OPINION

Trashing Treaties: It’s Not Just Trump

Viewpoint by Rick Wayman

The writer is Deputy Director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. (Twitter @rickwayman)

SANTA BARBARA, CA (IDN) – There is no shortage of critics who have pointed out President Donald Trump’s monumental strategic mistake in unilaterally withdrawing the United States from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. It is indeed a blunder of the highest degree that not only makes the Trump administration look incompetent and foolish, but also puts the United States’ European allies and all of us at greater risk of nuclear catastrophe.

: UN Bureau; OPINION; 04 February 2019

Photo: Russian Iskander-M SRBM system with 9M723K5 missiles. CC BY-SA 4.0

Next Steps Out Of The INF Treaty Crisis

Viewpoint by Daryl G. Kimball

The writer is Executive Director of the Arms Control Association. This article was posted on the Association's website as an Issue Brief on February 1, 2019.

WASHINGTON, DC (IDN-INPS) – The Trump administration announced on February 1 that effective February 2, the United States will suspend implementation of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, and formally notify other parties to the treaty that it will withdraw in six months if Russia does not return to compliance by eliminating its ground-launched 9M729 missile, which the United States alleges can fly beyond the 500-kilometer range limit set by the treaty.

: Daryl G. Kimball; OPINION; 02 February 2019

Photo: Demonstration on Avenida Bolivar, in the center of Caracas, to support President Nicolás Madura and protest the economic war that, according to the government, has been launched against Venezuela. 17 December 2016. CC BY-SA 4.0

Independent Election Monitors Could Have Averted Current Crisis in Venezuela

Viewpoint by Rene Wadlow

The writer is President of the Association of World Citizens and its Representative to the United Nations, Geneva.

GENEVA (IDN) – The social, economic, and political situation in Venezuela grows more tense and complex by the day. On January 27, Pope Francis speaking from Panama said. "Faced with the grave situation it [Venezuela] is going through, I ask the Lord that a just and peaceful solution is sought and achieved in order to overcome the crisis, respecting human rights and the good of all the people in the country."

: UN Bureau; THE WORLD; Latin America & the Caribbean; 31 January 2019

Photo: The U.S. Air Force’s 45th Space Wing supported the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch of the Echostar 105/SES-11 communications satellite from Space Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on Oct. 11, 2017. (SpaceX)

Trump’s Missile Defence Buildup Plans Are Dangerous

Viewpoint by Kingston A. Reif

The writer is director for disarmament and threat reduction policy at Arms Control Association (ACA). He casts a close look at the '2019 Missile Defense Review'. This article appeared as an Issue Brief on ACA website on January 17, 2019.

WASHINGTON, DC (IDN-INPS) – The Trump administration’s long-awaited 'Missile Defense Review', which was released on January 17, proposes a significant and costly expansion of the role and scope of U.S. missile defences that is likely to exacerbate Russian and Chinese concerns about the threat to their strategic nuclear deterrents, undermine strategic stability, and further complicate the prospects for additional nuclear arms reductions.

Of particular concern was President Donald Trump’s statement during his remarks at the Pentagon that the goal of U.S. missile defences is to “ensure we can detect and destroy any missile launched against the United States anywhere, anytime, anyplace.”

: UN Bureau; OPINION; 30 January 2019

Photo: 2019 Missile Defense Review. Credit: Defense News Weekly.

Time Is Running Out For Sensible Decision-Making On Missile Defences

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – The number of nuclear weapons possessed by the U.S. and Russia is a fraction of what it was during the height of the Cold War. Successive presidents on both sides, since the time of John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev, have feared their destructive power. The supposed value of nuclear arsenal, so called Mutually Assured Destruction, known by its capitals, MAD, is in fact valueless. They cannot be used, and nearly everyone accepts that.

Yet they continue to exist and, as President Mikhail Gorbachev and his ally in nuclear arms control, President Ronald Reagan, both said, there is the fear of a false alarm or two errant officers in the silo entering simultaneously their keys, which allows the firing of the rocket.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 29 January 2019

Photo: Sergio Duarte speaks at the August 2017 Pugwash Conference on Science and World Affairs held in Astana, Kazakhstan. Credit: Pugwash.

