OPINION: Fear Is not a Good Counsellor

A new spectre is haunting the world. It is not the spectre of communism, as Marx’s Manifesto famously proclaimed. It is the spectre of fear, which has increasingly become the rationale behind politics. And, as the old proverb says, fear is not a good counselor.

The Real Heresy of London’s New Mayor Is that He Is a Liverpool Fan?

Sadiq Khan is not just the new mayor of London, but happens to have individually won more votes than any other politician in British history. Prime ministers and members of Parliament run in their home districts, where the total number of ballots are fewer.

OPINION: After the Primaries

It was no news to observers, analysts and potential voters that Hillary Clinton would seek the Democratic nomination again to run for president of the United States in November 2016. This was not a surprise. But what only a bold analyst could have speculated is that Bill Clinton’s wife would end up facing off against such unlikely rivals.

Economic Failings Lead to Impeachment of Another Economist in Brazil

Ironically, the only two economists who have served as president of Brazil are also the only ones impeached for economic failures.

Europe’s Regression

In a speech marking Holocaust Remembrance Day last week, the Israeli army`s deputy chief of staff offered his compatriots an uncomfortable reminder. `If there`s something that frightens me about Holocaust remembrance,` Maj-Gen Yair Golan noted, `it`s the recognition of the revolting processes that occurred in Europe in general, and particularly in Germany, back then 70, 80 and 90 years ago and finding signs of them here among us today in 2016.

Unity Over Division

Sadiq Khan's strength is that he exemplifies the city he is set to run as its mayor. “I'm a Londoner, I'm European, I'm British, I'm English, I'm of Islamic faith, of Asian origin, of Pakistani heritage, a dad, a husband,” he said in a recent interview with The New York Times. He was born in South London, to immigrants from Pakistan, and grew up in a public-housing project. His father drove a bus, and his mother was a seamstress.

A Women`s Jirga

When interviewed by Reuters, Zardad Khan, from the village of Makol to which 16-year-old Ambreen belonged, said, `This barbarity has never happened before.` The teenager was killed, her body put in a van and burned.

FAO’s Peace-Building Efforts Through Food Security

At the launching today, of the FAO-Nobel Peace Laureate Alliance for food security and peace, FAO’s Director-General said that “peace and food security are inextricably linked – we cannot achieve one without the other. By integrating food security and peace-building initiatives, we can work together to ensure that hunger is neither a cause nor a result of conflict.”

Why Peacebuilding is Part of the Sustainable Development Agenda

We tend not to worry when things are going well. If people can take care of their daily business and send their kids to school without fear of violence, resolve disputes through a functioning justice system when the need arises, express their views both in private discussions and in public processes, feel they can truly contribute to decisions that affect their lives, and know effective institutions are in place to deliver basic services to their families and communities without interruption or the need for bribes, chances are they will be broadly content with the way their society is managed.

OPINION: Greece, the Punching Ball of Germany

Greece is again in the media, because a new negotiation is due between the embattled country and its creditors. The North-South divide of Europe is coming back with force (while the East-West relationship is increasingly looking as beyond repair). The German minister of Finance, Wolfgang Schäuble , has come back with his peculiar view of the economy as a branch of moral and ethical discipline, and not as a reading of reality. He has asked the Greeks “to not get distracted” by the refugees crisis, and not forget their primary task, which is to pay their debt. The request is to cut 2% of the Gross National Product; in case there will not be a 3.5% budget surplus within 2018.

Should Sadiq Khan`s Faith Matter?

Sadiq Khan`s brilliant victory as London mayor is a feather in the cap of Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party, which the leftist leader is striving to lick into an agreeable shape. How is it of use to be reminded profusely that Khan is a Muslim or is of Pakistani extraction? Parochial exultations here will necessarily smack of hypocrisy and are disingenuous.

Refugees and Migrants: A Crisis of Solidarity

This September, the United Nations General Assembly will bring together world leaders to address one of the leading challenges of our time: responding to large movements of refugees and migrants.

Identity Politics?

Sadiq Khan is London`s new mayor. Today is his first day in office. Or, as the world`s press would have it, he is London`s first Muslim mayor; the first Muslim mayor of a European capital. As results rolled in on Friday, to show that he had beat the Conservative Party`s Zac Goldsmith 57pc to 43pe, global news headlines began trickling in, with Khan`s religious identity inevitably the adjective of choice.

Rohingya Crisis: Politics of Denial

The Rohingyas are probably one of the only ethnic groups in the world whose existence is denied despite their presence. Although Rohingyas are one of the 136 ethnic groups in Myanmar, they have been most widely used as a political pawn in the country. While giving a glimpse of the history of the Rohingya issue, this article will also look at how Myanmar as a nation is thriving upon a flawed premise, thereby risking its image which the country only recently re-established in the international world after its return to democracy.

May Day Hijacked by Politicians

Workers of the world – or at least in Sri Lanka – ‘Divide’. The rallying call of the International Workers, from the barricades as they romantically say, for workers of the world to ‘Unite’ is now a thing of the past. The interests of the working class have been submerged by the interests of the political class.

In 2016 Islamophobia is a Political Tool

When the blasphemous anti Islam cartoons published in 2006 by a Danish newspaper left 205 people dead, the then Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Ekmeleddin Mehmet Ihsaoglu, went to see Javier Solana who was responsible for foreign affairs of the European Union. The position of the EU was that there was no islamophobia at all, and this was an isolated incident. Since then, this has been more or less the position of the European institutions.

Analysis: The Role of the Free Press in Sustainable Development

This year’s World Press Freedom Day marks the 250^th anniversary of the first-ever freedom of information law, enacted in what are now Sweden and Finland. 3 May, 2016 is more than just an important anniversary, however; this is the first celebration of World Press Freedom Day since the adoption of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. Securing a free press is essential for progress towards achieving these ambitious goals for people and planet by the year 2030.

Mideast: 1 in 3 Bribes to Access Basic Public Services

Just an ordinary citizen living in a Middle East and North of Africa country and requring a birth certificate for your new-born daughter? No problem—just take something with you, either some cash, a pack of cigarettes or buy a glass of tea with milk and a lot of sugar.

Democratic Corruption

`Chaste to her husband, frank to all beside / A teeming mistress, but a barren bride` - Alexander Pope From Brazil to Malaysia, democracy around the world is under threat. Not from the march of army columns, but from the greed and corruption of a rapaclous global political elite. While nation-destroying corruption of leaders such as Ferdinand Marcos, Mobutu Sese Seko, Sani Abacha, Alberto Fujimori, or Robert Mugabe was the accepted `norm` till the 1990s for a select band of unfortunate Third World countries whose people had been made destitute by their leaders` insatiable greed, the latest wave of democracy was thought to have brought in a newer, and lesstainted, leadership.

Free Press a Casualty of Pakistan’s Terror War

Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) is widely viewed as one of the world's most dangerous places to be a journalist, with at least 14 killed since 2005 and a dozen of those cases still unsolved, according to local and international groups.

Grilled for a Retweet: Press Freedom in Kenya

In early January, Judith Akolo, a journalist with the Kenya Broadcasting Corporation, found herself in unfamiliar territory when she was summoned and grilled by the Directorate of Criminal Investigations for retweeting a Twitter message.