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Photo: Global prosperity is at its highest level in the 12-year history of the Legatum Index. Only in the U.S. do we see a significant setback in such good fortune. Tragically for many, under Trump, it is going to get worse. Credit: Legatum Institute.

Global Prosperity Rises, Inequality Haunts The U.S.

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – Every so often reports emerge that attempt to measure which are the best countries to live in. The Nordic countries plus New Zealand, Holland and Switzerland, usually come out on top. Sweden is number one just for the sheer stability of life and security. Denmark is seen as the most agreeable place to live. The highest rate of longevity is found in Japan. The best schools are in Finland, New Zealand and Canada. Political and press freedom put the Nordics at the top of the league.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 05 February 2019

Photo: Foreign Affairs Minister Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey. Credit: Graphic Online.

U.S. Hits Ghana With Visa Sanctions In Spat Over Deportees

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) - The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and State Department say they will no longer issue visas for certain Ghanaians owing to a “lack of cooperation” by the West African nation – namely its refusal to accept 7,000 Ghanaian nationals that the U.S. wants to deport.

Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen said Ghana has “denied or unreasonably delayed accepting their nationals ordered removed from the United States.”

But Foreign Affairs Minister Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey hotly disputed the charge, calling the allegations “unfounded.”

: Ramesh Jaura; THE WORLD; Africa; 05 February 2019

Photo: Dumisani Kumalo served as Permanent Representative of South Africa to the United Nations, from 1999 – 2009. Credit: Thabo Mbeki Foundation.

Remembering Dumisani Kumalo, Anti-Apartheid Campaigner And South Africa's Leading Diplomat

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – In an interview for the book No Easy Victories: African Liberation and American Activists Over a Half Century, Dumisani Kumalo recalled the struggle to cut off the U.S. funds that were sustaining the apartheid government of South Africa.

“I spoke to more than 1,000 campuses all over the country in all 50 states,” Kumalo recalled. A particular triumph came in 1986, when the U.S. Congress, overriding a veto by President Ronald Reagan, passed the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 04 February 2019

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.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; OPINION; 04 February 2019

Photo (left to right): CTBTO Executive Secretary Lassina Zerbo; UNIDO DG LI Yong; new G-77 Vienna Chapter Chair, Ambassador Omar Youssef of Egypt; IAEA DG Yukiya Amano; and UNODC Deputy Executive Secretary and Deputy Director-General of the United Nations Office at Vienna (UNOV). Credit: UNIDO

Egypt Assumes Presidency Of The Group Of 77 At UN In Vienna

By Reinhard Jacobsen

VIENNA (IDN) – While the State of Palestine has in a historic move taken over the presidency of the Group of 77 (G-77) and China at the United Nations in New York, Egypt has assumed the chairmanship of the Vienna Chapter of the largest Inter-Governmental Organization of developing countries in the UN, comprising 134 countries representing some 80 percent of the world population.

Egypt has been a staunch supporter of the Palestinian cause since the 1950s. Even today Cairo maintains strong relations with the Palestinian Authority and it favours peace between both Israel and Palestine.

: Reinhard Jacobsen; GLOBAL GOVERNANCE; The Group of 77; 03 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

International Year Kicks Off To Protect Indigenous Languages

By UN DESA Voice

NEW YORK (IDN) – Languages play a crucial role in our daily lives. They also make up our unique cultural identities. Yet, of the about 6,700 languages spoken in the world today, 40 percent are at risk of disappearing. Most of them are indigenous languages. And when a language dies, it can mean the end of a community’s values and traditions.

This is where the 2019 International Year of Indigenous Languages comes in. UN DESA Voice spoke with Mirian Masaquiza in UN DESA’s Division for Inclusive Social Development (DISD), about the year and its mission to protect and preserve the world’s indigenous languages.

: J Nastranis; UN INSIDER; 01 February 2019

Photo: Town hall Meeting with President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo at the Ghana Embassy in Washington, DC. Credit: Ghana Embassy, Washington, DC.

Ghana Rolls Out The Red Carpet To Encourage Resettlement In The Motherland

By Benjamin Tetteh, Africa Renewal

ACCRA (IDN-INPS) – In the heart of Accra, Ghana’s capital, just a few meters from the United States embassy, lie the tombs of W. E. B. Du Bois, a great African-American civil rights leader, and his wife, Shirley. The founder of the U.S.-based National Association for the Advancement of Colored People moved to Accra in 1961, settling in the city’s serene residential area of Labone and living there until his death in August 1963.

Mr. Du Bois’s journey to Ghana may have signaled the emergence of a profound desire among Africans in the diaspora to retrace their roots and return to the continent. Ghana was a major hub for the transatlantic slave trade from the 16th to the 19th centuries.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; THE WORLD; Africa; 01 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."

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

'Mexodus': American Retirees Moving To Mexico The New NORM

By Bill Dahl*

The following is an excerpt from investigative journalist Bill Dahl’s new book, Lake Chapala – Beneath The Surface – Considerations for Retiring in Mexico. It is available in paperback and e-book editions on Amazon. Copyright @ 2019. – The Editor

REDMOND, Oregon, USA (IDN) – Needless to say, the social and political rancor in North America has reached new heights (or lows). In the U.S. political sphere, the November 2018 mid-term elections resulted in the Democratic Party wresting control of the U.S. House of Representatives. The U.S. President's approval ratings are hovering around 40 percent. The issue of U.S. immigration reform remains paralyzed amidst political acrimony.