By Chakravarthi Raghavan | IDN-InDepthNews Analysis
GENEVA (IDN | TWN) – When the WTO’s Nairobi Ministerial Conference (MC10) ended on December 19, WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo and Kenya Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed were beaming that they had pulled off a coup of sorts in a successful Conference, with a Declaration and decisions – with the U.S. and the EU, acclaiming both of them.
By Michael McDonald* | IDN-InDepthNews Feature
LONDON (IDN) – Every year around the world, hundreds of millions of children wait anxiously for Santa Claus to arrive and bring presents and good cheer. But what if Santa never came? What if this year the reindeer all fall ill, perhaps due to Crazy Reindeer disease (the analog to Mad Cow) and Santa is forced to cancel Christmas? The result would be devastating.
Fortunately, for any children reading, official word from the North Pole is that Santa’s sleigh has some new upgrades this year that allow it to run on good old fashioned jet fuel if the reindeer fail. And with the current glut of oil around the world, fuel prices are so affordable that even if the reindeer are feeling up to their usual task, Old Saint Nick might just give them the night off and choose to fly with fuel nonetheless.
So how much oil does Santa need for his rounds on the night of the 24th?
By Firouzeh Mirrazavi* | IDN-InDepthNews Feature
TEHRAN (IDN | Iran Review) – Iranians around the world celebrate Yalda, which is one of the most ancient Persian festivals. The festival dates back to the time when a majority of Persians were followers of Zoroastrianism prior to the advent of Islam.
On Yalda festival, Iranians celebrate the arrival of winter, the renewal of the sun and the victory of light over darkness.
Considered the longest night of the year, Yalda eve is the night when ancient Iranians celebrated the birth of Mithra, the goddess of light.
Yalda, which means birth, is a Syriac word imported into the Persian language. It is also referred to as Shab-e Chelleh, a celebration of winter solstice on December 21 – the last night of fall and the longest night of the year.
By Devendra Kamarajan | IDN-InDepthNews Analysis
NAIROBI (IDN) – If India and other developing countries, including the 79-nation African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of states had insisted that the World Trade Organization (WTO) Conference – the first on African soil – must reaffirm the focus on development and the ‘Doha Development Agenda’ (DDA), it would have concluded without an outcome document.
However, despite disappointment and strong reservations expressed by India and by representatives of the ACP Group, the conference endorsed the Nairobi Ministerial Declaration (NMD).
By Kalinga Seneviratne* | IDN-InDepthNews Analysis
BANGKOK (IDN) – While a ‘Mindful Communication’ fad is currently sweeping across the United States, a group of Asian scholars and media practitioners gathered here to examine how this traditional Asian way of communication could be adopted to train 21st century journalists to create a media that would promote harmony rather than conflict.
By Ronald Joshua | IDN-InDepthNews Analysis
BERLIN (IDN) – Hundreds of thousands of poor people joined spontaneous “bread riots” in most major cities in Egypt back in 1977, protesting termination of state subsidies as dictated to the country’s government by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Those uprisings, which were crushed by the army, underlined the callousness with which the two organizations enforced their aggressive policies of liberalization, turning a blind eye to the sufferings of the people.
By J C Suresh | IDN-InDepthNews Report
WASHINGTON (IDN) – Trillions, not billions, are required to transition to a low carbon and resilient economy and to prevent more than 100 million people, particularly in Africa and South Asia, being pushed back into poverty over the next 15 years, says the World Bank.
The World Bank Group has committed to increasing the share of its portfolio devoted to climate finance, from the current 21 percent, to 28 percent, over the next five years. “When including financing generated from other partners and associated private sector financing, such financing would amount to a potential $29 billion a year by 2020.”
By Emad Mekay* | IDN-InDepthNews Viewpoint
WASHINGTON (IDN) – President Barack Obama’s argument that a ban on gun sales to people on the no-fly list is disingenuous. The U.S. is the biggest seller of arms to people much worse than those on that list. Washington sells weapons to tyrants on the most abusive dictators list – which the State Department certifies repeatedly in its annual account of global human rights abusers.
By INPS* | IDN-InDepthNews Report
NAIROBI (IDN) – Trade ministers of African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of countries have emphasized the importance of securing a development centred outcome at the Tenth Ministerial Conference (MC10) of the World Trade Organization (WTO).
This is the first ever WTO conference to be held in Africa – from December 15 to 18, 2015 in Kenya’s capital Nairobi. At a strategic preparatory meeting a day ahead of the conference, WTO members of the 79-nation ACP Group reaffirmed their declaration on the WTO 10th Ministerial Conference, which was previously endorsed in October by trade ministers meeting in Brussels.
By Emiliano Alessandri* | IDN-InDepthNews Viewpoint
WASHINGTON (IDN | GMF) – Ongoing developments in EU-Turkey relations are as significant as they are worrying. In an exceptional summit in November, the EU committed itself to massive financial aid in exchange for Turkey bearing the brunt of a refugee crisis that has sent it over 2 million Syrians since 2011.
Despite the direct threat posed by the self-proclaimed Islamic State group (ISIS) after the Paris terrorist attacks, the summit’s focus was only partly on the transit of foreign terrorist fighters across the porous Turkish-Syrian border that Turkey has recently been working to block.
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