INTERNATIONAL

Both The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post report today that the Obama administration is planning to exploit the disorder from the civil war in Yemen by dramatically escalating a CIA-led drone bombing campaign.  In one sense, this is nothing new.  Contrary to false denials, the U.S., under the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner, has been bombing Yemen for the last two years, including one attack using cluster …

Russia and NATO have an open channel for talks, but there are still fundamental points in which they have trouble seeing eye-to-eye. From how to handle Libya and Syria through to missile defence, the hurdles are clear. To see if that might change any time soon, we can talk to NATO's Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

When Britain lost control of Egypt in 1956, Prime Minister Anthony Eden said he wanted the nationalist president Gamal Abdel Nasser “destroyed … murdered … I don’t give a damn if there’s anarchy and chaos in Egypt”. Those insolent Arabs, Winston Churchill had urged in 1951, should be driven “into the gutter from which they should never have emerged”.  The language …

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 9, 2011 (IPS) – A resolution inspired by Western nations critical of civilian killings in politically-beleaguered Syria is facing threats from two veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council: Russia and China. If and when the resolution is adopted by the 15-member Council, perhaps next week, it will be diluted to avoid the customary call for economic …

We have an obligation to every last victim of this illegal aggression because all of this carnage has been done in our name. Since World War II, 90% of the casualties of war are unarmed civilians. 1/3 of them children. Our victims have done nothing to us. From Palestine to Afghanistan to Iraq to Somalia to wherever our next target …

  Serb Gen. Ratko Mladic is accused of killing at least five times more civilians than Osama bin Laden, yet for years no one seemed in any hurry to find the “Butcher of Sarajevo.” Mladic managed to hide in plain sight in Serbia for 16 years, no doubt with aid from the Serb Secret Police, military intelligence, and his old …