Dear Friend,
It is indeed a sort of turning point for the entire world to completely transform our global or national systems — political, financial or social. Many have died and more will in the coming days, before COVID-19 runs out of poison. We should beat back the pandemic urgently but also make every life count, building on the current willingness to do the unthinkable — by making the world a truly better place.
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One Pandemic, Many Possibilities
by Satya Sagar
It is indeed a sort of turning point for the entire world to completely transform our global or national systems — political, financial or social. Many have died and more will in the coming days, before COVID-19 runs out of poison. We should beat back the pandemic urgently but also make every life count, building on the current willingness to do the unthinkable — by making the world a truly better place.
A month ago, if someone had said ‘social distancing’, I would have really thought they were talking about the Indian caste system with its perverse idea of untouchability. ‘Lockdown’ till recently would have evoked images of a very entertaining style of wrestling where all matches take place inside a steel cage. And ‘flattening the curve’ would obviously be an attempt to trim the well-rounded waistlines of Indian policemen and politicians.
But after reading all the literature on the new pandemic gripping the world, I am slowly beginning to understand how out of sync I have been. These terms are the new jargon for concepts and measures being pushed worldwide as the best way to stop the rapidly spreading COVID-19 on its tracks.
The theory is that social distancing, which requires everyone on the planet to be permanently several feet apart from all other members of our species — will help avoid transmission of this highly contagious virus. ‘Lockdown’, the most recent Chinese product to go global, now means imprisoning entire populations in their own homes — along with plenty of soap and water- to slow the speed at which newly infected land up in hospitals. All these will then ‘flatten’ the graph of exponentially rising infections, predicted by mathematical models.
These measures have set in motion things, completely unimaginable till very recently and what is unfolding now in front of our eyes is like a bad sci-fi Netflix series. Governments are boldly ordering entire countries, cities, malls, schools, religious institutions and all entertainment venues to a standstill. Security guards in hazmat suits are pointing guns, thermal ones of course, at everyone’s faces all over the place.
Politicians and religious leaders are cancelling mass rallies or photo-ops while the rich and famous hide in their private bunkers (hopefully forever). Even the usually ‘me first’ middle-classes are cooperating by stopping all airline travel, stockpiling essential supplies, buying up all masks and sanitizers in the market and pulling out all their money from the stock markets. (some inexplicably fight over extra toilet paper rolls, but then protecting one’s behind in these tense times is perfectly understandable.)
In case you think I am being even a wee bit skeptical or sarcastic, attitudes that are as dangerous as sedition these days, let me clarify. I am not complaining about any of this at all. In fact, I am personally enjoying the quieter ambience, less polluted air, empty streets, easy availability of tickets for flights and trains, cancelled meetings and so many other things that seem like luxuries from the distant past. When was the last time you got to snooze right after lunch on a weekday? (Darwin never said our species was meant to work very hard!)
Given what little we know about COVID-19 and the even larger number of unknowns (I have seen some very pretty graphics that are also pretty frightening), governments being proactive and erring on the side of caution does make sense. And if these radical steps manage to save even a single life, anywhere in the world — irrespective of class, colour, creed — all this disruption of our lives should be well worth it.
It is indeed a sort of turning point for the entire world to completely transform our global or national systems — political, financial or social. Many have died and more will in the coming days, before COVID-19 runs out of poison. We should beat back the pandemic urgently but also make every life count, building on the current willingness to do the unthinkable — by making the world a truly better place.
In fact, I now believe strongly that this ‘war footing’ approach, to marshal all resources available to save human lives, should be the model of governance in every country for all time to come in the future — not just for medical disasters but all disasters in general.
Just imagine if a similar effort as the one we are witnessing globally can be done to solve the looming crisis of climate change — no more use of fossil fuels, no coal-fired power plants, no mining or deforestation or factory farms. Or winding up the global weapons industry and putting in all that money to prevent malnourishment that affects a whopping 815 million people around the world.
