Articles in English

Smoke billows after Israeli bombardment in Gaza City on Tuesday. (AFP via Getty Images)

MundoOriente Próximo

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is facing increased pressure to agree to a hostage and cease-fire deal, including from close allies like President Biden, Benny Gantz and Yoav Gallant. But key to any long-term cease-fire is the question of who will police the Gaza Strip the next day. In some ways, it is easier to imagine a “day after the day after”. It entails a reformed, legitimate Palestinian Authority that takes control of both the West Bank and Gaza and engages in serious negotiations for a two-state solution. But how to get there? How will the transition between a cease-fire and the establishment of a revitalized Palestinian Authority be managed in Gaza?…  Seguir leyendo »

Displaced people taking shelter at a school wash their clothes in Nairobi on April 25. (Daniel Irungu/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)

MundoÁfrica,

If you’ve donated clothing to a local charity or tossed your stained shirts in a drop-off bin, chances are your discarded items will be dumped in Africa, winding up in landfills, water and eventually breaking down into microplastics. Your castoff T-shirt will be among millions of items harming human health, marine life and local economies. In 2021, the United States was the leading exporter of secondhand clothing, according to United Nations data, and Africa was one of the main destinations for these goods. The intention is for vendors to sell at African markets, but the quality of the used clothing — referred to as mitumba — is often so poor and soiled that the items are dumped or burned as fuel.…  Seguir leyendo »

Protesting weapons shipments to Israel in front of the White House, Washington, D.C., May 2024. Craig Hudson / Reuters

MundoAméricaMundoOriente Próximo, ,

On May 8, the Biden administration confirmed that it was withholding a major weapons shipment to the Israel Defense Forces. It was the biggest step that the United States has taken in decades to restrain Israel’s actions. The decision concerned a consignment of 2,000-pound bombs—weapons that the United States generally avoids in urban warfare, and which White House officials believed that Israel would use in its Rafah operation in the Gaza Strip—and did not affect other weapons transfers. Nonetheless, the administration’s willingness to employ measures that could materially constrain Israel’s behavior reflected its growing frustration with Israel’s nearly eight-month-old war in Gaza.…  Seguir leyendo »

The tractors of protesting farmers parked in Berlin, December 2023. Christian Mang / Reuters

EuropaUnión EuropeaUE a debate

From late 2023 until the spring of 2024, farmers across Europe flooded capitals to voice their disapproval of national and European Union policies. Tractors rolled down boulevards as protesters blocked streets and caused havoc. The anger reached the heart of the EU, where demonstrators brought the Brussels city center to a standstill and pelted the European Parliament building with eggs.

The protesters had a multitude of concerns, but chief among them was the European Green Deal, launched by the European Commission in 2019, a package of policy initiatives that included new restrictions on the use of pesticides, bans on combustion engines, and the protection of biodiversity—all measures that came with costs for farmers.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

When I was mayor of Mexico City, I led a comprehensive strategy to improve the security of the capital’s residents. The results were impressive: between December 2018 and June 2023 the average daily number of intentional homicides fell by 51%, returning to levels seen before the four-year spike that immediately preceded the new strategy. Crimes classed as “high-impact” fell by 58% and violent vehicle theft by 69%.

The strategy that made these achievements possible rested on four pillars. The first involved focusing on the cause of insecurity with youth programmes introduced by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and other social programmes I implemented in Mexico City to improve well-being and break the vicious cycle of violence.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

In recent years Mexico has found itself grappling with a deep security crisis, threatening its very democratic foundations. As criminal organisations cast a shadow over society, the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has failed to fulfil its basic responsibility of protecting the life and freedom of citizens. Criminal violence remains unchecked, and the government increasingly resorts to post-truth politics and unlawful, undemocratic means to maintain power.

At the heart of Mexico’s democratic woes lies the pervasive influence of organised crime. While my country has long struggled with criminal impunity and violence, Mr López Obrador’s time in office has seen an unprecedented escalation in the power and reach of these illegal networks.…  Seguir leyendo »

A resident waiting to be evacuated from Vovchansk, as Russia continues its offensive in Kharkiv oblast. Photograph: Global Images Ukraine/Getty Images

Europa, , ,

The Russian offensive on the Kharkiv region this month has, after 20 months of relative peace, again placed many of the villages where my charity works, repairing homes destroyed by bombs, at the forefront of the war.

I began volunteering in Kharkiv two years ago, having dropped out of my master’s degree in Russian literature and set up the charity to support Ukrainians. After the region’s liberation in September 2022, hundreds of thousands of people had started to return to Kharkiv city and the wider region from other parts of Ukraine, and countries that had taken them in as refugees. The villages where I work were reawakening, the craters that lined the streets had been filled, shops were reopening, electricity was back on.…  Seguir leyendo »

A local health worker in Kandahar, Afghanistan, marked a girl’s finger to show she had received a polio vaccine. Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times

InternacionalSalud Pública,

The fight to eradicate polio has been long and difficult. It’s been nearly 50 years since vaccines eliminated the disease in the United States. But polio continues to this day disabling or killing children in some harder to reach parts of the world. The good news is that we are now on the cusp of eradicating this terrible disease everywhere and forever.

