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Ideas Trump And The World

The Wall Of Trump: Stand Your Ground, Pena Nieto!

-Editorial- SANTIAGO — Finally. The Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto reacted correctly to the new U.S. President Donald J. Trump, canceling the meeting they were scheduled to have last week. Mr. Peña Nieto seems to have come into his own! Trump had asked for the meeting, to discuss trade, immigration and above all, frontier security. […]

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Geopolitics Trump And The World

Defying Trump, Texas Sheriff Gives Safe Haven To Immigrants

Austin, Texas may be the first of many ‘sanctuary cities’ that disobey President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policy.

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Ideas Trump And The World

After Trump, Argentina Restricts Immigration To Fight Crime

-Analysis- BUENOS AIRES — It must be a sign of the times. Echoing the clampdown of foreign visitors by U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration, Argentina is set to tighten its border controls in a country that has long received migrants from around the world. The move was taken ostensibly to target crime, which many Argentines […]

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In The News

How Trump Muslim Ban Looks In Iran

PARIS — President Donald Trump’s executive order banning entry into the United States of citizens of seven different Muslim-majority countries has prompted outrage both at home and abroad. But the drama comes with extra layers of intrigue and import for one country in particular: Iran. For the pragmatic government of President Hassan Rouhani, who reached […]

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Geopolitics Trump And The World

World Reacts To Trump’s Muslim Ban, 24 Newspaper Front Pages

UNITED STATES The Washington Post Chicago Sun-Times MEXICO La Razon de Mexico BRAZIL O Globo Folha de S. Paulo URUGUAY El Observador HONDURAS La Prensa EL SALVADOR El Diario de Hoy POLAND Gazeta Wyborcza NETHERLANDS Nrc.Next Metro Nieuws RUSSIA SPAIN El Pais La Razon La Vanguardia ITALY La Repubblica GREECE E Ephemerida TURKEY Cumhuriyet EGYPT […]

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In The News

Across Mexican Border, Deportees Feel Trump’s Heat

TIJUANA — Martin Pina stands in the courtyard of the “Casa del Migrante,” which was founded 29 years ago by Catholic Scalabrinian missionaries to help migrants in this teeming Mexican border city. Sporting a tattoo of his mother Belinda on his left arm and Mexican singer Selena on his right, Pina says that he had […]

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In The News

Mexican Newspaper On Trump Deportation Plans

La Jornada, Nov. 14, 2016 As U.S. president-elect Donald Trump begins to reveal if and how he will follow through on his campaign promises, Mexico is keeping a close eye on his immigration plans. In an interview with CBS “60 Minutes” program on Sunday night, Trump indicated that his pledge to build a wall between […]

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Migrant Lives Society

Calais To Paris, The Grim Mobility Of Migrant “Jungles”

Near the French capital’s Gare du Nord train station, migrants have expanded yet another shantytown just days after the controversial Calais “Jungle” was dismantled by the state. Locals are not pleased.

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blog

A Vast, Small World After All

We, the fortunate and overstimulated masses of the early 21st century can watch the whole world pass by on our computer and smartphone screens. The picture often isn’t pretty, and we would all do well to lift our heads up more often to see what’s happening right in front of us. In real life, as […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics

Welcome To The Town That Always Votes For White House Winner

The town in Indiana of Terre Haute is a mix of organized labor and university students, traditional values and growing immigrant communities. It has picked the president the last 15 elections.

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Geopolitics Ideas

Orban’s Law: When National Identity Is Warped By Fear Of The Other

Who are we? A referendum in Hungary raises fundamental questions in the West about how the fear of otherness turns culture into a weapon in the hands of populists.

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blog

Orban’s Law, National Identity As Fear

That disturbingly flexible phrase “fear of the other” appears to be driving electoral politics around the world right now. Perhaps the intellectual center can be found in central Europe, specifically Viktor Orban’s Hungary. Since taking office in 2010, the smooth-talking right-wing prime minister has been a singular voice for those who see the West as […]

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Geopolitics Migrant Lives

How Syrian Refugees In A Small Russian City Made It To School

NOGINSK — Knowledge Day falls on Sept. 1 and marks the traditional start of the school year in Russia. But for the children of Syrian refugees who live in Noginsk, a town of about 100,000 inhabitants that’s a 90-minute train ride from Moscow, it’s a day like any other. These refugee children can’t go to […]

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blog

Attacks In Poland For Speaking Foreign Languages

New signs from Poland that racism and xenophobia are on the rise. A Polish lecturer at the University of Warsaw, Jerzy Kochanowski, was beat up on a tram in Warsaw for speaking German to a professor from another university, Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza reports. An inebriated man near Kochanowski reportedly told him not to speak […]

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Eyes on the U.S.

