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EUROPE

10 Friday, November 27, 2020

B

ritain defended yester-

day its planned cuts to its

overseas aid budget after

an outpouring of protests that it

marks a life-threatening retreat

on the government’s ambitions

to play a global role after Brexit.

Breaking an election manifes-

to promise, Prime Minister Boris

Johnson’s Conservative gov-

ernment says it needs to slash

spending on aid because of the

coronavirus pandemic.

The coronavirus causes the

Covid-19 respiratory disease.

However, critics pointed out

that the Treasury was releas-

ing billions elsewhere for other

priorities, including military

spending, even as it pleads pan-

demic poverty in the budget

overall.

One junior minister in the

Foreign Offi ce quit her post in

protest.

Foreign Secretary Dominic

Raab insisted the cut was tem-

porary, given the economic cri-

sis brought on by Covid-19, and

vowed no retreat in UK leader-

ship across aid priorities such as

girls’ education, famine relief,

and preventative health pro-

grammes.

“Even in the toughest eco-

nomic times, we will continue

that mission, we will continue to

lead,” he told parliament.

The sum lost for aid is rough-

ly £4bn ($5.3bn) from a £15bn

budget – the same awarded to a

new development fund for the

north of England, where John-

son’s Conservatives won seats at

last year’s election on a promise

to “get Brexit done”.

Mark Sheard, chief executive

of the aid group World Vision

UK, said that the government’s

spending priorities would come

at “the cost of lives” just as it

prepares to take over the G

presidency and host global sum-

mits on climate change and edu-

cation next year.

“The UK’s commitment to

ending poverty worldwide has

always been something of which

we could be rightly proud, but

just when global leadership is

most needed we are stepping

back,” he said.

By cutting aid, the govern-

ment had “relinquished its right

to talk about ‘Global Britain’

leading the world”, he added.

However, Raab underlined

British goals for the G7 and

COP26 climate summit, and

said that 2021 would be “a year

of leadership for Global Britain

as a force for good around the

world”.

“We will prioritise measures

to tackle climate change, pro-

tect biodiversity and fi nance

low-carbon and climate-resil-

ient technologies such as solar

and wind in poor and emerging

economies,” he said.

Criticism has come too from

religious leaders, including

Archbishop of Canterbury Justin

Welby, the leader of the world-

wide Anglican church, who

called it “shameful and wrong”,

as well as fi ve former prime min-

isters.

Most pertinently for Johnson

ahead of a parliamentary vote

to amend the aid target, sev-

eral Conservatives have broken

ranks to join opposition parties

in vowing to oppose it, point-

ing out that the UK risks falling

foul of Joe Biden’s incoming US

presidency.

“As President-elect Biden

commits to a new era of Western

leadership, here we are about to

mark the start of our G7 presi-

dency by cutting our overseas

aid budget,” Tobias Ellwood,

chairman of the House of Com-

mons defence committee, told

parliament.

“Downgrading our soft power

programmes will leave vacuums

in some of the poorest parts of

the world that will further pov-

erty and instability,” the Con-

servative MP said. “It is likely to

see China and Russia extending

their authoritarian infl uence by

taking our place.”

Former international de-

velopment secretary Andrew

Mitchell said the reduction

would be “the cause of 100,

preventable deaths, mainly

among children”.

The government says it is not

rowing back on global commit-

ments as it starts a new chapter

outside the European Union,

pointing in part to its involve-

ment in research and future not-

for-profi t distribution of a vac-

cine against Covid-19.

The aid budget will remain at

a hefty £10bn, ranking highly in

the G7 club of rich nations, of-

fi cials said.

Finance minister Rishi Sunak

told Sky News that Britain is

facing an “economic emergen-

cy” because of the pandemic.

“I don’t think anyone could

characterise our level of sup-

port for the poorest countries as

turning our back,” he added.

Yesterday UK-based develop-

ment NGO network Bond said

that the government seemed

to have forgotten the “bottom

billion” poorest people in the

world, in a bid to redirect its aid

towards “short-term, self-serv-

ing priorities”.

Some aid experts have criti-

cised London’s eff orts to realign

its foreign aid spending more

closely with security, defence

and trade interests – areas high-

lighted by Raab yesterday.

In a letter to the Guard-

ian newspaper on Tuesday, the

heads of 17 aid agencies, green

groups and think-tanks said the

planned headline aid cut would

“fail” the poorest countries who

are “at the frontline of a climate

crisis they did not cause”.

