Category: opinion

Cardiovascular disease remains Europe’s biggest killer

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Cardiovascular disease accounts for 45% of all deaths in Europe and 37% of all deaths in the EU Death rates from cardiovascular diseases such as heart attacks and strokes are falling but still cost the EU economy an estimated €210 billion a year, according to new figures. Despite overall success in maintaining a fall in mortality rates, inequality between different parts of Europe persists, with central and Eastern Europe lagging behind. An annual study by the European Heart Network – an alliance of heart foundations and NGOs in 25 countries – shows…

Persona non grata: Potential Sisi Tunisia visit sparks anger

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The potential visit of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to Tunisia has sparked controversy within domestic politics with many political figures expressing anger at President Beij Caid Essebsi’s apparent invite of his Egyptian counterpart. During meetings between figures from the Tunisian government and Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry in January, an invite for Sisi to visit Tunis is said to have been extended – in order to discuss matters related to Libya’s ongoing civil crisis, and how to contain the regional fallout. However Sisi is viewed as a controversial figure in…

What will Trump’s North Africa policy look like?

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“If Tunisia receives assistance, it will be given mainly to support Tunisia’s armed forces, security units.” Africa had been largely absent from the debates and speeches of the two US presidential candidates, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Also among their advisers on foreign policy, Donald Trump definitely has no political knowledge on the continent. This raises some concerns about the uncertainty of his policy on the North African region and the African continent. Over the past two decades, United States Africa policy has enjoyed strong two-party congressional support from both…

Did you know that a Tunisian pope created Valentine’s Day?

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Beyond the flood of everything red and heart-shaped, very little about Valentine’s Day can be deemed factual and it is quite hard to distinguish between the historical and the mythical. The day of love is said to have acquired its name from that of a saint, yet there is no consensus over which one. The Catholic Church, in fact, recognizes several saints with the name Valentine or Valentinus, each said to have some link or another to the now internationally renowned holiday. In the third century AD, Roman emperor Claudius…

Libya: Why it went wrong, and what should be done

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The current power vacuum in Libya came about because of the poor intervention of the West, which in the wake of the revolution of 2011 did not contribute enough towards state building, and as a result, it will take one or two generations for a modern state to emerge. This is one of the conclusions of Professor Dirk Vandewalle, a leading expert on the North African country who gave a lecture on Tuesday entitled “The Libyan crisis and its implications on the broader Arab spring”. The talk was organized by…

The Boy Who Started the Syrian War Tells His Story

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“If we had known what would happen, we’d never have written that graffiti,” says Mouawiya Syasneh in The Boy Who Started The Syrian War, a recent Al Jazeera documentary that tells his story. Mouawiya was 14 and in the seventh grade when he sprayed anti-government slogans on a school wall in Deraa in February 2011, never thinking his mischievous act of youthful defiance would spark a war that’s left over half a million dead. We saw what was happening in Egypt and Tunisia,” he tells Al Jazeera, referring to the Arab…

Life, Interrupted, For those covered by President Donald Trump’s travel order, there is potential heartache at every turn

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Dr. Muhamad Alhaj Moustafa and Nabila Alhaffar wed in 2015 and planned to start a family this year. He was almost through his residency at Washington Hospital Center, and they both longed for children. On Jan. 27, Moustafa went to Dulles International Airport to pick up Alhaffar when she returned from a short trip to visit her mother, a breast cancer survivor, in Qatar. But due to the order issued by President Donald Trump earlier that day, she was denied entry and put on a plane back. For 10 days,…

The man who declared the ‘end of history’ fears for democracy’s future

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Francis Fukuyama, an acclaimed American political philosopher, entered the global imagination at the end of the Cold War when he prophesied the “end of history” — a belief that, after the fall of communism, free-market liberal democracy had won out and would become the world’s “final form of human government.” Now, at a moment when liberal democracy seems to be in crisis across the West, Fukuyama, too, wonders about its future. “Twenty five years ago, I didn’t have a sense or a theory about how democracies can go backward,” said Fukuyama in a phone interview. “And…

Analysis: Trump paints dark picture in defense of travel ban

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WASHINGTON (AP) — The more Donald Trump tries to build support for his refugee and immigration ban, the darker the world seems to get. In defending his policies barring refugees and curbing immigration, the president is painting an increasingly ominous picture of the danger posed by Islamic extremists. In his speeches, tweets and an imposing new tally of what Trump calls an unreported “genocide” by the Islamic State group, he has raised the prospect of imminent attacks on the United States and cast the debate over safety as a clash…

Lessons from Tunisia: Empowering Civil Society in the Post-Truth Era

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The surge of populism that led to stunning political upsets in 2016 signals a deep distrust of institutions such as governments and media. Inequality has never been so strong—according to a recent Oxfam report, the world’s eight richest men possess wealth equal to that of half of the global population. Public anger and its political consequences are apparent worldwide. In this context, Tunisia’s nascent democracy and fight against regional inequality provide an instructive case study of how empowered civil society can play a crucial role in holding government accountable. For more…