Imagine, finding a cure for cancer, that takes over 9.5 million lives annually. Or preventing deaths of an estimated 1.35 million people and 54 million debilitating injuries each year in road accidents by taking all the private cars off the roads. Yes, shut those bloody malls, universities, schools, airports and declare a global health emergency to tackle tuberculosis (1.5 million deaths), malaria (619,000 deaths) or save the lives of babies in Africa and South Asia (2.5 million), who die within the first month of being born due to preventable diseases.
Imagine, putting the money needed to set up universal health care or basic income programs for everyone on the planet. Imagine… ok, ok I realize I am beginning to sound like John Lennon himself, so please don’t shoot me now!
I accept at face value all the extraordinary new policies regimes everywhere are trying out to save their citizens as being completely well-intentioned. All these were completely unimaginable just a few weeks ago. My point is very simple — I am only pleading that we continue on this same path for well after the coronavirus crisis is over. At least till we solve some of the biggest threats to survival of millions of human beings that have been around, even before this new virus appeared recently.
Surely such a noble goal will be championed by every politician, social media influencer, television anchor, movie celebrity and star medical expert? And the wonderful people of the world will readily sacrifice their personal comforts in order to prevent so many needless deaths of our fellow human beings? Yes, please say yes!
Uh, oh…why do I get the feeling that in just a couple of months some big pharma companies will announce a new vaccine, fast tracked by regulators, those who can afford it will get their shots — and then all this global panic will be over as abruptly as it began? Journalists will restart covering fashion models, instead of epidemiological ones, and all will be well with the world again.
In the meanwhile, COVID-19 will continue to still hunt down the aged, the poor and the weak in many parts of the world for a long time to come — joining the legion of ailments that have tormented them for decades. And then the term ‘social distancing’ will go back to being all about the deeply racist and hierarchical caste system, while ‘lockdown’ is what will happen to those who refuse to hand over all fundamental rights to the mighty state or some elite groups of experts.
As for millions of the poor, unemployed, homeless, refugees, daily wagers — it is their survival ‘curves’ that will be completely ‘flattened’ due to the great recession about to hit the globe. In the end, there will probably be more people at the bottom of the social ladder who will die of deprivation — than due to the ongoing pandemic — with no one to calculate their mortality or case fatality rates.
Mass disasters of any kind can turn all of us fearful and selfish or inspire the display of great compassion and solidarity. COVID-19 is a pandemic with many possibilities and a ‘once in a century’ opportunity to sift real facts from hyperbole, get organised, change the world dramatically for the better and forever.
Satya Sagar is a journalist and public health worker who can be reached at sagarnama@gmail.com
Surf the Internet Instead: Britannic Herd Immunity and Coronavirus
by Dr Binoy Kampmark
The COVID-19 reaction formula still remains a Britannia goes it alone approach though closer to that adopted by the Trump administration. Keep it voluntary; take measures as a matter of good sense. Responses on the European continent remain determinedly autocratic in an effort to flatten the curve of infection. French
President Emmanuel Macron has resorted to war metaphors, implementing measures akin to that: mandatory registration of intent to leave homes or face a fine of 38 euros. In Britain, however, Johnson’s preference is to prepare for the worst, wash your hands and surf the Internet.
Facing off the virus
by Sally Dugman
In Massachusetts, USA, bars and restaurants are closed except for takeout, schools are closed starting on this Tuesday. They will all be shut for at least three weeks and no gatherings are legally allowed with more than 25 people in our state. We also can test 400 people per day now in MA.
Stop Tightening the Thumb Screws, A Humanitarian Message
by Kathy Kelly
U.S. sanctions against Iran, cruelly strengthened in March of 2018, continue a collective punishment of extremely vulnerable people. Presently, the U.S.
“maximum pressure” policyseverely undermines Iranian efforts to cope with the ravages of COVID-19, causing hardship and tragedy while contributing to the global spread of the pandemic.On March 12, 2020, Iran’s Foreign Minister Jawad Zarif urged member states of the UN to end theUnited States’unconscionable and lethal economic warfare.
12 Ways the U.S. Invasion of Iraq Lives On In Infamy
Co-Written by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J S Davies
While the world is consumed with the terrifying coronavirus pandemic, on March 19 the Trump administration will be marking the 17th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq by ramping up the conflict there.
