The situation in Syria continues to deteriorate. Apparently, the Arab League is getting prepared to ask the UN for assistance, just as it did in the Libyan crisis. I doubt very much that the Security Council is prepared to offer any substantial assistance, given the reluctance of Russia and China to any intervention. We’ll have to watch whether the protests in Russia affect the Russian position on the matter. Putin may look at an intervention as an opportunity to score a foreign policy initiative in order to deflect criticism of his government. Or the Russian protests could stiffen his resolve to reinforce the principle of non-intervention.
Today is the one year anniversary of the beginning of what we now call the “Arab Spring.” When the turmoil in Tunisia started, few expected the protests to spread so widely or to be so decisive. The protests continue in Egypt, and the future there remains uncertain.
The French face an imminent credit downgrade by the credit ratings agencies. Right now, things have quieted down because the European Central Bank has promised to lend money at very low interest rates for a three year period. So the banks are buying the sovereign debt of Italy, Spain, and Portugal to use as collateral for those loans. The difference between the interests rates charged by the ECB and the interest rates earned by the sovereign debt is enough to make a tidy profit (as long as no state defaults). It’s a real economic game of chicken. We’ll see how it turns out.
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