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INTERNATIONAL EDITION | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017

Seize facts, For Europe,

not fear, in U.S. is the
refugee plan new threat
Angelina Jolie in town
LONDON

OPINION
Refugees are men, women and chil-
dren caught in the fury of war, or the
cross hairs of persecution. Far from
being terrorists, they are often the
victims of terrorism themselves.
Im proud of our countrys history of
giving shelter to the most vulnerable
people. Americans have shed blood to
defend the idea that human rights
transcend culture, geography, ethnicity
and religion. The decision to suspend
the resettlement of refugees to the
United States and deny entry to citi-
zens of seven Muslim-majority coun-
tries has been met with shock by our
friends around the world precisely
because of this record.
The global refugee crisis and the
threat from terrorism make it entirely
justifiable that we consider how best to
secure our borders. Every government
must balance the
needs of its
When we citizens with its
divide people international
beyond our responsibilities.
But our response
borders, must be meas-
E.U. leaders face struggle
with how to proceed
under President Trump
BY STEVEN ERLANGER
The European Union is accustomed to
crises. But it is probably safe to say that
none of the 28 leaders who were gather-
ing in Malta on Friday expected the cri-
sis that has unexpectedly overtaken the
agenda: the United States of America.
Like much of the world, the European
Union is struggling to decipher a Presi-
dent Trump who seems every day to be
picking a fight with a new nation,
whether friend or foe. Hopes among Eu-
ropean leaders that Mr. Trumps bom-
bastic tone as a candidate would some-
how smooth into a more temperate one
as commander in chief are dissipating,
replaced by a mounting sense of anxiety
and puzzlement over how to proceed.
If many foreign leaders expected a
Trump administration to push to rene-
gotiate trade deals, or take a tough line
on immigration, few anticipated that he
Apprehension Ismail Ali Ibrahim, left, and Salad Rage Saleh are among more than 100 Somali refugees who were in the process of being resettled in the United
SVEN TORFINN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

would become an equal opportunity of-

we divide ured and should States but are now marooned in Nairobi, Kenya. They are afraid of being labeled friends of America upon their return to their poorly policed refugee camp. PAGE 5 fender. He has insulted or humiliated
ourselves. be based on Mexico, Britain, Germany and Iraq; en-
facts, not fear. gaged in a war of words with China and
As the mother Iran; and turned a routine phone call

Frances culture of privilege

of six children, who were all born in
foreign lands and are proud American
citizens, I very much want our country
to be safe for them, and all our nations
children. But I also want to know that
refugee children who qualify for asy-
lum will always have a chance to plead
their case to a compassionate America.
And that we can manage our security
without writing off citizens of entire
countries even babies as unsafe
to visit our country by virtue of geog-
raphy or religion.
It is simply not true that our borders
are overrun or that refugees are admit-
ted to the United States without close
scrutiny.
Refugees are in fact subject to the
highest level of screening of any cate-
gory of traveler to the United States.
This includes months of interviews,
and security checks carried out by the
F.B.I., the National Counterterrorism
Center, the Department of Homeland
Security and the State Department.
Furthermore, only the most vulnera-
ble people are put forward for resettle-
JOLIE, PAGE 13
PARIS
Nepotism scandal affecting
presidential candidate seen
as indicting political class
BY ADAM NOSSITER
The president of the National Assembly
does it. The president of the Senate de-
fends it. Dozens of rank-and-file mem-
bers of Parliament do it, too. Hiring your
spouse, son or sister in Frances Parlia-
ment is perfectly legal.
So, with Franois Fillon, until recently
Frances leading presidential candidate,
in deep trouble for payments of nearly $1
million from the public payroll to his
wife and children, many French poli-
ticians are asking: Whats the big deal?
The answer has, belatedly, come roar-
ing back from much of the countrys
press and public: They just dont get it.
Penelopegate, a scandal named for
Mr. Fillons wife, now threatens to sink
the ambitions of a man who little more
than a week ago seemed all but certain
to become Frances next president.
But the scandal has done more than
add another volatile element to Frances
presidential campaign. It has also
tapped a wellspring of anger in the
French electorate and called into ques-
tion the standard operating procedures
of the political class.
The outrage has buffeted the estab-
lishment, rendering it ever more vulner-
able to the same angry populist forces
that have already upset politics as usual
from Washington to London to Rome.
FRANCE, PAGE 6
with the prime minister of Australia, a
staunch ally, into a minor diplomatic cri-
sis.
With the possible exception of NATO,
where he has softened his tone, Mr.
Trump has expressed disdain for other
multilateral institutions such as the Eu-
ropean Union. His praise has been re-
served for populists and strongmen, like
Nigel Farage, the former leader of the
U.K. Independence Party, President Ro-
drigo Duterte of the Philippines and, of
EUROPE, PAGE 7
TRUMPS SHIFT ON FOREIGN POLICY
President Trump appears to have
embraced key pillars of his predeces-
sors strategy on foreign policy. PAGE 6
BRINGING POLITICS BACK TO THE PULPITS
The president has vowed to overturn a
law restricting political speech by
tax-exempt churches. PAGE 7
CASE STUDY IN MANAGEMENT CHAOS
Experts say the Trump administration
CHRISTIAN HARTMANN/REUTERS is a textbook example of how not to
A nepotism scandal seems to have damaged the political prospects of Franois Fillon. run a complex organization. PAGE 9

In Japan, speaking the language of intrigue

ISESAKI, JAPAN
Hideo Yokoyama subverts
crime novel in first work
to get English translation
BY MOTOKO RICH
Hideo Yokoyama is one of Japans most
popular crime novelists. Yet he regards
the crime as the least interesting part of
the stories he tells.
Usually, in a mystery or thriller, the
main character is the detective, and the
crime is the main ingredient, said Mr.
Yokoyama during an interview in the
home he shares with his wife in a quiet
residential neighborhood about 75 miles
northwest of central Tokyo. But is that
really a special thing for the detective?
Its not a big deal for the detective.
Instead, Mr. Yokoyama, 60, is inter-
ested in the psychology and social dy-
namics of characters who happen to be
affected by crime. In the case of Six
Four, his 15th novel and the first to be
translated into English, the main char-
acter, Yoshinobu Mikami, is not a detec-
tive but a police department spokesman
ensnared in a 14-year-old unsolved kid-
napping case while his own teenage
daughter has gone missing.
While there is a whodunit aspect to
the novel (and a spectacular twist at the
end), much of the books 560-plus pages
are devoted to probing Mikamis domes-
tic life with his wife, a former detective,
as they navigate their marriage after
their daughter runs away, and exploring
the treacherous police bureaucracy and
its combative relations with the news
media.
In order to describe the main charac-
ters feelings or passions, you need a big
organization that is like a big ocean that
I let the character swim in, said Mr. Boundaries, Identity and
Yokoyama, who spent a dozen years as a
reporter on the police beat in Gunma the Public Realm
Prefecture.
Six Four has sold extremely well in March 1013, 2017
KENTARO TAKAHASHI FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Japan and was adapted into a movie that Doha, Qatar
Hideo Yokoyama at home in Japan. Now that I have been working as an author, I has been nominated for the Japan Acad-
believe that I could commit a crime or that anyone could commit a crime. JAPAN, PAGE 2

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2 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
PAGE TWO
Porcelain arts thrive again in Chinese town
JINGDEZHEN, CHINA
Jingdezhen is attracting
artists from around globe
to study its traditions
BY EDWARD WONG
For centuries, the most coveted china
from China came out of Jingdezhens
workshops fashioned from clay made
smooth by trained hands, fired in kilns
and then transported across the world.
The works graced the courts of the
Persians, Mongols and French. Some
craved blue-and-white vases. Others ad-
mired jade-green celadon bowls. This
was Chinas greatest export, the rival of
silk.
The fall of the Qing dynasty and war
and revolutions in the 20th century
broke the artisan culture, unless one
counts Communist statues as an impor-
tant stage in Chinas hallowed porcelain
tradition.
Now that tradition is being revived at
the roots. Young people are moving to
study in Jingdezhen, a river town in the
southern Chinese province of Jiangxi.
Studios and workshops have popped up
around town and in the surrounding val-
leys. Some of the new artisans hope to
profit from their skills, since the coun-
trys middle-class boom of recent dec-
ades has meant a greater demand for
porcelain.
I like the atmosphere here very
More and more young
people decide to stay here.
Some of them come from
big cities. Here, its easier
to start ceramics workshops.
much, said Fang Xin, 27, a woman from
the Guangxi region who showed me how
she was sculpting a clay cup with her
hands one morning in a former factory.
A lot of people with dreams come here.
There is a variety of teachers, and they
teach all kinds of skills and ideas.
There is even a term for young artists
like Ms. Fang: jingpiao, or Jingdezhen
drifters.
Ms. Fang was working in a space
managed by the Pottery Workshop, an
education center opened in 2005 by the
sculptors Caroline Cheng and Takeshi
Yasuda that has become a magnet for
jingpiao. (The workshops mother
branch opened in Hong Kong in 1985.)
The center has been critical in rejuve-
nating the Jingdezhen ceramics scene.
In 2008, Ms. Cheng opened a Saturday
outdoor market in a courtyard space by
the workshop and its cafe, so artists
Chen Bin, 23, a staff member at the Pottery Workshop in Jingdezhen. It was opened in
2005 by two sculptors and has become a magnet for young artists studying porcelain.
Japanese writer subverts the crime novel, now in English
JAPAN, FROM PAGE 1
emy Prize, this countrys equivalent of
the Academy Awards. The book was
translated into English last year and
published to positive reviews in Britain,
where it was a best seller, and will go on
sale in the United States on Tuesday.
Mr. Yokoyama follows other Japanese
crime writers whose work has been
translated into English, including Sei-
cho Matsumoto, Natsuo Kirino and
Keigo Higashino, though he is currently
assigned to a marketing pigeonhole that
compares Six Four to Stieg Larssons
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.
Where Mr. Larssons series was pro-
pelled by violence, sex and its char-
ismatic heroine, Lisbeth Salander, Six
Four features a stodgy protagonist
who is called a gargoyle by the press
and is haunted by the fact that his
daughter ran away because she de-
spised the face she inherited.
In his descriptions of interactions be-
tween the police and the news media,
Mr. Yokoyama captures their everyday
sexism: One of the junior press officers,
a young woman, repeatedly asks
Mikami to let her attend after-hours
drinking sessions with reporters. He re-
fuses, in a paternalistic effort to protect
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could try to make a living by selling their
creations.
The idea came when a recent work-
shop graduate asked Ms. Cheng if she
could sell items outside the cafe. She
wanted to set up on a blanket, but Ms.
Cheng insisted on erecting a proper tent
covering, said Po-Wen Liu, the work-
shops deputy director and a teacher
there.
These days, about 80 artists take part
in the market. They place their wares on
tables under white awnings.
Mr. Liu is from Taiwan and studied ce-
ramics art there and in the United States
before teaching at the University of
North Carolina at Greensboro. He joined
the Pottery Workshop in December 2015
after answering an ad for a teaching po-
sition. His wife, son and daughter con-
tinue to live in Greensboro.
Since I was a student, I wanted to
come to Jingdezhen, he said. Its the
mecca.
Mr. Liu teaches classes of about 15 stu-
dents for one week or more. These take
place in a building at the rear gate of the
compound, which is on the grounds of a
state-run sculpture factory. Two brick
chimneys from an unused kiln rise near
the education center. Many students are
recent graduates of the Jingdezhen Ce-
ramic Institute, the most prominent
academy in town.
I would say their craftsmanship is
amazing and their technical level is very
high, Mr. Liu said. But their conceptu-
al skills need improvement. Theres too
much historical burden. They need to
break out of the boundaries.
For example, if I ask them to make a
cup, they will make something very uni-
form, he added. They might have an
idea of what a Chinese cup looked like
1,000 years ago. They will stick with this.
I personally like more creativity. I tell
them to have the work reflect the hand-
made quality, not something made by
machine.
Though most students are Chinese,
the workshop has an international fla-
vor. The manager is Siumei Ngan, a
trained arts administrator who moved
here from Hong Kong in November 2015.
At any given time, the workshop has
about eight artists in residence, most of
them from outside China. They stay up
to six months.
There are also foreign study groups.
In the cafe, I met Brandon Schnur, 29,
the co-leader of a group of 13 students
from the West Virginia University Ce-
ramics Program visiting for the sum-
mer.
The workshop has a pottery kiln that
resident artists can use. They work in in-
dividual studios on the upper floor of
one building. Sunlight streams in from
large glass windows.
A Canadian woman, Denise White, 29,
sat at a table painting a small porcelain
outdoor scene with snow-covered trees
her from lecherous journalists.
With his gray hair long enough to
brush the edge of his collar, Mr.
Yokoyama recalled how he grew frus-
trated with journalism and what he saw
as its absolutist lens.
When I was a reporter, I was very
confident that I was not the kind of per-
son who could ever commit a crime, he
said. But now that I have been working
as an author, I believe that I could com-
mit a crime or that anyone could com-
mit a crime.
Toward the end of his reporting ca-
reer, Mr. Yokoyama started writing fic-
tion. He submitted a short story for a lit-
erary prize and won third place; by
then, he had decided to quit his job.
He was 34 and married, with two
young children at home, so he worked
odd jobs at moving and security compa-
nies while writing in his spare time.
It took seven years for him to sell his
first novel, Kage no Kisetsu, or Sea-
son of Shadows, which was published in
1998 and won a prestigious prize for
mystery writers.
Publishers began clamoring for more,
and Mr. Yokoyama buried himself in
writing.
He rented a 110-square-foot studio
A pottery district in Jingdezhen, where a new generation is trying to revive a traditional artisan culture in a city that once produced Chinas most coveted porcelain.
and a polar bear. She said her goal for
the two-and-a-half-week residency was
to design molds of Canadian scenes that
she could bring home to make sculp-
tures for sale.
I got 13 small molds made here, Ms.
White said. The master mold-makers
here can pretty much do anything.
Jingdezhen has been producing ce-
ramics since the early Chinese dynas-
ties. But it was during the Tang dynasty,
from 618 to 907, that word of the towns
arts spread.
In that era, Jingdezhen was called
Changnan because it sits on the south
bank of the Chang River, and some histo-
rians say the word china and thus
the Western name of the country
came from a bad transliteration of the
towns name. Some scholars date Chi-
nas earliest fine porcelain to the Five
Dynasties and 10 Kingdoms period, a
time of upheaval in the 10th century.
Dynasties rose and fell, but each new
emperor ordered porcelain to be
brought from Jingdezhen to their
courts. Imperial officials were posted in
Jingdezhen to oversee the production.
Pieces from here carried a stamp of au-
thenticity and gained prominence
worldwide.
Today, the value of those works are
among the highest in the Chinese art
world. At a 2014 Sothebys auction in
Hong Kong, the Shanghai businessman
Liu Yiqian offered a record-setting $36.3
million for a delicate Ming dynasty
porcelain cup, called a chicken cup,
that was fired in Jingdezhens imperial
kilns.
After paying for the cup with a credit
card, he took a celebratory sip of tea
from it.
After the Communists took over in
1949, Jingdezhen became known for the
production of propaganda statues. By
SONNY FIGUEROA/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Six Four has sold extremely well in
Japan and was adapted into a movie.
apartment and wrote for more than 20
hours a day, imbibing energy drinks to
keep awake and popping sleeping pills
when he needed to nap. I just stayed in
that apartment, writing on three hours
of sleep a night, he said. It was a big
Beijing
R.
Ye l l o w
CHINA
Ya n g t z e
R
.
Jingdezhen
JIANGXI
Hong Kong
South
China Sea
The fall of the Qing dynasty and upheavals in the 20th century broke the towns artisan culture. Above, statues of Mao Zedong.
1958, that work was consolidated into 10
main factories or studios.
In recent years, the local government
has begun its own efforts to rejuvenate
the porcelain industry. But people in the
industry say it is the small, privately run
workshops that are revitalizing the tra-
ditions while injecting them with new
ideas.
One such workshop lies in the Sanbao
Village area across a river. Here, artists
and businesspeople have opened work-
shops and studios throughout a lush val-
ley.
Perhaps the most striking one is
Zhenrutang, whose sprawling show-
room consists of four connected tradi-
tional homes moved here from the
white-walled village area of Huizhou, in
neighboring Anhui Province. Bowls,
plates and vases sit on tables and are
bathed in the soft glow of overhead
science experiment.
Mr. Yokoyama frantically pumped out
four new books in five years, while also
working on and off on the manuscript of
Six Four. It takes its title from the reign
of Emperor Hirohito, the father of the
current Japanese emperor, Akihito, and
denotes the year in which the cold kid-
napping case at the center of the novel
took place. (The Japanese count the
years of each emperors reign sepa-
rately from the Gregorian calendar year,
and the year of the emperors death was
known as 64.)
The punishing schedule caught up
with him, and Mr. Yokoyama had a heart
attack. As he gradually recovered and
returned to writing, he could not even
remember Mikamis name. But long
bouts tending his garden helped refresh
him, and three years later, he finished
the novel.
The publisher Bungeishunju released
Six Four in 2012, and Japanese critics
praised it for subverting the traditional
police procedural. In a culture where an
increasing number of workers are frus-
trated by hierarchical bureaucracy, the
novel was a big hit.
At a dinner party in Tokyo, Jon Riley,
editor in chief of Quercus, a London-
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
Yellow
Sea
Shanghai
TAIWAN
200 MILES
lights. Buddhist figurines are also on
display.
The porcelain works are designed by
Jiang Bo, 35, a native of Xian who came
to Jingdezhen in 2001 to study at the ce-
ramics institute.
Eight years later, he opened his own
studio. More than 40 people work for it
on the grounds here.
A signature piece is a small teapot
with a pair of cups, all in a creamy pow-
der blue. Each cup has a tiny rough nub
on the smooth bottom, like a rock pro-
truding from an oceans surface. Called
Mountain and Water, the set sells for
$150.
If you want to develop a career
around ceramics, Jingdezhen is the best
place, said Mr. Jiang, who is now vice
general manager of the company.
Like the Pottery Workshop, Zhen-
rutang also has a residency program for
based publisher that released the Stieg
Larsson novels in Britain, heard of the
novels popularity and commissioned an
English summary. On the basis of that
report, Quercus bought the rights to
translate Six Four into English, and
hired Jonathan Lloyd-Davies, an accom-
plished translator of Japanese fiction.
I just stayed in that apartment,
writing on three hours of sleep a
night. It was a big science
experiment.
Writing in The Guardian last year, Ali-
son Flood described Six Four as a
slow burn crime novel that provided a
layered insight into internal police poli-
tics. It was shortlisted for an Interna-
tional Dagger Award for crime fiction.
In the United States, where Six Four
will be released by Farrar, Straus and
Giroux in Mr. Lloyd-Daviess transla-
tion, the publisher is planning an initial
print run of 11,000 hardcover copies and
hopes American audiences will be
drawn to the discursive police drama.
Yes, its about a Japanese police de-
partment, and clearly its central to the
..
PHOTOGRAPHS BY LAM YIK FEI FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
foreign artists.
More and more young people decide
to stay here, Mr. Jiang said. Some of
them come from big cities. Here, its eas-
ier to start ceramics workshops.
But like the towns pottery, some
Jingdezhen drifters are now moving to
other corners of China. Ms. Cheng, co-
founder of the Pottery Workshop, said
artists were getting married, having
children and asking themselves what
were more suitable environments for
them. She lives in Dali, a rural town in
Yunnan Province that has attracted an
extraordinary number of Chinese flee-
ing the cities.
I have now met a lot of people who
have gone home, Ms. Cheng said. I re-
ally dont encourage people to stay in
Jingdezhen forever. Its good that they
go home. They can teach others what
theyve learned here.
story that it is Japanese, said Sean Mc-
Donald, executive editor at Farrar,
Straus and Giroux. But I dont think
you need to be reading it because youre
interested in Japan.
David Peace, the Tokyo-based author
of the crime novels Tokyo Year Zero
and Occupied City, who was an early
champion of the novel, argues that more
such translations are vital, and not just
for literary reasons.
At a time when the United States and
Britain are becoming more inward-
looking than they already are, Mr.
Peace said, our need for translated lit-
erature and to try to understand other
cultures and countries is greater than
ever.
Mr. Yokoyama continues to work
what he describes as irregular hours
on a 15-year-old Mitsubishi computer in
a narrow room in his home that smells of
tobacco and overflows with books,
newspaper clippings, postcards and ink
bottles. He proudly displays a baseball
bat autographed by the Japanese base-
ball player Hideki Matsui.
He said he was working on four or five
projects. Im trying to finish them, he
said, so they will be presentable to soci-
ety.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 3
 ..
4 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION

World
Protests erupt in Romania over corruption law
Demonstrators say
measure would allow
official wrongdoing
BY PALKO KARASZ

Huge protests, among the largest since

the fall of communism, have rocked Ro-
mania after the government passed a
law that would effectively allow official
corruption.
More than 250,000 Romanians took to
the streets, about half of them in the cap-
ital, Bucharest. Thieves, thieves, they
shouted, denouncing the government
and corruption. A few demonstrators
clashed with riot police.
The protests which continued
Thursday night and were expected to
swell further over the weekend
erupted after the government adopted
an emergency law on Tuesday night that
would make official misconduct punish-
able by prison time only in cases in
which the financial damage is more than
200,000 lei, or about $47,000.
The measure had been debated for
several weeks, but the government de-
cided to adopt it abruptly late on Tues-
day night, stunning observers. Officials
including Liviu Dragnea, the leader of
the governing Social Democratic Party,
stand to benefit from the measure. Mr.
Dragnea faces charges of abuse of
power involving a sum of 24,000 euros,
or about $25,800.
Romanias top judicial watchdog, the
Superior Magistrates Council, on
Wednesday issued a constitutional
court challenge to the decree. Another
body, the Higher Judicial Council, which
helps oversee the court system, has also
challenged the law.
President Klaus Iohannis, whose role
as head of state is largely ceremonial but
who commands respect in many parts of
the country, asked the constitutional
court to strike it down.
I am very impressed by the scale of
demonstrations that took place last
night in the entire country, he said in a
statement on Thursday, praising the lat- ANDREI PUNGOVSCHI/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE GETTY IMAGES
est in a series of protests at which he Protesters being detained near government headquarters in Bucharest. More than 250,000 Romanians took to the streets, about half of them in the capital, shouting, thieves, thieves, and denouncing the government.
himself has turned up.
Mr. Iohannis, who was elected in 2014
as the first president from the countrys The fight against corruption needs to In fact, senior political and business
German-speaking minority, called Tues- Officials, including the leader of be advanced, not undone, Jean-Claude figures, including Mr. Dragnea, were un-
day a day of mourning for the rule of the governing Social Democratic Juncker and Frans Timmermans, the der investigation and likely to be con-
law. Party, stand to benefit. president and vice president of the Eu- victed under the rules the decree was
In the northwestern city of Cluj, ropean Commission, said in a joint state- concerning.
Raluca Sandor, a 30-year-old pharma- ment on Wednesday. Romania is far from being a success
cist, braved cold weather to take part in night? She added, In a world where But the government appeared to story, Ms. Mungiu-Pippidi said in a tele-
the demonstrations. we talk about corruption, they want to stand its ground. On Wednesday night, phone interview. We ended impunity,
This decree will drag Romania back change legislation and encourage it or Florin Iordache, the minister of justice, we managed to put in jail very important
in time, she said. The Social Demo- go easy on punishing it. whose portfolio the measures belong to, people. But the problem is that corrup-
cratic Party is the most corrupt party, Until recently, Romania, which joined published a message on his Facebook tion has not gone down people who re-
and they are trying to save themselves the European Union in 2007, along with page, urging the protesters to read the placed those people behave similarly.
from prosecution. I want the govern- Bulgaria, was seen as making slow but text of the decree themselves. The countrys anticorruption pros-
ment to resign and these decrees to be steady progress on corruption. The new I dont understand what the pro- ecution service, which was behind many
canceled. law threatens to create a new problem testers are upset about, Mr. Dragnea of those arrests, is investigating over
Another demonstrator in Cluj, for the blocs executives in Brussels, said before the decree was passed on 2,000 cases of abuse of power. It warned
Alexandrin Pop, 30, said, Im pro- who are already troubled by problems Tuesday. its work would be hampered by the new
testing because I see this as an assault like the Greek debt crisis, sluggish What infuriated the crowds was that regulation. In a statement before the de-
on the judiciary and the rule of law. growth among the countries that use the the decrees gave people the impression cree was passed on Tuesday, the service
Alexandra Zaraf, 27, one of many euro currency and Britains plans for that the government is legislating in its said it would benefit both future infrac-
young protesters in Bucharest, asked, withdrawing from the bloc. own benefit, said Alina Mungiu-Pip- tors and those already being investi-
What self-respecting government is- Analysts feared that the government pidi, a professor at Hertie School of Gov- gated for abuse of power. VADIM GHIRDA/ASSOCIATED PRESS
sues emergency ordinances at 9 p.m. could further reverse the countrys ernance in Berlin, who runs a website A few demonstrators clashed with riot police. The countrys president has called for a
and publishes it in the middle of the progress. that monitors corruption in the country. Glen Johnson contributed reporting. court to strike down the law. A protester said it would drag Romania back in time.

