South Africa has seen an upsurge in protests recently, but can it really be said to be less peaceful than dictatorships such as Equatorial Guinea and Gambia?
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
Indexes such as the Global Peace Index are used by a wide variety of players to make decisions ranging from investments to providing other support. But do they deserve this level of credibility?
__The turmoil of 2014 was a timely reminder to businesses that they need to be prepared and have contingency plans for global conflict. The crisis in Ukraine brought Russia and the West to the brink of…
The Security Council votes unanimously for Resolution 2185, the first ever devoted to UN policing as an integral part of the mandates of peacekeeping operations and political missions.
UN Photo/Yubi Hoffmann
As UN Security Council president for November, Australia’s major initiative was to promote the centrality of civilian policing in UN peace operations. Noting Australia’s experiences with police peacekeeping…
Three Australian IS fighters may have been killed in the last month, including Mohammad Ali Baryalei.
AAP Image/YouTube
Estimates are that there are more than 60 Australian citizens in the ranks of the Islamic State (IS) armies sweeping through Syria and Iraq. In a recent case, reported by the Sydney Morning Herald last…
Crowding in refugee and internal displacement camps create conditions ripe for disease transmission.
Conflict continues to afflict the globe at a seemingly undiminished rate. The world’s attention is focused on Syria and Iraq in an escalating conflict that has resulted in about three million refugees…
You don’t even need a match to burn a digital book.
Jason Verwey
Not all violence in war and conflict is simply strategic. And not all the destruction that takes place is a consequence of territorial or geopolitical objectives. Taking over the next village, blocking…
A fight on her hands: CAR’s interim president, Catherine Samba-Panza.
Jerome Delay/AP
More than 2,000 people are feared killed since violence intensified in the Central African Republic (CAR) in early December of last year. Much of the violence erupted between the Séléka alliance of armed…
A former child soldier following his rescue from the LRA.
Inmediahk
The government of the Central African Republic claims to be in talks with one of the world’s most enigmatic African guerrilla leaders, Joseph Kony. But Kony has entered talks before with no intention of…
Twenty years later, the instability that began in Mogadishu still ripples through East Africa.
TSGT Perry Heimer/USMC
Twenty years ago, on 3 and 4 October 1993, the so-called Battle of Mogadishu, also referred to as Black Hawk Down, raged in the Somali capital. Two decades on, this region of East Africa still suffers…
Australia sends more foreign fighters to Syria than any other western nation - including suspected suicide bomber ‘Abu Asma al-Australi’. What problems does this pose?
Twitter/@AbuSiqr
A married Queenslander using the nom de guerre “Abu Asma al-Australi” featured as a suicide bomber in a promotional video released by the Syrian al-Qaeda affiliate Jahbat al-Nusra earlier this month. He…
In part 15 of our multi-disciplinary Millennium Project series, Edward Spence argues that the modern world is crying out for a return to classical cosmopolitanism. Global challenge 15: How can ethical…
Muslim women pass bombed Christian shops in Nigeria: researchers and policymakers are developing complex views of organised violence.
AAP/EPA/Ruth McDowall
In part 10 of the multi-disciplinary Millennium Project series, Alex Burns argues that we are getting more sophisticated in our approach to global threats and conflict. Global challenge 10: How can shared…
Diplomacy, rather than the use of force, has been a key plank of Brazil’s foreign policy.
Embaixada dos EUA - Brasil
The five major emerging economies – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) – will meet at a summit today to discuss the possibility of a new development bank and trade agreements between…
You don’t need to take Iran’s nuclear facilities out by force. Just pass a virus onto them.
EPA
The latest round of chest beating over Iran developing nuclear weapons has seen renewed speculation over the possibility of military strikes on the Islamic Republic’s enrichment facilities. Certainly if…
People in Libya are desperate for change and the new government will have to manage expectations carefully.
AFP/Abdullah Doma
The relegation of Moammar Gaddafi to the meat-locker of history is a significant exorcism of Libya’s past. Whether it would have been better for him to face trial is a moot point. It’s doubtful that too…
Muammar Gaddafi’s 42-year-rule of Libya has come to an violent end in a manner reminiscent of the dispatch of Fascist Italy’s Benito Mussolini. Libya under Gaddafi, like Libya before him, had a complex…
We all think we know what a child soldier looks like, but we’d be wrong.
AFP/Georges Gobet
The commander of United Nations peacekeeping forces in Rwanda during the terrible conflict in the early 1990s has put forward legislation in Canada to help former child soldiers seek refuge there. During…