Can We Help Belarus?

Superficially, the democratic world is of one mind and one voice when weighing the future of Belarus. Both citizens and those who lead us are meant to agree. We see Belarusian people surge out in protest every week, and our hearts go with them. When they are increasingly maltreated by authority, beaten and arbitrarily arrested and worse, we feel their fear and their pain. We want that pain to end.

Man Against His History

At the moment, in my old college, there is a campaign being run mainly by current students, but drawing in a few alumni, to reconsider the continued existence of a memorial. The memorial, in itself, is almost nothing, taking up a small space in the hall, totalling the guy’s name, some professional information, and a little coloured glass.

France, Mali and Military Coups

It was difficult to disagree with France’s intervention in Mali’s civil war in 2013, and hard to dispute its effects.  Various jihadist factions including al-Qaeda, after first allying with and then repudiating the separatist National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), had begun to capture great territory and impose barbaric rule on millions.

Hope and Fear for Belarus

In his not uncontroversial White House memoir, The Room Where It Happened, John Bolton describes how the administration he was part of protractedly failed to liberate Venezuela.