They come from advertising agencies and the military, but have scant political experience. Eastern Ukraine’s new strongmen have one thing in common: They’re all “Friends of Vladimir.”
Category: Geopolitics
An experiment in the Amazon forest will test a hypothesis that higher levels of CO2, due to climate change, can avert the drought and high temperatures it was supposed to cause.
LVIV — There’s a commotion in Room 312 of Lviv’s social services department, where over 50 Crimean Tatars are crowded into the small space — families with children, older married couples, students. All of them fled Crimea in March and headed for this western Ukrainian city. They’re now in the concrete block near St. George’s […]
It’s the look on the faces of mothers that Sarah Lawan finds so painful. And when the 19-year-old walks by them in the Nigerian village of Chibok, the mothers frequently break into tears. Lawan, who spoke with the Associated Press, is one of the 53 girls who got away from the Islamist extremist group Boko […]
An Aleppo ear-nose-and-throat specialist had to suddenly face the treating of war’s horrific injuries, especially after a government barrel-bomb offensive began there in December.
The Russian leader’s propaganda machine attracts all sorts of extremist movements in the European Union, on both sides of the political spectrum.
France’s May 1954 defeat in this battle in north Vietnam marked the beginning of the end of centuries of Western colonialism. A visit to the battle scene that should have been a warning to others.
-OpEd- PARIS — Before the end of 2014, China will have become the world’s largest economy. For the first time since 1872 — when China overtook Britain — the United States will not top the list. This news amid data published last week by the International Comparison Program, a respected institution hosted by the World […]
Using rumors and references to the Soviet past, the Russian media propaganda bears a clear responsibility in the Ukraine crisis.
Turkey’s current prime minister has big plans, both for himself and the very way his country is governed.
Since Crimea became part of Russia, China is the first foreign country looking to invest. In light of Moscow’s standoff with the West, this is about much more than money.
CAIRO — A student in a pre-kindergarten classroom at one of Cairo’s suburban schools is anticipating her impending birthday. When asked how old she will be, the girl begins to count up to four on her fingers, but then looks at her hand in dismay and quickly puts it down. Only “bad people” make that […]
Newsmaking images that caught our eye…
MOSCOW — Russia’s deteriorating relationship with the West could lead to a complete restructuring of Internet policy in the country, Kommersant has learned. The Kremlin is currently holding internal discussions about instituting complex methods for tightening the control over Internet access providers. This means filtering content at all levels of content, forbidding the registration of […]
Here’s what words have been making news…
A decade after Poland became part of the European Union, Gazeta Wyborcza sent a reporter on a train from Warsaw to Berlin to take stock of the transformation among Polish passengers. WARSAW — “There are only two vivid and well-maintained places in my native Wloclawek (a city in northern Poland with a population over 100,000): […]
A military pact between Manila and Washington sealed on Obama’s trip to Asia is giving Beijing the jitters.
SÂO PAULO — The Chinese government is already making its first plans to celebrate the centenary of two momentous events in the country’s history. Seven years from now, in 2021, the nation will mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China. Then in 2049, the country will celebrate the creation […]
A teenage girl living in one of Syria’s besieged cities shares her stories of life in a time of war. She dreams of getting an education, but the ongoing violence has destroyed local schools.
The current President of the Republic mulls whether to stand against his old ally Prime Minister Erdogan in upcoming direct presidential elections. Turkey’s political future is at stake.
SEOUL — Kim Ju-hwan is headed toward an uncertain future. The 24-year old university student was sentenced to a year in jail for refusing to serve in South Korea’s military. As a Jehovah’s Witness, Kim says he’s morally opposed to war. “Based on what I learned in the Bible, I’m a conscientious objector. There’s a verse that says love your enemy. That’s my belief, and it’s how I’m trying to lead my life.” All able-bodied South Korean are required to serve in the armed forces for about two years. But for conscientious objectors like Kim Ju-hwan, there is no alternative […]
KOSTIANTYNIVKA — It was still early on Monday morning in the east Ukrainian city of Kostiantynivka when the city administration and police station were visited by 20 weapons-bearing men wearing camouflage uniforms. Within a few minutes they had control of the seat of power in this city of 95,000 people, and it wasn’t long before […]
An accusation, later withdrawn, by French cosmetics giant Yves Rocher stands at the center of the case of against celebrated anti-Kremlin blogger Alexei Navalny. Who’s pulling the strings?
