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What We're Watching: K-pop in China, US ends Remain in Mexico, China vs. porcupine
South Korea’s top diplomat visits China
South Korea's Foreign Minister Park Jin traveled to China this week for meetings with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi – the first such high-level visit since Yoon Suk-yeol became South Korea’s new president earlier this year. They had plenty to discuss. China wants Yoon to keep his predecessor’s promises not to expand the use of a US missile defense system, not to join a US-led global missile shield, and not to create a trilateral military alliance that includes Japan. China also wants South Korea to stay out of a computer chip alliance involving Taiwan and Japan. South Korea, meanwhile, wants China to understand that it values Beijing as a top trade partner and wants to build stronger commercial ties. Yoon notably refused to meet US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi during her uber-controversial trip through Asia last week. But he’s also made clear that his predecessor’s commitments to Beijing are not binding on his government. The long-term economic and security stakes are high, but we will also be watching to see if South Korea has persuaded China to relax restrictions on the access of Chinese citizens to K-Pop, the South Korean pop music phenomenon. Seoul needs durable commercial relations with Beijing, and millions of Chinese music lovers need their South Korean boy bands.
Remain in Mexico no more!
The Biden administration has officially ended the so-called “Remain in Mexico” policy, a Trump-era measure that required migrants seeking asylum in the US to await their fate south of the border. Asylum processing can take years, and immigration advocates had long criticized the policy because of the high levels of crime and violence that asylum-seekers face while waiting in Mexico rather than in the US. President Joe Biden tried to stop the “Remain in Mexico” when he first took office, arguing it drained resources from broader border control operations, but he was blocked by a district judge. The US Supreme Court later overturned that judge’s ruling, opening the way for the discontinuation of the policy. Separately, courts continue to block the Biden Administration’s bid to scrap Title 42, a Trump-era pandemic rule that allows border officials, on public health grounds, to expel migrants without giving them a chance to apply for asylum at all. During the current fiscal year, US authorities have already encountered more than 1.7 million migrants at the southwest border, the highest number on record.
Will China eat Taiwanese porcupine?
As China continued its large-scale military drills around Taiwan as payback for Nancy Pelosi's visit, Taipei responded Tuesday by launching its own two-day exercise simulating a Chinese invasion. The maneuvers, which were planned months before, aim to show the Taiwanese military is ready to defend the island from an attack by China. Meanwhile, Beijing is extending its drills near Taiwan, and this is disrupting air travel and trade in the Taiwan Strait, one of the world's busiest waterways. China is signaling to Taiwan that it's ready to invade, while Taipei is letting China know it’ll be its porcupine – as in “you can hurt us, but we will also hurt you.” Taiwan is also warning other countries they could be next: Taipei says Beijing's next move will be to kick Japan out of the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu islands to control the East China Sea and link it to the (also disputed) South China Sea via the Taiwan Strait.
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What We're Watching: Trump-era immigration rule is back
"Remain in Mexico" policy is back. The US and Mexico several days ago reached a deal to restart the controversial “Remain in Mexico” policy, which requires that migrants seeking entry to the US wait south of the border while their asylum applications are processed. The policy has forced thousands of asylum-seekers to spend months – or even years – in rundown Mexican border towns where crime, rape, and kidnapping for ransom are rife. As part of the new deal, unaccompanied minors will be allowed to wait for asylum rulings in the US, and the Biden administration has agreed to improve human rights conditions at the border, including by providing migrants with COVID-19 vaccines. Upon coming into office, Biden pledged to take a more "humane" approach to migration than his predecessor, but in August the Supreme Court ruled that he had to follow “Remain in Mexico.” He has also been criticized by rights groups for failing to undo the Trump administration’s use of a public health rule to keep migrants out. The new agreement between Mexico and the US comes just days after Washington pledged to help Central America deal with the root causes of migration.
What We’re Watching: SCOTUS immigration ruling, Barbecue runs Haiti quake relief, Eritreans back in Tigray
SCOTUS brings back "Remain in Mexico" policy: The US Supreme Court has ordered the Biden administration to reinstate a Trump-era immigration rule that requires asylum-seekers who attempt to cross the US southern border to wait in Mexico until their applications get processed. This is bad news for Joe Biden for two reasons. First, he cancelled that policy because it failed to accomplish its stated goal of reducing processing backlogs, while leaving thousands of migrants stranded in Mexico in legal limbo. Second, Biden knows he can't actually implement the policy anew if Mexico doesn't agree to accept migrants whom the US wants to send back. More broadly, the ruling throws yet another wrench into an already testy US-Mexico relationship — with tens of thousands of vulnerable human beings caught in the middle. Biden, who's tied up with the Afghanistan fiasco these days, wants to avoid a tussle with the Mexicans amid record numbers of migrants arriving at the US border so far this year. The Mexicans, for their part, will probably want something in exchange (maybe COVID vaccines) to be helpful.
Haitian gangs run quake relief: Need assistance after the recent earthquake that has killed over 2,400 in Haiti? Call Jimmy "Barbecue" Cherizier, head of the notorious G9, a "federation" of nine criminal gangs that a year ago stopped fighting each other to declare war on Haiti's corrupt political class. In the wake of President Jovenel Moïse's July 7 assassination, Barbecue — an ex-cop known to burn his enemies alive — is arguably the most powerful person in the country. The government knows this, and so has secured a truce with the G9 to allow safe passage for aid. Indeed, Barbecue calling the shots on post-quake humanitarian relief illustrates the collapse of the Haitian state: If the government needs permission from criminal gangs to deliver assistance to victims of a natural disaster, it may also need their cooperation to eventually hold elections to replace Moïse — perhaps with a politician who's friendly to the G9.
Eritreans back in Tigray? For nine months the Ethiopian government has been warring — at various levels of intensity — with militant nationalists from the Tigray region who want more autonomy from the central government. Early on in the conflict, neighboring Eritrea sent in troops to help the Ethiopian army. In June, a shaky ceasefire was agreed to after Tigray forces gained the upper hand, and the Eritreans began to go home. But now US Secretary of State Tony Blinken says they're back. What's more, Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed reportedly made an unannounced stop in Asmara last week, for undisclosed reasons. These are ominous signals for a simmering conflict that is far from resolved. The US has slapped sanctions on Eritrean leaders who it says are responsible for war crimes in Tigray, but as we wrote recently, there may not be much the US can really do to avert a deepening catastrophe in Africa's second most populous country.