Archive

July 08, 2022

RSVP, Please

[featurecontent] NEED TO KNOW RSVP, Please EUROPEAN UNION [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/597ff6f5-aa2a-4913-81c8-7a38f364a41b.png"] Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has already resulted in proposals to expand NATO. Now, in a move to counter Russian threats, the European Union might also add Ukraine, Moldova and, eventually, Georgia, three former Soviet republics where Russian President Vladimir Putin...

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July 07, 2022

Crimes of Thought

NEED TO KNOW Crimes of Thought RUSSIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/db8acf88-8b4f-4b1c-bf9a-1e71d4eee94b.png"] Along with other activism to promote democracy and respect for the law in his native Russia, Sergei Davidis spoke in the defense of Alexei Navalny in court earlier this year. He told the i (inews.co.uk), a British news outlet, that...

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July 06, 2022

Petro-fied

NEED TO KNOW Petro-fied COLOMBIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/80e582e1-1ef0-4fb5-a86a-699a8cf7cddf.png"] The president-elect of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, was in jail when his leftist guerilla movement, M-19, stormed the Palace of Justice in the South American country’s capital, Bogotá, in 1985. They launched the attack with the financial backing of drug lord Pablo Escobar...

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July 05, 2022

Pride and Politics

NEED TO KNOW Pride and Politics ISRAEL [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/a7853464-ef94-4b48-96b9-d7badbef5e55.png"] Israel is set to hold its fifth election in less than four years, a surfeit of democracy that is not likely to result in much change unless you are former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu was Israel’s longest-serving leader, the BBC...

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July 04, 2022

Make Some Noise

NEED TO KNOW Make Some Noise SENEGAL [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/3676cf10-2f23-4295-b085-c86147830390.png"] The leader of Senegal’s opposition, Yewwi Askan Wi, asked his fellow citizens to bang pots and pans in the streets to show their displeasure with the regime of President Macky Sall. The result was a lot of banging. “I'm here to...

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July 01, 2022

Stuck in Neutral

[featurecontent] NEED TO KNOW Stuck in Neutral SCOTLAND [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/e059648e-a464-410c-a812-d6debee7d46c.png"] Scotland’s first minister and leader of the ruling Scottish National Party, Nicola Sturgeon, wants to precipitate a political fight over Scottish independence from the rest of the United Kingdom – she thinks she and the country’s independence cause have been...

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June 30, 2022

The New Opium

NEED TO KNOW The New Opium INDIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/1ac703d1-8192-40be-95ea-427a8f7ed9ee.png"] Does India have a problem with Muslims? Many say yes, after a recent political firestorm caused by high-ranking Hindu nationalists. Earlier this month, Nupur Sharma, a spokeswoman for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and other party officials...

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June 29, 2022

Back to the Future

NEED TO KNOW Back to the Future BOLIVIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/8ed01a1e-5cea-4b63-b4c0-c3727f7de51c.png"] Bolivian President Luis Arce and dozens of others recently attended a ritual at the Tiwanaku pre-Inca religious complex near La Paz, one of the South American country’s two capitals. Dressed in the traditional, alpaca-and-llama-wool multicolored ponchos of the indigenous...

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June 28, 2022

Crackdown, Meet Backlash

NEED TO KNOW Crackdown, Meet Backlash MYANMAR [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/9ef34308-9cd1-4a8e-a2b3-e7a7ab6846ed.png"] The military junta that controls Myanmar recently put deposed civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi into solitary confinement. She has been imprisoned since February 2021 when the junta overthrew her elected government, the BBC reported. Suu Kyi, 77, is a Nobel...

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June 27, 2022

The Disappeared

NEED TO KNOW The Disappeared RUSSIA/ UKRAINE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/2aaf5c8d-a4e6-42cf-9dd9-f761d6bfed83.png"] Russian lawmaker Oleg Morozov of the pro-government United Russia political party, the largest in the country, was recently sharing his thoughts on a Rossiya-1 state television talk show. Speaking to pro-Kremlin TV host Olga Skabeyeva, he asked: what if Russian...

