentially to be the premier intel shop for anti-government violence, full stop. We are sitting on a vast trove of threat information that’s being sent to us by our members’ offices and that we are finding on our own. And the key distinction here is we get it from all sides all the time. We’re protecting Democrats; we’re protecting Republicans, people of all political persuasions.” Satkalmi came out publicly as a gay man while previously working at NYPD and describes the importance of inclusivity in the national security and counterterrorism domain. He notes that “essentially, anybody can experience the challenge of belonging and anybody can be part of the solution. If we can check some of our own assumptions about who may be struggling and who effective change agents can be, we improve the likelihood for progress.” Tore Hamming draws on a new cache of Islamic State documents he collected to examine how the Islamic State’s General Directorate of Provinces has managed the Islamic State’s global network. He writes: “With the deaths of successive caliphs, the territorial demise in the Levant, and the growing importance of its external provinces, the General Directorate of Provinces has emerged as the organization’s most decisive body.” His article “describes the institution’s decisive role in the group’s military and economic affairs and its growing responsibility managing its external attack planning and execution.”
Topic:
Political Violence, Counter-terrorism, Weapons, Islamic State, Borders, LGBT+, Drugs, Smuggling, and January 6
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, North America, Egypt, Jordan, and United States of America

3. Toward a Better Immigration System: Fixing Immigration Governance at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security

Author:
Doris Meissner and Ruth Ellen Wasem
Publication Date:
04-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Whether it is record-breaking numbers of unaccompanied child and family migrants crossing the southwest border or unprecedented backlogs in immigration and naturalization petitions, immigration governance is buckling from breakdowns in performance across key Department of Homeland Security (DHS) immigration components and partner agencies. Rethinking immigration governance at DHS and across the executive branch is essential. Although many of the issues plaguing the immigration system are due to Congress’s failure to update immigration laws to reflect national needs, the management of DHS’ immigration components is the responsibility of the executive branch. DHS’ current chain of command and coordination capabilities are not strong enough to counteract the centrifugal forces of better-resourced, singular operations (e.g. border security and immigration detention). The DHS components and the agencies they collaborate with in other federal departments lack the assuredness and agility to effectively recalibrate and adjust to new circumstances. The challenge for the DHS immigration components is to fuse broader immigration policy and performance outcomes with enduring border and national security imperatives. This paper examines questions of structure—as compared with leadership and policy—and proposes changes that would enable more effective and humane implementation of the nation’s immigration laws. It identifies four key organizational areas of concern—mission, institutional structures, funding priorities, and institutional culture—essential to the vitality and governance of the U.S. immigration system. We argue that immigration is a system that spans both intra-DHS and interagency organizational entities and processes, and that it must operate as a system to successfully carry out its duties. Managing immigration as a system calls for coordinated operational capabilities, decision-making structures, and resource allocations. The paper provides recommendations that can be accomplished within the current authority of the secretary of homeland security and the executive branch. In addition, it closes with select proposals for a longer-term change agenda that would require legislation.
Topic:
Immigration, Governance, Homeland Security, and Borders
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

4. Georgian Ethnopolitical Conflicts as a Subject of Confrontation between the USA and Russia

Author:
Ekaterine Lomia and Loid Karchava
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Liberty and International Affairs
Institution:
Institute for Research and European Studies (IRES)
Abstract:
Since 2009 Russia has increased its military forces in Abkhazia and South Ossetia and pursued the policy of ‘creeping annexation in the occupied territories of Georgia. Today, 20% of Georgian territories are occupied by the Russian Federation. The Russian-baked separatists continuously erect barbed-wire border posts in one of the occupied regions of Georgia-South Ossetia and detain Georgian people, under the pretext of ‘illegally crossing the border’. Fundamental rights of the local population are violated daily since the occupants install barbers through people’s houses, gardens, and cultivated lands. Innocent citizens are forced to leave their homes, belongings, and cultivated lands that are left beyond the occupants’ demarcation line. The paper argues that along with other global challenges of the world, the USA-Russia clashes of interests are also found with the Georgian conflicts. While Washington hugely supports Georgia’s territorial integrity and welcomes its Euro-Atlantic aspirations, the Russian Federation, on the contrary, prevents the aforementioned process and directly opposes Georgia’s integration into NATO. The USA condemns Russia’s creeping annexation of Georgian territories and continuously calls on Russia to respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of an independent country. Furthermore, the USA-Russia relations have considerably deteriorated following Russia’s military intervention in Georgia and the recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states.
Topic:
Military Strategy, Hegemony, Self Determination, Military Intervention, Conflict, Borders, and Territory
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, Georgia, North America, and United States of America

