Council of Councils
Think Global Health
Online Store
Blogs
Politics, Power, and Preventive Action
Latest Post
Signing Off
Today is my last day at the Council on Foreign Relations after eight and one-half fun and fulfilling years. An archive of everything I authored or co-authored remains here. Subsequently, this is the final post of this blog after more than 400 posts. Read More
Is Iran’s Election a Litmus Test for the Next Supreme Leader?
Iranians are heading to the polls this Friday to decide Iran’s next president: incumbent Hassan Rouhani or his challenger Ebrahim Raisi. A victory for Raisi could mean he is being tested out for a potential run at being Iran’s next supreme leader.
Sex Trafficking and the Refugee Crisis: Exploiting the Vulnerable
Caroline O’Leary is an intern in the Center for Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations.
April was Sexual Assault Awareness Month, which brought a deserved spotlight to the 5,551 cases of human sex trafficking reported nationally in 2016. Across the globe, however, a parallel crisis gets far less attention: violent conflict—which creates weakened legal infrastructure and increases economic instability—has left tens of millions vulnerable to sex trafficking.
The sexual abuse and trafficking of refugees is a little-acknowledged facet of the refugee crisis in Europe and the Middle East. However, it is a very real part of life for many forced to flee their homes because of violence from Syria and Iraq. The total number of people forcibly displaced by conflict reached 65.3 million by the end of 2015. These refugees face a dire economic situation; for instance, 90 percent of Syrian refugees are living below their host country’s national poverty line. As former Secretary of State John Kerry once noted, “Wherever we find poverty and lack of opportunity…we find not just vulnerability to trafficking, but zones of impunity where traffickers can prey on their victims.”
Migration to Europe for work is considered a perilous necessity for many unable to support themselves or their families. According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), at least 1,883 migrants have died so far in 2017—70 percent while attempting to cross the Mediterranean Sea. The conditions in which migrants travel can not only be deadly, but also open venues through which they can become ensnared in sex trafficking rings. In some circumstances, migrants voluntarily make the decision to take on sex work—which smugglers promise will be lucrative and not require foreign language skills or documentation—as a means of surviving financially. However, upon agreeing to this work, many are abused and treated as sex slaves as well as taken further from home, where they often fall deeper into poverty.
Others are unaware of their coercion into the trade until it is too late. Smugglers promise safe passage into Europe in return for payments that run on average from $3,400 to $6,800, according to a 2015 Interpol report. However, smugglers frequently use physical and sexual abuse to demand more money from their victims than initially agreed upon. The IOM notes that this exchange often leads to sex trafficking, where victims are “repeatedly raped or forced to prostitute themselves in near slavery condition” in order to pay back their “debts.” Despairingly, refugee sex trafficking victims often then find themselves unable to report abuse due to their legal status, for fear that alerting authorities may result in their own arrest rather than that of their abuser.
Child refugees are decidedly vulnerable as well. They currently account for more than half of the refugee population, and often find themselves parent-less and destitute. At least ten thousand unaccompanied minor refugees have been reported missing after reaching Europe, and many of them are believed to have fallen victim to trafficking and sexual exploitation. Europol has also found crossover between the gangs that help smuggle refugees into the European Union and those exploiting them for sex and slavery.
Since this illegal trade takes place largely underground, it is difficult to craft responsive policy. However, a humanitarian crisis of this proportion demands attention and deserves the response of policymakers. To combat sex trafficking and abuse among refugees, the United States should:
Increase contributions to refugee resettlement programs to provide alternative work options and asylum in refugees’ new home countries. While potentially highly impactful, this would be difficult to implement due given the current political climate in the United States. The massive scope of the population in need of resettlement is also a significant challenge.
Continue to encourage international reflection periods similar to what the European Union has. Such periods provide a reprieve from deportation to allow identified sex victims to seek emergency health and aid services while being legally classified as victims of crime, thereby mitigating any concerns victims may have regarding reporting their abuse.
Strengthen legal systems for victimized refugees in order to empower them to get in contact with law enforcement authorities, should they wish to. The benefits of doing so contribute not only to individual refugee empowerment, but also the long-term goal of bringing down sex trafficking rings.
Sex trafficking is just one symptom of an enormous refugee crisis—the largest since World War II. To respond to such an issue will take years of cohesive anti-sex-trafficking strategy on the parts of governments around the world—particularly around areas of conflict. Implementing policies that streamline the legal aid and rehabilitation of victims, however, is an achievable way to humanize refugees in a time of uncertainty and fear.