Putin swaggers into Hungary as world shifts
BUDAPEST
BY RICK LYMAN
When President Vladimir V. Putin of
Russia last paid a visit to Hungary,
Prime Minister Viktor Orban was under
siege for his autocratic style, Russia was
isolated for its seizure of Crimea, and
both men were called xenophobes for
their hard-line stance on immigration.
Two years later, as Mr. Putin landed
on Thursday for his first foray into Eu-
rope in the Trump era, it was a different
story. Both men feel vindicated. There
was talk of lifting the economic sanc-
tions placed on Russia for its land grab
in Ukraine. Their brand of nationalism
has moved from the fringe to the main-
stream.
There was a note of triumphalism,
even a bit of swagger, in the air.
We all sense, its in the air, that the
world is in the process of a substantial
realignment, Mr. Orban said in a news
conference after Thursdays meeting.
We believe this will create favorable
conditions for stronger Russian-Hun-
garian relations.
Even so, beneath the triumph lies a
strain of uneasiness. The visit is ex-
pected to be fairly low-key, an indication
of the uncertainty surrounding the new
Trump administration, analysts say.
President Trumps intentions remain
unclear, and the prospects of a grand
bargain between Washington and the
Kremlin are highly uncertain.
In the meantime, leaders across Eu-
rope have been forced to recalculate the
best way to balance pressures in the
East and West. Nowhere is that chal-
lenge felt more keenly than in Central
and Eastern Europe, historically torn
between Russia and the West.
That means European and global
leaders are closely scrutinizing the visit.
They are looking for hints of how ag-
gressive Mr. Putin and populist leaders
like Mr. Orban will be in capitalizing on
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, center, with Prime Minister Viktor Orban of
Hungary, right, who said, The world is in the process of a substantial realignment.
this new international climate and on
Mr. Trumps stated desire for better rela-
tions with Moscow.
If Thursdays post-meeting news con-
ference is any indication, any hints of ag-
gression are well buried. Both leaders
focused on economic issues, such as
Russian energy deals, and emphasized
the need for international cooperation.
I provided information in great detail
on our assessment of what is happening
in eastern Ukraine and what, in our
opinion, is happening in Syria, Mr.
Putin said which, he added, under-
lines the need for more global coopera-
tion to fight terrorism.
Many here, skeptical that the Ameri-
cans and Russians will actually bridge
the chasm of interests dividing them,
are injecting a note of caution about the
balancing act ahead for leaders like Mr.
Orban and his governing right-wing
party, Fidesz.
Andras Racz, a Russia expert and as-
sociate professor at Pazmany Peter
Catholic University in Budapest, pre-
dicted that the reset in relations be-
KAROLY ARVAI/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE GETTY IMAGES
tween the United States and Russia
would result in a brief honeymoon, but
nothing else, soon overwritten by con-
flicting interests.
As for Hungary, there is no trust on
the Russian side towards Orban, Mr.
Racz said. The Hungarian leader has
been seen mostly as a useful tool for
weakening European Union unity, he
said.
And the feeling is mutual, said Balazs
Orban, director of research for the Sza-
zadveg Foundation, a think tank that ad-
vises the Fidesz party.
Fidesz doesnt feel chemistry with
the Russians, said Mr. Orban, who is
not related to the prime minister. They
dont think they are friends of Hungary,
necessarily.
The warmer relations of recent years,
he said, had more to do with economic
necessity and Hungarys dependence
on Russian energy.
Indeed, Zoltan Kovacs, Viktor Orbans
spokesman, said in an interview that
both nations would treat Mr. Putins visit
as business as usual, with energy pol-
icy and a Russian deal to build a nuclear
power plant in Hungary at the top of the
agenda.
It was not clear how significant a role,
if any, the thorniest issue between Rus-
sia and the West the sanctions im-
posed by the European Union and the
United States after the seizure of
Crimea would play in the meeting.
But Mr. Putin is clearly eager to have the
sanctions lifted, and to sow divisions in
the European Union on that policy and
others.
Hungary may be among the nations
most susceptible to Mr. Putins maneu-
vering to remove the sanctions. Mr. Or-
ban has voted with other European na-
tions to support them, as a show of soli-
darity.
Mr. Orbans hosting of Mr. Putin is the
first part of a busy year of global out-
reach. Efforts are underway to arrange
a meeting with Mr. Trump the timing
and location are still under discussion
and Mr. Orban is also planning a visit to
Beijing and a meeting with Turkeys in- ficers to try to prevent bad behavior,
creasingly autocratic leader, Recep
Tayyip Erdogan.
Orban has collected some credits in
the international sphere, said Balazs
Orban, the researcher. He forecast ev-
erything correctly, like immigration.
Now, seeing a potential ally in Wash-
ington to balance the one in Moscow, the
prime minister intends to cash those
credits.
He understands geopolitics is chang-
ing, Balazs Orban said: The notion that
all nations need to embrace globalism
and the liberal world order is no long-
er automatically accepted.
The Hungarian prime ministers chief
opposition comes from the far-right Job-
bik Party. Its leader, Gabor Vona, said in
an interview in the past week that he
had very mixed feelings about Donald
J. Trumps election, and that he was un-
sure how seriously to take Mr. Trumps
talk.
He said he would wait to see what
will be unfurled.
Fighting les pipis sauvages
in Paris with public urinals
BY DAN BILEFSKY
In cities the world over, men (and, to a
lesser extent, women) who urinate in
the street al fresco are a scourge of
urban life, costing millions of dollars for
cleaning and the repair of damage to
public infrastructure. And, oh, the
stench.
Now, Paris has a new weapon against
what the French call les pipis sau-
vages or wild peeing: a sleek and
eco-friendly public toilet. Befitting the
country of Matisse, the urinal looks
more like a modernist flower box than a
receptacle for human waste.
You can even grow flowers in its com-
post.
The Parisian innovation was spurred
by a problem of public urination so en-
demic that City Hall recently proposed
dispatching a nearly 2,000-strong inci-
vility brigade of truncheon-wielding of-
which also includes leaving dog waste
on the street and littering cigarette
butts. Fines for public urination are
steep about $75.
Even that was not deterrent enough,
officials say. A small brigade of sanita-
tion workers still has to scrub about
1,800 square miles of sidewalk each day.
And dozens of surfaces are splattered by
urine, according to City Hall.
Enter the boxy Uritrottoir a combi-
nation of the French words for urinal
and pavement which has grabbed
headlines and has already been lauded
as a friend of flowers by Le Figaro, the
French newspaper, because it produces
compost that can be used for fertilizer.
Designed by Faltazi, a Nantes-based in-
dustrial design firm, its top section also
doubles as an attractive flower or plant
holder.
The Uritrottoir, which has graffiti-
proof paint and does not use water,
works by storing urine on a bed of dry
straw, sawdust or wood chips. Moni-
tored remotely by a urine attendant
who can see on a computer when the toi-
let is full, the urine and straw is carted
away to the outskirts of Paris, where it is
turned into compost that can later be
used in public gardens or parks.
Fabien Esculier, an engineer who is
known in the French media as Mon-
sieur Pipi because of his expertise on
the subject, said the Uritrottoir was
more eco-friendly than the dozens of ex-
isting public toilets that dot the capital.
Its greatest virtue is that it doesnt
use water, and produces compost that
can be used for public gardens and
parks, he said.
So far, Pariss Gare de Lyon, a railway
station that has become ground zero in
the capitals war against public urina-
tion, has ordered two of the toilets,
which were installed on Tuesday outside
the station, and the SNCF, Frances
state-owned national railway, says it
plans to roll out more across the capital
if the Uritrottoir is a success.
I am optimistic it will work, said
Maxime Bourette, the SNFC mainte-
nance official who ordered the toilets for
the railway. Everyone is tired of the
mess.
He said it remained to be seen
whether the toilets were cost effective
he said the SNCF paid about $9,730 for
two, and it would cost about $865 a
month to pay a sanitation worker to
clean the toilets.
A designer of the Uritrottoir, Laurent
Lebot, 45, an industrial engineer who
has also invented an eco-friendly vac-
uum cleaner, said Nantes, in western
France, had ordered three.
Public urination is a huge problem in
France, Mr. Lebot said. Beyond the
terrible smell, urine degrades lamp
posts and telephone poles, damages
cars, pollutes the Seine and undermines
everyday life of a city. Cleaning up
wastes water, and detergents are dam-
aging for the environment.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
Refugees at the transit center in Nairobi, Kenya. More than 25,000 Somalians were in the process of being resettled in the United States. Some gave away most of their possessions.
Somalis fear return to camp
NAIROBI, KENYA
For refugees stranded
by Trump order, friend of
America is a deadly label
BY JEFFREY GETTLEMAN
Ismail Ali Ibrahim gave away every-
thing he owned: his bed, his sheets, his
shirts, his pots, his pans, his plates, even
his house.
He didnt care. He was going to Amer-
ica.
But this past week, he remained 7,000
miles away, marooned with more than
100 other Somali refugees in a spartan
transit center in central Nairobi that
smelled of nervous sweat.
Mr. Ibrahim and many of his dis-
placed comrades had been waiting more
than two decades to be resettled in the
United States and were supposed to
have flown to America this past week.
But their hopes were crushed by Presi-
dent Trumps executive order to freeze
the refugee flow into the United States
for at least four months.
More than 25,000 refugees from So-
malia, one of the poorest, hungriest,
war-torn countries on earth, were in the
pipeline to be resettled in the United
States.
Mr. Ibrahim was much closer than
most so close that, with his ticket, pa-
perwork and bag all zipped up, the
thought of it made his voice quiver. He
had waited 26 long years for this, living
in a sweltering, crowded, disease-rid-
den refugee camp along the Kenya-So-
malia border that is the opposite of hope.
A correspondents own refugee experience
TIMES INSIDER
WASHINGTON
HELENE COOPER
When I was 13 years old, my family
fled our home for the United States.
We were refugees, even though we
came here on visitor visas that we
simply outstayed. The country of my
birth, Liberia, had just seen a military
coup, where enlisted soldiers took over
the government, disemboweled the
president and launched an orgy of
retribution against the old guard.
My father was shot. My cousin was
executed on the beach by firing squad.
My mom was gang-raped by soldiers
in the basement of our house after she
volunteered to submit to them on the
condition that they leave my sisters
and me, ages 8 to 16, alone.
In the hours after it happened, my
sisters and I huddled on the floor in my
moms bedroom while she sat, silently,
on the love seat, like a sentry keeping
watch over us. In her lap she held a
pistol. Twice that night, the soldiers
came back, but each time they left
again without entering the house.
In the ensuing weeks, my mom
worked steadily to get us out of Libe-
ria. First, she went to the American
Embassy, to begin the painstaking
process of trying to get us a visa to the
United States. She knew refugee status
or an immigrant visa would take
months or years, so she went straight
for the easiest one, the tourist visa,
thinking that was the quickest way out
of the country for us. It still took al-
most a month to get.
Now his worst fears are shaping up.
The Somali refugees who had already
been extensively vetted and approved
by several American government agen-
cies will most likely be bused back to the
camps. Many said that they feared for
their lives and that their situation was
actually worse than it had been before
they came so close to leaving.
Trump shocked us, Mr. Ibrahim
said.
Most of them are now broke, having
just two weeks ago given away their
worldly possessions in a spree of happi-
ness to friends less fortunate. But more
worrisome, many refugees said as they
The Shabab will be suspicious
of us. They dont want anyone
resettled to the U.S. Theyll
think weve been giving
information to the Americans.
gathered under the shade of a mango
tree at the transit center, was the risk
that they could be labeled friends of
America. Thats a dangerous tag in a
poorly policed refugee camp crawling
with Islamic militants.
The Shabab will be suspicious of us,
said Deck Abdi Korriyow, another ref-
ugee, referring to the militant group that
has slaughtered thousands of people
across eastern Africa. They dont want
anyone resettled to the U.S. Theyll
think weve been giving information to
the Americans.
Several men around him vigorously
nodded when he added, Who knows
what will happen to us next?
Kenya is home to hundreds of thou-
After the rape, my mom had moved
us to our cousins house, where she
thought we would be safer than in our
isolated home way out in the bush. My
dad was still in the hospital recovering
from gunshot wounds, but at my cous-
ins house there seemed to be safety in
numbers. Still, every night, my mom
would come into the bedroom where
we were all sleeping to check on us
three, four, sometimes five times a
night.
Finally, we got the visas.
But we still had to get exit permits
from the new Liberian military govern-
ment allowing us to leave the country.
My mom drained her bank account
and bribed everyone she could find.
She had a singular mission, it seemed:
She was going to get her daughters to
safety any way she could. (My father
would join us once he was released
from the hospital.)
It was around midnight on May 16,
1980, when we boarded Pan Am Flight
100 at Robertsfield Airport outside
Monrovia. The destination was New
York. The plane was a DC-10. The cabin
engulfed us in its foreignness; it was
like we were already in America, with
carpets and air-conditioning and air
fresheners.
I remember being terrified. I sat
across the aisle from my mom, who sat
next to my sister. We all kept looking at
the open door of the plane, for some-
one to come and pull us off.
Over 30 years later, on Friday, I was
at the Pentagon, which I cover for The
New York Times, when President
Trump came to sign his executive
order closing the door on refugees
coming into this country. I was on
sands of Somali refugees and many are
treated terribly constantly harassed,
arrested, often beaten, discriminated
against, kept in large camps or locked in
a soccer stadium during police round-
ups, and sometimes they have even dis-
appeared. Many Kenyans see Somalia
the way much of the world does: as a ter-
rorist threat.
So the refugees have set their sights
on a faraway dream. Its called America.
The United States runs a vigorous reset-
tlement program, taking in thousands of
Somalis each year. Being one of them is
like holding a winning lottery ticket and
it generates a lot of envy.
Some of the refugees said another
reason they dreaded going back to the
camps was because they knew some of
their neighbors would barely be able to
contain their glee that the resettlement
had not worked out.
The people against me will be
happy, Mr. Ibrahim said.
The more than 100 approved refugees
here are now stuck because they dont
have proper papers to walk the streets
of Nairobi. They were supposed to be
walking the streets of Atlanta, Buffalo,
Des Moines and St. Louis by now.
They arent allowed to leave the tran-
sit center, which is in Nairobis old Indi-
an quarter; it was supposed to be their
last stop. The gate here is large and un-
marked. Security is serious; many of the
refugees who pass through here are
hunted in their homelands.
American officials did not address the
fears of Shabab reprisals directly. One
State Department official said that the
government would continue to show
compassion to refugees but that it was
also important to protect American citi-
zens.
The writer, Helene Cooper, left, with her
mother in Monrovia, Liberia, in 1972.
deadline and hurriedly typed out my
feed for the story, which I was work-
ing on with my colleague, a Times
White House correspondent, Michael
Shear.
I am no longer a refugee, so theoreti-
cally I am not affected by the ban.
After eight years of living illegally in
the United States, I received a green
card as part of Ronald Reagans am-
nesty program.
Ten years after that, I became an
American citizen.
This country took me and my family
in when we were at one of the lowest
points of our lives and returned to me
a feeling I had lost: that of being safe. I
was so proud when I eventually took
SVEN TORFINN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Refugee officials said the Shabab
fears could be real, but that some ref-
ugees also played up such concerns in
an attempt to delay or stop their return
to the camps, which can be depressing
on a good day.
Life for many Somali refugees means
confronting famine, anarchy, pestilence
and death on a daily basis. Ever since
the government collapsed in 1991, Soma-
lia has been stuck in perpetual crisis.
One set of three brothers at the transit
camp fled Somalia after their parents
were killed 25 years ago, trudging
across the Kenya border as three lost
souls. For more than a quarter-century,
the brothers had been living together in
a small makeshift house in a refugee
camp, usually jobless and surviving off
the monthly United Nations rations,
which they said had been cut down to
seven pounds of grain, one cup of oil and
a bottle capful of salt. The Kenyans have
been threatening to close this camp be-
cause of terrorism fears.
The brothers had just cleared the final
medical checks to be resettled in Rhode
Island. Ahmed Hassan, the eldest, a qui-
et man with a red pen in his pocket,
spoke proudly of how in recent days
they had been trained to wear jackets,
hats and gloves when it was cold.
Most of the refugees will now return
to the same squalid camps where they
had been living for years. Others in the
pipeline will be put on what the State De-
partment calls indefinite hold.
When this was announced at the tran-
sit center last weekend at a meeting in
the yard, several men cried.
It was pretty shattering for me, said
Lori Seymour, the official with the Inter-
national Organization for Migration
who made the announcement.
the oath of citizenship and posed for
photos, waving an American flag, in
front of the courthouse where I was
sworn in.
Liberia, which went through a 15-
year civil war after we left, has been
slowly picking itself up. It elected a
female president the first African
country to do so.
The absence of war in the past 14
years has allowed businesses to re-
open, roads to be fixed and children to
go to school. The country is about to
hold another election a hoped-for
peaceful transfer of power. These days,
when I go to Liberia, Im not afraid
anymore.
On Saturday, when I read reports of
the refugees and Muslims from seven
countries who were being denied entry
into the United States, one passage in
particular jumped out at me, in our
lead story about the executive order:
In Istanbul, during a stopover on
Saturday, passengers reported that
security officers had entered a plane
after everyone had boarded and or-
dered a young Iranian woman and her
family to leave the aircraft.
That single sentence took me back
to another plane on another tarmac,
and another family, more than 37 years
ago. To my mom and my sister and
myself, as we sat fearfully looking at
the door of the plane, praying that no
one would come on and take us off.
I hadnt seen my mom cry in the
whole month after the coup. Not even
the night she was raped. But when the
planes engines revved and it acceler-
ated down the runway the night we left
for the United States, her chest heaved
with big racking sobs.
SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 5
Ahistory of authority
and the U.S. visa ban
WASHINGTON
Scholars suggest parallels
between new immigration
rules and harsh regimes
BY AMANDA TAUB
History is full of examples of leaders us-
ing us versus them politics to paint a
particular minority group as a threat to
the majoritys safety, morals or culture.
That history has scholars of authori-
tarianism unnerved by President
Trumps order to halt immigration from
seven predominantly Muslim countries,
temporarily suspend the United States
refugee resettlement program, and in-
definitely bar refugees from Syria.
The new rules are in line with the ban
on Muslim immigration that Mr. Trump
proposed during the presidential cam-
paign, though they do not bar all Mus-
lims outright. Nevertheless, the schol-
ars say there are worrying parallels be-
tween his ban and the behaviors of the
governments they study.
That kind of us-versus-them politics,
they warn, can have harmful conse-
quences not just for the specific groups
that are targeted, but for political sys-
tems as a whole.
TARGETING THE WEAK
The us-versus-them dynamic is easy
for many people to rally around, said
Jonathan D. Weiler, a political scientist
at the University of North Carolina. Tar-
geting feared or unpopular minorities is
a way of setting a boundary, said Sheri
E. Berman, a political scientist at
Barnard College a way to distinguish
between us deserving of protection,
and them who are a threat.
There is always a segment in every
population that is suspicious of out-
siders and frightened of difference, said
Marc J. Hetherington, a Vanderbilt Uni-
versity political scientist and an author,
along with Mr. Weiler, of the book Au-
thoritarianism and Polarization in
American Politics. And many others
who would ordinarily be more tolerant
and open will turn against outsiders if
they feel especially frightened in
times of war, for instance.
That fear creates a ripe environment
for politics that targets a particular mi-
nority with repressive policies in the
name of protecting the majority.
Politicians who work from the play-
book of how to take advantage of those
innate human biases, Mr. Hetherington
said, can use that fear to bolster their
popularity and political power.
It is a playbook that authoritarian
leaders around the world have followed.
They may do so out of a conscious desire
to manipulate the public, a belief that the
group they target poses a threat, or
some combination of both.
Often, leaders argue that the targeted
group is so dangerous that ordinary
checks and balances must be set aside
and core norms abandoned to properly
respond to the threat.
Mr. Weiler cited the example of Presi-
dent Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines,
who was elected on a promise to rid the
country of drug dealers, as an example
of an elected leader who used such tac-
tics. Since taking office, Mr. Duterte has
encouraged the police to kill thousands
of civilians accused of being drug push-
ers.
Eelco van der Maat, an expert in au-
thoritarian consolidation at Leiden Uni-
versity in the Netherlands, said leaders
tend to be strategic about the groups
they identify as threats. They focus on
those who are politically marginalized
and relatively powerless, and who are
already seen as alien and frightening.
Targeting such groups, Mr. van der
Maat said, is easier because the public
is more likely to accept that those
groups are threatening, and that there
also is little political cost to persecuting
those who are already weak.
Mr. Hetherington said he believes
that Mr. Trumps executive order fol-
lows that pattern.
Muslim immigrants are not a power-
ful group in the United States, he said.
And the publics fear of terrorism makes
Muslim immigrants a particularly easy
target, he added. Mix in the 9/11 at-
tacks, and you can turn this into con-
cerns about survival.
Mr. van der Maat said the us-them
boundary tends to not remain stable,
however. Authoritarian leaders, he has
Police officers pushing back protesters in Turkey, where, one expert says, the demo-
cratic system has eroded to the point where most analysts think it no longer exists.
world
found in his research, tend to expand the
category of people targeted as threat-
ening outsiders.
And their policies often become
harsher as well as broader, Mr. van der
Maat said, as leaders climb what he
called the ladder of violence moving
from discrimination into more signifi-
cant persecution.
Large-scale deportations, such as
those Mr. Trump promised on the cam-
paign trail, would be a step higher on
that ladder, Mr. van der Maat said, be-
cause they would require the use of
force and affect a wide segment of the
population. The president late last
month signed an executive order that
would give law enforcement officials ex-
panded resources for carrying out de-
portations, and promised to punish
sanctuary cities that refuse to cooper-
ate with federal deportation efforts.
TESTING THE LIMITS OF POWER
Mr. Trump is a democratically elected
president, and the United States is a de-
mocracy. But the experts caution that
does not mean that the lessons of au-
thoritarian behavior should be ignored.
Presidents Recep Tayyip Erdogan of
Turkey and Vladimir V. Putin of Russia,
Mr. Weiler said, were democratically
elected, then systematically under-
mined democratic checks and balances
to consolidate their own power.
Leaders with authoritarian tenden-
cies will push and push until they find a
spot where they cant push anymore
and if they dont, theyll keep going, Ms.
Berman said. Were watching that
process happen in not-so-slow motion in
Turkey now, she said, where Mr. Erdo-
gan has eroded the democratic system
to the point where most analysts think
Leaders with authoritarian
tendencies will push and push
until they find a spot where they
cant push anymore.
its no longer democratic at all.
Mr. Trumps refugee ban, if it is found
to be legal, is not necessarily a step to-
ward that kind of democratic decline,
Ms. Berman said. The key thing to
watch for, she said, is whether he will try
to use the power of the presidency to
push through illegal rules or overrule
checks and balances.
That has not yet occurred. But the ban
is a sign that Mr. Trump is willing to
push the limits of the norms of American
governing. By circumventing normal
procedures for drafting and issuing ex-
ecutive orders, the White House created
confusion and chaos within the agencies
that will enforce the new rules. On Mon-
day, Acting Attorney General Sally Q.
Yates said she did not think the ban was
legal and directed the Justice Depart-
ment not to defend it. Mr. Trump fired
her later that day.
Several federal courts have issued
emergency orders that limit the new
rules effect. There have been reports of
Customs and Border Protection officials
refusing to comply with the court or-
ders, prompting concerns that this could
lead to a direct clash between the judi-
cial and executive branches. If the exec-
utive branch blocks the judicial branch
from enforcing its orders, that could per-
haps lead to the type of constitutional
crisis Ms. Berman warned of.
The United States today is in a far dif-
ferent position than Turkey under Mr.
Erdogan. But, Ms. Berman said, Turkey
had one advantage: multiple opposition
parties that could obstruct Mr. Erdo-
gans agenda. By contrast, in the Ameri-
can political system, opposition has to
come from within the main party itself
particularly when that party controls
both houses of Congress and the presi-
dency, as the Republican Party does.
But as long as Mr. Trump remains
popular with a core base of supporters
who appreciate this type of us-versus-
them politics, Mr. Hetherington said, re-
sisting him will be politically risky for
Republicans.
And if Republican lawmakers allow
Mr. Trump to continue with his
promised crackdowns, they will have an
opportunity to make progress on their
legislative agenda.
That leaves experts uncertain about
how far Mr. Trump might push against
the core norms of Americas liberal de-
mocracy.
We are now all looking for things that
could be some kind of slippery slope,
Ms. Berman said.
ILYAS AKENGIN/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE GETTY IMAGES

6 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
world
Trump adopts key points of Obama foreign policy
WASHINGTON
BY MARK LANDLER,
PETER BAKER
AND DAVID E. SANGER
President Trump, after promising a rad-
ical break with the foreign policy of
Barack Obama, is embracing some key
pillars of the former administrations
strategy, including warning Israel to
curb settlement construction, demand-
ing that Russia withdraw from Crimea
and threatening Iran with sanctions for
ballistic missile tests.
In the most startling shift, the White
House issued an unexpected statement
appealing to the Israeli government not
to expand the construction of Jewish
settlements beyond their current bor-
ders in East Jerusalem and the West
Bank. Such expansion, it said, may not
be helpful in achieving the goal of
peace.
At the United Nations, Ambassador
Nikki R. Haley declared that the United
States would not lift sanctions against
Russia until it stopped destabilizing
Ukraine and pulled troops out of
Crimea.
On Iran, the administration is prepar-
ing economic sanctions similar to those
the Obama administration imposed just
over a year ago. The White House has
also shown no indication that it plans to
rip up Mr. Obamas landmark nuclear
deal, despite Mr. Trumps withering crit-
icism of it during the presidential cam-
paign.
New administrations often fail to
change the foreign policies of their pred-
Regulation to protect
U.S. waterways reversed
BY HIROKO TABUCHI
Republicans have taken one of their first
steps to officially dismantle Obama-era
environmental regulations by easing re-
strictions on coal mining, bolstering an
industry that President Trump has
made a symbol of Americas neglected
heartland.
Using an obscure law that allows Con-
gress to review regulations before they
take effect, the Senate voted on Thurs-
day to reverse the Stream Protection
Rule, which seeks to protect the nations
waterways from debris generated by a
practice called surface mining. The Inte-
rior Department had said the rule would
protect 6,000 miles of streams and
52,000 acres of forests by keeping coal
mining debris away from nearby wa-
ters.
The Senate vote was 54 to 45, follow-
ing a House vote for repeal on Wednes-
day.
Make no mistake about it, this
Obama administration rule is not de-
signed to protect streams, Representa-
tive Bill Johnson, a Republican from
Ohio who sponsored the move to re-
verse the rule, said on Wednesday. In-
stead, it was an effort to regulate the
coal mining industry right out of busi-
ness.
The Senate also moved to reverse a
separate rule requiring publicly traded
oil, gas and mineral companies to dis-
close payments to foreign governments
for licenses or permits. The disclosure
rule was aimed at curbing bribery and
at helping resource-rich developing
countries hold fossil-fuel companies,
and their governments, accountable.
After a procedural vote on Thursday,
final Senate action to cancel the rule was
expected on Friday, with Mr. Trumps
signature to follow.
Both the coal and foreign-payment
rules were made final in the last days of
the Obama administration, putting
them in the cross hairs of the Republi-
can-controlled Congress, together with
other last-minute Obama regulations
yet to take effect.
The Stream Protection Rule, which
requires companies to restore mined ar-
eas to their original physical and eco-
logical state and to monitor for envi-
ronmental effects, would have effec-
tively made mountaintop removal un-
economical, experts said especially
when coal prices remain depressed
amid competition from natural gas and
renewable energy sources like wind and
solar.
But the rule was challenged in court
almost immediately by Republican at-
torneys general in states across the
country, as well as the Ohio-based coal
Train cars in September at a stacking tube where coal is loaded by Pine Branch Mining
in Hazard, Ky. President Trump has vowed to aid the coal industry.
ecessors as radically as they promised,
in large part because statecraft is so dif-
ferent from campaigning. And of course,
todays positions could shift over time.
There is no doubt the Trump administra-
tion has staked out new ground on trade
and immigration, upending relations
with Mexico and large parts of the Mus-
lim world in the process.
But the administrations reversals
were particularly stark because they
came after days of tempestuous phone
calls between Mr. Trump and foreign
leaders, in which he gleefully chal-
lenged diplomatic orthodoxy and ap-
peared to jeopardize one relationship af-
ter another.
Mr. Trump made warmer relations
with Russia the centerpiece of his for-
eign policy during the campaign, and
European leaders had been steeling for
him to lift sanctions they and Mr. Obama
imposed on President Vladimir V. Putin
after he annexed Crimea. But on Thurs-
day, Mr. Trumps United Nations ambas-
sador, Ms. Haley, sounded a lot like her
predecessor, Samantha Power.
We do want to better our relations
with Russia, she said in her first re-
marks to an open session of the United
Nations Security Council. However, the
dire situation in eastern Ukraine is one
that demands clear and strong con-
demnation of Russian actions.
Similarly, Mr. Trump presented him-
self during the campaign as a stalwart
supporter of Israel and criticized the
Obama administration for allowing the
passage of a Security Council resolution
in December that condemned Israel for
its expansion of settlements.
While we dont believe the existence
giant Murray Energy. The company had
previously filed 14,000 pages of com-
ments opposing stronger regulations.
This unlawful and destructive rule is
nothing but a thinly veiled attempt to de-
stroy our nations underground coal
mines and put our nations coal miners
out of work, Robert E. Murray, the com-
panys chief executive, said in com-
ments released ahead of Thursdays
vote.
A report released by the Congres-
sional Research Service last month laid
out the environmental and health bene-
fits of the rule. Stream restoration re-
quirements would reduce human expo-
sure to contaminants in the drinking wa-
ter, and the probability of adverse health
effects, the report said. The replanting
of trees also required by the rule would
increase carbon storage and reduce
emissions, aiding in the fight against cli-
mate change, the report said.
The report also outlined the costs to
industry: $52 million in annual compli-
ance costs for the coal industry as a
whole, of which roughly half was ex-
pected to be borne by mining operations
in Appalachia.
The rule could endanger up to 590
coal mining jobs in the region, the report
estimated, though the losses would be
partly offset by engineers and biologists
that companies would need to hire to
comply with its terms.
Even without the rule, coal industry
employment would shrink by more than
15,000 workers, from a total of 90,000 in
2012, the report noted.
Daile Rois, 56, lives about 2,000 feet
from a shuttered coal mine outside
Charleston, W.Va. The mine, Keystone
Development No. 2, released debris and
chemicals into two creeks that meet at
the edge of her property and run past
her home.
After intense opposition from envi-
ronmental groups, which documented
streams clouded by sediment and moni-
tored rising acidity levels, West Virgin-
ias Department of Environmental Pro-
tection permanently closed the mine
last year and ordered the operator to re-
store the site a rare victory for local
environmentalists.
Here in West Virginia, many creeks
run orange from the contamination,
said Ms. Rois, who moved to West Vir-
ginia in 2012 with her partner to take
care of elderly relatives.
She called the Republican vote to re-
peal the Stream Protection Rule devas-
tating, a move that would allow mines
like Keystone to stay open.
Of course I care about miners jobs,
and I care about their safety, Ms. Rois
said. But orange is not the color of wa-
ter.
MIKE BELLEME FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
of settlements is an impediment to
peace, his press secretary, Sean Spicer,
said in a statement, the construction of
new settlements or the expansion of ex-
isting settlements beyond their current
borders may not be helpful in achieving
that goal.
The White House noted that the presi-
dent has not taken an official position
on settlement activity. It said he would
discuss the issue with Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel when
they meet Feb. 15, in effect telling Mr.
Netanyahu to wait until then. Embold-
ened by Mr. Trumps support, Israel has
announced plans for more than 5,000
new homes in the West Bank since his
inauguration.
Mr. Trump shifted his policy after he
met briefly with King Abdullah II of Jor-
dan on the sidelines of the National
Prayer Breakfast an encounter that
put the king, one of the most respected
leaders of the Arab world, ahead of Mr.
Netanyahu in seeing the new president.
Jordan, with its large Palestinian popu-
lation, has been steadfastly critical of
settlements.
The administrations abrupt turn-
around also coincided with Secretary of
State Rex W. Tillersons first day at the
State Department and the arrival of De-
fense Secretary Jim Mattis in South Ko-
rea on his first official trip. Both men are
viewed as potentially capable of exert-
ing a moderating influence on the presi-
dent and his cadre of White House ad-
visers, though it was unclear how much
they had to do with the shifts.
With Iran, Mr. Trump has indisput-
ably taken a harder line than his prede-
cessor. While the Obama administration
Franois Fillon leaving a rally. The perception of a political structure run by and for elites is helping propel the far-right National Front presidential candidate, Marine Le Pen.
Scandal indicts Frances political elite
FRANCE, FROM PAGE 1
Frances gilded political culture of im-
munity and privilege free train and
plane tickets, first-class travel, chauf-
feurs, all in a setting of marble and tap-
estries can no longer be taken for
granted, analysts warn.
The perception of a political structure
run by and for elites who use it to enrich
themselves sometimes corruptly, but
more often perfectly legally is helping
propel the far-right National Front can-
didate, Marine Le Pen.
Nepotism is part of French institu-
tional genetics, said Matthieu Caron, an
expert on government ethics at the Uni-
versity of Valenciennes. It is unfortu-
nately a great French tradition.
The scandal over Mr. Fillon, he added,
is making the National Fronts day,
even as Ms. Le Pens party, too, faces its
own no-show employment scandal in
the European Parliament.
The difference is that, unlike Mr. Fil-
lon, who has campaigned on a platform
of probity and high ethics, Ms. Le Pen
has never presented herself as the in-
carnation of republican morality, Mr.
Caron said.
Though a fixture of Frances political
landscape for over 40 years, the Na-
tional Front has never held power at the
top, and so can position itself outside the
establishment.
Just how much Mr. Fillons scandal
has improved the Fronts chances of top-
pling the old order in this springs elec-
tion is among the most urgent questions
facing France and Europe as a whole.
The uproar has similarly lifted the
hopes of Emmanuel Macron, the former
Rothschild banker and economy min-
ister in the Socialist government, who is
running an insurgent campaign atop his
own newly formed political movement.
The immediate problem facing Mr.
Fillon from the revelations in Le Canard
Enchan newspaper is that it is not
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, left, will appreciate President Trumps
tough tone on Iran, but Mr. Trumps statement on new settlements may trouble him.
often looked for ways to avoid con-
frontation with Iran in its last year, Mr.
Trump seems equally eager to chal-
lenge what he has said is an Iranian ex-
pansion across the region, especially in
Iraq and Yemen.
In an early morning Twitter post on
Thursday, Mr. Trump was bombastic on
Iran. Iran has been formally PUT ON
NOTICE for firing a ballistic missile, he
wrote. Should have been thankful for
the terrible deal the U.S. made with
them! In a second post, he said
wrongly, Iran was on its last legs and
ready to collapse until the U.S. came
along and gave it a life-line in the form of
clear his family members actually
worked for the money.
Frances financial prosecutor is now
looking into Mr. Fillons cozy monetary
arrangements with his wife. His parlia-
mentary offices were raided in the past
week, he and his wife, Penelope, were
questioned by the investigators, and Mr.
Fillon has said he will bow out of the race
if he is indicted.
But it is telling of the decades of slow
rot that have eaten into the political es-
tablishment that virtually no one in line
to replace Mr. Fillon is untainted, either.
Former prime minister Alain Jupp,
defeated by Mr. Fillon in the November
primary, was himself convicted in a no-
show employment scheme. The runner-
up, former president Nicolas Sarkozy,
too, is a subject of multiple financial in-
vestigations into alleged improprieties.
In France, to be a high-level member
of the political class is to enter an ex-
alted state where it appears O.K. to sum-
mon a professional shoeshiner to the
presidential palace (one of President
Franois Hollandes top aides was
forced to resign after that and similar
revelations). Lunches with the minister
are at least three courses with wine,
served by gloved footmen in gilt-pan-
eled chambers hung with tapestries.
Which may explain why Mr. Fillon, 62
and also a former prime minister,
sounded plaintive in the past week, de-
fending himself at a Paris trade show.
He had been in Frances Parliament
for 30 years and his wife had been work-
ing for him that long, he said. If they
wanted to get me in trouble over this,
they could have done it earlier, he com-
plained.
But that may be precisely the prob-
lem. Mr. Fillon didnt say it, but the im-
plication seemed clear: Over years of fat
parliamentary paychecks to his wife,
nobody ever raised questions about it.
And that, in spite of the fact that she
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
RONEN ZVULUN/REUTERS
the Iran Deal: $150 billion.
Still, the administration has been
careful not to specify what the national
security adviser, Michael T. Flynn,
meant when he said on Wednesday that
Iran had been put on notice for its mis-
sile test and for its arming and training
of the Houthi rebels in Yemen.
Mr. Netanyahu will cheer Mr. Trumps
tough tone with Iran. But the statement
on settlements may force him to change
course on a delicate domestic issue. Af-
ter Mr. Trump was sworn in, Israel an-
nounced that it would authorize another
2,500 homes in areas already settled in
the West Bank, and then followed that in
was never seen around the building, did
not have a badge or an email address,
according to some news reports, and
told interviewers over the years she
stayed away from her husbands poli-
tical life.
The sense of entitlement, and indeed
nepotism, is an inheritance of the coun-
trys monarchical culture, political ex-
perts and historians say.
At least 20 percent, and probably
more, of French legislators hire family
members. Others hire the wives, chil-
dren or nephews of colleagues, accord-
ing to some in Parliament a mutual
back-scratching that can profit both
sides.
Nepotism is part of French
institutional genetics.
Inside Parliaments stately marbled
chambers, some members ducked ques-
tions about family hiring. Just a few
wondered whether moral issues might
be involved.
On the whole, they are not calling
into question at all family employment,
insisted Ren Dosire, a veteran Social-
ist member of Parliament who has been
associated with ethics reform in Parlia-
ment. Even he defended the practice,
though he does not do it himself.
It is legal, Mr. Dosire mused. But
is it moral?
That question has not arisen publicly,
until now, and for good reason, experts
say. Employing family members bears
witness to a culture of caste or oligarchy
that makes it absolutely natural for poli-
ticians to profit to the maximum from
political power, said Jean Garrigues, a
leading historian of Frances political
culture.
Theres a custom, a culture which
has become part of French political life,
..
the past week by announcing 3,000
more.
On Wednesday, Mr. Netanyahu took it
a step further, vowing to build the first
new settlement in the West Bank in
many years.
For Mr. Netanyahu, the settlement
spree reflects a sense of liberation after
years of constraints from Washington,
especially under Mr. Obama, who, like
other presidents, viewed settlement
construction as an impediment to nego-
tiating a final peace settlement. It is also
an effort to deflect criticism from Is-
raels political right for Mr. Netanyahus
compliance with a court order to force
several dozen families out of an illegal
West Bank outpost, Amona.
The beyond their current borders
phrase in the White House statement
hinted at a return to a policy President
George W. Bush outlined to Prime Min-
ister Ariel Sharon in 2004, which ac-
knowledged that it was unrealistic to ex-
pect Israel to give up its major settle-
ments in a final deal, although they
would be offset by mutually agreed-
upon land swaps.
Mr. Trump had also promised to move
the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to
Jerusalem. But the White House has
slowed down the move, in part out of
fear of a violent response.
The policy shifts came after a turbu-
lent week in which Mr. Trump also
clashed with the leaders of Australia
and Mexico over one of the most fraught
issues of his new presidency: immigra-
tion. He defended the tense exchanges
as an overdue display of toughness by a
United States that has been exploited
by every nation in the world, virtually.
JULIEN WARNAND/EUROPEAN PRESSPHOTO AGENCY
which is a heritage of the monarchy, and
which is completely French, Mr. Gar-
rigues said. Theres this idea that, as
soon as he is picked, hes free to dispose
of public money as he pleases.
That is so despite reforms in 2013 that
have raised public expectations for
change, something Mr. Fillon appears to
have underestimated.
Since the ethics reform, members of
Parliament have to give the names of
their assistants, though not necessarily
their relationship to them.
Franois Fillon is in a new world
now, said Mr. Caron, the ethics expert.
There is a demand for transparency.
Some lawmakers were indignant.
Im transparent, one member of Par-
liament, Jean-Pierre Gorges, said an-
grily. I tell people, go see my wife and
daughter, and you will see how hard
they are working.
People are mixing everything up,
said Mr. Gorges, who represents the
town of Chartres. Its all just to have
next to you an employee who is actually
much closer to you, and can keep things
confidential. You are not just a deputy 9
to 5, you know.
The scandal over Mr. Fillon is unlikely
to simply blow over. What was toler-
ated 10 years ago will no longer be toler-
ated by the French, Mr. Garrigues said.
Theres a disjunction between public
opinion and the conservatism of the poli-
ticians.
That certainly appeared to be borne
out in the comments of visitors to the
grand old Parliament building in the
past week. As members ducked and
scurried in a marble antechamber off
the main hall, a visiting group from the
rural Loiret dpartement expressed dis-
may at the affair.
This just casts a shadow over our po-
litical institutions, Marc Bouwyn said.
And we are only now finding out about
it.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 7

world

Apush to let politics back in pulpits For Europe, the U.S.

