Latest in Opinion Highlight
Latest in Opinion
An African Horn of plenty
By José Graziano da Silva ROME: After six months and the deaths of tens of thousands of people, the famine in Somalia — caused by the worst drought in 60 years — is over. But a wider crisis in Africa continues. In the Horn of Africa — Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, South Sudan, and Sudan – …
America’s Islamic blind spots
By Naomi Wolf NEW YORK: In the wake of the Quran-burning by troops at the United States’ Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, protests continue to escalate, and the death toll mounts. In the process, three US blind spots have become obvious. One is that of the US media, whose coverage simply underscores — and amplifies — …
China’s growing growth risks
By Yao Yang BEIJING: If everything goes right for China, it will surpass the United States as the world’s largest economy, in current dollar terms (and more quickly in real terms), by 2021. Its per capita income will reach that of today’s lower tier of high-income countries. But, despite its forward momentum, the Chinese economy faces …
No mud. No lotus
By Philip Whitfield CAIRO: Ever thought who thought up yin and yang, the opposites that make a whole? Hot and cold, day and night. Zhou Dunyi (1017–1073) the Chinese philosopher considered a worthy life balanced humanity, righteousness, propriety, wisdom and faithfulness. Would that Egypt moved towards equilibrium? The revolution has opened up chasms of disagreement. I …
The Eurozone’s fork in the road
By Mario I. Blejer and Eduardo Levy Yeyati BUENOS AIRES: Many observers have recently declared that the eurozone debt crisis is practically resolved, or at least on hold for a few years. The falling yields at the Italian government’s last bond auctions in 2011 suggested a significant reduction in the perceived sovereign-default risk. Since Italian bonds …
Nuclear disarmament’s midnight hour
By Gareth Evans CANBERRA: Last month, the Doomsday Clock’s hands were moved a minute closer to midnight by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the respected global organization that for decades has tracked the risk of a nuclear-weapons catastrophe, whether caused by accident or design, state or terrorist, fission bomb or dirty radiological bomb. Few around …
Quran burnings indicate need for mission overhaul
By Lisa Schirch and Karim Merchant LONDON: Recent news of US troops burning copies of the Quran in Afghanistan sparked protests and fuelled violence. In response, US President Barack Obama apologized and US military leaders in Afghanistan announced that all foreign troops will receive training on how to handle religious materials. This current crisis signals the …
Hollywood recognizes Iran’s “glorious culture”
By Persheng Vaziri NEW YORK, New York: If you could climb over the mountain of threats and political posturing that are part of the language used by the United States, Europe and Iran and look out, you might see the light of a movie screen. If you set aside the loud clamor in the West about …
Japan’s rubble economy
By Yuriko Koike TOKYO: On March 11, a year will have passed since Japan was struck by the triple tragedy of an earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear accident. According to figures announced by the country’s National Police Agency, the Great East Japan Earthquake left behind 15,848 dead and 3,305 missing — the largest loss of life due …
Apartheid has a face
By Samah Jabr Last month, in the early evening, as I drove on Jerusalem’s Route 1 in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, I was attacked by several Israeli boys. They were about 12 or 13 years old, in religious orthodox dress. They threw a ball of burning gas into my car while I was stopped at a …
Sowing seeds of peace, from Virginia to Iraq
By Rev. Wayne Lavender SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq: Soon after the tragic attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, I left the church where I had been serving as the senior pastor for 12 years, sensing a call to work for peace and justice. I travelled up and down the east coast of the United States to speak about peace, …
Reflections on the recent AU Summit
By Maite Nkoana-Mashabane We recently returned from Addis Ababa, the headquarters of the African Union (AU), as part of a high-level South African government delegation to the 18th Ordinary Session of the AU Summit. One of the most anticipated decisions to be made by the Summit (amongst other similarly important decisions) was the election of candidates …
Between two hells
By Issa Samandar One can’t help but be astonished by the behavior of the United States and European governments over the vast changes occurring in Arab countries, especially their reactions towards the killing spree in Syria. They have been swift — their politicians rarely vague — in their condemnations of the Syrian regime and calls for …
Don’t blame it on Rio
By Michel Rocard PARIS: We are little more than a decade into the twenty-first century, but a terrible precedent has already been set: all of the major international negotiations and cooperative efforts initiated in this century thus far have ended in failure. With regard to the environment, the fight against global warming has come to a …
Innovation needed for Saudi women to join the work force
By Lulua Asaad VIENNA: Why do men in Saudi Arabia educate their female children if women aren’t able to work later? This is the question Khalid Al-Khudair, founder of the employment platform Glowork, asked. The question actually arose when his sister Aia, who graduated with a degree in psychology from a Canadian university, returned to Saudi …
Of patriotism and pyramid schemes
