It’s easy to get lost in the magic of the performances of Olympians. We have come to expect perfection for things difficult and even impossible for the mere mortal to perform — especially when an Olympic gold medal is up for grabs. But as we’ve seen in these Winter Games — and at every Olympics — the athlete favoured to win doesn’t always make it to the top of the medal podium. Why is it that throughout a season an athlete can demonstrate domination in their respective sport, but fail to perform when it counts most at the Olympic Games? The easiest answer is to assume that athlete has choked…

Turkey-backed Free Syrian Army, FSA, fighters in the Syrian town of Azez near the border with Turkey, Sunday, Jan. 21, 2018. Depo Photos/ Press Association. All rights reserved. On January 20, Turkey began its second military campaign in northern Syria. The target is Afrin, a Kurdish-majority canton and stronghold of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the military alliance led by the People’s Protection Unit (YPG). The Turkish intervention is backed by the Free Syrian Army (FSA), comprised of several Syrian opposition groups such as the Islamic Ahrar Al-Sham and the Hamza Brigade. Turkey’s ‘Operation Olive Branch’ objective is aimed at neutralising the YPG, which Ankara considers a terrorist group and…

In 2016, the homicide rate in Los Angeles rose for the third year in a row. Between gang-related shootings and a growing homeless population, robberies went up 13% and homicides increased by 5% from 2015 to 2016. And yet, the streets of Los Angeles are actually safer than they were 10 years ago. In 1996, there were 46% more robberies than in 2016. It’s not just Los Angeles that has seen a decline in crime — in some cities, the change has been more prominent, and the decline has held steady. National violence dropped between the 1990s and the 2010s, which is widely known as the Great American Crime Decline.…

Participants at the Antigua meeting. Photo: Katy Tartakoff.Latin American countries have the highest rates of femicide in the world and are considered the most dangerous places for women outside of war zones. Many places in this region are effectively war zones – they just don’t fit the model of conventional warfare. Too many women face constant threats of violence from drug cartels, government forces, paramilitaries, gangs, husbands and partners. Women organisers from across the Americas met in Antigua, Guatemala in November 2017 to discuss root causes of such violence, challenges to peace, and how to respond. The meeting gathered women working in Colombia’s peace process; searching for the disappeared, and…

THE GOOD NEWS: New discoveries can cast new light on familiar subjects, sometimes making iconic figures seem more accessible.   Today we know a lot about evolution, the driving genetic force that we experience every day, whether we’re removing those pesky vestigial organs like wisdom teeth or the appendix, or maybe landing on a tailbone after a nasty skateboarding fail. Yet we seem to know little about the everyday life of the founder of the theory of evolution, Charles Darwin. A newly acquired photo album reveals a closer look at Charles Darwin’s family. The 19 prints of the family photo album were recently acquired by the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and…

Boys sit on the rubble of a two-floor building after it was allegedly destroyed by Saudi-led airstrikes on the northern outskirts of Sanaa, Yemen, 23 August 2017. Picture by Hani Al-Ansi/DPA/PA Images. All rights reserved.Today, conflict in the Middle East is reduced to Saudi-Iranian rivalry. The story is that emergent Iranian hegemonic designs in the Levant pose a threat to regional peace that needs to be countered. The narrative is cast as religious ‘Shi’a v. Sunni strife’ for additional existential effect. However, this simplistic frame obscures a more significant development: the return of authoritarianism to the Middle East. Autocratic rule is consolidating in Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt and Iran alike.…

With colorful rhetoric about dotards and nuclear buttons, North Korean propaganda is attracting attention around the world. Outside observers can now easily access some of this propaganda by visiting regime-sponsored websites. These have, in turn, spawned foreign feeds like the excellent KCNA Watch media aggregator and satirical sites like “Kim Jong Un Looking at Things.” However, there’s another side to North Korean political messaging, one directed at the domestic population. Difficult to access and written in a highly stylized, dogmatic prose, North Korea’s domestic propaganda is not only largely ignored abroad, but it’s also difficult for even South Koreans to understand. It includes state-sponsored Chosun Central TV broadcasts, state-produced films,…

Egyptian political activists, victims and prisoners' relatives take part in a protest on 29 March 2013. AA/ABACA/Press Association Images. All rights reserved.Giuseppe Acconcia (GA): It is the seventh anniversary of the revolution bringing an end to the Mubarak regime. Can you elaborate on what those days mean to you? Mahienour el-Massry (MM): One of the best moments that ever happened to the Egyptian people. It was an uprising against the injustices of the Mubarak regime and especially against the police state of that time. Over the years, the lack of political space, and the inclusion of public space in formal politics, resulted in an apolitical environment in Egyptian society. People…

Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy in Brussels press conference at the end of an EU Summit. Wiktor Dabkowski/Press Association. All rights reserved.Consistency is a virtue. It demonstrates one’s principles, creates predictability, and insulates oneself from charges of hypocrisy. But as with any virtue, its excessive application can prove tedious, annoying, and boorish. “A foolish consistency,” the American philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson reminds us, “is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.” Such hobgoblins clearly haunt the halls of power in Madrid. Spanish leaders have taken a firm line against separatism everywhere because of their home-grown separatists in the Basque Country and Catalonia. As a…

THE GOOD NEWS:  The global effort to wipe out tuberculosis is making huge gains in recent years.   Tuberculosis may sound like a disease of the past, but for the lingering places in the world with no defense against it, TB still presents a major health concern. To do away with scourge for good, 75 global leaders gathered in Moscow this past November for the inaugural World Health Organization Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Tuberculosis in the Sustainable Development Era: A Multisectoral Response. With 114 countries represented, the conference was “a long overdue global commitment to stop the death and suffering caused by this ancient killer,” said WHO director-general Dr.…