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Behind China's 'Belt and Road Initiative'

Viewpoint by William R. Hawkins

William R. Hawkins, a former economics professor and Congressional staffer, is a consultant specializing in international economics and national security issues. He is a contributor to SFPPR News & Analysis, of the Conservative-Online-Journalism center at the Washington-based Selous Foundation for Public Policy Research. This article was published on August 2, 2017 in The World Tribune. Opinions expressed in Viewpoints are those of the writer and not necessarily shared by IDN-INPS. – The Editor

WASHINGTON, D.C. (IDN-INPS) - The state-owned press in China was all aglow about President Xi Jinping’s address to the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany. Xinhua proclaimed how “Many overseas experts and scholars have praised” it.

: IDN-INPS Asia Editor; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 11 August 2017

Students Send Social Message Through Movement

By A.D. McKenzie

KINGSTON (IDN | SWAN) – Dance has long been a potent force among the arts in Jamaica, with pioneering companies such as Rex Nettleford’s National Dance Theatre Company holding a mirror up to society and promoting Caribbean culture.

Now students are taking the genre to a whole new level with powerful, socially relevant performances.

The island’s top high school, Campion College, is one of the institutions leading the way. Now in its seventh season, the school’s Dance Society performed to packed audiences in Kingston in July with its “Roots” production, which addressed issues such as violence against women and the challenges young people face in building confidence and self-esteem.

: A.D. McKenzie; ARTS & CULTURE; 01 August 2017

Photo: The Titan II ICBM at the Titan Missile Museum in Arizona (Steve Jurvetson, CC BY-NC 2.0)

Democracy at the UN: 122 Nations Vote to Ban the Bomb

By Alice Slater*

NEW YORJ (IDN-INPS) - On July 7 2017, at a UN Conference mandated by the UN General Assembly to negotiate a treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons, the only weapons of mass destruction yet to be banned, 122 nations completed the job after three weeks, accompanied by a celebratory outburst of cheers, tears, and applause among hundreds of activists, government delegates, and experts, as well as survivors of the lethal nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and witnesses to the devastating, toxic nuclear-test explosions in the Pacific.

The new treaty outlaws any prohibited activities related to nuclear weapons, including use, threat to use, development, testing, production, manufacturing, acquiring, possession, stockpiling, transferring, receiving, stationing, installation, and deployment of nuclear weapons. It also bans states from lending assistance, which includes such prohibited acts as financing for their development and manufacture, engaging in military preparations and planning, and permitting the transit of nuclear weapons through territorial water or airspace.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; ARMAMENTS; Nuclear Weapons; 17 July 2017

Photo: Prime Minister Netanyahu thanks Modi for Israel visit. Credit: www.narendramodi.in

Terrorism Hinders Hailing Modi's Israel Visit Climaxing 25 Years

By Shastri Ramachandaran*

NEW DELHI (IDN-INPS) - Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s three-day visit to Israel from July 4 to 6, the first ever by an Indian Prime Minister, is a historic departure with ramifications that may have been missed in the euphoric aftermath of the moment.

This was also the first time that a high-level Indian dignitary visiting Israel did not travel to Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority. Usually, visiting dignitaries are at pains to emphasise, at least, optical equality between Israel and Palestine, and make it a point to visit Ramallah. This act of omission – or is it commission? -- alone, it is observed, takes India-Israel relations to a new level.

: Shastri Ramachandran; THE WORLD; Middle East & North Africa; 13 July 2017

Photo: Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Sri Lankan President J.R. Jayewardene sign the historic Indo-Sri Lanka accord in Colombo on July 29, 1987. File photo. Courtesy of The Hindu.

Thirty Years of Jittery Indo-Lanka Relations

Viewpoint by Sugeeswara Senadhira*

COLOMBO (IDN-INPS) - While there is much written about China’s jittery relations with many of its neighbours these days, there is hardly anything written about equally jittery relations between India and its smaller neighbours in South Asia.

The scorching summer of 1987 saw the relations between Sri Lanka and India plummeting to a lowest ever ebb. New Delhi's decision to airdrop supplies over Jaffna had opened up a diplomatic Pandora's Box. New Delhi tried to justify this blatant violation of Sri Lanka's sovereignty as an act of humanitarian necessity. But the world knew it as a hegemonic political action entangled directly in the ethnic crisis in Sri Lanka.

