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South Korea starts process to suspend licenses of nearly 5,000 striking junior doctors

South Korea has started a process to suspend licenses of thousands of striking junior doctors protesting the government’s medical training reforms. The South Korean government announced on March 11 that it had started procedures to suspend the medical licenses of 4,900 junior doctors who have resigned and stopped working to protest against changes in the medical training system. The government changes include...

Five UK special forces arrested, investigated over Syria war crime probe

Five members of the British army’s Special Air Service (SAS) have been arrested by British military police on suspicion of committing war crimes during operations in Syria. The military’s top brass on March 5 said the troops used excessive force during a mission, killing a suspected militant in Syria, adding that they should have arrested the man instead. The soldiers from...

Historical roots and ties of apartheid and colonialism

According to the Financial Times, South Africa has a population of nearly 50,000 Jews, the majority of whom are Ashkenazi. The country has a history of Zionist Jews that supported South African apartheid but also has a history of anti-apartheid, anti-Zionist Jews, including Koni Benson, a member of South African Jews for a Free Palestine, and Andrew Feinstein, a...

The U.S., Israel and Palestine

The more things change, the more they stay the same In an hour-plus State of the Union Address, President Joe Biden touched on a range of foreign affairs. He spoke on lawmakers providing more weaponry to Ukraine, the chaos of Russia and Ukraine affecting Europe and beyond, and after nearly one hour on domestic issues, he addressed the Middle East. “I...

Israel’s spyware, cyber warfare were used on Palestinians and exported to Africa

Late last year, journalist Antony Loewenstein told inkstick.com, “In the last 10 years, Israel has made significant efforts to build relationships with Africa, but these are mostly transactional and a way to hopefully win support in the UN and other international forums.” Loewenstein, who was based in South Sudan in 2015 and Jerusalem between 2016 and 2020, is the author...

China raises defense budget by 7.2 percent as it pushes for global heft and regional tensions continue

BEIJING—China on March 5 announced a 7.2 percent increase in its defense budget, which is already the world’s second-highest behind the United States at 1.6 trillion yuan ($222 billion), roughly mirroring last year’s rise. Tensions with the U.S., Taiwan, Japan and neighbors with competing claims to the crucial South China Sea are seen as furthering growth in high-tech military technologies from...

U.S. anti-drug policies caused ‘genocide’ in Latin America: Colombia president

Colombian President Gustavo Petro says the United States’ anti-drug policies have caused a “genocide” in Latin America. “We have lived through a genocide of a million Latin Americans in the last half-century,” Petro declared on March 1 at a meeting of regional leaders on the Caribbean island of St Vincent and the Grenadines. The Colombian president said the U.S. drug strategy...

Wildfire grows into one of largest in Texas history and storms leave trail of destruction in Midwest

CANADIAN, Texas—A cluster of wildfires scorched the Texas Panhandle on Feb. 28, including a blaze that grew into one of the largest in state history, as flames moved with alarming speed and blackened the landscape across a vast stretch of small towns and cattle ranches. Authorities warned that the damage to communities on the high plains could be extensive. Known as...

Activists urge Nigeria to delay Shell’s $2.4 B sale of assets in deeply polluted Niger Delta

ABUJA, Nigeria—Local activists and international environmental groups want Nigeria’s government to delay approving the sale of oil company Shell’s onshore assets, claiming Shell is trying to shirk its environmental and social responsibilities in the highly polluted Niger Delta. The London-based company is trying to sell its subsidiary Shell Petroleum Development Company—which operates its onshore assets in the delta—to Renaissance Africa Energy Company,...

Russia: Conflict with Europe ‘inevitable’ if NATO deploys troops in Ukraine

Russia has warned NATO’s European member states of a potential conflict if the West realizes a debated plan of deploying troops to Ukraine. The Kremlin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Feb. 27 that both Europe and the United States should “assess” their support to Ukraine. “In this case, we need to talk not about the likelihood, but about the inevitability of...