This movie is hard to describe. It is in part a journey back in time for director Ari Folman, who is disturbed by the fact he cannot remember incidents that happened while he was in the Israeli army. Folman reconnects with others who were with him in 1982 when Bashir Gemayel, Lebanon’s newly elected president, […]
A preliminary report from a review team for the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS) has found “horrific violence” on the part of the military against civilians in the diamond-rich Marange District in eastern Zimbabwe. The Kimberley Process was established in 2003 to thwart the trade of so-called conflict diamonds which funded numerous rebel movements in […]
Time to re-read Huntington? His controversial and path-breaking Foreign Affairs article of 1993 and subsequent book posited that the post-Cold War era would be one of conflict and “fault line wars” among the world’s major civilizations: Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, and Latin American and possibly African… Is the current unrest in China’s western […]
At the summit in Gleneagles 2005, I remember the promises made – as I’m sure most in the developing world have as well. But the rich have forgotten; money is to be made not spent. Tony Blair was prime minister and had released a commission report on poverty in Africa. His message was clear, the […]
The Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate (MEF) issued a declaration today after its leaders met in Italy. There were no big surprises, as I predicted yesterday. (See last post below.) However, there was some potentially useful language regarding the role of the developing economies. “Developing countries among us will promptly undertake actions whose […]
The Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) recommended last week that Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf should be banned from government for 30 years for her previous support of former President Charles Taylor. Taylor is currently on trial before the Special Court for Sierra Leone for his role in the civil war there, where tens […]
U.N. agency suspends food rations in Philippine south Hundreds of thousands of displaced people in the southern Philippines will go without food rations after the World Food Programme suspended deliveries in the midst of a series of bomb attacks that have killed eight and left dozens wounded. The United Nations and several diplomatic missions have […]
Australian Foreign Minister Steven Smith stated today that Stern Hu, General Manager of Rio Tinto China, was detained on espionage charges earlier this week. Hu’s firm, Rio Tinto, is a major Australian supplier of iron ore (a necessary ingredient for making steel). The company is currently negotiating annual contracts with China that dictate pricing terms […]
There’s some good news from Italy, and some bad news. I reported on the G-8 summit from a couple of years ago here. Then, President Bush (who?) derailed any substantive agreement. Now, although the G-8 itself seems fully loaded to attack climate change, the leading developing nations involved in the Major Economies Forum on Energy […]
As the 2009 G-8 Summit of the worlds seven welathiest nations draw near, 8-10 July in L’Aquila, IT we provide a quick run-down of the primary items on the docket.
Climate change is inextricably linked to poverty. As the droughts continue and as the sea level rises, hundreds of thousands will be forced to resettle. The most recent conference on climate change in Copenhagen concluded that the climate is changing faster than previous models suggested. Rhetoric and fear mongering aside, these are serious issues with […]
President Obama has completed his first ever Russia Summit dealing with The Big Issue. Actually, I guess the status of nuclear forces used to be The Big Issue, those days are gone. Still, I have to admit to a certain sense of expectancy at seeing the U.S. and Russian presidents meet to discuss nuclear weapons […]
The popular news media is obsessing over Michael Jackson today with non-stop coverage of the memorial service in Los Angeles. I’ve never devoted any attention to celebrity news in this space and had not planned to consider it at all until I saw this Associated Press report. The report has me thinking about this in […]
As the American troops pull out from the everyday mayhem of trying to keep order in a country that seems tediously on the verge of implosion, Iraq’s gay and lesbian community have become prime targets for a new wave of violence. On the streets in the Shia strongholds of Sadr City, wanted posters of men are […]