Breakthroughs, deals, accords and agreements

breakthrough outcome

agreement reach agreement reach an

agreement strike an agreement

accord deal

Sudden progress in talks is a breakthrough. Breakthroughs are often described as major, important, significant or dramatic and may lead to a successful outcome of the talks.

When talks are successful, the sides reach agreement or reach or strike an agreement. An agreement may also be referred to as an accord or a deal.

Before it comes into effect, an agreement may have to be approved or ratified by an elected body such as a parliament, which may refuse ratification by vetoing the agreement.

ratify

The vital breakthrough in GATT talks eventually came with concessions on both sides.

The high-volume propaganda exchange between the United States and the European Community has not only made a sue-

78 ______ Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

cessful outcome to the talks much more difficult to achieve, but has also soured relations generally.

Vietnam and Britain have reached agreement on the return of at least 300 Vietnamese boat people to their communist homeland.

Dresdner Bank and Banque Nationale de Paris have just struck an agreement to collaborate in international markets.

That's how he came to meet Lenin in 1921 and broke a trade impasse. Hammer struck a deal in which Soviet furs were exchanged for American wheat.

He still carries weight in White House, especially on Middle East questions, where he supervised the Camp David accord between Israel and Egypt.

In a follow-up to the Earth summit, the declaration called on other nations to join the G7 partners in ratifying the climate change convention.

STRAINED RELATIONS

relations Two countries beginning diplomatic re-

establish relations lations establish them. If they had dip-
break off relations lomatic relations previously but broke
restore relations them off, they restore them, normalis-
normalise ing relations between them.

relations

Bad relations are often described as
strained, tense or frosty. Relations are
sour relations said to be soured by something that

negatively affects them.

strained relations When bad relations between countries
tense relations improve, commentators talk about a

frosty relations thaw between the countries.

A country having diplomatic relations
diplomatically with very few other countries is diplo-

isolated matically isolated.

§ 7. Supplementary Reader

sanctions When one country wants to put pres-

trade sanctions sure on another, it may limit trade with

embargo that country and impose sanctions, or it

economic may stop trade and other contacts and

embargo impose an economic embargo.

LANGUAGE NOTE Thaw is a noun and a verb.

Denmark and Iceland have become the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with the three Baltic republics.

After Indonesia's invasion of East Timor, Portugal broke off diplomatic relations with Indonesia.

Britain's trade with Iran cannot be wholly unrelated to the two countries' history of strained relations. Though, diplomatic relations were restored last year, ambassadors have not been exchanged yet.

The trip is being seen as an important step in normalising relations between the two countries. Our correspondent says that the visit undoubtedly marks a thaw in Harare's previously frosty attitude to South Africa.

Japan — fearful of putting further strain on its already tense relations with the United States — has continued to support the economic embargo against Vietnam, albeit unwillingly.

By extending central rule, the government risks souring relations with the Sikhs.

Some Europeans think that, if Serbia were morally and diplomatically isolated, it would think twice about fighting on.

The United States is considering imposing trade sanctions against Thailand, unless Thailand lifts a ban on foreign cigarette imports and advertising.

80__________ Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

Diplomatic relations.Which of the verbs below mean the same as 1) "break off and 2) "restore" in the context of diplomatic relations? Use appropriate forms of the verbs to complete the extracts below.

a) resume c) re-open e) break

b) renew d) cut off f) re-establish

1. Senegal and Mauritania have agreed in principle to___

diplomatic relations, broken off two years ago after bloody clashes along the Senegal river which forms their common frontier.

2. The Moscow talks were the first between senior diplomats of the two countries since the Soviet Union _ diplomatic relations with Israel in 1967.

3. Mexico and the Vatican_______ diplomatic relations in

1867, when the reformist President Juarez confiscated all church properties and suppressed the religious orders.

4. The visit is caking place just over three months after Argen
tina and Britain agreed to_____ diplomatic relations eight

years after the two countries broke all links during the Falk-lands War.

5. In recent years, Albania has —_______________ diplomatic relations with most European countries.

6. Table tennis teams were visiting China before Nixon —

________ diplomatic relations between Communist China

and the United States.

WAR AND THREATSOF WAR

escalating tension If the differences between two sides

increase, there is escalating tension be-

war tween them. A standoff is a period of

avert a war extreme tension that may or may not

§ 7. Supplementary Reader

teeter on the lead to violence. If two sides are very

brink of war close to war, they are (teetering) on the

brink of war.

standoff If a war is prevented, perhaps by talks,

it is averted. If not, hostilities begin or
break out.
hostilities
hostilities begin A hot spot is a place where tension is

hostilities break high and fighting may break out at any

out moment.

