A power shift at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in favor of Emerging Market nations has now set the stage for a fierce international battle over who should succeed Dominique Strauss-Kahn (DSK) as he battles well-publicized allegations of sexual assault in New York. The outcome of this struggle and may threaten the ‘gentlemen’s agreement’ […]
It was an exciting day yesterday at Opinio Juris, as State Department Legal Adviser, Harold Koh, in a blog post, laid out the U.S. Government’s official legal justification for killing bin Laden. Was it really that exciting though? Koh reiterated the rationale he gave in a speech last year to justify targeted killing. Then he […]
The problem with President Obama’s “Remarks on the Middle East and North Africa” is that it is already being regarded by almost everyone as a speech on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. This is a shame because it wasn’t what the speech should have been about (and actually otherwise was about) at all. For that reason, I […]
Over the past few weeks, the spotlight has been on Greg Mortenson, the founder of Central Asia Institute and co-author of Three Cups of Tea, for alleged financial fraud and false claims–with one of the most damning accounts coming from Jon Krakauer. One of the refrains I’ve heard from colleagues and friends is a frustration […]
Just as I was finishing the Kissinger/Nixon ‘Detente’ chapter of John Lewis Gaddis’ “Strategies of Containment“, I came across this excerpt from Henry Kissinger’s new book “On China”. Kissinger, whose strategic leadership comes across very well in Gaddis’ book, dishes about his secret trip to Beijing in 1971 to lay the ground work for American […]
On this day in 1974, India detonated a low-yield device (8 kilotons) under the Rajasthan desert at Pokhran. Code-named “Smiling Buddha”, the “peaceful nuclear explosion (PNE)” was also the first confirmed nuclear test by a country outside the P5 nuke states codified by the NPT. India famously developed and executed the test weapon from materials […]
What can we expect for the future of global food security when factoring in the impact of global warming, population and consumption patterns? Recently published reports may help illuminate the discussion. Researchers at Stanford University and Columbia University analyzed the impact that global warming has had on food production from 1980 to 2008. The study […]
Twilight on the corniche in Beirut in February The chatter in the news and on Twitter today is about President Obama’s big speech on the Middle East at the State Department tomorrow. What will he say? There is no question this is a serious opportunity to get the Arab Spring back on track. It has veered […]
How green are the Tories? was the question from The Independent a few years back. “Vote Blue, Go Green” said the Conservative leader, David Cameron. Now he’s the PM and he’s backing up his words with actions. His government’s announcement yesterday that it is going to halve the UK’s GHG emissions, relative to 1990 figures, […]
A deal between BP and Russia’s state-owned oil company Rosneft to explore the Arctic seems to have fallen apart after the two failed to come to an arrangement on a stock swap. It is now doubtful that BP will get a piece of the Arctic action at all. Rosneft was to take a 5% stake […]
Let me start with saying how happy I am to be living in a new democracy. Today is election day in South Africa, as voters go to the polls for the fourth municipal elections in the history of the Republic of South Africa. Although I’m an observer in this democratic process, the ability to witness […]
Foreign Policy magazine has come out with their “food issue,” in which authors discuss how food is a driver of world politics. While the authors discussed food’s role in the recent protests in the Middle East, and well as the intersection of hunger and poverty (the hungry are the poor and the poor are the […]
Reactions to the so-called twitterspat between Rwandan President Paul Kagame, Rwandan Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo and British journalist Ian Birrell that I posted on Monday is still in full swing online. The reactions I posted then pretty much summed up general opinion about the incident with most people siding with Birrell. And while I am […]
“Action This Day” is what Winston Churchill demanded in his World War II memos. That’s what the National Academies are calling for in their fifth and final report on America’s Climate Choices. Their press release said the report, prepared by a blue-ribbon panel of the National Research Council, “… reiterated the pressing need for substantial […]
The legal debates about the killing of Osama bin Laden continue. My previous posts on the subject (here and here, for example) have focused mostly on the jus ad bellum dimension (the UN Charter’s Article 51 and the inherent right of self-defense). But recent discussions at Opinio Juris turn my attention to the jus in […]