Blog archive all
20th October 2013
Saudi Arabia, which spent more than a year campaigning for a seat on the UN Security Council only to turn it down when elected last week, is seeking election to yet another UN body – the Human Rights Council. The kingdom is one of several notorious rights abusers hoping to win a place in next month… Read more
19th October 2013
Saudi Arabia was one of the founding members of the United Nations and yet, throughout the organisation's 68-year history, it has never held a seat on the Security Council. Until recently it had also shown no desire to do so.
That changed just over a year ago when the kingdom began lobbying for… Read more
15th October 2013
Seven public relations firms – mostly British or American – are vying to win a contract from Bahrain's repressive government.
Western PR companies have often been criticised in the past for taking up lucrative assignments aimed at polishing the kingdom's tarnished image. In Bahrain itself, they… Read more
12th October 2013
The destruction of Syria's chemical weapons got under way this week. In a letter to the Security Council, UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon reported:
"Under the supervision of OPCW experts, supported by the United Nations, the Syrian Arab Republic began to destroy its chemical weapons. Syrian… Read more
6th October 2013
Tunisian leaders yesterday agreed on a road map aimed at resolving the country's political crisis. The plan, which requires the Islamist-led government to hand over power to a technocratic caretaker administration, has been widely hailed as a preferable alternative to the military takeover in Egypt… Read more
5th October 2013
On August 14, hundreds of Egyptians died when security forces violently dispersed sit-in protests against the military takeover that ousted President Morsi. One week later, hundreds of Syrians died in the chemical attacks near Damascus. Both these massacres were on a similar scale, and yet only one… Read more
3rd October 2013
Star Trekker: Abdullah before he became king of Jordan
Mohamed Morsi, the ousted Egyptian president, admires Planet of the Apes. King Abdullah of Jordan is a Star Trek enthusiast who even made a brief appearance in one of its episodes. These were a couple of obscure facts that I learned last… Read more
2nd October 2013
There's yet another twist in the story of Yahya Ababneh, the mystery journalist who reported claims that Saudi Arabia supplied chemical weapons to Syrian rebels. After more than a month's silence since the claims were published on an American "advocacy journalism" website, Ababneh has now surfaced… Read more
28th September 2013
For the first time since the Syrian conflict erupted, a political solution under UN auspices is beginning to look like a real possibility. There's still a long way to go, of course, but the Security Council's unanimous adoption of a binding resolution on dismantling Syria's chemical weapons has… Read more
26th September 2013
In the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov continues to claim that Syrian rebels were responsible for the chemical attacks in Damascus on August 21.
Lavrov "recently presented his US counterpart John Kerry with the latest compilation of evidence,… Read more
ARAB ART ONLINE: Susan Hefuna: Al Sabr Gamil (Patience is Beautiful) 2007. Ink stained on wood 140 x 170 cm. More information | Click to enlarge