Latino Pride Is Bigger Than Any Wall Trump Can Build

Donald Trump shows disdain for both Latinos in his own country, as well as some basic tenets of international relations.

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blog

Are Beggars In Iran Dressing Like Girls To Earn A Quick Buck?

TEHRAN — A councilwoman in Tehran, Fatemeh Daneshvar, said that a growing number of male beggars are dressing like females in the Iranian capital, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported last week. “Some of these beggars are Pakistani and some are dressed as girls, and of course the feminine beggars have increased,” Daneshvar said, […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Trump And The World

Joke’s On Us: Mexico Reacts To Trump Visit With Pena Nieto

A reviled U.S. presidential candidate visiting a very unpopular Mexican president. How did Donald Trump’s flash visit Wednesday to Mexico City look to the people and press south of the border? After the Republican nominee’s diatribes and insults against Mexicans and vows to build a “huge” wall, what was President Enrique Peña Nieto seeking by […]

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Ideas Society

The Burqa Has No Place In A Western Democracy

-OpEd- As I walk through central London, I see many women wearing burqas passing me by. And as I’ve always felt in that sort of situation, I was uncomfortable. Physically and morally uncomfortable. They say you’re not supposed to feel such things. Nor to write about them. What right, indeed, do I have to impose […]

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Migrant Lives Society

Glimpse Of A Gifted Refugee’s Life In A German High School

INGOLSTADT — Math is the first class of the day. Only two students, who are clearly aces at math, are raising their hands to answer the teacher’s questions. Almost everyone else is dozing off. But Mahmoud, who is seated in the first row, appears to be wide awake. He does not, however, raise his hand. […]

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blog

Terror In Germany, Russia’s Rio Relief, Shawshank Tree

SPOTLIGHT: TERROR REACHES GERMANY Though Germany has been at the center of Europe’s debate over refugees, it had largely been spared the kind of terrorist attacks that have struck neighboring France. But now, in the span of just a few days, Germany suddenly finds itself struggling to make sense of a string of violent attacks […]

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Geopolitics Society

What Brexit Means For Those Polish Immigrants In The UK

A decade ago, the “Polish plumber” became the symbol of British fears of immigrants coming in poorer Europe Union countries. After the UK’s referendum to pull out of the EU, uncertainty reigns for all.

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Geopolitics

Ahmed’s Story: From Syria To A South Korean Island

For Syrians able to escape the horrors of war, Europe is the preferred destination. But some have ventured farther afield. One 22-year-old refugee landed on Jeju island, a popular honeymoon spot off the coast of South Korea.

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blog

Hajj Boycott, Big Enchilada, Bleached Reef

SPOTLIGHT: IRAN TO BOYCOTT HAJJ PILGRIMAGE Tensions between Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia are once again threatening to escalate. The two archenemies are already entangled in proxy wars against each other, in Syria and Yemen, and diplomatic ties between the two have been cut since Saudi Arabia executed a Shia cleric at the beginning […]

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Eyes on the U.S.

History Lessons For Trump: When America Feared German Immigrants

Donald Trump’s ancestors left Germany for the U.S. with dreams of a better life. They faced longstanding fears about the “Germanization” of America.

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Economy Eyes on the U.S.

A Yogurt Story, When Immigrant Dreams Feed American Capitalism

Twenty years ago, Hamdi Ulukaya, a Kurdish shepherd born in Turkey, grew tired of eating nothing but yogurt, so he came down from the mountains to seek his fortune in New York. For 10 years, he lived the hard life of an immigrant, and over time, came to miss the very yogurt he had once […]

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blog

Chernobyl Anniversary, Failed Afghan Peace Talks, Mexican Photoshop

REMEMBERING CHERNOBYL Photo: Celestino Arce/ZUMA Memorial services are scheduled across Ukraine today, as the country commemorates the 30th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster that killed dozens and shot deadly clouds of radioactive particles into the atmosphere. CANADIAN JOURNALIST BEHEADED IN THE PHILIPPINES Government officials have confirmed the death of kidnapped Canadian journalist John Ridsdel […]

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Geopolitics Ideas Rue Amelot Syria Crisis

Syrian Lessons Close To Home, From Paris To Tennessee

PARIS — Our usual spot at Parc Sainte-Périne to plop our blanket and sports equipment for a few hours of recreational escape was already taken when we arrived on Saturday. A group of about 10 young men were sprawled out on the patch, enjoying the sunshine and talking among themselves — in Arabic, I noticed. […]

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Geopolitics Migrant Lives Society

A Dying Town In Sicily, Reborn With Immigrants

The village of Sutera was facing demographic doom as young people have been leaving for generations. Then locals started to wonder about those migrants coming to Italy.

