As war reaches Europe, EuroMed Rights’ Executive Director Rasmus Boserup looks at the impact it may have for human rights in the Euro-Mediterranean region.
War has come to Europe. President Putin’s decision to order a full-blown military attack on Ukraine in late February has killed civilians and military personnel. It now risks triggering massive human rights violation on a scale that Europe has not seen for decades.
While Ukrainians are mounting a military response against the overwhelming might of the Russian army, European leaders have shown resolve and unity. They have uncompromisingly condemned the Russian aggression. They have delivered defensive military equipment to the Ukrainian government. And they have imposed draconian sanctions on the Russian economy, its financial system, and its global trade.
It is too early to predict the outcome of the confrontations. But it is dawning for all of us that this war has already upended the security architecture that emerged in the aftermath of the Cold War, and that we are now forced to speculate about the long forgotten scenarios of nuclear war. It also reveals that Europe may be more of a geopolitical player than what we anticipated just a few weeks ago.
Beyond the immediate perils in and around Ukraine, Russia’s warfare and the European responses are also likely to affect power and politics in the Euro-Mediterranean region.
Lessened EU pressure to reform in the Mediterranean region?
On the one hand, the confrontation is likely to reduce the level of pressure to reform until now put by Europe on Middle Eastern and North African autocrats. The shift in the attention of European leaders towards security in Eastern Europe will likely permit despots and autocrats to further consolidate and roll back the respect for human rights and good governance.
Notwithstanding their own central role in generating violent uprisings and emigration, authoritarian leaders in the Southern Mediterranean have over the past two decades successfully built leverage among Western leaders by posing as partners in fighting Islamist terrorism and as partners in fighting migration towards Europe.
With Europe depending at around 40% from Russian gas and with newly-imposed economic, financial, and trade-oriented sanctions by European leaders and their allies against Russia, autocratic leaders in oil- and gas-exporting Middle Eastern and North African countries will in the short run be able to increase their political leverage among European leaders by posing as suppliers of Europe’s immediate energy gap. Algeria has already done so – and other countries like Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Iran are likely to follow. As they do this, the will of European leaders to push for reforms may cool off comparatively.
Lessened EU support for autocrats?
On the other hand, the war in Ukraine may end up pushing Middle Eastern and North African political leaders to take sides for or against the struggle between global authoritarianism and the international liberal order. For almost a decade Russia has been propping up authoritarian leaders in the Southern Mediterranean.
Its pivotal role in tilting the local power balances in favor of Syria’s Assad with minimal efforts and resources was particularly disturbing. Later examples of Russian support have emerged from many other countries struck by domestic power battles and conflict including Egypt, Libya and Algeria. A protracted Russian military operation in Ukraine is likely, however, to decrease its capacity to continue playing this role in the Southern Mediterranean region. This will, no matter how we turn the tables, leave the region’s authoritarian leaders with less global support than in the immediate past.
Furthermore, the seemingly newfound and unprecedented resolve of European and Western political leaders and populations in support of the values, norms and institutions underpinning the liberal order could be bad news for the region’s authoritarian leaders. It could eventually echo also in the exchanges that European leaders will have in the future with their counterparts in the Southern Mediterranean region.
We now need to see whether the global reach of Russian authoritarianism and Europe’s seemingly increasing resolve can partially or fully counterbalance the increased leverage that some authoritarian leaders will build on the basis of their petro-exports.
Food security at risk
What remains quite sure, however, is that authoritarian leaders in the Southern Mediterranean region are also likely to experience increased domestic pressure derived from increasing socio-economic strains. This expected knock-on effect of the war in Ukraine will be more directly felt in countries where food security depends heavily on imports of basic commodities such as wheat. As sanctions roll out and world trade with Russian supplies is likely to stall, the socio-economic challenges faced by populations in the south will likely rise.
The situation in Egypt illustrates this well: to feed the lower-income strata of its hundred million population (including a third is estimated to live under the poverty line) the government has for decades relied on imported wheat to produce and distribute subsidised basic food commodities including bread. In 2021 alone, Russia and Ukraine were together responsible for around 60% of the country’s total wheat import.
While the Egyptian government has already begun looking for alternative suppliers, it is likely to come at a higher price and deliveries will possibly slow down. Over the past decade, Egypt has witnessed a gradual shift in the dynamics of popular mobilisation away from the political issues that characterised the Arab Spring in 2011 towards a focus on socio-economic strains. This included the denunciation of elite corruption and failures of the state to deliver basic rights and living conditions. The protests that appeared in 2019 (the first in a long while) were sparked by accusations of corruption and money squandering by the political elite.
Long-term impacts for the region
Egypt is far from alone in experiencing these dynamics. Algeria is also a major importer of Russian wheat. And in Tunisia and Morocco as well as Lebanon and Jordan, socio-economic factors are increasingly important in shaping the ruling elite’s ability to govern. As the sanctions imposed on Russia take effect, the governments will have to grabble with potential protests or, as it was the case in Tunisia last year, power-grabs by populist political competitors.
The war in Ukraine is horrifying in its potential bloodshed, and the prospects of further escalation of the war is truly terrifying. Still, the knock-on effects for the Euro-Mediterranean region may turn out to be bittersweet. Truly bitter because of the horrific, unnecessary, and completely unjustified waste of human lives in Ukraine. Bitter also because of the high risks entailed in the process. But sweet, because we may for the first time in a long while see a true and concerted effort among the world’s liberal democracies to stand up for the values of the liberal order – democracy, rule of law, and human rights.
Human rights defenders and pro-democracy activists in the Euro-Mediterranean region should stand ready to capitalise on every opportunity – even the smallest – that emerges from this sad situation. In the long run, doing so will be the best way that we can show sincere support to those suffering authoritarian repression and warfare in Ukraine today.
Rasmus Alenius Boserup
EuroMed Rights Executive Director