WASHINGTON
Trump calls for repeal
of 1954 prohibition
affecting churches
BY MARK LANDLER
AND LAURIE GOODSTEIN
President Trump has vowed to overturn
a law restricting political speech by tax-
exempt churches, a potentially huge
victory for the religious right and a ges-
ture to evangelicals, a voting bloc he at-
tracted to his campaign by promising to
free up their pulpits.
Mr. Trump said on Thursday that his
administration would totally destroy
the Johnson Amendment, a 1954 law
that prohibits churches from endorsing
or opposing political candidates at the
risk of losing their tax-exempt status.
Freedom of religion is a sacred right,
but it is also a right under threat all
around us, Mr. Trump told religious
leaders at the National Prayer Break-
fast. That is why I will get rid of and to-
tally destroy the Johnson Amendment
and allow our representatives of faith to
speak freely and without fear of retribu-
tion.
Repealing the law would require ap-
proval by Congress, which could prove
challenging given that Democrats, and
even some Republicans, would resist
what many view as an erosion of the
separation between church and state.
Still, Mr. Trumps promise to repeal
the law fulfills a campaign pledge one
that became a centerpiece of his effort to
mollify the religious right, which was
slow to warm to his insurgent candidacy.
Eliminating the measure has been a
goal of many social conservatives, who
argue that it unfairly restricts clergy
members from expressing themselves
by endorsing, or speaking out against,
political candidates.
Many see government persecution in
limits on their official religious activities
at work, and complain that the Internal
Revenue Service an agency that the
right views with a special ire singles
out churches dominated by Christian
conservatives.
It was one of several checklist items
that religious conservative leaders told
Mr. Trump were important to them. And
they reacted to his announcement with
delight.
Americans dont need a federal tax
agency to be the speech police of
churches or any other nonprofit groups,
President Trump at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington. Repealing the law would require approval by Congress.
who have a constitutionally protected
freedom to decide for themselves what
they want to say or not say, said Erik
Stanley, senior counsel for the Alliance
Defending Freedom, a conservative
Christian legal defense group that has
opposed the Johnson Amendment.
Tony Perkins, the president of the
Family Research Council, a conserva-
tive Christian group, called Mr. Trumps
pledge outstanding right on target.
Pastors should be held accountable
to God alone for what they say behind
the pulpit, not the I.R.S., he said.
Many clergy members, however, say
they see no reason to lift the prohibition,
because making political endorsements
could divide their congregations. They
say the law in effect shields them from
pressure by advocacy groups and poli-
tically active congregants to make en-
dorsements.
It would usher our partisan divisions
into the pews, said Amanda Tyler, the
executive director of the Baptist Joint
Committee for Religious Liberty, a
group that advocates a strict separation
of church and state.
Churches and clergy members are
free to speak out on political and social
issues and many do but the John-
son Amendment was intended to inhibit
them from endorsing or opposing poli-
tical candidates.
Separately, the Free Speech Fairness
Act was introduced in the House of Rep-
resentatives and the Senate on Wednes-
day. The bill would modify the Johnson
Amendment by allowing churches and
other charities to engage in political ex-
pression.
However, most Americans, and even
most clergy members, say they do not
want churches and houses of worship to
engage in partisan politics. Nearly 80
percent of Americans said it was in-
appropriate for pastors to endorse a
candidate in church, and 75 percent said
churches should not make endorse-
ments, according to a survey released in
STEPHEN CROWLEY/THE NEW YORK TIMES
September by LifeWay Research, an
evangelical polling group based in
Nashville.
Moreover, 87 percent of pastors said
they should not make political endorse-
ments from the pulpit, according to a
LifeWay survey conducted in 2012 of
pastors in evangelical and mainline
Protestant churches. (Clergy members
who were Republicans were slightly
more in favor of endorsements than
those who were Democrats or independ-
ents.)
Pastors and churches that endorsed
candidates have seemed to have little to
fear from the I.R.S.
Only one church is known to have
ever lost its tax-exempt status for parti-
san politicking, and that was in 1995,
those on all sides said.
Mark Landler reported from Washing-
ton, and Laurie Goodstein from New
York. Jeremy W. Peters contributed re-
porting from Washington.
is the new threat
EUROPE, FROM PAGE 1
course, President Vladimir V. Putin of
Russia.
Mr. Trump is convinced that the
United States has been played for a
patsy by the rest of the world and is vow-
ing to set things straight. Were taken
advantage of by every nation in the
world virtually, he said on Thursday at
a prayer breakfast. Its not going to
happen anymore.
Against this forbidding backdrop,
some European leaders are urging their
counterparts to recognize that Mr.
Trump may represent a truly dire chal-
lenge, one that threatens to upend not
only the 70-year European project of in-
tegration and security, but just about ev-
erything they stand for, including liberal
democracy itself.
A European official, Donald Tusk, cre-
ated a stir on Tuesday when he wrote a
letter to 27 leaders of the blocs 28 mem-
ber states suggesting that the Trump
administration presented a threat on a
par with a newly assertive China, an ag-
gressive Russia and wars, terror and
anarchy in the Middle East and Africa.
Intentionally, he left out Britain, be-
cause it has voted to leave the bloc and
its prime minister, Theresa May, has
rushed with what some Europeans con-
sider unseemly rapidity to the side of
Mr. Trump, who has derided the Euro-
pean Union and praised Britains with-
drawal, or Brexit, saying, I dont think
it matters much for the United States.
In his letter, Mr. Tusk, a former Polish
prime minister who is the president of
the European Council, made up of the
national leaders, wrote of worrying
declarations from the Trump team,
adding: Particularly the change in
Washington puts the European Union in
a difficult situation, with the new admin-
istration seeming to put into question
the last 70 years of American foreign
policy. to gain trade advantages over other Eu-
Stefano Stefanini, a former Italian
ambassador working in Brussels, said
that Mr. Tusk is prone to exaggeration exports, annoying some of its neighbors,
and that he had a specific Polish fear of
Mr. Trumps apparent coziness with Mr.
Putin.
But Mr. Tusk has some justification,
Mr. Stefanini said, because he is also re-
acting to a complacent Brussels estab-
lishment that he believes is shrugging
off Brexit, Trump and right-wing popu-
lism and believes its business as usual. himself as Mr. Trumps top choice to suc-
Others say Mr. Tusk is adapting real-
istically to a series of new dangers
posed by the new administration in
Washington. Mr. Trumps open protec-
tionism, his contempt for the European
his reluctance to commit to summit
meetings with the European Union or
even with NATO are deeply troubling
for Europeans, said Leslie Vinjamuri, a
professor of international relations at
Londons School of Oriental and African
Studies.
Americas strategy towards Europe
has always been highly consequential,
but up until now that strategy has been
aimed at bolstering Europe, she said.
The United States has provided that
overarching protection and alliance that
underpins the whole thing and makes it
work, she said. But dealing with Rus-
sia and China is suddenly a whole differ-
ent calculus if you dont have America
behind you.
Then there is Germany and the euro.
Traditionally, Europeans view Germany
as the bulwark of the European Union,
its largest, richest and most influential
country, but uncomfortable with open
leadership. Chancellor Angela Merkel of
Germany, up for re-election this au-
tumn, is viewed as practical, pragmatic
and devoted to the European project,
and Germans see the euro as a political
sacrifice they made of the revered
deutschemark to please the French.
So they deeply resent Mr. Trumps at-
tacks on Ms. Merkel for her refugee pol-
icy and his statements that the Euro-
pean Union itself is a vehicle for Ger-
man self-interest. Ms. Merkel was angry
over comments by Peter Navarro, the
director of Mr. Trumps new National
Trade Council, that Germany was ma-
nipulating a grossly undervalued euro
Rather than acting as a check
on these forces, Trump seems to
be amplifying them, and thats
pretty terrifying.
ropeans and the United States.
While Germany depends heavily on
the value of the euro is the same for all
that use it, and Ms. Merkel made clear
that its value was up to the European
Central Bank, not Berlin. But a protec-
tionist America that opposes free trade
is certainly unhelpful to Germany.
Added to that are the comments by
Ted Malloch, who has been advertising
ceed Anthony L. Gardner as ambassa-
dor to the European Union. Mr. Malloch,
a strong supporter of Britain leaving the
bloc, has publicly said that Mr. Trump
doesnt like an organization that is su-

Visa ban amended to allow Iraqi interpreters

BAGHDAD
Change eases some anger
generated by travel order,
which has sown anxiety
BY DAVID ZUCCHINO
The Trump administration has
amended its visa ban to allow emigra-
tion by the families of Iraqi interpreters
who served the United States govern-
ment and military forces deployed in
their country.
The change on Thursday, recom-
mended by the Pentagon, eased some of
the anger generated in Iraq by Presi-
dent Trumps executive order imposing
the ban, which has stoked anxiety and
confusion around much of the world
since it was issued late last month.
The order temporarily blocked all
Syrian refugees from entering the
United States and suspended visas for
applicants from seven Muslim-majority
countries, including Iraq. It applied to
holders of so-called Special Immigrant
Visas issued to interpreters who worked
for the United States during its 2003-11
occupation, often at great personal risk,
and to their families.
In a statement about the change sent
to The New York Times, a United States
Embassy official in Baghdad said, The
U.S. government has determined that it
is in the national interest to allow Iraqi
Special Immigrant Visa (S.I.V.) holders
to continue to travel to the United
States. Iraqis who have received the vi-
sas, the statement said, may use them,
and the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad will
continue to process and issue S.I.V.s to
applicants who are otherwise qualified.
For the family of a 37-year-old Iraqi
who once worked as an interpreter for
American forces, the news was a joyous
surprise after nearly a week of upended
travel plans. An embassy official called
to inform family members that they
were again permitted to fly to the United
States.
Im shocked all over again, said the
former interpreter, who asked to be
identified only by his first name and an
initial, Munther A., to protect relatives
in Iraq.
The ban has thrown the lives of many
former interpreters in Iraq into turmoil.
Even with valid visas, some were re-
fused entry at American airports and
others were removed from planes
scheduled to fly to the United States.
There was also confusion because the
executive order, at least initially, barred
entry to Iraqis who held American
green cards. Many of them, but not all,
CHRISTOPH BANGERT FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
An Iraqi interpreter, right, with American and Iraqi military forces in Baghdad in 2009.
Interpreters have risked their lives as the eyes and ears of the American military.
The Pentagon recommended that the Since 2007, the State Department has
White House exempt from the travel issued more than 1,700 Special Immi-
ban Special Immigrant Visa holders and grant Visas to Iraqi interpreters and
others who had demonstrated their their family members.
commitment to American forces. The embassy in Baghdad did not dis-
Munther A. and his family were re- close the number of Iraqis affected by
moved from a Turkish Airlines flight in the change in the Trump administra-
Istanbul last weekend just as they had tions visa ban. Only 19 such visas were
settled into their seats for a scheduled issued to Iraqi interpreters and their
flight to Kennedy Airport. They were families during the past three years, ac-
forced to fly back to Baghdad, he said. cording to State Department figures.
Most Iraqis holding the special visas Mr. Trump said when he issued the ex-
have sold their homes, cars and other ecutive order that it was intended to al-
possessions in anticipation of starting a low American officials to vet Iraqis and
new life in the United States. Munther A. others more thoroughly. But the inter-
said his family had been forced to find preters had extensive security vetting
emergency housing with friends in before they were permitted to accompa-
Baghdad. ny American forces. They spent years
clearing more background security
checks while applying for the visas.
Even after the phone call from the em-
bassy, Munther A. and his family were
initially turned away by airline officials
in Baghdad on Thursday as they tried to
board a connecting flight to Doha, Qatar.
He called a telephone number provided
by the embassy, he said, and the prob-
lem was resolved.
Were getting on the flight now,
Munther A. said in a telephone inter-
view from the Baghdad airport late
Thursday afternoon.
He said his 7-year-old daughter was in
tears last weekend because the can-
celed flight meant she would not be able
to visit Disneyland, as her father had
promised. I told her shes going now,
Munther A. said.
Thousands of interpreters, known to
the troops as terps, rode for years with
American forces on combat missions in
Iraq and Afghanistan.
They were given American nick-
faces to mask their identities.
They risked their lives as the eyes and
ears of the American military in Iraq.
They did far more than just interpret,
guiding American soldiers and com-
manders through Iraqi politics, tribal
disputes and social customs.
Other Iraqis who assisted the Ameri-
can military or government in Iraq indi-
rectly remained in limbo on Thursday.
Many had received refugee visas to re-
settle in the United States with the as-
sistance of the International Organiza-
tion for Migration, but they were
blocked by the travel ban this past week.
A 33-year-old Iraqi father of two who
worked seven years for a contractor
that supplied American troops said he
and his family had been granted visas
for relocation to Charlotte, N.C., after
passing extensive security checks.
They were scheduled to fly from Iraq
to the United States on Thursday, said
the man, who asked to be identified as
Ahmed A.
He was told by the International Or-
ganization for Migration this past week
that his flight had been canceled be-
cause of the travel ban.
Having already sold his home and car
and quit his job, he scrambled to find a
The interpreters already have
had extensive security vetting.
place to live with friends in Erbil, Iraq.
Ahmed A. said he had heard nothing
from the International Organization for
Migration as of Thursday. A spokesman
for the organization in Iraq did not re-
spond to a request for comment.
There also was confusion on Thurs-
day for Qusay Fawzi Ahmed, 38, a for-
mer military interpreter who moved to
Tampa, Fla., in 2012, after receiving a
special immigrant visa.
Last weekend, Mr. Ahmed was await-
ing a phone call from his fiance, Marwa
Nasr al-Din, who was flying to New York
from Iraq with a valid visa in her pass-
port. After years of waiting, she said, she
received approval to join her fianc.
Mr. Ahmed, who works at Dominos,
said he was delivering a pizza in Tampa
when his fiance called him from Ken-
nedy Airport. She told him she had been
detained and ordered to fly back to
Cairo, where her flight had originated,
and then to her home in Erbil.
My fiance is a 25-year-old girl
shes not going to bomb anything, Mr.
Ahmed said in a telephone interview.
Ms. Din said on Thursday that she
had been unable to find out when, or
whether, her visa would allow her to join
her fianc in Tampa.
Is this the freedom and democracy
Union and his ambivalence toward
NATO are serious and damaging, which
Mr. Tusk understands, said Mark Leon-
ard, the director of the European Coun-
cil on Foreign Relations.
Trump is the first American presi-
dent since the E.U. was created not to be
in favor of deeper European integra-
tion, Mr. Leonard said. Not only that,
but hes against it and sees the destruc-
tion of the European Union as in Ameri-
cas interest.
Worse, he said: Europeans see
Trump as the biggest threat to global or-
der and the European ideal of how the
world should be organized. The U.S. has
been a crucial part of the ballast meant
to be upholding the global order in the
face of these other challenges Tusk men-
tions, from Russia and China to Islamic
radicalism.
But rather than acting as a check on
these forces, Trump seems to be ampli-
fying them, and thats pretty terrifying,
Mr. Leonard continued. Its like you
suddenly discover that the medicine
youve been taking is making you sicker
than the illness itself.
For his part, Mr. Trump described his
confrontational diplomatic style as a ne-
cessity. The world is in trouble, but
were going to straighten it out, O.K.?
he said at the prayer breakfast on
Thursday. Thats what I do I fix
things.
There have been other moments
when Europeans judged American poli-
cies as harmful, including the Iraq war
and the assaults on multilateralism
early in the first term of President
George W. Bush. But Trumps attacks
are of a different scale and come when
theres a lot of indigenous turmoil any-
way, Mr. Leonard said. He seems to be
linking up with some of the scariest and
darkest forces within European socie-
ties, which all want the European Un-
ion to fail, he said.
Mr. Trumps views about Europe and
pranational, that is unelected, where the
bureaucrats run amok, and is not
frankly a proper democracy.
Mr. Malloch has also referred to Jean-
Claude Juncker, the European Commis-
sion president, as a very adequate
mayor of some city in Luxembourg,
predicted that the euro would collapse
and compared the bloc to the Soviet Un-
ion. I had in a previous career a diplo-
matic post where I helped bring down
the Soviet Union, he said on British
television. So maybe theres another
union that needs a little taming.
Mr. Malloch may not get nominated,
and if he does, the bloc may not accept
his posting, Mr. Gardner said.
Mr. Trump is getting advice that is a
caricature of the E.U. as a dysfunctional
entity, not delivering and wholly inaccu-
rate, despite all the challenges, Mr.
Gardner said, citing joint European-
American efforts in counterterrorism,
trade, sanctions, security, digital pri-
vacy and policing. Even Mrs. May has
said Britain sees a cohesive E.U. in
British interests. She doesnt want to see
a disintegrating E.U. on its doorstep and
nor do we. Hopefully that will be heard
by others in the administration.
Mr. Tusk, he said, has a point, trying to
dissuade other European Union nations,
like Hungary and Poland, from rushing
to Washington to try to make separate
deals, which would be illegal, with the
Trump administration. China and Rus-
sia, too, have always tried to ignore the
European Union and deal bilaterally
with member states, something Mr.
Trump seems to be encouraging.
The French, who are being tough on a
British withdrawal and are deeply dis-
concerted by Mr. Trump, see him as a
bigger threat to European cohesion,
said Charles Grant, director of the Cen-
ter for European Reform. They see the
three great world powers Russia,
China and now the U.S. wanting to de-
stroy the E.U., he said.
FILIPPO MONTEFORTE/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE GETTY IMAGES

were eventually permitted to enter the Qusay Fawzi Ahmed, a former military names like Tony and Bobby and Max. we have heard about in the U.S.A.? she Donald Tusk of the European Council suggested that the Trump administration was a
United States. interpreter, with his fiance. They often wore scarves across their asked. threat on a par with China, Russia and conflicts in the Middle East and Africa.

8 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
SCIENCE LAB
I C E C A PA D E S
A beach where diamonds melt
Large lumps scatter across a beach at the mouth of the
Tokachi River on Hokkaido, the northern island of Japan.
They shine like diamonds beneath evening moonbeams and
glow like amber in the setting sun.
At first glance, the scene looks like the remnants of a giants
jewel heist gone wrong. But these glistening gems are just ice
chunks, spit out by the river and tumbled by ocean waves.
Theyre called Tokachi river ice, jewelry ice or jewel ice, and
they appear only here, and only during the coldest winter
months. After locals began posting pictures online, the jewel
ice went viral.
D I F F I C U LT R E L AT I V E S
This prehistoric human ancestor was all mouth
About 540 million years ago, our
ancestors were insignificant creatures
no more than a millimeter in size.
They wriggled around in the sedi-
ment of shallow seas, gulped prey
into their minuscule, baglike bodies
and expelled the water through cone-
shaped spouts around their mouths.
Animals this small do not fossilize
well, which is why this stage of the
distant evolutionary past is so little
known. But a cache of 45 individuals
has been unearthed in Shaanxi Prov-
ince, in central China, in rock strata
said to be some 540 million years old.
The creatures are the oldest known
members of an ancient group called
deuterostomes, which are ancestral JIAN HAN/NORTHWEST UNIVERSITY, CHINA
not just to humans but to a wide array
of animals, from sea urchins and fossils are known, they lie on branches
starfish to the vast family of verte- of the tree of life that do not lead to
brates. Although slightly older animal humans.
MAURICIO ANTN/NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY
Nobody deliberately set out to make
tomatoes that dont have flavor.
Harry Klee, of the University of Florida, who is trying to breed tomatoes that
taste like older varieties.
STAT E O F T H I N G S
Hydrogen squeezed into a metal, possibly solid, Harvard physicists say
Squeezed between two pieces of dia-
mond, hydrogen has been transformed
into a metallic form believed to exist
inside giant planets like Jupiter, scien-
tists reported last week in the journal
Science.
You can see it becomes a lustrous,
shiny material, which is what you
expect for a metal, said Isaac F. Sil-
vera, a professor of physics at Har-
vard, who published the findings with
Ranga P. Dias, a postdoctoral re-
searcher.
NICHOLAS WADE If some theoretical predictions turn
MASAMI GOTO/SEBUN PHOTO/AMANA IMAGES
OT T E R S AU R U S
Suddenly, not so cute
Cuddly and covered in soft brown fur,
otters look like teddy bears that can
swim. But six million years ago in
the wetlands of southwestern China,
there roamed a relative that was
more fearsome than adorable.
Known as Siamogale melilutra, the
newly discovered extinct otter was
about the size of a wolf and had
strong-looking jaws. A team of scien-
tists from China and the United
States described the species after
finding a cranium, a mandible and
some teeth.
Its huge, its bigger than any-
thing Ive ever seen in terms of
otters, said Denise Su of the Cleve-
land Museum of Natural History and
co-author of a report describing the
otter, which measured about six feet
long and weighed about 110 pounds.
NICHOLAS ST. FLEUR
out to be true, the new state of hydro-
gen could even be a solid metal that is
metastable remaining solid even
after the crushing pressure is removed
and a superconductor, able to con-
duct electricity without resistance, Dr.
Silvera said.
But in the small but contentious field
of high-pressure physics, some scien-
tists who perform similar experiments
were harshly skeptical and wondered
how the research passed peer review
at a top journal like Science.
Its how should I put it? the
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
MASAAKI TANAKA/SEBUN PHOTO/AMANA IMAGES
When temperatures are well below freezing, the mouth of
the crystal-clear river freezes over. The ice breaks into chunks
that float out into the frigid ocean and then wash up on shore.
There, the polished blocks accumulate and eventually
melt into the sand. Its the same type of hexagonal ice that
snow crystals are made of.
I had never heard of this type of ice and have never seen
any sea ice like it, wrote Peter Wadhams, an ocean physicist
at the University of Cambridge who studies polar oceans and
sea ice. Its just river ice, which is transparent because it has
no salt in it. JOANNA KLEIN
COSMIC DEBRIS
Meteorite origins
hidden in tiny crystals
You would think that meteorites
landing on Earth might closely re-
semble asteroids orbiting in the solar
system. But they seem to made of
different materials. Why?
To find out, an international team
of researchers dissolved almost 600
pounds of ancient limestone from
Russia to extract 46 minuscule crys-
tals containing the mineral chromite.
NOAA/NASA
These crystals persist unchanged for
HURRICANES IN HD
hundreds of millions of years.
Pretty pictures Forty-one of the 46 crystals came
from space, and more than a third
and better forecasts
were a type of meteorite known as a
Heres a reminder of how beautiful our primitive achondrite. Thats unusual,
planet is. because today achondrites account
The National Oceanic and Atmos- for less than half of 1 percent of mete-
pheric Administration has released the orites.
first batch of images taken by the
The finding supports the idea that
recently launched GOES-16 satellite.
many meteorites landing on Earth
With a high-definition camera, the
are debris from a vast collision in the
satellite shows our blue marble with
asteroid belt some 466 million years
wisps of white clouds and splotches of
green and brown in vivid detail. ago. KENNETH CHANG
GOES-16 is the first in a series of
next-generation geostationary weather
satellites designed to observe Earth ONLINE: TRILOBITES
and provide better weather forecasts. Daily nuggets of science for mobile
NICHOLAS ST. FLEUR readers. nytimes.com/trilobites
product of Ikes imagination from the
title to the end, said Eugene Greg-
oryanz, a physicist at the University of
Edinburgh in Scotland.
Editors at Science declined to dis-
cuss the paper, but in a statement,
Jeremy Berg, the editor in chief, said
that submissions must pass rigorous
review by experts and that only about
7 percent are published.
Dr. Silvera defended his work. If we
did it again, wed get the same result,
Im certain, he said.
KENNETH CHANG RANGA DIAS AND ISAAC F. SILVERA
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
Business
Tourists waving at Marine One, the presidents helicopter, after President Trump returned to the White House. He has ignored basic management principles, experts say.
Case study in management chaos
James B. Stewart
COMMON SENSE
For someone who promoted his man-
agement skills and campaigned as an
organizational genius, as Anderson
Cooper of CNN put it, it has been a
rocky White House debut for Donald J.
Trump, the first president to go di-
rectly from the executive suite to the
Oval Office.
Chaos seems to be the word most
often invoked, closely followed by
turmoil. (One exception: the White
House spokesman, Sean Spicer, who
said he preferred action-packed.)
In less than two weeks, Mr. Trump
created upheaval at the nations bor-
ders, alienated longtime allies, roiled
markets with talk of a trade war and
prompted some of the largest protests
any president has faced.
The conservative editorial page of
The Wall Street Journal bemoaned a
refugee policy so poorly explained
and prepared for, that it has produced
confusion and fear at airports, an
immediate legal defeat, and political
fury at home and abroad.
Even the top House Republican,
Speaker Paul D. Ryan, who had re-
leased a statement praising the immi-
gration order, later distanced himself,
saying, Its regrettable that there was
some confusion with the rollout.
All new presidents undergo a learn-
ing curve. But Mr. Trump promised a
seamless transition and, with a real
chief executive in charge as opposed to
Uber chiefs tricky calculus as Trump adviser
SAN FRANCISCO
Decision to leave council
follows pressure from
workers and social media
BY MIKE ISAAC
Travis Kalanick needed everyone to
take a deep breath.
The chief executive of Uber was hold-
ing a regularly scheduled all-hands
meeting on Tuesday at the ride-hailing
companys San Francisco headquarters
when he faced an onslaught of questions
from upset employees.
Uber was under attack unfairly,
many staff members believed after
people accused the company of seeking
to profit from giving rides to airport
customers in New York during weekend
protests against President Trumps im-
migration order.
But there was another matter disturb-
ing the employees: Mr. Kalanick him-
self. He had joined Mr. Trumps eco-
nomic advisory council in December. Af-
ter the immigration order against ref-
ugees and seven Muslim-majority
countries, many staff members won-
dered why Mr. Kalanick was still willing
a career politician, an administration
that would function as a well-oiled
machine.
So it doesnt seem premature to ask
some leading management experts for
an assessment of Mr. Trumps first
weeks, purely from the viewpoint of
organizational behavior and manage-
ment effectiveness.
The unanimous verdict: Thus far,
the Trump administration is a textbook
case of how not to run a complex orga-
nization like the executive branch of
the United States government.
This is so basic, its covered in the
introduction to the M.B.A. program
that all our students take, said Lin-
dred Greer, an assistant professor of
organizational behavior at the Stanford
Graduate School of Business. By all
outward indications, Mr. Trump des-
perately needs to take the course, she
said.
Jeffrey Pfeffer, professor of organiza-
tional behavior at Stanford and the
author of Power: Why Some People
Have It and Others Dont, said Mr.
Trumps executive actions as president
are so far from any responsible man-
agement approach that they all but
defy analysis.
Of course, this isnt new, he told
me. His campaign also violated every
prudent management principle. Every-
one including our friends on Wall
Street somehow believed that once he
was president hed change. I dont
understand that logic.
Wall Street did take notice. After
months of cheering the prospect of tax
reform and infrastructure spending,
investors sold stocks after a weekend
of chaos at the nations airports con-
nected to the presidents executive
order on immigration. On Monday, the
Dow industrials experienced the big-
gest one-day decline since the election,
fueled by worries that a dysfunctional
White House wouldnt be able to exe-
cute Mr. Trumps policies.
to advise the president.
What would it take for you to quit the
economic council? at least two employ-
ees asked at the Tuesday meeting.
On Thursday, Mr. Kalanick gave his
answer, stepping down from Mr.
Trumps economic advisory council.
There are many ways we will continue
to advocate for just change on immigra-
tion, but staying on the council was go-
ing to get in the way of that, Mr. Kalan-
ick wrote in an email to employees ob-
tained by The New York Times.
Mr. Kalanicks exit from the advisory
council underscores the tricky calculus
facing many Silicon Valley corporate
chieftains who try to work with the new
administration. On one hand, many tech
executives have openly tried to engage
with the president, a path that is typi-
cally good for business. Yet Mr. Trumps
immigration order has been so unpopu-
lar with so many tech workers many
of whom are immigrants themselves
and who advocate globalization that
they are now exerting pressure on their
chief executives to push back forcefully
against the administration.
The tension over continuing to work
with Mr. Trump reached a breaking
point at Uber because Mr. Kalanick was
one of the most vocal proponents among
tech chiefs of engaging with the presi-
dent. As recently as Jan. 28, Mr. Kalan-
If you thought immigration was
bad, just wait for health care, Mr.
Pfeffer warned.
The White House did not respond to
requests for comment.
There is an enormous amount of
literature and data exploring what
constitutes effective management of
complicated organizations. The core
principles have served many leaders
really well, said Jeffrey T. Polzer,
professor of human resource manage-
ment at Harvard Business School. Its
really common sense: You want to
surround yourself with talented people
who have the most expertise, who
bring different perspectives to the
issue at hand. Then you foster debate
The unanimous verdict: Thus
far, the Trump administration is
a textbook example of how not
to run a complex organization
like the executive branch.
ness of the immigration ban, Mr. Spicer
and invite different points of view in
order to reach a high-quality solution.
This is often easier said than done. It
requires an openness to being chal- Greer said. Comments like Mr. Spicers
lenged, and some self-awareness and
even humility to acknowledge that
there are areas where other people
know more than you do, Mr. Polzer
continued. This doesnt mean deci- hear.
sions are made by consensus. The
person at the top makes the decisions,
but based on the facts and expertise
necessary to make a good decision.
Mr. Trump has already violated
several of these core principles. The
secretary of Homeland Security, John
F. Kelly, was still discussing a proposed
executive order restricting immigra-
tion when Mr. Trump went ahead and
signed it. Nor was Jim Mattis, the
defense secretary, consulted; he saw
the final order only hours before it
ick had publicly said in a blog post that
the best route forward was to have a
seat at the table. He had added, We
partner around the world optimistically
in the belief that by speaking up and en-
gaging we can make a difference.
Outside of the internal pressure, Uber
faced other fallout from Mr. Kalanicks
stance. More than 200,000 customers
had deleted their accounts.
In addition, Uber rivals had seized the
moment to attack the company and bol-
ster their own businesses. The New
York Taxi Workers Alliance sent emails
to the news media calling attention to
Ubers ties to Mr. Trump.
Travis and the other C.E.O.s are on
that (presidential) board for one simple
reason: To advance their business inter-
ests, said Dan OSullivan, a writer from
the Chicago area who helped to spread
the #DeleteUber campaign on social
media.
Internally, Uber staff members also
began piling on the pressure. According
to nearly a dozen current and former
Uber engineers and product managers
who attended or were briefed on the
Tuesday all-hands meeting, employees
said they were concerned that Mr.
Kalanicks willingness to work with Mr.
Trump after the immigration order
would color Uber as a soulless company
that cared only about its bottom line.
AL DRAGO/THE NEW YORK TIMES
went into effect.
Not to consult thoroughly with top
cabinet officers before deciding on the
order is insane, since they have the
expertise and should be on top of the
data, Ms. Greer said. Ignoring them
leads to bad decisions and is also in-
credibly demoralizing.
And theres another reason to con-
sult, Mr. Polzer said: When people are
genuinely involved in a decision and
their input is heard and valued and
respected, they are more likely to
support and buy into the decision and
be motivated to execute to the best of
their abilities, even if the decision
doesnt go their way.
Conversely, people who arent con-
sulted feel they have no stake in a
successful outcome.
Far from encouraging and weighing
differing views as part of decision-
making, Mr. Trump appears to view
dissension as disloyalty. After career
State Department officers circulated a
draft cable questioning the effective-
responded, They should either get
with the program or they can go.
Debate and dissent are essential to
reaching any thoughtful outcome, Ms.
will discourage anyone from speaking
up. You end up with group think, an
echo chamber where people only say
what they think the president wants to
And while its understandable that
the president was eager to act swiftly
to follow through on his campaign
promises, he had made a long list of
actions to be carried out on Day 1
his directives came across as need-
lessly hasty and poorly thought
through. Some had to be reframed
(talk of a Mexican border surcharge)
or significantly modified and clarified
after the fact (immigration policy).
I asked the management experts to
STEWART, PAGE 10
Some told Mr. Kalanick that they had
suffered a personal cost a stigma,
they said of working at Uber. One staff
member asked him to present the bene-
fits of working at Uber that could out-
weigh that personal cost.
Mr. Kalanick replied that he believed
that change could be best affected
through engagement, and through the
work they did every single day.
Many employees were not satisfied
with his answer. On Wednesday, staff
members followed up by circulating a
Google document titled Letters to
Travis to tell the chief executive how
and why his willingness to engage with
the administration had affected them.
By Thursday morning, Mr. Kalanick
had reversed his position on engaging
with Mr. Trump. His participation in the
economic advisory council had created
what he called a perception-reality gap
between who people think we are, and
who we actually are.
In his email to employees, he said his
participation was being interpreted as a
sign that he had endorsed the president.
In fact, Mr. Kalanick said, the immigra-
tion order was hurting many people
across America.
Immigration and openness to ref-
ugees is an important part of our coun-
trys success and quite honestly to
Ubers, he wrote.
SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 9
Snapchat filing
showcases strength
SAN FRANCISCO
Company says it wants
to raise $3 billion in
preparation for I.P.O.
BY MICHAEL J. DE LA MERCED
AND KATIE BENNER
Snapchat may have been built on disap-
pearing messages. But as the social me-
dia darling is on the cusp of becoming a
public company, its parent is trying to
show how durable its business is.
In its first public prospectus, Snap
Inc. disclosed on Thursday that it had
built a nearly $405 million advertising
business in just over two years. While
the filing does not indicate a price for an
initial public offering, Snap is expected
to seek a market valuation of more than
$20 billion from investors.
In the filing, Snap said that it wanted
to raise $3 billion, an estimate meant to
help determine registration fees. The
company may seek as much as $4 bil-
lion, a figure that would make it one of
the biggest tech offerings in United
States history, according to Standard &
Poors Global Market Intelligence.
Snap filed confidentially to go public
with the Securities and Exchange Com-
mission late last year. Making the filing
public was one of the companys final
steps before it begins trading on the
New York Stock Exchange under the
ticker symbol SNAP. If all goes well, the
offering is expected to furnish its
founders and early investors with a
windfall.
Within weeks, Snap executives will
begin formally meeting with prospec-
tive investors, along with the companys
lead underwriters at Morgan Stanley
and Goldman Sachs. The pitch is
straightforward: Snap is one of technol-
ogys biggest success stories of late, and
it is heading to the public markets amid
a relative dearth of noteworthy offer-
ings.
Still, company executives are ex-
pected to face questions about whether
Snap can maintain its enormous growth
rate, particularly as Facebooks Insta-
gram unit copies many of Snapchats
major features. Potential investors may
question the slowing growth rate of
daily users, though Snap will probably
argue that it will keep adding new prod-
ucts, which will accelerate growth.
Others in Snaps class of popular
start-ups like Uber, Airbnb and Drop-
box are not expected to begin selling
stock on public markets for months or
even years, as they are tied up with legal
issues or are overhauling their busi-
nesses.
The filing on Thursday formally pulls
back the curtain on Snaps meteoric
growth. From 2011 to 2012, the number of
people using the Snapchat app every
day grew to one million from 1,000. By
the end of last year, an average of 158
million people were using the app daily. pany said, employing what is surely one
The average user opens the app more
than 18 times a day, according to the pro-
spectus, and the services users send
more than 2.5 billion messages and im-
ages each day. Snap declared in its prospectus that it
Snap demonstrated in the prospectus
that its business model is viable. Its an-
nual revenue grew by about seven times
in just a year, to $404.5 million last year,
from $58.7 million in 2015.
Martin Sorrell, chief executive of the
advertising conglomerate WPP, re-
cently estimated that his company
spent $90 million on Snapchat last year.
He called Snap a rogue elephant, even
as WPP deployed $5 billion to Google
and $1.7 billion to Facebook in 2016.
I would say Snapchat is the one thing
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that people look at and say, Maybe
thats a third force that can counter the
domination, Mr. Sorrell said last
month, speaking at a conference held by
Citigroup.
Still, Snap lost $514 million last year,
compared with nearly $373 million in
2015. One difference between Snap and
its rivals Facebook and Twitter makes it
hard to compare their financials side by
side: Those older social networks own
their own server farms, so the expense
of operating them does not show up as a
line item in the companies financial
statements. By contrast, Snap rents
storage and server space from Google.
The ad market is highly concentrated
in 10 countries, according to data from
International Data Corporation, and
about 60 percent of Snaps users are in
those countries.
By the end of 2016, the prospectus
says, Snap made $1.05 for each of its us-
ers, up from 31 cents in the fourth quar-
ter of 2015. The company made $2.15 per
user in North America in the fourth
quarter of 2016, compared with 67 cents
the year before. In Europe, by compari-
son, the company made 28 cents per
user at the end of last year.
Started in 2011 in a Stanford dorm
room, Snap has grown from a curio for
millennials into a broad social phenom-
enon. The start-up, founded by Evan
Spiegel and Bobby Murphy, was origi-
nally built for users to send self-destruc-
LUCAS JACKSON/REUTERS
Evan Spiegel, who co-founded Snap Inc.
with Bobby Murphy to let users send
self-destructing photographs and texts.
When we were just getting
started, many people didnt
understand what Snapchat was
and said it was just for sexting.
ting photographs and messages to their
friends. But Snaps ambitions have risen
over time. It introduced ways for users
to compile stories about their days
and innovative filters that can trans-
form faces to look like dogs or monsters
or, crucially, branded content like
Taco Bell tacos.
When we were just getting started,
many people didnt understand what
Snapchat was and said it was just for
sexting, even when we knew it was be-
ing used for so much more, the com-
of the few uses of the word sexting in a
regulatory filing.
While generally seen as a social me-
dia company like Facebook and Twitter,
is a camera company. And indeed last
year, Snap introduced a line of camera-
equipped sunglasses, Spectacles, which
help funnel even more user content onto
the platform. Snap also created Dis-
cover, allowing media companies to post
content onto their own channels on the
service. On Thursday, The New York
Times Company announced a partner-
ship with Snapchat Discover.
Sapna Maheshwari contributed report-
ing.
Est.
1926
taxfreecars@bluewin.ch

