Opinion and Analysis Archive

29.12.2005 Two writers face trial and imprisonment in Europe for something they said or wrote. Both could be incarcerated - not for physically harming another person or for damaging property, but for uttering words that European states deem offensive. Brendan O'Neill objects.

27.12.2005 The George Bush administration has embarked on a new effort to pressure Iraq's militant Shiite party leaders to give up their control over internal security affairs that could lead the Shiites to reconsider their reliance on US troops, says Gareth Porter.

27.12.2005 Washington must announce that it will not tolerate further Israeli expansion in the Occupied Territories and will deduct from financial aid to Israel an amount equal to Israel's expenditures on settlements there and on construction and maintenance of the portion of the wall inside the West Bank, says Sarah Leah Whitson.

27.12.2005 UN Secretary-Generals, 1945-2006: 3 Europeans, 2 Africans, 1 Latin American, 1 Asian, 0 Women.

25.12.2005 Nalaka Gunawardene argues that governments in disaster-prone areas need stronger partnerships with the media to ensure that information gets rapidly where it is needed during emergencies.

23.12.2005 Is it an accident that the least corrupt countries in the world should also be the richest? The virtues of the most privileged should always be viewed with caution, argues Jeremy Seabrook.

22.12.2005 The restoration of the Cheonggyecheon River is the most spectacular symbol of Seoul’s shift from car-oriented city to one favouring transit, walking, and cycling.

21.12.2005 African and Asian journalists, reporting during the WTO's summit in Hong Kong, show how rules governing international trade have an impact on peoples’ lives.

20.12.2005 Butter mountains have melted away, but what of the future of agriculture in Europe?

19.12.2005 Bolivia's indigenous leader Evo Morales scorns US imperialism and promises social change, but will he be able to deliver after Sunday's election? Nick Buxton reports from La Paz.

16.12.2005 Despite the apparent success of the international negotiations on climate change, new approaches to reaching agreement on reducing carbon emissions in an equitable way are needed more than ever, say David Dickson and Johanna Wolf.

15.12.2005 The success of this week's trade talks in Hong Kong hinge on the willingness of the US, Japan and the European Union to cut their $1 billion a day agricultural subsidies. But, wonders Mark Engler, is market access really the answer to poverty?

13.12.2005 The press, environmental groups and politicians all agree that Montreal is a major step forward in tackling climate change. But Mark Lynas argues that it is barely a first step that will make no measurable difference to either the rate or magnitude of global warming.

12.12.2005 Hong Kong may consolidate the World Trade Organisation as the engine of global trade liberalisation, or it may prove to be the stake that is driven through the heart of this profoundly anti-people organisation and finishes it off, permanently, says Walden Bello.



Answers to migration questions at the top of the page:
* US, 35m, and the Russian Federation, 13.3m
* Mexico, $16bn a year; India, $9.9bn; The Philippines, $8.5bn
* Pakistan, with just over 1 million

08.12.2005 In Botswana, hundreds of Bushmen have been forcibly evicted from their diamond-rich land. Kalahari tribesman and ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’ winner Roy Sesana talks about his people’s threatened future.

07.12.2005 Elderly widows in northern Ghana often find themselves made scapegoats for life's tragedies, writes Jeevan Vasagar for the Guardian.

06.12.2005 The Millennium Development Goals will not be met without the participation of local organisations - even with more aid, debt relief and open markets, argues David Satterthwaite.

04.12.2005 Could peace unravel?...NGO coordination in the south...How peace risks marginalising women...The world's greatest humanitarian transport challenge: more than 30 articles look at the immediate problems and prospects for war-shattered Sudan.
* Gender- based violence still rampant in Darfur, say aid agencies

02.12.2005 The United States is not the only reason the world is losing the battle against AIDS — but it's the biggest, argues David Bryden.

01.12.2005 Brazilian descendents of runaway slaves, known as quilombos, are hoping a new law will finally give them the right over their own land.