The Foreign Policy Association and the European Courier spoke with Ambassador Christian Wenaweser, Permanent Mission of Liechtenstein to the United Nations, about the role of small countries at the UN, the International Criminal Court and reform at the United Nations. Transcript available at the European Courier. April 11, 2008 [kml_flashembed movie=”http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-5792792129699709429″ width=”400″ height=”326″ wmode=”transparent” /]
Despite rampant inflation, increasing violence, an opposition apparently on the run, mounting outside pressure, and, if British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is the be believed, a stolen election, Thabo Mbeki continues with his untenable belief that all is going to be fine in Zimbabwe. The latest sign of complacency is South Africa's willingness to allow a […]
[Cross-posted from the FPA South Africa Blog.] Despite rampant inflation, increasing violence, an opposition apparently on the run, mounting outside pressure, and, if British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is the be believed, a stolen election, Thabo Mbeki continues with his untenable belief that all is going to be fine in Zimbabwe. The latest sign of complacency […]
Kenya's new cabinet has been sworn in. It is bloated, it is costly, it is huge. But if you are Kenyan, I suppose you work with the cabinet you have, not the one you wish you had. The country has a long road ahead. Let us hope that road is traversible.
There is an argument, and it is a plausible one, at least, that oil and other resources can represent a curse for African nations and other countries in the developing world. But certainly having resources is preferable to having none — if oil is a curse, that curse has dual edges, cutting good and cutting bad. […]
Self-promotion? No. An educational opportunity. Your author has a new article up on Yemen in the Jamestown Foundation's Terrorism Focus. Want a teaser? Why not? Yemen is running out of water. Its economy is one of the weakest in the world. Its second-most powerful and influential political figure, Shaykh Abdullah al-Ahmar, recently died, and Saleh […]
Richard Weitz, a scholar for the Hudson Institute, makes the argument that China's government has either exaggerated or outright fabricated a plot by Uighur separatist to attack the upcoming Olympics. The plot in question was reported by Chinese authorities on April 10, and in their words involved 45 suspects from the Uighur dominated Xinjiang Province, […]
The World Bank (WB) provided a briefing regarding the state of Eastern European and Central Asian economies before their annual IMF spring meeting. The World Bank's report reinforced most of the Asian Development Bank's (ADB) recent analysis of the current and future state of CA's economy. For instance, the World Bank warns of a coming […]
I hate being the guy who only publishes bad stories, and I promise to try and publish some things that are more uplifting, but I came across this story last week and it has bothered me ever since. I suppose there is a bit of inspiration in the story, but the overall arch is wildly […]
Victim accounts of violence and torture of those perceived to be disloyal to Robert Mugabe — which is to say those who have had the audacity to exercise what should have been their right to support opposition parties such as the Movement for Democratic Change — have begun to emerge in Zimbabwe. As a general […]
New York City's Winkleman Gallery is currently exhibiting seven media projects called “I Dream of the Stans: New Central Asian Video.” One of the exhibitions curators, Leeza Ahmady, stated that their aim was to ‘assemble a representative collection that highlighted the adventurous spirit of regional artists.’ The exhibition features such CA artists as Said Atabekov, […]
Well, how to interpret this?: On the one hand, from Harare Zimbabwe's High Court ordered the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) not to recount the results from nearly two-dozen constituencies because the result of the presidential poll had not yet been announced. This represents a blow to Robert Mugabe. On the other hand, the same court […]
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has met to deal with the situation in Zimbabwe and has made clear that the region's leaders want to see the results of the election that was held more than two weeks ago. Spokesmen nonetheless insist that there is no crisis in Zimbabwe, which, while absurd in light of the fact […]
South Africa has produced more than its share of great golfers. And yet Trevor Immelman's victory in today's Masters at Augusta National made him the first South African winner of a green jacket since the incomparable Gary Player won in 1978. This was Immelman's tournament and Immelman's week. He was unflappable playing from the lead […]
The New York Times has a great piece on the dismissal of 1,300 soldiers and policemen in the wake of the Basra offensive. Stephen Farrell writes that there have been revelations “more than 1,000 members of the security forces had laid down their weapons during the fight“. There were a multitude of reasons behind the […]