“Cheaper than water.” This is how Iraqis commented on the value of their lives after they learned that US President Donald Trump had pardoned the four Blackwater security contractors who had previously been sentenced over the death of 17 Iraqi civilians in the 2007 Nisur Square massacre. Sentences included life imprisonment for a first-degree murder. A child [...]
The Constitutional Charter for the Transitional Period that governs the Transitional Government in Sudan has recently been amended to incorporate the Juba Agreement for Peace in Sudan. The amendment has ignited a fierce political and constitutional debate between those who support the amendment and those who stand against it. This article aims to briefly make [...]
With the continuing pandemic – and expiring housing and unemployment benefits across the country – millions of people may have their utilities cut off soon. Meanwhile, at least 13 states currently have expired moratoriums on water shut-offs. Many notable COVID-19 hotspot states (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Oklahoma) never implemented any moratorium on utility shut-offs. For those facing [...]
As the political conversation in the United States increasingly scrutinizes the problems with policing and the inequities within America’s criminal justice system, many books have been published on the topic. From Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, to Bryan Stevenson’s Just Mercy, to Ibram X. Kendi’s How to be An Anti-Racist, these books paint a [...]
The promulgation of the Kerala Police (Amendment) Ordinance 2020 on 21st November 2020 and its subsequent repeal in a matter of four days, with the repeal order being signed by the Kerala Governor on 25th November 2020 makes a very good case for responsive governance in the state of Kerala. The abovementioned ordinance was sanctioned [...]
This article is written in view of the recent Reply (GJ/63/2020) made by the Permanent Mission of the People’s Republic of China in Geneva in pursuance of a Joint Communication (AL CHN 16/2020). The Joint Communication was made by a number of Special Rapporteurs and Working Groups in the United Nations in August 2020 in [...]
As a rabbi who has not attended an indoor prayer service since March, I still would have been happy if the Supreme Court had held that draconian restrictions on indoor religious services are unconstitutional. However, what the Court’s liberal and conservative justices actually evaluated in Roman Catholic Diocese v. Cuomo was whether New York’s coronavirus [...]
A mere 9 months after the previous attempt of the UK government to deport en masse to Jamaica, the Home Office yet again attempted to deport Jamaican nationals, some of whom either came as children to the UK, have established families in the UK or fear for their life should they be returned to Jamaica. [...]
In the early 1930s, a newly installed Chancellor Adolf Hitler, holding on to a shaky majority in the German parliament, the Reichstag, sensed a weakened hold on power. Just four weeks after he was sworn in as Chancellor, a mysterious fire occurred in the Reichstag on 27th February, 1933. Sensing a moment, Hitler quickly accused [...]
The COVID-19 pandemic has taken its toll on developed and developing economies alike. While the major international focus has shifted towards restoring normalcy, a blind eye has been turned to the growing instability in the global political sphere. Whether they be the recent tensions in the Nagorno-Karabakh Region or the fierce simmering between Iran and [...]
