Europe

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – In his townhall on Thursday evening, Joe Biden pointed to the way infrastructural investments in green energy will help the economy. He said, according to the ABC transcript, “For example, we’re going to invest a great deal of that money into infrastructure. And into green infrastructure. We’re going to put […]

Jabhat al-Nusra

Russia and Syria are committing War Crimes, Targeting Civilian Infrastructure

Human Rights Watch

Unlawful Attacks on Hospitals, Schools, Markets Forced Idlib Population Out

France

Republican Food: French President Macron nails his colours to the Mast of Islamophobia

Open Democracy

By Chris Myant ( OpenDemocracy.net) – In the small Provençal town of Aups, where the local Catholic church declares République française: Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité [The French Republic: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity], above its main entrance, there is a plain and nondescript monument put up in 1881. Its plaque announces that it is there: A la memoire […]

Armenia

Where does Iran stand on Armenia’s conflict with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh?

Middle East Monitor

By Marwan Kabalan | – ( Middle East Monitor) – While most attention is focused on the positions of Russia and Turkey in the ongoing conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, Iran receives less attention. The former are the direct regional sponsors of the Armenian and Azeri parties to the crisis, but Iran is likely to […]

Armenia

War for Oil, again? Why are Russia and Turkey intervening in the Azerbaijan-Armenia Clashes?

Nikola Mikovic

Belgrade (Special to Informed Comment) – Clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh threaten to destabilize the Caucasus. Turkey and Russia – the major foreign actors in this proxy conflict – are still not directly involved in bloodshed that erupted on September 27, although Ankara openly supports Baku by providing full […]

Germany

Renewables cover almost half of German electricity use in first 9 months 2020

Julian Wettengel

(Clean Energy Wire ) – Renewables covered about 48 percent of German power consumption in the first three quarters of 2020, preliminary data from energy industry association BDEW and the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research Baden-Wuerttemberg (ZSW) shows, a 5-percentage point increase over the same period last year. On the one hand, the […]

Donald Trump

Russia tells Trump to Jump in Lake, commits 80,000 Personnel to War drill alongside Iran, China

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – This week, Russia is deploying 80,000 personnel, including 12,000 troops, alongside 1,000 troops from friendly countries in its region, in its Caucasus 2020 (Kavkaz 2020) military drills. Its partners include Iran, China, Belarus, Armenia, Pakistan, and Myanmar. The choice of Iran was deliberate. The Trump administration has threatened the most […]

China

France’s Macron declares Europe’s independence of Trump, stands by Iran Nuclear Deal

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – French President Emmanuel Macron declared independence of the United States and of China for Europe at the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, in the starkest “third way” bid for a French president since Charles De Gaulle withdrew from the military wing of NATO in 1965 and established France’s own nuclear […]

Climate Change

Germany’s Crypto-Neo-Nazi AfD Party calls for end to all climate action efforts

Benjamin Wehrmann

( Clean Energy Wire ) – The right-wing nationalist AfD party has called for an end to all major climate action efforts Germany has committed itself to and wants to abandon both the Paris Climate Agreement and the European Green Deal. One year before the general election in autumn 2021, the party that holds 12.6 […]