The bankruptcy of neoliberalism has been highlighted by the vastly different responses of the world’s two most powerful countries to the coronavirus pandemic.
Geography Archives: Asia
Countries in the continent of Asia
A niggardly response to an extraordinary crisis
In a show of solidarity, some of India’s opposition leaders have declared the much-delayed relief package (titled Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana) announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on March 26 to mitigate the effects of the Coronavirus pandemic on the poor as a welcome “first step”.
An often overlooked region of India is a beacon to the world for taking on the coronavirus
In a pandemic, a rational person would much rather live in a society governed by the norms of socialism than of capitalism, a society where people rally together to overcome a virus; than to live in a society where fear pervades and where stigmatization becomes the antidote to collective action.
The COVID-19 debt deluge
How long the COVID-19 crisis will last, and what its immediate economic costs will be, is anyone’s guess. But even if the pandemic’s economic impact is contained, it may have already set the stage for a debt meltdown long in the making, starting in many of the Asian emerging and developing economies on the front […]
Talking Lenin with Tariq Ali – II
Raza Naeem sat down with one of the most influential leftists of our world today to discuss politics, history and his new book
Talking Lenin with Tariq Ali – I
Raza Naeem sat down with one of the most influential leftists of our world today to discuss politics, history and his 2017 book
Fighting COVID-19 in Cuba, China and the United States
The pandemic has effectively provided a laboratory-like demonstration that people do better when states can plan ahead, apply national resources unequivocally to the public good, put science in the service of the people, and practice international solidarity. These are characteristics of socialist societies.
Can the U.S. learn from China’s determined response to Coronavirus?
Red Lines host Anya Parampil provides a global Coronavirus update, explaining how China suppressed the pandemic with a determined and centralized strategy that was heavily criticized in the West.
United States Imposed Economic Sanctions: The Big Heist
The money trail of U.S. Sanctions leads to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which—behind the shadow of secrecy laws that effectively prohibit any form of public accountability—facilitates the theft of public wealth from targeted countries on a scale only previously accomplished through military invasion and occupation.
Yellow-caking an epidemic: New York Times spreads the virus of hatred, again
In a repeat of the gutter journalism used to justify the 2003 Iraq War, the New York Times has had to “yellow-cake” up a foul brew of innuendo, half-truths, misrepresentations, outright lies—spiked fiercely with stereotypes, racial hatred, and red-baiting—to makes its case for a China “cover-up.”
A little help from their friends: How Vietnam withstood largest bombing campaign in human history
Between 1965 the 1975, the United States Air Force dropped over three times more bombs on the Southeast Asian nations of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia than the total tonnage dropped by the Allies during World War II.
A World no longer shaped by Atlantic powers
The annual Munich Security Conference that took place February 14-16 this year turned out to be an iconic event, drawing comparison with the one held in the same Bavarian city on February 10, 2007, where in a prophetic speech Russian President Vladimir Putin had criticized the world order characterized by the United States’ global hegemony […]
How India’s Modi is playing on Trump’s ego to his advantage
One thing about U.S. President Donald Trump is that he can be brutally frank. Trump recently picked up the phone and called British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to convey his displeasure over the latter’s decision to allow Huawei to operate in the UK despite Washington’s repeated urgings.
Standing up for Left literature—In India, it can cost you your life
On February 16, 2015, Govind and Uma Pansare went for a morning walk near their home in Pune (Maharashtra, India). Two men on a motorcycle stopped near them and asked for directions, but the Pansares could not help them; one of the men laughed, removed a gun, and shot the two. Uma survived the attack […]
Climate emergency: Indonesia faces catastrophic floods, disappearing islands
While the stark reality of the global climate emergency struck home in Australia with its worst bushfire season, its neighbour Indonesia faced catastrophic floods and islands disappearing below the rising sea. Green Left’s Peter Boyle interviewed Yuyun Harmono, the climate change campaigner of Friends of the Earth Indonesia (Wahana Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia – WAHLI).
This is the time for solidarity, not stigma
In December 2019, several people began to develop infections in Wuhan (People’s Republic of China); early signs indicated that the virus had emerged out of the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, but there is no certainty about that verdict.
Dossier 25: People’s Polyclinics: The initiative of the Telugu communist movement
Under the shadow of the Charter of the United Nations (1945) and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), countries are obliged to guarantee the right to health. The 1946 Constitution of the World Health Organisation (WHO) defines health as ‘a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of […]
Your arrow can pierce the sky, but ours has gone into orbit
On Wednesday, 15 January, China and the United States agreed to suspend their full-scale trade war. From February 2018, the United States placed tariffs on Chinese goods that entered the US market, and then China retaliated. This tit-for-tat game continued for almost two years, causing massive disruption in the global value chain.
Not an inch: Indian students stand against the far-right
With her head bandaged and her arm in a sling, university student Aishe Ghosh went before the cameras to say that the students of the university she attends in New Delhi would move “not an inch back.”
Indian workers fight back: 250 million people go on strike
Millions of Indians hit the streets today in support of the general strike and as part of nationwide coalition-building efforts to resist the policies of the right-wing Modi government.
