- May 30, 2025
Global Affairs
‘Defined Voices’: Giap, Wallace, and the Never-Ending Battle for Freedom
By Ramzy Baroud “Nothing is more precious than freedom,” is quoted as being attributed to Vo Nguyen Giap, a Vietnamese General that led his country through two liberation wars. The first was against French colonialists, the second against the Americans. And despite heavy and painful losses, Vietnam prevailed, defeating the first colonial quest at the […]
Rohingya Population Control: The Onslaught in Burma Continues
By Ramzy Baroud On April 21, the BBC obtained disturbing video footage shot in Burma. It confirmed extreme reports of what has been taking place in that country, even as it is being touted by the US and European governments as a success story pertaining to political reforms and democracy. The BBC footage was difficult […]
The Pain of Bangladesh: T-shirts Made with Blood and Tears
By Ramzy Baroud As they spoke to a BBC correspondent in their run-down room which they call home in Dhaka, Bangladesh, a man sobbed as his 12-year-old daughter sat close to him. His face, wrinkled before its time, was a picture of utter anguish. It could only be understood by a parent whose child was […]
Hungering for Freedom at Guantanamo: Obama’s Legacy of Broken Promises
By Ramzy Baroud The Guantanamo Bay prison is a glaring attestation to the state of political indecision which the United States has experienced since President Barack Obama’s first day in office. While his second term is unlikely to deliver much of the ‘change’ he had so industriously promised, skeletal men continue to sink into utter […]
Ignoring Genocide: Rohingya People Deserve to Live
By Ramzy Baroud One fails to understand the unperturbed attitude with which regional and international leaders and organizations are treating the unrelenting onslaught against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, formally known as Burma. Numbers speak of atrocities where every violent act is prelude to greater violence and ethnic cleansing. Yet, western governments’ normalization with the Myanmar […]
No Security Firms for African Refugees: Opportunities and War in Mali
By Ramzy Baroud The British security firm G4S is set to rake in massive profits thanks to crises in Mali, Libya and Algeria. Recognized as the world’s biggest security firm, the group’s brand plummeted during the London Olympics last year due to its failure to satisfy conditions of a government contract. But with growing unrest […]
The War in Mali: Stability at Stake in West Africa
By Ramzy Baroud ‘Many of us may not be able to point to Mali on a map,’ began National Public Radio show host Neal Conan last Thursday, “but this landlocked nation in West Africa has emerged as a crisis.” The buzzword is, of course, Al Qaeda. Although it is the least urgent component of the […]
Humanitarian Disaster at Sea – Little Girl with Green Jacket
By Ramzy Baroud Has the sea always been so cruel? The little girl was dressed in blue pants and a green jacket. Her hair was finely kempt in a ponytail, probably interwoven by her mother. Thursday was meant to be a special day for her, a fact that was highlighted by the carefully chosen details […]
At Stake in Mali: Refugees at Every Border
By Ramzy Baroud ‘We don’t even know who to be afraid of anymore,’ said Hama Ould Mohammad Bashir, a refugee from Mali (New York Times, July 18). ‘There are a lot of armed people, coming and going all the time.’ The humanitarian crisis in Mali is developing at an alarmingly fast pace. While there are […]
Rohingya People Killed as the World Watches
By Ramzy Baroud The Muslim Rohingya people of Burma – also known as Myanmar – have long undergone systematic discrimination in a country with a bleak human rights record. However, the latest pogrom of violence and ethnic cleansing against the minority group has crossed even traditional bounds of cruelty. The campaign against the extremely poor […]
Sudan Conflict: War is Not an Option
By Ramzy Baroud In a statement published last July, Amnesty International called on UN member states to control arm shipments to both Sudan and South Sudan. It accused the US, Russia and China of fuelling violations in the Sudan conflict through the arms trade. While China was reportedly supplying the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) with […]
Mess in Mali: The Logic of Unintended Consequences
By Ramzy Baroud The intentional misreading of UN security council resolution 1973 resulted in Nato’s predictably violent Operation Odyssey in Libya last year. Not only did the action cost many thousands of lives and untold destruction, it also paved the way for perpetual conflict – not only in Libya but throughout north Africa. Mali was […]
Balandi is America’s My Lai
By Ramzy Baroud Like Vietnam, Afghanistan is a lost cause, and more troops will do nothing but push the US deeper into the quagmire. Some of us warned about the Vietnamisation of Afghanistan as early as the first months of the war in 2001. The Afghans are a proud people with a long and formidable […]
Costly ‘Freedom’ in Afghanistan: On Morbid Wars and Logic
By Ramzy Baroud The Afghans are a proud people with a long and formidable history of resistance to foreign occupation. The fact that they have always prevailed, however, should not distract from the horror they still routinely experience. The latest atrocious episode against Afghans took place on March 11 in the village of Balandi, when […]
Cold War in Warm Waters: US-China’s Dangerous Contest for Asia-Pacific
By Ramzy Baroud On two occasions in my life I found myself living close to the South China Sea. The sea became my escape from life’s pressing responsibilities. But there is no escaping the fact that the deceptively serene waters are now also grounds for a nascent but real new cold war. China takes the […]
