Articles by Al Jazeera
We found 942 results.
Guantanamo Inmate Accuses Military of Rape
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Jul 2013
A detainee at the Guantanamo Bay prison is accusing the US military of sexual assault under the guise of maintaining security. In a letter to his lawyers, the inmate claims the practice is widespread.
→ read full articleBulgaria: A New Face for European Dissent
Julian Popov – Al Jazeera,
15 Jul 2013
Bulgaria’s peaceful protests might provide a new model for discontented Europeans seeking to engage their governments.
→ read full articleMy Life at Guantanamo
Moath al-Alwi – Al Jazeera,
8 Jul 2013
A detainee at the US prison explains that hunger striking is the only way left to cry out for life, freedom and dignity. This article was translated from Arabic by his attorney, Ramzi Kassem.
→ read full articleInfographic: The United Kingdom’s Tax Havens – Interactive
Simon Hooper and Ben Willers – Al Jazeera,
24 Jun 2013
About one-fifth of the world’s tax-free shelters are UK territories and crown dependencies.
→ read full articleThe International Criminal Court’s Africa Problem
Solomon Dersso – Al Jazeera,
17 Jun 2013
The ICC’s current list of cases puts into question the international character of the ICC, giving credence to descriptions of the court as being the “International Criminal Court for Africa”. “Its name notwithstanding, the ICC is rapidly turning into a Western court to try African crimes against humanity”.
→ read full articleHonduras: When Will the US Stop Funding Death Squads?
Lauren Carasik – Al Jazeera,
10 Jun 2013
As documented in a series of AP investigative reports, it is increasingly apparent that US-funded Honduran National Police are dispatching summary justice to gang members, in a policy of “social cleansing”, with complete impunity.
→ read full articleHungry for Justice at Guantanamo
Ramzi Kassem – Al Jazeera,
10 Jun 2013
Much has been written about the ongoing hunger strike undertaken four months ago today [6 June 2013] at the infamous US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, more than 11 years after its establishment. Today, more than 100 of the 166 prisoners refuse to eat.
→ read full articleRival Honduras Gangs Declare Truce
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Jun 2013
Two of the most violent gangs apologise for their crimes and seek talks with the government on rehabilitation and jobs under a church-brokered drive to stem a tide of violence that has turned Honduras into the world’s most murderous country.
→ read full articleBrazil to Write Off $900m of African Debt`
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 May 2013
Brasilia pardons debts for 12 African countries after creating agency to support development in continent.
→ read full articleReport: Canada Could See Indigenous Uprising
Chris Arsenault – Al Jazeera,
20 May 2013
Living standards for indigenous people on par with “third world” countries, buttressed by a large population of unemployed young men in a “warrior cohort”, and easy-to-target economic infrastructure, all mean Canada has conditions for a potential indigenous “insurgency”.
→ read full articleMyanmar’s Conflicting Narratives
Veronica Pedrosa – Al Jazeera,
6 May 2013
This is the best of bad scenarios, and there’s a strategic dividend for Washington and its allies: however distant the regime moves away from Beijing is the West’s gain. –Dr Maung Zarni, exiled activist.
→ read full articleNearly Half Guantanamo Now On Hunger Strike
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Apr 2013
US official says 77 inmates now on hunger strike over jailing without charge or trial, nearly half of total population.
→ read full articleThe Truth about Extreme Global Inequality
Jason Hickel – Al Jazeera,
22 Apr 2013
The richest 300 people on earth have more wealth than the poorest 3bn – almost half the world’s population. We chose those numbers because it makes for a clear and memorable comparison, but in truth the situation is even worse: the richest 200 people have about $2.7 trillion, which is more than the poorest 3.5bn people, who have only $2.2 trillion combined. It is very difficult to wrap one’s mind around such extreme figures.
→ read full articleTop Swedish Judge Defends WikiLeaks’ Assange
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Apr 2013
A senior Swedish judge has said that the sex-crime allegations against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange are “a mess”, and praised him for leaking classified US documents. Speaking on Wednesday [3 Apr 2013] at the University of Adelaide in Australia, Stefan Lindskog, chairman of the Supreme Court of Sweden, also listed legal obstacles to extraditing Assange to the United States.
→ read full articleViolence Against Women Act and the US Catholic Bishops
Cristina LH Traina – Al Jazeera,
25 Mar 2013
Bishops are attacking a major social justice document that does not even threaten the values they are trying to uphold. On the eve of President Obama’s signature on the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013, five leaders of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops earlier last week [6 Mar 2013] attacked the necessary legislation.
→ read full articleIsrael and the Politics of Boycott
Joseph Massad – Al Jazeera,
25 Mar 2013
Zionism and Israel will continue to support any boycott that seeks to institutionalise racism and racial separatism. For Zionism, what mattered most was its commitment to racial separatism, whether in Germany or Palestine, and it supported only those boycotts that would bring it about.
