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Latest in Opinion


Facebook, Twitter and change in the Middle East

By Arianna Huffington LOS ANGELES, California: We all know the many ways the internet has been used in the service of terrorism — Al Qaeda-linked websites, recruitment videos, uploads of Osama Bin Laden’s latest video screed, and how-to-blow-things-up online manuals. Al Qaeda and its sympathizers were early adopters of the web and have made destructive use …

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Doing poorly by doing good

By  Raghuram Rajan KIEL: The new catchphrase in business seems to be “do well by doing good.” In other words, undertaking socially responsible activities boosts profits. For example, Pepsi bolsters its bottom line by shifting to more nutritious, healthier food. Yet, in much of the world, doing well still implies that you must be up to …

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Europe’s inevitable haircut

By Barry Eichengreen BERKELEY: What once could be dismissed as simply a Greek crisis, or simply a Greek and Irish crisis, is now clearly a eurozone crisis. Resolving that crisis is both easier and more difficult than is commonly supposed. The economics is really quite simple. Greece has a budget problem. Ireland has a banking problem. …

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America’s war with itself in Central Asia

By Philip Shishkin WASHINGTON, DC: In its decade-long slog to secure Afghanistan, the United States has juggled contradictory foreign policies in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, the fragile Central Asian states with key supporting roles in the war. There’s the policy of engaging the two post-Soviet states for their own sake, promoting good governance, human rights, and business …

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Morocco: Paths to progress

By Oxford Business Group Optimism in Morocco’s business environment, seen in recent World Bank plaudits for its measures to protect investors, is likely to be further boosted by a series of major transport infrastructure projects that are under way. Speaking at a World Economic Forum conference held in Marrakech in October, Karim Ghellab, equipment and transport …

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Haiti’s moment

  NEW YORK: Fortune has not been kind to Haiti. The pain and suffering arising from last year’s earthquake was already enormous, and has since been compounded by Hurricane Tomas and an outbreak of cholera. Now there is growing tension surrounding the just completed election. That epidemic has spread to all 10 departments of the …

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Obama’s vision thing

By Shlomo Ben Ami MADRID: Humbled by the Republicans’ landslide mid-term election victory, US President Barack Obama will now need to negotiate every minor detail of his domestic agenda with a confrontational Congress — at least until the next elections in 2012. Congress can obstruct Obama’s foreign policy as well, but this remains a domain where …

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My not-so-kosher Hanukkah

By Mehra Rimer GENEVA: This year I found myself the co-host of a not-so-kosher Hanukkah. What is a not-so-kosher Hanukkah? You will understand once you have read my story. I am Swiss, but originally from Iran. I am also a Shia Muslim, but I grew up in a Catholic boarding school in Switzerland run by Italian …

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Much more to Yemen than what we see in the news

By Alice Hackman LONDON: The British media’s focus on a young British Muslim woman who stabbed a British Member of Parliament last month once again shines a gloomy spotlight on Yemen. According to The Guardian, Roshonara Choudhry, a 21-year-old student who stabbed the politician for supporting the war in Iraq, told the police: “I’ve been listening …

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Time for Barak to depart

By Alon Ben-Meir NEW YORK: The Israeli government must still approve the proposed United States-Israeli agreement to freeze settlement construction in the West Bank in exchange for a US offer of $3 billion worth of military hardware, including stealth fighter jets. If Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu succeeds in obtaining cabinet approval, the parties will have 90 …

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A fair deal for Africa’s resources

By Nahas Angula WINDHOEK: Namibia is a resource-based economy that has embarked on an ambitious development program. Our vision is to turn Namibia into a knowledge-based, diversified economy by 2030. One of the major principles upon which this vision is based is the idea of “partnerships” — a major prerequisite for the achievement of dynamic, efficient, …

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Rejecting the power to waste

By Malavika Jain Bambawale SINGAPORE: Our ancestors preached it. Our parents taught it to us. The West is adopting it. So why are we Asians abandoning it? I’m talking about environmental consciousness. Conserving water. Switching off a TV that no one is watching. Calling the municipality to get a recycling bin in the building. Not flushing …

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Nicaragua should confront its demons

By César Chelala NEW YORK: For a long time it has been one of Nicaragua most guarded secrets. But a new Amnesty International report, “Listen to their Voice and Act: Stop the Rape and Sexual Abuse of Girls in Nicaragua,” brings it to light. Rape of teenagers in Nicaragua is widespread, and nothing is being done …

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Defying the Garden of Eden syndrome

By Kandeh Yumkella ACCRA: When you fly into Takoradi, Ghana’s fourth largest city and an industrial and commercial center, one of the first things you notice are the oil rigs along the coast. It is a panorama that is increasingly characteristic of modern-day Africa. Nearby, in the city of Elmina, one can see the scars of …

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In the footsteps of Gandhi, Mandela, and Havel

By Ma Jian LONDON: Liu Xiaobo, the imprisoned Chinese writer and human-rights campaigner, will receive the Nobel Peace Prize on Dec. 10. For the first time in history, however, neither the laureate nor any member of his immediate family will be present in Oslo to accept the award. China’s government has blocked Liu’s wife, the acclaimed …

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What size the fire exit?

