Global Archive

Two weeks ago, unidentified gunmen targeted Somali radio reporter Ahmed Omar Hashi, aka Ahmed “Tajir,” as he was walking in Mogadishu’s Bakara Market with Moqtar Hirabe, his director. Hirabe died, on the spot; Hashi’s friends rushed him to Medina Hospital, pictured, with wounds to his arm and stomach. The attack was the latest in a series of assaults on journalists. In the following week, my readers at War is Boring, with a big boost from World Politics Review, helped me raise more than $1,600 to get Hashi out of Somalia — and the Committee to Protect Journalists raised $1,000, on […]

World Politics Review friend and contributor Iason Athanasiadis was arrested by the government of Iran this week, and World Politics Review joins the Washington Times, the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, Global Post, the Neiman Foundation, and Iason’s friends and family in calling for his release. A Greek citizen who lived in Iran as a journalist and student for three years, and who obtained fluency in Farsi during that period, Iason’s coverage of Iran and regions beyond for World Politics Review and numerous other publications has been characterized by a rare dedication to objectivity, intellectual honesty and cultural understanding. His […]

Today’s selection demonstrates that, while some of the images might age, the theme, sadly, never seems to go out of date. Notice, by the way, the color of the balloon John Lennon carries in the opening demonstration. As I said earlier this week, the events in Iran separate the idealists from the realists. And what I’ve realized about myself is that I’m something of a hybrid: realist when it comes to relations between states, and idealist when it comes to the relation between citizen and state. I’m not sure whether and how we can influence the outcome in Iran for […]

U.K. Ambassador for Multilateral Arms Control and Disarmament John Duncan talks about digital diplomacy — including his use of blogs, Twitter and Facebook. UPDATE: U.S. Secretary gives the U.S. view of digital diplomacy, which the State Department calls “21st century statecraft.”

Today’s selection comes a week late, since it talks about D-Day, and the debt the French owe to us ‘Marruhcunz (as I learned how to say in the Big D). And no, the song isn’t performed by a Fox News commentator, but by Michel Sardou, a French cultural rarity: the right-wing artist. The opening stanza about says it all: If the ‘Mericans hadn’t been thereYou would all be in GermanyTalking about I don’t know whatSaluting I don’t know who. That’s where he gives the Heil Hitler salute, as if to say, You guys really are a bunch of ungrateful bastidz. […]

Today’s selection selected itself. It’s been a while since it was so easy to find something topical, actually, and it comes from one of the great bands, one that managed to build on its initial derivative gimmick to end up with an original sound that can only be described as, well, the heavy, heavy monster sound of Madness. I missed the one chance I had to see them play live, at the old Concert on the Pier series, in ’83, it must have been. If memory serves correctly, I’d just gotten grounded after Pops found out about my 14-year-old fondness […]