→ read full articleIraq: War’s Legacy of Cancer
Dahr Jamail – Al Jazeera,
25 Mar 2013
Two US-led wars in Iraq have left behind hundreds of tonnes of depleted uranium munitions and other toxic wastes. Doctors in Fallujah are continuing to witness a steep rise in severe congenital birth defects, including children being born with two heads, children born with only one eye, multiple tumours.
→ read full articleRobert Fisk on Latest Developments in Syria
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Mar 2013
March 5, 2013 -Veteran journalist Robert Fisk speaks from Beirut about latest developments in Syria.
→ read full articleInfographic: Global South Is Rising Fast
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Mar 2013
Flagship human development report by United Nations Development Programme shows rapid growth in Asia’s middle class.
→ read full articleDo Academics Own the Titles of Their Articles?
Joshua A. Tucker – Al Jazeera,
18 Mar 2013
What happens if someone co-opts someone else’s title in academia without giving due credit?
→ read full articleThe Great Garbage Patch of the Pacific
Rose Aguilar – Al Jazeera,
11 Mar 2013
When you can scoop up in our oceans more plastic than biomass, it’s time to recognise that we may have a problem. If you listen closely, you can hear the oceans, underwater life, and birds crying. Sometimes they’re yelling for help. Plastic is quickly and painfully killing their environment and overall way of life.
→ read full articleIsrael Launches Segregated Bus Service
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Mar 2013
Haaretz reported that the ministry opened the lines on Monday [4 Mar 2013], to be used by Palestinian labourers travelling between the West Bank and Israel, after Jewish settlers complained that Palestinians on mixed buses were a security risk.
→ read full articleArab League Offers Syria Seat to Opposition
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Mar 2013
Nabil Elaraby, the regional body’s secretary-general, said on Wednesday [6 Mar 2013] that ministers meeting in Cairo had invited the Syrian National Council-SNC to choose a representative to attend the league summit in the Qatari capital, Doha, on March 26 and 27. The Arab League suspended Syria’s membership in 2011 after Assad’s government failed to abide by an Arab peace plan that aimed to end the conflict.
→ read full articleGreenpeace: From Hippies to Lobbyists
Al Jazeera World – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Mar 2013
Its epic battles are legendary. Its influence is undeniable. And it is hard to imagine that, in 1971, it took just a handful of individuals who were strongly opposed to nuclear testing to give birth to this worldwide organisation. So where did it all begin?
→ read full articleRacism and the Hypocrisy of Israel’s Advocates
Ben White – Al Jazeera,
18 Feb 2013
The vital fight against anti-Semitism is “cynically abused to defend Israel’s institutionalised racism”.
→ read full articleDiscovering Voyager 1’s Interstellar Dragons
Ian O'Neill – Al Jazeera,
18 Feb 2013
After 35 years, Voyager 1 has travelled over 18 billion kilometres (or 123 Astronomical Units – that’s over three times the distance of Pluto to the Sun). To put that another way, Voyager 1 is so distant that it takes over 17 hours for a signal sent from Earth to reach the probe’s antennae. It is therefore over 17 light-hours away. Voyager 1 is the most distant (and fastest) manmade object ever sent into space, but it is still minuscule considering it takes over 4 years for light to travel to our nearest star, Proxima Centauri.
→ read full articleIceland President: Let Banks Go Bankrupt
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Feb 2013
Iceland President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson tells Al Jazeera’s Stephen Cole that Europe should let banks that are ran “irresponsibly” go bankrupt. Speaking at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Grimsson also held his country as a model of economic recovery after its near-collapse four years ago. “We didn’t follow the traditional prevailing orthodoxies. And the end result four years later is that Iceland is enjoying progress and recovery.”
→ read full articleIsrael Boycotts UN Human Rights Council
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Feb 2013
Israel has become the first country to boycott a UN Human Rights Council review of its rights situation, sparking heated debate among diplomats on how to respond. Its absence on Tuesday [29 Jan 2013], however, came as no surprise as it cut all ties with the 47-member state council last March after the body announced that it would probe how Israeli illegal settlements may be infringing on the rights of the Palestinians.
→ read full articleAre Humans Created or Evolved?
Muhammad Abdul Bari – Al Jazeera,
28 Jan 2013
Recently there have been impassioned debate on this area on two high-profile TV programmes: one an Al Jazeera interview with atheist Richard Dawkins by Muslim political commentator Mehdi Hasan and the other a BBC Big Questions debate over whether it is time for all religions to accept evolution as fact. Many of my co-religionists are left bemused, if not downright confused, by all this kerfuffle.
