The Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria is considering starting a loan program for countries that can afford it, but still need help buying HIV meds. I guess it makes sense in a way, but it is a pretty stark change from the traditional wisdom on foreign aid loans, isn't it? I thought […]
Over the past several days as we've seen the death and damage from the storm in Burma/Myanmar metastasize, there has been a greater-than-usual sense of impotency on the part of the international community in its inability to rise to the challenge. There is the extraordinary scale of the disaster, and the fact that so much […]
The AIDS pandemic effects not only those who sub-come to the deadly disease, but to both their families and communities. Villages have been stripped of generations, families have fallen apart, and children have been orphaned in extraordinary numbers. The long reaching effects of HIV/AIDS cannot be ignored, and nor can the children for which it […]
Charles Le Gai Eaton wrote in the introduction to his book, Islam and the Destiny of Man (1985), "Religion is a different matter." This blog's working premise is that the forces of religion influence to a great degree world politics and international debates on critical issues like terrorism and human rights. Even if a country […]
Lisa Mullins of Public Radio International's “The World” program spoke with Mohamad Manzarpour of the BBC's Persian Service on Iran's move to suspend talks about Iraq's regional security. Toward the end of the conversation Mullins asks Manzarpour about the Iranian public's reaction to Senator Clinton's recent remarks about what she would do as President if Iran […]
This October, Georgetown University Press will publish a new “manual” on the Foreign Service titled Career Diplomacy. Authored by former Foreign Service Officer Harry Kopp and the recently-passed Charles “Tony” Gillespie, a former Ambassador to Colombia and Chile, the book serves as an A to Z guide on the Foreign Service and US diplomacy. Here's some […]
UN treaty for world's disabled people takes effect A United Nations pact aimed at boosting the rights of the 650 million disabled people around the world took effect Saturday. Twenty-five countries so far have ratified the treaty, which outlaws discrimination based on disability in the workplace and in education. Mexican journalist Lydia Cacho Ribeiro has […]
Do the mass media form or reflect public opinion? Specialists in these matters always answer "both," but in this election year it's critical to know which predominates. Take the Rev. Wright "issue." In the seven weeks since March 18th, when ABC-TV unveiled footage of Wright's most notorious quotes, the media have incessantly declaimed on behalf […]
Here's an eye-catching quote: "I believe the age of fossil fuels is coming to end – and that the age of clean energy will follow." That's what Massachusetts Governor Deval L. Patrick told the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce last week. See this from the AP. Massachusetts is home, as you probably know, to the […]
Here we go again. The top prosecutor with the United Nations said Sunday four war crimes suspects, including Ratko Mladic, are within reach of Serbian officials. Serbia in its bidding to ascend to the European Union faces pressure to hand over war crimes fugitives suspected of atrocities during the 1990s, including the massacre of 5,000 […]
Child labor may seem like a thing of the past, a relic last left in the cloudy days of the Depression, sadly the use of child labor has never been erased and it has proved to be a stalemate in societies. In India, child labor proves hard to end, as millions of children continue to […]
This op/ed from the Times of India is worth a read. It discusses the rising wealth of many Indians, and argues that a rise in personal philanthropy is not coming along with it. India has 52 billionaires, the most in Asia. But it has only 4 people on the Forbes list of 48 top Asian […]
NAFSA: Association of International Educators is a non-profit, professional association of international educators dedicated to promoting international education in America and worldwide. US International education centers around two flows: foreign students travelling to the US to study and experience American life, and American students travelling abroad to study and experience living abroad. Recently, we have […]
According to a survey of Latin American immigrants, the number of people sending remittances home to Latin America has fallen significantly in only a few years. In 2006 73 percent of immigrants from the region sent money home, but now it is only half. The fall is credited to anti-immigrant sentiment in the US that […]