By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, 16 May 2023 (IDN) — The world is currently experiencing one of the fastest advances in modern technology: the AI Chat GPT search engine, which has generated both curiosity and skepticism. At a White House May 4 meeting of executives from Google, Microsoft, Anthropic and OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, […]
Barbados and UN Urge Reform of the Global Finance System
By J Nastranis NEW YORK, 30 April 2023 (IDN) — With clock ticking for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and the Barbados Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley have called for urgent action to transform the broken global financial system, for a large-scale SDG Stimulus package to invest in SDGs, […]
A Civil War in Sudan Threatens Another Humanitarian Disaster
By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, 17 April 2023 (IDN) — The four-day-old military conflict in Sudan—between two factions of the country’s armed forces—is threatening to unleash a civil war reminiscent of two other nations in the Middle East: Yemen and Syria The conflict in both countries has resulted in two of the worst humanitarian disasters […]
US Foreign Policy Conflicts with the UN Charter
By Jeffrey D. Sachs* NEW YORK, 15 April 2023 (IDN) — US foreign policy is based on an inherent contradiction and fatal flaw. The aim of US foreign policy is a US-dominated world in which the US writes the global trade and financial rules, controls advanced technologies, maintains militarily supremacy, and dominates all potential competitors. […]
UN General Assembly Commemorates the Rwandan Tragedy
‘Genocide Can Happen Anywhere By J Nastranis NEW YORK, 15 April 2023 (IDN) — The UN General Assembly commemorated the International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. It mourned the more than one million children, women, and men who perished in one hundred days of horror—in the presence of […]
UN General Assembly Seeks World Court Ruling on Climate Change
Youth-Led Initiative Focuses on Protecting Human Rights By J Nastranis NEW YORK, 29 March 2023 (IDN) — The UN General Assembly has adopted a landmark resolution requesting the International Court of Justice to render an Advisory Opinion on the obligations of States in respect of climate change. Pacific Island Students Fighting Climate Change initiated the […]
UN Constrained to Focus on Consequences of Climate Change
By René Wadlow, President, Association of World Citizens GENEVA, 28 March 2023 (IDN) — On 20 March 2023, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published a Synthesis Report based on its three previous reports covering eight years of work. The IPCC is a panel of 93 scientists co-chaired by Hoesung Lee of South Korea […]
China’s Peacemaker Role Stymied In Ukraine, But Makes Headway Elsewhere
By Arul Louis The writer is a New York-based non-resident senior fellow of the Society for Policy Studies, a New Delhi-based think tank. He can be contacted @arulouis. UNITED NATIONS, 27 March 2023 (IDN) — Chinese President Xi Jinping is auditioning for the role of a global statesman through diplomatic efforts to mediate in several […]
Our Global Water Crisis — A Few Facts
By John Scales Avery* COPENHAGEN, 24 March 2023 (IDN) — On its home page on World Water Day, 2021, the United Nations pointed out the following facts: Today, 1 in 3 people live without safe drinking water. By 2050, up to 5.7 billion people could be living in areas where water is scarce for at […]
Twenty Years Ago in Iraq, Ignoring Weapons Inspectors Proved to Be a Fatal Mistake
By Robert E. Kelley The writer is Distinguished Associate Fellow at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). “Let me begin by saying, we were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here.”—David Kay, Head of the Iraq Survey Group, during testimony to the US Senate on 29 January 2004.