INTERNATIONAL

The Palestinians won't achieve statehood, but they will consign the 'peace process' to history. The Palestinians won't get a state this week. But they will prove – if they get enough votes in the General Assembly and if Mahmoud Abbas does not succumb to his characteristic grovelling in the face of US-Israeli power – that they are worthy of statehood. And …

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 16, 2011 (IPS) – "Syria is on fire," says one exasperated U.N. diplomat, "while the Security Council fiddles." The revolt and the bloody street demonstrations are nearly six months old but the U.N.'s most powerful political body continues to remain paralysed – unable and unwilling to help resolve the spreading crisis.  At last count, the number of …

At a time when our memories have been refreshed with what happened ten years ago on September 11, discussing political terrorism by the very country which is prosecuting the global war on terror is timely. The victims of the US political terrorism are the Palestinian people. They are unable to free themselves from the yoke of Israeli occupation largely because …

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 14, 2011 (IPS) – When a landmark world conference against racism adopted a historic political declaration in the South African port city of Durban back in 2001, the 62-page document covered virtually every conceivable act of racism, xenophobia and racial intolerance worldwide. The Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (DDPA) identified discrimination of all political stripes, including …

Having achieved regime change in Libya through military intervention, the Western powers and their regional allies now have Syria firmly in their sights as part of their plans for re-dividing the resource-rich Middle East. They are intent on using the six-month long protests and civil conflict that the Baathist regime of President Bashar al-Assad has brutally suppressed—at least 2,000 people are …