Co-Written by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J S Davies
While the world is consumed with the terrifying coronavirus pandemic, on March 19 the Trump administration will be marking the 17th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq by ramping up the conflict there. After an Iran-aligned militia allegedly struck a U.S. base near Baghdad on March 11, the U.S. military carried out retaliatory strikes against five of the militia’s weapons factories and announced it is sending two more aircraft carriers to the region, as well as new Patriot missile systems and hundreds more troops to operate them. This contradicts the January vote of the Iraqi Parliament that called for U.S. troops to leave the country. It also goes against the sentiment of most Americans, who think the Iraq war was not worth fighting, and against the campaign promise of Donald Trump to end the endless wars.
Seventeen years ago, the U.S. armed forces attacked and invaded Iraq with a force of over 460,000 troops from all its armed services, supported by 46,000 UK troops, 2,000 from Australia and a few hundred from Poland, Spain, Portugal and Denmark. The “shock and awe” aerial bombardment unleashed 29,200 bombs and missiles on Iraq in the first five weeks of the war.
The U.S. invasion was a crime of aggression under international law, and was actively opposed by people and countries all over the world, including 30 million people who took to the streets in 60 countries on February 15, 2003, to express their horror that this could really be happening at the dawn of the 21st century. American historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr., who was a speechwriter for President John F. Kennedy, compared the U.S. invasion of Iraq to Japan’s preemptive attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 and wrote, “Today, it is we Americans who live in infamy.”
Seventeen years later, the consequences of the invasion have lived up to the fears of all who opposed it. Wars and hostilities rage across the region, and divisions over war and peace in the U.S. and Western countries challenge our highly selective view of ourselves as advanced, civilized societies. Here is a look at 12 of the most serious consequences of the U.S. war in Iraq.
- Millions of Iraqis Killed and Wounded
Estimates on the number of people killed in the invasion and occupation of Iraq vary widely, but even the most conservative estimates based on fragmentary reporting of minimum confirmed deaths are in the hundreds of thousands. Serious scientific studies estimated that 655,000 Iraqis had died in the first three years of war, and about a million by September 2007. The violence of the U.S. escalation or “surge” continued into 2008, and sporadic conflict continued from 2009 until 2014. Then in its new campaign against Islamic State, the U.S. and its allies bombarded major cities in Iraq and Syria with more than 118,000 bombs and the heaviest artillery bombardments since the Vietnam War. They reduced much of Mosul and other Iraqi cities to rubble, and a preliminary Iraqi Kurdish intelligence report found that more than 40,000 civilians were killed in Mosul alone. There are no comprehensive mortality studies for this latest deadly phase of the war. In addition to all the lives lost, even more people have been wounded. The Iraqi government’s Central Statistical Organization says that 2 million Iraqis have been left disabled.
- Millions More Iraqis Displaced
By 2007, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported that nearly 2 million Iraqis had fled the violence and chaos of occupied Iraq, mostly to Jordan and Syria, while another 1.7 million were displaced within the country. The U.S. war on the Islamic State relied even more on bombing and artillery bombardment, destroying even more homes and displacing an astounding 6 million Iraqis from 2014 to 2017. According to the UNHCR, 4.35 million people have returned to their homes as the war on IS has wound down, but many face “destroyed properties, damaged or non-existent infrastructure and the lack of livelihood opportunities and financial resources, which at times [has] led to secondary displacement.” Iraq’s internally displaced children represent “a generation traumatized by violence, deprived of education and opportunities,” according to UN Special Rapporteur Cecilia Jimenez-Damary.
