The Economist

Syria crisis: The fire is getting closer

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Posted by admin 181 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

AFTER a period of relative stalemate, the rebels seeking to topple President Bashar Assad and his regime have, in the past month, made further gains across the board. They have been steadily winning territory, including on the outskirts of Damascus, the capital. The Syrian National Coalition, the opposition umbrella group that got together under watchful American eyes in Qatar in m

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Iraq, Kurds, Turks and oil: A tortuous triangle

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Posted by admin 181 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

SNAKING their way from Kirkuk, a city 240 kilometres (150 miles) north of Baghdad, through Kurdistan and across Turkey’s eastern region of Anatolia to the Mediterranean are pipes that once carried 1.6m barrels a day (b/d) of Iraqi oil to the global market and yielded fat transit fees to Turkey along the way. The infrastructure underpinned the two countries’ mutual dependence. But nowadays the bal

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Egypt’s constitutional referendum: A dubious yes

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Posted by admin 181 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

MUHAMMAD MORSI, Egypt’s embattled president, has won a risky gamble. He had staked his own future and the reputation of his faction, the Muslim Brotherhood, on the outcome of a referendum to approve a new constitution. Half of the electorate voted on December 15th and the rest will do so on the 22nd, but it is already clear that the charter will pass, probably by a margin of around 60%. So can Eg

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South African politics: Return of a prodigal son

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Posted by admin 181 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

Will Zuma (left) let Ramaphosa move in? DESPITE a growing lack of enthusiasm for his leadership, Jacob Zuma has been re-elected to lead the ruling African National Congress (ANC), and by extension, to a likely second term as the country’s president. At a congress held every five years, this time in Mangaung, formerly Bloemfontein, he got three-quarters of the 3,977 votes cast by the

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America and the Middle East: The masochism tango

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Posted by admin 187 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

The broadcaster-in-chief WHEN Barack Obama became America’s president four years ago, he had two main aims in the Middle East: to make America more popular around the region; and to get out of it, starting with Iraq and ending with Afghanistan. Such was the faith in his powers that some thought Mr Obama might even find the solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict that had eluded pr

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Unstable Mali: The 400 coups

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Posted by admin 187 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

LATE on December 10th soldiers arrested Mali’s prime minister, Cheick Modibo Diarra, a former NASA astrophysicist and ex-employee of Microsoft. They hauled him off to an army base outside Bamako, the capital, which serves as the headquarters of the junta that seized power in a coup in March before—theoretically—handing it back to civilians. At 4am a nervous-looking Mr Diarra appeared on televisio

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Egypt’s choice: The Founding Brothers

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Posted by admin 187 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

THE choice looks simple. Over the coming week Egypt’s electorate of 51m will have the opportunity to vote yes or no to a new constitution. A healthy blast of political advertising floods airwaves, billboards and the internet. Yet this is no cheery exercise in democracy. Seldom has any nation confronted so momentous a question at a time of such polarisation.Rival marches of supporte

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South Africa: Wrangling in the ruling party

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Posted by admin 187 days ago (http://www.economist.com)

Zuma style ON A street in Johannesburg’s posh northern suburbs, a hand-lettered sign warns of danger ahead: MANGAUNG, it says, with an arrow pointing down a cavernous pothole. On December 16th the ruling African National Congress (ANC) will gather several thousand delegates for a special five-yearly “elective” conference in Mangaung (“place of cheetahs”), the African name for Bloemf