10 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
business
Chief regrets
Deutsche
Banks past
misconduct
FRANKFURT
German lender absorbs
large legal settlement and
cuts managers bonuses
BY JACK EWING
The chief executive of Deutsche Bank
has apologized in especially contrite
terms for the long list of misdeeds that
tarnished the German lenders reputa-
tion and cost it billions of euros in fines
and settlements, adding that bonuses of
top managers would be cut.
The unusually strong expression of
humility on Thursday, which came as
the bank disclosed a quarterly loss of 1.9
billion euros, or $2 billion, reflected the
tone that John Cryan, the chief execu-
tive, has tried to set since taking over in
July 2015.
His comments at a news conference
signaled another step away from the ag-
gressive risk-taking that was part of the
lenders attempt to keep pace with
American investment banking titans
like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan
Chase.
Speaking slowly and with a grave de-
meanor, Mr. Cryan expressed deep re-
gret for what happened.
We would like to apologize sin-
cerely, he said. Serious errors were
made.
Under Mr. Cryans leadership,
Deutsche Bank has followed European
rivals like Credit Suisse in scaling back
operations on Wall Street. But Mr. Cryan
said on Thursday that Deutsche Bank
would nevertheless retain a strong pres-
ence in the United States.
We cannot be the international bank
we need to be and want to be unless we
can deal with the largest economy in the
world, he said.
Deutsche Banks top managers will
take substantial cuts in their bonuses
for 2016, Mr. Cryan said, declining to
give exact figures. It would be inappro-
priate, he added, for executives to re-
ceive large bonuses when the bank was
not paying a dividend to shareholders
and was laying off thousands of work-
ers. The 1.9 billion loss in the last three
months of 2016 compared with a loss of
2.1 billion during the quarter a year ear-
lier.
The lender has been hiring more in-
ternal overseers to try to prevent the be-
havior that eventually led to a $7.2 bil-
lion settlement with the United States
Justice Department related to the
banks sale of toxic mortgage securities.
Deutsche Bank has also had to deal with
accusations that it colluded with other
banks to manipulate benchmark inter-
est rates and helped wealthy Russians
to launder $10 billion.
Mr. Cryan acknowledged that the
bank had endured a crisis in September
and October after reports emerged that
the mortgage securities settlement
would be as high as $14 billion. The news
caused Deutsche Bank shares to plunge,
and led to speculation the bank might
collapse.
I hope to never go through some-
thing like that again, he said. Shares fell
as much as 7 percent on Thursday in
Frankfurt before recovering in the early
afternoon, to 18 18 per share.
Separately, when asked about Presi-
dent Trumps moves to block people
from some predominantly Muslim coun-
tries from entering the United States,
Mr. Cryan declined to comment directly.
But he did say that Deutsche Bank was
proud to have employees of many na-
tionalities and religions.
For online listings and past
performance visit:
www.morningstar.com/Cover/Funds.aspx
005 ABSOLUTE PERFORM Tel.: +31 20 5722 110
d Asia Pacific Performance A
991 DEGROOF PETERCAM
d Asia Pacific Performance B
d Asia Pacific Performance C
d Asia Pacific Performance D
d Asia Pacific Performance F
d DPAM Eq L Eur Behav Val F
d DPAM Eq L Eur Behav Val B
d Gutzwiller One
995 GUTZWILLER FONDS MANAGEMENT AG
www.gutzwiller-funds.com
Tel.: +41 61 205 70 00
m Gutzwiller Two (CHF)
m Gutzwiller Two (USD)
m Premier Global Bd Fd
The data in the list above is the n.a.v. supplied by the fund groups to MORNINGSTAR. It is collated and reformatted into the list before being transmitted to the IHT.
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the IHT or MORNINGSTAR to sell securities or investments of any kind. Investments can fall as well as rise. Past performance does not guarantee future success.
It is advisable to seek advice from a qualified independent advisor before investing.
The designer Ralph Lauren celebrates with Stefan Larsson, chief executive of the Ralph Lauren brand, at a show last fall. Mr. Larsson is to leave the company in May.
Split at Ralph Lauren leaves a vacancy
Chief executive quitting
after dispute with founder
over brands direction
BY RACHEL ABRAMS
AND VANESSA FRIEDMAN
When Stefan Larsson joined Ralph Lau-
ren as its chief executive less than two
years ago, to work beside the fashion
houses founder, he had big ideas for
transforming the stagnant brands offer-
ings into must-have clothing for the 21st
century.
But as it turned out, Mr. Larssons
ideas did not work for Mr. Lauren.
Citing creative differences between
them, the company said on Thursday
that Mr. Larsson would leave May 1, an
abrupt shake-up for one of the most rec-
ognizable brands.
Stefan and I share a love and respect
for the DNA of this great brand, and we
both recognize the need to evolve, Mr.
Trend of designer moves strikes Givenchy
BY VANESSA FRIEDMAN
Yet another seismic shift is taking place
in French fashion. Riccardo Tisci, the
creative director of Givenchy and the
designer responsible for redefining for
the Kardashian era the brand Audrey
Hepburn built, is leaving Givenchy after
12 years. A successor has not been an-
nounced.
Bernard Arnault, chief executive of
LVMH Mot Hennessy Louis Vuitton,
the French conglomerate that owns Giv-
enchy, said in a statement Thursday,
The chapter Riccardo Tisci has written
with the House of Givenchy represents
an incredible vision to sustain its contin-
uous success, and I would like to warmly
thank him for his core contribution.
Designer moves have become so com-
mon of late they are starting to seem
International Funds
For information please contact Roxane Spencer
e mail: rspencer@nytimes.com
25.32
141 PREMIER INVESTMENT FUNDS LTD
c/o P.O. Box 1100, Grand Cayman
Fax: (345) 949 0993
m Premier Global Yield Fd
m Premier Intl Equities Fund
m Premier Total Return Fd
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d European Equities Class A
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Tel.: +41 58 818 95 68 E-mail: infoprifund@bper.ch
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m Alpha Volatility Class A USD
CHF 104.20 m Alpha Concentrated Class A Euro
$ 149.40 m Alpha Concentrated Class A USD
$ 2959.48 m Global Emerging Markets K1(31/12/10)
Lauren said in a statement. However,
we have found that we have different
views on how to evolve the creative and
consumer-facing parts of this business.
The shake-up adds uncertainty about
the future of Ralph Lauren. Like many
other brands that helped put American
fashion on the global map, Ralph Lauren
has recently struggled to reinvent itself.
That struggle has been exacerbated by
global slowdowns in high-end fashion,
resulting from currency fluctuations
and consumer unease, that have in-
creased pressure to upset the status
quo.
A result has been a rash of executive
moves in the industry, on the creative
and corporate sides. Just on Thursday,
Riccardo Tisci, the creative director of
the French label Givenchy, announced
he was leaving after 12 years, and Bar-
neys New York, the luxury fashion re-
tailer, named Daniella Vitale as its new
chief executive.
I have never seen so much move-
ment and disruption, said Robert
yawn-inducing. But Mr. Tiscis amicable
divorce from Givenchy, rumors of which
WWD reported on last month, could
have deeper repercussions.
Mr. Tisci had, after all, not only trans-
formed Givenchy into one of LVMHs
most successful brands, but was often
held up as a model for the partnership
between hot young designer and her-
itage house. That he was willing to end
what appeared to be a happy marriage
suggests that the old days of designers
staying in place for decades (Karl La-
gerfeld has been at Chanel since 1983)
may be finally, officially, over.
Linda Fargo, senior vice president for
fashion and store presentation at
Bergdorf Goodman, said, I guess de-
stabilization is the new normal.
LVMH, which also has brands such as
Louis Vuitton, Cline and Fendi in its
345 SPINNAKER CAPITAL GROUP
www.spinnakercaptial.com
m Global Opportunity K1(31/12/10) $ 104.10
$ 2560.91
m Haussman Holdings Class C 2269.87
$ 3643.54
$ 1309.64 999 OTHER FUNDS
$ 6618.23
m Haussmann Hldgs N.V. $ 2638.23
177.78
w Leaf Sicav $ 2825.95
- Sterlings; $ - US Dollars; AUD - Australian Dollars;
CAD - Canadian Dollars; CHF - Swiss Francs; DKK
- Danish Krones; - Euros; HKD - HK Dollars; NOK -
Norwegian Krones; SEK - Swedish Krones; Y - Yen;
ZAR -Rand;
$ 169.48 a - asked + - Offer Prices; N.A. - Not Available; N.C.
195.73 - Not Communicated; o- New; S - suspended; S/S
- Stock Split; **- Ex-Dividend; **- Ex-Rts; -@ Offer
Price incl. 3% prelim. charge; *- Paris exchange;
++ -Amsterdam exchange; e - misquoted earlier;
x-not registered with regulatory authority. P:Middle
$ 215.46 of bid and offered price. E: estimated price; y:
135.63 price calculated 2 days prior to publication; z: bid
$ 147.28 price.
135.82
The marginal Symbols indicate the frequency of
$ 148.70 quotations supplied: (d) - daily; (w) - weekly; (b) -
$ 127.26 bi-mon hly; (f) - fortnightly; (r)
Burke, a luxury consultant who was an
executive at Ralph Lauren in the 1990s.
But the move at Ralph Lauren also
points to a truism of the industry: that it
is often difficult for fashion founders to
cede control of their businesses. Diane
von Furstenberg, for example, went
through a string of design heirs and re-
cently agreed to part ways with a chief
executive, and Carolina Herrera parted
ways with her chief executive this year
after disagreements over the direction
of the company.
After decades leading the company,
Mr. Lauren left the chief executive job
when Mr. Larsson joined the business at
the end of 2015. The new chief reported
to Mr. Lauren, who characterized the re-
lationship as a partnership at the time.
Still, Mr. Larsson, now 42, was
brought in to shake things up. Well-
styled and soft-spoken, Mr. Larsson had
been widely credited with rehabilitating
Old Navys dowdy image and expanding
H&Ms cheap chic offerings.
His appointment at Ralph Lauren sig-
portfolio, does not break down the per-
formance of individual maisons in its fi-
nancial results. But the number of em-
ployees at Givenchy has more than tri-
pled since Mr. Tisci joined the house in
2005, and sales revenue is believed to
have grown to about $539 million annu-
ally. There are now 72 free-standing
stores worldwide (compared with seven
in 2005), with a Rome flagship set to
open this year, and plans for a London
store are underway for next year.
Riccardo has accomplished every-
thing a designer can do for a brand,
clocking a very respectable tenure and
creating a fully realized language for
them, Ms. Fargo said.
So, why leave?
Mr. Tisci said in his statement, I now
wish to focus on my personal interests
and passions. But rumors have sug-
Management experts
rate the White House
STEWART, FROM PAGE 9
ignore their views about the merits of
Mr. Trumps policies, but all said that
execution and substance are inextrica-
bly linked.
When youre on the receiving end of
a policy decision, the merits of the
decision and the execution go hand in
hand, Mr. Polzer said. If either one is
done poorly, the outcomes will be bad.
Even good plans that are poorly rolled
out arent going to work well.
For many people, the Affordable
Care Act was indelibly tainted by the
computer malfunctions that plagued
its start. Similarly, for many Ameri-
cans, the enduring image of Mr.
Trumps immigration policy will be
that of a tearful Iraqi immigrant who
was detained at Kennedy International
Airport after risking his life working as
a translator for the American military
over a 10-year period. (He was re-
leased after lawyers intervened.)
That prompted even Mr. Ryan to say,
No one wanted to see people with
green cards or special immigrant
visas, like translators, get caught up in
all of this.
Some Trump defenders have said
that the president thrives on chaos,
and it has proved to be an effective
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
PETER WHITE/GETTY IMAGES
naled that Mr. Lauren, 77, was loosening
his grip on the company. He had long re-
sisted appointing someone else as a
chief executive, and his decision to ap-
point Mr. Larsson was considered an ac-
knowledgment that the brand needed a
makeover.
In June, Mr. Larsson unveiled the
companys Way Forward Plan, pledging
to focus on the creative and practical
sides of the business. Drawing from the
fast-fashion model, the company
needed more surprising designs and a
quicker way to get them to shoppers.
The path, however, has been bumpy,
and Mr. Larssons departure is the latest
example. But the push-and-pull be-
tween past and future was perhaps most
visible on Inauguration Day for Presi-
dent Trump, when Melania Trump wore
a Ralph Lauren powder-blue cashmere
outfit that looked like a first lady cos-
tume of yore a Jacqueline Kennedy
outfit for a Camelot-themed party.
It was appropriate. It was safe. It had
worked before.
gested he may go to Versace. It would
mean going home to Italy, and to a brand
whose aesthetic mirrors his own.
Once upon a time, a designers name
was on the door, and his or her heart was
in building a legacy. Now it is rare that
any creatives start their own line.
Rather, the biggest jobs involve putting
their talents at the service of someone
elses already gilded name. That may be
an interesting intellectual and creative
challenge for a while, but once achieved,
it no longer holds the same allure, and
the search for the next test begins.
This clearly shows that a lot of folks
are about change and evolution, and
both designers and brands want to be
continually in motion, said Marc Met-
rick, president of Saks Fifth Avenue.
Elizabeth Paton contributed reporting.
management approach for him in the
past. But every expert I consulted said
there is no empirical data or research
that supports the notion that chaos is a
productive management tool.
Im not aware of anyone who advo-
cates that, Mr. Polzer said. I dont
really know whats going on in the
White House, so I dont feel comfort-
able commenting on that specifically.
But I can say in general that in organi-
zational settings, less chaos is a good
thing.
Everyone agreed that there was still
time for Mr. Trump to right the ship.
Other administrations have had course
corrections and personnel shake-ups.
But having to reorganize only weeks
into a first term is not promising.
If this were the private sector,
someone would be fired, Ms. Greer
said. That seems highly unlikely, since
Mr. Trump has not even acknowledged
a problem, instead blaming the media
for an impression of upheaval in the
White House.
That is a fundamental problem, Mr.
Pfeffer said. No good business makes
decisions that are based on false-
hoods, he said. My sense is that
Trump takes no ones counsel but his
own. Thats bad management, period.
..
Trump team
garbles its
message on
the dollar
THE UPSHOT
Should it rise or fall?
Administration offers
contradictory signals
BY NEIL IRWIN
For a very long time, if you asked United
States government officials their view
on the value of the dollar, they would al-
most certainly decline to answer. The
currency is the purview of the Treasury
secretary, theyd say.
If you asked the Treasury secretary
his view of the dollar, the answer would
be equally rote: A strong dollar is in the
interest of the United States. Those
words have been so standard that when
Paul ONeill deviated from it in an inter-
view with a German newspaper in 2001,
he caused a kerfuffle in global currency
markets and quickly backtracked.
The Trump administration looks to be
taking a different approach. Officials, in-
cluding the president himself, have been
breaking tradition and talking about
currency markets and in many cases,
suggesting that the dollar is too highly
valued.
But the Trump administration has
also offered contradictory signals about
just what it wants to see happen on cur-
rency markets, with tension building be-
tween the administrations stated goals
and the policies it says it advocates. Pre-
dicting the direction of currency policy
in the Trump administration requires
parsing the words and policy proposals
that come from several different places.
Both before and since the inaugura-
tion, Donald J. Trump has weighed in on
currency issues more than any of his re-
cent predecessors. Our dollar is too
strong, he said in an interview with The
Wall Street Journal in mid-January.
And our companies cant compete be-
cause the currency is too strong. Its
killing us, he said.
Mr. Trump enlarged on this theme in
comments this past week at a meeting
The president and his aides
have been breaking tradition.
with pharmaceutical executives. We
know nothing about devaluation, he
said. Every other country lives on de-
valuation. You look at what Chinas do-
ing, you look at what Japan has done
over the years they played the money
market, they played the devaluation
market, and we sit there like a bunch of
dummies.
Taking the presidents words at face
value, we would seem to be in for a delib-
erate effort by the administration to re-
duce the value of the United States cur-
rency relative to its neighbors, in hopes
of giving United States exporters an ad-
vantage and reducing the trade deficit.
That is also the tone that Peter
Navarro, the director of the White
Houses national trade council, struck in
an interview with The Financial Times
this past week. He described the euro as
grossly undervalued, which would im-
ply that the dollar is too strong against
the worlds other most widely used cur-
rency.
Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secre-
tary nominee, has tried to take a more
balanced approach to talking about the
valuation of the dollar. While trying not
to undercut his boss, he has made the
point that over the longer run a strong
domestic economy will cause the dollar
to increase in value.
The currency is very, very strong,
and what you see is people from all over
the world wanting to invest in the U.S.
currency, Mr. Mnuchin said in his con-
firmation hearing. I think when the
president-elect made a comment on the
U.S. currency, it was not meant to be
long-term comment. It was meant to be
that perhaps in the short term, the
strength in the currency as a result of
free markets and people wanting to in-
vest here may have had negative im-
pacts on on our ability in trade.
But even that nuanced thought from
Mr. Mnuchin is in tension with the out-
comes in the currency markets that are
resulting from his administrations poli-
cies. Late last month, for example, Sean
Spicer, the presidents press secretary,
suggested that a policy known as the
border adjustment tax would be a way
to force Mexico to pay for a border wall.
But that policys adherents believe it
would actually increase the value of the
dollar on currency markets by perhaps
20 percent. (And if it doesnt, the tax
would hit American consumers and re-
tailers hard.)
Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary
nominee, urged a renegotiation of the
North American Free Trade Agreement.
Those comments, at his confirmation
hearing, prompted a sell-off of the Cana-
dian and Mexican currencies.
And more broadly, if the administra-
tions plan to cut taxes and increase in-
frastructure comes to fruition, it implies
that interest rates in the United States
will be higher than they otherwise
would be. Higher interest rates will
bring global investors, with their assets,
flocking into the United States and pro-
pel the dollar even higher.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 11

Opinion
Bangladeshs creeping Islamism
Religious K. Anis Ahmed
conservatives
have
managed DHAKA, BANGLADESH Every year on the
to paint first day of school, students across
Bangladesh wait eagerly for their new
secularism as textbooks. Many have few extrava-
anti-Islamic. gances in their lives, and for them that
The new day is as thrilling as Christmas morning
in other countries. Distributing over 360
school million textbooks for free, on time, to
curriculum more than 42 million children is no small
proves it. feat, and it was a signature achievement
for the ruling Awami League this year.
But public appreciation was quickly
overtaken by outrage over the quiet
revisions that appeared in books for
classes ranging from primary grades to
high school.
The Bengali letter o used to stand
for ol, a yam; now it stands for orna,
a scarf worn by women for modesty.
Texts by non-Muslim writers includ-
ing some revered as part of Bengali
heritage, like the classical poet Gyandas
or the contemporary novelist Sunil
Gangopadhyay have been removed.
Also gone are a small excerpt from the
Ramayana, a Hindu classic that Islam-
ists reject as foreign to the Muslim
canon, and songs of the Sufi icon Lalon
Shah, whose syncretic faith is anath-
ema to Muslim conservatives.
This is exactly what Islamists have
long wished for, particularly Hefazat-e-
Islam, a network of madrasa leaders
who hope to introduce Shariah in
Bangladesh. But why these changes
now, and from a nominally secular
government that seems to have tried, if
unevenly, to clamp down on Islamists in
other ways?
The ruling
The Awami League
government has been criti-
seems to waver cized for being
apathetic and
between blaming the
appeasing and victim during a
containing spate of attacks
nonviolent in 2015 and 2016
against liberal
Islamists. bloggers, aca-
demics and
religious minor-
ities, some claimed by groups affiliated
with Al Qaeda or the Islamic State. It
started cracking down hard after a
massacre at a cafe in Dhaka last July.
But even as the government tries to
curb Islamist terrorism, in other re-
spects it appears to waver between
appeasing and containing nonviolent
religious conservatives.
The Awami League seems to have
agreed to the textbook revisions in
exchange for bringing the state-sanc-
tioned curriculum into private ma-
drasas and subjecting the schools to
some government scrutiny. This is a
delicate maneuver, which cannot be
executed by fiat, because Hefazat has a
committed power base among its mem-
bers and people who sympathize with SHONAGH RAE

its aspirations for Shariah.
Proponents of the revisions say the
changes are a small price to pay for
modernizing the madrasas curriculum.
Yet government officials have de-
murred when asked about any bargain
being struck presumably they fear
drawing criticism from the cultured
classes or seeming weak to the wider
populace. In any case, that the authori-
ties are even entertaining the demands
of Hefazat says a lot about where
Bangladesh is today: on a path to creep-
ing Islamism.
When Bangladesh became independ-
ent from Pakistan in 1971, secularism
was one of the new countrys founding
principles. It soon came under siege
first in the 1970s, under Ziaur Rahman,
the founder of the Bangladesh National-
ist Party (B.N.P.), who rehabilitated the
Jamaat-e-Islami, a party disgraced for
collaborating with the Pakistani army;
then in the 1980s, when the dictator
Hussain Mohammed Ershad declared
Islam as the state religion.
After democracy was restored in 1991,
the two leading parties traded places
running the country. Over time, the
B.N.P. invoked religious sentiment to
broaden its appeal with an increasingly
conservative population, forcing the
Awami League to play defense.
Things took a dire turn as B.N.P.,
upon its return to power in 2001, drew
much closer to Islamist forces like
Jamaat, allowing the rise of terrorist
groups, which killed top Awami League
leaders and scores of civilians. In turn,
when the Awami League was in govern-
ment again, it hit the opposition with a
cascade of legal cases.
In 2009, it set up a special tribunal to
prosecute crimes committed during the
Liberation War of 1971. Since members
of Jamaat had collaborated with the
Pakistani Army back then, the court
was destined to target the groups lead-
ers.
The B.N.P.-Jamaat alliance took to the
streets, sometimes staging violent
protests against the trials, especially
ahead of the 2014 general election. It
also supported the nonviolent mass
marches and sit-ins that Hefazat staged
in May 2013 as Hefazat called for turn-
ing Bangladesh into an Islamic state.
The Awami League authorities forc-
ibly dispersed those crowds, killing at
least 50 civilians, according to Human
Rights Watch. But the violence has been
vastly exaggerated, and such accounts
have become a touchstone in some
Islamists imagination: Nonviolent
Hefazat nothing like Jamaat has
been cast as a martyr of state repres-
sion, and has emerged as a powerful
mouthpiece for Islamic demands.
The battle for a secular Bangladesh is
both political and cultural. Bangla-
deshis continually evaluate what they
will or will not accept in the name of
Islam. In universities, as many women
seem to wear jeans as hijabs. Young
people openly celebrate Valentines
Day. But there has been a significant
shift over the past few decades.
During my school years in the 1980s,
religion was a matter of personal choice.
No one batted an eyelid if you chose not
to fast during Ramadan. Today, eat in
public during the holiday and you may
be chided by strangers. Thanks to
shows on cable TV, social media and
group meetings, Islamists have suc-
ceeded to an alarming degree in paint-
ing secularism as a threat to Islam.
And now schools. Its true that non-
Muslim writers still appear in the re-
vised textbooks, while some Muslim
authors have been dropped. But the
exclusion of the great novelist Sarat
Chandra Chattopadhyay, the Charles
Dickens of Bengali literature, is a
galling concession to the sectarian view
that Hindu writers like him do not be-
long on a Muslim curriculum.
A dark political calculation may be
lurking behind these changes. The
Awami League, now in its second term
after highly controversial elections in
2014, is widely perceived to be authori-
tarian. It would make sense for the
party to pry Hefazat away from B.N.P.-
Jamaat in order to reduce the impact of
any future protests by its archrivals. A
standard political gambit, one might call
this, only it comes at a lasting cost to
culture.
One of the casualties of the recent
purge is the great poet Michael Mad-
husudan Dutt, who wrote achingly
about his belated embrace of his native
language, Bengali. In a poem I remem-
ber reading in school, he says of the
Kapotakkha, a river in southern
Bangladesh, Many rivers I have seen
in many countries/But none to quench
the thirst of my longings.
Most Bangladeshis see Bengali as the
cradle of their national identity, and
Islamists have long sought to replace
language with religion in that role. To
evict Dutt from our textbooks today is to
strike at the heart of the cultural convic-
tions that gave birth to our nation.
is a writer based in
K. ANIS AHMED
Bangladesh and publisher of the Dhaka
Tribune.

