Angela’s Ashes: How Merkel Failed Greece and Europe
Angela Merkel relishes her reputation as queen of Europe. But she hasn’t learned how to use her power, instead allowing a bad situation to heat up to the boiling point. Her inability to take unpopular stances badly exacerbated the Greek crisis.
By Peter Müller and René Pfister
Angela Merkel was already leaving for the weekend when she received the call that would change everything. The chancellor had just had a grueling day, spending all of it in meetings with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras — sometimes as part of a larger group, and others with only him and French President François Hollande.They discussed debt restructuring and billions of euros in additional investments. When it comes to issues important to him, Tsipras can be exhaustingly stubborn. In the end, though, Merkel was left with the feeling the EU summit was the milestone that could quite possibly mark a turn for the better.
How Britain and the US decided to abandon Srebrenica to its fate
New research reveals that Britain and the US knew six weeks before massacre that enclave would fall – but they decided to sacrifice it in their efforts for peace
Florence Hartmann and Ed Vulliamy
They will fill the VIP stands at Srebrenica next weekend to mark the 20th anniversary of the worst massacre on European soil since the Third Reich; heads of state, politicians, the great and good.There will be speeches and tributes at the town’s memorial site, Potocari, but the least likely homily would be one that answered the question: how did Srebrenica happen? Why were Bosnian Serb death squads able, unfettered, to murder more than 8,000 men and boys in a few days, under the noses of United Nations troops legally bound to protect the victims? Who delivered the UN-declared “safe area” of Srebrenica to the death squads, and why?
Sobriety, not austerity
by Philippe Descamps
The UN’s Paris climate change conference in November doesn’t hold out much promise. Since the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, fossil fuel consumption has gone on growing. The Green Climate Fund launched by the UN in 2011 has attracted only €10bn to date. In 2013 subsidies for fuels responsible for greenhouse gases totalled €400bn worldwide – four times the amount allocated to renewable energy sources.Any international agreement will fail to keep global warming within 2ºC if governments insist on protecting a production system based on accumulation, pillage and waste. We can’t meet the challenge of climate change without popular involvement; but individual and local initiatives won’t be effective without global political will. If we are to agree to consume less energy and become more frugal – changing well-established habits – we need the prospect of an improved quality of life. There can be no real energy transition without economic and social change, and without proper redistribution of income, globally and nationally. India, where 300 million people have no access to electricity, reports hundreds of thousands of deaths from air pollution each year.
The Nevada ranchers taking on Washington
July 5, 2015 – 12:08PM
Julie Turkewitz
Battle Mountain: Around here they call it “going Bundy”: allowing cattle to graze illegally on federally owned land. For months, ranching families in this tiny community have itched to do it – both because of the relentless drought, which has left their own land dry and their animals hungry, and because of the anti-Washington streak that runs deep in this part of the rural West, where people fervently believe that the government owns too much land.This month, the Filippini family finally did it: They released hundreds of cattle onto federal land here at the border of Lander and Humboldt counties, an arid patch that straddles part of the old Pony Express cross-country mail route of 1860 and 1861. Drought has reduced the grass cover here to less than 10 centimetres of stubble in some creek beds, a level that leads to a ban on grazing.
“We Will Not Negotiate With Boko Haram From A position Of Weakness”-Nigerian Govt
Following a BBC interview last night where Presidential spokesperson Femi Adesina was quoted as saying that the Nigerian government would negotiate with Islamist militant group, Boko Haram, the Nigerian government has now clarified its stand on the matter.
by Femi Adesina Jul 04, 2015
Following a BBC interview last night where Presidential spokesperson Femi Adesina was quoted as saying that the Nigerian government would negotiate with Islamist militant group, Boko Haram, the Nigerian government has now clarified its stand on the matter.In a press release issued from his Abuja office, Mr. Adesina has said the Nigerian state is putting in place mechanisms that would completely devastate Boko Haram from a multinational level. The statement further stated that the government would consider negotiations with the dreaded Islamist group if they accept to do so.
Pope starts Latin American visit in Ecuador
BBC
Pope Francis is due to arrive in Ecuador at the start of a seven-day tour of South America.Ecuador’s left-wing President Rafael Correa called the visit “an honour”.
Pope Francis will also travel to Bolivia and Paraguay, as part of his second trip to the region since becoming pontiff in 2013.
The Argentine is the first Pope to come from South America. He is expected to highlight the themes of poverty and inequality.
In 2007, before becoming Pope, he told a gathering of Latin American bishops that they were living in the most unequal part of the world.
During his previous trip in 2013, he addressed millions on Brazil’s Copacabana
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