How long will it take the United Nations Security Council to answer the Palestinian application for membership in the global organization? “Technical procedures require about a month,” Mahmoud Abbas replies when the question comes up in Strasbourg, where the president of the Palestinian Authority has come to make the most of the time …
Spy Swap: the Reality Show Washington and Havana Have Yet to Learn
During the Cold War, spy swaps were seemingly commonplace. Iconic, in fact: countless movies of the era use scenes of spooks and dissidents being exchanged at Checkpoint Charlie. And we still do it: just last year, the U.S. sent 10 arrested Russian agents home while Russia in turn let go four prisoners accused of espionage whose …
Couch Potato Briefing: Ten Years of War in Afghanistan
The return of the Couch Potato Briefing marks the tenth anniversary of the invasion of Afghanistan.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwglCgW0H8M&feature=player_embedded]
Kandahar
The International Crisis Group released in August a comprehensive report detailing the continued failure of President Hamid Karzai’s government …
With All Eyes on Apple, It’s Easy to Forget Afghanistan
Every day, Mother Jones, an American magazine, publishes a photograph from a war zone or military base. The pictures, taken in places like Ramadi, Iraq, or Kabul, Afghanistan, are labeled with the date, the location and a bracing tagline: “We’re still at war.” Indeed, today marks 10 years since the beginning of the U.S.-led war in …
China Mourns Steve Jobs. But Can It Produce Its Own Tech Visionary?
Less than a decade ago, I was going through airport security in southwestern China. The airport guy took a look at my laptop and began to chuckle. “Pingguo,” he said, pointing to the bitten fruit on the cover, “Apple.” What was my computer doing emblazoned with a healthy snack? What would these crazy foreigners think of …
Can a Young Prime Minister Reform Jamaica’s Old Criminality?
When Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding announced his resignation last month, the only surprise was that it took him so long. Since last year, Golding, leader of the Jamaica Labor Party (JLP), has been embroiled in one of the worst scandals to hit Jamaica since it won independence five decades ago. His government faces accusations …
A Blow to Europe’s Far-Right: Denmark Reshapes Its Immigration Policies
When the Liberal-Conservative coalition led by Lars Lokke Rasmussen came to power in Denmark in 2001, it relied on support from the right-wing and staunchly anti-immigrant Danish People’s Party (DPP). As a result of that union, Denmark passed some of the strictest immigration and asylum laws in Europe. Among other things, its …
On Either Side of the Atlantic, Protesters Find Power in Vagueness
Their dilemma isn’t new, isn’t easy, and may eventually require tough choices that will impact the very existence of their movement: How can the growing ranks of the motley anti-Wall Street protest prod an entire system to change when most of the U.S.’s economic establishment, political class, and a significant portion of its …
Mogadishu Bombing Delivers a Slap to Turkey
The truck bomb attack that killed more than 100 people in Mogadishu on Tuesday was a not entirely unfamiliar horror for the residents of a city locked in a permanent state of fratricidal warfare for two decades, but it highlighted the scale of a foreign policy challenge recently accepted by the government of Turkey.
Prime Minister …
How the U.S. Has Gone Soft
In his latest column for TIME, Fareed Zakaria rebuffs conservative fury at President Barack Obama for having suggested that the U.S. has gone a bit “soft” and lost its competitive edge. As others have before him, Zakaria trots out concrete stats showing how U.S. education and performance standards have slipped and how the nation lags, …
For Chinese Nobel Laureate’s Wife, Peace Prize Means Silence
On Friday the Norwegian Nobel Committee will announce the 2011 Peace Prize laureate. Bookmakers Paddy Power, which correctly predicted Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo’s win last year, currently list Sima Samar, chairperson of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, as favorite, at 5/4. She is followed by Burmese opposition …
Does Qatar Share the West’s Agenda in Libya?
When Qatar took a lead in the military campaign to oust Libya’s Colonel Gaddafi, Western officials gushed with praise for the tiny Gulf State punching way above its weight. The nation of just 2 million sent six Mirage fighter jets to lend an all-important Arab presence in the air campaign; it cajoled the Arab League into supporting …
Ivory Coast: Human Rights Watch Documents Massacres of Civilians
A terrific video for TIME by Peter di Campo shines a light on the massacres that took place in the Ivory Coast this past year, as competing militias loyal to sparring presidential candidates Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara both wreaked havoc among the country’s civilian population. Ouattara, who was deemed to have won an …