The American ambassador in Delhi has confirmed that his country is urging India and Pakistan to hold talks to try to avert the threat of war over Kashmir.

North Korea often accuses the South of escalating tension to the brink of war by staging joint military manoeuvres known as "Team Spirit" with the United States.

In 1961, just after the building of the Berlin Wall, this was the scene of a tense standoff between Soviet and American tanks: the world teetered on the brink of war.

Mr Urqhart emphasised the need for a preventive UN force to be dispatched to hot spots before hostilities break out.

"The only acceptable outcome, if, in fact, hostilities begin, is absolute, total victory."

Types of war.Find the following types of war in the table. Then use the expressions to complete the extracts.

A war...

1. that isolated clashes might degenerate into

2. between East and West that lasted from 1945 to 1989

3. where nuclear arms are used

4. where nuclear arms are not used

82__________ Английский язык. Общественно-поДкгический перевод

5. between factions of the same nationality

6. causing an enormous number of deaths and amount of damage

7. fought by irregular forces, perhaps avoiding direct confrontation with the other side.

	civil
guerrilla		Cold
full-scale	war	conventional
nuclear		devastating

a The Cold War is over. The world is learning to live with
out the imminent threat of_______ war that had con
ditioned our lives for 40 years.

b A grim reminder of the________ War — the border

crossing point between East and West Berlin known as Checkpoint Charlie — is to go the way of the rest of the Berlin Wall and be dismantled.

с As the________ war in Liberia enters its tenth month,

thousands of people continue to stream across the borders into neighbouring countries.

d Because of the intensity of the fighting — what analysts
call "low-intensity ______ war"— neither side ap
pears strong enough to defeat the other.

e The President himself said he is against withdrawing all
Nato nuclear weapons from Europe and thus making it
safe for_______ war.

f The question is whether anything else but a neutral out
side force would be strong enough to persuade them to
leave the scene before the current clashes degenerate into
________ war.

g The two men stressed the importance of averting the ca
tastrophe of a________ war and the need to achieve a

common Arab stand.

§ ?. Supplementary Reader

WARRING PARTIES

belligerent Before or during a war, one side may accuse

combatant the other of belligerent statements, remarks or

actions: things that make war more likely, or

prolong or intensify a war that has already

warring party started.

wage war Belligerents, combatants or warring parties

are countries or factions participating in a war, or waging war against each other. Combatants are also people physically doing the fighting.

Troops had been mentally prepared for hostilities. Pakistan believes, that India's frustration at its inability to control the situation in Kashmir is leading to increasingly belligerent statements from its politicians, alerting the military on both sides.

The foreign ministers of the four main belligerents of World War Two in Europe have signed in Moscow a treaty endorsing German unity.

It is simply a demilitarized zone — 4 km wide — separating two combatants who have not yet reached formal agreement that the Korean War of the early 1950's is formally over.

His remarks came only a few days before the warring parties to the conflict are due to gather in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, for another round of peace talks.

President Milosevic called on them to be ready to fight to defend themselves, but he added: "Before we are forced to wage war we will do everything to preserve peace."

Adversaries and allies. Look at the extracts and complete the key words below.

84________ Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

The new government will have to bring Lebanon's warring factions together and end the country's 15-year civil war.

There have been renewed clashes in El Salvador between government forces and left-wing rebels of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front.

This seems to be the time of uniting: two Germanics are about to merge and two former foes — Iran and Iraq — have become allies.

The Foreign Secretary, Mr Douglas Hurd, has been stressing the importance of Britain's friendship and alliance with Germany and France.

When John F. Kennedy came,to Berlin in June of 1963, he paid a tribute that seemed to turn at least West Germans from being occupied adversaries into allies.

During the second world war Burmese and Indonesian nationalists allied themselves with the Japanese, finding them a useful lever against the colonial power.

None has improved on Palmerston's dictum that Britain has no permanent friends or enemies, only permanent interests.

warring faction The different sides in a civil war are
___________ ^________ . Factions oppos-

rebels ing a central government are__________ .

Countries or factions with the same interests

ally ______ themselves with each other and are

alliance _______ forming an__________ . Oppos-

ingsidesare__________ ,_____________

enemy or_______ .

adversary

foe

LANGUAGENOTE

Ally is pronounced with the stress on the first syllable when a noun and with the stress on the second syllable when a verb.

