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      Fears of foreign policy chaos in Trump's final days fueled by Iran bombing report

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      Fears that Donald Trump might try to wreak havoc on the world stage in his final, desperate, weeks in office appear to have been well-founded, after he reportedly asked for options on bombing Iran.
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      A report in the New York Times said Trump was advised against strikes on Iranian nuclear sites by senior officials warning of the risk of triggering a major conflict. But it added that the president may not have entirely given up on the idea of staging attacks on Iran or its allies and proxies in the region.
      On the same day, Trump’s newly installed defence secretary, Christopher Miller, confirmed that the US would draw down its military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq to 2,500 troops in each country, shrugging off concerns that an abrupt withdrawal in Afghanistan could derail peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban by convincing the rebels they could win without a deal.
      A defence department inspector general report on Tuesday said it was “unclear” whether the Taliban were violating a separate deal it made with the US in February.
      The developments come days after Trump removed Mark Esper, who as defence secretary had argued against a rapid departure from Afghanistan, and installed loyalists in the Pentagon and National Security Agency, with a record of backing aggressive action against Iran, or supporting a rapid extrication from Afghanistan.
      Miller issued a message to Pentagon staff on Tuesday, with a warning not to try to resist new orders from the top. “Do your job,” Miller said. “Focus on your assignment.”
      He stated his first goal was: “Bring the current war to an end in a responsible manner that guarantees the security of our citizens.”
      Miller did not define the “current war” but it was widely seen as a reference to the military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq.
      The new acting under secretary of defence for intelligence and security, Ezra Cohen-Watnick, installed in the Pentagon at the same time as Miller, has reportedly pushed for regime change in Iran, and for aggressive action against Iranian-backed militias in Syria and Iraq.
      The turmoil in foreign and defence policy comes at a time when Trump is refusing to accept election defeat and is preventing Joe Biden’s incoming team from receiving intelligence or policy briefings.
      Former officials have suggested that Trump is aware he will eventually have to leave office and is considering another run at the presidency in 2024. To that end, he is looking at last-minute options for fulfilling campaign promises he can point to, to build a narrative that he ran a successful administration that was removed by a rigged election.
      “This will be his version of the Lost Cause,” a former official from the Trump White House said, referring to attempts after the civil war to romanticise the Confederacy. “He can go out in a blaze of glory, and the stab in the back theory gets strengthened because he can point to all the things that he did.” More

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      Trump officials rush plans to drill in Arctic refuge before Biden inauguration