- Thousands of American, British and Other Foreign Troops Killed and Wounded
While the U.S. military downplays Iraqi casualties, it precisely tracks and publishes its own. As of February 2020, 4,576 U.S. troops and 181 British troops have been killed in Iraq, as well as 142 other foreign occupation troops. Over 93 percent of the foreign occupation troops killed in Iraq have been Americans. In Afghanistan, where the U.S. has had more support from NATO and other allies, only 68 percent of occupation troops killed have been Americans. The greater share of U.S. casualties in Iraq is one of the prices Americans have paid for the unilateral, illegal nature of the U.S. invasion. By the time U.S. forces temporarily withdrew from Iraq in 2011, 32,200 U.S. troops had been wounded. As the U.S. tried to outsource and privatize its occupation, at least 917 civilian contractors and mercenaries were also killed and 10,569 wounded in Iraq, but not all of them were U.S. nationals.
- Even More Veterans Have Committed Suicide
More than 20 U.S. veterans kill themselves every day—that’s more deaths each year than the total U.S. military deaths in Iraq. Those with the highest rates of suicide are young veterans with combat exposure, who commit suicide at rates “4-10 times higher than their civilian peers.” Why? As Matthew Hoh of Veterans for Peace explains, many veterans “struggle to reintegrate into society,” are ashamed to ask for help, are burdened by what they saw and did in the military, are trained in shooting and own guns, and carry mental and physical wounds that make their lives difficult.
- Trillions of Dollars Wasted
On March 16, 2003, just days before the U.S. invasion, Vice President Dick Cheney projected that the war would cost the U.S. about $100 billion and that the U.S. involvement would last for two years. Seventeen years on, the costs are still mounting. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated a cost of $2.4 trillion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2007. Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard University’s Linda Bilmes estimated the cost of the Iraq war at more than $3 trillion, “based on conservative assumptions,” in 2008. The UK government spent at least 9 billion pounds in direct costs through 2010. What the U.S. did not spend money on, contrary to what many Americans believe, was to rebuild Iraq, the country our war destroyed.
- Dysfunctional and Corrupt Iraqi Government
Most of the men (no women!) running Iraq today are still former exiles who flew into Baghdad in 2003 on the heels of the U.S. and British invasion forces. Iraq is finally once again exporting 3.8 million barrels of oil per day and earning $80 billion a year in oil exports, but little of this money trickles down to rebuild destroyed and damaged homes or provide jobs, health care or education for Iraqis, only 36 percent of whom even have jobs. Iraq’s young people have taken to the streets to demand an end to the corrupt post-2003 Iraqi political regime and U.S. and Iranian influence over Iraqi politics. More than 600 protesters were killed by government forces, but the protests forced Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi to resign. Another former Western-based exile, Mohammed Tawfiq Allawi, the cousin of former U.S.-appointed interim prime minister Ayad Allawi, was chosen to replace him, but he resigned within weeks after the National Assembly failed to approve his cabinet choices. The popular protest movement celebrated Allawi’s resignation, and Abdul Mahdi agreed to remain as prime minister, but only as a “caretaker” to carry out essential functions until new elections can be held. He has called for new elections in December. Until then, Iraq remains in political limbo, still occupied by about 5,000 U.S. troops.
- Illegal War on Iraq Has Undermined the Rule of International Law
When the U.S. invaded Iraq without the approval of the UN Security Council, the first victim was the United Nations Charter, the foundation of peace and international law since World War II, which prohibits the threat or use of force by any country against another. International law only permits military action as a necessary and proportionate defense against an attack or imminent threat. The illegal 2002 Bush doctrine of preemption was universally rejected because it went beyond this narrow principle and claimed an exceptional U.S. right to use unilateral military force “to preempt emerging threats,” undermining the authority of the UN Security Council to decide whether a specific threat requires a military response or not. Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general at the time, said the invasion was illegal and would lead to a breakdown in international order, and that is exactly what has happened. When the U.S. trampled the UN Charter, others were bound to follow. Today we are watching Turkey and Israel follow in the U.S.’s footsteps, attacking and invading Syria at will as if it were not even a sovereign country, using the people of Syria as pawns in their political games.
