Regions

For those of you with wanderlust, this Sunday’s New York Times travel section has a feature on Malawi, which it calls “an Africa in microcosm,” a concept I reject inasmuch as it essentializes and thus reduces Africa, as if it is possible to cull Africa down to one tourist-friendly microcosm. There is already too much […]

Jacob Zuma is now President of South Africa. For all of the gnashing of teeth in recent months, for all of the resentments, petty and substantial, Zuma has ascended to the country’s highest office. And if his inaugural address provides any indication, he is aware of the responsibilities before him. Or at least he is […]

Tristan McConnell has an article at Global Post showing the ongoing adjustment of a survivor from Rwanda’s 1994 genocide. Julienne Uwimana’s is a story about survival and overcoming the most unimaginable tragedies but also about how the overcoming is a lifelong process. She has devoted herself to helping others, especially to orphans, who have helped […]

The global economic meltdown is creating what an IRIN Report is calling “crisis upon crisis” whereby countries already dealing with difficult situations are having those situations multiplied. It should come as no surprise that the most vulnerable states might suffer the most during a worldwide downturn.

Two Arctic species – the two which happen to be the cutest and cuddliest, the poster children for Arctic wildlife conservation movements – have been in the news lately: polar bears and seals. I’ll cover the seal issue in my next post. Polar Bears To the disappointment of environmentalists, the Department of the Interior will uphold […]

If you want a pretty good example of the resource curse at work, let this one roll around in your brain for a minute: Nigeria is suffering a potentially crippling fuel scarcity. That’s right: oil rich Nigeria, which has Africa’s largest population and theoretically (and so far just about only only theoretically) ought to be […]

The World Bank, via IRIN, has a report listing the ten African nations most vulnerable to rising sea levels. The list includes: Mozambique, Madagascar, Nigeria, Mauritania, Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, Cote D’Ivoire, Gabon, South Africa, and Somalia.

The African Export-Import Bank (Afrexim) has granted Zimbabwe an additional $250 million line of credit to help the country with its on going economic restructuring and reconstruction. This would seem to be a sign that in some circles, at least, there is a modicum of faith that Zimbabwe has stepped back from the brink even […]

Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer deconstructs the ten-year truce deal offered by Hamas leader Khalid Meshal in an interview earlier this week with the New York Times. He asserts that the ceasefire would only serve to permit Hamas to rearm itself and gain momentum to eventually rid the Middle East of Israel, a staple in the […]

Renewable energy plan ready for government approval China’s new plan for renewable energy development is finalized and waiting for government approval, according to the State Administration of Energy (SAE). The new energy blueprint calls for total investment in renewable energy projects of more than 2 trillion yuan ($293.3 billion). Priority will be given to wind […]

It seems that president Zardari’s trip to Washington has been a success, even though, before he arrived there, there were rumors of tension between Washington and Islamabad.  Well, there is some truth to the rumors of serious differences between Pakistan and the U.S., so eloquently described by Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister (no relation) […]

On March 26, at a meeting in Almaty of state-sponsored environmentalists and ecologists, the Syr Darya was declared too polluted to even be used for irrigation in Kazakhstan. By the time the river weaves through the other Central Asian states, including through the Ferghana Valley, the river has accumulated the runoff from massive amounts of […]