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Geopolitics Migrant Lives

Refugee Lives At Risk Along The Balkan Route To Europe

On foot in the cold or crammed into run-down train cars, migrants face a long journey of long waits, endless security checks, and uncertain prospects. Up close along the Serbo-Macedonian Border.

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Ideas

The Niqab And Us — A Fateful Bus Ride In Frankfurt

FRANKFURT — It’s a Thursday morning on the No. 39 bus in Frankfurt, Germany. Suddenly, a migrant woman with an accent begins to complain loudly and aggressively about a woman wearing a niqab. “I don’t feel safe next to her,” she says to no one in particular. The other passengers remain silent, though one eventually […]

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Geopolitics

The Anti-Migrant “Eastern European Union” — With Orban As Emperor

Fed up of waiting for Brussels to act, countries in Eastern Europe and the Balkans are building an anti-migrant fortress bloc with Hungary’s Viktor Orbán as the architect.

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blog

Migrant Influx Pushing Germany To Learn Arabic

HAMBURG — Few will deny that the influx of migrants in recent months, mostly coming from Syria and other Arab countries, has shaken up German society. Reactions have ranged from pride in Germany’s ability to welcome refugees to outrage at the New Year’s Eve attacks against women by mobs of mostly North African men. But […]

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blog

Australia: A ‘Historic’ Ruling On Offshore Detention

Australia’s controversial policy of diverting immigrants to tiny Pacific Islands dominated the Australian media Thursday, after country’s highest court ruled it was legal for the government to fund and participate in offshore detention. The Sydney Morning Herald juxtaposed a photograph of an immigrant baby with the faces and votes of the High Court’s seven justices […]

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Geopolitics Migrant Lives

A Syrian Refugee Family Struggles To Start Anew In Austria

Six month later, a reporter is reconnected to a family who’d fled war in Deir ez-Zor, Syria. They wound up in a small village, where they are building a new life. Integration is not easy.

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blog

Austria To Set Migrant Ceiling

Austrian daily Salzburger Nachrichten poses the question “Sealed border?” on its front page Thursday, after the government announced plans to limit the number of migrants allowed in the country. An estimated 90,000 asylum seekers registered in 8-million-strong Austria last year, with tens of thousands more crossing the country for Germany. Austrian authorities revealed plans Wednesday […]

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Geopolitics Migrant Lives

Algerian Limbo: Black, Undocumented, Dreaming Of Europe

The North African country is increasingly a destination for sub-Saharian Africans looking to move on to Europe, even if many get stuck in Algeria with few rights or hopes for work.

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blog

Denmark Daily: New Sex Education For Asylum Seekers

“Asylum seekers will learn more about sexual norms,” reads the headline of the provocatively creative front page of Danish daily Jyllands-Posten. The national newspaper, based in western Denmark, reports that the Danish Red Cross wants to expand education programs for asylum seekers to include what it calls “adult education.” Anne la Cour Vågen, head of […]

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Geopolitics Ideas

Why Cologne Attacks Have Killed Taboo On Muslim Immigration

It has been considered not politically correct to talk about challenges of integrating Muslim immigrants in German society. That has changed forever after the New Year’s attacks on women in Cologne.

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Ideas Syria Crisis

ISIS, Children And The Sweet Little Horrors Of War

-OpEd- ROME — The year begins with the absurd destiny of two children, both tiny victims of a war that we’d rather not see. On the left is a screen-grab image of a shockingly young boy who is featured in the first propoganda video of 2016 by the butchers of ISIS. Like adults members of […]

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Geopolitics Migrant Lives

When Refugee Children Disappear

About 60,000 underage refugees have arrived in Germany this year without their parents. An alarming number are disappearing from custody. Experts warn they are vulnerable to both human traffickers and Islamists.

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