- Iraq War Lies Corrupted U.S. Democracy
The second victim of the invasion was American democracy. Congress voted for war based on a so-called “summary” of a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that was nothing of the kind. The Washington Post reported that only six out of 100 senators and a few House members read the actual NIE. The 25-page “summary” that other members of Congress based their votes on was a document produced months earlier “to make the public case for war,” as one of its authors, the CIA’s Paul Pillar, later confessed to PBS Frontline. It contained astounding claims that were nowhere to be found in the real NIE, such as that the CIA knew of 550 sites where Iraq was storing chemical and biological weapons. Secretary of State Colin Powell repeated many of these lies in his shameful performance at the UN Security Council in February 2003, while Bush and Cheney used them in major speeches, including Bush’s 2003 State of the Union address. How is democracy—the rule of the people—even possible if the people we elect to represent us in Congress can be manipulated into voting for a catastrophic war by such a web of lies?
- Impunity for Systematic War Crimes
Another victim of the invasion of Iraq was the presumption that U.S. presidents and policy are subject to the rule of law. Seventeen years later, most Americans assume that the president can conduct war and assassinate foreign leaders and terrorism suspects as he pleases, with no accountability whatsoever—like a dictator. When President Obama said he wanted to look forward instead of backward, and held no one from the Bush administration accountable for their crimes, it was as if they ceased to be crimes and became normalized as U.S. policy. That includes crimes of aggression against other countries; the mass killing of civilians in U.S. airstrikes and drone strikes; and the unrestricted surveillance of every American’s phone calls, emails, browsing history and opinions. But these are crimes and violations of the U.S. Constitution, and refusing to hold accountable those who committed these crimes has made it easier for them to be repeated.
- Destruction of the Environment
During the first Gulf War, the U.S. fired 340 tons of warheads and explosives made with depleted uranium, which poisoned the soil and water and led to skyrocketing levels of cancer. In the following decades of “ecocide,” Iraq has been plagued by the burning of dozens of oil wells; the pollution of water sources from the dumping of oil, sewage and chemicals; millions of tons of rubble from destroyed cities and towns; and the burning of huge volumes of military waste in open air “burn pits” during the war. The pollution caused by war is linked to the high levels of congenital birth defects, premature births, miscarriages and cancer (including leukemia) in Iraq. The pollution has also affected U.S. soldiers. “More than 85,000 U.S. Iraq war veterans… have been diagnosed with respiratory and breathing problems, cancers, neurological diseases, depression and emphysema since returning from Iraq,” as the Guardian reports. And parts of Iraq may never recover from the environmental devastation.
- The U.S.’s Sectarian “Divide and Rule” Policy in Iraq Spawned Havoc Across the Region
In secular 20th-century Iraq, the Sunni minority was more powerful than the Shia majority, but for the most part, the different ethnic groups lived side-by-side in mixed neighborhoods and even intermarried. Friends with mixed Shia/Sunni parents tell us that before the U.S. invasion, they didn’t even know which parent was Shia and which was Sunni. After the invasion, the U.S. empowered a new Shiite ruling class led by former exiles allied with the U.S. and Iran, as well as the Kurds in their semi-autonomous region in the north. The upending of the balance of power and deliberate U.S. “divide and rule” policies led to waves of horrific sectarian violence, including the ethnic cleansing of communities by Interior Ministry death squads under U.S. command. The sectarian divisions the U.S. unleashed in Iraq led to the resurgence of Al Qaeda and the emergence of ISIS, which have wreaked havoc throughout the entire region.
- The New Cold War Between the U.S. and the Emerging Multilateral World
When President Bush declared his “doctrine of preemption” in 2002, Senator Edward Kennedy called it “a call for 21st century American imperialism that no other nation can or should accept.” But the world has so far failed to either persuade the U.S. to change course or to unite in diplomatic opposition to its militarism and imperialism. France and Germany bravely stood with Russia and most of the Global South to oppose the invasion of Iraq in the UN Security Council in 2003. But Western governments embraced Obama’s superficial charm offensive as cover for reinforcing their traditional ties with the U.S. China was busy expanding its peaceful economic development and its role as the economic hub of Asia, while Russia was still rebuilding its economy from the neoliberal chaos and poverty of the 1990s. Neither was ready to actively challenge U.S. aggression until the U.S., NATO and their Arab monarchist allies launched proxy wars against Libya and Syria in 2011. After the fall of Libya, Russia appears to have decided it must either stand up to U.S. regime change operations or eventually fall victim itself.
