Archive for the ‘World current affairs’ Category
Back to Sderot (2)
February 27th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
A couple of times in the last few weeks, I have blogged about Sderot, small town in Israel that is attacked by Qassam rockets from Gaza on an almost daily basis. In the first posting, I mentioned that I knew two students at Sapir College in the town. Today one of their fellow students was […]
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Power failures in South Africa
February 27th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
In the last couple of days, I’ve blogged about the rising price of fuel in Britain but, down in South Africa, they are experiencing regular power cuts as the publicly-owned electricity provider Eskom fails to keep up with demand. Since the African National Congress came to power in 1994, South Africa has doubled the percentage […]
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Reinterpreting the Hadith
February 26th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
The most sacred text is Islam is of course the Koran. However, another extremely important text for Muslims is the Hadith, a collection of thousands of sayings reputed to come from the Prophet Muhammad. Therefore it is really interesting to hear that Turkey’s powerful Department of Religious Affairs has commissioned a team of theologians at […]
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The American presidential election (21)
February 24th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
As if the American presidential election was not already exciting enough – with the Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton battling it out for the Democratic nomination and John McCain still being harried by Mick Huckabee – today 73 year old Ralph Nader announced his candidacy for the fifth time [more information here]. Nader is renown […]
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Back to Sderot (1)
February 23rd, 2008 by Roger Darlington
Two weeks ago, I blogged about the small Israeli town of Sderot which is being constantly targeted by Qassam rockets fired from Hamas-controlled Gaza. This week, a child lost a leg in a rocket attack. Over the past two months, an average of 50 rockets a week have been hittingthe town and its residents. This […]
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The American presidential election (20)
February 21st, 2008 by Roger Darlington
I am a huge fan of the American television series “The West Wing”. I have seen every episode of the seven series and viewed the first five series twice. Now, in the last two series, we see the non-white character Matt Santos win the Democratic candidacy and then the Presidency itself. One cannot help but […]
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After Fidel … what?
February 21st, 2008 by Roger Darlington
This week’s announcement by Fidel Castro that he is stepping down as President of Cuba after half a century of power was of much more than passing interest to me. I’m travelling to Cuba for a holiday in two weeks time and, over the last month, I’ve been working my way through a huge 700-page […]
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The American presidential election (19)
February 17th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
Which candidate for the US Presidency is “an irresponsible tax-and-spend liberal”, has “the most liberal voting record in 2007 of any senator”, is “the most left-wing candidate to run since George McGovern” and has “the voting record of a hard-left socialist”? According to certain excitable Republicans quoted in this piece in today’s “Sunday Times”, it’s […]
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The other American presidential candidate (2)
February 16th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
A month ago, I did a blog posting about the then impending election of a President for the Czech Republic. I explained that the incumbent, the Right-wing and Euro-sceptic former Prime Minister Václav Klaus ought to win a second term, but that he was being opposed by a Czech American who works for the World […]
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Forgotten World (125): Benin
February 15th, 2008 by Roger Darlington
Benin, formerly known as Dahomey, is one of Africa’s most stable democracies with a proliferation of political parties and a strong civil society. The International Press Institute (IPI) says Benin has one of the region’s “most vibrant media landscapes”. Press freedom is said to be in “very good shape” by the media rights body Reporters […]
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