What just happened
- Mitch McConnell, the senior Senate Republican, reportedly said he backs Democratic efforts to impeach Trump a second time, starting today.
- A new study found that nearly half of NHS critical care staff are suffering from post-traumatic stress from the first wave of the pandemic.
- The biggest mafia trial in more than 30 years started in Calabria.
In Taiwan, Yemen, Cuba and Iran, the outgoing US administration is leaving political landmines for Team Biden in what David Miliband, the former UK foreign secretary, has called “pure diplomatic vandalism”. The man behind this is Mike Pompeo, the outgoing secretary of state; his aim apparently to make Biden look weak as he restores some common sense to US foreign policy. Looking ahead, there’s another thing: Pompeo wants to be president.
In chronological order:
- Taiwan. On Saturday Pompeo lifted restrictions on formal contacts between US and Taiwanese officials that have been in place for 41 years. Ostensibly this underlines the Trump administration’s firm support for Taiwan and its democracy in the face of Chinese intimidation. It also hands Pompeo’s successor, Tony Blinken, a diplomatic emergency on day one in his new job. Nothing causes more acute neuralgia in Beijing than recognition for an island it claims as its own.
- Yemen. On Sunday Pompeo said he planned to designate Yemen’s Houthi rebels a foreign terrorist organisation. In principle this will make it illegal under US law to move food through the crucial Houthi-controlled port of Hodeidah from 19 January. The designation allows waivers for aid agencies that help feed 80 per cent of Yemenis, but in practice there’s no way to police it or the waivers – which would only protect US government employees and entities anyway. Pompeo’s main aim is to make it as hard as possible for Blinken to resume talks with Iran, which supports the Houthis. More than 100,000 have died in Yemen’s civil war and famine is forecast for 2021. Iona Craig, an expert on the region, says the impact of the designation is going to be felt by civilians rather than the Houthis.
- Cuba. On Monday Pompeo added Cuba to the US list of state sponsors of terrorism, principally to reverse a key element of Obama’s rapprochement with Havana before it’s too late. There’s zero evidence of Cuba sponsoring terrorism over the past four years, which is why Senator Patrick Leahy, a Democrat, called this a “blatantly politicised designation”. Pompeo will certainly remind Cuban-Americans of his brave stand on their behalf when he wades into his first presidential primary.
- Iran. On Tuesday Pompeo said Iran was a new “home base” for al-Qaeda. Again, zero evidence. And again, the purpose seems to be to derail the Biden administration’s efforts to patch Obama’s Iran deal back together before they’ve even begun. Team Trump’s Iran strategy of “maximum pressure” is working, Pompeo insisted in a tweet. Washington’s abiding fear is that this strategy might culminate in military action ordered by an unhinged commander-in-chief.
Question for the post-mortem: what role in all this did the soon-to-be-ex First Son-in-law Jared Kushner have? Everything that hurts Iran helps Saudi Arabia, where he’s been cultivating ties with the Crown Prince – despite the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the jailing of Loujain al-Hathloul and so much else – for most of the past four years. Just asking.