The Global Polio Eradication Initiative is a consortium of major players in the fight — the Gates Foundation, Rotary International, the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. The group has the ambitious aim to end transmission of the virus that causes the disease, wild poliovirus, by the end of the year in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the two countries where it is still actively infecting humans.…  Seguir leyendo »

Nikki Haley supporters attend a rally for the Republican presidential candidate in Spring, Texas, on March 4. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)

MundoAmérica,

Remember that early spring phenomenon known as the “Nikki Haley voter”, the supposed key to Joe Biden’s reelection? Yeah, I agree: It’s a hazy memory. It appears Biden and his campaign team have completely forgotten about them — and that’s a big mistake.

The Haley voter has been reduced to scrolling the dating apps. One can imagine a typical profile: “I refuse to be taken for granted. Prove you want me, and we can talk”.

The arc of Biden’s campaign is forever caught between two forces: the progressive left of his party’s coalition and the moderate bent of college-educated suburbanites, including Republicans who regard Donald Trump as a pustule upon the festering posterior of their once-sensibly conservative party.…  Seguir leyendo »

Reporters gather before a White House press briefing in 2019. (Oliver Contreras for The Washington Post)

MundoAmérica, , ,

“I say up front, openly and proudly, that when I WIN the Presidency of the United States, they and others of the LameStream Media will be thoroughly scrutinized for their knowingly dishonest and corrupt coverage of people, things, and events”, Donald Trump posted on Truth Social in September in an attack on NBC News. “The Fake News Media should pay a big price for what they have done to our once great Country”.

What could Trump do to the news media and their ability to inform the American people? Judging by what he did in his first term, plenty.

As president, he habitually attacked the news media and individual journalists as “fake news” and “the enemy of the people”, undermining public trust in the fact-finding press.…  Seguir leyendo »

Karim Khan, chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court, in Bogotá, Colombia, on April 25. (Luis Acosta/AFP/Getty Images)

MundoOriente Próximo,

On Monday, Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, announced that he was seeking arrest warrants for both Israeli and Hamas senior officials on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Post Opinions asked six experts for their view of the decision.

Avi Mayer: The ICC has united Israel in opposition

In the immediate aftermath of the pogrom perpetrated by Hamas on Oct. 7, Israelis of all backgrounds and beliefs came together in a demonstration of unity seldom seen in this country. The impassioned debates of the preceding months seemed to vanish overnight as the country rallied behind efforts to support the victims of the carnage and the families of the hostages — and to ensure that Hamas can never again carry out a comparable massacre.…  Seguir leyendo »

A Ukrainian serviceman patrolling an area in the Zaporizhzhia region, Ukraine, May 2024. Stringer / Reuters.

Europa, , ,

The U.S. Congress’s approval last month of a $61 billion aid package for Ukraine came not a minute too soon. Ammunition shortages resulting from Washington’s months-long dysfunction have eroded Ukrainian frontline positions and left cities and critical infrastructure exposed to missile and drone barrages. Top military and intelligence officials in Kyiv have advised Ukrainians to brace for territorial setbacks in the coming months. Already, the Russian military has stepped up pressure on Kharkiv, forcing thousands of Ukrainians to flee out of fear that Russian forces could soon reoccupy their towns.

The infusion of U.S. aid should help Ukraine stabilize the front and protect its skies.…  Seguir leyendo »

A Swedish soldier and a Finnish soldier participate in a military exercise outside Stockholm, April 2023. Andres Wiklund / TT News Agency

InternacionalOTANEuropaUnión Europea,

If Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ambition in invading Ukraine was to rein in NATO, it had precisely the opposite effect. In April 2023, Finland joined the alliance, more than doubling the length of NATO’s border with Russia, and in March 2024, Sweden became a member as well. As U.S. President Joe Biden has said of Putin: “He thought he’d get the Finlandization of NATO; instead, he got the NATO-ization of Finland—and Sweden”.

Russia’s brutal war on Ukraine hastened the admissions process, but it was only a matter of time before the two Nordic nations shed their neutrality. Finland’s Cold War policy of nonalignment was always rooted less in principle than in the exigencies of survival; the country was coerced into neutrality by its domineering Soviet neighbor.…  Seguir leyendo »

‘It is time for these key western governments to reconsider.’ Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

MundoOriente Próximo,

‘It is time for these key western governments to reconsider.’ Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, responded with predictable vitriol to international criminal court (ICC) accusations against him and the Israeli defense minister, Yoav Gallant. Yet his arguments are all spin, designed to divert attention from their devastating conduct in Gaza. The American, British and German governments were little better.