→ read full articleTorture Is Trivial
Robert Jensen – Al Jazeera,
28 Jan 2013
The focus on torture in “Zero Dark Thirty” ignores more significant US policies of dubious legality. When I look at the decade since 9/11, torture is hardly the greatest crime of the US war machine. Since 9/11, the United States has helped destroy two countries with, at best, sketchy moral and legal justification.
→ read full articleThe Political Consequences of Academic Paywalls
Sarah Kendzior – Al Jazeera,
21 Jan 2013
Under the current system, academic research is housed in scholarly databases, which charge as much as $50 per article to those without a university affiliation. The only people who profit from this system are academic publishers. Scholars receive no money from the sale of their articles, and are marginalized by a public who cannot afford to read their work.
→ read full articleMonsanto versus the People
Charlotte Silver – Al Jazeera,
21 Jan 2013
14 Jan 2013 – Many farmers have decided to forego growing corn and soybeans due to the “inevitable contamination that will result”. Last week Monsanto announced staggering profits while American farmers filed into Washington, DC to challenge the Biotech giant’s right to sue farmers whose fields have become contaminated with Monsanto’s seeds. Monsanto’s earnings nearly doubled analysts’ projections and its total revenue reached $2.94bn at the end of 2012.
→ read full articleMali: The ‘Gentle’ Face of Al-Qaeda
May Ying Welsh – Al Jazeera,
31 Dec 2012
“We are mujahideen in the cause of Allah.” The hair on our necks stands on end. The fighters look like desert military preachers – members of some stoical sect that took a vow of poverty and jihad. They wear austere beige cotton smocks and high cropped pants – like inhabitants of Tatooine, the desert planet in Star Wars. These are not outfits one buys at the market, or inherits from a brother or friend. They are uniforms tailor-made to send a message of simplicity.
→ read full article
Johan Galtung on Goldman Sachs and the Protocols
Al Jazeera, The Stream – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Dec 2012
Gilad Atzmon: Johan Galtung confirms that many people believe that Goldman Sachs actions are not that different from the reality described in the Protocols of The Elders of Zion. Protocols also refer to Jews’ control of the press. According to Galtung we see a lack of debate on that matter.
→ read full articleWWF Drones Raise Serious Questions for International Security
Eddie Walsh – Al Jazeera,
17 Dec 2012
The World Wildlife Federation’s proposed plans to utilise drones in anti-poaching efforts raise serious concerns. From a normative perspective, one can certainly differentiate between WWF, Anonymous, Green Peace, Executive Outcomes, Volunteer in Policing, Arbakai, Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, Neighbourhood Watch, and Blackwater. But, from a theoretical perspective, all have challenged the state dominated status quo that has remained largely unchallenged since arguably the nineteenth century (at least in the West).
→ read full articleMulti-Stakeholder Approach to Internet Governance
Jillian C. York – Al Jazeera,
10 Dec 2012
Civil society groups and web companies have joined together in opposing what many perceive to be a takeover of internet governance by the Internet Telecommunications Union-ITU, a UN body. If it were to gain more control, those parties would be the biggest losers.
→ read full articleScholars and Spies: A Disastrous Combination
Mark LeVine – Al Jazeera,
10 Dec 2012
The academic community needs to create a clear firewall between itself and the military and intelligence communities. Buried in a Washington Post exposé on the expansion of spying operations by the Defence Intelligence Agency is a sentence that should send shivers down the spine of any researcher, journalist, student or scholar working in the Muslim world: “Having DIA operatives pose as academics or business executives requires painstaking work to create those false identities, and it means they won’t be protected by diplomatic immunity if caught.”
→ read full articleOpen Access: Stakes Are High At the Debates over the Future of Scholarship
Manuel Barcia – Al Jazeera,
10 Dec 2012
Publishers and academics should look into how to spread the costs and make research outputs more accessible to everybody.
→ read full articleNormalising Death: The Business of Drones
Charlotte Silver – Al Jazeera,
10 Dec 2012
As the leading suppliers, users and developers of drones, the US and Israel have defined the landscape of the industry. While families bury and mourn loved ones struck dead by US and Israeli drone attacks and pundits examine casus belli, US drone manufacturers are hard at work strategising their industry’s business plans.
→ read full articleNeoliberal Plague: AIDS and Global Capitalism
Jason Hickel – Al Jazeera,
10 Dec 2012
Battling AIDS means challenging the power of rich nations over the world’s resources. If you’re like me, you’re probably tired of the whole show at this point. After all, it’s 2012; we were supposed to have this epidemic licked by now. Why, despite billions of dollars’ worth of interventions and three decades of high-profile messaging, does AIDS remain such a pressing problem?
