The Washington Post (Continuación)

The Toronto skyline is silhouetted in 2015. (Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images)

MundoAmérica,

According to Canada’s most recent census, only 17.9 percent of Canadians claim to speak both French and English, which means 82.1 percent of Canadians are ineligible to occupy the multitude of government positions reserved by law or custom for those fluent in Canada’s “two official languages.” This includes not only flashy jobs such as prime minister or Supreme Court justice, but 43 percent of all positions in the Canadian federal bureaucracy, according to a 2017 report by the Clerk of the Privy Council.

Ottawa is aware that this imbalance is not warmly received by all. As the Clerk’s report delicately noted, “for some public servants, mostly employees who did not learn French prior to entering the labor market, they expressed concern that this makes it difficult to acquire the language skills needed to advance in their careers, and could limit access to bilingual positions to individuals who entered the Public Service bilingual.”…  Seguir leyendo »

An undated photo of Syrian activist Raed Fares. Fares was fatally shot on Nov. 23. (Kafranbl News/AP)

MundoOriente Próximo,

On Friday, Raed Fares — a Syrian revolutionary, citizen journalist and civil society leader — was assassinated in northern Syria by masked gunmen suspected of being affiliated with al-Qaeda. He was 46 years old. Hammoud Jneed, Raed’s friend and photographer, was also killed.

The news came as a gut punch to me and many activists around the world: Raed was a friend, an inspiration, and a teacher. If I am to speak about what he taught me, I wouldn’t know where to begin, and wouldn’t know where to stop. But I write these lines to try to tell you who he was, why we are shattered by his loss, and why we were lucky to have had him.…  Seguir leyendo »

A Chinese soldier stands guard in front of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Mar. 5, 2017. (Roman Pilipey/European Pressphoto Agency)

MundoAsia

China is often described as ruthless and dystopian. Escalating censorship, intensified propaganda and the social credit system present a threatening new mode of Internet governance to the West, one where the freewheeling World Wide Web seems “captured” by the Chinese Communist Party.

Such increases in control, however, do not tell the whole story. Since the inception and spread of the Internet in China, the Chinese party-state has attempted to use the Internet for governance and legitimacy-building as well as for weeding out sensitive information. Chinese President Xi Jinping has referred to the Internet as a “battlefield” where the party struggles to sway public opinion.…  Seguir leyendo »

Seized Ukrainian military vessels are seen in a port of Kerch, Crimea, on Nov. 26, 2018. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)

Europa, , ,

The Nov. 25 skirmish between Russian Border Guard and Ukrainian navy ships in the Kerch Strait has escalated tensions not just between the two countries, but also between Russia and NATO.

Two Ukrainian navy small-armored boats and a tugboat attempted to cross into the Sea of Azov via the Kerch Strait. A Russian Border Guard ship rammed the tug. Russian forces eventually captured all three boats, holding them in the Crimean port of Kerch.

This crisis kicked off months ago

In March 2018 Ukraine seized a Russian-flagged fishing vessel, claiming that it had violated exit procedures from the “temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine.”…  Seguir leyendo »

Europa

This morning, I woke up with one thought in my head: The fate of democracy in my country may be decided by a vote over which I have no control. The Ukrainian president and parliament have just joined to pass legislation that could mark the beginning of the end of the democratic institutions for which so many have fought and died.

The unprecedented declaration of martial law in Ukraine, the first since World War II, came just hours after Russian warships attacked Ukrainian naval vessels in the Sea of Azov, opening a dangerous new front in the continuing Russian-Ukrainian war.

The bill that President Petro Poroshenko sent to parliament, and which lawmakers passed on Monday, gives the president wide-ranging powers, but Poroshenko assured the public that he wouldn’t use those powers to suppress civic freedoms.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoCáucaso,

The stakes in the second round of Georgia’s presidential elections, scheduled for Wednesday, could not be higher — for Georgia and the West. Either Georgia will demonstrate that it has passed the point of being a transitional, post-Soviet democracy and earned its place in the European family, or its image as a modernizing democracy will suffer a major blow, pulling Georgia back into a post-Soviet limbo.

