Will UK election be an extinction-level event?
“Why did he do it? We were all told it would be the autumn and we were hoping by then we could turn things around. It is very perplexing,” said ...
LNG import blues
This is becoming the recurring theme of all major projects in Cyprus. Almost invariably they all run into problems, run out of time and costs sky-rocket. The antiquated methods employed ...
UK ELECTIONS
Both Labour and Tories lack ‘the vision thing’
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak walked a few steps to a lectern outside his official residence at 10 Downing Street in London last Wednesday to announce that he was calling an ...
Crunch Time for Netanyahu?
It has not been a good week for Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin ‘Bibi’ Netanyahu, chief decision-maker in the war in the Gaza Strip that has already cost at least 35,000 ...
South African election: the fall of the ANC
“The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born,” wrote Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci in 1929. “Now is the time of monsters.”
Gramsci’s remark is being ...
As wealth inequality rises in Cyprus both people and democracy suffer
It has profound socioeconomic effects, as well as political consequences in shaping the outcome of elections and policies
Cyprus is a wealthy nation; but that wealth is very unevenly divided. ...
A new world order really is in the making
The beginning of the end of Pax Americana
President Vladimir Putin of Russia on a state visit to China declared a new era in international relations. Well, he would say ...
Thought experiment: buying the Palestinians out?
Last week a despairing reader asked me if the solution to the ‘Middle East Problem’ might be to throw money at it: just buy the Palestinians out. Offer every Palestinian ...
Aphrodite blues
This is the second time this year I feel compelled to write about the development of – or lack of – the Aphrodite gas field. This is the fifth attempt made by ...
The mother of all climate feedbacks?
“Just like this year, last year the heat wave extended from parts of India to Bangladesh and Myanmar, and all the way to Thailand. This year it went further east, ...
Broken Britain: right-wing defection drama
Politics in the UK turned farcical last week when Natalie Elphicke, the Conservative member for Dover, defected to the Labour Party. In the jargon, she crossed the floor and sat ...
What potential arrest warrants against Israeli leaders mean
Israeli leaders are waiting with bated breath to find out if the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) is going to issue arrest warrants against some of them for ...
The future of LNG exports
I participated at FLAME 2024, Europe’s lead natural gas conference, in Amsterdam end April. The theme of the conference was ‘Navigating the energy trilemma’ and LNG featured prominently.
A key ...
Arctic seals and coral reefs: every little bit helps
“Without extinction, there would likely be insufficient ecological ‘space’ available for new species.”
What? Is this person saying that extinction is a good thing? But what about the scarlet-throated goat-botherer? ...
The mother of all betrayals
The Annan experience was devastating for Turkish Cypriots. Who can blame them for being cynical about future talks?
If we take August 1960 as the year of the shotgun wedding between ...
Cyprus government and banks piling-up cash
They could do more to support economy and citizens
Over the last two years the Cyprus government has produced mounting surpluses and boosted substantially its cash balances at banks. And ...
Rwanda solution is probably lawful but not the answer
West’s foreign policy blunders to blame for migrant crisis
What to do about boat people? The problem is not as overwhelming in UK as it is in the Mediterranean ...
Indian elections: fascism is not necessarily India’s future
Extreme nationalism always looks foolish or even deranged to those who have not caught the virus, but in India it’s now official.
In January, India’s Ministry of Defence ...
Iran, Israel and the right to self-defence
It is extraordinary that the West still buys into the idea that it was necessary and proportionate for the defence of Israel to destroy Gaza
The UN Charter which was ...
Pain delivers pain
THE WAY THINGS ARE
Why wasn’t Joe Biden’s ‘Outrage and heartbreak!’ at the brutal death of seven foreign aid workers the reaction of a man who suffered family ...
Iran retaliation: A pantomime crisis, not a real war
Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s ‘Supreme Leader’, is embarrassed and humiliated by the complete failure of his drone and missile attack on Israel, but does US President Joe Biden have the ...
Sending Cyprus gas to Egypt
Egypt desperately needs a major gas discovery to shore up its declining production
The submission of the updated development plan for the Aphrodite gasfield by Chevron at the beginning of ...
There really are rules when it comes to borders
History is mostly a matter of dates, and the key date is always that of the last conquest. All previous conquests are then magically forgiven and forgotten.
This observation is ...
‘Dragging us back to Soviet times’
Describing herself as an accidental politician, the head of Belarus’ government in exile was in Cyprus this week drumming up support against the country’s leader, who she accuses of ...