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      In a last-ditch attempt to make good on promises to the oil and gas industry, the Trump administration is rushing to formalize plans to drill for oil in the Arctic national wildlife refuge before Joe Biden takes office. On Tuesday, the Bureau of Land Management initiated the process with a formal “call for nominations”, inviting input on which land tracts should be auctioned off in the refuge’s 1.5m-acre coastal plain region.The call for nominations “brings us one step closer to […] advancing this administration’s policy of energy independence”, said Chad Padgett, the BLM Alaska state director, in a statement.The call for nominations lasts 30 days, which would allow the bureau to begin auctioning leases for land tracts to oil and gas companies just days before Biden’s inauguration on 20 January. The coastal plain region, where land could be auctioned, is considered some of the country’s last pristine wilderness, containing dozens of polar bear dens, essential migratory bird habitat, and caribou calving grounds held sacred to the Gwich’in people.“Oil and gas drilling could wipe out polar bears on the coastal plain of the Arctic national wildlife refuge in our lifetimes,” said Jamie Rappaport Clark, president and chief executive of Defenders of Wildlife, in a statement.Native communities in the region say they will also be disproportionately affected by the leasing of Arctic lands to oil and gas companies.“The adverse impacts of oil development in these sacred and critical caribou calving grounds will be heavily felt by Gwich’in and Inupiat villages,” said Jody Potts, Native Movement regional director, in a statement. “As a Gwich’in person, I know my family’s food security, culture, spirituality and ways of life are at stake.”The rush to sell leases appears to be spurred by Biden’s very different approach to public land management. He has promised to “permanently protect” the refuge and ban all new oil and gas leasing on public lands, making it unlikely that leases will be sold once Biden takes office.Even if the BLM holds an auction as early as 17 January, it’s unclear how much bidding will take place. The oil industry is also having a particularly bad year; two dozen banks have announced that they would not fund fossil fuel extraction in the Arctic refuge. And either way, it could be years before any drilling might take place, given the environmental reviews required to do so.“If BLM holds an auction, but doesn’t get as far as issuing leases, the new administration may be able to avoid issuing them, particularly if it concludes the program or lease sale was unlawfully adopted,” said Erik Grafe, an attorney with the environmental law non-profit Earthjustice.Drilling in the refuge has been fiercely opposed for decades and remains extremely unpopular; the Yukon government in Canada has recently voiced opposition to oil exploration in the region due to the harm it could cause to the 200,000 Porcupine caribou who use the coastal plain as calving grounds.In August, more than a dozen environmental organizations sued the Trump administration to block drilling in the refuge, citing “irreparable damage to one of the world’s most important wild places”.If sales do occur before Biden takes office, it would be challenging – but not impossible – for Biden to walk back leases issued.“Even if leases are issued by the Trump administration, the Biden administration could seek to withdraw the leases if it concludes they were unlawfully issued or pose too great a threat to the environment,” Grafe said.In addition to rushing lease sales in the refuge, the Trump administration has fast-tracked seismic testing for oil on the coastal plain, trimming a permitting process that would normally take up to a year down to a few months. The testing, proposed by Kaktovik Inupiat Corporation, could begin as soon as December and run until May. Environmentalists oppose testing, which involves 90,000lb (41,000kg) “thumper” trucks that could leave permanent scars on the landscape and disturb denning polar bear mothers.The Arctic refuge’s coastal plain has been at the center of a fierce battle over oil extraction on public lands for decades. It was earmarked for potential development in 1980 but remained protected until a Republican-controlled Congress added a provision to a tax bill in 2017 that finally opened the area to oil development.The Gwich’in people, who have lived in the area for thousands of years, have consistently opposed drilling in a land they call iizhik gwats’an gwandaii goodlit, or “the sacred place where life begins”. Their opposition has remained strong as they have borne the brunt of the climate crisis’s impacts. The call for nominations comes during a month when Arctic sea ice is at a record low and temperatures are at a record high for this time of year.“The Trump administration opening up oil lease sales is devastating to our way of life as Gwich’in people,” said Quannah ChasingHorse Potts, a member of the Gwich’in Youth Council. “The Gwich’in people’s identity is connected to the land and animals. We have lost so much [that] we can’t afford to lose more.” More