Most important is that this election be peaceful, free and fair, and that both sides must accept the outcome, regardless of who wins. In the first round of the election on Oct. 28, emotions ran high, political debate often turned into ugly personal attacks, and the threat of violence and popular unrest came close to becoming a reality.…  Seguir leyendo »

Europa, , ,

On Saturday evening, three small Ukrainian naval vessels left the Ukrainian port of Odessa and headed for the Ukrainian port of Mariupol. Along the way, they had to pass through the Kerch Strait, a sliver of water that lies between the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula and the Russian mainland. The Ukrainian ships were well within their rights to be there — a similar group of ships went through the strait just a month ago, and a 2003 treaty guarantees the rights of both nations to use those waters. But this time, in a carefully arranged provocation, Russian ships fired on the Ukrainian ships — and then seized them, along with 23 crew members.…  Seguir leyendo »

Newly graduated Afghan National Army cadets march during a graduation ceremony in Afghanistan’s Herat province on Nov. 19. (Hoshang Hashimi/AFP/Getty Images)

MundoOriente Próximo,

In recent days, President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan has met with civic and political actors here to discuss the formation of a team to negotiate peace with the Taliban insurgents who have subjected the country to decades of violence. The U.S. special representative for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, said at a Nov. 18 news conference that he is “cautiously optimistic” about peace prospects. He even urged all sides to work toward getting a deal by the spring presidential elections.

As a human rights advocate for many years before I joined the Afghan government in 2016, I used to struggle to imagine how we could ever reconcile with a group that has for so long contravened basic human rights principles.…  Seguir leyendo »

The icons for Tencent’s WeChat, QQ, JOOX, Tencent News and Tencent Video are seen on an iPhone. July 26, 2017. (Anthony Kwan/Bloomberg)

MundoAsia,

According to estimates by the China Internet Network Information Center, there were 751 million Internet users in China as of June 30, 2017. That is about 9 million more than Europe’s total population during the same time period. It is also more than twice the total U.S. population of 323 million people at the end of 2016.

Those 751 million individuals make up the world’s largest single Internet market. Every day, almost all of them will open WeChat, send messages and browse Moments, WeChat’s sharing platform. Every day, a significant majority of them will use WeChat Pay or Alipay to buy things in stores, supermarkets, restaurants and hotels.…  Seguir leyendo »

Venezuelan migrants are inoculated against tetanus, influenza, yellow fever, measles and rubella by workers with the Health Ministry and the Red Cross in Tumbes, Peru, on Nov. 1. (Juan Vita/AFP/Getty Images)

MundoAmérica,

President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela finally asked the United Nations for help to purchase medical equipment in mid-November, saying that “North American imperialism is persecuting and blocking us”. But days earlier, the main public hospital in Caracas rejected medicines and supplies donated by the nongovernmental humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders.

At first glance, this may seem contradictory. But it more likely reveals an incipient change in the Maduro government’s absolute denial of the country’s humanitarian crisis.

Maduro’s government remains as opaque and repressive as ever. In January, the president called those who spoke out about the crisis “traitors to the fatherland”.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen, left, waits to vote in Taipei on Saturday. (David Chang/EPA-EFE)

MundoAsia,

The people of Taiwan have been taking part Saturday in local elections — an event that people across the Taiwan Strait in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) can only dream of. The vote is taking place amid widespread worries about interference from Beijing, which appears to have organized a full-scale disinformation campaign to undermine the current government of President Tsai Ing-wen and support political forces who favor closer ties with the mainland.

China has been steadily increasing its pressure on Taiwan in recent years, picking off several of its formal diplomatic allies and continuing to build up its military capacity to force or intimidate Taiwan to merge.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoÁfrica, ,

Last month, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced that he had appointed a new cabinet — and that half of its ministers were female. Particularly noteworthy are the appointments of Aisha Mohammed as minister of defense and Muferiat Kamil as the first minister of peace, prestigious ministries at a time when Ethiopia is beginning to soften relations with neighboring Eritrea.

Two days after Abiy’s announcement, Rwanda’s leader, Maj. Gen. Paul Kagame, announced that his country’s cabinet would also be 50 percent female; its members of parliament have been majority female since the genocide.

Some observers have argued that dictators undertake high-profile gender reforms such as these to improve their country’s image, hoping investors and lenders will look more favorably on a “modernizing autocrat.”…  Seguir leyendo »

Enough is enough. End the war in Yemen

MundoOriente Próximo,

Today, the Yemeni people are suffering from the actions of outsiders. Regional powers have turned the country into an arena for proxy conflicts that have little to do with the actual interests of the Yemeni nation. Large parts of the country have been devastated, including much of its vital infrastructure. Millions are threatened by starvation and disease. The fighting has left tens of thousands of others dead or wounded.

