By Matthew Berger

LONDON, Jun 30 (IPS) - Governments and interest groups around the world followed the U.S. House of Representatives’ vote Friday on the first U.S. policy to limit the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. They were especially interested in Europe, where a system similar to the bill’s cap-and-trade scheme already exists and where EU countries agreed last December to tough emissions targets.
(more…)

By HELENE COOPER and MARC LACEY - The New York Times

June 30, 2009 - WASHINGTON — President Obama on Monday strongly condemned the ouster of Honduras’s president as an illegal coup that set a “terrible precedent” for the region, as the country’s new government defied international calls to return the toppled president to power and clashed with thousands of protesters.
(more…)

By Joaquin Roy (*)

BRASILIA, Jun (IPS) It is said that a French politician, asked whether Brazil had a good future, answered with scorn and knowing irony, “Brazil has always had, still has, and will always have a magnificent future.” It would seem that the country has suffered for decades under this sort of stigma.
(more…)

News Analysis by The New York Times and The Washington Post

Rare Hemisphere Unity in Assailing Honduran Coup

By SIMON ROMERO - The New York Times

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — With their condemnation on Sunday of the coup ousting President Manuel Zelaya in Honduras, governments in the Western Hemisphere from across the ideological spectrum found a rare issue around which they could swiftly arrive at unity.
(more…)

Por Fabiana Frayssinet

RÍO DE JANEIRO, jun (IPS) - Con más de 90 por ciento de su nueva flota automovilística con motores impulsados indistintamente a gasolina o biodisel, el gobierno de Brasil emprende ahora una nueva carrera tecnológica. Se trata de los vehículos eléctricos.
(more…)

By Gareth Porter

EXCLUSIVE-PART 5*

WASHINGTON, Jun 26 (IPS) - In early November 1998, Louis Freeh sent an FBI team off to observe Saudi secret police officials interviewing eight Shi’a detainees from behind a one-way mirror at the Riyadh detention centre. He planned to use the Shi’a testimony to show that Iran was behind the bombing.
(more…)

By Joseph E. Stiglitz

This article appeared in the July 13, 2009 edition of The Nation.

This is not only the worst global economic downturn of the post-World War II era; it is the first serious global downturn of the modern era of globalization. America’s financial markets failed to do what they should have done–manage risk and allocate capital well–and these failures have had a major impact all over the world. Globalization, too, did not work the way it was supposed to. It helped spread the consequences of the failures of US financial markets around the world. September 11, 2001, taught us that with globalization not only do good things travel more easily across borders; bad things do too. September 15, 2008, has reinforced that lesson.
(more…)

By Gareth Porter*

EXCLUSIVE-PART 3

WASHINGTON, Jun 24 (IPS) - In March 1997, FBI Director Louis Freeh got what he calls in his memoirs “the first truly big break in the case": the arrest in Canada of one of the Saudi Hezbollah members the Saudis accused of being the driver of the getaway car at Khobar Towers.
(more…)

By Greg Grandin*

This article originally appeared on TomDispatch.

June 23, 2009. The empire ends with a pullout. Not, as many supposed a few years ago, from Iraq. There, as well as in Afghanistan, we are mulishly staying the course, come what may, trapped in the biggest of all the “too-big-to-fail” boondoggles. But from Detroit.
(more…)

Osvaldo León *

On June 13, just after midnight, the United States produced the so-called “analog blackout,” by which all of the nation’s television stations stopped using the analog signal and gave way to exclusively digital transmission.

Presenting this change as a new technological leap forward (similar to the switch from black and white to color), the hype has framed digital TV primarily as merchandise, a spectacle that did not fail to dazzle Latin America. Yet far from being a mere technical matter, it represents for our countries a serious possibility to advance the democratization of communication.
(more…)

By Gareth Porter

EXCLUSIVE-PART 2 (*)

WASHINGTON, Jun 23 (IPS) - In the last week of October 1996, the Saudi secret police, the Mabahith, gave David Williams, the FBI’s assistant special agent in charge of counter-terrorism issues, what they said were summaries of the confessions obtained from some 40 Shi’a detainees.
(more…)

John Boonstra - in UN Dispatch

June 22, 2009. Excuse me if I find some irony in Ethiopia declining the Somali government’s request to send troops, when all indicators point to the likelihood that Ethiopia already sent some of its troops “reconnaissance missions” over the border weeks ago. (Not to mention the irony of Somalia inviting back the very military presence that its citizens railed against for over two years.)
(more…)