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      in US Politics

      Biden's first staff appointments include five women and four people of color

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      Joe Biden, the US president-elect, made another sharp break from Donald Trump on Tuesday by naming a White House senior staff that “looks like America”, including several women and people of colour.Trump has been criticised for running the most white and male administration since Ronald Reagan. There are currently four women and 19 men in cabinet or cabinet-level positions. Picks for the federal judiciary are also dominated by white men.But Biden and Kamala Harris, who will be the first female and first Black vice-president, have promised to build a team to reflect shifting demographics. Tuesday’s first wave of appointments included five women and four people of colour.Jen O’Malley Dillon will be White House deputy chief of staff. The 44-year-old, who as campaign manager was the first woman to lead a winning Democratic presidential bid, will work under Ron Klain, anointed chief of staff last week.Cedric Richmond, a national co-chair of Biden’s campaign and former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, will quit the House of Representatives to join as a senior adviser and director of the White House Office of Public Engagement.Dana Remus, the campaign’s top lawyer, will be senior counsel to the president. Longtime advisers Mike Donilon and Steve Ricchetti will be senior adviser and counsellor to the president respectively.Julie Chavez Rodriguez, one of Biden’s deputy campaign managers and the granddaughter of the farmworker union leader César Chávez, will be director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs. Annie Tomasini, currently Biden’s traveling chief of staff, will be director of Oval Office operations.In a statement, Biden’s transition team said: “These diverse, experienced, and talented individuals demonstrate President-elect Biden’s commitment to building an administration that looks like America.”It also quoted Biden as saying: “America faces great challenges, and they bring diverse perspectives and a shared commitment to tackling these challenges and emerging on the other side a stronger, more united nation.”The appointments reward many of the advisers who helped Biden beat Trump in the 3 November election. Biden won the national popular vote by at least 5.6m votes, or 3.6 points, and in the state-by-state electoral college secured 306 votes to 232.The announcement also reflected Biden’s determination to press ahead with a transition despite Trump’s increasingly tenuous effort to reverse the election.The former vice-president was due to discuss national security threats on Tuesday with his own advisers, rather than government officials, as the Trump administration has blocked him from receiving the classified briefings normally accorded to a president-elect.Emily Murphy, the general services administrator, has not yet recognised Biden as the “apparent winner”, which is needed to release funding and office space.Seeking to project calm, Biden told reporters on Monday: “I find this more embarrassing for the country, than debilitating for my ability to get started.”But he expressed frustration over the impact on his attempt to fight the coronavirus pandemic: “More people may die if we don’t coordinate … If we have to wait to 20 January to start that planning, it puts us behind over a month and a half. So it’s important that it be done, that there be coordination now or as rapidly as we can get it done.”Trump has not conceded and has repeatedly claimed without evidence he is the victim of widespread voter fraud. His campaign has filed multiple lawsuits in battleground states – without success. The president has remained defiant even as a minority of Republicans have said Biden should be considered president-elect.Election officials in both parties have said they see no evidence of serious irregularities.Trump campaign spokeswoman Erin Perrine was asked on Tuesday what evidence the campaign had for its claims. She told Fox News: “That’s part of what our pursuit is at this point … There’s no silver bullet here. It’s going to take a little bit of time.”One of Trump’s legal challenges was due a hearing on Tuesday in a Pennsylvania federal court, where another setback would probably kill off his already slim chances. US district judge Matthew Brann will hear arguments in a Trump lawsuit that seeks to block the state’s top election official from certifying Biden the winner.Pennsylvania officials have said the dispute only affects a small number of ballots in a state where Biden is projected to win by more than 70,000.Georgia is undertaking a manual recount. Its top elections official, secretary of state Brad Raffensperger, said in TV interviews the audit was almost complete and the results would be largely unchanged.Raffensperger also repeated his assertion that fellow Republicans, including Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, have pressured him to find ways to throw out legally cast votes.“I’ve always been a conservative Republican and I want to make sure we have a lawful process because I think integrity still matters,” he told CBS. “That’s what this audit is going to do.”Graham, a diehard Trump loyalist, denied the allegation. “No, that’s ridiculous,” he told reporters on Capitol Hill. “I talked to him about how you verify signatures.”Asked why a senator from South Carolina was involving himself in Georgia, Graham replied: “Because the future of the country hangs in the balance.”The Rev William Barber, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, tweeted: “Lindsey Graham trying to get [the Georgia secretary of state] to not count legal votes is not a surprise. Graham has supported voter suppression tactics for years.“Election rigging is real, but it doesn’t suppress the Republican vote. It’s of Black, brown, Native American, & poor voters.” More

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      in World Politics

      What Is Russia’s Stake in the Nagorno-Karabakh War?

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      As the world discusses the sudden cessation of fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh and the deployment of Russian “peacekeepers” to the region to monitor the truce, one critically important question is overlooked: Why did Russia not discourage Azerbaijan’s military offensive? A powerful security rationale implies a strong Russian interest in deterring a war that might change the regional status quo. Preserving a favorable status quo, by strategic logic, is the central security interest of a regional hegemon like Russia.

      Armenia and Azerbaijan Clash Again

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      The six-week-long war has instead weakened Armenian control over Nagorno-Karabakh, which had endured for over two decades only because it served Russia’s interests. The risk of spillover across the volatile Caucasus presents another security threat to Russia. The war has altered the balance of interests in the region — unfavorably for Moscow — creating openings for regional interventions by Turkey, the United States and others. So what objectives are worth the Kremlin taking such risks?

