Article on the calls for intervention in Sudan.
The writer addresses the vital issue of whether US intervention would actually be good in Sudan to solve the humanitarian crisis as opposed to its current occupation in Iraq. It does seem that US intervention in Sudan to stop the ethnic violence perpetuated by govenrment-assisted militia, Janjaweed against Darfurians would be a valid action. But the author says that imperialism in any form is still imperialism even if it can seemingly stop a current crisis.

The war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), formely Zaire, which went on in the late nineties and involved several African countries and the ensuing conflicts and upheavals since have approximately accounted for four million lives. This is the spectacular but credible claim made by the English medicine journal, the Lancet. This article on Zmag details some of the fighting and the reasons behind them in the Congo, involving foreign countries, American former top-level government officials and multinational corporation.
The article is very detailed especially in describing the various resources found in the DRC in which many countries and corporations have vested interests in.

US Trade and China
Spreading China fears to boost public support and score cheap political points is what Democrats are trying to do to Bush. Still there do exist likely conflicts with regard to trade between US and China as this article points out.


US and India.
Bush visited India recently as well as Pakistan and Afghanistan. The US is undoubtedly making a big effort to improve ties with India because of its growing economy, its shared democracy heritage but especially because of its strategic geo-political status as a major Asian ally and potential bulwark to China. This article shows that it will not be simple for America, especially with balancing its alliance with rivals India and Pakistan.

So why and how has Bush and the Republicans become so dominant in US? Because the Democrats have no spine, and because they're just as corrupt as the Republicans.
See this post in Pressaction about Democract Sen. Dianne Fienstein and her massive profiteering through her husband's business with the War/ Occupation on Iraq. While it's just one example, she is certainly not the only Democrat legislator/ Senator who benefits from criminal actions of the ruling party.
The writer makes a great case why the Democrats deserve so much criticism as the Bush adminsitration. This isn't surprising in any country where there's only two parties competing for power as you either have a situation where the two of them fight tooth and nail and tear the country apart or where the two have a kind of informal arrangement where both parties alternate power after each election or two and both parties commit the same crimes in power with the other one condoning it.

Found a Newsweek article from last year that talks about poverty in Asia. It's a bit long but gives some good information. it's quite true that when it comes to Asia, especially East Asia, people think about prosperity, whether the Asian tigers, China's booming economy or India growing modernity.
It seems surprising to hear how there's more poverty in Asia but then, the number of people in Asia is much more than Africa too- China by itself has more people than Africa. Still I think it's a major issue and it's good to see the South Korean president talking about it being a big priority.

International relations theory is just killing me nowadays. That and school in general.
I'm sure from that, you can figure out why my long absence.

Here're 2 good articles from online magazine Slate. The first by Christopher Hitchens is on North Korea. It's blunt, direct and tells it as it is, describing North Korea. Ironically GW Bush has to be given some small credit for his stance on that country and its leader. Everytime I think about this country it makes me feel disgusted and scared how anybody can so openly and blatantly wield absolute power and dominance over a country. At the same time, I do understand why this is allowed to happen, because all the neighboring countries stand to lose something if the regime and leader are brought down or attempted against.

The second, is on the recent Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections. I think the real test will be to see if the results will be accepted and peace maintained in the upcoming elections. It's good that a new party other than Fatah won, it gives the Palestinian state a solid chance to start over
and curb the corruption and inefficiency characterised by the previous administration. Let's just hope violence doesn't break out soon or in the near future, whether between the different Palestinian factions or with Israel.

Naomi Klein writes a powerful article on the issue of torture and America's history of it. She contrasts America's disgust and shame of the current Iraq, Guantanamo and secret prison torture scandals with the fact that America has been conducting and "teaching" torture ever since Vietnam. Of course most American civilians won't be aware of their country's role in training Latin American officers in vicious counterinsurgency programs like forceful interrogation or the Phoenix program which resulted in thousands of deaths of suspected Vietcong members under custody, but it is much worse when members of government like Senators or Congressmen profess ignorance of this.

See here for Our Amnesiac Torture Debate

I haven't posted on this for a long time because of school and work. During this time away, I thought about what's the real purpose of this blog, what is the main goal or theme, because I know I've covered many with the articles and sites I linked to. For now, I have to give a simple explanation and say the things I post here are about injustice in this world, in different forms and places but always about injustices.

This article from Counterpunch talks about the media's role during the Katrina aftermath.
It especially blasts the misrepresentation of looting and disorder by the media and describes the real circumstances behind the poverty in New Orleans.

A little-known yet brutal occupation exists quite close to North America, the situation in Haiti. Two websites that focus on the ongoing situation there and try to shed light on the atrocities happening include "Canada out of Haiti" and Zmag's Haiti watch.

Canada has been helping a UN force establish control and security in this Caribbean country. In 2004 former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced into exile after an opposition-led uprising spead rapidly whilst America and other leading nations urged Aristide to step down. However under the supervision of the UN and Canada, leading political and media activists have been jailed without trial, and even worse, Canadian-trained police have been alleged to have committed massacres in slum areas in Port-au-Prince and fire on unarmed protestors in demonstrations against the government.
This piece in the McGill daily explains a lot about the events and immediat history of the Haiti situation.

2005 seems to be the year of the disasters. The Tsunami, Katrina, now the Pakistan earthquake with tens of thousands dead. In addition there was Hurricanes Rita, Stan and the ensuing flooding which killed over a thousand in Central America.

