Vatican repudiates colonial-era ‘doctrine of discovery’ of mountains, lakes, continents by Europeans
The Vatican on Thursday formally repudiated the colonial-era “doctrine of discovery” used centuries ago to justify European conquests of Africa and the Americas, saying “it is not part of Catholic Church teaching”. The Vatican acknowledged in a statement from its culture and human development departments that papal documents from the...
South Sudan’s President Kiir’s appointment of defence minister risks peace deal with rivals
South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir has appointed a member of his own party as defence minister, according to a decree read on state media, breaching a peace deal in which the role should be selected by the party of opposition leader Riek Machar. Kiir fired defence minister Angelina Teny, who...
Al Shabaab’s resilience is helped by a regime fraught with clannism that makes it susceptible to infiltration and sabotage – report
In areas where al Shabaab has not been able to penetrate the locality to establish a threat of violence, its extortion practices are less successful. Businessmen operating solely within Baidoa and Kismayo, for example, have reported rebuffing al Shabaab demands for payment without fear of retribution. This has coincided with...
Report: Dismantling Al Shabaab’s revenue generating infrastructure is key to weakening the militant group
Cutting off al Shabaab’s estimated $100 million in extortion-generated annual revenue will require restoring the integrity of Somalia’s compromised financial, judicial and intelligence agencies. Despite setbacks, al Shabaab remains a resilient and destabilising threat in Somalia. In the past year, it was linked to 2,553 violent events and 6,225 fatalities....
Counterterrorism and regional stability are new tricks Africa’s omnipresent dictators use to win Western support
While regimes hoisted on cult of personality may appear durable – frequently deploying “anti-imperialist” and “anti-colonialist” rhetoric to appeal to African sympathies while also positioning themselves as key Western partners on counterterrorism and regional stability – they are inherently fragile. Security services in such contexts are often used to suppress...
How Africa’s ordinary souls ascend to power, then embrace ‘semi-divine’ tag to stifle political competition
When long-serving, neo-patrimonial leaders in Burkina Faso, Gambia, Zimbabwe and Sudan were forced to step down because of popular and youthful protests in recent years, the era of “presidents for life” in Africa seemed to be ending. Yet, for every such leader who has been forced from power, new ones...
Ukrainian revolution put Russian president in crosshairs as he resisted ‘colour-revolution’ scenarios
In 2014 Ukraine’s “revolution of dignity” culminated in the ouster of a Russian-friendly president, Viktor Yanukovych, and this created fear in Moscow. For Russian President Vladimir Putin the revolt in Ukraine hit too close to home. He reacted by annexing Crimea (after a referendum that violated Ukraine’s constitution), while working...
War of Surprises: Ukrainian resistance to Russian invasion has confounded military mavens world over
Some wars acquire names that stick. The Lancaster and York clans fought the War of the Roses from 1455-1485 to claim the British throne. The Hundred Years’ War pitted England against France from 1337-1453. In the Thirty Years’ War, 1618-1648, many European countries clashed, while Britain and France waged the...
Holocaust: Be it actual war or potential nuclear catastrophe, it’s certainly looking mighty ugly right now
In my youth, atomic war was, culturally speaking, all around us. It was even in outer space, as in the 1955 film This Island Earth in which another planet goes up in a version of radioactive flames, scaring the living hell out of the 11-year-old Thomas M. Engelhardt. So, yes,...
Everywhere in our lives there lurks the possibility we might be next victims of nuclear wipe out
Indulge me for a moment. This is how “The Prophecy” in my 1962 high school yearbook began. It was written by some of my classmates in the year we graduated from Friends Seminary in New York City. “Being an historian, I am jotting down these notes out of habit, but...
