(cntasul.blogspot.com) In the September 2011 issue of National Geographic, to which I subscribe through my beloved grandmother, Cynthia Gorney chronicles the steep decline in fertility rate of Brazilian women. It is a thought-provoking coincidence that, in the short-term at least, this decline has coincided with a woman ascending to the presidency.[1] Gorney shows that […]
US policymakers have never known how to deal with Latin America. Now, in the wake of last weekend’s embarrassing Summit of the Americas, domestic politics and diplomatic inertia add up to ongoing US disengagement from the region. It doesn’t have to be this way. Rather, President Obama should make a follow up speech to his […]
Guinea-Bissau followed Mali’s example last week, as members of the military seized power, overturning the civilian government and disrupting elections. But for observers a coup in Bissau is vastly different from last month’s upset in Mali. While Mali had been upheld as an icon of democracy in West Africa, Guinea-Bissau is seen as a troubled, […]
Three main issues surrounded this year’s Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia this past weekend. For the most part, those issues created a division between the Americans and Canadians poised against most of Latin America with the exception of the prostitution scandal that will likely be more of an issue between Obama and the […]
Space has become an increasingly important domain within regional security cooperation initiatives. While the Nordic countries have embraced the prospect of a joint satellite system as an important tool in advancing common interests, the Visegrad nations have yet to recognize the immense potential of collaboration in outer space. Central European leaders presently face a challenge of focusing too much on the challenges and risks associated with the declining defense budgets, while overlooking the opportunities that might offer unique investments with long-lasting benefits.
Russian Orthodox Easter has arrived, but one man is refusing to give up his fast. Oleg Shein lost to the ruling United Russia candidate in the Astrakhan mayoral elections in March, and has gone on a hunger strike until the election, which he alleges was fraudulent, can be held again. He has been on hunger […]
Israeli politics more so than in many other countries tends to focus on larger than life characters and individuals placed in larger than life situations. Former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, a war general at the heart of a major controversy in the Lebanon War, rose to power after decades in politics, dumped his party’s long […]
The following is a guest appearance by by Adam Hedengren, co-founder and managing editor, and David Hedengren, co-founder and editor-in-chief of YourMiddleEast.Com We are two brothers on a quest to challenge the major media companies’ Middle East and North Africa coverage. We believe that there are no satisfactory sources of news and information in English about […]
Thousands of Uzbek women secretly sterilized Evidence gathered by the BBC shows that, for at least the past two years, the government of Uzbekistan has been ordering physicians to secretly sterilize tens of thousands of women, often without their knowledge. “Every year we are presented with a plan. Every doctor is told how many women […]
No, it’s not because the land of the Pampas looks to become an energy giant as it taps the world’s third-largest shale gas reserves. Rather, Argentina is becoming the victimizer of internet-gullible Westerners. PRI’s “The World” recently aired a story on foreign nationals recently arrested in Argentina for trafficking cocaine. Says The World anchor Marco […]
“Romney is a risk when it comes to foreign policy and national security,” read bullet number three in an email titled, “Five things you should know about Mitt Romney,” sent by President Obama’s campaign manager Jim Messina to supporters Wednesday. Mitt Romney took on the role of presumed Republican nominee long before Rick Santorum left […]
The North Koreans have announced that sometime between Thursday April 12th and Monday April 16th, as part of the celebration for Kim Il Sung’s 100th birthday and the 80th birthday of the North Korean Army, they will launch a weather satellite, Kwangmyongsong-3, aboard a Unha-3 rocket into space. The celebration is also expected to see […]
Mileuristas are 20-something Spaniards who, beyond the current economic crisis, also face a labor market oversaturated with qualified candidates. Despite impressive CVs—many are bilingual and possess graduate degrees—mileuristas can’t earn more than 1,000 euros a month. Hence, they’re forced to live with their parents and, in general, put life plans on hold until they can […]
Hollywood on the Potomac–movie actors deserting Tinseltown to remind the Big Dogs back east that every time an A-list celeb is arrested for picketing a foreign embassy an angel gets his wings.
Actor George Clooney, his father Nick, and four Congressional Democrats were among more than a dozen protesters who descended on the Sudanese Embassy on March 16 for the purpose of crossing, in a disorderly fashion, a police line.
The cast of characters? Along with Clooneys I and II, it included Reps. James Moran (D-VA), Jim McGovern (D-MA), John Olver (D-MA) and Al Green (D-TX). NAACP President Ben Jealous was also arrested, along with Martin Luther King III.
Clooney’s mid-day performance on Mass Ave was the finale to a 3-day tour in DC that included an impassioned plea to a standing-room-only crowd at the Council on Foreign Relations, and dramatic testimony delivered to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about the miserable state of affairs in the border region of Sudan.
Omar al-Bashir’s military, operating out of Khartoum, is working assiduously to wipe out mostly Christian populations hunkered down on some highly contested, oil-rich real estate to the south.
Clooney, who has frequently taken on the role of the world-weary activist in his films, accuses Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and the ‘same criminals responsible for Darfur’ of conducting a genocidal war against his own people, of starving, maiming, raping, and murdering them.
And he says it as if no one has ever heard it before. . .
A recent article by IPSNews.net discussed the downside of Brazil’s investment relationship with China. While much of the article discusses the positive exponential growth between Brazil and China, the different nature of growth and long-term investment between the two BRICS are quite different, and in some cases places the two countries on opposite sides of […]