→ read full articleBurma/Myanmar: Expert Warns of Rohingya Genocide
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Dec 2012
“Warning signs” are in place for a genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, an Al Jazeera investigation has been told by a leading expert in the field. According to Professor William Schabas, until recently President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, the findings of an Al Jazeera documentary reveal that “we’re moving into a zone where the word can be used”.
→ read full articleGaza: People Need Far More Than a Ceasefire
Saree Makdisi – Al Jazeera,
3 Dec 2012
In bombing Gaza, then, Israel was not striking the territory of another state. It was bombing people for whose welfare it is legally accountable as the only sovereign power that exercises control over their lives – including everything from determining how their names appear on identity cards and in the official population registry, to how much electricity they receive and how much food they are allowed to eat.
→ read full article
Johan Galtung on Peace Economy, Palestine and More (Video of the Week)
Al Jazeera, The Stream – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Dec 2012
28 Nov 2012 – The Founder of Peace Studies discusses Sociocide, Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and building economies of peace.
→ read full articleThe Greek Resistance
Barnaby Phillips - Al Jazeera,
26 Nov 2012
Tied together by a painful history, Greece and Germany are locked into a new conflict that has reawakened old ghosts. Why has the European vision, designed to heal the wounds of the past, instead brought them back to the surface? And who is to blame – the Greeks themselves, the EU or the old enemy, Germany?
→ read full articleThe Greek Resistance
Barnaby Philips – Al Jazeera,
26 Nov 2012
Al Jazeera correspondent Barnaby Phillips travels to Greece to discover why these two countries, tied by history and culture, are now locked into a conflict. Why has the European vision, designed to heal the wounds of the past, instead brought them back to the surface? And who is to blame – the Greeks themselves, the EU or the old enemy, Germany?
→ read full articleThe United Nations’ Role in Haiti Cholera Outbreak
Lauren Carasik – Al Jazeera,
26 Nov 2012
Just over two years have passed since the cholera epidemic started its deadly march in Haiti, exacting a staggering toll. Cholera has left 600,885 sick and taken 7,568 lives, with 76,981 new cases diagnosed in 2012. As details emerged about the origin of the cholera epidemic, a disease not seen in Haiti in almost a century prior to the outbreak, it became clear that the UN stabilisation force, known by its French acronym, MINUSTAH, was to blame.
→ read full articleUK Nuclear Deterrent Plan Triggers Divisions
Simon Hooper – Al Jazeera,
12 Nov 2012
Announcement of an extra $565m for improved nuclear weapons capacity worries critics in an era of austerity. At an unknown location somewhere deep beneath the world’s oceans, a British submarine sits primed to launch up to 40 nuclear warheads with a collective destructive power almost 300 times greater than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.
→ read full articleKurdish Hunger-Strikers Fight for Rights
Berza Simsek – Al Jazeera,
12 Nov 2012
Nearly 700 prisoners demanding greater recognition for Kurds in Turkey have refused food, some for nearly two months. Death by starvation or long-term health damage are what Mazlum Dikmen and hundreds of other Kurdish prisoners in Turkey are now facing.
→ read full articleIndia’s Nuclear Programme: Trust Abroad but Not At Home
Catherine Mei Ling Wong – Al Jazeera,
12 Nov 2012
The protests in Kudankulam will continue if the government doesn’t reassess the root cause of public unrest. Even as trust in India’s nuclear power programme in the international arena grows steadily, trust on its domestic front has been eroding over the last few decades.
→ read full article
Chile’s Most Wanted
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
Branded a ‘terrorist’ at an early age by the government of Chile, Pascual Pichun is a man on a mission. Pascual is a symbol of the indigenous Mapuche resistance movement, which is trying to protect and reclaim its ancestral lands from the government and foreign companies. The movement is accused of attacks on forestry company property, destroying bulldozers and burning down a helicopter.
→ read full articleThe Cold Shoulder to Climate Change
Hilal Elver – Al Jazeera,
5 Nov 2012
Neither Barack Obama nor Mitt Romney mentioned climate change in three TV debates, despite a summer of record temperatures, historic drought and wildfires in the US. More surprisingly, none of the moderators asked a question about climate change or environmental protection. The American public seems eager to discuss climate change, at least in relation to extreme weather events, as they are living with its impacts on their lives.
→ read full articleInequality: The Silly Tales Economists Like To Tell
Dean Baker – Al Jazeera,
5 Nov 2012
Some economists don’t get paid to know about the economy, but to justify the trickle-up of wealth. Hence we can look forward to many more people telling us that all the money going to the rich was just the natural workings of the economy. When it comes to all the government rules and regulations that shifted income upward, they just don’t know what you’re talking about.
