IDN-InDepthNews

Nuclear Weapons2017-09-132023-07-10

Ulaanbaatar Conference Stresses the Role of Individual States in Nuclear Disarmament Process

By Jamshed Baruah

NEW YORK | ULAANBAATAR (IDN) – While unanimously agreeing on tougher sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in response to the country’s sixth and most powerful nuclear test early September, the UN Security Council called for the resumption of the Six-Party Talks.

By pleading for the multilateral negotiations involving China, DPRK, Japan, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation and the United States, the 15-member Council expressed its “commitment to a peaceful, diplomatic and political solution to the situation on the Korean Peninsula”.

The issue also drew the focus of the ‘International Conference on Nuclear Disarmament Issues: Global and Regional Aspects’ on August 31-September 1 some 10,150 kilometres away in Ulaanbaatar, the capital city of Mongolia, bordered by China to its south and the Russian Federation to it north.

UN INSIDER2017-09-122023-07-10

UN Panel Remains Sceptical about Sanctions on North Korea

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN | NEW YORK (IDN) – Six days before the UN Security Council unanimously agreed to impose harsher sanctions on the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), it received a far from encouraging report on the implementation of sanctions slammed so far.

The report submitted to the Council on September 5 by the UN Panel of Experts monitoring the implementation of Security Council sanctions against North Korea says: “Lax enforcement of the sanctions regime coupled with the country’s evolving evasion techniques are undermining the goals of the resolutions that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea abandon all weapons of mass destruction and cease all related programmes and activities.”

NEWSBRIEFS2017-09-122023-07-10

Corruption Returns with a Vengeance in Ghana

By Global Information Network

NEW YORK | ACCRA (IDN) – Waving a gold sword – a symbol of Ghana’s presidency – the new president came out swinging against years of debilitating corruption.

“We must restore integrity in public life,” President Nana Akufo-Addo thundered at his swearing in ceremony last January. “State coffers are not spoils for the party that wins an election, but resources for the country’s social and economic development.”

Nine months later, the unpleasant stench of corruption is swirling around the presidency after it was revealed that highly-overpriced garbage contracts to the tune of $74 million were okayed by government officials.

NEWSBRIEFS2017-09-122023-07-10

Thousands March for Change in Togo and End to Dynasty Rule

By Global Information Network

NEW YORK | LOME (IDN) – In another strike against presidents who refuse to hand over power, the people of Togo filled the streets this month to protest 50 years of repressive rule by one family.

In an estimated crowd of 100,000 protesters, banners reading “Free Togo” and “Faure resign” could be seen. Police dispersed the protestors with tear gas and violence. In earlier protests in August, two people were killed and 13 injured when police fired on demonstrators. Taking the punishment a step further, the regime shut down the internet, making it almost impossible for opponents to use social media to organize.

NEWSBRIEFS2017-09-122023-07-10

U.S.-Based Kenyan Scholars Spar Over Election Outcome

By Global Information Network

ATLANTA (IDN) – The fierce contest between President Uhuru Kenyatta and opposition candidate Raila Odinga since their discarded election in August found echo here in Atlanta between Nairobi’s ambassador to Washington and a prominent U.S.-based legal scholar.

“I can categorically say here looking you straight in the eye that the Supreme Court robbed Uhuru Kenyatta of his win and stole the election from the Kenyan people,” Ambassador Robinson Njeru Githae was reported to say.

Not so, responded Prof. Makua Mutua, a human rights advocate and former dean at the University at Buffalo Law School.

OPINION2017-09-122023-07-10

A Little Less Architectural Vanity Will Make A Lot Happier

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power*

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – “What did these vain and presumptuous men intend? How did they expect to raise their lofty mass against God, when they had built it above all the mountains and clouds of the earth’s atmosphere?” This is St. Augustine writing about Babylon in his ‘City of God’. In more modern times Jonathan Raban has written in ‘Soft City’: “The city has always been an embodiment of hope and a source of festering guilt: A dream pursued, and found vain, wanting and destructive.”

St. Augustine wrote the ‘City of God’ in a state of sorrowful contemplation. The city of man, he believed, ought to be a harmonious reflection of the City of God. In actuality it is vulgar, lazy and corrupt, a place so brutish that it lacks even the dignity of the satanic. St Augustine would surely write the same way if reincarnated in Atlanta, Johannesburg, Mumbai or Riyadh.

Global Partnerships2017-09-122023-07-10

‘EXPO 2017 Astana’ Ends, Leaving Behind Inspiring Legacies

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN | ASTANA (IDN) – Kazakhstan’s “biggest and probably most ambitious event” EXPO 2017, which concluded in the capital city on September 10 after three months, is leaving behind some far-reaching legacies.

One of the legacies is ‘Nur Alem,’ the world’s largest spherical building with the diameter of 80 and height of 100 meters. It is the world’s first ‘complete sphere’ building and hence called the Sphere. Integration of photovoltaic elements into the façade allows conversion of sunlight energy into electric one. Two wind generators are also provided for at the upper part of the sphere. Watch Our Video for an interview with Kazakh Deputy Foreign Minister Roman Vassilenko on the legacies of EXPO 2017 Astana

OPINION2017-09-112023-07-10

BRICS: From Economic Partnership to Global Governance

By Somar Wijayadasa*

NEW YORK (IDN) – The leaders of the five BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) held their 9th annual Summit in Xiamen, China, from September 3 to 5, 2017, under the theme “Stronger Partnership for a Brighter Future”

A significant change from the norm was to invite non-BRICS countries, and name the event as “BRICS Plus Summit”. Expanding its participation is a positive manifestation that the BRICS nations are now ready to translate their economic power into global governance.

Over 1000 delegates from many countries attended the meeting including leaders of Egypt, Mexico, Thailand, Guinea and Tajikistan.

USA and Canada2017-09-112023-07-10

9/11 – The Morning That Changed The World I Knew

By Dr Palitha Kohona*

COLOMBO (IDN) – It was another sunny September morning. The sky was a brilliant blue. As I gazed out of my kitchen window while having breakfast, in Mid Town Manhattan, the twin towers were glistening in the morning sun. I noted, as I often had, that they were still there, a familiar reassuring sight. The cute young blonde in the apartment across the street was drying her wet hair, as usual, by her plate glass window. The walk to the UN and my office on the 32nd floor of the Secretariat was uneventful. Not that I expected anything untoward to happen. A pre-scheduled closed-door management meeting began on time.

UN INSIDER2017-09-102023-07-10

UN Concerned About the Implementation of Development Goals

By Amina Mohammed, UN Deputy Secretary-General

The United Nations adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development at a historic summit on September 25, 2015. While 114 Governments have requested support from country teams on implementation of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the world body’s “assessment clearly shows that the pace of progress is insufficient to fully meet that ambition.” Following are extensive excerpts from her remarks, as prepared for delivery, at the Sustainable Development Goals Dialogue in New York on September 8, 2017. – The Editor

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – Two years have passed since the world came together to adopt a truly remarkable framework for common progress — the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Agenda is transformative and inspiring in its own right. That it was agreed at a time of severe political divisions on so many other issues was especially encouraging.