By Gareth Porter*

EXCLUSIVE-PART1

WASHINGTON, Jun 22 (IPS) - On Jun. 25, 1996, a massive truck bomb exploded at a building in the Khobar Towers complex in Khobar, Saudi Arabia, which housed U.S. Air Force personnel, killing 19 U.S. airmen and wounding 372.
(more…)

Josep Xercavins i Valls *

“The Conference on the crisis: a key moment for the future of the UN” and/or “The silence of the powerful media about what is happening at the UN”

In a few days the “UN Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and Its Impact on Development” will take place in the United Nations Headquarters in New York, from 24 to 26 June 2009.
(more…)

Analysis by Zoltán Dujisin

SEOUL, Jun 18 (IPS) - Ever since being elected as President in 2008, conservative Lee-Myung-bak has pursued a hard-line policy towards North Korea, with the country’s left also blaming him for recent tensions in the peninsula.

Criticising previous left-wing presidents for being idealistic, conservatives say the policy of appeasement has brought no results.
(more…)

Josep Xercavins i Valls *

“La Conferencia sobre la crisis: un momento clave para el futuro de la ONU” y/o “Los medios poderosos de comunicación callan acerca de lo que sucede en la ONU”

Estamos a unos muy pocos días de que empiece en la sede central de la ONU en Nueva York la “Conferencia sobre la crisis financiera y económica mundial y sus impactos sobre el desarrollo”, que tendrá lugar del 24 al 26 de Junio.
(more…)

By Katie Mattern

WASHINGTON, Jun (IPS) - Gaza, South Africa and Thailand are among the world’s worst places to be a refugee, according to the latest annual World Refugee Survey released here Wednesday by the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI).

The survey, which was issued in advance of World Refugee Day Jun. 20, found that the number of refugees had dropped modestly worldwide in the past year – from 14 million to 13.6 million, according to USCRI.
(more…)

By Maurice Isserman

This article appeared in the June 29, 2009 edition of The Nation.

On October 9, 1967, a Bolivian army communiqué from La Paz announced that Ernesto “Che” Guevara, the Argentine-born Cuban revolutionary comandante turned itinerant guerrilla, had been hunted down by soldiers and killed in battle. The New York Times responded editorially, and with evident satisfaction, that if the report proved true, “as now seems probable,” then “a myth as well as a man has been laid to rest.” It was not the Times’s most accurate prediction.
(more…)

By Jacques Diouf (*)

ROME, Jun (IPS) The World Grain Forum that took place in Saint Petersburg June 6-7 is one in a series of high-level meetings devoted to food and agriculture this year. Such meetings -including the G8 agriculture ministers gathering in Treviso last April and FAO’s conference on How to Feed the World in 2050 next October in Rome- show that powerful momentum is building for resolving outstanding food insecurity issues and establishing a new global agricultural order that can finally ensure that everyone on earth has enough to eat.
(more…)

ANSA

Interview in leading daily sparks Berlusconi’s reaction

(ANSA) - Rome, June 17 - Premier Silvio Berlusconi blasted as ‘’trash'’ an interview published by leading Italian daily Corriere della Sera on Thursday which alleged that women were paid to attend parties in his Rome and Sardinian homes.

‘’Once again, the papers are full of trash and falsehoods. I will not be swayed by these aggressions and will continue to work for the good of the country,'’ the premier said when asked about the report.
(more…)

By Joao Pedro Stedile (*)

SAN PAOLO, Jun (IPS) In the 250-year history of industrial capitalism, there have been numerous cyclical crises, at least three of them global and systemic, including this one. In the preceding crises, capitalists always introduced measures to repair the system and restart the cycle of expansion and capital formation.
(more…)

Norman Girvan *

Prime Minister Bruce Golding of Jamaica is reported as having expressed concern about ‘a number of things’ that are ‘destabilising and threatening the existence of Caricom’. In particular he believes that the political integration being pursued by Trinidad and a number of countries in the Eastern Caribbean may be ‘commendable’, but is ‘to the detriment to the deepening and strengthening of Caricom’ (Jamaica Observer June 10, 2009).
(more…)

By Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 15 (IPS) - The global economic crisis, which has pushed millions more into extreme poverty, is threatening to have a devastating impact on the health of women and children.

