June 2019

Shortly after the media broke the news that President Trump had first endorse bombing of Iran and then called it off – see the report by the New York Times here – I had the opportunity and privilege to speak with iran’s PressTV about various aspects of this very dangerous tension build-up. The program first discusses the sensational pictures of the American drone which was shot down by Iran after which the anchor turns to me.

Lake Prespa in Macedonia Abstract The Prespa Agreement (PA) between Athens and Skopje was meant to be a final solution to the ‘name issue’. Yet the dispute has never been only about the state name, which is proved by the 20-pages long text. A plethora of other provisions is to be implemented erga omnes (internationally and domestically). Despite the insistence of the external mediators that the name dispute has never concerned the issues of ethnicity, nationality, culture, and language, these issues indeed appear to be simultaneously central as well as the Achilles heel of the deal. This paper does not deal with conceptual and theoretical aspects of ethnicity and nationality; yet its focus is on the fact that the Agreement indeed regulates identity issues, i.e. it represents a legal intervention in spheres pertaining to both ethnicity and national identity with implications for each. The basic premise is that instead of...

In 1980 in his State of the Union address President Jimmy Carter said: “Any attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.” Dear President Donald Trump: We’ve been here before and it’s as ludicrous this time as it was nearly 40 years ago. Why on earth are you sending in a flotilla of ships and 2,500 troops? Why are you so convinced that the mines that exploded on two oil tankers, neither of which were American, in the Persian Gulf are the work of the Iranians? The Persian Gulf, and in particular the infamous Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway (21 miles wide, the same as the English Channel) that is its entrance, is no longer the “jugular”...

Only immediate climate action can save the future. If we don’t take action, the collapse of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the horizon. A speech by Bill Moyers At an April 30 conference entitled “Covering Climate Now”, co-sponsored by The Nation and Colombia Journalism Review, Bill Moyers made a speech which included the following remarks: “I have been asked to bring this gathering to a close by summing up how we can do better at covering the possible ‘collapse of our civilization and extinction of much of the natural world’, to quote the noted environmentalist David Attenborough, speaking at the recent Unites Nations climate summit in Poland… “Many of us have recognized that our coverage of global warming has fallen short. There’s been some excellent reporting by independent journalists and by enterprising reporters and photographers from legacy newspapers and other news outlets....

Av Erni & Ola Friholt 18:e juni 2019 Vid upprepade tillfällen de senaste åren hör vi ledande politiker i USA och EU-länder tala om ”Våra intressen”. Märkligt nog gäller intressena inte hemma i USA eller England eller Frankrike. Nej det gäller Libyen, Venezuela, Iran, Irak, Afghanistan, Nordkorea, Syrien, Arabemiraten, Bahrein, Qatar, Kuwait m fl… Ännu tror många människor i vår världsdel att kolonialismens övergrepp mot världens folk upphörde stegvis under 1950- och 60-talen. En massiv desinformation lydigt återgiven i media lär oss att det är våra kristna och humana värderingar som kränks av ociviliserade råa regimer i de forna kolonierna. När kolonialmakterna insåg att det skulle bli kostsamt att behålla kontrollen av kolonierna med direkt militär och administrativ närvaro, gavs kolonierna ”fria” och erbjöds istället lån till sin kommande återuppbyggnad. Snabbt gav dessa lån och tillhörande miljardräntor kontroll över de nya staternas politik, som anpassades till kolonialstaternas ekonomiska behov. I...

Andrew Ross’s Stone Men: The Palestinians Who Built Israel, Verso, 2019. On May 10th Andrew Ross came to University of California, Santa Barbara for a discussion of his extraordinary book, Stone Men, offering the audience a lively presentation enlivened by a Powerpoint array of informative pictures. I took part in a conversation with Andrew that was held prior to giving the small, yet intense, audience an opportunity to participate with questions. Andrew expressed the most startling aspect of Stone Men in these words:“..it would be no exaggeration to say that the ‘stone men’ of Palestine have built every state in the region except their own.” (3) Originally published on May 13th, 2019 on Richard Falk’s blog here His very readable text mainly adopts a somewhat narrower focus, concentrating its efforts on the particular role of Palestinian workers and the rich stone quarries of Palestine in the physical evolution of the Israeli state, not only establishing its architectural...

