A new Castro, but the same old Cuba

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:00:29 +0000

It's straight out of Orwell.

The Cuban government of Raul Castro has kept up the repression of the Cuban people through a Criminal Code known as “dangerousness.”

According to a new report released by Human Rights Watch today, this code allows authorities to imprison individuals before they have committed any crime, on the suspicion that they are likely to commit an offense in the future.

In northern Iraq, O'Malley continues a tireless pursuit of reconciliation

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:08:03 +0000

Making peace is hard work. And there are few in the world who pursue it with the relentlessness and entrepreneurial spirit of Padraig O'Malley.

This time the professor and advocate for peace takes his energy to Kirkuk, Iraq, where he is pulling together the leaders from each of the three governmental bodies that lay claim to the coveted oil fields of Kirkuk.

The call from Oslo came way too early for Obama

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 14:11:42 +0000

The call came too early for President Obama on the Nobel Peace Prize.

In fact, it was precisely 6 a.m. when President Obama was awoken by his press secretary Robert Gibbs and informed that he was the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

He hadn’t even had his morning coffee yet. And here was the young president winning the Nobel just nine months into his presidency.

The fog lifts in Pittsburgh, and the G20 leaders are already scrambling for position

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 15:19:56 +0000

PITTSBURGH — A fog is lifting over the city of three rivers as world leaders begin to arrive here for the Group of 20 summit.

And before they even arrive in their limousines snarling traffic for all the locals, presidents and prime ministers are positioning their policies for the summit which will focus on how to keep the slow, but steady recovery of the global economy going forward.

Pittsburgh braces to welcome the world

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 20:51:49 +0000

PITTSBURGH — Just landed in this gritty town of rivers and steel and a no-nonsense people who work hard and play hard.

The city is bracing for the Group of 20 summit on the global economy that will shut down roads and disrupt life and generally mess with the local economy. But the folks here are pretty welcoming, sort of in the way you welcome your in-laws who'll be spending a few days.

To be polite, they seem to be watching international affairs a bit more closely than usual. But from what I can tell they're not too impressed.

Obama needs to do his homework on Israel-Palestine

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 20:51:00 +0000

In the realms of the Middle East, to hold a snap Israeli-Palestinian summit like this one on the eve of the U.N. General Assembly is the grade-school equivalent to staying up late watching David Letterman and trying to do your homework on the bus.

You can get away with it once or twice, but it will catch up to you.

Next thing you know a war will break out between the two sides and this administration will be saying the dog ate my homework.

Top general's report says more troops or Afghan war is lost, but Obama isn't necessarily buying it

Mon, 21 Sep 2009 17:59:20 +0000

For a first glimpse at the much-anticipated strategic review of the war in Afghanistan by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, check out the Washington Post, the first to obtain and publish the 66-page document on its website. The scoop was the work of none other than Bob Woodward.

US steps up attacks against a fractured Al Qaeda from Indonesia to the Horn of Africa

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:24:03 +0000

In case you haven’t noticed, the U.S. is working with governments around the world on an aggressive and coordinated effort to attack Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda-inspired movements.

Consider the events GlobalPost correspondents reported just this week:

In Indonesia, Peter Gelling provided authoritative coverage of the country’s elite counter-terrorism force killing Noordin Top, the leader of Indonesia’s answer to Al Qaeda.

You gotta be crazy to take on the government in China

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 23:09:18 +0000

BOSTON, Massachusetts — If you are a factory worker demanding back pay or a doctor daring to speak out against illegal medical experiments, you have to be crazy in China.

In a devastating and well-reported segment on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, contributing correspondent Shannon Van Sant reveals a look inside China's legal system and how local officials are turning to psychiatric hospitals as "a convenient means of silencing troublemakers."

Mission creep in Afghanistan

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 16:23:19 +0000

BOSTON — Hate to say we told you so, but we did.

GlobalPost predicted back in August in our special report "Life, Death and the Taliban" that there would be requests by the Pentagon for more troops in Afghanistan.

And Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen delivered the anticipated plea before Congress Tuesday, saying that success in Afghanistan would require more troops and that more time would be needed to "succeed" in Afghanistan.

Why one Afghan village tells you everything you need to know about how bad things are over there

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 18:13:40 +0000

So here is why the small, remote village of Ganjgal in Afghanistan tells you everything you need to know about why the U.S.-led occupation of the country seems so doomed to so many.