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June 24, 2022

Second Spring

[featurecontent] NEED TO KNOW Second Spring TUNISIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/1f262cf6-0ed8-4367-aeca-5f0f2b6684d0.png"] Commerce and public services ground to a halt in Tunisia recently as the country’s massive Tunisian General Labor Union (UGTT) went on strike to protest President Kais Saied’s economic plan. Saied has proposed wage freezes, subsidy cuts and other steps that the...

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June 23, 2022

Loathed, Loved

NEED TO KNOW Loathed, Loved UNITED KINGDOM [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/db250264-45f9-48fa-be6e-ab4d2ef0d6a5.png"] When he announced his resignation as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s ethics advisor, Lord Christopher Geidt complained that Johnson had put him in the “impossible and odious” position of trying to justify how to break the rules of conduct for...

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June 22, 2022

Drawing in Pencil

NEED TO KNOW Drawing in Pencil KASHMIR [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/90dd5b26-68ab-4da8-9ee5-e4e856464e0d.png"] Three years ago, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi unilaterally abolished the limited autonomy that India’s portion of the disputed region of Kashmir enjoyed. At the time, Modi claimed the move would reduce violence in the region. Kashmir is the only Muslim-majority...

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June 21, 2022

Country First

NEED TO KNOW Country First SOUTH AFRICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/5516b8d6-0af4-46a7-8454-a3339ff1009f.png"] At a recent demonstration against foreigners in South Africa, Mary Lowe said she was marching because an undocumented immigrant killed her nephew. "We are basically fighting against all the crime committed by foreigners who are illegally in the country," Lowe,...

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June 20, 2022

The Book of Executioners

NEED TO KNOW The Book of Executioners RUSSIA-UKRAINE [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/2aaf5c8d-a4e6-42cf-9dd9-f761d6bfed83.png"] Ukrainian prosecutors claim that Russian forces have committed more than 15,000 war crimes while waging Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war to push back against Western influence and reconstitute the Russian-Soviet empire, Sky News reported recently. That’s a rate of...

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June 17, 2022

No Place Like Home

[featurecontent] NEED TO KNOW No Place Like Home AFRICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/b8aca45b-1687-4d5b-b62c-09186470d8a2.png"] Khady Sene, 53, has a problem – rising seawater claimed her ancestral home in Saint-Louis, Senegal four years ago. It happened to be located on the Atlantic coast of the country, a place the United Nations has determined is...

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June 16, 2022

Truth and Consequences

NEED TO KNOW Truth and Consequences RUSSIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/db8acf88-8b4f-4b1c-bf9a-1e71d4eee94b.png"] Renowned historian Timothy Snyder recently warned in his Substack newsletter that giving Russian President Vladimir Putin an “off-ramp” to quit the war in Ukraine after, say, a military challenge or a diplomatic or economic inducement, is folly. If he wants...

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June 15, 2022

New World Order

NEED TO KNOW New World Order MEXICO/ LATIN AMERICA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/96171786-dbde-0ef3-51b8-efb48e2520c3.png"] The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, skipped the recent Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles. The move was considered a snub against American leaders who convened the summit to tackle migration and other serious issues...

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June 14, 2022

Going, Going, Gone

NEED TO KNOW Going, Going, Gone KAZAKHSTAN [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/d52e63cf-06bb-47d0-b573-377bff5ae37c.png"] Kazakhs overwhelmingly voted in favor of decentralizing government, reducing the power of the president, rescinding former president Nursultan Nazarbayev's status as "Leader of the Nation," and banning his family from official positions. "We have shown that we are united in building...

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June 13, 2022

The War on Grain

NEED TO KNOW The War on Grain INDIA [map url="https://mcusercontent.com/a2e22d7f24f6d1e3464d05be4/images/1ac703d1-8192-40be-95ea-427a8f7ed9ee.png"] India and other nations are banning exports of wheat as the price of the vital commodity skyrockets due to supply chain shocks from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “As the war continues, there is a growing likelihood that food shortages, particularly...

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