As the head of the state of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, the thirty-something babyface leader is among the many incompetents who employ religion as a tool to impose authority. Islam has been the main driving religion in Chechnya ever since an independence movement first sprang in the late 18th century that was able to mobilize the [...]
18
Dec
09
Dec
Protests have yet again set ablaze the city of Bangkok. Does this new wave of uprisings prove a feeling of unease that plagues the Thai population? On November 24th, 2012 violent demonstrations paralyzed the Thai capital. A much too frequent occurrence, these events oppose the royalist Yellow Shirts to the Red Shirt partisans of the [...]
08
Dec
It could be a terrible movie title! Chechnya is a small state sandwiched between Dagestan, Georgia, and what is now the state of Ingushetia. It lies on the southwest border of the Russian Federation in the North Caucasus Mountains. It is a state built on a tradition of resistance against Russian forces dating back to [...]
26
Nov
Erected in 1982, the Pearl Roundabout long stood as a major landmark in the heart of Manama, Bahrain’s capital. This rather bizarre-looking monument served as a focal point for popular mobilization during the Arab Spring – very much Bahrain’s Tahrir Square. However, while Tahrir Square stands today as a proud symbol of Egypt’s triumph over [...]
Homosexuality is currently criminalized in the Ugandan penal code, but an extreme anti-homosexuality bill that would heavily substantiate this informal law seems doomed to pass in parliament before the end of the year. The bill seeks to eradicate homosexuality entirely from Uganda and become a model for the rest of Africa. The bill appeared in [...]