“It has never been more im-

portant that UK aid and climate

fi nance work together to build

resilience in the face of climate

change and the Covid-19 crisis,”

they wrote.

After the initial announce-

ment of the aid reduction on

Wednesday, which the govern-

ment intends to reverse “when

the fi scal situation allows”,

Greenpeace UK’s head of poli-

tics, Rebecca Newsom, said that

the decision would “fundamen-

tally undermine the UK’s cli-

mate leadership”.

“It will hinder poorer coun-

tries’ ability to tackle and adapt

to the climate emergency, and

sour the UK’s diplomatic rela-

tionships in the run-up to the

crucial Glasgow climate confer-

ence next year,” she added in a

statement.

Sonam Phuntsho Wangdi of

Bhutan, who chairs the group

of 47 least-developed coun-

tries at UN climate change talks,

tweeted on Tuesday that at a

time poor nations needed sup-

port more than ever, the aid cuts

“take us in the wrong direction”.

‘Global Britain’ defends

foreign aid budget cuts

AFP/Reuters

London

Raab: We will prioritise measures to tackle climate change, protect

biodiversity and finance low-carbon and climate-resilient

technologies such as solar and wind in poor and emerging

economies.

UK’s Johnson picks new chief of staff to lead post-Cummings ‘reset’

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson appointed

Dan Rosenfield, a business consultant and former

treasury off icial, as his new chief of staff yesterday as

he tries to restore trust in his leadership.

Johnson is reshaping his senior team of advisers fol-

lowing the departure of Dominic Cummings earlier

this month.

Cummings was seen as the driving force behind

Johnson’s strategy on Brexit and most other policies,

and his exit has been billed as a chance for a “reset”

for the British leader.

Rosenfield joins from Hakluyt, a strategic advisory

firm for businesses and investors, where he has been

global head of corporate clients and head of the UK

business since 2016, the government said.

He previously worked at Bank of America as a man-

aging director of investment banking, and spent over

a decade working in the finance ministry where he

served as a senior aide to former finance ministers

Alistair Darling and George Osborne.

Johnson has been heavily criticised for his response

to the coronavirus crisis and a failure to communi-

cate properly with elected members of his ruling

Conservative Party, which has stirred rebellion over

lockdown rules and Brexit policies.

The chief of staff is traditionally the most powerful

political appointment in the prime minister’s off ice.

Though exact responsibilities vary according the

leaders’ preference, the job involves providing stra-

tegic and political advice to help the prime minister

take decisions.

Rosenfield will begin work on December 7 and

off icially take up the chief of staff role on January 1,

Downing Street said.

Danish PM

in tears

after mink

farm visit

Reuters
Copenhagen

D

enmark’s Prime Minister
Mette Frederiksen broke
down yesterday when
visiting a mink farmer who lost
his herd following the govern-
ment’s order this month to cull
all 17mn mink in the country to
curb the spread of coronavirus.
The coronavirus causes the
Covid-19 respiratory disease.
She has faced opposition calls
to resign and a vote of no-con-
fi dence in parliament after an
order by the government in early
November, which it later admit-
ted was illegal, to cull the coun-
try’s entire mink population.
The order was given after au-
thorities found Covid-19 out-
breaks at hundreds of mink
farms, including a new strain
of the virus, suspected of being
able to compromise the effi cacy
of vaccines.
“We have two generations of
really skilled mink farmers, fa-
ther and son, who in a very, very
short time have had their life’s
work shattered,” Frederiksen
told reporters after a meeting
with a mink farmer and his son at
their farm near Kolding in West-
ern Denmark.
“It has been emotional for
them, and ... sorry. It has for me
too,” Frederiksen said with a wa-
vering voice, pausing for breath
in between words.
The move to cull Denmark’s
entire mink population, one of
the world’s biggest and highly
valued for the quality of its fur,
has left the government reeling
after it admitted that it did not
have the legal basis to order the
culling of healthy mink.
After a tumultuous couple of
weeks since the order was given
on November 4, Agriculture
Minister Mogens Jensen stepped
down last week after an internal
investigation revealed a fl awed
political process.

Prime Minister Frederiksen is
seen after visiting a closed and
empty mink farm near Kolding,
Denmark.

G

ermany’s plan to seek an

EU-wide ban on ski tour-

ism over the Christmas

holiday season to halt corona-

virus transmissions has struck

a nerve among European peers,

including in neighbouring Aus-

tria.