      Controlled Chaos

      Russia’s ultimate goal in the post-Soviet space is to politically reintegrate its former satellites into an interstate union. Yet its attempts to achieve this over the past three decades have produced only failures. The most recent experience with Belarus suggests it might be possible in a case where an authoritarian leadership feels extremely threatened. Heightening insecurity in the population has historically been another favorable condition for political integration. Moscow’s ability to put pressure on Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has been limited.

      Embed from Getty Images

      A recent report reveals that the Kremlin views Pashinyan as a “Soros appointee” and accuses him of “promoting pro-American politicians.” The Kremlin’s Armenia desk apparently receives its information from agents representing actors Pashinyan excluded from power. They discreetly sold to the Kremlin the idea that Pashinyan needs to be replaced by a more loyal politician.

      The war and the Azeri territorial gains in and around Nagorno-Karabakh create a context favorable to Russia. First, it allows blame for defeats to be projected onto Armenia’s leadership. Russian media have broadcast statements from Russian political and security experts asserting that Pashinyan is responsible for both the war losses and Russia’s restrained reaction in the conflict on account of his unfriendly attitude toward Moscow and his favoritism towards the West. They also promoted claims concerning mounting domestic opposition. These signals suggest that Russia’s first goal is to bring to power a more loyal Armenian prime minister.

      A second goal is to create insecurity among the population, propagating the idea that Armenia cannot survive as a state without Russia. To produce the necessary feeling of threat, Russia allowed Azerbaijan to recover all its territories around Nagorno-Karabakh, making defending the enclave extremely difficult in the future. Azerbaijan’s victory also underlines the military vulnerability of Armenia itself. Russia will exploit this sense of vulnerability to persuade Armenia’s population and leadership to agree to closer integration with Russia, likely similar to the Union State of Russia and Belarus.

      On the other hand, Russia delivered an immense favor to Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev by choosing not to employ its electronic warfare capabilities against Azeri drones. This was key to Baku’s military success and clearly communicates to the Azeri audience that preserving their war gains is conditional on good relations with Moscow. This will not create the level of vulnerability found in Armenia, but it will start building a dependency.

      Ankara’s open involvement in the war offers Russia opportunities to curtail Turkey’s growing regional ambitions or raise their costs. Armenia and the West view Turkey as a party to the conflict and will resist Turkish participation in internationally accepted peace negotiations and peacekeeping mechanisms. This could create an opportunity for Russia to later push for a UN Security Council authorization for its Collective Security Treaty Organization “peacekeeping forces.” That would be a historic first for Russia and another strategic gain.

      Not an Accidental Escalation

      It is legitimate to ask whether Russia acted opportunistically in response to the war or actively contributed to the escalation of the simmering conflict. It is highly unlikely that Russia was unaware of Azerbaijan’s intentions. Russia has extensive intelligence-gathering capacities in the South Caucasus. Its ability to monitor military and civilian communications, movements of troops and materiel, as well as preparations for offensive operations in the region is pretty much unquestioned.

      Moreover, the Azeri offensive started on 27 September, one day after Russia’s Kavkaz-2020 strategic exercise ended. The Armenian military participated in various phases of the exercise both in Russia and in Armenia. This suggests great confidence on the Azeri side, in starting the offensive when considerable Russian forces were still deployed in the region. It is highly unlikely that Baku failed to consult Moscow beforehand, given the scale, intensity and far-reaching objectives of its military operation.

      Any attempt to change the status quo in the post-Soviet space undermines Russia’s credibility and reputation. Moscow has been quick to punish threats to the status quo, witness Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014. It also threatened Moldova after 2014 by increasing its military exercises in Transnistria from a few dozen to a few hundred per year. Russia reacted unexpectedly calmly to Baku’s invasion. Most surprisingly, it repeatedly rejected Yerevan’s request for military assistance on procedural grounds.

      Moscow’s ability to stop the Azeri offensive immediately after the fall of Shushi, the second-largest city in Nagorno-Karabakh, revealed the extent of its control. Russia would only have allowed the change of the status quo if its expected gains exceeded the related risks and costs. This is what appears to have happened, with the Kremlin using Baku to pull its chestnuts out of the fire.

