Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani has addressed an audience of Islamic scholars in the Indian city of Hyderabad, during a wide ranging speech touching on pan-eastern resistance to western neo-imperialism, inter-sectarian unity among the wider Muslim Ummah (community) and the importance of Islam as a force of compassion and social moderation in modern society. Rouhani is …
Continue reading Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani Assures Pakistan…While in India
It seems as if the political temperature in the Indian Ocean region is not going to ‘settle down’, as we predicted a week ago, but has already started to rise. That is demonstrated by the worsening situation in the Maldives, which is taking on the character of an internal political crisis, although in this case …
A sharp, geoeconomic shift took place last month in Santiago, Chile at the second ministerial meeting of a forum grouping China and the 33-member Community of Latin American and Caribbean States. The Chinese Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, told his audience that the world’s second-largest economy and Latin America should join efforts to support free trade. This was …
Continue reading China’s ‘New Silk Roads’ Reach Latin America
The events in Syria on the eve of the Congress of National Dialogue in Sochi, the war against Russia on the diplomatic front, the operation of the Turkish Army in Kurdish Afrin and the cleaning up of the Jabat al-Nusra detachements, banned in Russia, in Idlib attract more media attention than anything else happening in …
The battle against Islamic State in Syria may be nearing its end, but the conflict in this war-torn country seems far from over. Competing factions and old rivalries have created a complicated, uncertain future for Syria. With so many different warring parties wrestling for control of Syria’s fate, it seems prudent to review the conflict’s …
Continue reading ISIS Is Almost Gone But the Fighting Continues: Who’s Still in Syria?
Once upon a time in the United States there was a general perception that organizations like the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were both apolitical and high-minded, existing only to calmly and professionally promote the safety and security of the nation. Directors of both organizations often retired quietly without …
Countless trillions of dollars are stashed in scores of tax havens worldwide – black holes of hidden wealth, much of it ill-gotten. Largely tax-free, they’re controlled by Wall Street and other powerful financial interests, part of a global tax injustice system, governments complicit with super-wealthy individuals and financial institutions managing their money. Taking advantage are …
A controversy surrounds the new Polish law just signed by Polish President Andrzej Duda that criminalizes Holocaust denial and Holocaust trivialization but also extends the prohibition to anyone who ascribes Nazi atrocities to the “Polish government or Polish nation.” Although I’m passionately opposed to all such efforts to muzzle open discussion (and have paid a …
Wall Street is bracing for a potential shake-up as China is set to launch its first-ever crude oil futures contract late March at the Shanghai Futures Exchange. The move, which had been laid out in 2012 but faced delays over possible market turbulence, could represent a bold step forward in China’s rise as an economic …
Continue reading Will Petrodollar Give Way to Petroyuan? China Makes First Move this March