The Taliban as organized crime; and why an American mob boss must be rolling over in his grave

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 13:01:30 +0000

BOSTON — In the end of the day, the Taliban are not a lot different than any other organized crime family.

And so it's good news that the U.S. government is finally getting that, even if it did take our Kabul correspondent Jean MacKenzie's story to wake them up.

As we reported Wednesday, the federal government announced an investigation and Congress declared it would hold public hearings this fall spurred by MacKenzie’s investigative piece about how American taxpayers’ money is ending up in the hands of the Taliban.

"... the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 01:56:49 +0000

"Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy."

They are the words of the Irish poet, William Butler Yeats, and they seem as if they were penned for Senator Edward M. Kennedy, who persevered through tragedy and always did so with a great sense of humor and a love for laughter.

The world remembers Sen. Kennedy

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:21:12 +0000

BOSTON — Sentator Edward M. Kennedy’s death has touched every corner of the world. He is being remembered by leaders in the halls of power and by people in city slums and rural villages whose lives were empowered and improved by the Kennedy family’s ideas and dreams and its great hope as articulated by the senator and his brothers, John and Robert, that America could be a light to the world. An outstanding multimedia rememberance of Kennedy's life and his legacy can be found at The Boston Globe.

World reacts to Sen. Kennedy's death

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 11:01:07 +0000

BOSTON — From Berlin, where President John F. Kennedy’s words still echo, to Belfast, where the Kennedy family played a key role in brokering peace, to Cape Town, where Robert F. Kennedy made a historic speech, the Kennedy name is known the world over.

And yesterday the world mourned the loss of the last surviving son of an Irish-American family from Boston that suffered triumph and tragedy, sometimes scandal, and came to define American politics.

The violence was considerable but so was the courage of the Afghan voters

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 20:57:50 +0000

As the smoke clears on the Afghan election, President Hamid Karzai and and his U.S. allies wasted no time in setting out on a public relations offensive declaring the election a success.

They did this even before the ballots — and the dead and wounded from violence — are completely counted. At the end of the day, the violence was considerable but so was the courage of the Afghan people in resisting a campaign of fear and intimidation by the Taliban.

Afghanistan's future? Too early to tell

Sat, 22 Aug 2009 14:13:57 +0000

Violent attacks by the Taliban in Kabul early today has meant a low voter turnout in the first hours of voting in the Afghan elections.

There are reports of at least five bombings, a rocket attack and a gun battle between Afghan army and police and Taliban militants. At least a dozen polling booths in the capital are closed as a result, according to election monitors.

As GlobalPost correspondents Jean MacKenzie in Kabul and Kimberly Johnson in Helmand Province continue their reporting from the field, it is still too early to tell where these elections are headed.

Who, in God's name, could kill kids walking to school?

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 13:31:22 +0000

I know that road just outside of Kabul in the Logar Province. I know the kids who walk to school on it every morning. I know their faces were full of hope and glee when I saw them two years ago at their beautiful new school and I can only imagine the fear that must be etched on their faces now.

On Thursday morning, Taliban terrorists packed a timber truck full of explosives and detonated it at a checkpoint between two schools in the Logar Province, they killed 25 people, including 13 elementary school students.

AfPak Journal: Gen. McChrystal takes charge

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 22:41:48 +0000

KABUL — The city was in a full clampdown for the big gathering as heavily armed convoys shuttled the president, diplomats and military brass to the event.

Everyone who is anyone in Kabul was gathering for the ceremony at a heavily-guarded military base where Gen. Stanley McChrystal, a former top special operations commander, took charge of nearly 90,000 U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan.

McChrystal told the gathering on Monday that the U.S. and coalition forces must protect Afghan civilians from all kinds of violence.

AfPak Journal: A suicide bomb kills 29 outside a crowded mosque in northwest Pakistan.

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 18:46:56 +0000

AFPAK JOURNAL: GlobalPost executive editor Charles Sennott begins today to write “AfPak Journal,” a chronicle of his reporting trip through Afghanistan and Pakistan.

ISLAMABAD — As the Pakistan International Airlines flight touched down here, I noticed that the in-flight screen featured the lush landscape of the Swat Valley with a promotional message: “Pakistan, heaven on earth.”

Not exactly.