Good idea, bad timing?
It's not clear whether the world's worst drought in over a century provided impetus for the agriculture ministers of the BRICS nations to gather in Brasilia in March and launch a manifesto designed to make the group a key player in the global food security regime. But they did. Now the world is waiting.
 
From a…

In recent months, Russian officials have repeatedly emphasized Russian sovereignty and autonomy. Russia indeed is not a part to an integration project or a military alliance that dismantle its bundle of sovereign rights. There are no foreign troops on the Russian territory and no-one dictates economic policy to Moscow. Vladimir Putin has recently…

           The Jihadist terror has now extended from Europe across the Atlantic to North Garland Texas.  Dutch politician Geert Wilders, the man on an Al Qaeda hit list for his daring film, “Filna,” was the keynote speaker at an art exhibit and cartoon competition portraying the…

Turkey’s transition from a parliamentary system to a presidential one has long been a cornerstone of an election platform of the ruling conservative Justice and Development Party. Perhaps one of the most vocal supporters of the proposed changes is the current president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. After his election as a…

“Space”— to riot, burglarize, and burn our cities at home, but also space for terrorists to destroy, murder, crucify and behead abroad.  
 
Indeed, Baltimore mayor Stephanie Rawlings Blake’s subsequently retracted comment that, “we also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well,&rdquo…

April 25, 2015
April 24 had two meanings for us; the hundredth anniversary of the Armenian genocide by the Ottoman Turks, but also the 90th birthday of my Jewish mother who lived through the Holocaust.  Unable to marry, she carried this mischling [mixed race Jew] in her womb from July 1944 (a few days after D-day) to April 9, 1945. And only…

On May 9th 2015, the Russian Federation  will be celebrating the 70th anniversary of the victory over fascism. A military parade is annually organized for the victory parade. Commemorating this victory goes beyond simply attending a formal ceremony, or a tank defile. Commemorating this victory is paying respect  for the 27 Million Soviet…

It is no wonder why statements on the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire made last week by the European Parliament and Pope on the occasion of approaching the 100th anniversary of the tragic events have caused such a strong reaction of Turkey’s political establishment: the theme of "events of 1915" is still considered to be a…

III. Canada
 
Stephen Harper: the rise and fall of Canada's defence budget
 
Since coming to power in 2006, Canada’s Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper has made support for the military the centrepiece of his campaign to garner support from voters disillusioned with the Liberal party’s policies towards veterans…

Canada took over the rotating chairmanship of the Arctic Council in 2013 for the first time since its inauguration in 1998. The Council, however, could hardly be described as the same forum that it was in the ’90s. The organisation has begun to focus more on security for transportation routes and resource exploration since its 2011…

 
Media outlets and government circles both cringe and squirm when the subject of Westerners leaving the West to go fight in Syria and Iraq with the Islamic State arises. While acquiring data and calculating accurate numbers wildly diverges from source to source, there is no doubt that ANY number simply makes countries like the United States…

Russian President Vladimir Putin has just declared his readiness to mend his ties to the West as long as Moscow is not treated as a “vassal.”  Why now?  Likely because the Obama era of “strategic patience” is nearing its end.  The presidential primaries will be soon upon us.
 
Like his predecessors…