SYNDICATION

Photo: Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu with the then US Vice President Joe Biden. Source: The Times of Israel.

Biden Is A Veteran Friend of Israel But Against Settlement

By Raphael Ahren

The writer is the diplomatic correspondent at The Times of Israel, which published it on November 7, 2020.

JERUSALEM (IDN) – Joe Biden, the newly elected 46th president of the United States, is a true friend of the Jewish state, friends and even political adversaries of the emerging president-elect agree.

“He has a deep feeling for Israel,” said Michael Oren, who served as Israel’s ambassador to the US when Biden was vice president. Oren opposed almost all of the Middle East policies championed by Biden and his boss, Barack Obama, especially on Iran and the Israeli-Palestinian question. Still, he annually attended Biden’s Rosh Hashanah party, and asserts that the former Delaware senator is genuinely concerned about Israel’s well-being.

: Africa & ME Editor; THE WORLD; Middle East; 07 November 2020

Featured image: Greenpeace activists protest outside the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) shareholder’s meeting held at The Prince Park Tower in Tokyo. They hold a banner which reads: “TEPCO: The worst Ever Polluting Company.” TEPCO is the operator of the crisis-stricken Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant which has been emitting radion since it was struck by an earthquake and tsunami on March 2011. The activists also raised a banner reading “No more nuclear” in Japanese, asking TEPCO to disengage from the nuclear industry.

Almost Unnoticed Nuclear Pandemic Is Spreading in Japan

By Manlio Dinucci

This article was originally published in Italian on Il Manifesto. It is being republished from Global Research. Manlio Dinucci is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

MONTREAL (IDN) – It was not Covid-19, therefore the news went almost unnoticed: Japan will release over a million tons of radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the sea. The catastrophic incident in Fukushima was triggered by the Tsunami that struck the north-eastern coast of Japan on March 11, 2011, submerging the power plant and causing the core of three nuclear reactors to melt.

: Europe Editor; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 05 November 2020

Photo: Jean-Bertrand Aristide returns to Haiti, following the U.S.-led invasion in 1994 designed to remove the regime installed by the 1991 Haitian coup d'état. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Haiti Has a Long History of Being Assaulted by Its Latin American Neighbors

By Lautaro Rivara *

PORT-AU-PRINCE (IDN) – Thirteen United Nations peacekeeping missions are underway in various countries in Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Haiti has been the epicenter of the UN peacekeeping missions in Latin America and the Caribbean; there have been eight UN missions since the International Civilian Mission in Haiti (MICIVIH) was deployed in Haiti in 1993. On October 15, 2019, the UN finally ended its 15-year-long peacekeeping mission in Haiti that began in 2004, leaving behind a “mixed legacy.”

: Opinion Editor; THE WORLD; Latin America & the Caribbean; 02 November 2020

Photo: The exhibition for the International Day Against Nuclear Tests displayed at the CTBTO, based in Vienna, August 29 included winning artworks from a children’s art campaign launched in 2019 by CTBTO and the Spanish NGO Paz y Cooperación. The treaty, which has not entered into force, bans nuclear explosions by everyone everywhere. Credit: CTBTO.

Precarious Multilateralism Seizes CTBTO Nuclear-Test-Ban Organization

By Stephanie Liechtenstein*, Passblue

VIENNA (IDN) – For the first time in its 24-year history, state parties to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, a multilateral agreement that bans all nuclear testing worldwide, have taken a controversial decision by a two-thirds majority. Decisions in the treaty’s body are usually taken by consensus.

The majority decision on October 19 was focused on whether countries with unpaid dues could vote in the election of the next executive secretary of the Preparatory Commission to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization. (The body is not part of the United Nations but has a cooperative agreement with it.)

