By Dr. Asoka Bandarage* COLOMBO, Sri Lanka | 31 August 2025 (IDN) — In July 2025, the influential global travel website Big 7 named Sri Lanka the “most beautiful island in the world,” stating that the “teardrop-shaped island off the southern coast of India has it all—golden beaches, terraced tea plantations, timeworn temples, colonial towns, […]
From Guernica to Gaza, Mass Killers Have Been Above It All
By Norman Solomon / TomDispatch SAN FRANCISCO | 31 August 2025 (IDN) — Killing from the sky has long offered the sort of detachment that warfare on the ground can’t match. Far from its victims, air power remains the height of modernity. And yet, as the monk Thomas Merton concluded in a poem, using the […]
Europe Requires a New Approach to Foreign Policy
By Jeffrey D. Sachs* This article was published on CIRSD and is being republished with the author’s permission. NEW YORK | 28 August 2025 (IDN) —The European Union needs a new foreign policy based on Europe’s true economic and security interests. Europe is currently in an economic and security trap of its own making, characterized by its […]
Ethiopia to Host Second Climate Summit: A Call for Global Action
By Atiklit Atnafu Naramo The writer is a Second Secretary at the Ethiopian Embassy in New Delhi, India.. NEW DELHI | 28 August 2025 (IDN) — Ethiopia, a nation with over 3,000 years of civilisation and home to more than 80 ethnic groups, is often referred to as the “Land of Origin” owing to its […]
The Imperative for Nuclear Disarmament — Is Putin the Puppet-Master?
By Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden | 26 August 2025 (IDN) — Everything gets said, nothing gets done. When President Donald Trump met with President Vladimir Putin in Alaska, we were promised all sorts of goodies — progress in reconciliation in Ukraine and Syria, and, not least, nuclear disarmament. If there is progress behind the scenes, […]
Putin Is Trump’s Medicine
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 | 22 August 2025 (IDN) — European leaders often portray Russian President Vladimir Putin as a tyrant, a land grabber, and a modern-day Russian bear. And following the outbreak of […]
UN80 Early Separation Agreements – Legal Objections & Breach of Principles
By Nadine Kaddoura* An Open Letter to Mr. Guy Ryder, Under-Secretary-General (USG) for Policy and Head of the UN80 Taskforce. LEUSDEN, Netherlands | 21 August 2025 (IDN) — I write to register a formal objection to the UN80 Task Force’s deployment of “early separation” agreements containing waiver clauses of sweeping breadth. Such provisions are inconsistent with […]
Sérgio Vieira de Mello: Achievements in Post-Conflict State-Building and Lessons for UN at 80
By Chimdi Chukwukere* ABUJA, Nigeria | 21 August 2025 (IDN) — August 19 marked both World Humanitarian Day and the 22nd anniversary of the death of Sérgio Vieira de Mello, UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General, who was killed in a bomb blast while on duty in Baghdad, Iraq. This piece honors his transformative achievements, […]
US-Russia Talks: The Choice Between Pursuing Peace and Escalation
By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies* NEW YORK | 17 August 2025 (IDN) — Donald Trump came into office promising to end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours. Now, six months later, his high-stakes meeting with Vladimir Putin in Alaska may have put the United States and Russia on a new path […]
Nigeria’s Oil Industry and Its Administrators
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 | 14 August 2025 (IDN) — The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) is an animal that eats its curator for lunch. To survive it, either do not get close […]