Reconciliation between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority has angered Israeli leaders. But Israel’s own economy can’t afford a strangling of the Gaza and West Bank economies.
Before Kiev or Kharviv, Moscow’s new cold war with the West meant would-be American parents were banned from adopting Russian orphans. The effect can only now be tallied.
Categories
The Un-United States of Ukraine
Ukrainian politicians are united on the idea of more regional autonomy, but they seem to draw a red line on the question of federalism. That, they fear, would play right into Moscow’s hands.
QUINGGOU — It was back in the mid-1990s, amid China’s major economic reforms. Liu Changxia and other men in the village of Qinggou felt it was “time to leave home” because the farm wasn‘t bringing in enough and their families needed to be provided for. The whole country was talking of nothing but economic growth. […]
MUNICH — In many places in the northern Alps, the winter sports season is already over before Easter. Some view the mild winter as a kind of foretaste of climate change, but experts warn against reading too much into any single year’s weather. “What was extreme is that the weather this winter on the whole […]
-OpEd- PARIS — From Vichy France to the Algerian War, the demand that France “open the archives” resonates every time the country struggles with one of its “pasts that don’t pass.” Twenty years after the Rwandan genocide of the Tutsi people, researchers are once again singing this refrain, especially in light of the provocative declarations […]
In Sloviansk, masked men storm homes of Roma families and agitators blame the Jews.
Though denied by Putin, there is evidence emerging that investment projects elsewhere in Russia are being held up in order to divert funds to projects in newly annexed Crimea.
Did you notice that the Geneva deal on Ukraine made no mention of Crimea? Actually it may have been an unspoken license for Russia to continue to pursue control of the rest of the country.
As President Obama arrives on an Asian tour, yet another sign that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants to undo Japan’s pacifist policies that are a vestige of World War II.
MOSCOW — Amidst the showdown over Ukraine, the United States tried in vain to pressure China into joining the international sanctions against Russia. Moscow officials have said that while other countries were trying to tie a noose of sanctions around Russia’s neck, China has unexpectedly turned out to be an “absolutely solid partner.” And yet […]
It may be a new weapon to strike fear in store clerks around the world: a grocer in Colombia has died days after two individuals injected him with an unknown poison outside his store, in the district of Facatativá west of Bogotá. The Colombian daily El Espectador reported this past weekend that authorities had not […]
Some see signs that the world’s tectonic plates are positioned in such a way to set off “the mother of all quakes.” Seismology has made advances, but is still not a perfect science.
As part of a collaboration between Syria Deeply and Rookie, we’re publishing the memoirs of a teenage girl living in the midst of Syria’s war. Marah, as she’s chosen to be known, lives in a city under siege. She was 15 years old when the uprising began. This is the first in her series of articles. My city was once magnificent. In spring, it bloomed. We used to wake up to the sound of birds chirping and to the fragrant scent of flowers. Today, spring is here again. But what kind of spring is this? We now wake up to […]
PRO-RUSSIAN PROTESTERS REFUSE GENEVA DEAL Pro-Russian protesters in Eastern Ukraine have rejected the deal reached yesterday in Geneva, refusing to leave the official buildings they have been occupying over the past week in more than 10 cities, the BBC reports. Alexander Gnezdilov, a spokesman for the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, said that they would only […]
MOSCOW — The same picture that we saw at the end of 2013 in Kiev has now simply moved to Donetsk, Kharkiv, Luhansk and Mykolaiv. Buildings stormed, barricaded streets, people in masks and flags flying. The differences, at first glance, appear insignificant. Before, there was just one center of the protests — Kiev — whereas […]
Infighting among Syrian rebel leaders and radicalization of certain groups are dissuading private donors in Kuwait and elsewhere in the Gulf, who’d backed the Syrian opposition since 2011.