Only a madman would have predicted, even nine months ago, that Egyptian TV’s ramadan special, this year, would be the trial of Hosni Mubarak. It’s a compelling spectacle, to be sure, the erstwhile epitome of the Arab “strongman” now laid low on his sickbed inside a courtroom cage, forced to answer for the violence unleashed by his …
Dictatorships
Weekend Violence Increases Fears Of Libya’s Opposition Splitting Apart
It didn’t take the prescient gifts of Nostradamus to foresee that Thursday’s killing of Abdel Fattah Younes –commander of Libya’s anti-Gaddafi rebel forces–would exacerbate the tensions and divisions already rife within the opposition’s leadership. But it is a little surprising just how swiftly the suspicions of treason and …
Mysterious Assassination Of Libyan Rebel Commander Threatens Further Division Of Anti-Gaddafi Forces
Details surrounding Thursday’s assassination of the commander of Libyan rebel forces remained confused on Friday, though one thing does seem clear amid the uncertainty: the killing isn’t good news for insurgents battling Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, or the Western nations backing their effort. Indeed, initial reaction to the death of …
China’s Uighur Problem: One Man’s Ordeal Echoes the Plight of a People
Who is Ershidin Israil? An Islamic terrorist? A brave journalist? Or a Chinese spy? This much appears to be clear. In 2009 after riots convulsed Xinjiang, the tumultuous northwestern region of China that is home to the ethnic Uighur people, the 38-year-old teacher decamped to neighboring Kazakhstan. Ershidin’s friends and relatives …
New Developments On Libya Bring New Confusion About An Outcome
Another day in Europe, more mixed messages on just how Western allies in the NATO-led Libyan air intervention plan to end a campaign that has now officially attained “slog” status. Just hours after comments Tuesday from British officials saying they’d accept embattled leader Muammar Gaddafi remaining free in post-war Libya so long …
The West Slowly Backing Away From the Libyan Military Operation
It’s getting harder and harder to believe there’ll eventually be a resolution to Libya’s civil war that will allow anyone to claim Muammar Gaddafi lost to rebel forces—or was humbled by members of the NATO-led coalition waging air strikes against him. Indeed, it’s becoming increasingly clear as the weeks rush by that …
Will Egypt’s Military Hijack its Revolution?
Turkey, with its pluralistic democracy and booming economy under the stewardship of a moderate Islamist party, is hailed as the model for post-Mubarak Egypt by many leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood. But the latest initiatives by the 25-man military junta that has ruled since February’s ouster of President Hosni Mubarak suggests that …
Who Will Chip in to Help Six Million Hungry North Koreans?
It’s safe to say that prioritizing — at least in a way the rest of the world can relate to — has never been one of the hallmarks of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. While the nation’s International Olympic Committee was lobbying last week to co-host the 2018 Winter Olympics with the South, North Korean citizens were scouring the …
From the Magazine: Red State — Why China’s Leaders Are Reviving Maoism
Twelve-year-old Chen Le is a typical Chinese kid. He loves flying paper airplanes, plays Ping-Pong and dreams of becoming a scientist. And he aims one day to join the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) so, as Chen puts it, “I can puff out my chest and say I am a party member.” The public school that Chen attends in China’s southwestern …
From the Magazine: The Rise of Moderate Islam
As we wait for the Salafi leader Kamal Habib at the Cairo Journalists’ Union, a sudden panic comes over me. I’ve just noticed that my translator, Shahira Amin, an Egyptian journalist, is wearing a sleeveless top and that her hair is uncovered. In my experience, Salafis, adherents of a very strict school of Islam, take a dim view of such …
Is France Changing Its Tune as the Libya War Drags On?
There’s currently a lot of activity, a good measure of confusion, but no real sign of progress in France towards an eventual resolution to the NATO-led intervention in Libya that Paris was instrumental in launching. And it’s against that backdrop of somewhat chaotic operation slog that the French parliament is being asked Tuesday …
Marx, Bonaparte and the Egyptian Revolution: Another Friday in Tahrir Square
Karl Marx’s 19th century political journalism holds up a lot better than do his general theories of capitalism, socialism and history. Indeed, the father of modern communism may well have nailed the nature of the 2011 revolution in Egypt in The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, a tract written by the German in 1852. And Friday’s …
Is China’s Ex-Leader Jiang Zemin Dead? Local Censors Don’t Want Any Speculation
Is he or isn’t he? Around 11 pm on July 5, China’s blogosphere began trading in rumors that Jiang Zemin, the former leader of the People’s Republic, had died. By midnight local searches on this topic had become very popular. But within half an hour, the heavy hand of China’s censors descended. Chinese language searches for …