The legendary French actor just published a very personal book. So why is he so hard to talk to?
Category: In The News
The nations of South America’s MERCOSUR trade bloc are well positioned to cash in on increasing global demand for food. But they’d also do well to start planning a common approach.
-Analysis- Lebanon can be seen as a microcosm for the entire Middle East: intractable sectarian conflict, economic potential, terrorist threats and a labyrinthine web of competing national interests. These days, it seems, the small nation of just over six million inhabitants risks again becoming the live theater for the region to play out its many […]
WASHINGTON — This is an elegant city. It is smooth and soft-spoken. It’s clean and well kept, possibly because most of the residential buildings in the city are family townhouses. Low, two, three-story buildings spread the city out, creating the impression Washington is bigger than it is. Sparse-density urbanity evokes the pastoral, idyllic way of […]
CAGLIARI — Just over 280 kilometers (174 miles) of Mediterranean water separates the Algerian port city of Annaba from the Sulcis on the southwest coast of the Italian island of Sardinia. As Italy continues to crack down on trafficking routes linking Libya to its other major island, Sicily, attention is shifting to new routes. Algiers-based […]
Beijing has become one of the largest weapons exporters in the world, allowing it to gain new allies and place its pawns strategically throughout the continent.
HOMS – Akram al-Khoule and his 7-year-old son hold hands as they stare at the once familiar primary school building, now demolished, looted of its contents and stripped of its identifying markers. “This is where my children studied,” al-Khoule says in a melancholy voice. Al-Khoule returned to the Homs district of al-Khalidiye this year, after being displaced to the coastal Syrian city of Tartous for six years. He is one of 600,000 Syrian refugees and internally displaced people who are estimated to have returned to their hometowns this year – many of whom now face a barrage of problems trying […]
Boats will soon be capable of sailing without captains on board. The first tests will take place next year.
Categories
Imperial Memories Of Palaces Past
On two separate trips, we visited the Hofburg imperial palace you see here in the bustling center of Vienna, as well as the emperors’ exuberantly baroque summer residence at Schönbrunn. Even if this photograph is better, my memory is quite clear that the summer palace was far more stunning in person.
-OpEd- As the old saying goes, no situation is so bad that it can’t get worse. The cruel irony of Venezuela’s going from bad to worse is how the government of President Nicolás Maduro is incompetent at everything save keeping power. It is a power play designed to spread suffering further every day, while keeping […]
Japan’s trade surplus with the U.S. is mostly not about protectionism or aggressive Japanese policy — it’s about macroeconomics.
The South Korea nun’s culinary philosophy has influenced chefs and foodies around the world.
-Analysis- PARIS — A wave of popular revolt against the establishment, globalization and immigration is washing over the West. And as the recent election results in Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic suggest, it won’t be ending anytime soon. After the staggering victories of Brexit and Donald Trump in 2016, Western elites, always eager for […]
After a drop in oil prices left the Nigerian economy reeling, new government policies have boosted rice and other agricultural production. It’s a boost to stay home for Nigerians eyeing emigration to Europe.
Having spent 22 years in Israeli jails, Sinwar knows his adversary — and appears open to negotiate, with both Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
Categories
Welcome To The Hotel Los Angeles
My wife and I were able to enjoy the view on the snowy Sierra Nevada mountain chain from our room at the picturesque Hotel Los Angeles, in southern Spain. You can check out any time you like.
-Analysis- A political neophyte who launched his presidential campaign by railing against Mexican “rapists’ and “murderers’ was never supposed to win, especially against a seasoned stateswoman backed by her party’s establishment. Add to that unthinkable episodes, like his mocking a disabled reporter or the revelation of the infamous “grab ‘em by the p***y” recording, and […]
-Analysis- MADRID — Virtually everyone now uses the Internet before, during and after they travel, whether its downloading an app to become familiar with a particular destination or sharing your holiday photos on Facebook or Instagram. The information revolution has indeed revolutionized both the way we prepare trips, and how we experience them. As such, […]
-Analysis- Charlie Hebdo is facing another existential moment — and Harvey Weinstein is partly responsible. The surviving members of the French satirical weekly might appreciate the twisted irony. Less than three years after the terror attack that killed 12 members of its staff, Charlie has been receiving very explicit death threats after a cartoon they […]
All was calm around the recent inauguration of the northern city of Pavia’s new Islamic Center for Dialogue, bucking a trend of protests around Italy when new mosques are proposed.