: IDN-INPS Asia Editor; OPINION; 09 July 2017

Veterans For Peace Mobilise To Resist Militarism

By Brian Trautman*

WASHINGTON, D.C. (IDN-INPS) - The United States is the most militarized and jingoistic nation on earth. Its foreign policy is guided by imperialist militarism, neoliberal capitalism and racial xenophobia. For more than sixteen years now, three presidential administrations have carried out a so-called “War on Terror” (GWOT), a perpetual state of war that is waged globally, under the depraved reasoning that “the world is a battlefield,” to quote investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill.

As demonstrated by the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, the GWOT is conducted through conventional warfare. More often, however, it is executed through covert or “dirty” wars, against groups and individuals in many other nations.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; THE WORLD; USA and Canada; 25 May 2017

Photo: A Vesak pandal or thorana in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Crnedit: Wikimedia Commons.

Planting Churches and ‘Saving Souls’

By Janaka Perera*

COLOMBO (IDN-INPS) - Sri Lanka is celebrating the 2561st year of Vesak on an international scale starting on May 10. The question however is whether the organizers and the foreign participants in the event will pay sufficient attention to the facts highlighted in a recent report of the Bangkok-based World Buddhist University (WBU) on the socio-economic and cultural challenges facing Asian Buddhists with a case study in Sri Lanka.

Designed to give an insight to the challenges facing Sri Lanka’s grassroots, the study was undertaken by Communications & Media Specialist Dr. Kalinga Seneviratne assisted by Samanmalee Swarnalatha.

: IDN-INPS Asia Editor; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 10 May 2017

Photo: Maj. Gen. Kristin Lund, force commander of the UN peacekeeping mission in Cyprus from 2014 to 2016 and a Norwegian, with Jorn Gjelstad, her country’s ambassador to Cyprus and Greece, left; and Borge Brende, Norway’s foreign minister, May 6, 2016.

UN’s First Female Force Commander Talks Gender Equality in the Military

By Shana L. Childs* | Reproduced courtesy of PassBlue

NEW YORK (IDN | Passblue) - Maj. Gen. Kristin Lund made history in 2014 when she was appointed the first female force commander of a United Nations peacekeeping mission – in this case, Cyprus. Still in active duty in the Norwegian military, General Lund, 58, gives lectures and advises the Norwegian Defense University College in Oslo. Although she is proud to have made history and wants to see more women in the world’s militaries, General Lund has no silver bullets for peace.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; THE WORLD; Europe & Central Asia; 21 April 2017

Photo: President Sirisena (left) greeting people. Credit: The official website of the President of Sri Lanka.

Western Remedies for Sri Lanka's ills: Lessons From History

By Dr Palitha Kohona

Dr Palitha Kohona is former Ambassador & Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations in New York. This article first appeared in Ceylon Today on March 19, 2017 and is being reproduced courtesy of the daily newspaper. – The Editor

COLOMBO (IDN-INPS) -- Sri Lanka commemorated a dark day in its long and proud history last month. We recalled the cession of our sovereignty to King George III of Britain following the signature of the Kandyan Convention on March 2/3, 1815 in the historic Audience Hall.

On March 1, 2017, in the same Audience Hall, President Sirisena made the much belated pronouncement to remove from the list of traitors in the government Gazette those who valiantly but vainly struggled against the troops of George III three years later to recover the sovereignty that we had lost through a combination of factors well beyond our control.

: Dr. Palitha Kohona; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 20 April 2017

Photo: Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, with Liu Jieyi, China’s ambassador, before the April 18 Security Council meeting focused solely on human rights. Rick Bajornas/UN Photo

Haley’s ‘Historic’ Human Rights Debate Left a Small Impression

By Dulcie Leimbach* | Reproduced courtesy of PassBlue

NEW YORK (IDN | Passblue) - Nikki Haley, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, presided over what she was determined to sell as “an historic meeting exclusively on human rights” in the UN Security Council. But her brief speech in the April 18 meeting fell far short of introducing innovations to confront violations of human rights or prevent them in such places as Syria, Burundi and Myanmar.

“If this Council fails to take human rights violations and abuses seriously, they can escalate into real threats to international peace and security,” Haley began. “The Security Council cannot continue to be silent when we see widespread violations of human rights.