: Ramesh Jaura; ARMAMENTS; Nuclear Weapons; 25 October 2020

Photo: Panorama of the west facade of United States Supreme Court Building at dusk in Washington, D.c. CC BY-SA 3.0

A Tilt to Far-Right Looming Over the U.S. Supreme Court

Viewpoint by Sonali Kolhatkar

This article was produced by Economy for All, a project of the Independent Media Institute. Sonali Kolhatkar is the founder, host and executive producer of “Rising Up With Sonali,” a television and radio show that airs on Free Speech TV and Pacifica stations.

LOS ANGELES (IDN) – In the hours after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, shocked Americans speculated about whether or not Republican Senator Mitt Romney would oppose a Senate confirmation vote just weeks before the election.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 26 September 2020

Photo: The port at Tema, Ghana. @ Jonathan Ernst / World Bank.

COVID-19 Crisis Underlines the Importance of Economic Diversification in Africa

Business as Usual Will Only Reinforce Economic Hardship

Viewpoint by Njuguna Ndung’u*

NAIROBI (IDN) – Africa’s low level of economic diversification is a leading factor in the continent’s economic fragility. Further, the COVID-19 pandemic has magnified the risks of countries’ over-dependence on a single natural resource such as oil.

Africa is endowed with abundant natural resources, including minerals, and revenues from their export constitute a major source of income for many countries.

: Opinion Editor; THE WORLD; Africa; 19 September 2020

Uncertainty Hangs Over the UN Surviving Beyond 2045

Viewpoints by Franz Baumann, Fmr. UN Assistant Secretary-General, United Nations and Christopher Ankersen, Global Affairs, New York University.

This is the second of two rounds of Dr Franz Baumann's stimulating exchange with Dr Chris Ankersen posted on PAIRAGRAPH – A Hub of discourse between pairs of notable individuals. The first appeared on 8 September 2020. It can be freely accessed here.

: Ramesh Jaura; OPINION; 18 September 2020

Photo: U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson meets with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, in Manila, Philippines on August 6, 2017. (Photo credit: U.S. Department of State/Public Domain)

U.S. Shifts Arms Control Strategy with Russia

By Kingston Reif and Shannon Bugos

While Kingston Reif is the director for disarmament and threat reduction policy, Shannon Bugos is research assistant at the Arms Control Association.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (IDN) – The Trump administration has softened its demand that China immediately participate in trilateral nuclear arms control talks with the United States and Russia and says it is now seeking an interim step of a politically binding framework with Moscow.

But the administration continues to reject Russia’s offer of a clean five-year extension of the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) and has said that President Trump will not consider an extension until several conditions are met.

: Arms Control Association; ARMAMENTS; Nuclear Weapons; 17 September 2020

Photo: Downing Street said in February 2020, its adviser Andrew Sabisky had resigned, following criticism of alleged past remarks on pregnancies, eugenics and race. Credit: BBC.

The Need to Address That British Eugenics Scandal

Viewpoint by Justin Podur*

This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

TORONTO (IDN) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been known to have an interest in eugenics, but despite the persistence of support for this discredited idea over the years, eugenics is a scientific and moral failure.

In February, an adviser to Johnson resigned when some old racist posts he wrote in 2014 emerged. The contractor, Andrew Sabisky, called himself a “superforecaster” by trade and trafficked in theories of race and intelligence. Footage resurfaced of Boris Johnson talking about genetic inequality and IQ in 2013.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 16 September 2020

Photo: Iranian women wearing masks to protect themselves from coronavirus walk at the Grand Bazaar in Tehran on February 20, 2020. Credit: © 2020 WANA/Nazanin Tabatabaee via Reuters

Iran's #MeToo Movement Challenges Patriarchy and Western Stereotypes

Viewpoint by Sara Tafakori*

BEIRUT (IDN) – It has been called an Iranian #MeToo movement, and it is. Thousands of women in Iran – and some men – are going online to speak about the sexual assault and harassment they experienced. What is crucially important, at what promises to be a historic turning point in Iranian women’s struggle for their rights, is to set the movement clearly in its proper local and global context, rather than locating it in terms of the familiar binaries of East and West, as much of the coverage in the coming weeks and months will do.