Geography Archives: Russia

Brazil’s President, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, will travel to Iran this weekend, ostensibly to attend the G-15 summit meeting that opens in Tehran on Monday.  But Lula’s trip is attracting enormous international attention because the Brazilian leader will use his visit to try, in collaboration with Turkey’s Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, to broker […]

Ambassador Cabactulan, President of the Review Conference, Ambassador Sergio Duarte, High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Ladies and Gentlemen, I wish to congratulate you, Mr. President, for the chairmanship of this Conference.  You can count on my delegation’s best cooperation. The Non-Proliferation Treaty is an intrinsically unfair treaty, which divides the world between “haves” and “have-nots.”  […]

  The antiwar movement everywhere should be extremely alarmed about the Obama Administration’s declaration in April that Washington can target Iran with nuclear weapons.  Although vague “all options are on the table” warnings were also issued under George W. Bush, now the threat of a pre-emptive nuclear strike on Iran is enshrined in the revised […]

  Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 while at the same time sending more troops to the Afghanistan War.  What has become of the promise of “change”? I am one of the few who are not disillusioned, because I had no expectations.  I had written about Obama’s positions and prospects even before […]

The Washington Post‘s Glenn Kessler had an important story: “Even as Momentum for Iran Sanctions Grows, Containment Seems Only Viable Option.”  Glenn states his thesis up front: After months of first attempting to engage Iran and then wooing Russia and China to support new sanctions against the Islamic Republic, the Obama Administration appears within reach […]

During the military parade on Army Day in Iran, what looks very much like an Iranian variant of the Russian S-300 air defense system was on display. In 2007, Tehran announced that it signed a contract to buy S-300 from Russia, but Moscow, lobbied by Washington and Tel Aviv, has not delivered, citing “technical problems.”  […]

  Fyodor Savelyevich Khitruk, born on 1 Mary 1917, is a Russian animator.  This film was released by Soyuzmultfilm in 1973. | | Print  

Organized by a collective of civil society groups, social movements, progressive academics, social activists, and concerned citizens, the recently concluded Independent People’s Tribunal (IPT) on Land Acquisition, Resource Grab, and Operation Green Hunt in New Delhi offers a unique perspective into contemporary Indian reality.  While the national and international media talk profusely about the unprecedented […]

  Norman G. Finkelstein: Israel would not be so up in arms about the Goldstone Report, would not be so upset by it, were it not for the fact that, yes, they are very vulnerable to the public opinion, and they know very well the limits beyond which it may not express itself against them, […]

  The president of Brazil brings a firm message to the summit on nuclear security. “I’m going to ask President Obama: what is the significance of your recent accord with Medvedev on the deactivation of nuclear warheads [of the United States and Russia]?  Deactivation of what?  If we are talking about deactivating the warheads that […]

In the midst of its Nuclear Security Summit and in the wake of President Obama’s bilateral meeting with China’s President Hu yesterday, the Obama Administration is vigorously spinning the U.S. and Western media that it has won Chinese support for new sanctions against the Islamic Republic over its nuclear activities.  To say the least, this […]

  Martin Axmann.  Back to the Future: The Khanate of Kalat and the Genesis of Baloch Nationalism 1915-1955.  Oxford University Press, 2009. In a country where nationality is defined in terms of religion and religion alone, “the Baloch nation” can hardly find a legitimate space, even as a term of reference.  There is no notion […]

Obama Administration officials have been touting for some time that they have Russia “on board” for a new United Nations Security Council resolution imposing sanctions against Iran over the nuclear issue.  We, of course, have been arguing for months that, while Russia would probably end up supporting a new sanctions resolution, Moscow would not support […]

The “Cedar Revolution” of Lebanon and the “Orange Revolution” of Ukraine were democratically brought to an end.  A “Green Revolution” in Iran that Washington hoped for has turned out to be just a figment of its geopolitical fantasy.  And now there goes another color revolution. It is clear that the political revolution in Kyrgyzstan caught […]

A group of Jews and Arabs are fighting in the Israeli courts to be recognized as “Israelis,” a nationality currently denied them, in a case that officials fear may threaten the country’s self-declared status as a Jewish state. Israel refused to recognize an Israeli nationality at the country’s establishment in 1948, making an unusual distinction […]

Today — Tuesday, April 6, 2010 — the Obama Administration will proclaim, as a matter of declaratory policy, that the United States claims the prerogative to use nuclear weapons against the Islamic Republic of Iran, even as Iran remains a non-nuclear-weapons state.  The Administration will make this declaration as part of its much anticipated Nuclear […]

  John Bellamy Foster.  The Ecological Revolution: Making Peace with the Planet.  New York: Monthly Review Press, 2009.  288pp.  $17.95 (pb).  ISBN 9781583671795. This book is a major achievement.  It combines enormous breadth of scholarship with consummate theoretical integration to produce a powerful political argument.  It should be required reading for anyone who cares about […]

The absence of US-Iranian rapprochement will perpetuate the new Middle Eastern Cold War, imposing costs on the United States, Iran and other regional and international players.  However, in strategic terms, the heaviest costs of continued US-Iranian estrangement are likely to be borne by the United States.  In particular, lack of productive relations with Tehran will […]

  Jeff Halper: We’re one of the leading — I would say, modestly — peace and human rights organizations in Israel.  We started about thirteen years ago.  I’ve been involved for forty years in the Israeli peace movement.  During the Oslo peace process, during the 90s, the Israeli peace movement also, like other Israelis, invested […]

  “What is it that they have against Iran?  If you look at it, it’s only that Iran is rising as a competitor of Israel.  There is no other basis for this animosity.” — Aijaz Ahmad Aijaz Ahmad: The US is running out of all options.  You mentioned this possible agreement.  Iran has actually agreed […]