March 2019 marks the 16th anniversary of the onslaught of the war on Iraq. The US-NATO led invasion of Iraq started on 20 March 2003 on the pretext that Iraq possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). This month we are also commemorating the Vietnam War launched on March 8, 1965 following the adoption by the US…
The marathon talks between the US officials and the Taliban representatives at Doha through a 16-day period ending yesterday can be seen as a defining moment in the endgame in Afghanistan. Both the US special representative Zalmay Khalilzad and the Taliban have signalled that progress has been achieved in the negotiations. Khalilzad has tweeted: “The…
This year’s African American History Month takes on an added significance due to the fact that it represents the 400th anniversary of the beginning of slavery in the British colony of Virginia, in an area now known as the United States. In acknowledgement of this anniversary, the West African government of Ghana has made an offer…
The German soldiers of World War II have often been portrayed, both during the war and in the decades since, as simple-minded, unimaginative and brutish. Hollywood movies and popular U.S. television shows have for years contrasted confident, able and “cool” American GIs with slow-witted, cynical and cruel Germans. “Propaganda is an inescapable ingredient of modern…
Forty years ago, the Iranian revolution sent a shockwave through the Middle East, overthrowing the Western client, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and bringing to power the Islamic regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. While Iran now poses the biggest challenge to Western power in the Middle East, British relations with Islamic Iran were not always so…
France has once again been the scene of the “gilet jaunes” (yellow vests) demonstrations against the worsening social conditions of workers under the neo-liberal policies of La Republique en Marche government of President Emmanuel Macron. Protests on January 26 attracted tens of thousands continuing the 11 weeks of disturbances where many have been injured, hundreds…
