Analysis and Articles

One of the oddest — indeed, surreal — encounters around the war in Afghanistan has to be a telephone call this past July 27. On one end of the line was historian Stanley Karnow, author of Vietnam: A History. On the other, State Department special envoy Richard Holbrooke and the U.S. military commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal. The question: How can Washington avoid the kind of defeat it suffered in Southeast Asia 40 years ago?

President Rajapaksa’s treatment of the independent press is a shocking indictment of a regime that refuses to tolerate criticism.

On July 22, a week into Iran’s foreign media reporting ban, a group of Iranian protesters gathered on a grassy hill to speak out against Supreme Leader Khamenei’s continued support for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Some wore black T-shirts with a blood-spattered slogan: "Where Is My VOTE?" By midday, the protest had attracted several hundred attendees. One woman arrived wearing little more than a thong swimsuit and a pair of purple angel wings.

As the Obama administration struggles to devise a strategy for dealing with Iran’s intransigence on the uranium enrichment issue, it appears to be gravitating toward the imposition of an international embargo on gasoline sales to that country. Such a ban would be enacted if Iranian officials fail to come up with an acceptable negotiating plan by the time the UN General Assembly meets in late September — the deadline given by the White House for a constructive Iranian move.

The contradictions and confusions in U.S. policy in South Asia were on full display during Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s recent visit to India. U.S. support for India, which centers on making money, selling weapons, and turning a blind eye to the country’s nuclear weapons, is fatally at odds with U.S. policy and concerns about Pakistan.

In the past month, two seemingly unrelated events have turned Central Asia into a potential flashpoint: an aggressively expanding North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and a nascent strategic alliance between Russia and China.

The ongoing security crisis in West Bengal exposes the cracks in Indian democracy, stemming from a volatile mix of poor governance, petty politics, and a fundamental breakdown in credibility.

One of the most significant consequences of the collapse of neoliberal economics, with its worship of the "self-regulating market," has been the revival of the great English economist John Maynard Keynes.

The movement to call Israel to account for its crimes against the Palestinian people is growing. It is “invading the mainstream discourse, becoming part of the constant and unrelenting drumbeat against Israel.” It could eventually threaten the existence of the Jewish state by undermining the support it receives from its strongest backer, the U. S. government. That was the message of alarm delivered by the Executive Director of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Howard Kohr, to the AIPAC Policy Conference on May 3.[1]

The struggle within the power elite in Iran has spilled over into the streets and now threatens the theocracy.

"Change for the poor means food and jobs, not a relaxed dress code or mixed recreation…Politics in Iran is a lot more about class war than religion."

– Financial Times Editorial, June 15 2009

Credit rating agencies (CRAs) must be independent in order to be effective, says a new report released by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).

Pressure applied by the Canadian labour movement and civil society organizations has forced the Harper government to remove Colombia free trade legislation from the legislative agenda - at least for now.

Every day 300 million litres of water laced with sulphuric acid and heavy metals, known as acid mine drainage (AMD), bubbles to the surface around South Africa’s biggest city, Johannesburg.

Like most of the world, Quebec discovered the Alter-Globalist movement with 1999’s Battle in Seattle. After a lull of a few years, a new kind of activism took hold of the world.

The opening night is friday June 5 and the workshop over the week-end. Alternatives organizes three workshop for the Montreal Citizen Summit.