On Thursday, Hillary Clinton came out swinging against President Donald Trump and his silence over the alleged violence against LGBTQ people in Chechnya.  In early April, reports emerged claiming that hundreds of gay men may had been rounded up, arrested, and systematically tortured by local police in Chechnya, a federal subject of Russia.  “There has been a very strong outcry in recent days across the North Caucasus because a Russia LGBT group has applied for permission to hold a gay parade in the cities across the North Caucasus,” Natalia Antelava, editor in chief of Coda Story, told PRI. “They were denied, of course, because gay parades are not allowed in Russia. But it…

Introduction The war in Yemen reflects the failure of the 2011 transition deal to end the influence of the powerful patronage networks of the Salih regime and deal with the marginalisation of the Huthis and the south. Press Association/Abdulnasser Alseddik. All rights reserved.Huthi leaders used militias developed in the 2000s, their skills in mobilising tribal support and a Faustian pact with Salih to defeat Islah and, in the process, force President Hadi out of the country. Hubris may have led to their attempt to move out of their Zaydi heartland, but this provoked a Saudi-led coalition to mobilise against them. Fighting has continued for six months with much destruction of…

Donald Trump really seems to hate being president. Almost as much as people seem to hate him being president. In an interview with Reuters on Thursday, President Trump all but acknowledged the painful truth, saying: “I loved my previous life. I had so many things going. This is more work than in my previous life. I thought it would be easier.” And while the weight of the office has clearly caught Trump off guard, one person who saw it coming from far away was radio host Howard Stern, who has known Trump for decades. On his show, Stern said he had a conversation with Trump less than two weeks into…

Press Association/AP/Lefteris Pitarakis. All rights reserved.As I pointed out in early December, changes to the balance of forces in Syria and Iraq have been forcing together the disparate and fractious elements of the “informal Sunni coalition,” nominally led by Saudi Arabia. These actors have had little in common except an extreme wariness of Persian power and influence west of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, and a desire to see Bashar al Assad, a Persian ally in Syria, replaced by a Sunni government. Beyond those two points, there is little common ground between the Saudis and Turks. Both nations have their preferred proxies in the Syrian struggle against al Assad; but…

Woman silhouette. Shutterstock/arda savascioguliari. All rights reserved.Oslo, December 17: it’s the international day to end violence against sex workers, and Pro Senteret present the report Am I not a human being like you? Violence in Oslo’s street prostitution environment[i]. A few hours later Bulgarian sex worker Galina Sandeva is found stabbed to death in her car in front of the luxury sky rises lining the waterfront. Violence against sex workers is endemic on a global scale[ii]. Getting this group included in public health plans on interpersonal violence is a challenge. Although violence is considered a societal threat in Norway[iii], inclusion of the violence faced by sex workers is not high…

On April 15, Violet Mosses Brown officially became the world’s oldest living person after the last record holder, Emma Morano from Italy died at the age of 117.  Brown, who hails from Jamaica, is also 117 years young and was born in March of 1900. She credits her many years on Earth to loving her family, her church, and her love of a few delicious Jamaican food choices.  “Really and truly, when people ask what me eat and drink to live so long (sic), I say to them that I eat everything, except pork and chicken, and I don’t drink rum and dem tings,” Brown told The Jamaica Observer.  Brown additionally…

Fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad made history last summer, becoming the first Muslim woman to represent the United States in the Olympics while wearing a hijab. With her team, she won a bronze medal at the games and used her platform to advance acceptance of Muslims in America. In a letter she published on Time.com today, she warns that the tolerance and understanding she has been advocating has come under fire from President Donald Trump and his supporters. Muhammad explains to Trump that just because she is Muslim, that doesn’t make her any less American, and that she is in fact an embodiment of American ideals. She was born and raised in Maplewood, New Jersey. Her father is a…

Airstrike by the US-led coalition in Kobani, Syria, 2014. Lefteris Pitarakis/AP/Press Association Images. All rights reserved.The most recent Labour leadership hustings briefly touched on the issue of 'talking to terrorists' and then returned to more domestic issues. But the issue of alternatives to war remains at a time when the horrors of what is happening in Syria, let alone the violence in Iraq and Turkey, have once more brought to the fore the search for more peaceful solutions. In this context the Adam Curle Symposium at Bradford University on 5 – 6 September is all too relevant, especially given Adam’s own commitment to the peaceful resolution of conflict. This commitment…

Several years back, Oprah raised the bar for gift-giving talk show hosts everywhere by giving a free car (if you ignore the $7,000 in taxes each recipient had to pay) to her entire studio audience.  But while handing out a staggering $7,000,000 in cars is nothing to scoff at, Ellen DeGeneres’ recent gesture on her show might be an even bigger gift, even if the cumulative price tag is millions less. Ellen, with financial backing from Walmart, surprised each high school senior (41 in all) at Brooklyn’s Summit Academy Charter School with a four-year scholarship to any state university in New York.  Ellen had previously expressed admiration for the school,…

National Security Adviser Michael Flynn at the National Prayer Breakfast, February, 2017, Washington, DC. Pool/ABACA ABACA/Press Association. All rights reserved.The line of demarcation has been drawn. Is fear of Islam rational? or a mental illness, a phobia? Against the soon-to-be National Security Advisor Michael T. Flynn’s claim that fear of Islam is rational, we have the common and damning denunciation of Islamophobia. My perspective is unusual; I am a historian of modern Europe and a human rights lawyer who works in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. My work defending human rights is born out of requests from Muslim Mauritanians who believe deeply in the promise of human rights – the…