USA and Canada

Photo: Lorie Shaull/Flickr – Xena Goldman, Cadex Herrera, Greta McLain, Niko Alexander and Pablo Hernandez (artists)

Racism and Exceptionalism Are Backbones of Trump Doctrine

Viewpoint by John Scales Avery*

COPENHAGEN (IDN) – Elimination of excessive economic inequality makes societies happier and better, underlines the incontrovertible evidence that a new freely downloadable book presents.

Going back to history, the Age of Reason or the Enlightenment was an intellectual and philosophical movement that dominated the world of ideas during the 17th to 19th centuries. Sir Isaac Newton's rational explanations for cosmic phenomena demonstrated that reason is better than superstition.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 06 June 2020

Photo: A mural of George Floyd by Jonathan Perry adorns the Art Wall in Manette on Monday June 1, 2020. Credit: MEEGAN M. REID / KITSAP SUN

The Unravelling of America: You've Gotta Watch to Cry

Viewpoint by Azu Ishiekwene

The writer is the Managing Director/Editor-In-Chief of The Interview magazine based in Abuja, Nigeria.

ABUJA (IDN) – I first watched the movie in the lockdown. At the beginning, it was funny when the pair was fiddling with their entrée in the restaurant and wondering why they had both avoided each other until now.

A few minutes after they left the restaurant, trouble started. The movie, entitled “Queen & Slim,” is the love story of two black Americans drawn to each other by tragedy even before their love story began.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 04 June 2020

Photo: Collage of images of Australian PM Morrison (left), US State Secretary Pompeo (centre) and Premier Andrews of Victoria (right) from Wikimedia Commons.

Australian Prime Minister and State Premier Battle Over Joining China's BRI

By Kalinga Seneviratne

SYDNEY (IDN) – A battle is brewing up between Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Victorian State Premier Daniel Andrews over an agreement the latter has signed with China to link his state with the joint infrastructure development to China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo added fuel to the conflict on May 24 in an interview with Rupert Murdoch owned Sky News when he said if Victoria joined the BRI, the US could "simply disconnect" from Australia.

: Kalinga Seneviratne; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 02 June 2020

Photo: Collage of images of George Floyd and the video showing four police officers while one is kneeling on the back of Floyd's head and neck. Credit: heavy.com

Leaders and Media Respond to Police Killing of Shackled Black Man

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – The murder of George Floyd, a Black man in Minneapolis yanked from his car, shackled and suffocated to death by a police officer aided by at least three other officers, was front-page news in most of the major newspapers in the U.S. It was also covered internationally with many Africans expressing disgust and dismay over the cold-blooded police action. [Watch the video of the Minneapolis chocking an unarmed George Floyd.]

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; USA and Canada; 01 June 2020

Photo: A USAF Boeing OC-135B Open Skies. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

The Future of Arms Control Hangs in the Balance After US Quits Open Skies Treaty

By Kester Kenn Klomegah

MOSCOW (IDN) – President Donald Trump's surprise decision to withdraw from the 1992 Open Skies Treaty has posed unprecedented challenges, generated extensive debates among Russian politicians and experts. Equally worried are leaders in Europe and Asia.

Trump administration notified international partners on May 21 that the US was pulling out of a treaty that permits 30 plus nations to conduct unarmed, observation flights over each other's territory.

: Kester Kenn Klomegah; ARMAMENTS; Nuclear Weapons; 31 May 2020

Eminent Chomsky Says Trump a 'Sociopathic Megalomaniac'

By Andrea Germanos, Common Dreams

PORTLAND, USA (IDN) – World-renowned intellectual and author Noam Chomsky called U.S. President Donald Trump a "sociopathic megalomaniac" whose leadership drove the U.S. to become "singularly unprepared" for the coronavirus pandemic.

Chomsky's fresh criticism of the president came in an interview with Agence France-Presse published May 25.

"The White House," said Chomsky, "is in the hands of a sociopathic megalomaniac who's interested in nothing but his own power, electoral prospects."

: Opinion Editor; THE WORLD; USA and Canada; 26 May 2020

Photo: U.S. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Namaste Trump rally in Ahmedabad, India on 24 February 2020. (Official White House Photo by Andrea Hanks).

India Pivots to The United States to Balance China

Viewpoint by C Raja Mohan

The writer is Director of the Institute of South Asian Studies at The National University of Singapore. This article first appeared on EastAsiaForum on 19 May 2020. A longer version is available in the most recent edition of East Asia Forum Quarterly, ‘Middle Power Game’, Vol. 12 No. 1.

SINGAPORE (IDN) – At a time when much of Asia is reconciling itself to the regional dominance of China and increasing political distance from the United States, India is going the other way — moving into an ever-closer partnership with the United States and making a more intensive effort to balance China in the Indo-Pacific.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 25 May 2020

COVID-19: How the U.S. Ignored the Chinese and WHO Warnings

Viewpoint by Vijay Prashad*

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

KOLKATA‎, India (IDN) – On March 20, just after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global pandemic on March 11, the U.S. National Security Council (NSC) sent a cable to U.S. State Department instructing officials how they should speak about China and the novel coronavirus, according to the Daily Beast, which obtained the cable.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 25 May 2020

Photo: The foreign ministers from Iran and the countries of the P5+1, as well as the High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, after agreeing the Iran Nuclear deal, 14 July 2015. Courtesy of Dragan Tatic/Wikimedia.

US Seeks Iran Arms Embargo Extension Riling Europe

By Kelsey Davenport and Julia Masterson

While Julia Masterson is research assistant, Kelsey Davenport is director for nonproliferation policy at Arms Control Association. The Association's website published this analysis on May 15.

WASHINGTON (IDN) – The United States is considering a range of options to prevent the October 2020 expiration of a UN embargo that restricts arms sales to and from Iran. Those options include making a legal case that the United States remains a bona fide participant of the nuclear deal with Iran that it withdrew from in May 2018 in order to use a Security Council provision to block the embargo's expiration.

: Arms Control Association; THE WORLD; USA and Canada; 16 May 2020

Photo: "You should ask China," said Trump and terminated press conference on May 12 after clash with reporters – video

In Africa, Trump’s Fate Is Worse Than a Laughingstock

Viewpoint by Azu Ishiekwene

The writer is the Managing Director/Editor-In-Chief of The Interview magazine based in Abuja, Nigeria.

ABUJA (IDN) – In a recent article in The Atlantic also widely used elsewhere, American journalist, Anne Applebaum, described the pathetic meltdown of US President Donald Trump, especially since the outbreak of the global health crisis, COVID-19.

On April 29, the US President phoned his Nigerian counterpart, Muhammadu Buhari, and promised to help with some ventilators. The next day, an irreverent mascot in a cartoon strip in Leadership, a Nigerian newspaper, asked if Trump was also going send “Dettol vaccines,” a sarcastic reference to the President’s claim that disinfectants could mitigate the effect of Coronavirus.