By Rania Al Malky CAIRO: Absurdity has taken on new meaning in the Egyptian socio-political context. If one year after Egypt’s downtrodden and destitute people toppled Mubarak with thunderous, unrelenting calls for bread, freedom and social justice, those very Egyptians are being coerced into donating part of their paltry salaries to support a government they did …
Disease busters going bust
By Sisonke Msimang JOHANNESBURG: The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria marks its tenth anniversary this year against a backdrop of growing protests against global inequality. World attention has been trained on the Occupy movement, which has challenged the “1 percent” of the global population that exercises disproportionate influence on economic and social policy. …
Palestinian unity likely to be real this time
By Daoud Kuttab AMMAN: Palestinian reconciliation took a major step forward recently following an agreement that included President Mahmoud Abbas taking on the additional position of prime minister. The Doha Agreement between leader of the Hamas political bureau, Khaled Meshaal, and Abbas that was signed earlier this month has led many to ask: has Hamas capitulated …
Too big to jail
By Simon Johnson WASHINGTON, DC: Among the fundamental principles of any functioning justice system is the following: Don’t lie to a judge or falsify documents submitted to a court, or you will go to jail. Breaking an oath to tell the truth is perjury, and lying in official documents is both perjury and fraud. These are …
South Asia’s false spring
By Brahma Chellaney NEW DELHI: From the armed coup that recently ousted the Maldives’ first democratically elected president, Mohamed Nasheed, to the Pakistani Supreme Court’s current effort to undermine a toothless but elected government by indicting Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on contempt charges, South Asia’s democratic advances appear to be shifting into reverse. Nasheed’s forced …
Waging peace in Somalia
By Augustin P. Mahiga MOGADISHU: Later this week, an important high-level conference on Somalia in London, sponsored by the British government and attended by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, will present an unprecedented opportunity to take stock of — and reinvigorate — the international community’s engagement in Somalia. The meeting could not come at a better …
Abbas’, Netanyahu’s options: Rapidly dwindling avenues to peace
By Ghassan Khatib The regional and international environments appear increasingly less conducive to a peaceful solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, especially in the short term. The United States is preparing for coming presidential and congressional elections, and the Arab world is increasingly involved in internal revolutions that are naturally emphasizing local agendas. These factors are limiting …
Hamas comes in from the cold
By Michael Bröning GAZA CITY: In the wake of revolutionary change in the Middle East, the forces of political Islam have scored one electoral victory after another. As the West grapples with the rapid rise of moderate Islamists in Tunisia, Morocco, and Egypt, the issue of Hamas’s role in the Palestinian territories looms large. The signing …
The life of a heart: Muslims and Jews saving lives together
By Mehnaz M. Afridi NEW YORK, New York: As I listen to sound bites of news, a swarm of words sting me: Iran, Israel, nuclear, Palestine-Israel at a standstill, Muslims kill Jews, and Jews kill Muslims. As a Muslim woman who teaches classes about the Holocaust at a Catholic college, I am constantly frustrated by the …
Sarkozy at dusk
By Dominique Moisi PARIS: And the next French President will be…the Socialist Party’s candidate François Hollande. A month ago, any prediction uttered with such certainty would have sounded imprudent, if not foolish. Uncertainty prevailed. Four candidates dominated the competition, and no one would have dared to predict which two will make it to the second-round run-off. …
Good and bad deficits
By Robert Skidelsky LONDON: “Deficits are always bad,” thunder fiscal hawks. Not so, replies strategic investment analyst H. Wood Brock in an interesting new book, The American Gridlock. A proper assessment, Brock argues, depends on the “composition and quality of total government spending.” Government deficits incurred on current spending for services or transfers are bad, because …
Tobin trouble
By Mark Roe CAMBRIDGE: European leaders are seriously considering a Tobin tax, which would put a small levy on financial transactions, thereby dampening trading. But will the tax do as much as its proponents hope? The popularity of the tax (named for the late Nobel laureate economist James Tobin, for whom its aim was to …
Decades later, Malcolm X’s legacy lives on
By Muqtedar Khan NEWARK, Delaware: In February, Americans celebrate Black History Month. It is also during this month in 1965 that Malcolm X, an African American Muslim minister and civil rights activist, died. His legacy is important for Muslims and non-Muslims alike — and one that has influenced many Muslim Americans, including myself. One cannot reflect …
Spending spree: skyrocketing skyscrapers
By Philip Whitfield CAIRO: Music hath charms to sooth a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak — William Congreve’s The Mourning Bride (1697). My feet are killing me — the teetering tiptoeing on high-heel skyscrapers at Cityscape this week. Both reveal post-revolution Egypt in its true colors. The middle class is on …
Is the Web closing?
By Esther Dyson NEW YORK: Within the tech community, there is much angst about whether the Web is about to be “closed.” Will it be controlled by companies like Apple, Facebook, and Google, or will it remain “open” to all? Will individuals be able to reach any content they choose? Will developers be able to serve …