The coronavirus causes the

Covid-19 respiratory disease.

While governments across the

bloc battle to bring down infec-

tion numbers, each has taken

diff erent approaches on the

cherished winter sport season.

Authorities in Bavaria, Ger-

many’s ski region, have spoken

out emphatically for a ban on

holidays on the slopes.

Bavaria’s state premier

Markus Soeder said current in-

fection rates meant “we just

can’t have the classic ski holi-

days”.

He has also warned Germans

against simply crossing the

border to hit the slopes in Aus-

tria, as they would face a 10-day

quarantine upon return – even

for day-trips – since the neigh-

bouring country is classed as a

coronavirus risk zone.

Italian Prime Minister

Giuseppe Conte earlier this week

mooted the idea of co-ordinat-

ing with France and Germany for

a “common European protocol”

to halt ski tourism.

He told the talk show Otto e

Mezzo: “It’s not possible to al-

low holidays on the snow, we

can’t aff ord it.”

No further details have so far

emerged, and Conte would also

have to negotiate with Italy’s

powerful regional authorities

before any ban could be imple-

mented.

Ski resort operators are bit-

terly opposed, with some warn-

ing that following Merkel’s call

would mean killing off their en-

tire season.

Giovanni Brasso, who runs

Sestriere, a company that man-

ages Via Lattea resort, told AFP

that “we make 45% of our earn-

ings for the entire season during

Christmas holidays”.

“If that’s taken away from us,

we won’t be able to go on.”

French winter sport resorts

are free to open over the Christ-

mas vacation, Prime Minister

Jean Castex said yesterday, but

ski lifts will have to remain shut.

Castex said mountain holi-

days were still on the cards but

downhill skiing was eff ectively

ruled out.

“Naturally, everybody is free

to travel to resorts to enjoy the

clean air of our beautiful moun-

tains, and the shops which will

be open, although bars and res-

taurants won’t be,” Castex told

a news conference. “But all ski

lifts and collective infrastruc-

tures will be closed to the pub-

lic.”

Cross-country skiing, sled-

ding and snowshoe hikes are

among snow activities that do

not usually require mechanical

lifts.

France’s winter sport sector

says it generates some €11bn

($13bn) in revenues per year and

employs 120,000 people during

the season.

Vienna has opposed signing

up to a ski holidays ban.

Calling ski tourism “part of

our national identity”, Chancel-

lor Sebastian Kurz has said that

such winter holidays will go on.

What would be ruled out are

apres-ski parties.

Strict distancing rules will

also be ordered to lower trans-

mission risks, offi cials said.

Tourists must keep at least

1m (three feet) apart at all times,

wear masks in cable cars and

gondolas, and bars and restau-

rants will serve drink and food to

seated customers only.

The Austrian ski resort of

Ischgl gained notoriety earlier

this year after it became an early

Covid-19 hotspot and infected

tourists there helped spread the

virus across Europe.

Spain has so far been counting

on opening its ski stations, but

conditions are yet to be defi ned

between regional authorities

and the federal government.

In the Pyrenees, the Catalo-

nia region wants to open its re-

sorts from December 21, the date

when curbs preventing people

from entering or leaving regions

are due to be lifted.

However, some ski operators

are hoping for an even earlier

start.

“At the moment, we are ex-

pecting to open on December 11

... no one told us we can’t open,”

said a spokeswoman for the op-

erator of Baqueira Beret ski re-

sort at Catalonia’s Val d’Aran

region.

Spanish ski resorts welcomed

more than 5.6mn tourists during

the 2018-2019 season, said the

national association of ski op-

erators Atudem.

Bulgaria has no plans to cancel

ski holidays in the country, with

all three major resorts – Bansko,

Pamporovo and Borovets – to

open in December.

“There is no reason to cancel

the ski season. It’s not the sport

but the apres-ski parties that

sparked the spread of Covid-

in Europe,” said Ivan Obreikov,

spokesman for Ulen, a company

operating ski lifts and gondolas

in Bansko.

Restaurants across the coun-

try are shut at the moment up to

December 21.

But hotels and holiday homes

are open for business.

A decision on whether to open

the stations over Christmas on

Slovenia’s Julian Alps are pend-

ing.

An ongoing ban on public

transport at the moment applies

to cable cars.

Nevertheless, most ski re-

sorts have begun preparing their

courses with artifi cial snow in

the hopes that by December,

they’d get the go-ahead to let

tourists in.