5. Border Regulation Begins with Stronger Capacity at Official Points of Entry

Author:
Todd Rosenblum
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Third Way
Abstract:
After the Trump Administration cutbacks, Congress should invest in the U.S. southern border to benefit trade, stop bad actors, and humanely process people with real asylum claims. Managing vehicular, rail, and people throughput at border crossings is an enormous challenge, but one not being met. U.S. inspectors do not properly screen more than a small percentage of incoming commercial and personal vehicles making this the primary means for narco-trafficking into the United States. Investing more in screening capacity at the official land Points of Entry with Mexico will reduce crime, illegal drug importation, guns going southbound, strengthen regulation and order essential for safe trade and opportunity, and make for a safer environment for those seeking legal entry into the United States. Congress has steadily appropriated new funds for more border screening capacity, but additional investment in screening capacity is still needed to make up for Trump Administration cutbacks. President Biden’s U.S. Citizens Act of 2021 has a range of helpful proposals to make us safer and keep commerce moving. Congress should mandate better measures to evaluate actual screening effectiveness. Congress also should conduct stronger oversight to address shortcomings in the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Customs and Border Protection Agency (CBP) acquisition plans to make sure border inspectors spend the money more effectively and field the right capability in a timely fashion. There is a range of reforms we must make across immigration and border regulation to better serve our nation and those seeking to come here. Immigration and border enforcement have strayed from our values as a country and urgently need reform. Our legal immigration system both in asylum and visa-based needs clear modernization. Millions who have known no home but America deserve citizenship. Enforcement alone also will not solve our problems, but we must improve all aspects of American immigration and our border.
Topic:
Migration, Immigration, Law Enforcement, Borders, Illegal Trade, and Commercialization
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

6. A Virus Without Papers: Understanding COVID-19 and the Impact on Immigrant Communities

Author:
Elizabeth Kiester and Jennifer Vasquez-Merino
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:
Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the inequalities facing vulnerable populations: those living in economically precarious situations and lacking adequate health care. In addition, frontline workers deemed essential to meet our basic needs have faced enormous personal risk to keep earning their paychecks and the economy running. Immigrant communities face an intersection of all three vulnerabilities (e.g., economic precarity, health care barriers, essential workforce), making them one of the most vulnerable populations in the United States. We conducted 26 interviews via Zoom with immigrant service providers in Pennsylvania and New York, including lawyers, case workers, religious leaders, advocates, doctors, and educators in order to gain a better understanding of the impact of COVID-19 on immigrant communities. These interviews affirmed that immigrants are concentrated in essential industries, which increases their exposure to the virus. In addition, they lack access to social safety nets when trying to access health care or facing job/income loss. Last, COVID-19 did not adequately slow the detention and deportation machine in the United States, which led to increased transmission of the virus among not only detainees but also others in the detention system, surrounding communities, and the countries to which people were deported, countries that often lacked an adequate infrastructure for dealing with the pandemic. Based on our interviews, we have a series of specific policy recommendations to diminish the vulnerability of immigrants and create social safety nets that will include them and protect them when the market fails to do so. Immigrants of all types have made indispensable contributions to the US economy during the pandemic and before it. First, Congress and states should pass legislation to provide COVID-19 relief payments to all essential workers, regardless of their status, as compensation for putting their lives on the line to keep the economy running. Second, as a public health imperative, federal and state governments should expand coverage of Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Programs (CHIP) to include immigrant essential workers and their children, regardless of their status. Third, DHS should not refer essential workers to removal proceedings, and immigration courts should terminate all removal proceedings for essential workers without criminal records. When it comes to issues of health care affordability and access, Congress must continue to revise the Affordable Healthcare Act to expand coverage for those who do not qualify for Medicaid but earn too little to afford insurance on their own. Finally, there must be a review and rigorous enforcement of workplace health and safety standards, particularly when it comes to farming, meatpacking, food production, and food service industries. Our final recommendations are specific to DHS and two of the primary agencies they oversee: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Border Patrol. First, there needs to be a review of ICE policies and practices, leading to a shift in policy that keeps mixed-status families intact and minor children out of detention centers and that streamlines and expands the asylum process. Second, both Congress and the administration must create additional paths to legal status where none now exist, including for recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and for children who have arrived since June 2007.
Topic:
Immigration, Borders, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

7. Immigration After Trump: What Would Immigration Policy That Followed American Public Opinion Look Like?

Author:
PRRI Staff
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
PRRI: Public Religion Research Institute
Abstract:
The last four years of U.S. immigration policy have been driven by the Trump administration’s aggressive stance against all types of immigration, legal and illegal.[1] President Joe Biden has promised to reverse many restrictive immigration policies from the Trump era by reforming the asylum system, raising the cap on refugee admissions, revoking the travel ban on immigrants from several Muslim-majority countries, halting the construction of a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, suspending all deportations for the first 100 days of his presidency, making the DACA program permanent, and sending a comprehensive immigration reform bill to Congress.
Topic:
Immigration, Governance, Public Opinion, Refugees, Leadership, and Borders
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

