Political intimidation, ownership pressures, the rise of AI, and economic constraints are calling into question the future of press freedom – nowhere more conspicuously than in the United States, where these forces have combined to fuel growing anxiety about the fate of an institution that has been fundamental to democracies …
Read More »U.S. strike on Venezuela marks a defining moment in the erosion of American hegemony
Today, confronted with deepening domestic strains and an increasingly contested global position, Washington has shed its veneer of moralism and is resorting more openly to naked force to impose its will on other countries. COMMENT | XINHUA | Far from a triumphant display of strength and Western Hemisphere dominance as …
Read More »Trump meets U.S. oil companies on investment in Venezuela’s oil industry
NEW YORK | Xinhua | U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday promoted his plan of securing investment of at least 100 billion U.S. dollars to rebuild Venezuela’s oil industry in a meeting with U.S. oil company executives at the White House. Trump urged major U.S. oil companies to participate in …
Read More »Trump pulls US out of 66 international organisations
Washington, US | THE INDEPENDENT | Secretary of State Marco Rubio has announced that President Donald Trump has pulled the USA out of 66 international organisations and treaties that he called anti-American. “Today, President Trump announced the U.S. is leaving 66 anti-American, useless, or wasteful international organizations. Review of additional international …
Read More »America’s Post-Trump China Strategy
Although diplomacy has long been at the forefront of Sino-American engagement, the rise of politically constrained coupled with new strains of nationalism in the US and China, has rendered it ineffective COMMENT | STEPHEN S. ROACH | With the United States in the hands of an unstable president, diplomacy …
Read More »Donald Trump and the White Man’s Burden in Nigeria
US President Donald Trump has made good on his threat to take military action against Nigeria to save Christians from a “genocide.” COMMENT | ADEKYE ADEBAJO | On the eve of America’s imperial invasion of the Philippines in 1899, the British poet and defender of empire Rudyard Kipling urged the United States …
Read More »What is behind Washington’s escalating pressure on Venezuela?
Critics have compared the offensive against Venezuela to the Iraq war, citing a familiar mix of regime-change rhetoric and security pretexts, whose fundamental aim is to serve Washington’s oil interests. BEIJING | Xinhua | Since late August, the United States has ramped up military presence in the Caribbean off Venezuela’s …
Read More »Trump says Zelensky ‘doesn’t have anything until I approve it’
WASHINGTON | Xinhua | Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “doesn’t have anything until I approve it,” U.S. President Donald Trump said in an exclusive interview with Politico on Friday, two days ahead of his meeting with Zelensky in Florida over a peace plan to end the Russia-Ukraine conflict lasting nearly four …
Read More »The treason of the populists
COMMENT | MICHAEL BURLEIGH | Until a few days ago, it had never crossed my mind that people across Europe – including Londoners like me – were living in a strife-afflicted hell hole, “suffocated” by regulations, stripped of political liberties, and bound for “civilizational erasure.” So, it was with …
Read More »Trump announces plan to build ‘Trump-class’ battleships
WASHINGTON | Xinhua | U.S. President Donald Trump announced Monday that the U.S. Navy will build two new “Trump-class” warships, which he has claimed will be “the fastest, the biggest, and by far 100 times more powerful than any battleship ever built.” At a press conference along with Defense Secretary …
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