Oh yes! It can and it is ready to. And perhaps it even will. To tell you the truth, although NATO is the strongest, it could well fall apart thanks to Russia’s – Putin’s – cunning schemes. See here is how and why – in a video from The Infographics Show – and you’ll understand it all. You fear will increase and you’ll be more to pay more to your national military. Looked at from a professional conflict analytical perspective, one may mention a few problematic aspects of this piece of propaganda: • There is no conflict analysis. Russia is treated as the independent variable (active), the US/NATO the dependent (re-active). • Almost no mention of history (except that Russia was weak before but strong now). No mention, for instance, of NATO’s expansion in spite of promises given to then president Gorbachev. • Security and peace is about military matters...

When I was in Moscow three weeks ago, I was briefing myself for an interview with the Soviet Union’s last president, Mikhail Gorbachev. As it happened he had to cancel it as he went into hospital for tests. One of the American academics I always read is Gordon Hahn, an ex fellow of the highly regarded Centre for Strategic and International  Studies. He wrote that American policy towards Russia is a runaway train without rails, driven by a troubling confluence of hubristic ideological influences and bureaucratized sectorial interests. I would add to that Republican members of the Senate who have allowed President Donald Trump small room to manoeuvre on Russian issues, even though there are some indications that he’d like to make peace with Russia.  I also re-read what President Bill Clinton’s secretary of defence, William Perry, has said on a number of occasions: “The US is as much to...

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Photo: Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Credit: rferl.org Why Barr’s investigation is important and should be encouraged. By Stephen F. Cohen June 7, 2019 It cannot be emphasized too often: Russiagate – allegations that the American president has been compromised by the Kremlin, which may even have helped to put him in the White House – is the worst and (considering the lack of actual evidence) most fraudulent political scandal in American history. We have yet to calculate the damage Russiagate has inflicted on America’s democratic institutions, including the presidency and the electoral process, and on domestic and foreign perceptions of American democracy, or on US-Russian relations at a critical moment when both sides, having “modernized” their nuclear weapons, are embarking on a new, more dangerous, and largely unreported arms race. Originally published by The Nation Rational (if politically innocent) observers may have thought that when the Mueller report found no...

By Dr. Lawrence Wittner June 5, 2019 In late April, the highly-respected Stockholm International Peace Research Institute reported that, in 2018, world military expenditures rose to a record $1.82 trillion. The biggest military spender by far was the United States, which increased its military budget by nearly 5 percent to $649 billion (36 percent of the global total). But most other nations also joined the race for bigger and better ways to destroy one another through war. Originally publishes on Counterpunch.org on May 29th, 2019 here This situation represents a double tragedy. First, in a world bristling with weapons of vast destructive power, it threatens the annihilation of the human race. Second, as vast resources are poured into war and preparations for it, a host of other problems―poverty, environmental catastrophe, access to education and healthcare, and more―fail to be adequately addressed. But these circumstances can be changed, as shown by...

Some time ago, I wrote about the flood catastrophe in Iran which a) affects up to 10 million people and b) has gone virtually unmentioned in Western mainstream media: Stop the ongoing US humanitarian terrorism against Iran and help its people! Just in passing, not one of the more than 3000 media recipients of TFF PressInfo did, as far as I have been able to search, mention this issue in general, let alone refer to my analysis. The conspicuous uniformity in perspective of what hits the mainstream media headlines and the uniformity of what does not – omitted news – is today such, that it is hard to believe that it is not orchestrated and that self-censorship isn’t a normal, everyday practice among editors and reporters. So, on April 17, after having written the article, I did what I suggested at the end of it – I sent US$ 5...