Donald the menace

This isnt
a strategy;
its a
syndrome.
Paul Krugman
For the past couple of months, thought-
ful people have been quietly worrying
that the Trump administration might
get us into a foreign policy crisis, maybe
even a war.
Partly this worry reflected Donald
Trumps addiction to bombast and
swagger, which plays fine in Breitbart
and on Fox News but doesnt go down
well with foreign governments. But it
also reflected a cold view of the incen-
tives the new administration would
face: as working-class voters began to
realize that candidate Trumps prom-
ises about jobs and health care were
insincere, foreign distractions would
look increasingly attractive.
The most likely flash point seemed to
be China, the subject of much Trumpist
tough talk, where disputes over islands
in the South China Sea could easily turn
into shooting incidents.
But the war with China will, it seems,
have to wait. First comes Australia. And
Mexico. And Iran. And the European
Union. (But never Russia.)
And while there may be an element of
cynical calculation in some of the ad-
ministrations crisismongering, this is
looking less and less like a political
strategy and more and more like a
psychological syndrome.
The Australian confrontation has
gotten the most press, probably be-
cause its so weirdly gratuitous. Austral-
ia is, after all, arguably Americas most
faithful friend in the whole world, a
nation that has fought by our side again
and again. We will, of course, have
disputes, as any two nations will, but
nothing that should disturb the strength
of our alliance especially because
Australia is one of the countries we will
need to rely on if there is a confrontation
with China.
But this is the age of Trump: In a call
with Malcolm Turnbull, Australias
prime minister, the U.S. president
boasted about his election victory and
complained about an existing agree-
ment to take some of the refugees Aus-
tralia has been holding, accusing Mr.
Turnbull of sending us the next Boston
bombers. Then he abruptly ended the
conversation after only 25 minutes.
Well, at least Mr. Trump didnt threat-
en to invade Australia. In his conversa-
tion with President Enrique Pea Nieto
of Mexico, however, he did just that.
According to The Associated Press, he
told our neighbors democratically
elected leader: You have a bunch of
bad hombres down there. You arent
doing enough to stop them. I think your
military is scared. Our military isnt, so I
just might send them down to take care
of it.
White House sources are now claim-
ing that this threat remember, the
U.S. has in fact invaded Mexico in the
past, and the Mexicans have not forgot-
ten was a lighthearted joke. If you
believe that, I have a Mexico-paid-for
border wall to sell you.
The blowups with Mexico and Aus-
tralia have overshadowed a more con-
ventional war of words with Iran, which
tested a missile on Sunday. This was
definitely a provocation. But the White
House warning that it was putting Iran
on notice raises the question, notice of
what? Given the way the administra-
tion has been alienating our allies,
tighter sanctions arent going to hap-
pen. Are we ready for a war?
There was also a curious contrast
between the response to Iran and the
response to another, more serious
provocation: Russias escalation of its
proxy war in Ukraine. Senator John
McCain called on the president to help
Ukraine. Strangely, however, the White
House has said nothing at all about
Russias actions. This is getting a bit
obvious, isnt it?
Oh, and one more thing: Peter
Navarro, head of Mr. Trumps new
National Trade Council, accused Ger-
many of exploiting the United States
with an undervalued currency. Theres
an interesting economics discussion to
be had here, but government officials
arent supposed to make that sort of
accusation unless theyre prepared to
fight a trade war. Are they?
I doubt it. In fact, this administration
doesnt seem prepared on any front. Mr.
Trumps confrontational phone calls, in
particular, dont sound like the working
out of an economic or even political
strategy cunning schemers dont
waste time boasting about their election
victories and whining about media
reports on crowd sizes.
No, what were hearing sounds like a
man who is out of his depth and out of
control, who cant even pretend to
master his feelings of personal insecuri-
ty. His first two weeks in office have
been utter chaos, and things just keep
getting worse perhaps because he
responds to each debacle with a desper-
ate attempt to change the subject that
only leads to a fresh debacle.
America and the world cant take
much more of this. Think about it: If you
had an employee behaving this way,
youd immediately remove him from
any position of responsibility and
strongly suggest that he seek counsel-
ing. And this guy is commander in chief
of the worlds most powerful military.
Thanks, Comey.
 ..
12 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION

opinion

Combat nurses and Donut Dollies the threshold from combat to a drasti-
ARTHUR OCHS SULZBERGER JR., Publisher A.G. SULZBERGER, Deputy Publisher Heather Stur cally altered life, or death.
DEAN BAQUET, Executive Editor MARK THOMPSON, Chief Executive Officer Some nurses wore perfume because
JOSEPH KAHN, Managing Editor STEPHEN DUNBAR-JOHNSON, President, International
it reminded their patients of home. In a
TOM BODKIN, Creative Director PHILIPPE MONTJOLIN, Senior V.P., International Operations
military hospital in a war zone, it was at
once utterly incongruous and a desper-
SUZANNE DALEY, Associate Editor JEAN-CHRISTOPHE DEMARTA, Senior V.P., Global Advertising Joyce Denke was 19 years old when her
ately needed bit of normalcy. Lynda
ACHILLES TSALTAS, V.P., International Conferences fianc, Cpl. David Ives, received his
Van Devanter, a nurse whose memoir,
JAMES BENNET, Editorial Page Editor CHANTAL BONETTI, V.P., International Human Resources orders for Vietnam. It was early 1967,
Home Before Morning, was the inspi-
JAMES DAO, Deputy Editorial Page Editor CHARLOTTE GORDON, V.P., International Consumer Marketing and he had only six months left in the
ration for the television drama China
TERRY TANG, Deputy Editorial Page Editor PATRICE MONTI, V.P., International Circulation service. The young couple, who lived in
Beach, wore ribbons in her hair to
HELENA PHUA, Executive V.P., Asia-Pacific Temple, Tex., just south of Waco, de-
uphold the feminine image her patients
SUZANNE YVERNS, International Chief Financial Officer cided not to let the war dampen their
expected and needed. At the same time,
excitement about their future life to-
she suppressed her emotions and
gether, and they started making plans
steeled herself to cope with the mental
to get married when he came home in
burden of being soothing and pretty to
November.
broken and dying men.
After just seven weeks in Vietnam,
NEW TENSIONS WITH IRAN Ives was killed in action on April 23,
Linda Pugsley was a 22-year-old
1967, at the age of 20. Ms. Denke still registered nurse working at Boston
It didnt take long for tensions to flare between Iran and City Hospital when she joined the Air
Tehrans mis- President Trump, and both sides have to share the
has the last letter he wrote to her, dated
Force in 1967. She went through basic
April 19, 1967. He signed it, my very
sile launch blame. deepest love, Dave. training and flight school and was
was provoca- Iran was dangerously provocative in conducting a Ivess death inspired Ms. Denke to commissioned a second lieutenant. At
the time, she had no political feelings
tive, as was ballistic missile test this week. Officials in Tehran must join the American Red Cross and go to
about the Vietnam War, but she wanted
Vietnam. She wanted to do something
the Trump have known that the launch of the medium-range Shahab
to honor his service, and so in 1970 she LARRY RAY/AMERICAN RED CROSS
to help take care of American serv-
administra- missile would alarm America and other countries in the deployed with the Red Cross as part of A Red Cross worker with servicemen in Vietnam in November 1966.
icemen who were injured there. She
unstable region and would be red meat for the impulsive figured she could handle it, with good
tions re- its Supplemental Recreational Activi-
reason: A weekend shift at Boston City
new president. However, the Iranians seemed deter- ties Overseas program. It was one of
sponse. several ways American women partici- Hospital usually included gunshot and
mined to test not just the missile, but also whether Mr. stab wounds, car wrecks and other
pated in the war.
Trump would seize any excuse to blow up the 2015 nucle- The Vietnam War story is a tale of sorts of bloody trauma.
ar deal. combat: walking point, ambushes, Nothing could have prepared her for
Although Mr. Trump campaigned against the deal, booby traps, seeing friends die, nar- Vietnam, though. The varieties of
rowly escaping death. Too often, wounds, the constant low roar of in-
under which Iran curbed its nuclear program in return jured, maimed and dying men, the
though, our idea of combat is male-
for the lifting of international sanctions, he didnt imme- thrum of helicopters bringing in still
centered we think about the men
diately jettison it after the missile launch. Instead, he firing the weapons, flying the planes more wounded men, at times it almost
threw down a challenge that was itself provocative and and taking casualties. We forget that became too much. Like Ms. Strange,
thousands of women also played a Ms. Pugsley eventually stopped learn-
displayed an eagerness to confront Iran, a risky path
central role in that story. ing the names of her patients as a cop-
that could lead to a military conflict. As of today we are ing mechanism.
Military nurses, Womens Army
officially putting Iran on notice, his national security Corps personnel and civilians who After nurses, the next largest num-
adviser, Michael Flynn, told reporters Wednesday. served with the Red Cross regularly ber of servicewoman who went to
Moreover, there was no apparent attempt to discuss saw the consequences of combat. For Vietnam deployed with the Womens
nurses, and to some degree for S.R.A.O. Army Corps. Like nurses, the first
the missile issue with Iran privately and no coordination WACs went to Vietnam to train person-
women like Ms. Denke, dealing with
with Britain, France, China, Russia and Germany, the combat was their job. Nurses treated nel in South Vietnams Womens Armed
other major powers that are parties to the nuclear deal. soldiers physical wounds, and Red Forces Corps. About 700 WACs served
Mr. Flynn was right, however, in highlighting Irans Cross women worked to boost the in the war, mostly in clerical jobs, but
morale of troops, tending to their emo- that did not shield them from combat.
troubling behavior, including the recent attack on a Saudi
tional wounds. Linda McClenahan grew up in Berke-
Navy patrol boat by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels from Women were not subject to the Viet- ley, Calif., and joined the WAC after her
Yemen, as well as Irans expanding influence in Iraq. nam-era draft, but thousands volun- BETTMAN, VIA GETTY IMAGES high school bus was rerouted one day
Given these tensions, Iran needs to refrain from test- teered. For some women, the war of- Nurses with wounded American soldiers as they prepare to depart from Vietnam. because of an antiwar protest. She
ing missiles, even though the International Atomic Ener- fered an opportunity to travel and worked in the Armys communications
postpone marriage and motherhood, center from 1969 through 1970, and one
gy Agency said they are not capable of carrying nuclear of her jobs was to process casualty
still the expected roles for young wom- Red Cross instructors told the women herself and the guys she worked with.
warheads. Critically, this weeks launch does not violate en in the 1960s. Some military women that they were meant to be a touch of So she stopped learning their names, reports. She often was one of the first to
the 2015 nuclear agreement, which does not cover mis- offered to go to Vietnam because they home for the troops, a reminder of and stopped becoming their friends. read the names of men who were killed
siles. And despite what Mr. Flynn has said, the test is not wanted to support the war effort or to wives, girlfriends, mothers and sisters. Long after the war, she says she in action. Lt. Col. Janie Miller, a career
see for themselves what was really They should be the girl next door believed that there were probably guys WAC who served in Korea and Viet-
considered a violation of 2015 United Nations resolution
happening on the ground. Others en- cute, friendly and caring. Not sexual. she had encountered whose names nam, managed an Army mortuary in
that calls on Iran to refrain from testing ballistic missiles, listed in the military for college and Saigon. She rotated her staff through
Their powder-blue dresses projected a went onto the Vietnam Wall. But she
without making it mandatory. employment benefits after recruiters perky innocence but were impractical would not have to face the pain of know- every three months because of the
For now, the administration says it intends to impose promised they would not be sent to in Vietnams heat, dust and mud. Most ing for sure. It was Ms. Stranges job to works emotional toll. When Pinkie
Vietnam. of the women were in their early 20s, a make lonely, frightened soldiers feel Houser, a WAC who volunteered for
new missile-related sanctions in a way that does not
The Red Cross had sent teams of few years older better, and she had to show up and do Vietnam in 1968, lost her commanding
affect the nuclear deal. It could use existing American women overseas to work with troops officer in battle, she processed his
than the average her job despite the fear and isolation
sanctions to expand penalties on firms that support since World War II. They served coffee We remember enlisted man. she herself felt. She called it putting on records and sent his personal effects to
Irans missile program. It should work with the major and donuts, which earned them the Vietnam as Smiling was a her Eleanor Rigby face that she kept his family. It was one of the hardest
nickname Donut Dollies. In 1965, job requirement in a jar by the door. things she had to do during the war.
powers to strengthen efforts, under United Nations sanc- a mans war. Combat, that traumatic, life-shatter-
fearing the impact on troop morale of for Donut Dollies, Of the military women who served in
tions, to interdict missile technology shipments to Iran.
what was already looking to be a long But thousands so they had to the war, the majority, about 5,000, did so ing, experience of war, remains central
Another idea would be an initiative to persuade Iran to war, Defense Department officials of women compartmental- through the Army Nurse Corps. They to the American memory of the Viet-
agree to missile limits if Saudi Arabia and Israel did the asked the Red Cross to establish an served, too. ize their own fear were there from the beginning: As the nam War. Women who served in Viet-
same. S.R.A.O. program in Vietnam. From and sadness historian Kara Dixon Vuic has shown, nam were small in number compared
1965 through 1972, nearly 630 women about the war. the Army began deploying nurses to with the men who served, but because
What is most important is to find ways to manage
served in Vietnam through the pro- Many grew close to the men they Saigon in 1956 to train Vietnamese of that, their exposure to combat and its
tensions with Iran without creating a path toward con- gram. Some staffed recreation centers worked with. Emily Strange, a Donut nurses. As the war deepened, they had consequences was concentrated. They
frontation. on large bases where servicemen could Dolly who was stationed in the Mekong the double duty of treating the physical were there to help lighten the burden of
shoot pool, listen to music, read, play Delta with the Ninth Infantry Division wounds of servicemen, and sometimes servicemen, but they had to be so much
games, write letters, or sit and talk. and Mobile Riverine Force, became Vietnamese civilians, and offering an to so many, without any release for
Others traveled, usually by helicopter, friends with a soldier named Michael emotional salve to injured and dying themselves.
to fire support bases in remote areas
A BLOW TO MYANMARS DEMOCRACY where troops waited to go into battle.
Stacy. She had become close with Stacy
because they both played guitar, and
troops. Some nurses held men as they
cried out for their parents and took HEATHER STUR is an associate professor
The murder of U Ko Ni, a prominent Muslim lawyer and S.R.A.O. women traveled in pairs and they often strummed folk tunes togeth- their last breaths. They broke the news of history at the University of Southern
The murder a key member of Myanmars governing National League brought with them games, snacks, soda er. But after he died in a helicopter that a man would never walk or see Mississippi and the author, most re-
of a Muslim and juice. crash in March 1969, she realized that again. Literally and figuratively, nurses cently, of Beyond Combat: Women and
for Democracy party, on Sunday is a serious blow to the
In the pre-departure training session, she needed to put distance between carried wounded servicemen across Gender in the Vietnam War Era.
lawyer robs countrys fragile democracy. The brutal, public killing
Daw Aung he was shot at point-blank range outside Yangon Interna-
San Suu Kyi tional Airport after returning from a government-spon-
of a top ad- sored trip to Indonesia to discuss democracy and conflict
viser and resolution has the hallmark of a political assassina-
tion.
raises fears
Mr. Ko Nis murder deprives Myanmars civilian
of sectarian leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, and the governing party
violence. of a talented and trusted adviser, notably on reforming
Myanmars military-drafted Constitution. We lost a
hero, U Win Htein, a spokesman for the party lamented,
adding, It is a bad situation here.
Police in Myanmar announced on Wednesday that
they have now arrested four men. One, U Kyi Lin, ac-
cused of being the gunman, reportedly shouted, You
cant act like that, before opening fire. What this state-
ment means is unclear. U Thein Than Oo, a prominent
lawyer and a colleague of Mr. Ko Ni, offered possible
motivations, firstly the N.L.D. leadership, secondly
political and civic leaders who want to amend the mili-
tary-drafted Constitution, and thirdly the peace process,
referring to talks initiated by Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi
between ethnic armed groups and the military.
The office of Myanmars president issued a statement
saying, The motivation of the incident is to undermine
the countrys stability. That would, of course, provide a
perfect pretext for Myanmars military to reassert its
power and further hobble the civilian government.
Another worry is that the murder of Mr. Ko Ni, a rare
prominent Muslim in predominantly Buddhist Myanmar,
may unleash fresh spasms of sectarian violence between
the countrys Buddhist majority and its Muslim minority.
Last October, attacks on three border guard posts sig-
naled the emergence of an armed resistance, with inter-
national terror links, among Myanmars long-persecuted
Rohingya Muslims. In response, Myanmars military
launched a brutal counterinsurgency campaign that has
resulted in a humanitarian crisis and sent tens of thou-
sands of Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh.
It is incumbent on Myanmars authorities to launch a
thorough, independent investigation into Mr. Ko Nis
death, bring the perpetrators to justice, and send a
LARRY RAY/AMERICAN RED CROSS
strong message: assassinations will not be tolerated or
go unpunished. Recent college graduates in 1966 joined the Red Cross to serve refreshments and present recreational programs to American servicemen in Vietnam.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 13

opinion

U.S. to Australia: Get lost

Roger Cohen
Lets imagine for a moment Rex Tiller-
son, the newly installed secretary of
state, awakening to this tweet from
President Trump about an important
American ally:
Do you believe it? The Obama ad-
ministration agreed to take thousands
of illegal immigrants from Australia.
Why? I will study this dumb deal!
First, the illegal immigrants are in
fact desperate people fleeing conflict
whose status as refugees has in most
cases been officially recognized. Sec-
ond, as refugees, they have the right,
under the Geneva Conventions, of
which the United States is a signatory, to
be treated without discrimination as to
race, religion or country of origin.
Lets further imagine that all this
passes through Tillersons head before
he grabs The Washington Post and
discovers that Trump has taken his
Australia bashing further. He has hung
up on Australian Prime Minister Mal-
colm Turnbull after telling him its his
worst call by far with world leaders
(behind Vladimir Putin, of course), and
accused Turnbull of preparing to send
the next Boston bombers Americas
way.
At which point Tillerson must really
be wondering as is the rest of the
world after two weeks of fast-tracked
chaos from Trump. The president wants
to run the United States like his busi-
ness, with scant accountability and
contempt for rules. Fine, except that
bankruptcy is the worst conceivable
outcome for a business whereas nuclear
war is the worst conceivable outcome
for America and all of humanity. Trump
is in way over his skis.
From the pointless, counterproduc-
tive, prejudice-reeking temporary ban
on immigration
from seven
It is grotesque mainly Muslim
for Trump countries to a
kept secret, however, until Nov. 12, four
days after the election, because ref-
ugees, particularly Muslims from the
Middle East, were such a sensitive issue
in the campaign.
We really want to mothball these
places, Richard recalls Australian
officials telling her, referring to Manus
and Nauru. They have become an acute
embarrassment to Australia. The
United States got help with some na-
tional security issues in return, as well
as Australian commitments to take
more refugees from Central America.
Poor Turnbull whos white and con-
servative and might therefore have
thought he could get on the right side of
Trump. No way! Many of the refugees
are Iranians persecuted by the Islamic
Republic. Theres no surer way to drive
the president to paroxysms than to
suggest he extend a hand to Muslims,
signed accords between allies notwith-
standing.
I went to Manus last year with the
photographer Ashley Gilbertson to see
the suffering. Its not easy to get in;
Australia does not want prying eyes. I
met a young Iranian, Benham Satah,
who has a college degree in English and

Flynns bluster on Iran

Philip Gordon
WASHINGTON In an unusual appear-
ance in the White House briefing room
Wednesday, retired Lt. Gen. Michael T.
Flynn, President Trumps national
security adviser, issued a blunt warning
to Iran. After denouncing Irans latest
ballistic missile test and a recent attack
on a Saudi naval vessel by Yemeni
militants supported by Iran, and accus-
ing the Obama administration of failing
to respond adequately to previous
provocations, Mr. Flynn melodramati-
cally concluded: As of today, we are
officially putting Iran on notice.
There is, of course, good reason for
all Americans to be concerned about
Iranian behavior. Tests of ballistic
missiles especially missiles that can
carry nuclear warheads are destabil-
izing, and Iran continues to meddle in
its neighbors affairs. Our Middle East
partners are deeply worried by these
activities and want Washington to
make Iran pay a price. Indeed, the
Obama administration itself placed
sanctions on Iran over its ballistic
missile program and supported the
Saudis in Yemen with weapons, intelli-
gence and Navy patrols to interdict
weapons shipments from Iran.
Mr. Flynn, then, is not wrong about
Irans provocative actions and the need
for a vigorous response. The problem is
with his performance: By issuing a
warning so imprecise in such a dra-
matic, public fashion he has set
himself and the United States up for
either an embarrassing retreat or a
risky confrontation.
While Trump administration officials
have claimed to have a large range of
options to choose from in responding
more effectively to Iran, the reality is
that they do not. And it would be no
small irony if President Trump, who
hammered President Barack Obama
for failing to enforce a red line the
United States had drawn in Syria, ends
up failing to enforce his own.
Why will it prove so difficult to back
up Mr. Flynns words with significant
action?
First, contrary to a widespread per-
ception in the region and among Mr.
Obamas domestic critics that his ad-
ministration had tilted toward Iran and
failed to respond to its destabilizing
behavior, under Mr. Obama, the United
States made significant efforts to con-
tain Iran. Indeed, while the United
States rightly provides vast military,
political and intelligence support to its
partners in the region, even since the
nuclear deal it still does not trade with
or invest in Iran. It also continues to
maintain a wide array of sanctions
related to terrorism, human rights and
ballistic missiles, and deploy tens of
thousands of military personnel on a
network of nearby bases. Short of
abandoning the nuclear deal, which
would isolate the United States and let
Iran resume its nuclear weapons pro-
gram creating a far greater set of
problems than ballistic missile tests
there is simply not a lot of space for
significantly reconfiguring our regional
alignment
against Iran.
Drawing Second, as Mr.
a vague and Trump looks for
undefined red
ways to punish
line with Iran Iran for the tests,
only sets up he is unlikely to
find much inter-
America for national support,
humiliation which would be
or war. essential to make
any further sanc-
tions effective.
Indeed, as officials in his administra-
tion have acknowledged, ballistic mis-
sile tests are not part of the nuclear
agreement, and even United Nations
Security Council Resolution 2231, which
Mr. Flynn cited as the basis for punish-
ing Iran, only calls upon Iran to re-
frain from certain missile activities.
Why? Because when Mr. Obama sought
to include a prohibition on ballistic
missiles in the Iran deal, or at least
extend a previous Security Council
resolution banning them, not just Rus-
sia and China but even our European
allies in the nuclear negotiations re-
fused. They argued that the ballistic
missile ban was put in place in 2010 only
to pressure Iran to reach a nuclear deal,
and they refused to extend it once that
deal had been concluded.
Third and most important, as Presi-
dent Trump contemplates his options,
he will also have to consider Irans
likely response. If all the administration
has in mind is an expansion of existing
sanctions, Iran may not react, but that
hardly seems to be what Mr. Flynn
meant by officially putting Iran on
notice. If it were, Iran would likely just
carry on with its missile tests and main-
tain its rather inexpensive military
support for the Houthi rebels in Yemen,
effectively taunting Mr. Flynn and
making his threat empty.
If, on the other hand, President
Trump plans to back up his advisers
words with military action like carry-
ing out a threat he made last fall that if
Irans boats circled American warships
and made gestures at their crews they
will be shot out of the water he will
need to be prepared to manage the
consequences.
With Irans presidential elections
scheduled for the spring, and its own
hard-line constituencies opposed to the
nuclear deal and eager to cast America
as their implacable enemy, Iran is
unlikely to back down in the face of
mere warnings, or even symbolic mili-
tary strikes. It has its own range of
response options, including terrorist
attacks against Americans, attacks by
Shiite militias against the thousands of
American troops forces in Iraq, or
pressure on the Iraqi government to
deny the United States access to the
bases where it trains Iraqi security
forces. Any of these responses might
prompt an escalation by the United
States, including direct use of force
against Iran, especially in the wake of
all the administrations tough talk. I
hope that President Trump met with his
military advisers and thought this all
through before sending Mr. Flynn out to
make his remarks.
None of this is to argue against re-
sponding to Iranian provocations in the
region. Clear and credible private
warnings, strong cooperation with the
Gulf states and Israel, diplomacy to get
partners on board, financial and diplo-
matic measures to increase costs on
Iran, the effective use of intelligence
and covert action, and the maintenance
of superior military capacity will all be
necessary to contain the Iranian threat.
All of those are more advisable than
bluster and ambiguous public red lines
that would be hard to enforce.
PHILIP GORDON, a senior fellow at the
Council on Foreign Relations, was the
White House coordinator for the Middle
East, North Africa and the Gulf region
from 2013 to 2015.
Third, the thousands are in fact about to dismiss botched Navy has languished there since Aug. 27, 2013.
1,250 of the 2,500 men, women and SEAL raid on Al His roommate, another Iranian called
children who, for more than three years Australias Qaeda in Yemen, Reza Barati, was killed by a local mob in
now, have been marooned on two re- stranded the same traits of 2014.
mote South Pacific islands, Manus and refugees as the haste and impru- Sometimes I cut myself, Satah told
Nauru, in appalling conditions that have next Boston dence have been me, so that I can see my blood and
seen suicide, deaths through negli- apparent. Trump remember, oh yes! I am alive.
gence, a killing, and relentless mental
bombers. is a propagator of It is grotesque and offensive for
abuse. Fourth, this dumb deal reflects mayhem at the Trump to dismiss these stranded, mis-
the pressing Australian interest in head of a TV- and treated human beings as Boston bomb-
finding a way out of its predicament Twitter-driven movement whose goal is ers. Muslim equals terrorist is an idea
with the refugees and the American to circumvent democratic institutions that sullies America.
interest in strengthening its Australian through the exercise of hypnotic and What refugees like Satah want by an
alliance at a time when United States disorienting power. He is only inciden- overwhelming majority is not more
Marines are rotating through Darwin tally the president. violence but the dignity that comes with
and China is flexing its muscles in the That is already clear, as is the fact that a job, a roof over their heads and decent
South China Sea. Fifth, diplomacy is Trumps embrace of Putin was not some schooling for their children. Vetting to
about identifying shared interests; it weird whim but reflected a fundamental enter the United States takes at least 18
stands no chance when the tweeted alignment of values around bigotry, to 24 months one reason nobody from
tantrums of a tempestuous president racism, homophobia, anti-intellectu- Manus or Nauru has moved yet despite
constitute Washingtons highest-level alism, calculated religious absolutism, Australian hopes theyd all be scooped
communications with a world held in 21st-century big-data autocracy and up by a C-130. The vetting is already
America-first contempt. hatred of the media. The president extreme Trumps word.
The notion must cross Tillersons therefore feels more allied with Rus- For Australia, Trumps insults should
mind that Trumps inaccurate tweet is sia than with Americas European allies, be an incentive to do the right thing. The
needless provocation of a friend; that whose values run counter to his. refugee deal now looks near worthless.
simultaneously infuriating Asian and The worst deal ever as Trump Shut down the foul Manus and Nauru
European allies may not be smart; and put it according to The Washington Post operations. Bring these people, who
that his task will be a thankless one as was signed in September in New York have suffered and been bounced around
Trumps White House coterie hatches by Anne C. Richard, the former U.S. enough, to Australia. Close this chapter
seat-of-the-pants policy and leaves his assistant secretary of state for popula- that recalls the darkest moments of
already restive State Department to tion, refugees and migration, and Ra- Australian history. Cut loose from
deal with weighty issues in Luxem- chel Noble, deputy secretary of Austral- Trumps doomsday prejudice and give
bourg and the Solomon Islands. ias department of immigration. It was Tillerson inspiration to be brave.
Start the day
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JOLIE, FROM PAGE 1
ment in the first place: survivors of
torture, and women and children at
risk or who might not survive without
urgent, specialized medical assistance.
I have visited countless camps and
cities where hundreds of thousands of
refugees are barely surviving and
every family has suffered. When the
United Nations Refugee Agency identi-
fies those among them who are most in
need of protection, we can be sure that
they deserve the safety, shelter and
fresh start that countries like ours can
offer.
And in fact only a minuscule fraction
less than 1 percent of all refugees
in the world are ever resettled in the
United States or any other country.
There are more than 65 million
refugees and displaced people world-
wide. Nine out of 10 refugees live in
poor and middle-income countries, not
in rich Western nations. There are 2.8
million Syrian refugees in Turkey
alone. Only about 18,000 Syrians have
been resettled in America since 2011.
This disparity points to another,
more sobering reality. If we send a
message that it is acceptable to close
the door to refugees, or to discriminate
among them on the basis of religion,
we are playing with fire.
We are lighting a fuse that will burn
across continents, inviting the very
instability we seek to protect ourselves
against.
We are already living through the
worst refugee crisis since World War
II. There are countries in Africa and
the Middle East bursting at the seams
with refugees. For generations Ameri- If we create a tier of second-class
can diplomats have joined the United refugees, implying Muslims are less
Nations in urging those countries to worthy of protection, we fuel extre-
keep their borders open, and to uphold mism abroad, and at home we under-
international standards on the treat- mine the ideal of diversity cherished
ment of refugees. Many do just that by Democrats and Republicans alike:
with exemplary generosity. America is committed to the world
What will be our response if other because so much of the world is inside
countries use national security as an America, in the words of Ronald Rea-
excuse to start turning people away, or gan. If we divide people beyond our
deny rights on the basis of religion? borders, we divide ourselves.
What could this mean for the Rohingya The lesson of the years we have
from Myanmar, spent fighting terrorism since Sept. 11
or for Somali is that every time we depart from our
If we create refugees, or values we worsen the very problem we
a tier of millions of other are trying to contain. We must never
second-class displaced people allow our values to become the collat-
who happen to eral damage of a search for greater
refugees, be Muslim? security. Shutting our door to refugees
implying And what does or discriminating among them is not
Muslims are this do to the our way, and does not make us safer.
less worthy of absolute prohibi- Acting out of fear is not our way. Tar-
protection, we tion in interna- geting the weakest does not show
tional law strength.
fuel extremism against discrimi- We all want to keep our country safe.
abroad. nation on the So we must look to the sources of the
grounds of faith terrorist threat to the conflicts that
or religion? give space and oxygen to groups like
The truth is that even if the numbers the Islamic State, and the despair and
of refugees we take in are small, and lawlessness on which they feed. We
we do the bare minimum, we do it to have to make common cause with
uphold the United Nations conventions people of all faiths and backgrounds
and standards we fought so hard to fighting the same threat and seeking
build after World War II, for the sake the same security. This is where I
of our own security. would hope any president of our great
If we Americans say that these nation would lead on behalf of all
obligations are no longer important, we Americans.
risk a free-for-all in which even more
refugees are denied a home, guaran- ANGELINA JOLIE, a filmmaker, is the spe-
teeing more instability, hatred and cial envoy of the United Nations High
violence. Commissioner for Refugees.
 ..
14 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION

Sports
How Arsenal and its manager bought into analytics
not provide insights for any of its rivals.
ON SOCCER
There had been some skepticism
among Wengers back-room staff about
the value of that deal. Now Ivan Gazidis,
Club bought data firm Arsenals chief executive, and its head of
business development, Hendrik Alm-
after it showed how to stadt, wanted to do something even
avoid high-risk signings more radical.
With the use of and belief in analytics
BY RORY SMITH growing at many Premier League clubs,
a number of Arsenals peers had ap-
Neither Marouane Chamakh nor Park proached StatDNA, looking to employ
Chu-young occupies a particularly its services. Gazidis and Almstadt were
prominent place in Arsenals history. determined not to let that happen. To
The former, a Moroccan striker, spent thwart their rivals, they proposed buy-
three years at the English club after ing StatDNA outright, for around $4 mil-
joining in 2010. He scored only 14 goals, lion.
was packed off on loan to West Ham Wenger had been open to the idea of
United and then released to Crystal Pal- using data from the start, but to per-
ace. suade him to go further, Almstadt and
Park, a South Korean forward who ar- Gazidis prepared a presentation on the
rived in London a year later, fared even benefits of bringing StatDNA, its
worse. He had joined on transfer dead- founder Jaeson Rosenfeld and his team
line day in 2011, a surprise, last-minute in-house.
capture from Monaco. But he never Rather than making sweeping prom-
quite lived up to the drama of his arriv- ises, they focused instead on what ana-
al: In two years, Park played just seven lytics might have helped Arsenal avoid.
times and scored only once. He, too, Almstadt, the driving force behind the
went out on loan and was then cut loose. plan, picked out Chamakh and Park as
Both players left Arsenal unwept and high-risk signings that a more empirical
unsung; if fans recall their names at all, approach to recruitment would have
it is only as they reel through the list of averted.
their clubs missteps in the transfer mar- The presentation won over Wenger.
ket, that cathartic process of reciting re- The deal went through.
grets at all those players signed and all For several years, Europes elite clubs
that money spent for barely any reward have viewed analytics as soccers next
at all. frontier. Something of an arms race has
Yet for all that Chamakh and Park developed to see who can find a success-
failed to do at Arsenal, their effect since ful formula first. Most major teams em-
their departure has been lasting. In one ploy a team of analysts; in an increasing
light, in fact, it is possible to see these number of cases, their influence is grow-
two most forgettable players from Ar- ing exponentially.
senals past as leading characters in the They hold sway, particularly, in re-
clubs attempts to chart its future. More cruitment, something of a legacy of
significant, they played a key role in Moneyball, the best-seller by Michael
teaching Arsne Wenger, that oldest of Lewis interpreted in soccer as a guide to
managerial dogs, the most cutting edge how to crack the transfer market.
of tricks. In November, Liverpool promoted its
Toward the end of Parks first season onetime head of analytics, Michael Ed-
at Arsenal, the 2011-12 campaign, two of wards, to sporting director. Swansea
the clubs executives approached the City last year brought Daniel Altman,
seemingly immovable Wenger, with a the founder of North Yard Analytics, to
proposal. the club as a transfer consultant. Data
Throughout that year, Arsenal had en- also is central to much of the work done
gaged the services of StatDNA, a sports at Manchester City, as well as its cadre
analytics company based in Chicago. of sister teams across the world, includ-
The arrangement was based on exclu- ing New York City F.C.
sivity; Arsenal had paid around StatDNA provides a similar service to
$250,000 to ensure that StatDNA would Arsenal: It was a data-led approach that
Arsenal officials had to win over Manager Arsne Wenger before purchasing the sports analytics company StatDNA outright.
led to the signing of defender Gabriel
Paulista in 2015, and that encouraged
Wenger to try to land Gonzalo Higuan
before his move to Napoli, despite the
reservations of the clubs scouting de-
partment.
Kevin de Bruyne, now of Manchester
City, was also flagged as a potential sign-
ing, only to be discounted because of
doubts (incorrect, it turns out) about his
ability to cope with the tumult of the Pre-
mier League. The approach is not flaw-
less: When Wenger mentioned a tal-
ented young wing at Spains Real So-
ciedad, he was told that the players met-
rics were not overly impressive. Wenger
smiled and remarked that he would be
keen to see how the player, Antoine
Griezmann, now one of the most coveted
strikers in Europe, had developed.
StatDNAs work with Arsenal runs
much deeper than advice on transfers.
The majority of clubs jealously guard
the specific data gathered and methods
used by their analysts StatDNA was
invited to comment for this article but
declined for fear of eroding whatever
advantage they have accrued. Those fa-
miliar with Arsenals approach, though,
believe it is among the most advanced in
the field.
In part, that is because the data
StatDNA produces is tailored for Ar-
senal. Many clubs still rely on external
STUART MACFARLANE/ARSENAL FC VIA GETTY IMAGES
companies, such as Opta, to provide the
raw figures from which their own teams
of analysts work.
Arsenal, by contrast, has developed
not just different metrics but more thor-
ough ones. Where it takes a commercial
provider a couple of hours to code a sin-
gle match, StatDNA requires around 14.
The data Arsenal works from, in other
words, is far cleaner.
It is also more in depth. StatDNA fo-
cuses not only on individual offensive
output but on defensive metrics, factors
that are difficult to code. One measure at
Arsenal, for example, assesses how fre-
quently defenders make errors: failing
to spot an opponent running past them,
or losing a one-on-one duel.
Taken in conjunction with more tradi-
tional metrics like expected goals,
which is the value of the danger of con-
ceding in any given situation, Arsenal
has a way of establishing not only how
many errors a player makes but the se-
riousness of them.
There is a focus, too, on trying to
quantify the value of specific partner-
ships, or certain combinations, on the
field, something that remains faintly
quixotic elsewhere.
There are attempts to use the physical
data the club gathers to help in injury
prevention as well, which is done in con-
junction with Shad Forsyth, the Ameri-
can fitness expert recommended by
Almstadt and appointed by Wenger. The
detail here is remarkable, too: gauging a
players tiredness by measuring how
long his foot is planted on the ground as
he runs.
For several years, Europes elite
clubs have viewed analytics as
soccers next frontier. Something
of an arms race has developed.
Crucial to all of it, however, is that it
has Wengers full support. Rosenfeld is
regarded as one of Wengers most
trusted advisers, and what Wenger has
described as a core of StatDNA staff
members is regularly on hand at Ar-
senals training base. Wenger sees it as
his job to pick the four or five key
pieces of information that he requires
for each game, but he values highly the
many hundreds that come his way each
week, knowing that at some point, any
one of them could be useful.
Wenger once was regarded as a pio-
neer. His arrival in England two decades
ago began a revolution in nutrition, in
conditioning, in tactics; he was one of
the great modernizing forces in the Pre-
mier League. Recently, he has come to
be regarded not least by a substantial
portion of Arsenals fans as some-
thing of an anachronism, a man who has
lost his edge.
His willingness to embrace the new,
though, has never left him. He has con-
tinued to try to find the future, thanks in
no small part to two forgotten players
from his past.