By Daniel Gros BRUSSELS: The eurozone is being thrown into turmoil by a collective rush to the exits by investors. Yields on government debt of peripheral eurozone countries are skyrocketing, because investors do not really know what the risks are. Officials want to be reassuring. Investors should not worry, they argue, because the current bailout mechanism …

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The lessons of Europe’s carbon trade

By Denny Ellerman FLORENCE: As the Cancún climate change summit approaches, discussions about the viability of carbon trading systems is intensifying. The world can look to Europe as a model that is not only up and running, but that works. In 2005, the member states of the European Union became the first to create a cap-and-trade …

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Dubai: Confidence boost

By Oxford Business Group There are signs that Dubai is hitting the road to recovery, with investors once again eyeing the benefits of the emirate’s foreign direct investment (FDI) credentials and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicting a modest growth rate of 0.5 percent this year. A robust recovery by Asia has impacted positively on Dubai’s …

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Finally, Afghan perspectives from inside Afghanistan

By Karl Inderfurth and Theodore Eliot WASHINGTON, DC/BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS: One is constantly reminded of the grim realities of Afghanistan today, a country in its tenth year of war and a government in Kabul commonly viewed as corrupt and ineffective. But there is another perception that should be taken into account: what the Afghans themselves think of …

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The North Korean enigma

By Joseph Nye CAMBRIDGE : What is going on in North Korea? On November 23, its army fired nearly 200 artillery rounds onto the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong, near the two countries’ disputed maritime border, killing four – including two civilians – and demolishing scores of houses and other structures. The presence of civilians, many …

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Egyptian youth climb to the top for a good cause

By Rasha Dewedar CAIRO: Egyptian youth are putting a face on positive change in action — and undoing stereotypes at the same time. This September, 26 Egyptian climbers succeeded in climbing Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania as participants of The Right to Climb initiative, organized with the goal of raising support for children with special needs in …

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Editorial: Long live the NDP!

By Rania Al Malky CAIRO: The people of Egypt have spoken, and according to the results of the first round of parliamentary elections held last Sunday, they have collectively chosen the National Democratic Party. To the sore losers who claim that the elections were rigged, the NDP and the venerable electoral commission that supports it, have …

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Sports Talk: Surprise and surprise

By Alaa Abdel-Ghani Qatar gets the World Cup. So does Russia. The first World Cup in the Middle East and the first in East Europe. This is what FIFA decided Thursday, the Russian bid being picked ahead of England, Spain-Portugal and Holland-Belgium to host the 2018 event. Qatar got the better of the United States, Australia, …

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WikiLeaks, secrets, and lies

By Simon Chesterman SINGAPORE: The latest information dump from WikiLeaks offers fascinating insights into the workings of the US State Department that will keep foreign policy wonks and conspiracy theorists busy for months. Much of what has been reported is not “news” in the traditional sense, of course, but a series of embarrassing gaffes: truths that …

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Will my breasts blow up this airplane?

By Naomi Wolf OXFORD: Just when it seemed that America’s “Homeland Security state” could not get more surreal, the United States Transportation Security Administration has rolled out a costly Scylla and Charybdis at major airports: either you accept dangerous doses of radiation and high-resolution imaging of your naked body, or, worried about the health risks of …

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No to green fundamentalism

By Alain Juppé BORDEAUX: Climatology and its emphasis on global warming is a comparatively recent addition to science. Yet, despite the relative youth of this research, a clear consensus has emerged: climate change — for which human activity is significantly, though not exclusively, responsible — now threatens our way of life, so we must develop the …

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Muslims integral to American seminaries

By Joshua Stanton NEW YORK: Seminaries, higher education institutions where professors of religion and religious leaders train students to become clergy, have been present in the United States for centuries. Because seminary students are generally being trained as religious leaders who will oversee congregations, their seminary education has a powerful impact on these students’ future congregations. …

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Kuwait: Towards a healthy future

By Oxford Business Group While Kuwait’s rapid modernization over the past two decades has seen a rise in life expectancies and a decline in illness rates, the changes in lifestyle associated with rising wealth have created their own set of challenges. In early November the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) released its latest human development index …

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In Focus: Politics of Revenge

By Khalil Al-Anani CAIRO: The sole outcome of the recent Egyptian parliamentary elections is a powerless assembly. With no surprise in the sweeping victory of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP), the elections revealed its hideous face. For the sake of the analysis, one has to evoke the shadow of 2005 elections to grasp what happened …

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The G-20’s new thinking for the global economy

By Jeffrey Sachs NEW YORK: The Seoul G-20 summit was notable for the increasing political weight of the emerging economies. Not only was it located in one, but, in many ways, it was also dominated by them. In two crucial areas, macroeconomics and global economic development, the emerging economies’ view prevailed. And an excellent proposal to …

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