What Can Nuclear Security Officers Learn From Casino Managers? A Conversation with Matthew Bunn
This week, I was joined by Professor Matthew Bunn, professor of practice at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and co-principal investigator of the Belfer Center for International Affairs’ Project on Managing the Atom. We discuss insider threats in both the private and national security sectors, the topic of Professor Bunn’s recent book, Insider Threats (co-edited with Scott Sagan). Bunn also shares insights from his invaluable dissertation from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Guardians at the Gates of Hell: Estimating the Risk of Nuclear Theft and Terrorism—and Identifying the Highest-Priority Risks of Nuclear Theft, and talks about how nuclear security has evolved over the past quarter-century.
Professor Bunn provides guidance on how one can have an impact on policy, which is useful to policy professionals and those just entering the field, and shares his advice for young scholars who are interested in nuclear weapons and international security. Listen to our conversation, and follow the work of the Project on Managing the Atom @ManagingtheAtom.
Trump’s First 100 Days: A (Third) Conversation with Elizabeth Saunders
Following our conversations in the heat of the 2016 presidential campaign a year ago and post-election last December, Elizabeth Saunders joined me again, this time to discuss President Donald Trump’s first one hundred days. Professor Saunders is an assistant professor of political science and international affairs at the George Washington University and an editor for the Washington Post’s Monkey Cage, where she recently published, “100 Days in, Trump’s Foreign Policy Appears to Be All Show. Is There Enough Substance?” She also authored an article in the current issue of International Organization, “No Substitute for Experience: Presidents, Advisers, and Information in Group Decision-Making.”
We discuss the invisible but necessary aspects of foreign policy, which Trump may or may not be paying attention to. Professor Saunders also offers her recommendations for the president and for her bosses—which are remarkably similar. Listen to our conversation and be sure to follow her, @ProfSaunders.
Forced Off the Grid: A Cyberattack on the United States
Eshani Bhatt is an intern in the Center for Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The current U.S. power grid system is at risk of an external cyberattack that could severely cripple everyday life. The grid is the backbone of all functions requiring electricity—in homes and businesses, as well as at factories and power plants. All sixteen sectors of the U.S. economy that are considered the nation’s critical infrastructure—like manufacturing and healthcare—are dependent on electricity, which runs on a system of grids in three regions of the country: the Eastern, Western, and Texas interconnections. Among the spending authorized by Congress in 2009 was a $4.5 billion investment in a more reliable and cleaner energy grid. Though the power grids may now release less carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and speed up power outage recovery times, the question of how secure they are from external attacks remains.
At over fifty years old, the U.S. power grid is outdated, making it more vulnerable to cyberattacks using more modern and sophisticated software. Robert Knake, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, highlights possibilities of an attack and the implications for the United States in a new contingency planning memorandum from the Center for Preventive Action. Knake lays out potential scenarios in which the power grid would be targeted and presents policy recommendations to prevent or respond to such an attack.
Knake argues that an adversary may launch an attack in order to undermine public support for a U.S. administration, distract the U.S. government and delay its response to an opponent’s initiative, or retaliate against U.S. action considered threatening. Currently, the likelihood that the United States could successfully thwart a cyberattack is low. A power grid outage could affect access to food and water and cause health and security systems to fail—which could kill Americans. Economically, an outage could cause billions of dollars in damage, similar to the 2003 Northeast Blackout that left fifty million people without power and cost an estimated four to ten billion dollars. The U.S. response itself could also have serious implications: whether the attack successfully deterred U.S. action or not would have geopolitical consequences, and the U.S. domestic response could slow down grid operations, which now rest mostly in the private sector.
To deter a potential debilitating cyberattack, protect the U.S. power grid, and mitigate harm in the case of an attack, Knake outlines a series of recommendations that that the Donald J. Trump administration should take:
Articulate clearly how the administration would respond to a cyberattack, including treating such action as an armed attack meriting a military response;
Demonstrate law enforcement and intelligence capabilities to attribute the source of cyberattacks;
End the reliance of military installations on the grid, which will also reduce the likelihood that the grid becomes a military target;
Create an information-sharing system to recognize early signals of a potential attack;
Ensure both the government and the industry are prepared to respond if an attack causes a blackout by directing the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to develop a plan for a prolonged regional blackout and requiring companies to maintain capabilities for manual operations; and
Ensure that utilities can properly invest in cybersecurity, possibly by increasing funding through user fees, a tax deduction for utility spending on cybersecurity, or security requirements for infrastructure investments made for the grid as a part of its proposed stimulus package.
A cyberattack on the power grid is certainly possible, and the United States should implement safeguard measures to prevent a catastrophe. If a cyberattack were to successfully occur, it is necessary the United States should be able to recover governmental and military operations as quickly and effectively as possible. To learn more about how the United States could prevent or mitigate a cyberattack on the power grid, read Robert Knake’s Contingency Planning Memorandum, “A Cyberattack on the U.S. Power Grid.”