§ 7. Supplementary Reader

FIGHTING

fighting When fighting starts it breaks out or

break out erupts. If fighting flares or flares up, it

erupt starts, or starts again after a lull, a period

flare when it has stopped or been less intense.

flare up

Fighting may be sporadic, perhaps taking sporadic fighting the form of brief, unplanned encounters or heavy fighting skirmishes with only small numbers involved. Or it may be heavy, with large lull in fighting numbers of troops and other forces involved. skirmish

In Georgia, fierce fighting broke out today between rebel national guardsmen and troops loyal to President Zviad Gamsak-hurdia.

But for all the noise, the air base received only minor damage. In comparison to the permanent heavy fighting in the countryside, the attack was more of a skirmish.

People are taking advantage of a lull in the fighting to get out of the immediate war zone.

The most bitter fighting erupted here in eastern Croatia when federal tanks and airforce jets attacked the town of Vukovar.

While fighting has flared in the breakaway north of Yugoslavia, some of Serbia's leading politicians have begun to reassess their views on the future unity of the federation.

Both Libya and Sudan have denied any involvement in the Chadian fighting, which flared up again last month after a period of relative quiet.

«6

Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

CASUALTIES

casualties

losses heavy casualties heavy losses inflict casualties inflict losses civilian casualties

Casualties arc people killed and hurt, or wounded, especially those severely wounded. They may include civilian casualties, those not in the military. Military casualties may be referred to as losses. Where there are many casualties or losses, they are described as heavy.

Casualties and losses are inflicted by one side on the other.

wounded

friendly fire collateral damage

Military casualties killed or wounded by members of their own side are victims of friendly fire.

Unintended civilian casualties and damage to non-military targets may be referred to by the military, euphemistically, as collateral damage.

Rwandan casualties were 14 dead and 30 wounded.

You don't have to be much of a cynic to take military claims that they're being careful of civilian casualties skeptically.

Tigrean rebels say they inflicted heavy losses on government troops infighting in northern Shewa region last week.

The United States Defense Department says an investigation has shown that about one in every four Americans killed in battle during the Gulf War died as a result of so-called "friendly fire" — that is, killed by their own side.

Those of us who have been through it know that you're talking about human lives that are cut short. We don't think of words like "collateral damage" or "numbers". We think of friends.

§ 7. Supplementary! Reader

VICTIMS OF WAR

escalate

If a war intensifies, it escalates.

war-torn

atrocities

ethnic cleansing genocide

evacuee refugee

relief relief aid relief organisation

A country devastated by war is, in media terms, war-torn.

One side may accuse the other of atrocities: for example forcing civilians to leave an area for reasons of ethnic origin: ethnic cleansing. Or they may accuse them of the mass killing of civilians for racial or political reasons: genocide.

People fleeing war-zones arc refugees or evacuees, and the help provided to them by Organisations is relief or relief aid. Organisations such as the Red Cross are relief organisations.

Bosnian sources estimate that 50,000 people have so far been killed or are missing. Atrocities: rape, torture and murder, are unquestionably being carried out on a large scale.

"Ethnic cleansing", in which people are forced from their homes at gunpoint, has not stopped.

The Khmer Rouge objected to Vietnam's insistence on including the word "genocide" in reference to the Khmer Rouge's three years in power during which some two million Cambodians died.

...a flood of refugees from Somalia's escalating civil war.

The agreement calls for the return home of the evacuees who fled the fighting.

Refugee organizations say the majority of those arriving in Britain and the rest of Europe are fleeing from genuine persecu-

88 _______ Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

tion and misery in their war-torn countries. They want more resources to care for the refugees.

Britain yesterday pledged a further $18 million in food and relief aid to war-torn Somalia.

Monsieur Kouchner is a co-founder of the French relief organisation Medecins sans Frontieres and accustomed to high-profile missions to trouble spots.

ENDING THE BLOODSHED

bloodshed During wars, there are calls to end the

end the bloodshed, or violence. Military and civil-

bloodshed ians tired of a war are war-weary.

war-weary Outside governments may try to end a

civil war by sending a peace-keeping force, or peace-keepers, who try to stop

peace-keeping the fighting, or prevent it from starting
force again.

peace-keepers

If the sides say they will stop fighting, at

ceasefire least temporarily, they agree to a ceasefire

truce or a truce. If a ceasefire or truce continues

hold as agreed, it holds. If not. it is broken,

break usually with one side accusing the other of

having broken it.

LANGUAGE NOTE

Peace-keeping, peace-keeper and cease-fire are also spelt as one or two words.