8. Lessons Across Borders: Women’s Entrepreneurship in the U.S. and China

Author:
Yvonne Quek and Emma Crawford
Publication Date:
02-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security (GIWPS)
Abstract:
In both the United States and China, thousands of women are becoming entrepreneurs. Over the past 20 years, the number of women-owned businesses in the United States has grown 114 percent. Similarly, the All-China Women’s Federation reports that women accounted for one-quarter of total China-based entrepreneurs as of 2017. The upward trends in both countries underscore the growing economic opportunities for women in the entrepreneurial ecosystem, especially in the rapidly growing technology industry. However, despite the availability of national data highlighting these trends, we know little about the patterns of opportunities and challenges faced by women entrepreneurs, specifically those in tech. This report, produced in collaboration with The Mulan Foundation, seeks to address this gap by examining the key challenges faced by female founders in tech in the United States and China. Part I investigates these trends by synthesizing and sharing insights from 330 survey respondents across both countries, comparing the opportunities and challenges faced by women tech entrepreneurs in each economy. Part II then dives deep into the U.S. perspective, analyzing the survey responses from American women entrepreneurs in the tech sector and drawing from in-depth profiles of 17 individual founders. Their diverse experiences offer lessons for other women entrepreneurs. Our findings in both countries suggest that limited access to capital and networks are key challenges faced by female entrepreneurs in tech. In addition, gender bias and stereotypes inhibit growth opportunities for women-founded businesses. This report provides recommendations for how to support women entrepreneurs in technology, and it highlights opportunities for women founders and aspiring entrepreneurs.
Topic:
Women, Entrepreneurship, Business, and Borders
Political Geography:
China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

9. Operation Condor, The War on Drugs, and Counterinsurgency in the Golden Triangle (1977-1983)

Author:
Adela Cedillo
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
In the late 1960s, the Mexican government launched a series of counternarcotics campaigns characterized by the militarization of drug production zones, particularly in the northwestern region—the so-called Golden Triangle, epicenter of both production and trafficking of marijuana and opium poppy since the 1930s. Operations Canador (1969–1975) and Trizo (1976) served as a laboratory for methods to curb drug production, ranging from harassment of drug growers to the aerial defoliation of illicit crops. Operation Condor (1977–1988) combined and enhanced these strategies, wreaking havoc on communities of alleged drug growers, but without entirely disrupting the drug industry. This paper explores the role of the US government in the militarization of Mexico’s anti-drug policy, underscoring how the ruling party (the Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI) took advantage of this shift to tackle domestic issues and reassert its hegemony. I argue that Operation Condor functioned as a counterinsurgency campaign oriented to thwart both social and armed movements, eliminate competitors in the narcotics market, and reorganize the drug industry to protect successful drug lords. Operation Condor also caused the decentralization of the drug industry from the northwest and created a new clientelistic pact between drug lords and national security agencies, such as the Federal Security Directorate (DFS), the Office of the Attorney General of Mexico–Federal Judicial Police (PGR-PJF), and the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA), which benefited from drug proceeds. Finally, the de facto state of siege imposed in the Golden Triangle produced thousands of victims of harassment, torture, rape, murder, forced-disappearance, and displacement; massive human rights abuses that authorities either concealed or denied.
Topic:
Security, Corruption, Human Rights, Governance, Social Movement, History, Borders, and Violence
Political Geography:
Latin America, North America, Mexico, and United States of America

10. In 2019, the US Undocumented Population Continued a Decade-Long Decline and the Foreign-Born Population Neared Zero Growth

Author:
Robert Warren
Publication Date:
03-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:
Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:
This report presents new estimates of the undocumented population residing in the United States in July 2019, by country of origin and state of residence. The Center for Migration Studies (CMS) derived the estimates by analyzing data collected in the annual American Community Survey (ACS) conducted by the US Census Bureau (Ruggles et al. 2020). The methodology used to estimate the undocumented population is described in the Appendix. The report highlights an aspect of population change — the number leaving the population — that is often overlooked in discussions of immigration trends. The report shows that the annual numbers leaving the population, especially through return migration to Mexico, have been the primary determinant of population change in the undocumented population in the past decade. Increasing numbers leaving the population have also led to near-zero growth of the total foreign-born population, which grew by just 20,000 from July 2018 to June 2019, the slowest growth in that population in more than a half-century.
Topic:
Migration, Immigration, Borders, and Undocumented Population
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America