This appalling tragedy should have never been allowed to happen. In March 2015, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and their regional and international allies (including the United States and the U.K.)…  Seguir leyendo »

ReflexionesDemocracia

It’s all too easy to become obsessed with our domestic political turmoil. President Trump, after all, has fired the attorney general and FBI director to protect himself from investigation, tried to prosecute that same FBI director along with his defeated political opponent, described the media as the “enemy of the people,” trafficked in blatant racism and xenophobia, misused troops for political ends, spread fraudulent theories about voter fraud to undermine his political foes, and lied with impunity and abandon.

Democracy is under siege in the United States — but not just in the United States. It’s a worldwide crisis. Democracy has already been destroyed in Turkey, Egypt, Venezuela, Thailand and Russia, and it is now being undermined in Poland, Hungary and the Philippines.…  Seguir leyendo »

An electoral official counts ballots at a polling station in Yaounde, Cameroon, in October. (Nic Bothma/EPA-EFE/REX)

MundoÁfrica

International election observers aim to detect and deter electoral fraud — and build public confidence in the election process. This makes credibility a valuable commodity and explains why international observers take pains to present themselves as objective and impartial actors.

The importance of observer credibility was on display in the wake of Cameroon’s Oct. 7 presidential election. After the election, state-owned Cameroon Radio Television (CRTV) broadcast interviews with individuals it described as observers from Transparency International. Despite the fact that many citizens had been too scared to vote, these “observers” declared the election had been “extremely good.”

But Transparency International, a nongovernmental organization that campaigns against corruption, swiftly pointed out it had not, in fact, sent an observation mission to Cameroon.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia

Taiwanese voters will determine the outcome of 10 referendums Nov. 24 as well as local elections. This will not be the first time this autonomous island has held referendums, although none succeeded in the past.

This time, the story could be different. A recent change reduced the threshold requirement from 50 percent of eligible voters to just 25 percent in favor of the question — and a simple majority will suffice. And the new law decreased the referendum voting age from 20 to 18. This lower threshold suggests that it might be easier to pass referendums, impacting Taiwan’s domestic politics as well as its international relations.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoÁfrica

U.N. Special Representative for Libya Ghassan Salame indicated in a statement to the Security Council that a national conference should be convened at the start of 2019 to “create a space for Libyans to crystallize their vision for the transition and no longer be ignored by their politicians.” This follows a conference in Palermo, Italy, that brought together international partners and Libyan stakeholders to discuss the situation.

Salame’s framing suggests that the conference will seek to impose a new path, regardless of what existing institutions might want. In other words, Libya’s transition plan, established in 2012, is being rebooted following a painful lack of progress on a number of fronts.…  Seguir leyendo »

An open toilet sits in a field in Gorba in the eastern state of Chhattisgarh, India, on Nov. 16, 2015. (Adnan Abidi/Reuters)

MundoAsiaInternacionalSalud Pública

Today we celebrate World Toilet Day to promote awareness about the global sanitation crisis. Toilets have been around for more than 5,000 years, but many people around the world still do not have one.

No. 6 on the list of U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) is to achieve universal access to adequate sanitation and end the practice of open defecation by 2030, recognizing the dangers of waterborne disease. But 61 percent of the global population still lacked safely managed sanitation services in 2015. Why has progress toward this goal been so hard to achieve?

Rural Africa and South Asia are where the sanitation problems are concentrated — and India has one of the worst sanitation records.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

I often wonder if it would make any difference to the victims of the dictatorship of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela if the International Criminal Court did not exist. I’m afraid it wouldn’t.

But if the ICC were to act in accordance with its mandate — not bowing to political commitments and pressures — it might make a positive impact for the millions who have fled hunger and disease and to those who have been subject to political persecution and torture in Venezuela. People such as Juan Requesens, elected to the National Assembly, arbitrarily arrested and detained, and subject to abuse and humiliation.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

Canada’s politicians seem determined to give their country more democracy — whether the people want it or not.

Getting rid of so-called first-past-the-post-style (FPTP) elections, in which parliamentarians are elected based on whoever gets the most votes, even if that’s not an absolute majority, has been one of the great failed crusades of modern Canadian politics. Since 2005, there have been at least four province-level referendums on adopting a European-style “proportional representation” electoral system, as well as numerous recommendations from advisory councils and a definitive campaign promise from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Yet despite it all, no change has occurred — the referendums were voted down, the committees ignored, Trudeau’s promise brazenly broken.…  Seguir leyendo »