Africa
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Lingering White Supremacy In South Africa Sounds Much Like United States By Robert Jensen
‘During apartheid the racism of white people was up front, and we knew what we were dealing with. Now white people smile at us, but for most black people the unemployment and grinding poverty and dehumanizing conditions of everyday life haven’t changed,’ a black South African told me. ‘So, what kind of commitment to justice… Continue reading
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China, Copper, the Democratic Republic of Congo—and the IMF
In a classic example of the witless stenography that passes for Western reporting on Asian and African issues, the actual story – IMF threatens to withhold debt relief unless the Chinese deal is renegotiated – got a bit of a twist – as in Voice of America’s ‘Chinese Mineral Deal Blocking Congo’s IMF Debt Relief.’ Continue reading
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South African Political Power Balance Shifts Left – Though Not Yet Enough to Quell Grassroots Anger By Patrick Bond
Since the early 1990s, neoliberal policies have made SA economically more vulnerable than at any time since 1929. If five major currency crashes since 1996 were not evidence enough, the 6.4% quarterly GDP decline for early 2009 was the worst since 1984. By late 2008 it was apparent that labour would suffer vast retrenchments, what… Continue reading
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Book Review: Nancy Jacobs, "Nation-States as Building Blocks"
After one hundred pages of questioning the inevitability of decolonization and neocolonial domination, and of generalizing about Africa, we home in on 1960 to make sense of dozens of territories too durable to be taken apart and powerful enough for a degree of innovation. This raises the worthy question of how all these separate histories… Continue reading
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Video: Interview with Abderrahmane Sissako on "N'Dimagou — 'Dignity'"
I think the most stimulating aspect of the theme is that dignity should be a worldwide question. Anyone can speak about it, no matter where they come from. I’m an artist and part of my identity includes being universal. As a film-maker I’ve always wanted to tell the story of people who have really difficult… Continue reading
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Video: Shell on Trial: Landmark Trial Set to Begin Over Shell's Role in 1995 Execution of Nigerian Human Rights Activist Ken Saro-Wiwa
Fourteen years after the widely condemned execution of the acclaimed Nigerian writer and environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, the court will hear allegations that Shell was complicit in his torture and execution. Continue reading
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Video: "Massive Casualties Feared in Nigerian Military Attack on Niger Delta Villages"
Nigerian Joint Task Force troops, made up of the army, navy, air force and mobile police, launched an offensive on communities across Warri south and southwest government areas on 13 May after JTF troops were reported to have been attacked by armed groups in Delta state, according to Amnesty International. Continue reading
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Video: Nigeria – Sweet Crude Directed by Sandy Cioffi
“For fifty years, crude oil has been flowing from under the feet of the people of the Niger Delta. For fifty years, they have been promised that this would mean a better life. This promise has never been kept. Now, the people have had enough.” Continue reading
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Is There a Save Darfur Industrial Complex? By Bruce Dixon
The backers and founders of the ‘Save Darfur’ movement are the well-connected and well-funded U.S. foreign policy elite. Continue reading
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South Africa: Zuma presidency: New era or business as usual? By Fazila Farouk
Despite being sold down the river by the elite politics of their party, the poor still see the ANC as their saviour. Continue reading
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Congo Ignored, Not Forgotten – When 5 million dead aren’t worth two stories a year By Julie Hollar
U.S. media haven’t always ignored the Congo; it was one of the top foreign affairs stories in the early ’60s (In the Footsteps of Mr. Kurtz, 2002). At the time, the U.S. government was actively working to take down the newly independent country’s leader Patrice Lumumba and pave the way for greater U.S. business participation… Continue reading
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The Crisis in Somalia: US-NATO Plans to Control the Indian Ocean By Rick Rozoff
For all the horrors US administrations from that of Carter to the current one have visited upon the Somali people, Washington gained what it intended to: Military bases and forces astride many of the world’s most strategic shipping lanes and chokepoints in an area encompassing the Suez Canal and the Red Sea into the Gulf… Continue reading
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Yassine Temlali, "Images of Women in the Maghreb: Persistent Clichés and Changing Realities"
‘The evolution of the conditions of women still appears crucial for understanding the changes underway in Maghreb societies today,’ Khadija Mohsen-Finan writes in her introduction. These changes can be grasped through the evolution of the way society as a whole looks at women and their role.’ Continue reading
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Stephen Roblin, "Lessons from History: The Case against AFRICOM"
In contrast to proponents, I argue that, given the history of U.S. involvement in Africa, past and present, there is ‘sufficient reason’ to think that AFRICOM will be potentially disastrous for citizens of African countries. Continue reading
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US Aircraft and Elite Navy SEALs Defeat Three Somalis in a Lifeboat By Glen Ford
To hear the U.S. corporate media tell it, the Americans had won a huge victory over the forces of evil. The sole surviving Somali was in custody – a 16-year-old who essentially gave himself up, earlier, after being hurt in a scuffle with the American cargo ship captain who is now celebrated as a hero… Continue reading
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Sudan: Alex de Waal, "Saviors and Survivors"
Mamdani sees the Darfur war less as the outcome of the immediate political grievances of Darfurians and the Sudan Government’s specific objectives, but rather as the product of long encounter between the colonial and neo-colonial powers and Africa. Continue reading
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THE WINTER OF OMAR BASHIR’S DISCONTENT Keith Harmon Snow
The ICC can now be viewed as a tool of hegemonic U.S. foreign policy, where the weapons deployed by the U.S. and its allies include the accusations of, and indictments for, human rights violations, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Continue reading
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The Case Against Shell: Landmark Human Rights Trial (Wiwa v. Shell)
In the early 1990s, following decades of Shell’s environmental devastation in the Niger Delta in Nigeria, the Ogoni people of the region organized a non-violent movement against the oil company. Shell’s response? They armed, financed, and otherwise colluded with the Nigerian military regime to repress the non-violent movement — leading to the torture and shootings… Continue reading
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Pirates’ Strike a U.S. Ship Owned by a Pentagon Contractor, But Is the Media Telling the Whole Story? By Jeremy Scahill
The Somali pirates who took control of the 17,000-ton ‘Maersk Alabama’ cargo-ship in the early hours of Wednesday morning probably were unaware that the ship they were boarding belonged to a U.S. Department of Defense contractor with ‘top security clearance,’ which does a half-billion dollars in annual business with the Pentagon, primarily the Navy Continue reading
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Sudan/Darfur is Test Case for Obama’s “Humanitarian” Aggression By Glen Ford
“Obama has not broken the American mold, but rather, appears to be fine-tuning a ‘humanitarian’ interventionist doctrine.” Continue reading
The New Dark Age 