→ read full articleIsrael Is an Apartheid State (No Poll Required)
Ben White – Al Jazeera,
5 Nov 2012
A new Ha’aretz poll indicates a majority of Jewish Israelis favour apartheid – but that’s nothing new. There is no need for such a poll in order to reach the conclusion that Israel is guilty of apartheid: The facts speak for themselves.
→ read full articleGreek Editor Acquitted Over Swiss Bank List
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
A Greek journalist who published the names of more than 2,000 Greeks with Swiss bank accounts has been acquitted of breaking data privacy laws. Costas Vaxevanis’s acquittal on Thursday [1 Nov 2012] came hours after he went on trial in a case analysts said was a test for press freedom in Greece.
→ read full articleJapan Struggling To Store Radioactive Water
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Leading nuclear worker says space is running out for contaminated water cooling the Fukushima plant.
→ read full articleIsrael: Ethnic Cleansing in the Negev
Ben White – Al Jazeera,
22 Oct 2012
The forced relocation of Bedouins in southern Israel fits Foreign Affairs’ definition of ethnic cleansing.
→ read full articleThreats of Cyber War, Realities of Cyber Censorship
Danny Schechter – Al Jazeera,
22 Oct 2012
Cyber war is already underway, not just between some countries, but within countries and against cyber-active citizens.
→ read full article
Gaza-Bound Ship ‘Attacked By Israel Forces’ (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
20 Oct 2012 – Mikael Löfgren, media coordinator spokesman for the Estelle, spoke to Al Jazeera.
→ read full articleWhy We Won and How We Are Losing
Robert Jensen – Al Jazeera,
1 Oct 2012
“[A]part from death, the only ironclad rule of human experience has been the Law of Unintended Consequences. Our brains are extraordinary mechanisms, and they have allowed us to accomplish truly amazing things; but we are still only good at anticipating – or at least of paying attention to – highly immediate consequences. We are notably bad at assessing risk, especially long-term risk. We believe crazy things, such as that human sacrifice will propitiate the gods, or that people are kidnapped by space aliens, or that endless economic expansion is possible in a finite world, or that if we just ignore climate change we won’t have to face its consequences. Or at the very least, we act as if we do.”
→ read full articleRemembering the Sabra-Shatila Massacre
Habib Battah – Al Jazeera,
24 Sep 2012
Knowing the Phalangists sought revenge for Gemayel’s death, an Israeli government inquiry held the country’s defence minister, Ariel Sharon, “personally responsible” for the atrocities the militiamen carried out at Shatila on the evening of September 16 [1982]… Chamas himself was shot twice. He was shielded from additional rounds when the bodies of others collapsed on top of him. “I hid under the dead bodies for two days,” he says.
→ read full articleDreaming of the Apocalypse
Mark LeVine – Al Jazeera,
17 Sep 2012
If ever real leadership was needed among American, European and Arab leaders, it’s now. “Disgusting and Reprehensible!” That’s how Secretary of State Hilary Clinton described the “film” Innocence of Muslims in the latest official US comment on the movie that has sparked outrage across the Muslim world.
→ read full articleDesigning Food Systems to Protect Nature and Get Rid of Hunger
Vandana Shiva – Al Jazeera,
10 Sep 2012
Industrialisation of agriculture creates hunger and malnutrition, destroying the food web to which we all belong. Hunger and malnutrition is manmade. It is in the design of the industrial chemical model of agriculture. And just as hunger has been created by design, producing healthy and nutritious food for all can be designed through food democracy.
→ read full articleWhen the Addiction Cure Is Another Addiction
Chelsea Carmona – Al Jazeera,
10 Sep 2012
Addiction manifests itself in different compulsions and behaviours, which is critical to recognise during the treatment.
→ read full articlePandora or Peru: Resisting the Mining Multinationals
Manuel Barcia – Al Jazeera,
3 Sep 2012
An indigenous group with a millenarian bond to their land are sitting on large reserves of a precious metal. A massive multinational corporation coming from a foreign land with the intention of getting access to the said metal at whatever cost. A conflict that has left people dead and that has the potential to take even more lives – indigenous lives, of course – destroying the environment in the process.
→ read full articleUS Arms Sales Shoot To Record Levels
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Aug 2012
Congressional report shows that arms exports tripled from previous year, with Gulf Arab states the main customers.
→ read full articleThe Closing of American Academia
Sarah Kendzior – Al Jazeera,
27 Aug 2012
The plight of adjunct professors highlights the end of higher education as a means to prosperity.
