By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS | 9 December 2023 (IDN) — The US veto against a Security Council resolution for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza was highly predictable. Like the longstanding pro-Israeli foreign policy of successive US administrations, President Joe Biden said last week that he “stands with Israel—right or wrong—prompting one Middle Eastern diplomat […]
Political Upheaval Haunts Bangladesh Ahead of January Polls
By M. A. Hossain* DHAKA, Bangladesh | 7 December 2023 (IDN) — The political milieu in Bangladesh has been fraught with tension, climaxing in weeks of protests and violent clashes, casting a shadow of apprehension as the scheduled general election on 7 January 2024 approaches. The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), reinvigorated as the main opposition […]
COP28’s Delinquent Emitter: The US Military-Industrial Complex
By Mirabai Venkatesh* OAKLAND, California | 7 December 2023 (IDN) — As the world watches COP28 in Dubai amidst an accelerating climate crisis, a critical blind spot in global climate agreements remains. Despite being the world’s largest institutional emitter of greenhouse gases, the US military is completely exempt from international reporting obligations, significantly undermining global […]
Does It Make Sense to Invest Efforts in Reviving OSCE?
By Somar Wijayadasa* NEW YORK | 6 December 2023 (IDN) — With 57 participating States from North America, Europe and Asia (from Vancouver to Vladivostok), the OSCE—the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Euro-Atlantic and Eurasian—is the world’s largest regional security organization. Soon, it will be the fiftieth anniversary of the Helsinki Final Act of […]
How the US Has Darkened the Nuclear Cloud Over Humanity
By Norman Solomon* This article was originally published by The Nation. SAN FRANCISCO | 6 December 2023 (IDN) — Forty years ago, across a dozen pages of The Nation magazine, I was in a debate with the English historian E. P. Thompson about the US-Soviet nuclear arms race, the relative culpability of both governments and […]
Loss and Damage Fund Is Signed for Climate-Damaged Countries
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK | 5 December 2023 (IDN) — Diplomats from nearly 200 countries celebrated with cheers and applause at the opening of the UN Climate Conference in Dubai, where a disaster fund to help vulnerable nations cope with the impact of drought, floods and rising seawater was announced. The […]
Climate Crisis Fuels Child Marriages, FGM in East and Southern Africa
By Kizito Makoye DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania | 3 December 2023 (IDN) — At 15, Sarah* was entangled in an early marriage that would change her life forever. The drought spells in Kotulogh village in Kenya’s West Pokot country had pushed many pastoralist families to the brink of survival. Sarah’s mother, desperate for money to […]
For Media Elites, War Criminal Henry Kissinger Was a Great Man
By Norman Solomon* SAN FRANCISCO | 30 November 2023 (IDN) — For U.S. mass media, Henry Kissinger’s quip that “power is the ultimate aphrodisiac” rang true. Influential reporters and pundits often expressed their love for him. The media establishment kept swooning over one of the worst war criminals in modern history. After news of his […]
African Countries Lagging on Climate Justice, Rights Groups Say
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK | 29 November 2023 (IDN) — Rising sea levels, droughts and floods have exposed some of the failures of African countries to prioritize human rights and climate justice, resulting in negative outcomes for vulnerable communities. That was the view of Amnesty International, one of several groups monitoring […]
Ukraine War: A Steppingstone to Something Worse and More All-embracing?
By Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden | 29 November 2023 (IDN) — Trotsky, the one-time close comrade of Lenin, reportedly said, “You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you”. In a time when there is talk of using nuclear weapons, we should pause to think about this. This is how it […]