§ 7. Supplementary Reader

Everyone accepts the need for negotiations, to break the deadlock and try to end the bloodshed. In this, one of the world's worst examples of intercommunal violence, more than 3,000 people, Protestants and Catholics, have been killed.

People are very increasingly war-weary and disgusted and angry, but it is very hard for them to give expression to this in sectors where there is very strong intimidation and fear.

Over the past few weeks the peace-keeping force has been doing a good enough job that people feel safe to go back out on the streets and so there are markets everywhere.

Yesterday the Security Council passed a resolution warning all waning parties that they must abide by the latest cease-fire before peace-keepers can be sent.

The Phnom Penh government and its three guerrilla rivals unexpectedly agreed to a ceasefire. The truce held.

There were reports of fresh outbreaks of fighting in Rwanda, with the government accusing rebels of breaking the ceasefire agreement.

THE PEACE PROCESS

arbitrator A dispute may be resolved more easily

arbitrate with the help of someone not directly in-

volved in it.

mediator A mediator or arbitrator is someone from a

mediate third party who helps opposing parties set-

tle their differences and reach an agree
ment by mediating or arbitrating in the
reconciliation dispute. This process is reconciliation.

envoy An envoy is a representative sent by one

of the parties, or a mediator sent by a third

shuttle diplomacy party, who travels specially in order to take part in negotiations.

90___________ Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

peace conference Shuttle diplomacy involves a mediator vis-
peace process iting and re-visiting a number of places in
peace settlement a short period to mediate between the par-
peace talks ties involved.

Where negotiations are in many stages,
convention and progress is at times very slow, com-

mentators talk about the peace process.

Discussions between parties trying to reach a peace settlement are referred to as peace talks or a peace conference.

A conference involving many parties may be referred to as a convention, and so may the agreement reached at such a conference.

India says Kashmir is an internal Indian problem which doesn't require mediation by anyone else.

They have chosen their words with great care to describe America's role in the Middle East peacemaking effort. Not "arbitrator", which would mean dictating an outcome; not "mediator", which would imply it could suggest a solution.

The four pillars of her government, she said, would be national reconciliation, economic regeneration, social justice and the consolidation of democracy. But the first task, she said, was to end the war. •

Mr Primakor, who arrived in Bagdad on Saturday from Cairo, was to leave today for Riyadh on the next leg of his exercise in shuttle diplomacy.

The United Nations Secretary General's personal envoy, Mr. Alvaro de Soto, will mediate between the two sides in an attempt to settle El Salvador's ten-year conflict.

§ 7. Supplementary Reader

He had asked Switzerland to help organise a peace conference to negotiate a settlement to the Afghan conflict.

The African state of Liberia says it will not continue peace talks, describing them as a waste of time.

Mr. Boucher says that the absence of a peace process contributes to the spiralling violence in the region.

The agreement is scheduled to be formally signed at a peace convention on September 14th once remaining differences have been resolved.

A draft resolution also proposes a meeting of parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention on protecting civilians in time of war.

Peace partners.Find the following expressions in the table and use them to complete the extracts.

1. efforts to reach peace (two expressions)

2. someone who tries to mediate a peace agreement

3. economic benefit of having reached a peace agreement

4. popular protest against a war

5. peace agreement

6. recognition of peace efforts

	broker
movement		treaty
move	peace	dividend
prize		initiatives

a A spokesman for the Nobel committee said Suu Kyi, 47, is one of the foremost examples of civilian courage

in Asia. Today's news found the peace _________

winner in exactly the same place she has been for the past two years: under house arrest in Burma's capital, Rangoon.

92______ Английский язык. Общественно-политический перевод

b Afghan guerrilla groups based in Pakistan and Iran have

rejected the presidents latest peace______ .They want

nothing short of his removal from power.

с Camp David in 1978 was the high point of Mr Carter's presidency. He badgered and cajoled Menachem Begin of Israel and Anwar Sadat of Egypt into a peace

________ . Twelve years on, he feels he has unfinished

business in the region. Now he's a freelance peace

d German doubts about the fighter plane project make its whole future uncertain. In many countries now there's

talk of a "peace________ " — money to be saved on

defence being diverted to other uses.

e The battle zone, which borders Iraq and Turkey, is populated mostly by Moslem Armenians and is claimed by

Armenia. Previous peace ________ have failed and

ceasefire declarations have been ignored as each side accuses the other of genocide, massacres and atrocities.

f Word of the demonstration has been spreading for weeks, and the result could be one of the largest anti-war rallies

since Vietnam. While the peace________ mobilized,

those who support military action are also taking their message to the streets.

§ 7. Supplementary Reader