ASIA UZBEKISTAN Eurasianet helpfully tries to counter the emerging media narrative that Uzbekistan is little more than ISIS’s training facility: Such instant analysis falls short, mainly because it has to oversimplify in order to make a pattern plausible, many regional scholars contend. Edward Lemon, a postdoctoral fellow at the Harriman Institute at Columbia University, warned… Continue reading World update: November 2 2017
Tag: iceland
World update: October 28-29 2017
ASIA AFGHANISTAN A Taliban attack on a checkpoint in Kunduz province killed at least 13 Afghan police officers on Sunday. Meanwhile, in the city of Peshawar, Pakistan, the deputy governor of Afghanistan’s Kunar province, Mohammad Nabi Ahmadi, was reportedly kidnapped by…somebody. The Afghan Taliban denied involvement in the kidnapping, saying that they don’t do that sort… Continue reading World update: October 28-29 2017
Europe/Americas update: September 18 2017
ENVIRONMENT New science suggests that the Paris climate agreement’s pie-in-the-sky 1.5 degrees Celsius limit might not be so pie-in-the-sky after all: The 1.5C target was set as an aspiration by the global Paris climate change deal in 2015 to limit the damage wreaked by extreme weather and sea level rise. It was widely seen as… Continue reading Europe/Americas update: September 18 2017
World update: September 15 2017
UNITED KINGDOM At least 29 people were injured on Friday when an improvised explosive device went off on a London metro train at the Parsons Green station. The device only “partially” exploded, apparently, so things could have been substantially worse. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack, and British authorities raised their terror alert level to… Continue reading World update: September 15 2017
Model citizen, zero discipline
People who lived through the 1980s will understand the title: The big story for the past couple of days has been the massive leak of the so-called “Panama Papers,” a trove of records exposing sketchy financial dealings by people who have more money and political stroke than you or me. You can find any number… Continue reading Model citizen, zero discipline
Extreme Ramadan
During the month of Ramadan, observant Muslims are obliged to abstain from food and drink during daylight hours (as well as things like sex and cigarettes). This is hard enough to do during the fall or winter months, when daylight is shorter, let me tell you. When I was working in the Persian Gulf, which… Continue reading Extreme Ramadan
