|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 . '/' . substr('9780312425289',-6,3) . '/' . '9780312425289' . '.jpg'; ?>)
By Chris Abani
By Anna Badkhen
$2.99
$22
|
|
|
|
Wikimedia Commons / Bjoertvedt
|
His term as the United Nations’ official envoy to Afghanistan is up in March, and in his last address to the world body Kai Eide didn’t sound especially optimistic about the state of the country. In fact, Eide said Wednesday, if certain “negative trends” he sees at work “are not reversed,” the situation in Afghanistan could “become unmanageable.”
|
problembear.wordpress.com
|
The world leaders who showed up for the final stretch of the Copenhagen climate summit, perhaps assuming that their lesser representatives would have paved the way for a relatively easy finale, were in for some long hours and tough talks lasting into the night. Things didn’t go as planned, it seems, and rifts between countries weren’t being resolved in time Friday to strike the deals they sorely needed to make. Updated
|
AP / Anja Niedringhaus
|
In a move to ostensibly “save” the United Nations’ climate talks in Copenhagen, the U.S. has pledged to support a $100 billion multilateral fund to help poor countries adapt to climate change and develop environmentally friendly technologies.
|
thenation.com
|
So, author-activist Naomi Klein has spent the last few days in Copenhagen, taking in the developments—and appreciating streamlined and functional Scandinavian design—at the climate summit, but she has a message for her Danish hosts: Cool it on the whole control freak thing, or the “Hopenhagen” conference isn’t going to be a success.
|
landcoalition.org
|
The apparently deliberately timed release of leaked e-mails stolen from climate scientists at the University of East Anglia has created problems for the global warming cause just as world leaders are preparing to convene at the Copenhagen climate change summit, and now the United Nations is launching its own investigation into the incident.
|
|
On Wednesday, the 10th anniversary of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced the creation of a network of men tapped to serve as male role models in the fight against gender-based violence.
|
en.cop15.dk
|
The United States will take part, after all, in next month’s United Nations climate summit in Copenhagen. President Barack Obama will attend the meeting, if only for a day, to do his part for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and the White House also announced ... (continued)
|
defenselink.mil
|
A year after declaring independence from Serbia, Kosovo has received good marks from European monitors for its first round of local elections, which could lead to wider recognition and acceptance of its newly established status in the international community.
|
wikimedia.org
|
U.N. inspectors have found “nothing to be worried about” in their first report after visiting a previously clandestine uranium-enrichment site south of Tehran. The clean assessment, which described the site as a “hole in a mountain,” may cause critics to now look for more diplomatic solutions to Iran’s nuclear program.
|
tv5.co.th
|
Even if all the countries slated to show up in Copenhagen for next month’s climate talks are represented around the negotiating table, there remains a huge amount of work to do. For one, a legally binding measure to replace the Kyoto Treaty has yet to be created. Still, Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen is “optimistic” about the summit.
Posted on Nov 2, 2009
READ MORE 
|
bbc.co.uk
|
United Nations officials said Wednesday that at least five U.N. workers and three Afghans were killed and nine others wounded by three Taliban militants, who were themselves shot dead during the attack at a private residence in Kabul, Afghanistan.
|
AP / Valerie Kuypers, Pool
|
Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic was a no-show Monday at The Hague, where he was scheduled to stand trial on charges of genocide against Bosnian Muslims in the mid-1990s. The proceedings were expected to continue Tuesday regardless of his participation, or lack thereof, in court.
|
problembear.wordpress.com
|
President Obama may think he’s skipping December’s United Nations climate change summit in Copenhagen, but one Lord Stern of Brentford has a message for him and other world leaders taking a stubborn stance on the subject.
|
AP / Musadeq Sadeq
|
Considering the outcome of the last presidential election, or attempt at same, in Afghanistan, it’s not surprising that Hamid Karzai’s challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, would balk at the idea of letting the same polling officials head the voting effort during the runoff slated for Nov. 7.
Posted on Oct 26, 2009
READ MORE
|
AP / Vahid Salemi
|
The continuing drama surrounding Iran’s nuclear program took a daring turn earlier this month when the U.S. revealed the existence of a secret uranium enrichment plant. Now U.N. inspectors have checked out that plant, and will do so again in the next couple days.
|
wfp.org
|
Global hunger is a “world emergency” now, if it wasn’t before, with the number of hungry people rising to a record 1 billion, according to the United Nations. Given this scary statistic, it’s not looking good for a goal, set in 2000, to reduce the number of people going hungry worldwide by half by 2015.