→ read full articleMosaddegh and the Legacy of Non-Aligned Movement
Hamid Dabashi – Al Jazeera,
27 Aug 2012
The Islamists and the monarchists might distort the image of Mosaddegh, but not his memory in the hearts of people. As fate would have it, the 16th summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) will take place in Tehran from August 26 to 31, 2012 almost a week after the 59th anniversary of the notorious CIA (USA) and MI6 (UK)-engineered coup that on August 19, 1953, toppled the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh (1882-1967) – the champion of Iranian anti-colonial nationalism.
→ read full articleGulf Seafood Deformities Alarm Scientists
Dahr Jamail – Al Jazeera,
27 Aug 2012
Eyeless shrimp and fish with lesions are becoming common, with BP oil pollution believed to be the likely cause. “The fishermen have never seen anything like this,” Dr Jim Cowan said. “And in my 20 years working on red snapper, looking at somewhere between 20 and 30,000 fish, I’ve never seen anything like this either.” Dr Cowan, with Louisiana State University’s Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences started hearing about fish with sores and lesions from fishermen in November 2010.
→ read full articleWhat’s Gone Wrong At The Guardian?
Ali Abunimah – Al Jazeera,
21 Aug 2012
Hiring Joshua Trevino, who endorsed the killing of Gaza flotilla members, is a worrying step for journalism. Treviño is a Republican Party operative, paid political consultant and ideologue for hire. But while some may not like those attributes, they would not make him unique among columnists. What does distinguish Treviño is his propensity to call for violence. Endorsing the killing of unarmed civilians…
→ read full articleNobody’s People in a No-Man’s Land
Subir Bhaumik – Al Jazeera,
21 Aug 2012
Nearly a million Rohingya living in Myanmar are unwanted at home and shunned by neighbouring countries.
→ read full articleA Message in Blood That No One Wants to Hear
Tom Engelhardt – Al Jazeera,
20 Aug 2012
Foreign troops are dying at the hands of their Afghan “allies” in large numbers, underscoring a lack of trust. Perhaps the sole historical example that comes close might be the Indian Rebellion of 1857. In reality, the American mission in Afghanistan failed years ago. It’s as if we refused to notice, but the Afghans we were training did. Now, they are sending a message that couldn’t be blunter or grimmer from that endlessly war-torn land.
→ read full articleThe Compulsion to Partition
Joseph Massad – Al Jazeera,
13 Aug 2012
Palestinian rejection of the Partition Plan was rational – it was never a traumatic event. Whether a Palestinian “state” is admitted to the General Assembly or not, this compulsion to re-enact and repeat the partition plan is doomed to the same fate as its predecessors, as it will not lead to the “two-state solution”.”. Its failure, however, will be nothing short of another boon for the goal of a decolonised and democratic one state and for Palestinian liberation.
→ read full articleMeeting Myanmar’s Former Child Soldiers
Preethi Nallu – Al Jazeera,
13 Aug 2012
Teenagers continue to serve in both the state military and armed groups, despite new approach by country’s leaders. Myat Win, a 19-year-old former child soldier, says he was forcibly conscripted into the Myanmar military, taken off a street by a pair of policemen at the tender age of 15 and sent to an army training centre under deceitful promises, and without the knowledge of his family.
→ read full articleSyria’s Pipelineistan War
Pepe Escobar – Al Jazeera,
13 Aug 2012
This is a war of deals, not bullets. Deep beneath “Damascus volcano” and “the battle of Aleppo”, the tectonic plates of the global energy chessboard keep on rumbling. More than a year ago, a $10 billion Pipelineistan deal was clinched between Iran, Iraq and Syria for a natural gas pipeline to be built by 2016 from Iran’s giant South Pars field, traversing Iraq and Syria, with a possible extension to Lebanon. Key export target market: Europe.
→ read full articleWhen Philosophers Join the Kill Chain
Mark LeVine – Al Jazeera,
13 Aug 2012
The most vehement debates on the use of force by the US surround attacks by remotely-piloted drone aircraft. Plato was likely not the first thinker to understand that what goes by the name of “justice” is often merely the violence and thievery practiced by those holding the reins of power. For Plato, their ability to continue to rule depended on imposing upon the weak the very rules they routinely break to maintain their position.
→ read full articleBangladesh Child Labour Remains Social Norm
Nicolas Haque – Al Jazeera,
13 Aug 2012
Child labour is technically illegal but extremely widespread. Driven by poverty, it is often parents who are forced to push their children into work at an early age. These working children are treated just as adults, and in turn, they themselves behave and have taken on all the mannerisms of adults. According UNICEF an estimated 215 million children in the world are working, half of them in hazardous jobs.