Uncertain Prospects For Progress In Nuclear Disarmament

Viewpoint by Sergio Duarte

The writer is President of Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, and a former UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs. He was president of the 2005 Nonproliferation Treaty Review Conference.

NEW YORK (IDN) – Although humankind has known since the dawn of ages the sorrow, misery and devastation caused by war, the most catastrophic military conflicts in history are quite recent.

World War I lasted from July 1914 to November 1918 and claimed some 40 million lives, among civilians and combatants. In all, between 70-85 million people perished during World War II that lasted from 1939 to 1945. The estimated war casualties include those who are believed to have died from war-related causes, including captivity, disease and famine.

: Sergio Duarte; OPINION; 25 January 2019

Photo: A group of demobilized child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (2000-2007). Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

DR Congo Is Rotting From Within

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – The Algerian philosopher and revolutionary writer, Frantz Fanon, wrote: “Africa is shaped like a gun, and Congo is its trigger. If that explosive trigger bursts, the whole of Africa will explode.”

The Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa’s largest country, is now caught up in the aftermath of its first proper election since independence from Belgium in 1960. Towards the end of last year one could say, after years of non-stop wars and massive carnage, the country was 90 percent bereft of fighting.

The authoritarian regime of President Joseph Kabila was still in power but at last it had been pressured to call an election by the African Union, the Western aid-givers, some of the big Western businesses that mine in the mineral-rich country and, not least, the Catholic Church.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 22 January 2019

Photo: IOM transit centres in Niger. Credit: IOM | Amanda Nero 2016

Cooperation Key To Confronting Migration Challenges In West And Central Africa

Viewpoint by Richard Danzinger

The writer is regional director for West and Central Africa of International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN migration agency. This article first appeared on Africa Renewal, December 2018-March 2019 issue.

DAKAR (IDN-INPS) – Without a doubt, migration is a defining issue of this century. One billion people, one-seventh of the world’s population, are migrants. Some 244 million people are international migrants, 40 million are internally displaced and 24 million are refugees or asylum seekers. In 2018, there is no longer a single state that can claim to be untouched by human mobility.

About 423 million people are living in the Economic Community of West African States, a 15-member grouping whose aim is to promote economic integration in a region where the unemployment rate is sometimes 20 percent – inevitably leading to migration.

: Africa Renewal; OPINION; 21 January 2019

Photo: Commenting the latest, fourth meeting between President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in October 2018, Abu Dhabi newspaper commented: "Egypt sees in Russia a reliable and consistent ally…" Source: Egypt Today.

Trump Jeopardising Vital U.S. Interests In The Middle East

Viewpoint by Manish Rai

The writer is a columnist for Middle-East and Af-Pak region and Editor ViewsAround, A Geo-Political News Publication. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

NEW DELHI (IDN) – American forces have started withdrawing their equipment from Syria as part of President Donald Trump’s order in December to pull out from Northwest Syria. President Trump announced that they are withdrawing because, in his view, the Islamic State has been defeated.

Though, even the United States closet allies like the United Kingdom didn't share this view. Tobias Ellwood, a Minister in the British Ministry of Defence, said in a tweet that he “strongly” disagrees with Trump’s comment that ISIS had been defeated.

: Africa & ME Editor; OPINION; 20 January 2019

Photo: As the climate change melts sea ice, the U.S. Geological Survey projects that two-thirds of polar bears will disappear by 2050. CC BY-SA 4.0

Global Heating Poses A Serious Systemic Challenge

Viewpoint by Franz Baumann

The following are excerpts from an article first published in the October 2018 issue of 'International Politics Review'. Dr. Franz Baumann is a visiting professor at New York University and a former UN assistant secretary-general, special adviser on environment and peace operations. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

NEW YORK (IDN-INPS) – Climate change, used here synonymously and interchangeably with global heating and global warming, is happening. To wit: 17 of the 18 warmest years on record have occurred in the twenty-first century. The past three years were the hottest since records began (World Meteorological Organization, 2018a). Distress signals are coming from all corners of the earth (Achenbach and Fritz, 2018; Samenow, 2018; Sengupta, 2018b).