Geography Archives: South Africa

On 12 January, the day commemorating the 1904 revolt of the Herero people against German colonialism, Olaf Scholz’s government announced that it would intervene in the International Court of Justice to oppose South Africa’s charge of genocide against Israel.

This is extraordinary because the states supporting Israel, above all the United States, have claimed the high moral and legal ground and lectured the states of the Global South about the importance of the rule of law.

On 11 January, Adila Hassim, an advocate of the High Court of South Africa, stood before the judges of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and said: ‘Genocides are never declared in advance. But this court has the benefit of the past 13 weeks of evidence that shows incontrovertibly a pattern of conduct and related intention that justifies a plausible claim of genocidal acts’.

The Namibia presidency issues scathing criticism against Germany for failing to draw lessons from its genocide against the people of Namibia.

Former British diplomat Craig Murray was in the public gallery for the first day of South Africa’s genocide case against Israel. Here is his highly-personal account.

Hundreds flee Al-Aqsa Hospital in Gaza amid a deteriorating humanitarian situation across the enclave as Israel presses its assault.

Culture is a vital centre of struggle. It is where people see who they are, learn what they are capable of, and dare to imagine what they would like to build in this world. Art itself does not change the world, but without bringing imagination to life through art, we would resign ourselves to the present.

Every year, thousands of healthcare workers leave South Africa, in order to chase better opportunities, as wealthier countries exploit desperate working conditions faced by them. This brain drain is a direct result of neoliberal policies, especially austerity.

The story of Medu is not just a South or southern African story, but an international one. No single liberation struggle can exist without the circulation and exchange of ideas, strategies, material resources, political solidarity, and culture across the globe.

Economist Michael Hudson details how BRICS could create a mutual settlement currency for payment imbalances among central banks and build an alternative to the financialized neoliberal model of the dollar/NATO bloc.

From Brazil and Mexico to South Africa and Malaysia, international labor solidarity is aiding the UAW’s fight to reverse the global race to the bottom.

AS SIGNIFICANT as the fact of BRICS expansion are which countries are now set to join: Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Ethiopia and Argentina.

The mining super-majors are keen to walk away from their legacy responsibilities, which in the case of South Africa date back to colonial times under British rule, continuing under apartheid, and in the last generation since 1994.

South Africa’s media agencies report that the country’s authorities have rejected a French request to send an invitation to President Emmanuel Macron to attend the upcoming summit of the BRICS economic group.

The UK Labour Party’s latest corporate mega-donor is a pro-Israel businessperson whose firm profiteered from South African apartheid.

The new chief of the BRICS bloc’s New Development Bank, Brazil’s leftist ex-President Dilma Rousseff, revealed they are gradually moving away from the U.S. dollar, promising at least 30% of loans in local currencies of members.

This year marks the thirtieth anniversary of the brutal murder of the South African Communist Party (SACP) General Secretary, Comrade Thembisile Martin “Chris” Hani.

The U.S. government imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court, threatened to arrest judges, and passed a “Hague Invasion Act”. Previously, the ICC only prosecuted Africans. But now that it wants to arrest Russian President Putin, Washington praises the court (while still refusing to join it).

What constitutes a crisis worthy of global attention? When a regional bank in the United States falls victim to the inversion of the yield curve (i.e., when short-term bond interest rates become higher than long-term rates), the Earth nearly stops spinning.

The twentieth century was marked by national liberation struggles that emerged in Africa and Asia, as well as in Latin America, where neocolonial structures had subordinated the formally independent countries. The achievements of the Russian Revolution in 1917 inspired the peasantry and the working class across the Global South. The fight for equality and liberation […]