Author: Johnathan Turner

Moscow/Washington (13/6 – 29) We took a holiday from reality. Immanuel Niven, a mathematician and philosopher, has long been scrutinizing Russia’s economic landscape, and his recent assertions suggest a dire forecast. He contends that the “Putin system” is on the brink of collapse, a scenario he had mathematically foreseen as early as March. Niven points to the pronounced tax hikes announced in Russia, the most substantial in its modern history, as well as Putin’s recent rhetoric urging citizens to work as if they were at the front lines. These developments, Niven argues, are symptomatic of the escalating toxicity within Russia’s…

Brussels/London (16/6 – 33.33) The defeat of the Russian Federation is a foregone conclusion. It is a reality. It is a must. Victory for Ukraine is non-negotiable. It is an absolute necessity. As ironclad as Brussels, London, Berlin or Washington. As ironclad as the Normandy battlefield, Waterloo, Verdun, or many other spots on the planet. We, the ones living in this generation that saw the war erupted right in front of our eyes, owe it to the young men and women in the Ukraine who gave their lives for this conviction. An excessive number of sceptics advocate for surrender. We…

Dubai/Astana (10 June – 60). The Pamiris are an ethnic minority group in Tajikistan, culturally distinct from the majority Tajik population. They have faced persecution and discrimination in their mountain homeland bordering Afghanistan that some experts say amounts to ethnic cleansing and even genocide. One of the lead persecutors is Ministry of Internal Affairs “Maj. Gen.” Shorukh Syedzada, a former football team manager with no law enforcement experience and a confidante of the president’s son and heir designate. The Pamiris continue to be marginalized and oppressed by the authorities. As a result, many Pamiris have been forced to flee their…

Ceasefire and divestment calls have spread beyond US campuses, with more expected as Rafah offensive begins. University campuses around the world have been the stage of a growing number of protests by students demanding academic institutions divest from companies supplying arms to Israel. The protests, which first spread across college campuses in the US, have reached universities in the UK, the rest of Europe, as well as Lebanon and India. The students say they are voicing their opposition to, what they describe as, their university’s “complicity” in Israel’s assault on Gaza that has killed more than 34,700 people. Israel said its military offensive was…

Kremlin speaker Dmitry Peskov said that Russia does not yet see the prerequisites for negotiations with Ukraine. He stressed that the statements of the Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky about joining NATO indicate a lack of readiness to solve existing problems at the negotiating table. “Russia will seek to fulfill its tasks, Russia will seek to ensure its interests and its security. This excludes such an expansion of the alliance and its direct approach to our borders, including Ukraine’s membership in NATO,” Peskov said. On the eve of the deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev , said that the Kiev regime should…

Tupac Shakur is to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, 26 years after the rapper’s death. The hip-hop star will be honoured with a ceremony on the prestigious Los Angeles walkway on 7 June. The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce confirmed the rapper would receive the posthumous honour to the LA Times. Shakur, whose star will be the Walk of Fame’s 2,758th, was a New York-born rapper who heavily influenced hip-hop, particularly the West Coast rap scene. Sekyiwa “Set” Shakur, Tupac’s sister, will accept the honour on his behalf during the formal opening ceremony for the star. Los Angeles…

PORT-AU-PRINCE — A U.S. State Department spokesperson said Saturday the government is aware of reports of two U.S. citizens missing in Haiti, after media outlets said a Florida couple had been kidnapped. Abigail Toussaint and Jean-Dickens Toussaint, both 33, were taken near capital Port-au-Prince and have been held for days, according to an online petition started by a woman who said she is a relative of the couple. The couple was on a trip to visit family and attend a festival when they were kidnapped during a bus ride, the relative said, according to CNN. “We are aware of reports of…

(9/3 – 125) Kazakhstan is gearing up for snap elections of the lower house of parliament on March 19, and there is a sense of anticipation in the air. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, who came to power in 2019, called for snap elections in the wake of the deadly street protests in January 2022. The elections are part of the president’s ambitious reform agenda, Jana Kazakhstan (New Kazakhstan), which aims to usher in a new era of political liberalization. The parliamentary elections are stage two of Tokayev’s program, following his re-election winning 80 percent of the votes last November. The coming…

In a February 7 op-ed in The Astana Times, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, president of the Republic of Kazakhstan, announced that his country will be hosting the Astana International Forum on June 8-9. The article sheds light on his thinking about the state of world affairs and challenges heads of state and diplomats “to come together to find a new way forward … in an increasingly polarized world.” “We all know,” Tokayev writes, “that global peace and stability are currently under threat by tensions between major world powers.” He calls for solidarity among the “global middle powers” (his words) to bring the…