→ read full articleCIA: KUBARK’s Very Long Shadow
Lisa Hajjar – Al Jazeera,
13 Aug 2012
A 2011 FBI “primer” on overseas interrogations, which became public on August 2, 2012, as a result of Freedom of Information Act action taken by the American Civil Liberties Union, repeatedly cites the Central Intelligence Agency’s 1963 KUBARK Counterintelligence Interrogation. KUBARK was the code name the CIA used for itself. The FBI briefing also cites the CIA’s 1983 Human Resource Exploitation Manual (Honduras version) to train interrogators in the art of obtaining intelligence from “resistant sources”. Since KUBARK continues to be an operable model, it is worth recalling some highlights (or lowlights) of that history in order to put the 2011 primer into context.
→ read full articleCriticism of Ye Shiwen Is Unfair
Andrew Binner – Al Jazeera,
6 Aug 2012
When Michael Phelps won eight gold medals in Beijing four years ago he was quite rightly celebrated and paid his dues on an amazing athletic feat. Four years on and Ye Shiwen, the 16-year-old swimmer from China, sets a new world record in the 400m individual medley shortly followed by victory in the 200m version as well. Yet instead of receiving the adulation that Phelps was showered with, Shiwen has had to respond to allegations of doping which has more than taken the gloss of her astonishing swim.
→ read full articleMexican Official: CIA ‘Manages’ Drug Trade
Chris Arsenault – Al Jazeera,
30 Jul 2012
The CIA and other international security forces “don’t fight drug traffickers”, a spokesman for the Chihuahua state said. Instead, “they try to manage the drug trade”. Allegations about official complicity in the drug business are nothing new when they come from activists, professors, campaigners or even former officials. However, an official spokesman for the authorities in one of Mexico’s most violent states – one which directly borders Texas – going on the record with such accusations is unique.
→ read full articleNot So Fast: Cosmopolitics and the Higgs Boson
Nicolas Mendoza – Al Jazeera,
30 Jul 2012
Will media reports on the Higgs boson announcement influence the way “modern people” treat all other people? Latour explains how the West built its claim of higher ground over the rest by constructing the idea of a single, neutral, “nature”: “Religion had to become a mere culture so that nature could become a true religion – what brings everyone into assent”. This is precisely what is problematic about the language constructed around the Large Hadron Collider: it is crafted to make unthinkable dissent about the making of the universe.
→ read full articleWhy So Many Communist Philosophers?
Santiago Zabala – Al Jazeera,
30 Jul 2012
The destructive nature of neoliberalism has prompted many philosophers to reconsider communist ideas. Reading and writing about Karl Marx does not necessarily make you a communist, but the fact that a number of distinguished philosophers are reevaluating Marx’s ideas certainly means something.
→ read full articleBehind Paraguay’s Coup
Benjamin Dangl – Al Jazeera,
30 Jul 2012
At the heart of the nation’s current crisis is an ongoing battle over land. Approximately two per cent of landowners control 80 per cent of Paraguay’s land, and some 87,000 farming families are landless. Lugo and his cabinet resisted the use of Monsanto’s transgenic cotton seeds in Paraguay, a move that likely contributed to his ouster. But now that Franco is in power, negotiations with the Canadian mining company Rio Tinto have moved ahead.
→ read full articleThe Power of Cuba’s Free Healthcare
Belen Fernandez – Al Jazeera,
30 Jul 2012
The US’s notion of health care as a commodity is countered by the virtues of free health provision in Cuba. In 1995, Nelson Mandela declared with regard to Cuban international solidarity missions to Africa over past decades: “Cubans came to our region as doctors, teachers, soldiers, agricultural experts, but never as colonisers. They have shared the same trenches with us in the struggle against colonialism, underdevelopment and apartheid.”
→ read full articleGlaxoSmithKline Fraud Case: Does Crime Pay?
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Jul 2012
A business model of criminal activity: Are record fines enough to stop multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical companies from committing fraud? As the pharmaceutical giant is fined a record sum of $3bn, we ask if the move will be a deterrent for others.
→ read full articleCredit Card Giants Agree On $6bn Settlement
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Jul 2012
Credit card companies Visa and MasterCard have agreed to pay more than $6bn to US retailers in a negotiated settlement to resolve a seven-year-old case. Visa agreed to pay $4.03bn to settle the class-action lawsuit while MasterCard and banks that issue cards and were also part of the suit will pay $2.02bn, according to documents filed in federal court in New York on Friday [13 Jul 2012].
→ read full article
How Barclays Manipulated the Libor Rates (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 Jul 2012
The Barclays Bank scandal centres around a key interest rate known as Libor. Al Jazeera’s Dominic Kane reports on exactly what that is. We also speak to Bill Black, a former US banking regulator for more clarity on how this multi-trillion dollar fraud was perpetrated.
→ read full articleAlternative Voices from Rio+20
Preethi Nallu – Al Jazeera,
25 Jun 2012
Even before the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, also called Rio+20, commenced on June 20, hundreds of non-governmental groups focused on ecology, climate change and development gathered for a counter-conference that they named “The People’s Summit” – an alternative to the UN mechanisms that have yet to produce the needed results called for at the 1992 Earth Summit, which also took place in Rio.