The economy ministry said

it was expecting the European

Commission to make a recom-

mendation to member states.

Brussels however fl ung the

ball back to the courts of indi-

vidual governments.

“The fi rst thing to know is

that the decision whether or

not to allow skiing is, of course,

a national competence. This is

not European competence,” said

commission spokesman Stefan

de Keersmaecker. “Obviously,

there is no one-size-fi ts-all ap-

proach to gradual and science-

based and eff ective lifting of the

containment measures.”

Storm over call for EU ski tourism ban

AFP

Berlin

Skiers sit on a ski lift before hitting the slopes during the first snows

of the season above the ski resort of Verbier in the Swiss Alps on

November 15.

A

highly contagious and
deadly form of avian infl u-
enza is spreading rapidly
in Europe, putting the poultry
industry on alert with previous
outbreaks in mind that saw tens
of millions of birds culled and
signifi cant economic losses.
The disease, commonly called
bird fl u, has been found in France,
the Netherlands, Germany, Brit-

ain, Belgium, Denmark, Ireland,

Sweden and, for the fi rst time

this week in Croatia, Slovenia

and Poland, after severely hitting

Russia, Kazakhstan and Israel.

The vast majority of cases are

in migrating wild birds but out-

breaks have been reported on

farms, leading to the death or

culling of at least 1.6mn chick-

ens and ducks so far around the

region.

In the Netherlands, Europe’s

largest exporter of chicken meat

and eggs, nearly 500,000 chick-

ens died or were culled due to

the virus this autumn, and over

900,000 hens died on one sin-

gle farm in Poland this week, the

countries’ ministries said.

“The risk of a transfer in poul-

try farms and more cases among

wild birds is higher than in the

past two years because of the

massive appearance of various

bird fl u viruses in Europe,” said a

spokeswoman for the Friedrich-

Loeffl er Institute, Germany’s

federal animal disease research

agency.

Russia’s poultry death toll

reached 1.8mn by the end of Oc-

tober, with nearly 1.6mn of that

on one farm near Kazakhstan,

data by the World Organisation

for Animal Health (OIE) showed.

The main strain found this year

in Europe is H5N8, which deci-

mated fl ocks in 2016/17 when the

region recorded its largest out-

break in poultry and wild birds,

but there were also reports of

H5N5 and H5N1.

Although the risk to humans

is low, the European Food Safety

Agency (EFSA) said this week

that the virus’ evolution needed

to be closely monitored.

A strain of H5N1 has been

known to spread to humans.

EU poultry industry play-

ers said they are very concerned

about the latest outbreak but

were now experienced in dealing

with them.

“We have worked so hard to

improve safety, to train breeders

and improve traceability that we

hope that if there are cases we

will manage to contain them,”

said Anne Richard, head of

France’s poultry industry lobby

ANVOL.

Most counties have raised their

alert status to “high”, implying

that poultry and birds be kept

indoors or protected in order to

avoid contact with wild birds.

Bird fl u outbreaks like other

animal diseases often prompt

importing countries to impose

trade restrictions.

That will add to coronavirus-

related lockdowns threatening to

curb year-end holiday sales.

“It’s already diffi cult to export

with the Covid-19 pandemic ...

this would make it even worse,”

Denis Lambert, chief executive

of France’s largest poultry group

LDC said on Wednesday.

However, importing countries’

approach to limit restrictions

to regions aff ected by the virus

should help soften the impact.

China, for example, has sus-

pended imports of poultry prod-

ucts from four regions in Russia

due to bird fl u, Tass news agency

reported on Wednesday.

Fast spreading avian infl uenza puts EU poultry industry on the edge

Reuters
Paris

Museum project to

record Londoners’

Covid-19 dreams

The Museum of London has
announced a project to collect
the dreams of Londoners during
the coronavirus (Covid-19)
pandemic as a way to document
the impact of the crisis.
The lives of inhabitants of the
British capital have changed “not
just in the day to day” because
of the pandemic, but also “in
relation to how we sleep and
dream”, the museum said.
The project, dubbed “Guardians
of Sleep”, will look to collect
the dreams in the form of oral
histories.
It will also explore what insight
dreams might off er into mental
health and ways of coping with
external stresses, especially in
times of crisis.
The Museum of London is
launching the initiative in
partnership with the Museum
of Dreams based at Western
University in Canada.