The economic tides have shifted, a multipolar world is emerging, and the world is hoping against hope that the American people and new American leaders will act to rein in this 21st-century American imperialism before it leads to an even more catastrophic U.S. war with Iran, Russia or China. As Americans, we must hope that the world’s faith in the possibility that we can democratically bring sanity and peace to U.S. policy is not misplaced. A good place to start would be to join the call by the Iraqi Parliament for U.S. troops to leave Iraq.
Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK for Peace, is the author of several books, including Inside Iran: The Real History and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran and Kingdom of the Unjust: Behind the U.S.-Saudi Connection.
Nicolas J. S. Davies is an independent journalist, a researcher for CODEPINK, and the author of Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq.
This article was produced by Local Peace Economy, a project of the Independent Media Institute.
Playing for Higher Stakes: Saudi Arabia Gambles on Oil War with Russia
by Dr James M Dorsey
With stock markets crashing and economies
grinding to a halt as the world struggles to get a grip on the Coronavirus, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman could not have chosen a worse time to wreak havoc on energy markets by launching a price and production war against Russia.
With stock markets crashing and economies grinding to a halt as the world struggles to get a grip on the Coronavirus, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman could not have chosen a worse time to wreak havoc on energy markets by launching a price and production war against Russia.
Saudi Arabia’s oil spat with Russia throws a spanner into the works of the Kingdom’s long-standing effort to hedge its bets, a strategy that has taken on added significance as the Gulf comes to grips with the likelihood that the region’s security architecture will fundamentally change.
Saudi Arabia, despite a primary focus on close ties to the United States, has increasingly sought to put its eggs in multiple baskets by initially forging closer military and economic relations with Britain, France, and Germany, and more recently with Russia and China.
The Saudi strategy, stemming from mounting doubts about the reliability of the United States as an ally and protector of last resort, was showcased when China opened its first overseas defense production facility in Saudi Arabia for the manufacturing of the CH-4 Caihong, or Rainbow drone, as well as associated equipment.
The CH-4 is comparable to the US armed MQ-9 Reaper drone that Washington has refused to sell to the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia’s willingness to undermine its hedging strategy by challenging Russia’s refusal to continue to align its production levels with that of the Organization of Oil Exporting Countries (OPEC) follows the Kingdom’s bowing to US pressure to acquire Lockheed Martin’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system rather than Russia’s S-400 anti-aircraft and anti-missile weapon.
Russian President Vladimir Putin made a last-ditch sales pitch last September after the Kingdom’s six battalions of US-made Patriot batteries failed to detect drone and missile attacks on two of the country’s key oil facilities that knocked out half of its production capacity.
The decision by Mohammed bin Salman, known by his initials MbS, to confront Russia stemmed from a stark choice confronting the Crown Prince: endanger relations with the only power to have put forward a regional security plan that would have allowed the Kingdom to hedge its bets while maintaining close ties to the United States, or drive oil prices down in a bid to force Russia to coordinate production levels that would ensure a higher price.
Ultimately, the Crown Prince’s choice was driven by economics rather than longer-term security.
Low oil prices have already forced the Kingdom to borrow from international financial markets. $80 USD per barrel is the price it needs to balance its budget. It is also the price MbS needs for his ambitious plans to diversify and mainstream the Saudi economy and turn it into a cutting edge 21st century knowledge hub.
MbS may in some respects have shot himself in the foot even if his assumption proves correct that the Kingdom could win a price and production war and that Russian President Vladimir Putin would see a longer term move from a unipolar to a multilateral security arrangement in the Gulf as too big a prize to lose.
Last year’s limited initial public offering (IPO) on the Saudi stock exchange by Aramco, the Kingdom’s national oil company, that constituted a crown jewel in MbS’ economic reform plans, failed to convincingly address fears that it was subject to the whims of the Kingdom’s ruling elite.
The war with Russia may have convinced investors’ worst fears with Aramco raising capacity and production to help MbS with his gamble.