      *[This article was originally published by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), which advises the German government and Bundestag on all questions related to foreign and security policy.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      in World Politics

      Israel’s Comeback in the Horn of Africa

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      In 2016, Benjamin Netanyahu was the first Israeli prime minister to visit Africa in 30 years. The visit was consistent with his announced intent to rebuild Israel’s ties with the continent, especially East Africa, where his tour took him through Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda. Narrowing down focus on the Horn of Africa, Israel has a long history of engagement in the region that dates back to the 1960s. The Red Sea has always been a vital waterway for Tel Aviv as it connects the country to East Africa, Asia and Oceania through the tiny outlet of Eilat.

      This strategic imperative has always been confronted with the hostility of nearly all the states of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden basin. Only Ethiopia and Eritrea have maintained relations with the Jewish state in the past decades, though with some setbacks.

      Not All Arab States Will Normalize Ties With Israel

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      Now, even relations with Israel might see a significant change in the Horn of Africa. The Abraham Accords, signed in September by Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates to normalize bilateral relations with Israel, have caused a diplomatic earthquake in the Middle East and beyond. On the one hand, the treaty turned Abu Dhabi into a broker facilitating dialogue between its regional partners and Israel. On the other, the accords showed the friends and foes of the United States that there is a file rouge between their ties with Washington and their relationship with Tel Aviv.

      The Abraham Accords were undoubtedly part of an effort of the US administration to garner a foreign policy success ahead of the November presidential elections. Yet this policy might stay in place longer, even with a Democrat at the White House. The Horn of Africa mirrors the Middle East in many aspects, and the recognition of Israel might be yet another one.

      Perspective Allies in the Horn

      On October 23, US President Donald Trump made a double announcement about Sudan. He first revealed Khartoum’s intention to normalize ties with Israel. Then he removed Sudan from the list of state sponsors of terrorism in exchange for the payment of compensation for two terrorist attacks against American embassies in which the regime of erstwhile Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir was involved. The recognition of Israel clearly came down as an additional request for the delisting of Sudan — an indispensable, long-awaited measure that will allow international aid to flow into the country and help Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok to address the deepest economic crisis in decades.

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      But the issue of normalization with Israel is a highly contentious one for Sudan. The two countries have a conflicting history. The Jewish state has financed and trained South Sudanese guerrilla groups in the past, while the Arab country has long served as an operational base to ship weapons and aid to Hamas in Gaza. Not surprisingly, the announcement of the normalization sparked protests in Khartoum and led the Islamist National Umma Party to declare its withdrawal from the government coalition. Against this backdrop, the agreement does not seem under immediate threat since the levers of power ultimately remain in the hands of General Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagolo and General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who chair the Sovereign Council. The two generals benefitted from the UAE’s and Saudi Arabia’s military and financial support, with Abu Dhabi especially keen to see Sudan build stronger relations with its new ally, Israel.

      Eritrea is another country set to move closer to Tel Aviv. Eritreans received crucial military assistance from Israel during the liberation war against Ethiopia. After obtaining independence in 1991 after 30 years of conflict, Asmara went beyond establishing diplomatic relations and reportedly offered Israel a concession to open a military base on the island of Daklah, strategically located in the Red Sea. However, Eritrea’s growing isolation in the mid-2000s pushed President Isaias Afwerki more into Iran’s sphere of influence and, subsequently, on a collision course with Israel. The Asmara-Tehran alignment then became a key strategic concern for Saudi Arabia and the UAE since Iran allegedly used Eritrean soil as a logistics base to smuggle weapons to the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

      This concern prompted the Saudi and Emirati engagement in Eritrea, with Asmara ultimately realigning with the two Gulf states as signaled by the port concessions offered to the Emirati DP World and Eritrea’s membership in the Saudi-sponsored Council of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. Now, with mediation by Abu Dhabi, even relations with Israel might be back on the table if President Afwerki decides to soften his country’s international isolation through a rapprochement with the United States.

