Italian-Swedish diplomat Staffan de Mistura was named UN mediator for Syria on Thursday, taking on the Herculean task of finding a political solution to the dragging civil war. He replaces the hugely respected Lakhdar Brahimi, who resigned in May after two rounds of peace talks collapsed and as the conflict escalated into a fourth year, killing more than 162,000 people. UN chief Ban Ki-moon confirmed the appointment of the special representative and his Egyptian deputy, urging the much-divided Security Council and Syrian parties to work closely with him. Ban has frequently criticized animosity on the Council between Western powers and…
How is it going for everybody? Crazy working hours continued this week for me, even had to bring stuff home for the weekend, and I am in such a need of a holiday right now, I can’t even tell. I’m dreaming of doing absolutely nothing for a day. Or even half a day would be fine. Just one more week of work until then. Hope you’ll like what I found especially interesting this week. Forced Migration as a Weapon of War in Iraq and Beyond The numbers are disturbing as to how many people are forced to leave their homes…
What Drives the Man with the World’s “Most Impossible Job”? Check out this great interview with Secretary General Ban Ki-moon via LinkedIn: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Leadership, Climate Change, and Having the World’s Toughest Job from LinkedIn
I love infographics, don’t you? This one’s from epthinktank.eu, showing the political groups in the new EP.
Happy weekend everybody! There could not possibly be anyone who needed this weekend more than me. I have worked 10-12 hours/day all week, substituting for two of my colleagues away on vacation. It left me really worn out and anxiously looking forward to my own vacation two weeks from now. Catching up on world news was kind of a relaxation after all that. How about you all? How is your summer going so far? A Call for Article 51 Letters There are rules in the UN Charter for the instances of using force. And then there is reality. Perhaps this…
tinytimetravel: “Serb Student Assassinates Archduke and his Duchess”, from the Washington [DC] “Times”, 6/28/1914 [p.1]. And so World War One began 100 years ago today with an assassination in Sarajevo. This account, from an evening edition, is noticeably short on details and incorrect on one important point: the bomb was not thrown by the “Servian student”, but by another would-be assassin earlier in the day. Gavrilo Princip, the young man who actually shot the couple, was the second assassin after the bomb-thrower, and if, later in the day, the Archduke hadn’t decided to visit victims of the bombing, Princip wouldn’t…
Europeans: I drove forty minutes to the Netherlands for some groceries and then I popped into Germany to see some of my relatives before driving back home. Americans: I was in Florida, I drove for nine hours, now I’m still in Florida. #australians: i drove for nine hours #now i’m nine hours away from home #no one is here #the streets are empty #how did this happen #where has civilisation gone #i am alone in the universe #oh wait no there’s an echidna it’s okay Canadians: We left Toronto 2 days ago, We are still in Ontario, food is scarce….
Hello Everybody! I hope you all have spent the longest Saturday of the decade well! I keep being busy with important deadlines approaching both in my work and my studies, that’s the reason this blog seems to be neglected these days. Here’s what I recommend from my weekly reading anyway: UN Chief Warns Military Strikes in Iraq May Backfire The Secretary General actually suggests that keeping things unresolved once again and arming one side against the other would probably even worsen things in the region. World Refugee Day Draws Attention to Shortcomings of International Law World Refugee Day was Friday…
Top Kuwait court jails activist over Twitter posts Now, how about this? [JURIST] Kuwait’s Supreme Court on Sunday upheld the two-year jail sentence of an opposition online activist for writing tweets found to be offensive to the country’s Emir. After the ruling, activist Hejab Al Hajeri said on his Twitter [official website] account that his “determination is bigger than their jail.” Al Hajeri, a law student in his early 20s, was sentenced by the Emirate’s lower court last April after it found that comments he made on his twitter account were critical of the country’s Emir, Shaikh Sabah Al Ahmad…
Happy Sunday, people! I hope you are all having a great weekend! Has anybody else been hampered by Feedly’s down periods this week? I hope it’s all solved by now, because in the end I had to scroll through 250+ posts this weekend. Here’s what I thought was worth sharing with you out of all of it. Jihadi takeover in Mosul and Iraq’s looming breakdown This week’s events in Iraq adumbrates very difficult times to come while there already are plenty of problems to solve in the region. Why the UN General Assembly Just Selected Uganda’s Anti-Gay Foreign Minister as…