To some, it is simply a delicious chocolate hazelnut spread; to others, it is a key factor for understanding the difficulties of the European common currency.
-Analysis- The headlines echo of the not-so-distant past this morning. Yesterday, media outlets around the globe began to report on the Paradise Papers, a massive leak of documents detailing the offshore investments of politicians, business tycoons, and corporations. Le Monde, which dedicated 12 journalists over the past year to the multi-outlet investigation, writes that the […]
-Analysis- PARIS — Drilling operations have begun off the coast of Cyprus despite Ankara’s threats against the Cypriot government. And for French oil and gas multinational Total and its Italian partner, ENI, hopes for a huge payout are running high. As IHS Markit reported earlier this year, the “Onisiforos’ operation, as it’s known, is expected […]
The Macri government’s sober discourse and steady reformist hand suggest the political and economic dramas of the last century in Argentina may be ending.
China, Russia and the U.S. see potential and risks. And for now, there’s still no form of governance to oversee AI development — technology moves faster than diplomacy.
The stakes and uncertainty are high as the U.S. President begins a 10-day trip to five Asian countries. To begin with, decorum is extra important in this part of the world.
-Essay- CAIRO — I had never really thought much about my position on the death penalty. After I watched the film The Life of David Gale, I started to ask myself how one might possibly work on an issue as difficult as this. I don’t remember if I watched the movie before or after going […]
PARIS — Before Charlie Hebdo and the Bataclan, before the Bastille Day massacre in Nice and last month’s fatal stabbing in Marseille by a man shouting “Allahu akbar,” there was Toulouse. Back in March 2012, a 23-year-old native of that southern French city went on a meticulously planned shooting spree that killed three French soldiers […]
Categories
Islamic School Break
These veiled girls enjoying recess greeted us as we passed by their Islamic boarding school in the capital of the world’s biggest Muslim nation.
Last year, an unknown painting by the famous French artist was left to a small Swiss canton. Months of investigation were needed to uncover the canvas’s mysterious elements, but some questions remain.
For a Paris sex therapist, the fight against sexual abuse requires action against online pornography and the sexualization of youth. The victims are men and women alike.
Think of Facebook as akin to a delivery truck, noting that such trucks often carry guns, junk food and bad books.
As even the Catholic Church sells off its jewels to hungry hotel developers, the few remaining real Venetians wonder if their city is finally slipping away for good.
Television presenter Ksenia Sobchak’s surprise candidacy gives the democratic camp a second chance, as long as it is not a Kremlin ploy to attract younger voters.
A day after a suspected 29-year-old Uzbek national killed eight people and injured a dozen more with a rented pickup truck in Manhattan, newspapers around the world devoted their front pages to the worst terrorist attack in New York since 9/11. Here’s is how it looked in 11 different countries, including Argentina, home to five […]
Categories
Turkish Cinema Has A Gun To Its Head
A government crackdown on dissent in Turkish cinema is transforming filmmaking and destroying careers.
“Trump is finished.” That sentence has been pronounced so often over the past 18 months that it has lost any real meaning. Still, the events unfolding in Washington right now are different. By targeting top Trump campaign officials Paul Manafort and Richard Gates, and perhaps even more crucially, a lesser known foreign-policy advisor named George […]
Companies like Tres Montes in Santander are focusing on quality, not just quantity, and improving the lives of small-scale growers in the process.
Washington and the Trump administration are reeling after the first charges are filed in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election.
Refugees in the border town of Mae Sod are uniting across ethnic lines to defend their rights against unscrupulous employers and Thai authorities keen to send them back.