Remember the Sharpeville Six? They were six South Africans convicted of the murder of a local township leader who ‘collaborated’ with the apartheid regime. Their case became an international symbol of the anti-apartheid struggle. What happened? In early September 1984 in Sharpeville (south of Johannesburg) township protesters angered at rent rises converged upon the house of […]
Over at Open Democracy a long and learned piece by Roger Riddell on the impact of Development Aid: a board member of Oxford Policy Management, a Principal of The Policy Practice and a member of DFID’s the Independent Advisory Committee on Development Impact (IACDI). This mighty analysis explores at length […]
Few new entries these days as I am back in Brussels trying to earn some money for Christmas presents. While I am away have a look at the lively writing over at Samizdata at the moment. Including a link to this energetic piece about Zimbabwe and how the retreat of […]
A lively piece of work by Craig Murray looking at the prospects for Ghana getting rich and ruined by Oil Money. Knowing nothing about Ghana or indeed about Oil Money, I leave it to you to work out whether his well-turned analysis makes sense. It is certainly interesting enough. But […]
On a previous posting of mine about the BNP, one Chris made this comment: After the brouhaha of the BNP Question Time this interview https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00nh6w4 with Kwame Kwei-Armah went unnoticed on Radio 7 (as most things do) and yet (some 26 minutes in) we hear strikingly similar concerns voiced about multiculturalism […]
This Libya business gets worse. Now the UK government is tangled up in explaining what it did or did not to to help victims of IRA terrorist bombs get compensation from Libya, source of the IRA’s Semtex explosives. Here is a piece about the basic legal claim involved. To my long-lost […]
A youthful Crawf asks me what I make of the sending to Libya of the ‘Lockerbie bomber’. Very difficult to say, because it’s a fiendishly long and complicated story about which I know next to nothing on the inner detail. My only professional diplomatic encounter with Libya came on the […]
Most of the noise generated by Foreign Secretary David Miliband’s observations on a BBC Great Lives radio programme has been linked to his words on terrorism: Asked by presenter Matthew Parris whether there were any circumstances in which terrorism was justified, Mr Miliband said: ‘Yes, there are circumstances in which […]
Jim Fitzpatrick MP has attended many Muslim weddings. He caused a fuss recently when he and his wife as far as I know politely walked out of one at which men and women were segregated; he then used the media to make some political points about radicalisation among Muslims. (Update: picking […]
My good pal John Sawers is to take over as Head of MI6, the first (mainly) FCO person to do so although he did start off there a while ago before crossing to join the FCO. He enjoyed a brisk ride to the top with an unusual amount of sharp-end […]