NON SEQUITUR PEANUTS DOONESBURY CLASSIC 1988

GARFIELD CALVIN AND HOBBES

SUDOKU No. 0402

WIZARD of ID DILBERT
(c) PZZL.com Distributed by The New York Times syndicate
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KENKEN CROSSWORD | Edited by Will Shortz

Fill the grid so Solution No. 0302 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

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KenKen is a registered trademark of Nextoy, LLC.

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Solution to February 3 Puzzle 11 Slip away PUZZLE BY PATRICK BERRY

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..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 15

real estate

Capturing village life

of the 19th century
House Hunting In . . .
Ireland
BY ROXANA POPESCU
VICTORIAN RECTORY
WITH A COACH HOUSE
IN THE COUNTRYSIDE
$1.62 MILLION
This 3,670-square-foot Victorian house,
known as the Old Rectory, was built in
the late 1870s and used as a rectory, or
home of the local priest, until the
mid-20th century. It is a 10-minute walk
from the village of Ashford, in County
Wicklow, about 30 miles from Dublins
city center.
The front door, which is original to the
house, opens onto a small entryway and,
beyond that, a foyer. To the right are the
dining room, a family room and a bath-
room outfitted with bookshelves (the
owners call it the library bathroom).
To the left of the foyer is a large drawing
room. A corridor off the foyer leads to
the back of the house, connecting the
kitchen, pantry, a boot room, a playroom
the owners. The lot, which is about four
and a half acres, also has stables, an in-
door pool, a field and a landscaped gar-
den with magnolia and eucalyptus trees.
Ashford, with a population of around
1,500, is a 45-minute drive to the center
of Dublin, making it a commuter com-
munity. Buses run to Dublin, while a
train connects Dublin to the neighbor-
ing town of Wicklow, four miles away.
Ashford has several restaurants and a
small grocery store. Attractions include
hunting, riding, cycling and the Mount
Usher Gardens. Two schools are within
walking distance of the house, and Dub-
lins international airport is a 50-minute
drive.
MARKET OVERVIEW
After prices peaked in 2006 and hit bot-
tom in 2012, the Irish real estate market
is slowly recovering, said Keith Lowe,
chief executive of Douglas Newman
Good, a real estate agency in Ireland.
The recovery has radiated from Dublin
like a ripple effect, he said, first reach-
ing the commuter areas around the city
and then the rest of the country. Dublin
property has increased in price by an PHOTOGRAPHS BY DEREK SPEIRS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

and a half bathroom. A staircase from
the foyer leads to the second floor, where
there are five bedrooms, including a
master with an en-suite bath.
Original fixtures include marble fire-
places, windows and servants bells,
and records document the propertys
history. The kitchens four-oven AGA
stove was installed several decades ago.
The roof on the main house is about 10
years old; the coach house roof is at
most 15.
Separated from the main house by a
courtyard, the approximately 1,300-
square-foot coach house has a living
room, a full bathroom and a kitchen, as
well as a separate half-bath at the back,
accessible from the outside. The large
room upstairs has been used as a writ-
ing studio and as a space for slumber
parties. The property was a happy place
for raising children, said Maureen Sor-
aghan, an interior designer who is one of
The drawing room is at the front of the house, which was built in the late 1870s and was
used as a rectory until the mid-20th century.
average of 65 percent since 2012, but is
still 44 percent below the peak. I would
think that property prices are much
more in tune with peoples income and
their ability to borrow, Mr. Lowe said.
Still, the market is facing several is-
sues, he added: Prices have risen faster
than inflation; there is a housing short-
age, because construction is not meet-
ing demand; rents have risen sharply
for several years in a row, limiting the
purchasing power of potential home
buyers; and the central bank has re-
stricted credit.
In a report issued in early January by
Daft, another Irish real estate agency,
Ronan Lyons, an economist at Trinity
College Dublin, estimated that Ireland
needed between 40,000 and 50,000 new
homes each year because of population
growth and housing obsolescence. In-
stead, for every ten new families
formed, he wrote, just two new
The Old Rectory, a five bedroom Victorian with a coach house, equestrian facilities and a field, is in the village of Ashford.
dwellings were built, for the entire peri-
od from 2011 to 2016.
The government has taken some ac-
tion to address those challenges, Mr.
Lowe said. A new grant program for
first-time buyers is intended to spur
construction, and the central bank is
starting to relax income requirements
for those seeking mortgages.
Philip Guckian, the manager of the
Dublin-based Sherry FitzGerald Coun-
try Homes, Farms & Estates, which has
the listing, said luxury buyers were in-
terested in historic homes in Dublins
central neighborhoods, as well as the
southern suburbs of Dalkey and
Killiney. In County Wicklow, just south
of Dublin, the draw was value for
money, Mr. Guckian said. The entry
point for luxury homes is around
750,000 euros ($810,000), compared
with a million euros ($1.08 million) in
Dublin.
The Old Rectorys swimming pool. The property also has a landscaped garden.
WHO BUYS IN COUNTY WICKLOW
There has been a drop recently in the
number of foreigners purchasing homes of the purchase price, and there is a val- WEBSITES
in Ireland, including in Dublin and its ue-added tax of 23 percent on that fee. Dublin tourism: visitdublin.com
surroundings, Mr. Guckian said. We Closing costs paid by the buyer in- Wicklow tourism:
are seeing the domestic buyer coming clude a stamp duty (1 percent of the first visitwicklow.ie/towns-villages/ashford
back more and more, he added, citing million euros and 2 percent of every-
the Brexit referendum and the resulting thing over a million euros) paid on ei- LANGUAGES AND CURRENCY
weakened pound, as well as uncertainty ther the homes market value or the pur- Irish Gaelic, English; euro
about American politics leading up to chase price, whichever is greater, Mr. (one euro = $1.08)
the 2016 presidential election, as causes. Walsh said. The buyer also must pay a
Recent foreign buyers have come from title registration fee, which does not ex- TAXES AND FEES
the United States, Britain, China, Japan ceed 800 euros, and public registry For properties valued at more than a
and continental Europe, he said. search fees for liabilities or issues in- million euros ($1.08 million), the annual
cluding unpaid mortgages; those fees property tax is 1,800 euros ($1,944) and
BUYING BASICS typically do not exceed 300 euros. Usu- 0.25 percent of the excess value over a
Foreigners may purchase properties in ally, the seller pays the real estate million euros.
Ireland effectively without restrictions, agents commission.
said Michael Walsh, a partner with Mr. Walsh advised hiring a lawyer CONTACT
ByrneWallace, a Dublin law firm. Each with sufficient professional indemnity Philip Guckian, Sherry FitzGerald
party retains its own attorney. The law- insurance to cover the value of the ac- Country Homes, Farms & Estates;
yers fee is typically less than 1 percent quisition. +353 87-660-8639; sherryfitz.ie

Functionalist Czech estate

comes stocked with fish
PRAGUE
BY FIONA GAZE
Unlike their common Czech cousins
raised on local fish farms and destined
by tradition to be deep-fried and served
on Christmas Eve the 70 carp in the
koi pond at the joint functionalist villas
of the K Dymaci property are of a rare
breed, harking to the Japanese tradition
of koi-rearing and revering.
Jan Prucha, the owner of the villas
and a devoted carp enthusiast, had not
just the koi pond designed around a cer-
tain Zen aesthetic, but the whole prop-
erty, which includes a Japanese garden.
The 3,180-square-meter estate, in the
quiet village of Cholupice, in southern
Prague, is now for sale, and Mr. Prucha
is willing to sell the carp as well, so that
the fish can stay in their cultured hab-
itat. Listed by Svoboda & Williams at 50
million Czech koruna, or $2 million, the
property is not for the typical owner,
but ideal for two families, he said, and
allows for creative license in completing
the interiors of the main villa.
Built over 18 months between 2006
and 2008, K Dymaci originally com-
prised four farmstead buildings dating
to 1870, making it one of the oldest prop-
erties in the village, located about a 20-
minute drive from Pragues city center.
Its modern incarnation still has one of
the original brick cellars reachable by
a trap door on the patio that is now set
up as a wine cellar.
Mr. Prucha and his partner, Barbora
Filipova, found the original blueprints in
the city archive and used the old houses
bricks in the walls and stones in the
fence. Elements of the gardens history,
too, were preserved.
We kept the old trees. We tried to
build around them and respect them,
Mr. Prucha said. Since there are sev-
eral big Douglas fir trees on the plot, we
decided to have the buildings built with
concrete skeletons just in case one of the
trees fell.
Mr. Prucha and Ms. Filipova hired CS
Architects for the project, which was
nominated in 2009 for the Architecture
Grand Prix, the Czech Republics big-
gest architectural award. The architects
for the project, Jaroslav Zatko and Petra
Brzobohata, envisioned the functional-
ist design of the estate. Czech architec-
ture is quite famous for functionalism,
so we wanted to have the houses built in
that style, Mr. Prucha said.
The estate features two villas, both
two stories. The smaller, at 230 square
meters, or 2,475 square feet, has four
bedrooms and two baths, and is in move-
in condition. The upstairs en suite mas-
ter bedroom has floor-to-ceiling win-
dows overlooking the garden, the koi
pond and the adjacent swimming pool,
as well one of the propertys highlights:
a 136-square-meter open pool house fea-
turing an indoor and outdoor fireplace, a
pizza oven and a smokehouse, as well as
a bar.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY TOMAS MACH FOR SVOBODA & WILLIAMS
The larger villa, 514 square meters,
has a completed 110-square-meter stu- The wooded estate features two villas, both two stories, a koi pond (filled with dozens of carp) and an adjacent swimming pool.
dio, while the rest is in shell-and-core
state, allowing for a new owners per-
sonal touch. However, Mr. Prucha says
the same architects and designers used A highlight is an open pool
throughout the rest of the property can house featuring an indoor and
be available to complete the villa, which outdoor fireplace, a pizza oven, a
is set up to be a six-room, three-bath,
open-plan living area, with space for an
smokehouse and a bar.
office, spa and home cinema (one of the
rooms has base soundproofing). Floor- company Insight Home, which has since
to-ceiling windows let in an abundance used the property as a case study.
of natural light, and all the rooms have There are no restrictions on the type
views over the garden, which is leafy of ownership, so K Dymaci could even
enough to obscure views of neighboring be home to multiple company seats. Pre-
properties. viously it has also hosted small business
The entire complex is interconnected conferences, with the convenience of
via a smart-home system accessible private parking for 10 cars and built-in
by iPhone, iPad or AMX panels audiovisual facilities.
throughout the property that manages While sleepy Cholupice is part of the
security, lighting, temperature and en- larger Prague 4 municipal district, it
tertainment. When first designing the also has local amenities such as two
villas, Mr. Prucha had sought such an in- restaurants and a grocery store, with
tegrated system but found the market schools, a post office and shopping cen-
lacking; seeing a niche, he started the ters just a few bus stops away. The pool house has two fireplaces and plenty of space for entertaining guests.

16 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
WEEKEND
Puppetrys time
is at hand
CHICAGO
A festival in Chicago
shows off a thriving
international art form
BY LAURA COLLINS-HUGHES
A shop vacuum became a lover; suction
was involved. Feet turned into faces. A
great fanged creature appeared with a
man inside. Ghostly villagers assem-
bled, silent and wreathed with smoke as
their buildings burned and burned.
It was a puppet invasion all part of
the 11-day Chicago International Puppet
Theater Festival and the latest proof
that puppetry, a delicate and mysterious
art so often restricted in the United
States to the childrens table, or relegat-
ed to fringe productions, has claimed a
spot closer to the center. In an age in
search of relief from the relentless bar-
rage of technology, this low-fi, hand-
made form provides it.
A city where the dominant stage aes-
thetic for years was a kind of red-meat
realism think Steppenwolf Theater
Company, which unleashed John Malko-
vich on the world might not seem to
be a place where puppetry would flour-
ish. Yet the very existence of last
months festival, and the eagerness with
which dozens of institutions across Chi-
cago have embraced it since its start in
2015, is emblematic of a development
long in the making on American stages.
Its not so much that puppetry is hav-
ing a moment as that it has reached criti-
cal mass and settled in, cherished by
grown-up audiences raised on Sesame
Street and The Muppet Show who
have had their hunger stoked by land-
mark puppet productions on Broadway:
The Lion King; Avenue Q; War
Horse, with its magnificent steeds.
If, in theater as in opera and dance,
where it has also been making inroads
puppetry most often plays a support-
ing rather than starring role, it has a
much greater presence than it once did.
Infiltration is welcome, said the
puppeteer Blair Thomas, the festivals
founder and artistic director, who made
a dog puppet for Patti LuPones charac-
ter in the Broadway-bound musical
War Paint when it ran in Chicago last
summer. The doors have been opened.
And the puppets are marching right
through.
CATCHING UP WITH THE WORLD
You can see the shift in The New York
Times, with mention of puppets now
commonplace in theater reviews. But
then, New York is the puppetry capital
of America, where boundary-pushing
directors like Lee Breuer and Julie Tay-
mor have spent decades harnessing
that hybrid art part visual, part per-
formance to create fantastical worlds
heavily influenced by foreign traditions.
The best shows I saw over a weekend
at the Chicago festival did come from
other countries. One was the Norwegian
director Yngvild Aspelis Cendres, a
haunted, mesmerizing piece about ar-
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
LIZ LAUREN
Above, a scene
from Mr. and
Mrs. Pennyworth,
a play by Doug
Hara presented by
the Lookingglass
Theater Company.
At left, Chifln, El
Silencio del
Carbn (Chifln,
Silence of the
Coal) by the
Chilean collective
Silencio Blanco.
SILENCIO BLANCO
son and internal torment, full of life-size of coal mining, set partly deep beneath
puppets and miniature blazing build- the earth. That production, which con-
ings, from the French-Norwegian com- tinues its United States tour through
pany Plexus Polaire. Unfortunately for early March, will stop in New York this
American audiences, it has already month.
headed back to Europe. But the abundant homegrown pup-
The other was Chifln, El Silencio del petry in Mr. and Mrs. Pennyworth, a
Carbn (Chifln, Silence of the Coal), nouveau-Victorian play by Doug Hara at
by the Chilean collective Silencio Lookingglass Theater Company, was on
Blanco, whose artists manipulate sub- par with those imports both the shad-
limely crude-looking puppets with ow puppetry by the young Chicago col-
tender precision to tell a wordless story PUPPETS, PAGE 20
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
style
Phenomenon
of children of
Vanessa Friedman
UNBUT TONED
In Paris last month, the honor of the final
exit at the Chanel couture show the
one every model wants to walk was
bestowed on a fresh-faced young wom-
en, strolling the circular runway in a
long pink dress. A coronation of sorts, it
marked her as a new face of the brand
and favorite of Karl Lagerfeld, the de-
signer. Her being Lily-Rose Depp, the
daughter of the actress-singer Vanessa
Paradis, a former face of the brand, and
Johnny Depp.
As it happens, Ms. Depps appearance
at Chanel followed fast on the heels of
Burberrys announcement that it had
chosen Iris Law, the daughter of Jude
Law and Sadie Frost, as the new face of
its makeup line Liquid Lip Velvet, as
well as the appearance of Lennon Galla-
gher, the son of Liam Gallagher, the Oa-
sis frontman, and Patsy Kensit, on the
Topman runway during London Fash-
ion Week Mens. Not to mention the an-
nouncement that Frances Bean Cobain,
the daughter of Kurt Cobain and Court-
ney Love, was the star of the new Marc
Jacobs ads. Plus that Jimmy Freud, the
son of Bella Freud, was featured in the
new issue of Love magazine.
And it presaged the release of a new
Gap video campaign featuring Rumer
Willis (daughter of Demi Moore), T J
Mizell (son of Jam Master Jay), Coco
Gordon (daughter of Kim Gordon),
Lizzy Jagger (daughter of Mick Jag-
ger), Chelsea Tyler (daughter of Steven
Tyler) and Evan Ross (son of Diana
Ross) whose famous forebears once
upon a time made their own Gap ads.
Evan Ross
Mens wear shows
with a slant on politics
CRITICS NOTEBOOK
BY GUY TREBAY
Of course, reality intruded. Fabulous-
ness is no barricade against politics. Re-
acting to President Trumps executive
order banning for 90 days the entry of
citizens from seven Muslim-majority
nations and refugees from any country
for 120 days, designers who are showing
their work during the four days of mens
fashion in New York expressed dissent
in gestures that, while mainly small and
symbolic, added gravitas to the usual
street-style antics and overall frivolity.
Sooty-faced models in Robert Jamess
show at the New York Mens Day event
on Monday carried placards block-
printed with pointed messages: Made
in a Sanctuary City and Bridges Not
Walls. At a Private Policy presentation
that afternoon, members of a multiracial
cast clad in quilted bomber jackets and
hot pants had words like terrorist
stenciled on foreheads or cheeks.
Taking a bow at the end of a show on
Tuesday, in which models faces were
obscured behind neoprene ski masks,
the German-born designer Robert
Geller wore a sweatshirt that read: Im-
migrant.
And in a spirited introduction to Nick
Grahams Mars-themed collection on
Tuesday, presented against a giant pro-
jection of Earth seen from space, Bill
Nye the Science Guy addressed and the stylist Tsuyoshi Nimoras obser-
Given that the title is Generation
Gap and the clothes being worn are all
reissued updated versions of 15 staple
Gap pieces of the 90s that their respec-
tive parents wore the black bodysuit,
the sleeveless tee, the logo sweatshirt
the connection makes a certain amount
of sense. But it also may signal the sec-
ond, institutionalized phase of what has
become a bona fide cross-border fashion
phenomenon.
We call it the children of, said Ste-
fano Tonchi, the editor of W, who hap-
pened to have just shot Brandon Thom-
as Lee (son of Tommy Lee and Pamela
Anderson) and Nyima Ward (the model
Trish Goffs son) among others for the
April issue.
Never before have so many children
of famous parents been so celebrated
and rewarded for their lineage, and so
willing to publicly embrace it. IMG Mod-
els alone has more than 25 children of
on its books, including the latest name,
Dylan Brosnan, son of Pierce (also
Ethan Peck, grandson of Gregory, and
Alessandra Garcia, stepdaughter of
Andy).
What began with a few random mini-
mes (the Jagger kids, Keith Richardss
girls) and picked up steam when Dolce
& Gabbana replaced its usual celebrity
front row with a millennial children-of
front row (and billed it that way), can no
longer be dismissed as a coincidence or
even a fad.
It has become a profession to be the
son or daughter of a celebrity, Mr.
Tonchi said.
And that means we cannot dismiss
the associated implications about the
end of the meritocracy and our own
complicity or what Ivan Bart, presi-
dent of IMG Models, calls obsession
therein. Despite the public hoo-ha about
nepotism engendered by the recent
election, the palpable discomfort with
political dynasties and the ambiguity
around Ivanka Trumps role, when it
comes to what sells, apparently, lineage
matters.
This is not to say, of course, that lin-
Rumer Willis
climate-change deniers with a paean to
our fragile atmosphere.
You only have to go backstage to see
models from nearly every point on the
globe India, Mongolia, China and Su-
dan were just some of the countries that
have been represented here in the past
week and to understand that fashion
is a plurality undertaking. Sure, the pan-
oply of multiethnic faces is a relatively
new addition to a business not always
known for welcoming diversity. Yet be-
hind the scenes, fashion has always
been global, as Fern Mallis, the former
executive director of the Council of
Fashion Designers of America, said
Tuesday afternoon.
You have no idea how many visa
forms I filled out in my career, Ms.
Mallis said, referring to her work on be-
half of the artisans from distant coun-
tries whose skills were essential if
American designers visions were to be
realized. The garment industry itself
was built by immigrants, Ms. Mallis
noted of a business that continues to be
one of New Yorks top economic drivers.
Free-floating societal anxieties
seemed to inject themselves into the
proceedings in other ways. Take a
Krammer & Stoudt presentation frankly
inspired by street-living, rail-riding
transients, one in which the baggy lay-
ers often worn by crustys, or gutter
punks, were used as a form of armoring.
Or look at the N. Hoolywood show in-
spired by the designer Daisuke Obanas
bum, Double Roses, as models of both
SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 17
Weekend
eage is the only reason these NextGen
names are having a moment. They are
all attractive. They are generally tal-
ented, most forging their own artistic
paths in a variety of areas, in music, art
and film. They often have large social
media followings. But theres no getting
around the fact that their current pro-
file, especially in the fashion world,
seems somewhat out of proportion to
their achievements thus far.
Their X factor is their parentage; its
what makes them stand out from the
crowd of other attractive, talented peers
(and is used in all of the marketing ma-
terials). But the Y factor and this is
whats interesting is that they are per-
fectly happy not only to acknowledge it,
but also to leverage it.
Whereas once upon a time children of
famous parents might have changed
their surnames in order to prove them-
selves (see: Angelina Jolie, Emilio Es-
tevez) or even rejected their parents
choices, this generation is happy to as-
sume the mantle.
After all, if were going to be so fasci-
nated by celebrity, and what it may have
been like to grow up with celebrity par-
ents if were going to snap pictures of
the children eating ice cream and at the
park (celebs! theyre just like us!) from
the time they are little, and feel, some-
how, that we know them because we
know their parents why shouldnt
they use that to their own advantage?
Regardless of what we do in life, ev-
ery article starts with daughter of,
Ms. Willis said over the phone from the
set of Empire, discussing her partici-
pation in the Gap ad. We were all talk-
ing about it during the Gap shoot. You
can fight that, or accept it and appreci-
ate it. Personally, I love the idea of being
a part of something my parents were
part of but putting my own spin on it.
Mr. Ross agreed. I dont chafe
against it, he said. Im proud of it. We
had the Gap ad with my mother and sis-
ter blown up in our house in Greenwich
growing up.
They are the celebrity equivalent of
the millennials who move back and stay
with their parents, which is perhaps
why both the millennials and the par- As a result, many brands see in this Generations X and Z, between those Lizzy Jagger,
ents can relate. Indeed, its not just generation an opportunity to, effec- who remember their parents, and grew daughter of Mick,
about the children. As Mr. Tonchi points tively, double dip with their consumer up with them, and those who follow the in a Gap campaign
out, there has been a change in the social base; to reach two markets with one children on social media. Either way, that features the
acceptance of family, an incorporation name. they have an allure a nonpedigreed children of celebri-
of the formerly private into the public According to Craig Brommers, the model does not. ties who in the
narrative. Children have become part of chief marketing officer for Gap (who Weve had a lot of brands from past appeared in
a parents identity, both professionally also said not one child of who was in- Cindys past approach us about Kaia, Gap ads of their
and personally, in a way they never were vited to be part of the ad turned it down), Mr. Bart of IMG Models said, referring own.
before. they effectively act as a bridge between to Cindy Crawford and her daughter, the
model Kaia Gerber. They feel they have
a history with the family.
This creates, he went on, a ready-
made back story that forms a narrative
we all know and maybe more impor-
tant, buy.
Its authentic heritage, said Mandi
Lennard, the founder of Mandis Base-
ment, a brand consultancy. That sounds
kind of absurd, but authenticity of any
kind is what you need to engage people
today, she said. Or even to make it onto
a buzzy party list. According to Ms.
Lennard, the NextGen are among the
most coveted guests at any event. Some-
times they bring their parents on their
arm.
Still, Mr. Bart rejects the idea that
simply being a child of is enough for
anyone to make the leap to a bona fide
marketable personality in his or her own
right. There have to be celebs out there
that have children that dont get ap-
proached, he said.
He may be right. But given the fact
that every day another example seems
to land in the inbox the latest being
Dylan Bleue Murphy, daughter of the
Este Lauder model Carolyn Murphy,
who is featured with her mother in a
new Lauder fragrance ad scheduled to
break in September its hard to imag-
T J Mizell ine who it might be.
vations of homeless people on a recent sexes ambled through the crowd. Biafra, he said of the Dead Kennedys
cross-country trip. It can almost always be predicted that singer) began with an upstart hippie
Home and homecoming were a theme unpredictable pairings will pop up dur- movement that had its counterculture
at Billy Reids show Monday evening, ing mens week, which closed Thursday origins in the Beats.
held in the Cellar of the Beekman hotel, night, and this one was no exception. Mr. Music is my breadwinner, but fash-
a chic hide-out nestled in the financial Reid was inspired by the Beats, and so, ion is my creative outlet, said Mr. Aoki,
district, whose tall structures and windy too, somehow, was Steve Aoki, a star who, in an attempt to be disruptive
streets on a cold winter night evoked the D.J. whose Dim Mak line of skater-style (though not obvious), used quotes
cathedral of Januaries Frank OHara clothes, new to New York, has in only from and images of William S. Bur-
wrote about in Avenue A. four seasons become a hit in Japan. roughs throughout his collection.
The moody, elliptical OHara poem I wanted to embody the roots of what Happily, Mr. Aokis music career is
was recited at the show by the Tony all that came from, Mr. Aoki said in an thriving since his debut outing at New
Award-winning actor Alex Sharp to a interview Monday morning at the Roxy York Fashion Week: Mens was paid for
room full of guests eager to welcome Mr. Hotel, referring to the punk music he lis- from his own pocket.
Reid on his return to the New York fash- tened to during his college days at the Its terrifying to me to show this to
ion fold. Its good to be here, the de- University of California, Santa Barbara. critics, Mr. Aoki said, but I accept that
signer said to the crowd, referring to a By Mr. Aokis reckoning, the lineage of there are people that wont accept me.
period when he sat out the show cycle. the punk musicians he worshiped (I al- His response to that hurdle, he said, is
And if it is good, indeed, to have the most fell to my knees when I met Jello to just go for it.
genial Southerner around again, that
has less to do with the largely generic
designs he presented in a collection in-
spired, he said, by the Beats (though
some elements were more reminiscent
of the stuff he used to design for the golf-
er Greg Norman) than because of his
steady and grounding presence in a
sometimes shaky industry.
Also, he gives a good party. For the
last eight summers, Mr. Reid has staged
a festival of music, food, drinks and fash-
ion in Florence, Ala., and on Monday, he
gathered around him friends from many
realms, including the musicians Win-
ston Marshall and the Watson Twins.
Conceptually, its about people sharing
their talents and inspiring each other,
Mr. Reid said. The Private Policy
He also brought in the blues musician presentation in
Cedric Burnside to offer his rendition of New York, where a
Love Her Til I Die, along with Karen multiracial cast of
Elson, the luminous British model models had words
turned Nashville singer, who took to a like terrorist
microphone with a tune from her new al- written on fore-
BEN SKLAR FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES heads or cheeks.