Afghanistan: Ten Years of Tragedy and Misguided Policy
By Ramzy Baroud On July 1 2002, US planes bombed an Afghan wedding in the small village of Deh Rawud. Located to the north of Kandahar, the village seemed fortified by the region’s many mountains. For a few hours its people thought they were safe from a war they had never invited. They celebrated and, […]
Ground Your Warplanes, Save the Horn of Africa
By Ramzy Baroud ‘When you are hungry, cold is a killer, and the people here are starving and helpless.’ Not many of us can relate to such a statement, but millions of ‘starving and helpless’ people throughout the Horn of Africa know fully the pain of elderly Somali mother, Batula Moalim. Moalim, quoted by the […]
Hope in 2011: Peoples, Civil Society Stand Tall
By Ramzy Baroud When the Iraqi army fell before invading US and British troops in 2003, the latter’s mission seemed to be accomplished. But nearly eight years after the start of a war intended to shock and awe a whole population into submission, the Iraqi people continue to stand tall. They have confronted and rejected […]
Beyond Violence and Non-Violence: Resistance as a Culture
By RAMZY BAROUD Resistance is not a band of armed men hell-bent on wreaking havoc. It is not a cell of terrorists scheming ways to detonate buildings. True resistance is a culture. It is a collective retort to oppression. Understanding the real nature of resistance, however, is not easy. No newsbyte could be thorough enough […]
Cluster Bombs and Civilian Lives: Efficient Killing, Profits and Human Rights
By RAMZY BAROUD Cluster bombs are in the news again, thanks to a recent report from Amnesty International. The human rights agency has confirmed that 35 women and children were killed following the latest US attacks on an alleged al-Qaeda hideout in Yemen. Initially, there were attempts to bury the story, and Yemen officially denied […]
Karazai’s Washington Visit: The War Awaiting Kandahar
By RAMZY BAROUD Clad in his usual attire of a colorful, striped robe, Afghan President Hamid Karazai appeared more like an emperor as he began his fourth day in Washington. Accompanying him on a somber visit to the Arlington National Cemetery were US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. […]
My Children, Ralph Nader and the South China Sea
By RAMZY BAROUD I basked in the warm Borneo sun, following a long run somewhere at the edge of a rainforest. The beach was only partly clean, but the water was most inviting. My children ran excitedly, collecting what I assumed to be shells and whatever other treasures the South China Sea had decided to […]
Flexible Afghanistan War Objectives: And the Agony Grinds On
By RAMZY BAROUD Washington and its willing mouthpieces in the media have for years been trying to sell us the preposterous war in Afghanistan. While they attempt to convince us that the war is predicated on a faultless military logic and moral wisdom, it remains in fact a tragic adventure with no decipherable objectives, and […]
Muslims Must Not Pay Price for Europe’s Identity Crisis
By RAMZY BAROUD It seems that the targeting of Muslims and Islam has become a kind of national theater in France. Unlike theater, however, the disturbing trend can, and will turn ugly – in fact to a degree it already has – if the French government doesn’t get a grip on reality. The world, including […]
The Hypocrisy of Al-Demoqratia
By RAMZY BAROUD So this is how democracy works? In 2004, France banned headscarves and school principals chased after young “defiant” Muslim girls who continued to cover their heads in school. Now, following a national referendum, Switzerland has banned the construction of minarets, because minarets also somehow symbolize oppression. Thanks to the dedicated action of […]
A Paradigm Shift in Singapore: Yet Apec Offers No Clear Answers
By RAMZY BAROUD Like scores of journalists, I attentively listened as Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong delivering his closing remarks, and for the last time answering journalists’ questions. It was the conclusion of 17th Apec Economies Leaders’ Meeting in Singapore, on November 15, and Prime Minister Lee was clearly tired, although unruffled. Mr. Lee […]
No Emergency Summits for Arab Human Development Crisis
By RAMZY BAROUD When the first Arab Human Development Report (AHDR) was published in 2002, a star glistened in a vast, gloomy sky. The fact that a UN-sponsored report, authored by independent Arab scholars would receive so much attention in Arab media, was in itself a promising start. The fact that such terminology as human […]
Obama’s Test: Democracy or Chaos in Latin America
By RAMZY BAROUD Latin America stands at the threshold of a new era: one that promises a return to political uncertainty, violence and chaos or one of political stability and economic prosperity. Honduras is a crucial indicator. The possible outcomes of the Honduran crisis are likely to define the coming era for Latin America and […]
Perpetual Grief over September 11th
By RAMZY BAROUD The anniversary of the infamous tragedy of 9/11, 2001, and the subsequent ramifications indeed induce, throughout the world, a plethora of feelings of sorrow. The 9/11 event should have never taken place. Regardless of the situation, targeting civilians is unconditionally reviled. No matter where we stand on war, and how do we […]
A Fresh Approach in Afghanistan: An End to War?
By RAMZY BAROUD Left out of the options under consideration in “Obama’s war” is the only one with any chance of success. Despite assurances to the contrary in Washington and a major policy speech in London, one need not quibble with the obvious fact that the situation is deteriorating beyond repair in Afghanistan. Although international […]