Now that New Orleans has been destroyed and its population dispersed all over the country, it's time for the wealthy, the developers and corporate using federal and private-charity relief funds to rebuild and remake the city completely to benefit the rich and big business without having to deal with the poor who will be strongly discouraged from returning.
A horrendous idea? Yes, but is it true? Naomi Klein says it is.

The damage and suffering caused by Hurricane Katrina has been terrible, even more so as it seems that the city of New Orleans will be lost or completely evacuated for at least 2 months in order for authorities to clear it up and drain waters away.
The suffering of the people who were still in the city when Katrina struck has been prolonged and increased by slow, uncoordinated and insufficient relief efforts.
With all the coverage of the hurricane's aftermath by American media, one of the worst things has been the villification of people trapped in the city as criminals and gangsters as coverage has fixated at times on reports of snipers, rapes, gangs, etc.
This Zmag article talks about the unfair coverage by US media on Katrina and about some of the factors that has led to the weak relief efforts.
One damning factor is the occupation in Iraq because not only were budgets for emergency services weakened/ reduced to allow for funding for the Iraq war/occupation, but also manpower in the form of the state's (Louisiana) National Guardsmen were reduced because many of these Guardsman are fighting in Iraq where they were sent by their President.

Death, disorder and chaos

Well, the damage wrought by Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans and surrounding areas is turning out to be catastrophe. Not just the immense physical damage done to the city but the fates of the people still in the city, with all the chaos and disorder not to mention the suffering.

What is striking besides the suffering of people, is how seemingly slow and inefficient relief services are in reaching those in need. Of course there's numberous reports of disorder including looting, shootings and even rapes which is extremely sad.
The conclusion so far is that the events in New Orleans are resembling those of poor 3rd world countries, and nothing like the world's richest and supposedly most developed country.

To have a better understanding and empathy for those Palestinians, this Zmag article talks about the situation around a few small former Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
Around the former settlements of Ganim and Kadim (population: 300) lie the Palestinian city of Jenin and many smaller satellite villages.
As the article says: "According to a map made by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, there are currently five major trenches, three fixed checkpoints, two earthen mounds, and three roadblocks in the area – all barring Palestinian freedom of movement between villages as well as the city of Jenin, all purportedly to protect of the tiny settlements of Ganim and Kadim. "

What this means essentially is that tiny Israeli settlements exist at the expense of larger Palestinian towns around them as everything is geared towards the luxury and protection of the Israeli settlers while larger numbers of neighboring Palestinians are made to suffer from isolation and poverty due to lack of access to surrounding areas including fertile land, long waits through checkpoints for travel, poor infrastructure, barren land and general poor economic and physical conditions.

This is a long, extensive article on the Darfur crisis in Sudan and the sinister role of oil.

The Darfurian genocide has resulted in deaths of hundreds of thousands and the forced migration of millions to refugee camps across the border in Chad.
The author states that oil is the main reason for inactivity by the US who do not want to risk losing access to precious oil in Sudan, which they would if they imposed sanctions on it.
As well, the long-running civil war between the government and the oppressed South has only recently been ended with a tense peace agreement so the US is now eager to move in as have oil companies from other countries.

Millions in slavery today

Forced labour - a global problem as this BBC newsreport says.
Actually forced labour is too restrained and vague a term to describe what is essentially modern-day slavery and human trafficking.
From kidnapped teen prostitutes to sex slaves to child soldiers and labourers, the range of "forced labourers" is wide and happens all over the world, especially in South Asia, Latin America and West Africa.
12.3 million indeed.

The BBC has this in-depth section on modern-day slavery here. News reports, photos, videos, and statistics on this disturbing issue are presented.

Terrorism experts? Hardly.

A fine article on American media coverage and hyping up of "terrorists" and the terrorist threat. Many times, so-called terrorism experts never get into the real reasons why terorrists happen, such as political tensions and general rage against American foreign policies etc.

The Nation's Daily Outrage todayfeatures 5 ideas
on solutions addressing major issues. Regarding the world, eliminating poverty and curbing America's militarism sure look like good ideas, you can only wish that those in power get it, if ever.

The Gaza withdrawal has been seen in diferent lights by different people on different sides in the Middle East. Some see it as a cover for the Israelis to hold on to their settlements in the more precious land of the West Bank whilst seeming cooperative towards the Palestinians getting their own state but really just throwing a bone to the Palestinians in the form of barren Gaza, others see it as a great victory for the Palestinians. So one opinion is an Israeli victory while the other is a Palestinian victory. This spiked-online.com article says, it is neither.

From the troubles the Israeli army has been enduring in forcing out the settlers and dealing with anti-withdrawal protestors plus the heat that Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon has been receiving from politicians and some of his people, it's clear this is not an easy or desirable measure in pulling out from Gaza.
At the same time, the Palestinians seem to be unclear in who exactly will be running things, whether it's the PA, the official authority, or those other organisations like Hamas for instance.

Gwynne Dyer writes of how
basically the Israelis had to withdraw for their own safety.

Certainly when looking at scenes of the Israeli withdrawal, one sees and hears so much of the pain and anguish of many of the settlers and yes, one understands that they are losing their homes, yet compared to the suffering their Palestinian neighbors endure, the settlers' sadness seem like nothing. I mean, those settlers did get compensated by their government, plus they will move into new homes, they will not be homeless.
Here's a good article from the Guardian. The writer contrasts the circumstances of the settlers withdrawal with that of the Palestinians in Rafah when their homes were demolished by Israelis for "security reasons".