18 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
Weekend
The music director
as multitasker
PARIS
Philippe Jordan thrives
at the Paris Opera
while juggling productions
BY ROSLYN SULCAS
It was 10:45 on a gray, chilly January
morning here. The conductor Philippe
Jordan was spending a rehearsal break
on a couch in his spacious office at the
Bastille Opera House, looking through
the score of Mozarts Cos Fan Tutte. Over lunch at a nearby restaurant, Mr.
He had already spent an hour with the
Paris Operas orchestra going over
Cos, which was two weeks away from
opening in a new production directed by
the Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa
de Keersmaeker.
There is such a thin line between per-
fection and energy and life in Mozart,
Mr. Jordan said as he walked back to the
rehearsal. It takes a lot of work.
Every day is a lot of work for Mr. Jor-
dan, who was appointed the Paris Op-
eras music director in 2007, when he
was just 33, and has swiftly risen to be-
come one of the most sought-after con-
ductors of his generation. At any mo-
ment, he is juggling preparations for
several opera productions and orches-
tral concerts here (he will conduct 49
performances at the Paris Opera this
season), as well as engagements
abroad. In August, he will conduct a new
staging of Wagners Die Meistersinger
von Nrnberg at the Bayreuth Festival
in Germany, and he will return to the
Metropolitan Opera in the spring of 2019
for a crucial assignment: a full revival of
Robert Lepages controversial produc-
tion of Wagners Ring cycle.
Ive seen the DVD, he said when
asked about the production and its huge,
wonky seesaw set. Even Peter Gelb is
clear that things have to be changed,
and Ive made a list and given some sug-
gestions. Revivals give you the chance
to make things better.
This January, however, he was in
Paris, working on both Cos and Wag-
ners Lohengrin, the only one of that
composers operas he hadnt yet con-
ducted. In the corridor of the Bastille, he
crossed paths with the tenor Jonas
Kaufmann, who was scheduled to sing
Lohengrin after a much-publicized
monthslong pause to recover from a
burst blood vessel on his vocal cords.
Dont come near me, I have a cold! Mr.
Jordan said, and Mr. Kaufmann scooted
back dramatically, with a laugh.
The quality of the casts that Paris is
getting now is really quite frightening,
Mr. Kaufmann said in an interview the
next day. I think that one of the ingredi-
ents is Philippe, because you are guar-
anteed a superb musical quality and a
conductor who has not made up his
mind about how you should sing a role.
We always find a solution and an inspir-
ing interpretation.
11 A.M.
The break over, Mr. Jordan resumed
work with the orchestra. Or, rather, one
of them. The Paris Opera has a large
enough ensemble to be able to have two
orchestras coded green and blue
rehearsing and performing simulta-
neously. (Mr. Jordan was working with
Team Blue.) As the musicians began Act
I of Cos, he exhorted different sec-
tions to emphasize specific tonal quali-
ties, using a torrent of onomatopoeic
MONIKA RITTERSHAUS
JEAN-FRANCOIS LECLERCQ
sounds. Tssshhhtt! he hissed during a
quiet section; Yip-yip! as the tempo
quickened.
During a recitative passage, Mr. Jor-
dan sang the singers parts in Italian,
calling out instructions between the
lines. When you argue with singers
about color or the right tempi, he said
later, you need to feel the rubato of the
language. I learn every line and if I cant
pronounce the words, I feel like my
hands are tied. Perhaps in 10 years Ill
learn Russian and do all the Russian op-
eras.
12:30 P.M.
Jordan spoke about his childhood in Zu-
rich and his musical training. Born to
the noted Swiss conductor Armin Jor-
dan, who died in 2006, Philippe knew he
wanted to follow in his fathers footsteps
by the time he was 9. I never had the
astronaut or fireman phase, he said.
At 15, he left ordinary school for the
Zurich Conservatory, and completed a
piano diploma in case the conduct-
ing thing didnt work, he said as well
as studying composition. By 18, he was
assisting Jeffrey Tate on a Ring cycle
at the Thtre du Chtelet, headed at the
time by Stphane Lissner. Now the di-
rector of the Paris Opera, Mr. Lissner
said that Mr. Jordan stood out immedi-
ately. His rigorousness, the quality of
his preparation, his theatrical sense,
were evident even then, Mr. Lissner
said in an interview.
At 20, Mr. Jordan was hired as the con-
certmaster of the Ulm Stadttheater in
Germany. I learned conducting the old-
fashioned way, like Karajan, Kleiber,
Mahler, he said. You play the piano
through rehearsals, you step in to con-
duct for half an hour, you conduct oper-
etta, which is hard. Today this is out of
fashion: You do your studies, win a con-
ductors competition and your career
begins. But you have no idea about guid-
ing the machine. Its not fun to hear, but
sit on a piano in a German opera house
for four or five years and learn your job.
He said it was important for his per-
sonal growth to get away to Ulm, and
later to Berlin, where he worked as Dan-
iel Barenboims assistant for three years
at the Staatsoper. My father was a big
personality and I was immersed in his
world, which was a blessing and a
At 9, he knew curse, Mr. Jordan said. Later, I could
what he go back to him and realize: Thats part of
wanted. I me and I can be proud of it.
never had the 2:30 P.M.
astronaut or Back in a Bastille rehearsal studio, with
fireman a panoramic view of Paris rooftops, Mr.
phase. Jordan was taking six singers through
the recitative passages of Cos, which
he described as particularly vital in Ms.
De Keersmaekers production, which
uses both a singer and a dancer to inter-
pret each principal role.
Because you have little action, and
the dancers are moving, we have to do
everything with rhythm and tempo, he
told the singers. Really make it strong.
Speaking alternately in English, Ger-
man and Italian to the international
cast, he urged them to greater clarity of
expression, diction and meaning, often
discussing the potential intention of a
phrase. More bite, more hate! he much about this in his first job as a prin-
called out to Simone Del Savio, playing
the chilly Don Alfonso. Ah, thats so
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
music
PHILIPPE GONTIER
Clockwise from Barenboim in Berlin.
above, Philippe I was now really my own boss, at 27,
Jordan, who has he said, and I had to learn that the psy-
been music direc- chology of working with people is not al-
tor of the Paris ways easy.
Opera since 2007, After three years in Graz, he free-
when he was 33; lanced, making debuts at the Glynde-
the companys bourne Festival in England, the Aix-en-
production of Provence Festival in France, the Royal
Cos Fan Tutte, Opera House in London and the Metro-
directed by the politan Opera. Although it was an active
Belgian choreo- period, when Nicolas Joel, then the di-
grapher Anne rector of the Paris Opera, offered Mr.
Teresa de Keers- Jordan the music directorship, he de-
maeker; Mr. Jor- cided it was time to commit.
dan on the podium Internationally, the Paris Opera did-
in 2014; Jonas nt have a great reputation compared to,
Kaufmann and say, the Met, Mr. Jordan said. But my
Martina Serafin in father used to tell me it was good, and I
Lohengrin. felt that after the one-night stands of be-
ing a freelancer, it was time to have a se-
rious relationship, a marriage with an
ensemble which you work with on a
daily basis.
In 2014 he added another post, becom-
ing the chief conductor of the Vienna
Symphony Orchestra. If you are only
AGATHE POUPENEY
an orchestra conductor, or only an opera
conductor, he said, youre only doing
cynical and nasty lovely! half the job.
6:30 P.M. 7:30 P.M.
At a traditional internal presentation of After a day of Cos, an evening stage
New Years wishes, Mr. Lissner gave a rehearsal of Lohengrin began, with
short speech to about 70 orchestra and Mr. Jordan, now almost voiceless, lead-
technical staff members in an upper foy- ing the orchestra and singers through
er of the opera house. After listing some the first act. A chorus member twisted
triumphs and challenges of the past her ankle, and the rehearsal was sus-
year, he gestured to Mr. Jordan and pended for 10 minutes. Sounding
said: Not many musical directors are stressed for the first time in a busy day,
as engaged with both the performances he announced through a microphone:
and the daily life of the house as Phil- We need to move on if were going to
ippe. Mr. Jordan, whose slight cold had get through everything.
worsened, spoke briefly in a hoarse Mr. Jordans contract in Paris runs
voice, highlighting the orchestras through 2021; he said he was likely to
achievement in playing Bach at a recent leave then, when Mr. Lissner, 64, plans
concert. to retire. I have loved the intellectual
He added in a conversation that part approach that Stphane has brought to
of his job at the opera, where he is in the Opera, he said. He is clever be-
charge of about 300 people, involves cause he also knows how to enchant
successfully interacting with a variety Paris audiences. It can be very modern,
of personalities. He said he learned but must always look very good.
At 10:30, the rehearsal ended. The or-
cipal conductor, in Graz, Austria, where chestra applauded Mr. Jordan, who
he went after leaving his post with Mr. smiled. See you tomorrow, he said.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
arts
Choreographing
a fight for liberty
The OA, on Netflix, draws power
from the world of dance
BY GIA KOURLAS
A young woman, blind and adopted, dis-
appears from a small town. When she
returns seven years later, she can see.
But thats not the strangest part about
The OA, a brooding Netflix series that
involves abductions, brain experiments
and a shooting. The real surprise is the
choreography.
Even more than dialogue, this story
reveals itself through movement five
movements, to be exact. When executed
in unison by five people, these actions
have the power to liberate the body.
They bring a dead man back to life. And
they create the ability to open the door
to another dimension.
For a group of characters imprisoned
behind glass in an underground labora-
tory, the movements, which they dis-
cover over time, are their only chance
for escape. Their captor, a scientist, has
chosen them because they survived
near-death experiences.
A poetic idea: Its true that The OA requires pa-
Dance heals if tience (the movements dont even ap-
performed pear until midway through) and a
boundless suspension of disbelief, but it
with the right puts across an eerily poetic idea: that
intensity. movement, or dance, heals if it is per-
formed with the right effort and intensi-
ty.
Brit Marling, who stars in The OA
and created it with Zal Batmanglij, said
in an interview that violence has often
been used as a way to wake up an audi-
ence. They wanted to try something
else. We started to ask ourselves, is
there something else that was also
uniquely cinematic that could be a kind
of antidote to violence or that could be
an expression that could similarly shock
or to awaken that would be a counterbal-
ance? she said. I think thats why the
idea of using movement as a language
started to percolate.
Choreographed by Ryan Heffington,
SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 19
Weekend
who has worked extensively with the
pop singer Sia as well as presented his
own contemporary dance works, the
movement phrases accumulate and
grow in power the more they are re-
peated. Part of the story deals with the
characters struggle to discover the
movements not entirely unlike a chor-
eographers relentless search for the
most potent step.
Jerky and askew, yet primal, the five
moments, or dance phrases, create a
sense of order and ritual: A hand, posi-
tioned like a triangle and pressed
against the chest, pushes forward. Fin-
gers wiggle out like tentacles. Both
arms stretch out for a moment like
wings, and then the elbows pull in
sharply and the chin lifts to reveal the
face. As abstract as it is, the choreo-
graphy builds emotion through repeti-
tion and allows sensation rather than
words to guide the story.
I didnt want it to become this post-
modern contemporary dance routine
that made no sense, said Mr. Heffing-
ton, who has known the shows creators
JOJO WHILDEN/NETFLIX
for 15 years and worked on their 2013
film The East. On The OA, he said,
the characters perform the movements Brit Marling extreme. rience dancing while growing up but set. It was unsustainable.
eye to eye, breath to breath, face to face (standing, left) For a long time, Ms. Marling said, the never trained seriously; practicing the Before shooting, the crew didnt know
that feels so real. and Emory Cohen script would simply say in capital let- movements, for her, was an extraordi- what the movements would look like. Of
To make the movements feel authen- (standing, right) ters: And then they do the movements nary experience. I would feel this kind her first scene performing them with
tic, the actors trained for six months. For executing synchro- here. As to what that meant, she and of alertness in all of my senses and some Mr. Cohen, Ms. Marling said: Every-
the musical La La Land, Emma Stone nized movements Mr. Batmanglij agreed that instead of kind of radical aliveness, she said. And thing fell away. We were just two people
and Ryan Gosling trained for two in The OA, anything resembling formal dance, it a return to the present tense rather than stuck in our bodies, wanting to break all
months; the difference is palpable. The choreographed by would be kind of impolite and raw, mix- thoughts of the future and doubts about constraints, wanting to tell each other
actors on The OA dont look like ama- Ryan Heffington. ing the mundane and the extraordi- the future or traps to the past. complex things about need and betrayal
teur dancers. The movement is in their nary. When she and Emory Cohen, who and loss and love and only having these
blood. It makes sense that the work of the plays Homer Roberts, another prisoner, movements with which to do it. It
Zal and I are real believers in prac- choreographer Elizabeth Streb, who were learning the choreography, they touched something so sublime.
tice, and thats an aspect of the story, refers to herself as an action architect, faced the mirror to learn how to move in By the end of the shoot, one of the
Ms. Marling said. What about it taking came up at writers meetings. Ms. sync. They attained accuracy, but some- grips was openly weeping. That never
a long time to get good at something and Strebs dance experiments are daring thing was missing. One day, Denna happens on set, she said. I mean,
the investment of time being part of the and acrobatic: Imagine a swan dive Thomsen, who works with Mr. Heffing- never.
reward? from a platform 25 feet in the air and a ton, told them to ignore the mirror and to Can dance change lives? In The OA,
Mr. Heffingtons choreography is face-first landing. perform for each other. The move- it does. When people say, I was crying
complex for its precision, speed and She calls her dancers action heroes, ments became so possessed of narrative when I was watching it, its like, ex-
timing so the cast needed to be drilled Ms. Marling said. That seemed close to and story and a deep need to communi- actly, Mr. Heffington said. That is ex-
incessantly. What is so impressive is me to the inherent risk and danger in cate that it became quite literally a lan- actly what dance has the power to do.
the effort, Mr. Heffington said. You see standing up to fear and moving differ- guage, Ms. Marling said. It was so in- Whether or not its true which I think
it on camera, you see it in their faces, ently in the face of it. tense and so full of feeling that we actu- is a beautiful question in the series I
you see it in their bodies. They go to the Ms. Marling said she had some expe- ally had to stop doing it until we were on know that it can heal.
 ..
20 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION

Weekend arts

Puppetry,
its moment
PUPPETS, FROM PAGE 16
lective Manual Cinema, which has won
raves in its recent forays to New York,
and a menagerie of gorgeous beasts (a
cuddly pig, a shaggy wolf, an enormous
boar) by Mr. Thomas, who built them all
in his Wisconsin barn.
Exposing Chicago artists to interna-
tional work is part of the impetus for the
festival. Mr. Thomas, 54, intends to fill
some of the void left by the Henson In-
ternational Festival of Puppet Theater,
which ran in New York from 1992 to
2000, and the International Theater Fes-
tival of Chicago, which in the late 1980s
ignited his love of puppetry with a visit
from a Barcelona company. That event
changed Chicago, Mr. Thomas said, by
showing artists and audiences what the
standard was elsewhere.
He laments the advantage that Euro-
pean puppet artists have in the sheer op-
portunities for their productions to be
staged. But Cheryl Henson a daugh-
ter of the Muppets creator, Jim Henson,
and the president of the Jim Henson
Foundation, a major force in contempo-
rary puppet theater said that Ameri-
can puppeteers had caught up to the Eu-
ropean standard of the craft.
Theyre not second-class anymore,
she said from Britain, where she was at-
tending the London International Mime
Festival, which routinely also includes
puppetry.

THE MUPPET EFFECT

On my Sunday morning in Chicago, I
went to the Instituto Cervantes for a
childrens show by the Italian company
Teatro dei Piedi and watched Veronica
Gonzalez, a virtuoso of the form, create
a succession of joyous vignettes starring
puppets made from her own costumed
feet. It is astonishing how expressive
toes can be.
I was the age of the children in that
audience when my own love of puppetry
was nurtured by Sesame Street,
though I hadnt thought much about it
until an exhibition of the shows Mup-
pets two years ago at the New York Pub-
lic Library for the Performing Arts. I
SAVERIO TRUGLIA

Clockwise from
above, Blair Thom-
as, who founded
the Chicago Inter-
national Puppet
Theater Festival;
Yngvild Aspelis
Cendres, from
the French com-
pany Plexus Po-
laire; Lookingglass
Theater Compa-
nys Mr. and Mrs.
Pennyworth;
another scene
from Cendres;
puppets in Made
in China, a recent
show from the
troupe Wakka
Wakka in New
York.

EMON HASSAN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

was surprised at how moved I was to see

the Count. And when, in a corner at the
back of the gallery, I spotted the bashful
Mr. Snuffleupagus, it was like coming
upon a mythical creature.
Still, my enduring fondness is nothing
compared with the childhood fandom
that Sarah Fornace, one of the artistic
directors of Manual Cinema, described:
FANCHON BILLE
a devotion to the Muppets and to Jim
Henson movies like The Dark Crystal
(1982) and Labyrinth (1986) so im-
passioned that in eighth grade she wrote
a report about her ambition to be a Mup-
peteer.
All of that was really important to my
cultural identity growing up, she said.
Now 31, she has worked at Redmoon
Theater, which Mr. Thomas co-founded,
and has been a member of his troupe
Blair Thomas & Co. She extolled the Chi-
cago scene, noting a plethora of young
KRISTIN AAFLOY OPDAN
companies who either explicitly do pup-
petry or use puppetry and object work
to create moments of spectacle and ef- the show. One exception on the horizon: Loompas for this springs Broadway
fects that arent possible to achieve on- Top Puppet, a reality competition spe- production of Charlie and the Choco-
stage with human bodies. cial that NBC recently ordered from the late Factory.
That defiance of realism, of course, is Jim Henson Company and a producer of
part of puppets potency. The figures The Voice. BEYOND THE PERIPHERY
embrace metaphor, and we fill in the Ms. Henson did point out, though, that Back in New York, I called Mr. Twist,
blanks with our willingness to believe. more artists are working in the form who runs the Dream Music Puppetry
these days, and that, thanks to Avenue program at Here, where Chifln will
PURE PUPPETRY Q and War Horse, many actors have be performed. He regards the promi- LIZ LAUREN

The night before I flew to Chicago, I
went to Wakka Wakkas Made in
China at 59E59 Theaters. Its a puppet
show aimed at grown-ups (theres pup-
pet nudity almost immediately), but I
was surprised anyway as I looked at the
crowd. Nearly everyone was middle-
aged or older, normal for a Midtown
Manhattan theater but still surprising
for a production of pure puppetry: no ac-
tors, just puppets and puppeteers.
Pure puppetry is the ideal for people
in the puppet world. That is the sticking
point in any argument about the art
form being on the rise because, however
many gains it makes inside other disci-
plines, puppets are rarely the point of
gained experience as puppeteers. (She
also named the top American cities for
puppet theater after New York: Atlanta,
Chicago and Minneapolis.)
Last year, when the Henson Founda-
tion raised its grant levels, applications
rose about 80 percent. Meanwhile, Ms.
Henson said, puppeteers have a better
shot at getting financial support from
general arts funders and at being includ-
ed in performance festivals than they
used to.
All of that suggests a heightened re-
spect and a sturdier infrastructure, as
does the 2015 MacArthur Fellowship for
the puppeteer Basil Twist who, Ms.
Henson noted, is doing the Oompa-
nence of puppetry in theater today as
temporary.
But he did acknowledge a cumula-
tive effect of The Lion King, Avenue
Q, War Horse and the Henson festival
in shaping public perception persuad-
ing adults that puppetry isnt just kid
stuff. Made in China could not have
played in the same way 25 years ago, he
said.
Mr. Twist, 47, talked about his prefer-
ence for pure puppetry a mismatch,
he knows, with his many collaborative
forays into theater and dance. Then he
told me there was an exhibition I needed
to see: The Theater of Robert Anton,
running until Saturday, Feb. 11, at an Up-
per East Side gallery called Broadway and there is something sacred and beau-
Filling in the 1602. tiful about it. But also, in its hermeti-
blanks with When I went there, I ran into Mr. cism, a tinge of sadness.
our Twist, who cheerfully showed me Because in Mr. Antons time, in Amer-
around, filling me in on Mr. Anton, an ica, puppetry for grown-ups wasnt on
willingness to avant-garde puppeteer who died in 1984. the margins entirely by choice. There
believe. Mr. Antons puppets, some of which Mr. wasnt much call for it center stage.
Twist lent to the show, are tiny objects Puppetrys kind of an underdog, Mr.
with minutely detailed faces one evi- Thomas told me. Weve always existed
dently modeled on Ellen Stewart, the on the periphery of the dominant cul-
founder of La MaMa, where Mr. Anton ture. In some ways thats our strength.
did much of his work. Is it, though? Not everything has to be
Mr. Anton performed his puppet plays a popular art. Not everything can be.
for no more than 18 people at once and But sophisticated puppetry appears to
did not allow them to be filmed or pho- be moving swiftly in that direction. So
tographed. His art is the purest of pure, far, its gaining power as it goes.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 21

books Weekend

Nightmare
at the border
BOOK REVIEW
DARK AT THE CROSSING. By Elliot Acker-
man. 237 pp. Alfred A. Knopf. $25.95.
BY LAWRENCE OSBORNE
The age of the war correspondent as
hero, Phillip Knightley famously
wrote in his book The First Casualty,
appears to be over. According to
Knightley, Vietnam was the high-water
mark for the self-mythologizing and
self-aggrandizing descendants of the
war correspondent Ernie Pyle, mowed
down by the Japanese on the island of
Ie Shima in 1945. Since then, he argued,
governments at war have learned to
tame their roving journalists; to exag-
gerate only by a certain degree, many
correspondents have become variants
of the press eunuchs laconically de-
scribed by Evelyn Waugh in Abyssinia
sitting at the hotel bar writing up the
destruction of a hospital in Adowa by
Italian bombers. During that war in
1936, indeed, Waugh himself received a
cable from his editors in London con-
cerning the heroic nurses suppos-
edly killed at Adowa. It read, Require
earliest name life story photograph
American nurse upblown Adowa. To
which he immortally replied, Nurse
unupblown. The journalistic stenogra-
phy of war had already begun.
But what, conversely, of the war
literature created by Americans not
implicated in the corporate machinery
Ackermans of reportage? It could be argued that
novel brings its a richer harvest. And one could
Turkeys also argue that the most vital literary
terrain in Americas overseas wars is
ruined and now occupied not by journalists but by
splendidly novelists and even poets: Jehanne
ancient Dubrows Stateside, Brian Turners
geography Phantom Noise, David Abramss
into focus. Fobbit, Nadeem Aslams The Blind
Mans Garden, the stories of Katey
Schultz.
Elliot Ackerman is certainly one of
those novelists, and his first novel,
Green on Blue (2015), staked his
claim within the terrain. Ackerman,
who served in Iraq and is a recipient of
the Purple Heart, now lives in Turkey.
His second novel, Dark at the Cross-
ing, has as its setting the intricate,
slow-unfolding nightmare of that para-
doxical country. Based in Istanbul,
Ackerman is familiar with the formida-
bly volatile and increasingly dangerous
southern border zones with Syria.
Much of this slender novel is set in the
once pleasant city of Gaziantep or
Antep whose texture he renders
with economical accuracy and with
gathering unease. Its a physical land-
scape that rarely appears in novels,
and Ackerman has learned it well a
twilight world of desolate roads, ref-
ugee tents, hordes of scavenging boys,
desperados and lethal con men. Be-
yond it we hear the constant thud of
artillery and mortars, a sound like
soda cans crushed underfoot and a
sinister whine of car alarms acciden-
tally set off.
Dark at the Crossing follows the
attempt of an Arab-American ex-sol-
dier named Haris Abadi, who, after
having served with the United States
military as an interpreter in Iraq, is
now moved to enter Syria illicitly via
Turkey to fight with the Islamist mili-
tias waging war against the Assad
regime. It is of course a common real-
life scenario. Using a digital contact
bearing the code name Saladin, he
makes the attempt from Antep but fails
on his first try and subsequently falls
in with Amir, an exiled revolutionary,
and Amirs alluring wife, Daphne, who
wants to return to Syria for her own
reasons. These three sexually intercon-
nected lost souls constitute the narra-
tives emotional skeleton. Through a
web of murky connections Haris man-
ages to arrange a possible border
crossing through ISIS itself (here
known by its Arabic acronym, Daesh).
In some senses, Ackermans novel is
unusual for a young writer in that it
improves as it moves along rather than
the reverse. The first third is heavily
MUHSIN AKGN
weighted by flashbacks relating
Hariss life in Michigan with his sister
a studio in Dearborn with a foldout Elliot Ackerman They stop here at a small shanty by solitary rider. why he would want to fight with
couch and his time in Iraq domi- served in Iraq, is a the road, where a teenage acquaint- When Haris arrives at the Daesh Daesh. Seemingly convinced, despite
nated by his relationship with another recipient of the ance named Jamil elects to join them. headquarters buried inside this war- the slight strangeness of the exchange,
soldier. To my mind, these chop the Purple Heart and In a wonderful scene, the rest of the ren, he notices at once the portraits of Athid agrees to smuggle them all into
narrative and restrain its momentum. now lives in Tur- younger boys furious at being aban- martyrs pasted along the stairwell and Aleppo with some laborers and accepts
There are also repeated descriptions key. He is among doned by their older member attack is struck how the expressions on their the money they have brought. But
and phrases that could have been the novelists who the cars doors with their bare palms faces, eagerness mixed with fear, are treachery is the rule in the Syrian
ironed out more elegantly. Things occupy what is and then, seen recedingly through the indistinguishable from those on the badlands. When they are stopped just
improve, however, in the last half, as arguably the most rear window, tear their own hovel to faces of fallen American soldiers pho- before dawn by a Syrian Army patrol,
Ackerman allows his tale to unfold vital literary ter- pieces in impotent rage. tographically exalted on the other side. their reflective responses to its taunts
more directly and with more unclut- rain in Americas The same D850 takes Haris and his He is driven to wonder what the Daesh lead to a terrible end and a realization
tered velocity. The landscape both overseas wars. group to the ramshackle border town idea of martyrdom actually is, since that Daesh sometimes dresses up as
ruined and splendidly ancient also of Kilis, where Daesh has established a few outside the group appear to under- its enemies to weed out false believers.
comes more into its own: clandestine base it can use to sneak stand it. Dark at the Crossing is unusual in
They left Antep, driving until the into Syria: From the bellied domes of It occurred to Haris that martyr- that few of its characters are Western
early winter sun hovered near the the grand Canpolat, Akcurun and Ulu dom was an American conception. a bold move in a culture obsessed
horizon. It cast afternoon shadows mosques, and from the corrugated When taken in the pure Arabic, sha- with appropriation. Whether this
along the gentle sloping hills of Kilis steel roofs of backdoor shanties, the heed meant something different. The makes them convincing to an Arab ear
Province. Where the hills spilled into faithful had built spires, clutching their translation wasnt he who sacrifices is hard to say, but Ackermans decision
farmland, herded bales of cotton way upward. Where the D850 fed into himself, although that was often part is clearly motivated by empathy and a
spread across fields, which would Kiliss smaller roads, the smooth high- of it. The literal meaning was he who desire not to tell his story through
remain barren until the next year. way came apart like a river feeding a bears witness. Standing at the desk, characters thinking and speaking his
Laboring in the fields, farmers cleared delta, the single strip of black asphalt waiting to check into their rooms, own language. I commend him for
and burned the harvests stalks. Here ceding to riven pathways of dirt and Haris considered Amir, Daphne and that; he has created people who are
and there flames caught wisps of cot- concrete. Ancient pedestrian lanes ran even Jamil. Watching them, he no not the equivalents of the locally exotic
ton, and the wisps flashed like fireflies in all directions, their cobblestones too longer felt like a voyeur in their war subjects in your average NPR story,
in the day. Up ahead, dangling above narrow for a car. Flitting in and out of he was their witness. and he has used them to populate a
the smoothly laid macadam, a single traffic, and up through these tributary Haris is interviewed by a Daesh fascinating and topical novel.
traffic light was strung across the lanes, cheap Chinese motorcycles militant named Athid, who provides a
D850. It shuffled its colors to an empty Lifans, Zongshens, Jialings traveled thumbnail view of the Islamist revolu- Lawrence Osbornes latest novel is
road. past, always carrying more than a tion in Syria and, of course, asks Haris Hunters in the Dark.

By the Book crossword 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

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24 Theyre barrier 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83
night stand? car, on audio. At the dining table or my measured by or what the from, as a soup
You mean my leaning pile of guilt? If a desk, with a pen in hand. Best of all, in pluviometers answers to the 110 Caramel candies
84 85 86 87 88 89 90
book is on my night stand, it means I JILLIAN TAMAKI
bed, at night, with a double of Scotch, 25 Geneticists starred clues from Hershey
havent read it and feel like I should. neat. O.K., sometimes its a triple. study do? 112 Opposite of
26 Rage 68 Heavy weight standing 91 92 93
Im too embarrassed to name them, as tify with the rebels but so many in fact 28 Sheena who 69 Same with me 113 Getting ready to
some are written by people I know. As are complicit with the Empire. How do you organize your books? sang U Got 70 Move hastily swing 94 95 96 97 98 99 100
for the books that have come off my Organize? the Look with 71 Also-ran in 2000 114 Lake catch
Whats the last great book you read? Prince 72 Gray squirrel, in 115 White who is the 101 102 103 104 105 106
night stand recently, they are all forth- 29 No worries slang oldest person
coming. Here are some books worthy Kia Corthrons The Castle Cross the Whats your favorite book to assign to 30 It helps you 74 Send elsewhere ever to host 107 108 109 110 111
of reading in 2017: Thi Buis The Best Magnet Carter. This big, ambitious, and discuss with your students? achieve balance for the night, as S.N.L.
We Could Do; Charmaine Craigs challenging novel should have gotten Maxine Hong Kingstons The Woman 33 Highlighter a roommate, in 116 Participate in 112 113 114
shades modern lingo deciding
Miss Burma; Don Lees Lonesome much more attention. It tells the 20th- Warrior. I find the book endlessly
34 %: Abbr. 75 Easy-to-carry 117 Took care of 115 116 117
Lies Before Us; Bao Phis Thousand century history of the United States rewarding to teach, because its so rich 35 Reply to No telescope
Star Hotel; Vaddey Ratners Music of through the intersecting lives of two and layered and still relevant to the offense 79 Cubs home PUZZLE BY SAM TRABUCCO / EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ THE NEW YORK TIMES
37 Aid after a 80 Less safe for a Down
the Ghosts; and Akhil Sharmas A white brothers and two black brothers. lives of students. In addition, its a 6 Hurriedly 31 Cousin of 55 Hit record? 83 [Yawn]
computer crash, plane landing, in 1 Superfluous part
Life of Adventure and Delight. It is, by turns, tender, brutal and re- powerful book about the necessity and say of an essay showed oneself OMG! 57 Yi-i-ikes! 85 Rule by
a way
demptive. dangers of storytelling. The first line is 40 Get 2 *One who out? 32 Guido who 58 Pacific governing board
84 Change from painted
What has your post-election reading You must not tell anyone, my mother 41 Mark 64-Acrossed for 7 J to ____ L-O! 59 Ending with teen 87 Altar
black-and-white Massacre of
Supreme Court (Jennifer Lopez 61 Certain constellation
looked like? Whats the best classic novel you said, what I am about to tell you, and 44 Mosaic pieces 86 Classical the Innocents 88 * for Best
46 Question after a justices album) conservative
Ive been reading news and opinion recently read for the first time? the rest of the book is about the author musician with 36 Today
3 Emphatic refusal 8 * for skirt Directors
photo finish a Presidential
pieces on Facebook and Twitter. Ralph Ellisons Invisible Man on telling everyone what her mother said. 4 After deductions astronauts 37 Hmm, guess 62 Hillary Clinton 89 Rangers station
47 Hows it Medal of
Theyre utterly terrifying and depress- audio. I had read it a long time ago, but Telling what must not be told is one of 9 Like over four so in 1969 or Bill 90 Che Guevaras
hangin? Freedom 5 Gift shop item
billion people 38 Loo, for short Clinton in 1970 real first name
ing, since my social circle basically hearing Joe Mortons stupendous the writers primary tasks. It is also a Solution to puzzle of January 28-29 39 ____ rally 63 Monster 93 Puts forward, as
10 Victory is
thinks that a Trump presidency spells performance was like encountering the difficult and dangerous one. P L A Y E R T O O L B A R D E A L E R yours 42 What boats 65 Fictional effort
the end of the world. To get out of the novel for the first time, again. The O E U V R E V A M O O S E A R C A D E 11 Mexican shouldnt do spacecraft 95 Factor in area
echo chamber, I read Donald Trumps Morton version is absolutely riveting. Youre organizing a literary dinner T E R E S A S K A B A N D L I T M U S president 43 ____ Gay (W.W. created by the calculation
T W O S T R I P E R S E R V I C E A C E Enrique Pea II plane) Time Lords 96 ____ little
Twitter feed. Its utterly terrifying and party. Which three writers, dead or 44 Best Foreign 66 Like lettuce silhouetto of a
alive, do you invite?
E A R M O N E Y T R E E Z E N ____
depressing, and I run back into the Whats your favorite book no one else D Y A N L O T P O I W E S B E S T 12 Zac of
Film of 2005 set 67 West Coast air man (Queen
echo chamber. has heard of? Haruki Murakami, since it seems O B I S P U N K U F O in South Africa hub lyric)
Neighbors
T H R E E B E A R S G I V E M E F I V E 45 Kennedy who 73 Overly 97 Desert NE of the
I take comfort in the childrens litera- The Land at the End of the World, by unlikely Ill ever meet him. He can 13 Professors was the mother Sinai Peninsula
C O O L B E A N S D A Y T R A D E R 74 Two-____
ture that I read to my 3-year-old son. Antnio Lobo Antunes, beautifully curate the music and cook spaghetti. answer to them of Maria Shriver (smallish car) 98 * for Nobel
B R O E L S E E L F I R O N O N O
He will tolerate the tales of Beatrix translated by Margaret Jull Costa. This Carrie Fisher, for her wit and bravura. Y A M S T W E N T Y O N E A N T S
14 Reading material 46 Aid for the 75 ____-fi laureates
for a Hollywood handy, informally 76 Yapping dog, for 99 1941 chart-
Potter, which I find soothing, but novel about an old man reflecting on Lastly, John Berger. I love that Berger T A F T S E R I F L I L T
agent
B A R R A C K S F A C E T I M E 49 Letters of short topper Maria
mostly he wants to hear about Batman, his experiences as a young medic in gave half his Booker Prize money in S I X D E G R E E S C A S H I S K I N G 15 * for British pride 77 * for ____
Superman, Ghostbusters and Star Portugals colonial war in Angola was 1972 to the Black Panthers, and used A T E I T A N N T A Y L O R F E N D I prime ministers 50 Alternative to a secretaries of 101 Slice for a
Wars. The moral clarity of these my touchstone while I wrote The the other half to fund the research for Y E S F O Y T E G G F I F I D O G 16 Most-wanted pound state hearty appetite
A U T O M I E N S S I N S invitees 51 Emphatic 78 Dont be so 102 Miners strike
stories is comforting not just for a Sympathizer. Every morning I would his next book on migrant laborers.
J A C K L O N D O N E L I T E E I G H T 17 Texting while agreement dumb! 104 Catches off base
3-year-old, but also for many adults. read two or three pages of its magnifi- Berger was the kind of writer we need A F A R O B E S E T A K I N D R E I driving, e.g. 52 Org. with a 81 Rip off, 109 Apologia pro vita
This is why they are relevant in our cent prose, dense with striking and more of politically committed, aes- M E M O L O N E R S T E A D E A R N 18 Anchors place travel ban? informally ____
divided age, where most people iden- unexpected imagery, until the moment thetically serious, always curious. I W I N E X T S S A N S B U S T 27 Enter, as data 54 Bills, e.g. 82 Clown (around) 111 60 minuti