      The third actor on the list might be Somaliland. The Somali breakaway republic, which emerged from the collapse of the state back in 1991, is probably holding talks with Tel Aviv, as the chief of Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad, Eli Cohen, suggested in a recent interview. Here again, the UAE seems to play a crucial role. Somaliland has become a strong Emirati partner in recent years because of its strategic location looking out to the Gulf of Aden and southern Yemen. The alliance between Abu Dhabi and Hargeisa took shape around the concession of the port of Berbera to DP World and the construction of an Emirati airbase nearby.

      Inching Closer

      The UAE is very well positioned to bring Somaliland and Israel closer. Besides gaining a useful security partner in the fight against al-Shabaab, Hargeisa might see a rapprochement with the Jewish state as valuable political capital to sell to Washington in exchange for advancement in the process of recognition of its independence from Mogadishu. But Somaliland is not the only Somali state to enjoy strong ties with the UAE. Puntland in the north and Jubaland in the south are ruled by state governments similarly aligned to Abu Dhabi that could also require Israeli assistance against terrorism or even the Somali federal government in the future.Last but not least, there is Ethiopia. Addis Ababa and Tel Aviv resumed bilateral diplomacy in 1989, when the Derg military regime was toppled in Ethiopia. After years of clement relations, in September 2019, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took a successful visit to Israel. On that occasion, he signed a joint declaration with Benjamin Netanyahu that underlined their intention to foster cooperation, particularly in terms of bilateral trade, as well as military, economic and technological assistance. In this specific situation, it might be Israel that pulls the brakes on cooperation in order to avoid any steps that might antagonize Egypt, currently at loggerheads with Addis Ababa over the Ethiopian Renaissance Dam project on the Blue Nile.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Finally, the two remaining states in the Horn of Africa, Somalia and Djibouti, do not seem willing to reproach Israel. The reason for that can be found in the relations that these countries enjoy with Turkey and Qatar as well as in the lack of incentives from the United States to move in that direction.Given Israel’s new posture in the Middle East and Africa, more states might be willing to open to Israel — or be pressed to do so — in order to improve their relations with the US and the UAE. Yet the Palestinian issue is still a contentious topic in the vast majority of the Muslim and the post-colonial world. This makes bilateral relations with Israel a divisive issue, both in domestic and regional politics. At the domestic level, recognition of Israel is often perceived as a betrayal of the Palestinian people, especially in those countries where the Muslim Brotherhood or other Islamist movements are active, such as Sudan.

      At the regional level, the Turkey-Qatar axis firmly opposes any opening to Israel and has deep political, economic and security ties with many state and non-state actors across the Horn of Africa. Consequently, any agreement with Israel is likely to fuel internal dissent and entrench regional polarization at the same time. While new bilateral relations are always good news for the international system, normalization with Israel should be handled more carefully than other rapprochements.

      *[Fair Observer is a media partner of Gulf State Analytics.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      Trump 'considered striking Iran's nuclear sites' after election loss

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      Donald Trump asked top aides last week about the possibility of striking Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming weeks, according to a New York Times report.
      During a meeting at the Oval Office on Thursday, the outgoing US president asked several top aides, including the vice-president, Mike Pence, the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, and the chairman of the joint chiefs, Gen Mark Milley, “whether he had options to take action against Iran’s main nuclear site in the coming weeks”, the newspaper says.
      The senior officials “dissuaded the president from moving ahead with a military strike”, warning him that an attack could escalate into a broader conflict in the final weeks of his presidency, the Times writes.
      Trump reportedly asked the question after a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Iran was continuing to stockpile uranium.
      According to the Times, the most likely target of such a strike would have been Natanz, where the IAEA reported that Tehran’s “uranium stockpile was now 12 times larger than permitted under the nuclear accord that Mr Trump abandoned in 2018”, three years after it was signed in an attempt to curb Iran’s nuclear capabilities.
      Iran has long been Trump’s bete noire, and he reintroduced sanctions then tightened them even further after scrapping the nuclear accord.
      European partners in the accord, which have struggled to keep the deal afloat despite Trump’s efforts to torpedo it, hope for a renewed diplomatic approach after Joe Biden’s election victory on 3 November, although Trump refuses to concede defeat.
      The Trump administration has pledged to increase the punitive measures, which some critics see as an attempt to build a “wall of sanctions” that Biden would have difficulty dismantling when he takes office next year. More