Global bodies are rhetorically bled dry, but North Korea prevails

Global bodies are rhetorically bled dry, but North Korea prevails

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — A riveting Security Council session condemned North Korea for its Nuclear proliferation and illegal ballistic missile firings. The meeting at the Ministerial level saw Foreign Ministers and delegates nearly universally condemn Pyongyang’s provocative actions which have brought the world to the brink of conflict. Now […]

Upcoming Winter games in PyeongChang taking place in world’s foremost hot zone

Upcoming Winter games in PyeongChang taking place in world’s foremost hot zone

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — The Olympic Games should be entirely about sport, sportsmanship and solidarity. Yet they rarely are. Every four years the athletes of the world, or at least most of them, meet in an exotic locale plagued by political controversy, cost overruns, corruption, and doping concerns. The […]

As global migrant crisis continues, Hungary pushes back

As global migrant crisis continues, Hungary pushes back

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — The global surge of refugees and economic migrants continues unabated. Both the scourge of civil and ethnic conflicts, as well as the pull of economic betterment, have seen millions of people on the move to both the USA and the European Union. As countries scramble […]

‘Theatre of the absurd’? World powers trade insults over rights abuses in Iran, North Korea

‘Theatre of the absurd’? World powers trade insults over rights abuses in Iran, North Korea

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — A key UN Committee has condemned Iran’s widespread use of the death penalty and has urged the Islamic Republic to eliminate “all discrimination and rights violations against women and girls.” In a separate resolution, the Third Committee roundly chastised North Korea’s grave human rights situation […]

Trump’s Reaganesque speech in Seoul: ‘Tale of one people, but two Koreas’

Trump’s Reaganesque speech in Seoul: ‘Tale of one people, but two Koreas’

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — U.S. President Donald’s Trump’s whirlwind trip to East Asia was fraught with both promise and peril; the promise of expanding commercial alliances and reinforcing military alliances, and the peril of confronting North Korea’s ominous nuclear threat. In Seoul, South Korea’s bustling and free capital, the […]

Africa’s Sahel region ‘sinking into chaos’ as terror spreads

Africa’s  Sahel region ‘sinking into chaos’ as terror spreads

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — The recent killing of four U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers in Niger tragically highlighted a quiet but lethal conflict in sub-Saharan Africa’s Sahel region. Here in the confluence of the arid and largely forgotten lands of Mali, Chad, Niger, Burkina Faso and Mauritania lay a […]

Storm clouds in the Far East: In China, a coronation; In Japan, an election

Storm clouds in the Far East: In China, a coronation; In Japan, an election

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — The political optics could not have been more contrasting as China selected its leader and Japan elected its Prime Minister. In a grandiose and stunning setting, draped in the trappings of crimson and gold, 2,300 Chinese Communist Party (CCP) grandees predictably anointed Xi Jinping as […]

Meanwhile at the UN: Another Human Rights Council election farce

Meanwhile at the UN: Another Human Rights Council election farce

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — Truth is often stranger than fiction. Indeed elections for new members of the UN’s 47-member Human Rights Council proved yet again that some of the least qualified and most repressive regimes would win coveted seats on the watchdog committee tasked with monitoring human rights and […]

Separatist fault line stretches from Spain to Ukraine

Separatist fault line stretches from Spain to Ukraine

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — A dangerous and potentially riveting political fault line stretches from Spain across Europe to Ukraine as smoldering separatist movements have gained new strength and standing. From Catalonia in Spain to the eastern regions of Ukraine with Corsica in between, the nationalist rift runs through the […]

Only Iran reaping geopolitical benefits as Syria crisis is sidelined at UN

Only Iran reaping geopolitical benefits as Syria crisis is sidelined at UN

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — Perhaps it’s the dangerous global threat from North Korean nukes. Maybe it’s political fatigue and crisis overload. Or it could be the escalating ethnic cleansing in Burma. But the long running and brutal Syrian civil war has become largely an afterthought for many delegates at […]

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