22 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
Weekend
Descending
into darkness
BOOK REVIEW
THIS CLOSE TO HAPPY: A RECKONING
WITH DEPRESSION. By Daphne Merkin.
288 pp. Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $26.
BY ANDREW SOLOMON
Not so long ago, the mere fact of writ-
ing that you had suffered from depres-
sion conferred a badge of courage, but
such confessions have devolved into a
dull mark of solipsistic forthrightness.
Famous people use such disclosures to
persuade you that they are just like
you, perhaps even more vulnerable;
its a way of compensating for the
discomfort attached to their glamour.
Indeed, in an increasingly stratified
world, people with any modicum of
privilege may reveal their depression
as an assertion of their common hu-
manity. Clinical misery has taken over
from death as the great equalizer.
Vanity of vanities, all is depression.
Into this morass daringly comes
Daphne Merkin with the long-awaited
chronicle of her own consuming de-
spair. Merkin was born into circum-
stances of plenty, the poor little rich
girl; she is not interested in universal-
izing, though she often does so almost
inadvertently. In the earlier part of her
memoir, her tight focus on her own
story at the expense of anyone elses
can come off as self-indulgent, even
self-aggrandizing, but it is part of her
considerable art that by the end, it
feels like a winning frankness. The
reader is saved from diaristic fatigue
by the sharpness of her observations.
She is not out to demystify life on Park
Avenue, nor even to apologize for it,
but only to explain her experience,
which happens to have unfolded there.
She does not try to unpack the function
of the amygdala, avoids all the stat-
istics about the rate of the illness and
does not apologize for her descents
into darkness. Instead, she narrates
what happened and how it felt to her.
And she does so with insight, grace
and excruciating clarity, in exquisite
and sometimes darkly humorous
prose. The same tinge of self-aware
narcissism that makes the book at
times so annoying makes it finally
triumphant. Merkin is unlikely to cheer
you up, but if your misery loves com-
pany, you will find no better compan-
ion. This is not a how-to-get-better
book, but we hardly need another one
of those; it is a how-to-be-desolate
book, which is an altogether more
crucial manual.
Most memoirs aim to seduce; you
are supposed to fall in love with the
writer, or at the very least to approve
of him or her. Merkins book makes no
such demand; she is perfectly content
to ensure that you admire her not at
all. She blames herself so readily that
you get to blame her, too. She takes a
certain masochistic relish in trying to
alienate with her singular blend of
self-obsession and ostentatious vulner-
ability, and parts of the book appear to
be intended as a punishment of every-
one who hasnt loved or understood
her, from her mother on down to the
reader. Yet this very go ahead and
hate me dynamic achieves a real
intimacy that more cautious accounts
cannot equal; you end up liking her
nearly in spite of herself. Mary McCar-
thy, asked to blurb Merkins first book,
expressed astonishment at the books
How David
became Goliath
BOOK REVIEW
THE WEAPON WIZARDS: HOW ISRAEL
BECAME A HIGH-TECH MILITARY SUPER-
POWER. By Yaakov Katz and Amir Bo-
hbot. Illustrated. 288 pp. St. Martins
Press. $27.99.
BY ROSA BROOKS
Seventy years ago, the state of Israel
was still just a gleam in Zionists eyes,
and the future states military was
hardly more than a ragtag group of ir-
regulars, forced to manufacture bullets
in a secret facility built underneath a
kibbutz. Today, Israels military is
widely viewed as one of the most effec-
tive in the world. Once compelled to arm
itself with surplus equipment purchased
from more powerful states (and some-
times obtained by stealth), Israel is now
one of the worlds six largest arms ex-
porters, earning billions each year
through the sale of military equipment
to buyers from China and India to Co-
An Israeli flag lombia and Russia.
floating in front of The Weapon Wizards: How Israel
a model of an Became a High-Tech Military Super-
Arrow antiballistic power tells the story of this transfor-
missile during a mation. Written by the Israeli journal-
ceremony in 2000 ists Yaakov Katz and Amir Bohbot, The
at the Palmahim Weapon Wizards offers a lively account
Air Force Base, of Israels evolving military prowess,
south of Tel Aviv. from the early days of Jewish paramili-
lack of shame, and wrote that the
book fascinates one by its openness.
Its hard not to have the same take on
this mordant volume with its waves of
brittle honesty and blunt nakedness.
Merkin is capable of being at once
melodramatic and finely nuanced; she
has so many good phrases about de-
pression that its hard to choose among
them. In one episode, she is shorn of
relief, which condenses the relentless
descents into a perfect epigram. De-
pression is a social condition, and she
gives it a social context, writing: It
was as though I fell off the end of the
earth the minute I wasnt in the pres-
ence of another person or perhaps I
meant that the other person fell off the
end of the earth, or that we both did.
However the process works, everyone
seemed to dissolve, and I was left to
wander around in a moonscape
bleached of reliable human connec-
tion. For those of us who have suf-
fered the slings and arrows of this
particular demon, there can be no
clearer summary.
Merkins parents were prosperous
Orthodox Jews who, in her telling at
least, were cold and unloving, but who
seem nonetheless to have provoked in
her a passionate and consuming at-
tachment. Her mother fulfills all the
clichs about Jewish mothers except
the one about unbridled self-sacrifice.
She is domineering, intellectually
inclined, critical, with a viselike grip,
and so woven into the fabric of her
childrens lives that they cannot have
any experience that is not somehow of
her. She appears empathetic enough to
grasp what her children are feeling,
but not very kind in the application of
that knowledge. As a child, Merkin
could achieve her mothers full atten-
tion only when she was sick, and she
ponders whether her yearning for
maternal affection might have been an
engine of her later breakdowns. When
Merkin gets married, she feels she has
betrayed the sacred monster she so
loves to hate. We were tangled up like
bedclothes, she complains, and yet
she also writes, Without my mother,
who will cut up the world into bite-size
pieces for me?
You feel Merkin struggling to see
her mother even as she professes to
escape from her. The fact is that she is
not as unaware of my turmoil as she
acts or as I choose to believe, she
acknowledges. There is nothing she
doesnt know, nothing that will undo
her. Perhaps this resilience is what she
offers instead of a more recognizable
form of love. This ruthless intimacy,
no matter how poisoned, was inescap-
able; and when it faded, the shock was
palpable. Of her mothers final illness,
Merkin observes, She was alert
enough but seemed far away, as
though she had sailed out to sea while
the rest of us stayed on dry land.
Those psychoanalytic narratives in
which barely suppressed family drama
and cruelty are intermingled with
attachment and thus produce neurosis
are often questioned in our post-Freud-
ian epoch, but they hold true for Daph-
ne Merkin, who has been much ana-
lyzed by psychiatrists and friends and
family and self to emerge as an epit-
ome of what analysis seeks to locate: a
person in whom every emotion is also
its opposite.
Her concern that her own depres-
sion is a pathetic failure, and perhaps
even an imagined hysteria, salts a
SVEN NACKSTRAND/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESS GETTY IMAGES
memoir full of actual hospitalizations
and suicidal longings. She describes This is not a
sitting at a dinner where she feels how-to-get-
depression is a fraudulent bundle of better book,
symptoms, an inflated case of malin-
gering that everyone suffers from but
but we hardly
that only a select, self-indulgent few need another
choose to make a big deal about. She one; it is a
is one of those who make a big deal how-to-be-
about it, but she can hardly say how or desolate book.
why. In one telling passage, she writes:
Yesterday in therapy I described my
life as horrific, which I realize is sub-
jective and self-dramatizing. . . . I know
there are people hanging on by a
thread in Haiti and the Congo and
elsewhere across the globe, I know, I
know, I know. . . . But I still cant get
out of being me, a desperado from way
back. Elsewhere, she confesses, First
there was the confinement of my child-
hood, like an incessantly replayed loop
of film, and now there is my adulthood,
which seems like a prison of a different
kind. Yet she knows how unattractive
her condition is; she writes about
sweating a lot, and about being boring,
even to herself. The truth is that no
one is interested in why you want to
kill yourself, no one really believes that
you will, until youve already done it,
and then it becomes morbidly intrigu-
ing to try and map it backward.
Merkin is accustomed to the disen-
gagement that her emotional state
provokes; she dares us to disengage
like so many others. Of her most recent
hospitalization she says, In my intake
interview . . . I alternated between
breaking down in tears and repeating
that I wanted to go home, like a woeful
child left behind at sleep-away camp.
The admitting nurse was pleasant
taries operating within the British Man-
date to Israels recent emergence as ex-
porter of 60 percent of the worlds
drones. From satellites and missile de-
fense systems to adaptive armor and cy-
ber weapons, Israel has consistently
found ways to circumvent or leapfrog fi-
nancial and technological barriers.
But Katz and Bohbot aspire to do
more than just offer a journalistic his-
tory of the Israeli militarys technolog-
ical advances: They aim to explain just
how the tiny Jewish state managed to
become such a military innovator. How
did Israel do it? Katz and Bohbot ask.
What was the secret to Israels suc-
cess? Their answer: brains, pluck and
the bracing prospect of imminent anni-
hilation.
If The Weapon Wizards were a a
biblical allegory, it would be the story of
David and Goliath. Katz and Bohbot
highlight several interconnected cultur-
al drivers of Israels military innova-
tions. Surrounded by enemies at its in-
ception, Israel came to view itself as a
nation that could, as Arieh Herzog, a for-
mer head of Israels missile defense
agency, put it, either innovate or disap-
pear. Meanwhile, the Jewish tradition
of education and scholarship led Israel
to place a high value on investments in
research and development.
Today, Israel devotes a higher per-
centage of its G.D.P. to research and de-
velopment than any other country, and
Katz and Bohbot note that roughly 30
percent of Israeli R&D goes toward mili-
tary technologies. Israel also invests in
its human resources, with numerous
specialized educational programs de-
signed to bring top talent into the mili-
tary and to send soldiers back to school.
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
enough in a down-to-earth way but
was hardly swept away by gusts of
empathy for my bereft state. She
describes her envy of the anorexics on
the unit, who were clearly and poign-
antly victims of a culture that said you
were too fat unless you were too thin...
No one could blame them for their
condition or view it as a moral failure,
which was what I suspected even the
nurses of doing about us depressed
patients. In the eyes of the world, they
were suffering from a disease, and we
were suffering from being intractably
and disconsolately and some might
say self-indulgently ourselves.
While Merkin nearly boasts of her
nose-dives into hell, she also relates
how hard she has worked to mask her
depression, an enterprise that has
made her feel only more alone. I have
hurled all the charm and wits I have at
my disposal against my proclivity to
depression, such that it would be diffi-
cult for even close friends of mine to
detect how low I am at any given
time.
The power of such passages in This
Close to Happy is that she refuses all
defenses. She herself is never sure that
she isnt being self-indulgent, and her
consternation about that fact invites
deep sympathy with her underlying
pain. She longs to be a better mother to
her daughter, and worries constantly
that her lapses into inchoate abnega-
tion might be devastating to her child.
She might not be an easy person, but
she is determined to be better at affec-
tion than her parents were.
It is hard to be depressed, but it is
also hard for those who have been
depressed to forsake their condition.
Israels small size, combined with its
tradition of universal military service,
also helps, by ensuring that theres
rarely more than one degree of separa-
tion between military officials, scien-
tists and entrepreneurs; as a result, mil-
itary needs and challenges are quickly
and easily communicated to policy mak-
ers, academics and financiers.
Finally, Kahn and Bohbot argue, Is-
raels culture of informality offers an un-
derappreciated advantage: What
makes Israel unique is the complete lack
of structure. The absence of social hi- the way for the contentious expansion of
erarchy... helps spur innovation. In Is-
rael, junior soldiers feel free to argue
with high-ranking officers, and a keen
sense of chutzpah encourages creativ-
ity and protects against groupthink.
The Weapon Wizards offers plenty the international community.
of good stories about fascinating people.
Theres the young Shimon Peres, negoti-
ating weapons deals in Havana night-
clubs. Theres Danny Shapira, the leg-
endary Israeli pilot testing French Mi-
rages. Theres the Israeli official who
helps start Israels drone program in the
late 1960s by buying remote-control air-
planes at a Manhattan toy store and
sending them back to Israel in the em-
bassys diplomatic pouch.
What The Weapon Wizards doesnt
offer is any meditation on the political
context or implications of Israels rise to
military superpower status. Katz and
Bohbot are cheerleaders, not critics, and
theres little room for introspection in
this breathless tale of triumph over ad-
versity. Left largely unmentioned, for in-
stance, is the role of the United States.
American security guarantees over the
last few decades have kept Israels
neighbors relatively docile, if not pre-
..
books
RUTU MODAN
Merkin writes: One minute you were
in the shuttered-down universe of the
verifiably unwell, of people who talked
about their precarious inner states as if
that were all that mattered, and the
next you were admitted back into
ordinary life, where people were free to
roam as they pleased and seemed
filled with a sense of larger purpose. It
could cause vertigo if you werent
careful. Yet she does emerge, time and
again, to feel the relief in being able to
entertain unhappy thoughts without
getting stuck in a stranglehold of de-
spair.
She concludes by sharing that she
feels better now, but we already knew
that: If she didnt feel closer to happy,
she couldnt have finished this book.
She knows how foolish it is for a de-
pressive to write about being better in
a way that sounds permanent; she
describes how entering a hospital after
writing of depression in the past tense
seemed a betrayal of a literary persona
on which she had become reliant. She
limns the fantasy of the depressed
person, always believing against the
odds that it is possible to be free of the
conditions endemic weight. This
secret conviction bears some resem-
blance to religious faith, she observes,
although it demands nothing and
offers nothing back except its own
irrationality. It is standard fare to say
books on depression are brave, but this
one actually is. For all its highly per-
sonal focus, it is an important addition
to the literature of mental illness.
Andrew Solomon is the author of Far
From the Tree: Parents, Children and
the Search for Identity.
cisely friendly, and nearly a quarter of
Israels annual defense budget is effec-
tively paid for by the United States. Is-
rael receives more American military
aid than every other country in the
world combined. A more complete an-
swer to How did Israel do it? might
be: pluck, brains and billions of dollars
of American aid each year.
The Weapon Wizards is also largely
silent on how Israel uses its military
might. Absent is any reflection on the
role of the Israeli armed forces in paving
Jewish settlements into Palestinian ter-
ritory, for instance, or the Israeli prac-
tice of destroying homes occupied by
the families of suspected militants,
though both have been condemned by
Katz and Bohbot are similarly unin-
terested in the brave new world Israel is
helping to create. Israel, they note with
pride, has become the first country to
master the art of targeted killings,
which have now become the global
standard in the war on terror. Some
might consider this a dubious honor. To
Katz and Bohbot, however, targeted
killings are interesting only because
they showcase the mix of cutting-edge
technology, high quality intelligence,
and Israels best and brightest minds.
Israel, Katz and Bohbot note, is
changing the way wars are being
fought around the globe. Readers will
have to decide for themselves if this is
something to cheer or mourn.
Rosa Brooks is a professor at George-
town University Law Center and the au-
thor of How Everything Became War
and the Military Became Everything.
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017 | 23

living Weekend

Confronting
race, religion
and her heart
When two peoples differences lead
to a breakup, a black woman must
confront her ex and herself
Modern Love
BY LILIAN OBEN
Even before he spoke, I knew. A wom-
an I would meet years later described
the sensation as feeling it in the skin.
I felt the words he was about to say in
my skin.
In his I cant do this anymore, I
heard what he was really saying.
Something flashed red before my eyes.
I was shaking, holding the phone to
one ear. Screaming, but unable to
speak.
I thought maybe the worst was over,
but he went on to state the obvious
that I was black and not Jewish. He
explained that he was not ready to
handle the complexities of an interra-
cial relationship in a country like this,
as if it were the 1960s and we were
Richard and Mildred Loving. Or as if I
had fooled him by making a racial and
religious switch midway through our
relationship.
My throat closed, my chest tight-
ened, my eyes stung. I heard myself
call him a bigot the milder term
even though what I really wanted to
call him was a racist.
He said, Im sorry you feel that
way.
We had been serious, tentatively
exploring what our future might look
like. I was in my 20s, he in his 30s. He
didnt date casually, hed told me. At his
age, he was always considering long-
term potential.
I hated myself for letting him off so
easily. It just felt like too high a moun-
tain to climb. As a black woman in
America, I climbed that mountain
every day. To have to climb it again
because of him was too much.
Instead, I spent the days after our
breakup replaying his words in my
head. I rehearsed for a retake of our
conversation. In this imaginary con-
versation, I was brave and strong. I
spoke firmly and clearly. I held a mir-
ror up to his prejudice so he could not
help but see himself for what he was
and hear his words for what they were.
My feelings were untidy, but I had no
time to label. I tried to write, but ev-
erything was mush. I missed him but
resisted the urge to call. I reminded
myself that I was black and not Jewish.
Over time, the details became fuzzy
until he was just a blip on my dating
screen, a story I told my friends. My
black non-Jewishness ceased being my
problem and became his alone.
I started dating again. Before him, I
had dated only women, so I picked up
where I had left off but ardently
avoided anything interracial. I won-
dered what made me think I could be
with a man at all, let alone a white one.
With hindsight, I saw all the signs that
should have tipped me off dropping
my hand when he saw his friends, for
example. And with the benevolence
that comes from either forgiveness or
amnesia, I let it go.
When our paths crossed a year and a
half later, the hardest edges were gone,
leaving only the pulp substance of
shared history. Coffee became lunch,
lunch became dinner, dinner became
sex.
Something in me raised a hand to
object, but I ignored it. I knew what I
was doing, or thought I did. I wanted to
prove something: that I was still desir-
able, that I didnt care. It was just my
body, I told myself. My black non-
Jewish body.
For him, I imagine the complexities
of interracial casual sex in America
required a different kind of logic, a
different kind of bigotry.
During an inspired spell, I found
myself transferring our relationship to
paper. What came out was unexpected,
fresh. The pain seemed gone, our
conversations now comical. I kneaded
our story like bread, and it rose. Soon I
felt ready to share it with someone,
and I was aware I was going to send it
to him even before I actually decided.
He responded to the emailed draft
immediately, and the affection in his
greeting threw me.
He said my draft was good and
human and filled with conflict, as
though critiquing another couples tale,
but then admitted that he was embar-
rassed by the story.
I again saw that flash of red from
years before but tried my hand at
objectivity. Thank you for the feed-
back, I began. You raise some good
points. Yet something in me had been
unleashed, and I knew there could be
no backing away from the mountain
this time.
I emailed him again, and this time I
did not hold anything back. Calling him
out felt both frightening and liberating.
I worried about reopening a wound I
didnt have the resilience to mend. I
wondered if he would respond but
focused on how good it felt to finally
say everything I had hauled around for
so long. It dawned on me then how
much I had edited myself during our
relationship, afraid of scaring him off.
Two months later, his name ap-
peared in my inbox. I hesitated, wary
but curious.
His response was long yet concise,
BRIAN REA
deliberate and measured. I read it
twice, unsure what I was searching for.
Maybe I had simply hoped it would trying to suppress a gag reflex with a loved her for it. She rubbed my shoul- that I could see that so clearly seemed
end with my letter, with me getting the All along, he mouth crammed full of marbles. All der as I cried, asked the right ques- like further proof of my growth.
last word. had been only this time, it had been easier to be tions, listened to all of my answers. We parted as friends, and I contin-
Months passed, and I saw him in exactly who angry with him, to blame him. His When she told me, You didnt do ued learning, standing, falling.
every season. Springtime, crossing the wrongs were obvious and easy to label. anything but love, honey, her words Waiting at a crosswalk one spring, I
street. Summer, walking through the
and what he The vernacular for him and those like filled the void in me. saw him in a car stopped at a light. He
park. Fall, in the frozen-food aisle at an was. I was the him existed; it was nothing new. But in Apparently, as every self-help book was in the passenger seat, a woman at
organic food store. He looked unkempt one who the end, it was my own feelings of purports, love really does start with the wheel. The years had not changed
and seemed startled to see me, so he shrank shame that were hardest to unload. the self. And over the next two years, I him, and I recognized him before he
filled the silence with nervous chatter: myself. I had The disingenuousness was not, in went back to basics. It was not smooth, saw me. When our eyes met, they held,
He had a son now. Today was his bris. fact, his; all along, he had been only and there were countless false starts, and I heard in his gaze all the words I
Stumped for a reply, I shared that tried to exactly who and what he was. I was but with each one I learned new had wished for in our ending: Im
my car loan was paid off. whitewash my the one who shrank myself. I had tried lessons while keeping that mantra sorry. You were right. I wish. If only.
Over coffee with a friend, his name blackness. to whitewash my blackness, polished front and center. I felt like a toddler I didnt know what my own eyes said
came up. Whatever happened with myself to a colorless sheen, held my- learning to walk: First sit, then crawl, to him, but as the two restless children
you two, by the way? she asked, and self up for his inspection, searching for then stand, and fall. Stand and fall. It in the back bobbed up and down in
suddenly words I didnt recognize as the best light in which to stand to make felt simultaneously like the hardest their car seats, their mother oblivious
my own tumbled out. I told her about him forget. I had so desperately and easiest thing, and gratitude to her distracted husband, I felt myself
the heaviness I couldnt quite place. I wanted him to find me worthy. To have started to replace the heaviness that soften.
missed him sometimes, yes. Still felt failed in that at the expense of my had weighed me down. The children waved, and I smiled
cheated, yes. Owed, yes. But there was integrity shamed me more than any When I met a woman who seemed back. Somewhere on my shoulders, the
something else I struggled to articulate rejection of my black non-Jewishness the answer to everything I was ready last of something rose and flew gently
as she watched me patient, open, ever could. for, I was eager to test out my self-love away.
listening. My friend listened as if she were sea legs, and all seemed rosy for a
Parsing emotions that had existed hearing a secret she had long sus- time. Soon, however, I realized she was Lilian Oben is an actor and writer
only as masses in my chest was like pected but never mentioned, and I less an answer than a test, and the fact based in Washington, D.C.

What to do about a colleague

more hardworking and independent before returning, your obligations
than A with lots of initiative. Employee would disappear. But all shes asking for
A had said shed like to return to work in is an extra month or so of time off. As

who drinks on the job?

The Ethicist
BY KWAME ANTHONY APPIAH
A co-worker of mine has recently adopted
the habit of having a glass of wine at
lunch. She is the only one of our small
group who drinks alcohol at lunch; oth-
ers of our group find this behavior quite
odd or even outright wrong. I have not
said anything to my co-worker about this
and have written it off as a peculiarity.
But now I have learned that she is drink-
ing surreptitiously at her desk in the af-
ternoon. I have no way of knowing how
intoxicated she is when she leaves the of-
fice, but I believe that she drives herself
home at least a few days a week.
As you might expect, it is clearly
against our companys policy to drink at
the office; I am not inclined, however, to
disclose what I know to her superiors un-
der the general precept that she is an
adult capable of making her own deci-
sions and assuming whatever risks she
may choose to assume. Nor do I feel that I
have any responsibility to discuss my
opinion of her behavior with her directly.
Do I have the ethical responsibility to
do something in order to reduce the
chances that she hurts herself or others
driving while intoxicated? Or more gen-
erally, do I have any responsibility to
alert her directly to the inappropri-
ateness of her behavior? Name Withheld
There are various problems with your
co-workers conduct. One is a problem
for her. Another is a problem for your
employers, not so much because its a
breach of their rules as because the af-
ternoon tippling is probably affecting
her work. And, assuming she drives
home drunk, its a problem for other peo-
ple on the road. If shes like the ster-
eotypical alcoholic, your colleague is not
going to stop on her own, at least not be-
fore something pretty serious happens.
Its clearly in her interests to get her
to see these things. So if you care about
her, you should do something to help her
stop. Even if you dont much care about
her, impaired driving is something you
need to worry about. Were she to harm
someone (or herself) in a traffic acci-
dent, you would rightly feel bad for hav-
ing done nothing.
Of course, all those with whom youve
discussed this are in the same position
as you. They have whatever responsibil-
ities you have. So you can reasonably
say to them, Come on, we need to inter-
vene here.
Perhaps the best outcome would be
one in which a group of you tell her that
youve noticed she has this problem and
ILLUSTRATION BY TOMI UM
youre worried about its consequences
for her and for others. If there are any
recovering alcoholics in your office, they
could be particularly helpful in guiding
you here.
But co-workers you have lunch with
are people with whom you have the kind
of relationship that generates obliga-
tions. You plural ought to help.
I am the director of a small library, and
we have a staff of three, including me.
One of our staff (call her A) left to have a
baby, and wants to return in 2017. She
was employed for four hours a week and
is a delightful person and responsible
employee. I advertised and found some-
one to fill in for her (B).
Employee B is a model employee, even
early 2017, most likely in the spring. She
just sent me an email stating that be-
cause of family gatherings, she would
like to return a month later. Basically,
that means shell be on a leave of absence
for four months. During the last year she
took several weeks leave to go see dis-
tant family, putting me at an inconven-
ience.
I am torn. Should I simply accede to
her wishes as to when she returns, and let
Employee B go then? I have been consid-
ering keeping Employee B for two and a
half hours a week and letting A return for
two and a half hours a week. This may
seem like a paltry number of hours, but
our library is only open a few days a
week, and this is a very small town.
Can you give me some guidance as to
what is appropriate in this situation?
Name Withheld
You and your employee had a mutual
expectation that youd take her back af-
ter her maternity leave on the same
terms. Absent a good reason, you owe it
to her to respect that expectation. This
isnt a legal point: A lawyer could tell
you what legal obligations you may or
may not have. But its particularly im-
portant to respect your ethical obliga-
tions to employees when they have no
legal recourse. To do otherwise is to
abuse your power over them.
Your ethical obligation survives only
as long as she seeks to return within a
reasonable time, to be sure. If she an-
nounced she was taking another job for
a period or going off around the world
you have a temporary replacement who
can stay on, this isnt going to inconven-
ience you: Indeed, youll have someone
you prefer in the job for a while longer.
So its hard to see why you should refuse
her this additional time in these circum-
stances, even if it isnt what you agreed
to.
But Employee B is better, in your
view, and thats surely the real issue. Its
why youre tempted to insist on new
terms of employment. You think Em-
ployee As request for time off with the
family (with its reminder that she has
inconvenienced you by doing this be-
fore) gives you an excuse not to respect
your earlier understanding.
It doesnt. You could play hardball and
tell her that she can come back for the
full four hours only if she comes back at
the time you originally agreed. But Respect your
thats difficult to justify, given that, as I ethical
say, shes asking you to vary the terms of obligations to
the agreement in a way that is actually
to your advantage. This doesnt mean
employees. To
that you cant make staffing changes do otherwise is
down the road. But the onus on a man- to abuse your
ager is to manage expectations. power over
them.
Kwame Anthony Appiah teaches philos-
ophy at N.Y.U. He is the author of Cos-
mopolitanism and The Honor Code:
How Moral Revolutions Happen. To
submit a query: Send an email to ethi-
cist@nytimes.com; or send mail to The
Ethicist, The New York Times Magazine,
620 Eighth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10018.
(Include a daytime phone number.)

24 | SATURDAY-SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4-5, 2017
Weekend
Jewel of the South
revels in creativity
The streets spill over with artistry,
whether it be in architecture,
cuisine, crafts or fine art
36 Hours
Marrakesh, Morocco
BY SETH SHERWOOD
Arabic lesson No. 1: fenn. It means art,
and its being uttered, printed and prac-
ticed like never before in Moroccos
Jewel of the South. From the narrow
mazelike passages and bazaars of the
old medina to the modern boulevards of
the Gueliz district, a crop of new muse-
ums, galleries, gardens and indie cre-
ative spaces is showcasing the talents of
Moroccan and international artists. The
artistry is also spilling over into the
citys long-admired culinary and arti-
sanal traditions, melding 21st-century
materials and styles with classic Moroc-
can recipes and handwork. And with a
continuing hotel surge, from new luxury
palaces to renovated centuries-old pri-
vate homes, the city is easier than ever
to visit. Arabic lesson No. 2: Yalla! Lets
go!
Friday
Arty acronyms 4 p.m.
A creative corridor is flourishing along
Rue de Yougoslavie, in the Gueliz neigh-
borhood. Run by a Casablanca auction
house, Cmooa (Compagnie Marocaine
des Oeuvres et Objets dArt) is an ambi-
tious new art space. Already home to the
esteemed Galerie Matisse, the alley at
No. 61 last year welcomed Macma
(Muse dArt et de Culture de Mar-
rakech). Moroccan artifacts and Euro-
pean Orientalism comprise the perma-
nent collection, including Delacroix
prints, a Dufy watercolor and Fez ce-
ramics that once belonged to Yves St.
Laurent (who had a home in Mar-
rakesh).
Moorish morsels 8 p.m.
The best-kept secret in Gueliz dining is
Libzar. Crowds are sparse for now
but flavors are abundant and innova-
tively combined. Amid a cool gray din-
ing room decorated with red Berber
rugs and touches of chiseled plaster, you
can start with a selection of small
tapaslike salads, each colorful and jew-
el-like: a bright mound of julienned car-
rots scented with vanilla; roasted, mari-
nated eggplant slices around a core of
sweet almond paste; pumpkin pure
with diced nuts and a crisp phyllo shard.
The beguiling interplays continue in the
form of beef shank with candied lemons
and a standout chicken tajine stewed in
a broth of diced onions and topped by
sweet tomato jelly sprinkled with sesa-
me seeds and almonds. Saffron and car-
damom infuse the dual crme brle
The souk of the old dessert. Three courses are 280 dirhams,
city, one of the or about $28, per person.
most diverse
markets on earth. An Arabian night 10 p.m.
A night out in Gueliz can take you down
the bourgeois or bohemian path. For the
former, join the stylish young profes-
sional Moroccans who fill the couches at
Pointbar, a dimly lighted and laid-back
lounge with D.J.-spun mainstream
house, soul and R&B tunes. Booze, beer
and wines are on offer, including Moroc-
cos own Casablanca beer (60 dirhams)
and vin gris a very light ros from
the Moroccan winery Terres Rouges (45
dirhams). For a bohemian vibe, pack
into Le 68, a cozy and convivial cubby-
hole bar where Moroccans and Euro-
pean expats from the arty-intellectual
set soak up wines from an extensive
menu of French and local vintages by
the glass.
Saturday
Paradise found 10 a.m.
Echoing with buzzing scooters, portable
radios and the constant come-ons of
hawkers and storekeepers, the crowded
lanes of Marrakeshs medina, its old city,
are hardly havens of tranquillity. Until
you slip into Le Jardin Secret, which
opened last year. Built from the ruins of
a magnificent 19th-century palace, the
elegantly manicured grounds of exotic
flora, fruit trees, pavilions, pools and
fountains were inspired by a Koranic
verse about paradise: He will reward
them for what they endured with a gar-
den . . . . Scale the tower for views of the
medinas splintered geometry and the
soaring minaret of the medieval
Koutoubia Mosque. Admission is 80
dirhams for gardens and tower.
Treasure trail Noon
Arabic lesson No. 3: souk (market). The
medina must also rank among the plan-
ets oldest, largest, most diverse and
most atmospheric open-air markets,
thanks to stalls selling a wide range of
items, including water pipes and wed-
ding dresses. A targeted treasure hunt
offers a chance to explore its myriad
passages and discover some innovative
takes on traditional artisanal goods. A
design district is emerging at Souk
Chrifia, courtesy of boutiques like
Khmissa, which channels the spirit of
the jet-setter Talitha Getty through psy-
chedelic caftans, slippers and acces-
sories with a 1960s feel. For stylish up-
dates of tea glasses, ceramics, towels,
cushions and other dcor, step into
Chabi Chic, just south of the fragrant
spice market known as Place des
pices. And be sure to wear sunglasses
at Riad Yima, a funky and flamboyant
cafe-boutique-gallery where every sur-
face pops with radiant hues and crazy
geometric patterns. The space was
founded by the photographer Hassan
Hajjaj, whose color-soaked street por-
traits of Moroccan dandies and fashion-
istas line the walls, alongside vintage
Egyptian film posters, Arabic-language
street signs and many Warhol-esque ob-
jects and garments (all for sale) made
from upcycled Arabic-language adver-
tisements and food packaging. Seeking
a handbag created from a recycled cous-
cous sack? Its here.
Clock the Kasbah 2:30 p.m.
Time passes languidly at Caf Clock, an
arty hangout in the medinas southern
Kasbah district. Books, bric-a-brac fur-
niture and graffiti murals decorate the
space, while the eclectic comfort-food
menu roams from all-day Moroccan
breakfast to camel burgers to eggplant-
goat cheese quiche. Sweet-savory hy-
brids are especially rewarding, includ-
ing harira (a thick tomato-based soup
with chickpeas and vermicelli) with
dates and sticky pastry on the side and
the stewed chicken (immersed in a
heavy broth flavored with cinnamon,
ginger and caramelized onions). The
cafe also features regular cooking
classes, exhibitions, concerts and tradi-
tional Arabic storytelling nights. Lunch
for two: about 250 dirhams.
Art course 4 p.m.
Dont forget your putter when you set
out for Marrakeshs splashy new Mu-
seum of African Contemporary Art Al
Maaden (Macaal). The center is the lat-
est cultural offering at Al Maaden golf
resort, whose course already showcases
large-scale outdoor sculptures. Showing
until early March, the museums excel-
lent inaugural exhibition, Essentiel
Paysage, features dozens of African
artists who take nature as their theme.
Notable works include dreamlike surre-
alist canvases by the Congolese painter
Pierre Bodo; a wall sprouting tree
branches that blossom with colorful
plastic bags instead of fruit, by the Cam-
eroonian artist Pascale Marthine
Tayou; and a ghostly video montage of
African migrants relating tales of striv-
ing to reach Europe, by the Moroccan
photographer Leila Alaoui. Ms. Alaoui
was fatally shot in 2016 during a Qaeda
attack on a hotel in Burkina Faso, ma-
king the work doubly haunting. Admis-
sion: 40 dirhams.
Meat and sweet 8 p.m.
Like greenhouses, the disconnected din-
..
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL EDITION
travel
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DANIEL RODRIGUES FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
ing rooms on the lush grounds of the Dar all directions at the Epicurien nightclub. that fork through Anima, a wonderland The Kasbah dis-
Rhizlane hotel are angular, airy and Just outside, a buzzing casino awaits of exotic gardens, gazebos, ponds and trict of Marrakesh,
lined with glass walls. And, like green- with gambling tables and slots. Inside, mystical artworks 45 minutes south of home of the arty
houses, they bloom with exotic and fra- red velvety banquettes, mirrors and Marrakesh. (Use the website to reserve hangout Caf
grant specimens in this case from the flickering candles lend a boudoir vibe to the free shuttle bus, with Sunday depar- Clock.
genus of neo-North African haute cui- the sultry space, where singers and tures at 9:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m. and 2:30
sine. The classic meat-and-sweet med- bands channel soul, pop and funk p.m. Admission: 120 dirhams.) Like a
ley is elevated to new heights. An inter- grooves during the wee hours. A bottle stroll through the collective uncon-
play of vanilla paste, nuts and cara- of Moroccan Terres Sauvages red wine scious, the journey turns up something
melized onions lends multiple textures (380 dirhams) ups your I.Q. (indulgence primordial, archetypal or strange at ev-
and tastes to dark and smoky lamb, quotient) yet further. Nearby, things get ery turn. One trail passes a reproduction
while a spice biscuit of pistachios and even redder walls, carpets, chande- of Rodins The Thinker, who appears
dried fruits adds crunch to shredded liers, banquettes at Raspoutine, a to contemplate a tall cone ringed with
chicken in a sweet sea of pured carrot. brand new branch of the celebrated Pa- bands of color. Another lands you at a
Desserts are exceptional as well, includ- risian club. A few Raspoutine cocktails huge metal ark carrying a pyramid, a
ing a dense dome of orange mousse en- (vodka, tequila and lemon juice; 150 multicolored camel, a hollow giraffe and
livened by a zippy ginger sauce and dirhams) and you will fit right in. far weirder creatures. Turn again and
crumbly biscuit base. A three-course you find a soaring African mask blowing
meal for two, without drinks, costs smoke from its mouth. After, mull the
around 800 dirhams. Sunday meaning of it all over caf au lait (25
dirhams) at the sites Caf Paul Bowles
Red rooms 11 p.m. Get out of town 11 a.m. and prepare for Arabic lesson No. 4:
Pleasures and temptations beckon from Nature and culture envelop the paths Maassalama! Goodbye!
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