Top Stories This Week
Tentative agreement on Cyprus reached
Thursday, December 15th, 2022
Negotiators in the Swiss city of Zurich announced that a tentative agreement had been reached on Thursday to end the Turkish occupation of the Republic of Cyprus.
Facilitated by the Swiss government and Secretary-General Jonas Bakke of NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization), the proposed agreement would implement a phased withdrawal of Turkish forces from the Republic of Cyprus beginning in late January 2023, monitored by a NATO observation force with the United States providing the majority of naval and logistical support. Turkish forces would be required to withdraw across the former Attila Line by May 2023 and thereafter be restricted to the same number of military personnel that the country had in Northern Cyprus on January 1, 2019, nine months before the invasion of the Republic of Cyprus. In return, representatives from the Republic of Cyprus have agreed to recognize the disputed republic in the north as a "Special Autonomous Zone" to facilitate nationwide trade and movement, while forbidding the use of military force to re-establish control over the northern portion of the island that was seized by Turkish forces in 1974.
Several more facets of the agreement, including agreements by Greece and the United Kingdom to vote for an end to European Union sanctions against Turkey levelled after the invasion, the establishment of a United Nations investigation into alleged war crimes committed during the conflict, and the end of financial sanctions against top Turkish officials, were announced in subsequent days. The agreement will need to be ratified by the national legislatures in London, Athens, Ankara and the government-in-exile of the Republic of Cyprus before it will come into effect.
Final Israeli soldiers leave Golan Heights
Saturday, December 17th, 2022
The last members of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) left the Golan Heights on Saturday, handing military control over the final section of the region not under the control of United Nations peacekeepers. IDF forces departed shortly after noon on Saturday from the town of Katzrin, handing over control to forces of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), currently led by General Sugat Hamal of Nepal. Under the terms of the withdrawal, the Golan Heights will be permanently demilitarized and control will return to Syria, the nation the heights are internationally-recognized as belonging to, with Syrian administration resuming by 2037 unless all four members of the "Ankara framework" (Israel, Syria, Palestine and Jerusalem) agree to an earlier return of Syrian administration before then.
The heights, which Israel seized during the Six-Day War in 1967, had been a major diplomatic issue in the region for decades. Although internationally recognized as being Syrian territory, Israel controlled the heights for over five decades except for a few weeks during the Syrian War in 2011 when Syrian forces overran Israeli forces stationed there. The agreement has come at a high political cost for Israeli prime minister Gilad Doron, who finally agreed to calls for an early election days earlier after he failed to obtain an extension of the confidence-and-supply agreement he had reached with several opposition parties in order to oversee the withdrawal from the Golan Heights.
Seaborn promotes infrastructure plan ahead of new Congress
Wednesday, December 14th, 2022
President Sam Seaborn promoted his administration's plan to invest an additional $3 trillion in national infrastructure over the next decade on Wednesday. Speaking at the announcement of Small Business Administration head Damon Matteo to be the new Secretary of Transportation, Seaborn said he and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Mark Richardson would be working "in consultation with congressional and state leaders" to come up with legislation that would improve the nation's housing and transportation sectors. Current Transportation secretary Matt Skinner, the nation's first openly gay Cabinet secretary, will leave office at the end of this year to return to his native Vermont.
Senate Republican leader Cody Riley (AL), who will become minority leader when the new Congress is sworn in in January, has said that his caucus "broadly supports" efforts to repair the nation's infrastructure, but said it would "violently oppose" any measures the Republicans felt would "seek to impose new environmental regulations or measures on the American people" under the guise of infrastructure investment.
Former Supreme Court chief justice backs term limits for justices
Sunday, December 18th, 2022
Former Chief Justice Henry Staub of the Supreme Court said he supported the creation of a system of term limits for justices of the Supreme Court to "reduce the rancor surrounding court appointments" in a rare media appearance. The former chief justice, the first African-American to lead the Supreme Court, spoke to reporters when asked about the possibilities that one or both of the oldest members of the Court's liberal wing, Roberto Mendoza (age 77) and current chief Evelyn Baker Lang (age 75), would retire while Democrats control both the Senate and the White House. Staub, who has rarely ventured into political or judicial matters since his retirement in 1991, said he "did not know" either of the current justices' thought processes, but also said that the "intensely partisan nature" of court appointments since his retirement had led him to support proposed term limits for the justices.
"I read about a plan for each member of the court to serve a single 18-year term," Staub said. "Staggered every two years, so that every president gets at least two Supreme Court appointments...I think that would go a long way towards ending these kinds [of discussions about judicial retirements based around partisan control over the presidency and Senate]."
Staub, a lifelong Republican, did express "disappointment" with the GOP's nomination of Alan Duke this year, but did not disclose who he voted for in the election. He did express his support for Vice President-elect Bobby Tyler, set to become the nation's first African-American vice president, although he said he had "several criticisms" of his time as governor of their shared home state of Virginia.