→ read full articleInfographic: The Emissions Position
Ben Willers – Al Jazeera,
19 Jun 2012
Twenty years after the first Earth Summit, greenhouse gas concentrations continue to spiral upwards.
→ read full articleIsrael to Build More West Bank Homes
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Jun 2012
Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has approved construction of hundreds more settler homes on Palestinian land, even after the Israeli parliament rejected a bill to retroactively legalise some existing homes.
→ read full articleInteractive: World Nuclear Club
Mohammed Haddad and Ben Piven - Al Jazeera,
11 Jun 2012
While 14 nations host nuclear weapons, 30 countries generate atomic energy, and another 18 are building future reactors.
→ read full articleNicaragua’s ‘Revolutionary’ Drug War
Charles Davis – Al Jazeera,
4 Jun 2012
Ortega’s fixation on getting support for the ‘war on drugs’ may simply be an attempt to appeal to social conservatives. It’s been left to the likes of Guatemalan President Perez Molina – a former general elected last year on a platform of going after drug traffickers with an “iron fist” – to state the obvious: the status quo isn’t working. “We have to talk about decriminalisation of the production, the transit and, of course, the consumption” of drugs, he recently told CNN en Espanol, stating something that previously only ex-heads of state have had the courage to say.
→ read full articleQuebec’s Conflict of Contrasting Social Visions
Stefan Christoff – Al Jazeera,
4 Jun 2012
What began as a protest over tuition hikes has now become a standoff over a much deeper political discord in Quebec… Amnesty International describes the law as granting “unprecedented police powers,” and as violating “freedoms of speech, assembly and movement in breach of Canada’s international obligations.” Student unions are now challenging Law 78 at the Superior Court of Quebec, while hundreds of lawyers joined an evening demonstration against the law in Montreal.
→ read full articleFrom Iceland to Ireland: Two Paths to Financial Recovery?
Dan Hind – Al Jazeera,
4 Jun 2012
Iceland isn’t a model for Ireland. It is a model for the whole European Union. In the years before 2008, in both countries a lightly regulated financial sector ran out of control. Iceland’s big three banks – Glitnir, Kaupthing and Landsbanki – had lent out more than US $200 billion, eleven times the country’s GDP. Ireland’s banks were holding assets of around seven times GDP on their books. Much of the money had been lent abroad.
→ read full articleNATO Summit Highlights Neo-Con/Neo-Liberal Overlap
Paul Rosenberg – Al Jazeera,
4 Jun 2012
As the general election phase of the American presidential election gets underway, the recent NATO summit serves as a potent reminder of just how little difference there ultimately is between the neo-con extremists who dominated US foreign policy under George W Bush, and the neo-liberals who run just about everything in the Obama administration.
→ read full articleWhat’s Behind Obama’s New Military Base In Chile?
Nikolas Kozloff – Al Jazeera,
4 Jun 2012
The construction of a new US military base in Chile has some locals worrying – and wondering what it’s for. Obama has been even more militaristic than predecessor George Bush. In particular, he has been quietly constructing American bases in the remote Southern Cone. It’s an intriguing news story which has received scant attention in the US media, much less the so-called progressive media.
→ read full articleRio+20: A Green Industrial Revolution or Climate Change Diplomacy?
Hilal Elver – Al Jazeera,
4 Jun 2012
Diplomats at climate change talks this week appear unlikely to draft a workable legal document on CO2 reduction.
→ read full articleAlgerian MPs Boycott Parliament Session
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 May 2012
Opposition legislators boycott inaugural session of parliament, claiming fraud in election held earlier this month. For Algeria, the only country in North Africa left largely untouched by last year’s so-called “Arab Spring” revolts, a prolonged boycott by the MPs could complicate a reform of the constitution which President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has promised for this year.
→ read full articleVenezuela’s Indigenous University
Rhodri Davies – Al Jazeera,
28 May 2012
The institution, located in 5,000 acres of forestland, teaches ancient wisdom and rights in the modern world.
→ read full articleDR Congo: Victim to the Western Quest for Justice
Jessica Hatcher – Al Jazeera,
21 May 2012
The international judicial system could be helping to fuel the country’s recent surge in conflict.
→ read full articleAlgeria’s Election Was a Fraud
Jeremy Keenan – Al Jazeera,
21 May 2012
The results of Algeria’s May 10 [2012] legislative elections have been met with such fury by Algerians that some analysts believe that these will be the last elections held under the current regime. If there were any hopes for democracy still remaining in the country, these elections snuffed them out.
→ read full article