The path of the EU and the U.S. on Ukraine is defining not only the West’s long-term interests but also the key geopolitical players involved. A Russian look at two key diplomatic players.
Month: March 2014
A year after the death of President Hugo Chávez, food and consumer shortages are spreading through Caracas along with protests. Blame over-regulation or capitalistic hoarding?
Outrage in China has followed the Kunming attack that killed 29, not just for the violence, but for the way the West has (and hasn’t) defined what happened. Making sense of the *T* word.
Tensions are running high in Simferopol, the capital of the region of Crimea. A Polish reporter tries to take the pulse of a people increasingly divided.
Below are some of the songs topping the charts around the world. Worldcrunch Pick The first clips of the long awaited Jimi Hendrix biopic All Is By My Side were released yesterday, showing Outkast’s Andre 3000 playing the famous guitarist (see below). The film was premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in Sep. 2013, […]
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Yoko Tawada, A Writer Split In Two
STOCKHOLM — Some say Japanese-born Yoko Tawada who has adopted Germany as her home is a writer with a split cultural personality. After 30 years, she still struggles to reconcile the differences. “Like two personalities, they don’t want to be one,” she says. “They didn’t want to tell one story. I couldn’t put them together. It’s impossible.” In Sweden to launch her 23rd book, The Naked Eye, the award-winning author says the story has links to her own experience traveling by train from Japan to Germany. “I came to Europe by the Trans-Siberian Railway,” she says. “It is a slow […]
MUNICH — Pharmaceutical companies know that doctors more frequently prescribe medicine produced by companies whose sales representatives visit them regularly. That very logic means that these same companies are also busy trying to “recruit” future doctors across Germany, according to a recent survey of German medical school deans and some 1,100 med students. The study, […]
KHARKIV — There’s a critical situation in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, and it doesn’t involve human rights. If the city zoo doesn’t get more money by Monday, officials say the animals there will begin to die of starvation. Zoo director Aleksey Yakovlev says that there is a pregnant elephant named Tandy who is […]
Whatever political and ethnic forces are at play, all sides must remember that Crimea’s finances and infrastructure are Ukrainian to the core.
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Two Plus Two
Three are gone.
ALCORTA — Walter Canzani’s farm is in one of the most fertile zones of Argentina’s Pampas region. Still a proud gaucho (cowboy), this son of Italian immigrants knows, however, that the cows that made Argentina’s beef the most famous in the world are no longer the big money-maker. Although Canzani still keeps some 50 heifers […]
The crisis in Crimea says more about Russian ambitions and European foot-dragging than it does about indecisiveness in Washington.
In search of comedy in a complicated country, Youssef is back on the air.
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Waiting For The Changing Of The Guard
Amalienborg, the winter home of the Danish royal family, consists of four identical palaces situated around an octagonal square. Looking at more recent photos from Wikipedia, it’s unclear whether the same guard is still standing watch nearly five decades later!
As Chinese Premier Li Keqiang rolled out the country’s new ‘war on pollution,’ Le Monde paid a visit to the city that has registered the dirtiest air in China.
When she died of a brain tumor at the age of three, Naomi*’s parents, who were by her side until the end, decided to tell their story amidst a growing push to extend assisted death to children.
SEVASTOPOL — Tension is running high around the Ukrainian navy base in Sevastopol and around Belbek airport, with several spontaneous demonstrations breaking out. Meanwhile on the outskirts of the nearby city of Simferopol, says Vladislav Celeznevon, a Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman, military trucks without license plates are blocking in the perimeter of concrete military bases. […]
AJMER — In India, 70% of the population lives in rural areas, mostly in poverty. But as a voluntary program has proven, impoverished people can become experts in solar power. Thanks to Barefoot College, an NGO based here in Ajmer, in the western part of India’s Rajasthan state, some 600 women have been fully educated about solar power, a small step towards eradicating poverty. Sunaina Das, 20, is reviewing all the components needed to make a solar lamp. Though she doesn’t know how to read or write, she’s learning to become a solar engineer. “I’ve come here for training,” she […]
In Tehran, concern is growing that tensions between Western capitals and Moscow over the showdown in Ukraine could undermine progress on resolving Iran’s own standoff with the West over its nuclear program. Several political observers worried about the possible weakening of Russian influence should it face sanctions or diplomatic isolation concerning in response to its […]
A small dog on an airport runway last month reportedly caused quite a problem for a Yemeni plane attempting to land at Ta’izz airport, near the Red Sea in the Yemeni Highlands. While preparing to land, the Yemeni Airways pilot suddenly spotted the small dog walking along the runway. He immediately decided to divert the […]
The singular tale of a young French-Malian who spent three years in the world’s jihad hot spots in an attempt to join al-Qaeda fighters. No one would take him.
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A Different Kind Of Opera
“Peking Opera” bears little resemblance to the works of Verdi and Wagner. Though this traditional Chinese art form does feature music and singing, it combines them with dance, acrobatics, and mime. As you can see, it is a very lively and colorful performance, which draws from deep within the country’s myths and folklore – and […]
The competing sides, both globally and regionally, will never see Ukraine’s reality the same way, so deep are the historical and cultural divides. Analysis from Kiev.
Pressing news, random facts and other summings up of recent events in the world that counts.
A common archaeological theory holds that ancient Greeks threw their trash in the fields, which would explain the abundance of ceramic shards. But a dissenting narrative has emerged.
MOSCOW — The U.S. government seems to believe that Russia has already established “complete operational control of the Crimean Peninsula.” American intelligence sources have cited no fewer than 6,000 Russian soldiers who were used to achieve this goal. (In a press conference Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin denied his country’s troops were currently occupying Crimea, […]
The hotel’s location is practical, in one of the most sought-after areas of Edinburgh: just steps away from the railroad station, with the Old Town and Princes Street shopping only close by. Old and imposing on the outside, inside it’s all modern, minimalist, and even a little Scottish. Chairs in the reception area are upholstered […]
NAFTA has brought about practically everything that is positive about the Mexican economy. Unfortunately, good governance and stability remain elusive.
Europe and the U.S. must respond to Russian President Vladimir Putin with neither war nor capitulation. There is a third option: total isolation.
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The Village Of My Ancestors
I was 19 when I took this picture of my mother, father and younger cousin enjoying a sunny day in Chaignay, Bourgogne — my ancestors’ village, in eastern France. One year later, I would take (and pass) my driver’s license test in that Peugeot 201 you see in the background. I had nicknamed the car […]
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Verbatim: Hague, Maduro, Bowie
From Kiev to Caracas, what people are saying as the news turns…
A visit to an abandoned corner of Istanbul, where 40 families who fled Syria live in squalor.
The West has woken up to the gravity of the situation. But what real options are on the table?
A visit to Tzahala, a tony district on the edge of Tel Aviv, where a canine unit and dozens of cameras have been brought in to fight crime. But at what price?
Though reports say Peru has surpassed Colombia as world’s top source of cocaine, it has not faced the same kind of violence. Is Lima turning a blind eye toward drug trafficking?
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Where They Eat Bats
On the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, this kid was helping his street-vendor dad to sell fruit bats — to be eaten as a supposed cure for asthma. The bats are now on the endangered species list, and the government has recently taken steps to put an end to their sale.
-Opinion- ISTANBUL — On one hand, there is an investigation of an imaginary terrorist organization and the claim of a wiretapping list that includes some 7,000 people. On the other, there is the recording of a telephone conversation that has been spreading on YouTube, allegedly between Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his son. The […]
A quick look back at notable deaths of the past month
From Poland to Western Europe and beyond, Ukrainian democracy needs cash to flourish. There may not be a third chance.