In The News

Larry Elliot September 28, 2005
This year's G-8 Summit saw unprecedented cooperation on development issues, but the progress made at Gleneagles was abruptly disrupted by the London bombings on July 7. After the attacks, Western leaders quickly lost interest in plans for debt relief and improved aid flows, turning their attention towards coping with terrorism and election campaigns. G-8 plans were submitted to a special...
Hassan M. Fattah September 25, 2005
More than half of Dubai's one million people are poor immigrants from South Asia and the Philippines. Eight hundred of those residents, dissatisfied workers who have not been paid in five months, recently marched on the emirate's Ministry of Labor. It was a rare show of labor unrest in a city-state that tolerates much in the name of business and little in the way of dissent. Even more...
John Tagliabue September 22, 2005
Its egalitarian principles do not allow France to officially acknowledge the existence of its minorities, but those minorities do indeed exist – and their story is not a happy one. No one knows exactly how many blacks live in France, but hardly any of them hold positions of economic or political power. Hemmed in by a "low glass ceiling," the lucky among them escape corporate...
John Feffer August 29, 2005
The organic farms that line the Han River in South Korea may be the country's agricultural future – and sadly, they tell the story of its troubled past and present. More broadly, the Korean agricultural crisis is a story of small farmers forced to negotiate among the shifting currents of globalization. The industrialization of South Korea's agriculture, the Green Revolution, rendered...
Sharon LaFraniere August 25, 2005
In areas where electricity and indoor plumbing are rarities, a surprising trend is taking shape. Despite infrastructure shortcomings and widespread poverty, Africa is now the world's fastest-growing market for cellphones. Mobile technology is drastically changing business and daily life – speeding up communication and allowing for previously impossible interactions – in rural areas where...
Mary Robinson August 23, 2005
Since the July G-8 summit and Live 8 concerts, the topic of African development has received unusual public attention. While the conversations have focused primarily on aid and debt relief, according to Mary Robinson, one topic has received inadequate treatment in international policy circles: free trade. Recalling her travels to cotton producer Mali and sugar producer Mozambique, Robinson...
Kamran Taremi August 18, 2005
Relations between Iran and Iraq have been marked for decades by hostility, erupting most drastically in the infamous and bloody war following the success of Ayatollah Khomeini's Islamic revolution. Now, with a Shiite victory in the Iraqi elections, the two countries have found common ideological ground and have taken steps towards cooperation. An alliance with Iraq would provide Iran with...