A new study, released Monday, says the most “elusive” of the U.N.’s eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are the ones relating to health: reducing child mortality (Goal 4), improving maternal health (Goal 5) and combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases (Goal 6).
(more…)

Posted by Betsy Reed - The Notion (The Nation Blogs)

Just recently, things were looking up for socialism. In April, a much-discussed Rasmussen poll reported that only 53 percent of Americans expressed a preference for capitalism. The poll didn’t define either system, so one could surmise that the right’s desperate strategy of branding a popular Democratic president as a “socialist” had backfired: If Obama’s a socialist, then a good number of the 69 percent of Americans who viewed the President favorably were apparently ready to sign up. Perhaps this new openness to alternatives wasn’t deep, but it seemed promising.
(more…)

By Gareth Porter*

WASHINGTON, Jun 12 (IPS) - The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s refusal to share with other agencies even the most basic data on the bombing attacks by remote-controlled unmanned predator drones in Pakistan’s northwestern tribal region, combined with recent revelations that CIA operatives have been paying Pakistanis to identify the targets, suggests that managers of the drone attacks programmes have been using the total secrecy surrounding the programme to hide abuses and high civilian casualties.
(more…)

From The Economist print edition

The right and wrong ways to deal with the rich world’s fiscal mess

Jun 11th 2009 .THE worst global economic storm since the 1930s may be beginning to clear, but another cloud already looms on the financial horizon: massive public debt. Across the rich world governments are borrowing vast amounts as the recession reduces tax revenue and spending mounts—on bail-outs, unemployment benefits and stimulus plans. New figures from economists at the IMF suggest that the public debt of the ten leading rich countries will rise from 78% of GDP in 2007 to 114% by 2014. These governments will then owe around $50,000 for every one of their citizens (see article).
(more…)

By Mikhail Gorbachev (*)

MOSCOW, Jun (IPS) One of the most urgent problems of today’s world is the danger of nuclear weapons. The unexpected nuclear test by North Korea on May 25 and the test-firing of a series of short-range missiles is the latest, frightening reminder.
(more…)

Mark Weisbrot

The next big taxpayer bailout?

The bailout of private banks and financial institutions has become a touchy political issue in the United States, ever since President Bush’s Treasury Secretary and former Goldman Sachs CEO Hank Paulson asked Congress for a $700 billion dollar blank check last September.
(more…)

Analysis by Jerrold Kessel and Pierre Klochendler

JERUSALEM, Jun 10 (IPS) - Has Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu got the Obama message? To judge by his minimalist response to President Barack Obama’s landmark Cairo University address and his continuing reluctance to meet Obama’s demand for a total freeze on Israeli settlements, the answer would seem to be, ‘No’.
(more…)

By CELIA W. DUGGER - The New York Times

LUSAKA, Zambia — The fight against corruption in Africa’s most pivotal nations is faltering as public agencies investigating wrongdoing by powerful politicians have been undermined or disbanded and officials leading the charge have been dismissed, subjected to death threats and driven into exile.
(more…)

N. Janardhan interviews Jose Miguel Guzman (*)

DOHA, Jun 7 (IPS) - While explaining the reasons for rapid economic growth during the last decade and showcasing their potential for future development, many developing countries in Asia and Latin America highlight the strength of their youth population. But, they are also increasingly becoming aware of their aging populations - which could be converted into a source of strength rather than a liability.
(more…)

Gerardo Rénique

On June 5, near a stretch of highway known as the Devil’s Curve in the northern Peruvian Amazon, police began firing live rounds into a multitude of indigenous protestors – many wearing feathered crowns and carrying spears. In the nearby towns of Bagua Grande, Bagua Chica, and Utcubamba, shots also came from police snipers on rooftops, and from a helicopter that hovered above the mass of people. Both natives and mestizos took to the streets protesting the bloody repression.
(more…)

By Zoltán Dujisin

BUDAPEST, Jun 8 (IPS) - Eastern Europe is promoting nuclear energy as the only way to tackle climate change and reduce dependence on Russian gas, in spite of costs of going nuclear that it cannot meet.

