The Pentagon announced May 16 that a “small, persistent US military presence” of around 500 troops is to return to Somalia, to assist ongoing operations against the Shabaab insurgents. Media commentators widely portrayed this as a policy reversal, with some… Read moreUS troops ‘back’ to Somalia —but did they ever leave?
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, just days after issuing blatant nuclear threats, now engages in the classic anti-Semitic trope of blaming Nazism on the Jews. Speaking to Italian TV, Lavrov responded to a reminder that Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky is Jewish thusly:… Read moreRussian ‘denazification’ goes full Nazi
A series of blasts tore through the building of the de facto “Ministry of State Security” in Tiraspol, capital of Moldova’s separatist-controlled enclave of Transnistria, on April 25. Officials said the building was fired on by unknown assailants with grenade launchers…. Read moreTransnistria blasts signal spread of Ukraine war
Ukrainian officials are accusing Russian forces of having used chemical weapons on the besieged Azov Sea port city of Mariupol on April 11, causing troops and civilians alike to develop respiratory symptoms. The claim first emerged from the Azov Battalion, a unit of… Read moreUkraine: Russian chemical attack on Mariupol claimed
Long-depressed oil prices are suddenly soaring in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, with impacts already being felt globally. Kazakhstan, recently wracked by internal instability, is facing economic crisis as its crude exports are threatened. Most of these exports… Read moreUkraine war portends new oil shock
Russia announced on March 1 that it intends to host an international “Anti-Fascist Conference“—with hideous irony, on the same day its forces bombarded a Holocaust memorial site in Kyiv. Russia struck the Babi Yar Holocaust Memorial in a raid apparently targeting a… Read moreFascist pseudo-anti-fascism: Moscow’s propaganda offensive
As many as 17 people were killed in a massacre in Mexico’s west-central state of Michoacán on Feb. 27, with video of the grisly incident going viral on social media. The victims were lined up along the outer wall of… Read moreMexico: narco-massacre in militarized Michoacán
Mexico’s President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on Feb. 9 called for a “pause” in relations with Spain, in a speech that explicitly invoked the legacy of colonialism going back to the Conquest. But the speech was clearly aimed principally at… Read moreControl of oil behind Mexico-Spain tensions
Amid quickly escalating tensions over Ukraine, Russia has lodged a diplomatic protest with the US embassy in Moscow, claiming that a US nuclear submarine penetrated Russian territorial waters near the Kuril Islands. According to Moscow’s Defense Ministry, a Virginia-class US… Read moreSubmarine incident in flashpoint Kuril Islands
More than 100 Russian writers, activists and academics have signed a petition in protest of the war drive on Ukraine, which was published on the independent news site Echo of Moscow on Jan. 30. The “Declaration by supporters of peace… Read moreGlimmers of anti-war dissent in Russia
Peru’s authorities declared an environmental emergency on Jan. 20 after announcing that 21 beaches around the Lima area were contaminated by an oil spill at a refinery run by Spanish multinational Repsol, calling it the “worst ecological disaster” in the… Read morePeru demands Repsol pay in coastal oil spill
Hundreds in India’s conflicted eastern state of Nagaland began a two-day cross-country march Jan. 10 to protest the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which gives the military broad power to use deadly force in areas where it is declared… Read moreNagaland: cross-country march against ‘special powers’