|
AP / Khaled Omar
|
A controversial report about last winter’s war in Gaza, generated by the United Nations and headed up by South African Judge Richard Goldstone, was the subject of debate at the U.N. Security Council Wednesday, largely owing to the fact that the report accuses both Israel and Hamas of committing war crimes.
|
acus.org
|
After facing allegations of a cover-up, Kai Eide, the most senior U.N. representative in Afghanistan, acknowledged that “widespread fraud” has tainted the country’s presidential election but denied that he tried to hide evidence of cheating.
|
AP / Fraidoon Pooyaa
|
While the Obama administration continues to mull over its options regarding America’s commitment to the war in Afghanistan, the United Nations Security Council has voted to urge “member states to contribute personnel, equipment and other resources” to the ongoing conflict.
|
AP / B.K. Bangash
|
The United Nations World Food Program office in Islamabad, Pakistan, was a suicide bomber’s target Monday, and unfortunately it was a successful strike. The bomber was able to enter the building in the guise of a guard and set off 16 pounds of explosives during a busy noontime at the office, according to The New York Times.
|
U.S. Army / Staff Sgt. Ken Denny
|
A former U.N. diplomat has attacked the process and results of the recent Afghan elections, claiming that almost one in three votes cast for incumbent President Hamid Karzai was fraudulent and that the elections seriously weakened the democratic process in the eyes of the Afghan people. As a consequence, the Taliban is stronger, says Peter Galbraith, who was fired in a dispute over the voting.
|
Flickr / ISM Palestine
|
Under heavy U.S. pressure and threat of being denied critical communication infrastructure by Israel, Palestinian officials have removed their support for a U.N. report that criticized as war crimes some of Israel’s actions during its war in Gaza.
|
milwoman.com
|
International efforts to expand Afghanistan’s security forces are being undermined by “spiraling increases” in violent deaths among the nation’s police officers as the eighth anniversary of the U.S. war approaches.
|
Richard Ellis
|
President Obama has lowered the bar for December’s Copenhagen climate change conference by talking down the importance of arriving at an agreement on global warming by the end of the year. Obama’s position contradicts the United Nations and others who see the conference in Denmark as a crucial moment for stemming climate change.
|
news.bbc.co.uk
|
Following Thursday’s U.N. Security Council resolution aimed at halting nuclear proliferation, President Obama announced Friday that Iran has concealed a partly built second uranium enrichment plant. The Iranians admitted existence of the plant but asserted that it would be used only for peaceful purposes.
|
AP / Ajit Kumar
|
A U.N. Security Council session led by President Obama has adopted a resolution calling for nuclear disarmament, focusing largely on measures aimed at halting weapons proliferation and lowering the risk of “nuclear terrorism.”
|
|
President Obama held forth about the need to move quickly and “together” on the problem of global warming in a speech Tuesday at the United Nations. “Our prosperity, our health and our safety are in jeopardy and the time we have to reverse this tide is running out—and yet we can reverse it,” he said.
|
ABR / Ricardo Stuckert
|
After nearly three months in exile, ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya has reportedly returned to his home turf, although his exact whereabouts were unclear Monday. Meanwhile, the U.S. government is still putting pressure on current leader Roberto Micheletti and his camp to restore Zelaya to power.
|
|
Although the Obama administration, in particular Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, is maintaining a cautiously positive stance about the current state of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, there doesn’t seem to be much progress on that front—which, as Al Jazeera English points out in this report, might have to do with all involved parties driving a hard-line approach.
|
polarice.com
|
We normally think of capitalists as ravaging the Earth with profit in their eyes. While that still might be true, 181 of the world’s largest investors have issued a united call for action against climate change, most importantly a binding treaty to cut pollution and boost funding for low-carbon technologies.
|
AP / Sebastian Scheiner
|
In a strong rebuke of Israeli policy, the White House has expressed “regret” over an announcement by Israel that it will expand its illegal settlements in Palestinian areas. Hundreds of new housing units are expected to be approved for construction in the West Bank in a move seen as placating the rightists in power.
|
fresh.co.il
|
The U.N. military commander in Sudan has announced that the war in Darfur—which has killed more than 300,000 people—is over. Three million Sudanese remain displaced as the conflict ostensibly shifts from full-blown war to mere “security issues.”
Posted on Aug 27, 2009
READ MORE
|
AP / Roberto Schmidt, pool
|
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton witnessed the horrific living conditions that many Congolese women and children are enduring in their embattled country on Tuesday and was attentive to their stories about rape and sexual violence. She announced during her visit that the U.S. is extending $17 million in aid targeting sexual brutality.
|
Flickr / Lietmotiv
|
By Robert Fisk — Almost 19 years to the day after Saddam Hussein’s legions invaded Kuwait—and less than 18 years since the U.S. coalition liberated it—the Croesus-rich emirate is still demanding reparations from Baghdad as if the dictator of Iraq was still alive.
|
Radio Nederland Wereldomroep
|
The United Nations is facing a $4.8 billion shortfall in funding for humanitarian aid to some of the world’s poorest peoples. At the top of that list are the inhabitants of Zimbabwe, Palestine and Kenya, which face increasingly dire financial needs. Although emergency relief donations have risen, the global credit crunch has made it harder for developed countries to keep pace with the need.
