Tag: current affairs – international

Anna Iasmi Vallianatou: The Poland-Belarus border crisis is what happens when humans are treated as weapons

Another humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding on the European Union’s doorstep. Poland has responded by deploying 20,000 border police, firing water cannon and teargas at asylum seekers, reinforcing its border fencing and blocking access for journalists and aid organisations. This need to react is understandable: Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko’s use of refugees and migrants as pawns for… Read More Anna Iasmi Vallianatou: The Poland-Belarus border crisis is what happens when humans are treated as weapons

Dilip

Hundreds of global civil society representatives walk out of Cop26 in protest

Carrying blood-red ribbons to represent the crucial red lines already crossed by Cop26 negotiations, hundreds of representatives of global civil society walked out of the convention centre in Glasgow on the final morning of the summit in protest. The audience at the People’s Plenary in the conference blue zone heard speakers condemn the legitimacy and ambition of… Read More Hundreds of global civil society representatives walk out of Cop26 in protest

Dilip

Tom Engelhardt: Welcome to the American Century / Guy Saperstein: Why I’m Leaving America

In February 17, 1941, less than 10 months before the Japanese struck Pearl Harbor and the U.S. found itself in a global war, Henry Luce, in an editorial in Life magazine (which he founded along with Time and Fortune), declared the years to come “the American Century.”  He then urged this country’s leaders to “exert upon the world the full impact of… Read More Tom Engelhardt: Welcome to the American Century / Guy Saperstein: Why I’m Leaving America

Dilip

Richard Wolff: How the troubled U.S. empire could quickly fall apart

The U.S. wars lost in Iraq and Afghanistan showed imperial overreach beyond what even 20 years of war could manage. That the defeats were drawn out for so many years shows that domestic politics and the funding of the domestic military-industrial complex were, more than geopolitics, the key drivers of these wars. Empires can die… Read More Richard Wolff: How the troubled U.S. empire could quickly fall apart

Dilip

BRIAN KAREM – Dumbass nation: Our biggest national security problem is America's "vast and militant ignorance" / ExxonMobil's campaign to fund climate science denial

The United States is a nation of militantly ignorant people, arrogant in their beliefs, unable to change their minds and unwilling to try. We lack education. And the lack of education in this country is such a problem that national security adviser Jake Sullivan described it this week as a critical issue for our national… Read More BRIAN KAREM – Dumbass nation: Our biggest national security problem is America's "vast and militant ignorance" / ExxonMobil's campaign to fund climate science denial

Dilip

George Monbiot: Trashing the planet and hiding the money isn’t a perversion of capitalism. It is capitalism

Whenever there’s a leak of documents from the remote islands and obscure jurisdictions where rich people hide their money, such as this week’s release of the Pandora papers, we ask ourselves how such things could happen. How did we end up with a global system that enables great wealth to be transferred offshore, untaxed and hidden… Read More George Monbiot: Trashing the planet and hiding the money isn’t a perversion of capitalism. It is capitalism

Dilip

Pandora Papers: Suspect foreign money flows into booming American tax havens on promise of eternal secrecy

NB: What is capitalism without cronies and corruption? Will the free-market cult followers consider why capital is free, but human beings are not? DS Suspect foreign money flows into booming American tax havens By Will Fitzgibbon, Salwan Georges and Debbie Cenziper Across from a Holiday Inn, in a red-brick building with a welcome sign that… Read More Pandora Papers: Suspect foreign money flows into booming American tax havens on promise of eternal secrecy

Dilip

CHAUNCEY DEVEGA – America's political class: They knew, and did nothing / The real crime Gen. Milley exposed: the cowardice of Senate Republicans

NB: The criminalisation of the state in the USA has been fairly obvious for some decades now. But our op-ed fraternity persists in spinning American interventions abroad (for example in this editorial) as attempts to ‘remake other societies in the name of US global leadership.’ Were the 1953 coup in Iran, the prolonged bombing of… Read More CHAUNCEY DEVEGA – America's political class: They knew, and did nothing / The real crime Gen. Milley exposed: the cowardice of Senate Republicans

Dilip

Sarah Johnson: Climate crisis leaving ‘millions at risk of trafficking and slavery’

Millions of people forced to leave their homes because of severe drought and powerful cyclones are at risk of modern slavery and human trafficking over the coming decades, a new report warns. The climate crisis and the increasing frequency of extreme weather disasters including floods, droughts and megafires are having a devastating effect on the livelihoods of… Read More Sarah Johnson: Climate crisis leaving ‘millions at risk of trafficking and slavery’

Dilip

Sunita Viswanath: Why I feel the need to bring my Hinduism to the streets

At a gathering a couple of years ago in the Maharashtra hill station of Panchgani organised by Professor Rajmohan Gandhi, I was challenged by an angry young man: “Keep your Hinduism in your house. Why do you need to bring it into the streets?” The young man could have been a conservative Hindu offended by… Read More Sunita Viswanath: Why I feel the need to bring my Hinduism to the streets

Dilip