By Kaveh L Afrasiabi It is possible that by giving the go-ahead for the production of 20% enriched uranium, Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad has sufficiently jolted the other side to rethink its approach on the nuclear fuel-swap deal. On the surface, Iran’s decision has raised alarm bells in the West and has provoked a strong response from United States President Barack Obama, who has warned that his administration is “developing a significant regime of sanctions” to impose on Iran. Even Moscow has expressed its displeasure, in the form of a statement by a Foreign Ministry official, which said, “We are … Continue reading New twist in Iran’s nuclear brinkmanship

By Mohammed A Salih WASHINGTON – As Iran celebrates the 31st anniversary of the Islamic revolution it is a country divided, with pro-government groups and Green Movement supporters presenting their own narratives of what the highly symbolic day means and what each group represents. The political atmosphere is highly tense as both sides have called on their supporters to take to the streets to uphold what each sees as the real values and message of the revolution. Each side presents itself as the true defender of the 1979 revolution and the other group as “deviants” – making it hard for … Continue reading Revolution’s anniversary raises tensions

By Robert M Cutler MONTREAL – Of the “newly independent states” of the former Soviet Union, Kazakhstan continues to lead the economic recovery from the continuing global financial crisis, based in part on an innovative approach to financial restructuring of the banking sector that statutorily limits the prerogatives of creditors. The National Bank of Kazakhstan (NBK) will widen the exchange-rate corridor this month to 125-165 tenge per US dollar, according to chairman Grigorii Marchenko, moving towards a “controlled float” system in which the currency is allowed to fluctuate within a rather wide band with only occasional intervention by the central … Continue reading Kazakhstan innovates banking development

By David Cronin BRUSSELS – Secret discussions aimed at pressuring India into dropping all measures that shield its industry from foreign competition have been held between European Union officials and some of the world’s top corporations. BusinessEurope, a group representing large companies, has been intimately involved in all stages of the EU’s preparations for talks aimed at securing a free-trade agreement with India. Internal documents from the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, show that it requested advice from the group when setting priorities for the talks as early as February 2007 – nine months before the talks were formally … Continue reading EU pushes to prise open India

By Cristian Segura BEIJING – When Hu Jintao assumed the supreme leadership of China in 2002 his priority was to dispel the increasing feeling that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was losing contact with the masses while promoting a wild capitalism for the benefit of the urban elite. Under Hu, the CPP’s promotion of a better redistribution of wealth in a “socialist-capitalist economy” has given renewed significance to the “New Leftists”, thinkers who over the past two decades have advocated classic socialist methods to compensate for the imperfections of the capitalistic economy. The most recent chapter of this trend is … Continue reading Mao colossus strides a divide

By John Browne The European experiment with a trans-sovereign currency faces its first acid test. The flashpoint is Greece, which looks set to default on its debt, barring some outside intervention. While many commentators have been squawking about the immediate crisis as if it were the end of life on Earth, I would like to zoom out and discuss the history and longer-term outlook for the euro and its parent, the European Union. The launch of the euro was a major milestone in the 60-year process of European federalization. Economic considerations have always led the charge, from a normalization of … Continue reading Euro trash?

By Dahr Jamail MARFA, Texas – Army specialist and Iraq war veteran Marc Hall is being held by the United States Army in Georgia for recording a song that expresses his anger over the army’s stop-loss policy. He is waiting to be sent to Iraq to face a court martial. Stop-loss is a policy that allows the army to keep soldiers active beyond the end of their signed contracts. According to the Pentagon, more than 120,000 soldiers have been affected by stop-loss since 2001, and currently 13,000 soldiers are serving under stop-loss orders, despite public pledges by President Barack Obama … Continue reading Song lands soldier in the dock