BBC (October 21)
“Concern about Russia’s development and deployment of a missile system that breaches the INF treaty predates the Trump administration.” Still, Trump’s “decision to walk away from the agreement marks a significant setback for arms control. Many experts believe that negotiations should have continued to try to bring the Russians back into compliance.” Instead, the move may prove part of a “wider unravelling of the whole system of arms control treaties.”
Tags: Arms control, Compliance, Experts, INF, Missile system, Negotiations, Russia, Setback, Treaties, Treaty, Trump
New York Magazine (July 23)
Donald Trump is “slowly realizing it’s North Korea’s reality show, not his.” The President “seems to be learning, the hard way, that epic peace deals with foreign leaders work a lot better when those deals actually exist before celebrating or trying to implement them. North Korea has been blowing the U.S. off since the summit, leaving denuclearization negotiations at a standstill, and the impatient Trump has been fuming at aides about it.”
Tags: Celebrating, Denuclearization, Impatient, Learning, Negotiations, North Korea, Reality show, Standstill, Summit, Trump, U.S.
The Guardian (April 26)
“There is little chance of a concrete agreement of any kind resulting from the summit” between North Korea’s Kim Jong-un and South Korea’s Moon Jae-in on April 27. “Beginning negotiations with a meeting between the two leaders, before any details have been hammered out, is always risky. The meeting will likely be followed by months, if not years, of negotiations at the lower levels before anything is signed.”
Tags: Agreement, Kim Jong Un, Moon Jae-in, Negotiations, North Korea, Risky, South Korea, Summit
Bloomberg (November 6)
With the U.S. “hobbled by Trump,” China clearly has the “upper hand” in the upcoming negotiations. The stakes are potentially “huge, including the threat of nuclear conflict in North Korea,” as Trump sits down with China’s President Xi. The situation reminds many of 1961, when JFK was outmaneuvered by Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna. “Today’s two superpowers are coming from different directions. President Xi, consolidating his hold, probably is the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong.” Meanwhile, the American president heads a new administration “beset by chaos.”000
Tags: 1961, Chaos, China, Hobbled, JFK, Khrushchev, Mao, Negotiations, North Korea, Nuclear conflict, Stakes, Superpowers, Threat, Trump, U.S., Vienna, Xi
Reuters (August 6)
“Watching the slow-motion crash of Britain’s exit negotiations with the European Union is a disconcerting experience. A state that once ran a global empire is looking second-rate.” Realism has all but been abandoned. “The government’s implausible expectations about what it may be able to achieve” reveal a “dismaying lack of historical and strategic understanding about how Britain lost its clout outside the European club more than half a century ago.”
Tags: Brexit, Clout, Crash, Disconcerting, EU, Expectations, Global empire, Implausible, Negotiations, Realism, Strategic, UK, Understanding
The Economist (January 21)
“Negotiating free-trade agreements will be harder and more time-consuming than Mrs May suggests.” Reaching a comprehensive deal in two years is unrealistic. “Canada’s free-trade deal with the EU has taken seven years and is not yet in force. For Britain to replicate the EU’s trade deals with 53 third countries will be more testing” and ratification remains “tricky,” requiring approval by every parliament in the EU.”
Tags: Approval, Canada, EU, Free-trade agreements, May, Negotiations, Ratification, UK, Unrealistic
New York Times (October 5)
The Brexit “reality is that Britain has a lot to lose in leaving the union, and that putting a two-year limit on the negotiations further weakens an already shaky hand.” Following Prime Minister May’s announcement of a timetable for withdrawal, “the prompt plunge of the British currency to a 31-year low against the dollar provided a far louder response than the misguided cheers of her fellow Conservative Party members.”
Financial Times (October 3)
“By announcing that she will start the formal negotiations for Britain to leave the EU by March 2017, the prime minister has walked into a trap. She has given away what little leverage Britain has in the negotiations — without receiving any of the assurances that she needs to achieve a successful outcome.” This will allow the EU to “simply run the clock down — knowing that the UK will be in an increasingly difficult situation.”
Tags: Assurances, Britain, EU, Leverage, May, Negotiations, Outcome, Prime minister
New York Times (February 14)
A full disarmament, of North Korea “is unrealistic at this point. To have any chance of success, the negotiations should aim for constraint. That means persuading the North to end all testing and to forsake technology transfers to other parties. This is a formidable challenge, but neglecting it only guarantees that the threat will get worse.”
Wall Street Journal (February 6)
“The Greek effort to divide and conquer by negotiating individually with other EU members instead of with the bloc as a whole is going nowhere.” Nevertheless, there may still be “room for a prudent compromise that might involve a bridge deal to allow time for a permanent agreement, followed by some easing of the terms of bailout loans in exchange for a commitment to economic reform.”
Tags: Bailout, Compromise, Economic reform, Effort, EU, Greek, Loans, Negotiations
