International

When one of the most arrogant men in the world is forced to issue a full-page apology in national newspapers, you know that he feels he has little other choice. That must have been the calculation in the inner sanctum of News Corporation when billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch signed off on a full-page ad in several of his (and his competitors’) British newspapers.

What was incomprehensible only 20 years ago is commonplace today.

In the blink of any eye, messages, pictures, movies, everything that can be digitalized, can be sent from one corner of the earth to another. People have come to depend on the Internet and new media services to communicate with the world, from the person next door to a relative several time zones away.

When summer arrives citizens are thinking more about holidays and less about politics. At least this is what governments hope, so as to be able to pass certain laws and decrees without creating waves that could incite rejection whether from student activists, fully-functioning trade unions and associations with all their membership.

By Bernhard Schell

As September draws closer and the Palestine Authority prepares to achieve statehood as well as full membership of the United Nations, a new report is calling upon Fatah and Hamas rivals to take necessary steps to implement the Egyptian sponsored reconciliation agreement and install a Palestinian leadership able to reach and carry out peace with Israel.

Yesterday, the popular marches of the indignant arrived in Madrid — and took back the square. Another major demonstration is planned for today.
Saturday indignados brought much of Madrid to a standstill as the popular marches arrived in the city, taking 6 different routes from all over the country and culminating in a spectacular re-occupation of Sol by thousands of protesters

What do Bolivia, Iceland, Tunisia, Egypt and Spain all have in common? Given that they are famous respectively for; ladies in bowler hats, volcanoes, mosaics, pyramids and Rafael Nadal there seems to be little to connect these diverse countries, yet they are all undergoing the most radical forms of social revolution witnessed since the collapse of the Soviet Empire.

Now that the dust has settled in Greece and the austerity measures are in place our correspondent in Greece reflects about; the great truths about the non-violent nature of the movement of the “outraged” and the historic weekend of the 28th & 29th of June, unprecedented state repression, provocation and media propaganda.

The mainstream mass-media have been silent about the protests and the example of a popular revolution that took place in Iceland two years ago, when citizens made the government step down and rewrite the constitution. Because the events in Iceland are a model for how to make a popular revolution, the information has been hushed up.

Following a long absence from Venezuela for surgery in Cuba to remove a reported pelvic abcess, Chavez flies back to Havana for more treat. Chavez, who was accompanied by his daughter Rosa, will stay here for an undisclosed period of time.

Brushing off protests from China, Barack Obama welcomed the Dalai Lama to the White House, urging respect for human rights and cultural traditions in Tibet. China immediately lodged a protest and accused Obama of undermining relations between the world’s two largest economies by meeting with the Tibetan spiritual leader, who has spent more than a half-century in exile.