“This has proved to investors that their worst fears about Aramco were a reality. The company’s plans and its output decisions are based on MbS’ erratic behavior,” said a Saudi official familiar with Aramco’s offering.
MbS may not be the only one to suffer consequences of the oil war but his may be a tougher struggle because it involves restoration of trust.
The setback for US shale oil companies that need a relatively high oil price to break even, the reason Russia was willing to go to war with Saudi Arabia, is likely to be temporary as was evident in 2014 when Saudi Arabia gunned for market share rather than price to drive American producers out of business.
“A protracted crude oil price war on the supply side, combined with the simultaneous demand shock caused by Covid-19’s impact on economic activity, will hurt oil producers everywhere,” said Tilak K. Doshi, an energy scholar at the National University of Singapore’s Middle East Institute.
If the Crown Prince’s decision was driven by domestic considerations, so was Mr. Putin’s.
Yet, despite believing that OPEC had outlived its utility, Mr. Putin was taken aback by the ferocity of Saudi Arabia’s response to the Russian cancellation of its earlier production level agreement with OPEC, prompting Moscow to call for a return to the agreed levels for the first quarter of this year.
“OPEC is finished, so is any attempt to ‘manage’ the oil market. US shale (as a fully privately owned industry) operates on aggressive free market principals. The Russians understand that and so does Saudi. The energy game (including alternatives) is now a survival of the fittest,” tweeted Ali Shihabi, a banker-turned-pro-Saudi-political commentator.
In Russia, MbS is up against an opponent that could prove to have a longer breath.
Dr. James M. Dorsey is an award-winning journalist and a senior fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. He is also an adjunct senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore’s Middle East Institute and co-director of the University of Wuerzburg’s Institute of Fan Culture in Germany.
Originally published by Insidearabia.com
Food Waste Management: A Global Dilemma
Co written by Bipasha Saikia and Bishaldeep Kakati
According to Food and Agricultural Organization, every year one-third of the food produced across the globe goes to waste. The staggering amount is a huge concern for humanity, especially when seen alongside the fact that an equally staggering 820 million go hungry every day. Why does this happen?
Co written by Bipasha Saikia and Bishaldeep Kakati
According to Food and Agricultural Organization, every year one-third of the food produced across the globe goes to waste. The staggering amount is a huge concern for humanity, especially when seen alongside the fact that an equally staggering 820 million go hungry every day. Why does this happen?
While many may perceive the proliferation of food chains across the globe as a sign of development and availability of options to have a good time with friends and family; as a responsible inhabitant of this planet, one cannot help but wonder: How does the planet deal with the amount of food waste generated with such high levels of consumption?
A lot is happening these days on the front of climate change and waste management and one cannot seem to retract from the opinion that mushrooming of food outlets at such a killer pace along with many other factors is only worsening the problem.
If one were to trace the origin of the problem of food loss and food waste, we have to start from the process of food production followed by distribution and storage and finally consumption by consumers because it is an occurrence at every stage of this cyclical process.
How many of us eat out of boredom? Gorging on delicacies while watching our favourite shows on Netflix/Amazon Prime is a guilty pleasure we all have partaken. Even going out to dine appears a task let alone eating responsibly. Thus, these days we prefer ordering food online. And the bizarre offers sure propel us to take in their service. This has again compounded the effects of the whole food consumption and waste management crisis.
The Instagram generation is obsessed with food photography that has indeed changed the perception of young minds about food; from a source of energy to a commodity of entertainment. Popular shows like Master Chef have changed people’s idea of food and the concept of buffet restaurants have turned food into an idea of fun and entertainment. Our faulty consumption habits along with the projection of food as a means of entertainment have unimaginable consequences upon the planet. Large gatherings like weddings and parties serve more food than one can possibly eat, leading to colossal food waste. The question arises- can we be a little more responsible with our food habits? Will ‘Zero Hunger’ by 2030 be a reality?
