By Bernhard Schell RABAT, Morocco, 16 June 2023 (IDN | WHO) — One in eight people worldwide is either a migrant or is forcibly displaced by factors including conflict, persecution, environmental degradation, or the lack of human security and opportunity. With this in view, United Nations member states and several UN agencies have adopted a […]
Daniel Ellsberg Has Passed Away. He Left Us a Message.
By Norman Solomon* SAN FRANCISCO, USA, 16 June 2023 (IDN) — When Daniel Ellsberg died on Friday (16 June), the world lost a transcendent whistleblower with a powerful ethos of compassion and resolve. Ellsberg’s renown for openly challenging the mentalities of militarism began on 23 June 1971, when he appeared on CBS Evening News ten […]
UN told France has ‘Robbed’ Kanaks of New Caledonian Independence
By David Robie* This article was issued by the Asia Pacific Report and is being republished with their permission. AUCKLAND, New Zealand, 15 June 2023 (IDN) — New Caledonia’s Kanak national liberation movement has told the UN Decolonization Committee that France has “robbed” the indigenous people of their independence and has appealed for help.
Are Nuclear Talks with Iran Underway Again?
By Kelsey Davenport The author is Director for Nonproliferation Policy at the Arms Control Association (ACA). The following text was published in their P4+1 and Iran Nuclear Deal Alert news digest for June 2023. WASHINGTON, DC, 15 June 2023 (IDN) — Recent comments from U.S. and Iranian officials suggest that the space for negotiations over […]
A Climate Finance Goal That Works for Developing Countries
By Richard Kozul-Wright The writer is Director of the Globalization and Development Strategies Division, UNCTAD. GENEVA (IDN) — After years of failing to meet climate finance commitments, the new climate finance goal under discussion in Bonn (at the Climate Change Conference 5-15 June) is critical, but without supporting reforms of the global financial architecture we […]
The new Cold War between Russia and the West Is Unnecessary
By Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden, 13 June 2023 (IDN) — George Orwell, the author of “Animal Farm” and “1984”, was the first person to use the phrase “Cold War” in a 1945 newspaper article, written just after the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He argued that “the surface of the earth is being parcelled […]
Fiji’s Health Services in Crisis As Nurses Migrate
By Pauliasi Mateboto SUVA, Fiji, 13 June 2023 (IDN) — Fiji’s ailing medical industry has seen another massive blow as over 800 nurses have reportedly left for greener pastures so far this year, either to the local private sector or migrated overseas, mainly to neighbouring Australia and New Zealand.
UN Plans a Code of Conduct to Monitor AI & Prevent Abuses
By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, 13 June 2023 (IDN) — The widespread proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI)—and its CHATBOT search engine—has prompted the United Nations to propose a “set of guardrails” to prevent abuses and disinformation. The motive is to help governments with guidelines that “promote facts, while exposing conspiracies and lies, and safeguarding freedom […]
Spending on Nuclear Arms Reaches a Hefty $83 Billion & Rising
By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, 12 June 2023 (IDN) — As geopolitics take a turn for the worse—with Russian nuclear threats in Ukraine, the saber-rattling by North Korea and the increasing political confrontation between the US and China—there are rising investments in the world’s expanding nuclear arsenals. Global spending on nuclear weapons increased in 2022 […]
Corruption Is a Growing Threat to Africa’s Precarious Economies
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK, 12 June 2023 (IDN) — Declining profits from oil and gas production may no longer be sufficient to cover up weaknesses in African economies, including surging food prices, high rates of food insecurity particularly among the rural population, and corruption. With its once abundant oil fields, Equatorial […]