Amid the last Ukrainian-Russian gas spat early this year, officials from several Central and Eastern European countries were quick to point to the need for nuclear energy to reduce problematic imports of Russian gas.
(more…)

by Maria Margaronis - The Nation

06/08/2009 . Trying to divine the political future from the results of European Parliamentary elections always involves an element of entrail-gazing. Across the continent, people take the opportunity to register protest votes; this year, the turnout (43 percent) was at a historic low. But as the final results come in, two things are becoming clear: the center-right has gained at the expense of social democrats, even in France, Italy and Germany where voters might have been expected to give ruling conservatives a kicking; and the collapse of the left vote has let in an unprecedented number of far-right and neo-fascist candidates.
(more…)

by Juan Somavia *

On the occasion of World Environment Day , 5 June 2009

The global financial and economic crisis is prompting us to rethink values, policies and practices that have led to a global jobs crisis, increasing poverty and inequalities, and a widespread disregard for the environment.
(more…)

By Stephen Leahy

UXBRIDGE, Canada, Jun 5 (IPS) - The world has turned a green corner toward a more sustainable future, with investments in clean energy outpacing fossil fuel power generation for the first time.

Despite the global economic crisis, a record 155 billion dollars was invested in clean energy companies and projects worldwide last year, mainly in wind and solar, according to a new report from the U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP).
(more…)

Mario de Queiroz and Miren Gutierrez* interview MARIO SOARES

LISBON, Jun 3 (IPS) - Global house prices are diving further, unemployment in the 16 countries using the euro increased in April to its highest level in almost ten years, and Eurozone Gross Domestic Product is expected to shrink by 1.9 percent during 2009…

So what is Europe doing about it? Voters among the European Union’s 500 million people in 27 countries will be casting their ballots Jun. 4-7 to choose their representatives to the European Parliament for the next five years. The new Parliament will set the tone and pace of European policies in the face of the crisis.
(more…)

Fareed Zakaria - NEWSWEEK

From the magazine issue dated Jun 8, 2009

It is becoming increasingly clear that the story of the global economy is a tale of two worlds. In one, there is only gloom and doom, and in the other there is light and hope. In the traditional bastions of wealth and power—America, Europe and Japan—it is difficult to find much good news. But there is a new world out there—China, India, Indonesia, Brazil—in which economic growth continues to power ahead, in which governments are not buried under a mountain of debt and in which citizens remain remarkably optimistic about their future. This divergence, between the once rich and the once poor, might mark a turn in history.
(more…)

Stefania Milan interviews MAURIZIO GUBBIOTTI of Legambiente

FLORENCE, May 31 (IPS) - Millions of people will soon have to leave their homeland as a result of global warming, says a report on environmental refugees by the Italian environmental association Legambiente. Half of them will move due to natural catastrophes, the rest will be hit by desertification and rising sea levels.
(more…)

By Stephen Holmes *

This article appeared in the June 15, 2009 edition of The Nation.

Having catapulted himself back into the national spotlight as “the highest-profile critic of the new administration,” in the words of the New York Times, Dick Cheney has also invited us, inadvertently, to revisit his dispiriting legacy.
(more…)

By Mark Sommer (*)

ARCATA, CALIFORNIA, May (IPS) The specter of a swine flu pandemic has driven home the urgent need for more rapid and effective responses to a wide range of public health threats. But in order to respond more effectively, we need to create a more open system for the exchange of vital health information and research across sectors, disciplines, geographic, economic and cultural boundaries. In a world of increasingly global emergencies, we need all hands on deck, including the patients and publics most affected.
(more…)

Johannah Bernstein *

Ideally, this article should have been written in Inuit.

The language of “White Earth” provides countless words for ice, beautiful words such as hikuliaq, pegalujaq, ivuneq, akuvijaruak. Western Science on the other hand, has spawned less colourful terms such as sea ice, pack ice, frazil, shuga, and pancake ice (my personal favourite).
(more…)

By Chris Arsenault

VANCOUVER, Canada, Jun 1 (IPS) - A report from one of the world’s top energy consultancies says oil production in Canada’s tar sands could see a five-fold increase by 2035.

“The oil sands have moved from the fringe to the center of energy supply,” notes the report “Growth in the Canadian Oil Sands: Finding a New Balance” released by IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) on May 18.
(more…)

ANSA

Berlusconi says press whipping up smear and hate campaign

(ANSA) - Rome, June 1 - Premier Silvio Berlusconi on Monday railed against the foreign and Italian press and accused the centre-left opposition of whipping up a hate and smear campaign against him ahead of the weekend elections for the European parliament.
(more…)