On newsstands this week is The Economist’s special report on the Arctic. The region merits special attention because “no longer distant or inviolable,” the Arctic “has emerged, almost overnight, as a powerful symbol of the age of man.” With analyses on climate change, science, politics, natural resources, shipping, and biodiversity, the June 16-22 edition of […]
On Thursday, the Canadian House of Commons held a 24-hour session to vote on the 2012 federal budget. After members listened to the over 800 proposed amendments, they finally voted in favor of passing the budget. It will now move on the the Senate, where it will almost inevitably pass. One of the notable cuts […]
What to watch this weekend: the US golf open in San Francisco, the Euro 2012, the third game of the NBA Finals–Go Heat–or the latest Ridley Scott’s Prometheus? In fact the place to look and observe should be the Mediterranean. This weekend the world will be watching, especially in the US and Europe, the outcomes […]
North American Arctic nations are busy researching new developments in northern technology. As I mentioned recently, the U.S. is trying to develop a “Knight Rider” vehicle for Alaska. Now, Northrop Grumman, the American defense company, is trying to sell a modified version of its Block 30 RQ-4B Global Hawk, a type of surveillance drone, to […]
However justified, the public berating of Islamabad has become counterproductive. The comments made by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta during his swing through South Asia last week once again raise the question of how coordinated the Obama administration’s regional policy is. An earlier post flagged this issue two months ago by noting the curious timing […]
Admittedly, it’s not all doom and gloom coming out of Russia. I mean, look on the bright side. Chief Federal Prosecutor Aleksandr I. Bastrykin is really sorry for driving an opposition journalist into the woods, threatening to kill him, and joking that he himself would lead the investigation into the death. Bastrykin even offered the man (now […]
Born in the U.S. to Iranian parents and based in Washington D.C., Elahe Izadi is an emerging figure on the American journalism scene, whose work and firm belief in diversity have won her wide recognition in the industry. She has covered such issues as demographics, immigration, government, crime, and development. Until recently at DCentric, where she covered race and […]
By Scott Bleiweis and Tim LaRocco Recently Scott connected with fellow FPA blogger and journalist Tim LaRocco. Tim lives in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and shares his perspective on some issues raised in Scott’s recent post about chances for democracy in Cambodia. Tim writes, “Having been a resident of Phnom Penh for awhile now, I have had […]
You don’t hear much about Estonia, which is in part why this documentary is so extraordinary. It illustrates how thousands of Estonians gathered to sing patriotic songs in defiance of Soviet rule. It provides a brief history of the country, which was a small playing piece during the second world war. Singing has long been […]
Early Wednesday morning, nearly seventy people were killed and more than 100 wounded in a flurry of road-side bombings targeted against Shi’a pilgrims. A redoubtable Sunni insurgency launched the coordinated wave of attacks as tens of thousands of their countrymen participated in a religious festival marking the anniversary of the death of the eighth century […]
What’s going on with Russia? Yesterday, the country celebrated independence (from itself), the opposition marchers defied the new draconian laws without any reply from the police, football fans roughed up Warsaw before a draw with Poland, maybe some attack helicopters were sold to Assad. Stocks are up. Several Western observers have attempted to make some […]
Like in wars between states and other organized groups, civil wars and other protracted domestic conflicts are seldom caused by a single factor. Over time, even those that prove to be the exception to the rule eventually evolve into a much more complex conflict- hence the entity known as Somaliland. A Brief History Only […]
The world watched as campaigns during the 2009 Iranian Presidential election unfolded, and hopes were high that an administration change was imminent. The disputed reelection of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad catalyzed a wave of protests. Beginning June 12th, post-election uprisings occurred throughout Iran, and the world, to contest the election results and demand democracy and […]
With Europe on the brink of economic meltdown, it’s easy to forget that some people never saw the good times. The 10 to 12 million strong Roma minority—often disparaged as “Gypsies”—have lived in Europe for centuries, but have been considered unwelcome intruders at best. Enslaved in Romania, forcibly settled in Hungary and Poland, Roma are […]
Events lay bare just how strategically isolated Islamabad has become. As my last post noted, the events of the past week show that New Delhi is sitting pretty diplomatically, being courted ardently by both Washington and Beijing. Conversely, they also laid bare just how strategically isolated Islamabad has become. Pakistan’s most recent troubles began with […]