Brussels Has Yet to Learn Lessons This article first appeared on https://rjaura.substack.com By Ramesh Jaura BERLIN | 22 October 2025 (IDN) —Since the 1960s, India has prioritised strategic autonomy in its foreign policy, consistently avoiding alliances that could compromise its sovereignty. Western partners often overestimate their influence, overlooking India’s strong commitment to independence. For India, autonomy […]
Trump’s Assault on the UN is Self-Defeating
By Alon Ben-Meir* NEW YORK | October 22 2025 (IDN) — It is hard to imagine that there is not a single adult in Trump’s orbit to tell him that withdrawing from the many UN agencies that provide critical humanitarian services undermines rather than advances the United States’ national interest and global standing. There is […]
Trump’s CIA and Its Practices
By Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden | 21 October 2025 (IDN) — In Charles Dickens’s novel “A Tale of Two Cities”, set during the French revolution of 1789, he draws the character of Madame Defarge. She along with other members of the Tricoteuse, the knitting women, perch every day next to the guillotine, knitting into hats […]
Latest UN Resolution Puts Sri Lanka’s Commitment To The Test
By A.L.A. Azeez* This article was first published on Daily FT. COLOMBO, Sri Lanka | 19 October 2025 (IDN) — Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath made a statement in Parliament on Thursday, explaining Sri Lanka’s position at the 60th session of the Human Rights Council (HRC). On 8 September 2025, he delivered the country statement during consideration of the comprehensive report […]
How Island Nations Are Rewriting Climate Finance
Caribbean states are pioneering bold financial reforms to survive climate change. This article was first published on https://rjaura.substack.com BERLIN | 18 October 2025 (IDN) — When hurricanes strike the Caribbean, they leave behind more than just destruction. They also leave debt. Small island developing states (SIDS) often have to borrow large sums at high interest […]
Of Trump, Peace Deals and the Day After
By Azu Ishiekwene The writer is the Editor-In-Chief of LEADERSHIP and the author of the new book Writing for Media and Monetising It. ABUJA, Nigeria | 16 October 2025 (IDN) — U.S. President Donald Trump may be getting ahead of himself with the encouraging signs that, following the ceasefire in Gaza, the world might have […]
Morocco’s Sustainability Forward Today
By Yossef Ben-Meir* MARRAKECH, Morocco | 16 October 2025 (IDN) — So much of world poverty today can be accounted for by the gap between vision, intention, and the codification of policies to support people’s own driven change and growth juxtaposed against unsatisfactory implementation, the lack of application, and a deepening stratification. The disappointment, very […]
Would Trump Use Nuclear Weapons?
By Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden | 14 October 2025 (IDN) — I’m just out of the cinema having seen Kathryn Bigelow’s masterful film, A House of Dynamite, about a nuclear missile found on radar to be heading towards America. The film ends with the destruction of Chicago, and the U.S. president is unsure what to […]
Urgent Next Steps for Palestine at the UN
By Nicolas J. S. Davies* NEW YORK | 9 October 2025 (IDN) — As US President Donald Trump surely intended, his “20-point Gaza plan” succeeded in upstaging calls by many other world leaders at the UN General Assembly for concrete, coordinated UN-led measures to force Israel to end its criminal genocide in Gaza and the […]
Central Asia: Russia Reassures, China Builds, The West Scrutinises
This article was first published on https://rjaura.substack.com By Ramesh Jaura BERLIN | 9 October 2025 (IDN) — Phones rang in Central Asian capitals in mid-August, mere hours after Vladimir Putin finished an unusual three-hour summit with Donald Trump in Anchorage. Putin personally phoned each of the five regional leaders. It was an act of respect […]