On Monday, the court’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, announced that he would seek arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant as well as three senior Hamas officials. He proposed charges against the Hamas leadership for atrocities on 7 October as well as the mistreatment of the hostages since then.…  Seguir leyendo »

The Death of Iran’s President Does Not Bode Well

MundoOriente Próximo

Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, has not always seen eye to eye with his country’s presidents. Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani nudged the Islamic Republic too close to the West for the supreme leader’s liking. Mohammad Khatami rattled the conservative elite with subversive talk of how faith and freedom could coexist. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was too insubordinate and too populist, while Hassan Rouhani’s flirtation with the Americans and his disappointing arms-control agreement drove him out of the inner circle.

President Ebrahim Raisi, on the other hand, was Mr. Khamenei’s ideal partner. A lackluster manager with dispiriting rhetoric and a vicious streak, he was steadfastly loyal to Mr.…  Seguir leyendo »

National security adviser Jake Sullivan at the White House on May 13. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)

MundoOriente Próximo

Tell me how this war ends. From the beginning, that has been the agonizing question with the Gaza conflict. After seven horrific months, a resolution is still some way off. But some clarity is emerging about the shape of a possible endgame.

The parameters of an eventual conclusion to the war became more evident after a trip to Saudi Arabia and Israel this past weekend by national security adviser Jake Sullivan and his deputy for the Middle East, Brett McGurk. The conversations they had there were outlined to me by knowledgeable sources.

The U.S. officials haven’t drawn a road map; it’s more like a set of traffic signs and speed limits.…  Seguir leyendo »

A screen broadcasting Chinese naval exercises near Taiwan, in Beijing, April 2023. Tingshu Wang / Reuters

MundoAsia, ,

Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2021, Admiral Philip Davidson, the retiring commander of U.S. military joint forces in the Indo-Pacific, expressed concern that China was accelerating its timeline to unify with Taiwan by amphibious invasion. “I think the threat is manifest during this decade, in fact in the next six years”, he warned. This assessment that the United States is up against an urgent deadline to head off a Chinese attack on Taiwan—dubbed the “Davidson Window”—has since become a driving force in U.S. defense strategy and policy in Asia.

Indeed, the Defense Department has defined a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan as the “pacing scenario” around which U.S.…  Seguir leyendo »

A Ukrainian serviceman firing a howitzer toward Russian troops in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, May 2024. Valentyn Ogirenko / Reuters

Europa, , ,

The U.S. government decided to provide more assistance to Ukraine just in the nick of time. By the end of April, right before the aid package passed, the war-torn country was emptying its last reserves of ammunition and rationing artillery rounds and shells—and Ukrainian forces began to lose ground in part as a result. The $60 billion now flowing into Ukraine will help correct these disparities, providing Kyiv an opportunity to stop Russia’s offensive. The aid package also serves as a massive psychological boost, giving Ukrainians newfound confidence that they will not be abandoned by their most important partner.

But the aid package alone cannot answer the central question facing Ukraine: how to win the war.…  Seguir leyendo »

Libyan security forces take part in a military parade in the northwestern city of Misrata, on February 28, 2024. (Photo by MAHMUD TURKIA/AFP via Getty Images)

MundoÁfrica

With global attention focused on Gaza and the attacks on Israel by Iran, to the south, nearby Sudan passed a grim milestone largely unnoticed last month. It is now over a year since the outbreak of civil war between the army and its rebellious offshoot, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Thousands have been killed and millions displaced in a vicious conflict that has seen widespread rape, looting and ethnic cleansing.

With the international community’s bandwidth limited, a somewhat myopic focus on the immediate crisis in the Eastern Mediterranean is understandable, but perhaps not wise.

Sudan has been labelled by the UN, ‘ one of the worst human rights disasters in recent memory,’ and has the potential to destabilize its already fragile neighbours in the Sahel, Horn of Africa and Red Sea.…  Seguir leyendo »

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and Hamas’s Yahya Sinwar.Credit...Photo Illustration by The New York Times. Photographs by Amir Cohen/Agence France-Presse, Via Getty Images; Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

MundoOriente Próximo,

In seeking the arrests of senior leaders of Israel and Hamas, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has given the world a promise of accountability.

Regardless of the outcome of the cases, the prosecutor’s request that the court issue arrest warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas’s Yahya Sinwar helps cut through the polarizing language of the moment and promotes the idea that the basic rules of international humanitarian law apply to all. Anyone demanding an end to the conflict in Gaza and the release of all hostages from the grasp of Hamas should embrace the decision.

The prosecutor, Karim Khan, has also brought accusations against Hamas’s Muhammad Deif and Ismail Haniyeh.…  Seguir leyendo »