In The News

The New Yorker: Egypt's Farcical Election

Lauren Bohn April 4, 2018
US President Donald Trump has broken with American diplomatic tradition by welcoming with open arms the current Egyptian president Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, a former general with a spotty human rights record. El-Sisi captured 97 percent of the vote in this year’s election, where only one opponent remained in the race long enough for voters to see his name on the ballot. That lone opponent, Mousa...

Huffington Post: $1 Billion Arms Sale to Saudi Arabia

Nick Visser and Nick Robins-Early March 30, 2018
The Trump administration plans to approve a $1 billion dollar arms sale to Saudi Arabia, including “around 6,700 anti-tank missiles and $300 million in parts for the Saudis’ helicopters and tanks,” explains the US State Department. The deal is controversial due to the ongoing Saudi role in Yemen’s civil war. Since March 2015, the Saudi state has carried out lethal airstrike campaigns as part of...

Guardian: Indigenous Women Confront Ecuador's President

Dan Collyns March 28, 2018
Amazon indigenous women are protesting oil drilling and mining in their territories, urging Ecuador’s President Lenin Moreno to combat not only environmental exploitation but also the sexual and psychic violence “they claim accompany the industries.” A delegation of indigenous women met with Moreno after 100 protested by camping in Quito’s plaza near the Carondelet government palace for five days...

The Economist: Egypt’s Election Offers No Choice

March 27, 2018
Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi will win what the Economist is describing as a sham of an election. Opponent Moussa Mustafa Moussa “has lived up to a promise not to challenge the president,” notes the Economist. The election, March 26 to 28, is Egypt’s ninth national ballot since the 2011 revolution that ousted authoritarian President Hosni Mubarak. The first election in 2012 resulted in...

Washington Post: US Retreats From UN Leadership

Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León March 27, 2018
Migration is part of human history and human nature, sometimes the only means of surviving war, natural disaster or economic despair. In 2016, UN member states committed to negotiating the Global Compact on Migration. The United States, under the Trump administration, announced plans to withdraw from negotiations. The goal of the compact, not legally binding, is agreement on a “set of general...

CNN: Worldwide March for Our Lives and Gun Reform

Dakin Andone, Amanda Jackson and Isabella Gomez March 25, 2018
A tipping point was reached after 17 students and staff were gunned down in an affluent high school in Parkland, Florida. Survivors swiftly and articulately pointed to the US leading in gun violence and the need for controls like background checks and limits on assault weapons. They criticized politicians who instead do the bidding of industry associations like the National Rifle Association and...

Financial Times: Voice of China for the Globe

Emily Feng March 22, 2018
China is consolidating its state-run media including television broadcaster CCTV, China Radio International and China National Radio. The media giant will be known as Voice of China and will continue to target a global audience, presenting “Communist party theories, guidelines and policies” and a Chinese model of governance as an alternative to Western democracy and media reports. “China’s state...