Posted on Jul 21, 2009
READ MORE
|
AP photo / Mohammed Javed
|
It’s been a year and a half since the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and although her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, is now Pakistan’s president, local investigations haven’t produced many answers about her murder. Now a United Nations commission, led by Chilean Ambassador Heraldo Munoz, is conducting its own inquiry.
|
welt.de
|
U.N. drug chief Antonio Maria Costa believes drug use should be treated as an illness and not criminalized. Costa says international law enforcement should shift focus to traffickers rather than users, an intriguing (look at the U.S. prison population) but problematic (look at Mexico’s drug war death toll) strategy.
|
AP photo / Lee Jin-man
|
The U.N. Security Council condemned North Korea for carrying out an underground nuclear test on Monday. Pyongyang responded by test-launching two short-range missiles, after which the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Susan Rice, said the actions were “clearly provocative” and that North Korea will “pay a price” for them.
|
guardian.co.uk
|
Investigators with the U.N. Human Rights Council may be forced to enter the Palestinian territories from Egypt because Israel is likely to refuse cooperation in the U.N.’s mission to investigate potential war crimes by the Israeli military and Hamas.
|
AP photo
|
U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon and British Foreign Secretary David Miliband declared themselves appalled by the “blood bath” that took place over the weekend in Sri Lanka. An estimated 430 civilians—of whom at least 100 were children—have been killed in fighting between Tamil Tiger rebels and government forces on the country’s northeastern coast. The question of whether Sri Lanka should receive a loan from the IMF is now on the table.
|
|
Clearly, several dozen delegates at the United Nations anti-racism conference in Geneva, Switzerland, disagreed with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s assessment of Israel as a “racist government” on Monday.
|
wn.com
|
After an estimated 10,000 civilian deaths or injuries in only two months, the U.N. has called on the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tiger rebels to immediately suspend fighting, suggesting that actions by both parties may constitute violations of international human rights law.
|
breakfornews.com
|
The International Criminal Court is getting its teeth, as judges have ordered the arrest of Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity—including murder, extermination, forcible transfer, torture and rape—marking the first time the ICC has issued a warrant for a sitting head of state.
|
DFID / Hassan Bipul
|
Analysis is finding that, amid the historic neglect that rich nations show toward the poor, developing countries have received less than 10 percent of the funds promised to them by the developed world. This comes as countries in the global south struggle to respond to the myriad concerns about global warming.
Posted on Feb 20, 2009
READ MORE
|
Maan Images / Hatem Omar
|
Be it a political gamble or a mix-up of epic proportions, Hamas is being accused of stealing humanitarian aid from U.N. trucks in the Gaza Strip. Due to the thefts, officials say, aid has stopped flowing into the battle-torn territory, where half the population depends on the U.N. shipments for food.
|
AP photo / Fadi Adwan
|
By Robert Fisk — I wonder if we are “normalizing” war. It’s not just that Israel has yet again gotten away with the killing of hundreds of children in Gaza.
|
guardian.co.uk
|
Following accusations by human rights groups last week, Israel has finally admitted that its troops “may have used” white phosphorus shells—a chemical agent that wreaks havoc on the skin—in contravention of international law.
|
AP photo / Ben Curtis
|
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon toured several decimated sites in Gaza on Tuesday, including the remains of the U.N. compound in Gaza City destroyed last Thursday in an attack. The Israeli shelling of the compound has drawn strong international criticism—not the least of which came from Ban himself both before and during Tuesday’s visit.
|
AP photo / Hussein Malla, Pool
|
By Robert Fisk — It’s a wrap, a doddle, an Israeli cease-fire just in time for Barack Obama to have a squeaky-clean inauguration with all the world looking at the streets of Washington rather than the rubble of Gaza.
|
AP photo / Khalil Hamra)
|
As Israel’s Security Cabinet prepared to vote Saturday on a possible cease-fire in Gaza, the Israeli army drew criticism for the killing of two boys who were taking cover at a United Nations school in northern Gaza, according to The New York Times.
|
View the most popular tags overall?
|
|
The U.S. Military and the Unraveling of Africa
Newsletter 
Like Us
Follow Us
Get Our Feed