We produce more than we need. And the same exerts tremendous pressure on the resources of the planet. Farming requires vast amounts of land and is a water-intensive activity. When food produces with such resources goes to waste, it is a waste of these resources. In India and elsewhere, most of this wasted food ends up in landfills that produce methane over prolonged periods, which is 21 times more harmful than CO2. Shocking is the fact that if food waste was seen as a country, then it would be the third largest contributor to green house gas emissions after United States and China. These concerns had prompted the United Nations to formulate Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 requiring global community to reduce food waste and loss per capita by half by 2030.
The swift rate of increase of food waste has in no time become a global dilemma. And it has now reached such a stage, that food waste management has become one of the most difficult conundrums even for the experts. However, in order to find out the solutions to tackle food waste, it’s apposite for the commons to first understand the various ways via which food gets wasted.
According to the website trvst.world, an alarming 1.3 billion tonnes of food produced globally is wasted. And this staggering fact is simply enough to break the common perception that food waste occurs only via food items which get discarded at the end of various household activities or ceremonies such as marriage, birthdays etc. In reality, the issue of food waste begins directly at the start of food production process, which includes growing of crops, livestock till the point these are packaged and sold in the market. It is in fact after this point, where produced goods are sold in the market; human beings further worsen the scenario and act as the major barrier to the process of food waste management because of their never ending desires, inappropriate food habits and the careless attitude to fill the dustbins in a precipitous manner.
Food, no doubt, has always been one of the vitals for the population to survive. And one of the solutions to tackle the menace of food waste is available within the ambit of the realization of the importance of food for the population itself. It is estimated that by 2050, the world population would increase to 9.8 billion. And in this regard, the idea or practice of donating surplus food would definitely serve a dual purpose; reduce the menace of food waste and also ensure that the world doesn’t suffer from starvation, especially keeping in mind the ever increasing population graph. So, in order to fulfill this endeavour, countries like France and UK have already taken significant steps like conceptualizing the notion of regular donations of unused food rather than discarding the same. Further by giving proper training to the farmers regarding proper management of produced goods or making use of proper installations like solar-power refrigeration systems, a consequential reduction of food waste can also be achieved in each and every step of food production. In fact, invigorating initiatives like converting food wastes into useful resources like turning coffee cherries into flour or creating ale from leftover bread can also be taken to reduce food waste or sometimes food waste can also be used to produce household energy. However, all these measures would only work if people are properly educated regarding all these perspectives.
Thus stepping into the 21st century, it’s important for the people to realize the grave issue of food waste which has become a global dilemma and thus show their concern over it. But nothing can work in this regard until and unless this issue gets addressed both on a global scale and on a supply chain level, so as to come up with correct measures to reduce the serious predicament of food waste so that it can never hamper the progress of the present as well as the future generation.
Bipasha Saikia and Bishaldeep Kakati are activists
Denying Interim Bail To Anand Teltumbde and Gautam Navlakha Is Alarming
Press Release
The top court’s order to deny interim bail is alarming given that the case against the
activists is based on very thin evidence. Moreover, the cyber forensic analysis by credible investigative journalists and technical experts discredit the evidence used by Pune police to incriminate the activists. The analysis reveals that the letters which were allegedly recovered from the hard disk of Rona Wilson, one of the nine activists accused in the case, and used by the police to link the accused to a banned political party are most likely to have been planted in the disk through use of malware which allowed remote access to Wilson’s computer. This clearly indicates manipulation of evidence and the fabricated nature of the case.
Telangana Assembly passes resolution against CAA, NPR, and NRC
Countercurrents Collective
The Telangana State (TS) Legislative Assembly, by way of a resolution passed on March 16, Monday, has opposed the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National
Population Register (NPR), and National Register of Citizens (NRC), asserting these formed part of concerted attempts to tinker with the inclusive and non-religious nature of citizenship.
Silence between the Notes – Anthology of Partition Poetry
by Namrata
Silence between the Notes is an anthology of Partition poetry which includes contributions from Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, English, Hindi, Bengali and Kashmiri languages. It is a unique collection as this is the first book which is extensive, representative and inclusive of it all. Selected, edited and introduced by Aftab Husain and Sarita Jenamani, this anthology promises to bring forward the voices which had perhaps got lost somewhere in all the noise that followed Partition.
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