India's Defexpo 2010 and the Global Arms Trade
Issue:Global militarisation
The recently held Indian Defexpo 2010 (described as "Asia's biggest arms bazaar") illustrates the increasing levels of militarisation both in India but also globally writes Nitasha Kaul.
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Posted on 18/03/10
New Report Highlights the Links between Poverty, Marginalisation and Terrorism
Issue:Marginalisation
New Report Highlights the Links between Poverty, Marginalisation and Terrorism
A new report by the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment providing a critical survey of the academic literature on the causes of terrorism demonstrates the link between marginalisation and levels of political violence and terrorism.
Read more »Posted on 18/03/10
Climate science: a peace studies lesson
Issue:Climate change
The doubters of global warming are emboldened by their new ability - as in the “climategate” affair - to put climate researchers on the defensive. But the experience of comparable assaults on the discipline of peace studies in the 1980s suggests that hostile scrutiny can have longer-term benefits for the target.
Photo courtesy of tellytom.
Read more »Posted on 16/03/10
Reimagining Development
Issue:Marginalisation
A new initiative of the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex brings together 34 research projects exploring whether crises in food, finance, fuel and climate - and the way that people are responding to then - present us with an opportunity to rethink or 'reimagine' what international development means and how it needs to change.
Read more »Posted on 11/03/10
The nuclear-weapons moment
Issue:Global militarisation
The global effort to extinguish the nuclear peril needs to regain momentum. A bold act of leadership and imagination by one of the weapons-states could provide it.
Photo courtesy of thepretenda.
Read more »Posted on 9/03/10
Three connected conflicts - Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan
Issue:Global militarisation
At the beginning of February, ISAF sources announced that a major military offensive was about to be mounted in Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan. This was Operation Moshtarak (“together”), involving 15,000 US, British and Afghan National Army troops, and would concentrate on clearing Taliban and other paramilitary groups from two areas, one of them centred on the town of Marja. The publicity given to the operation appeared designed partly to encourage civilians to evacuate areas under Taliban influence, but would also serve to highlight the capabilities of coalition forces at a time when support for the war in the United States and Britain was fragile.
Given the size of the operation, it is likely that it will provide a major focus for western media attention for some weeks, but to get a full measure of its significance requires seeing it in the wider context of the conflicts in Iraq and Pakistan, and of the Status of the al-Qaida Movement. There have, in particular, been significant developments in both Iraq and Pakistan, with each likely to have an impact on what is now happening in Afghanistan.
Photo courtesy of Helmandblog.
Read more »Posted on 2/03/10
