A military drawdown in Syria and Afghanistan is good for America’s enemies – and contractors.
Tony Blair and George W. Bush shake hands after their press conference in the East Room of the White House on 12 November 2004. | Public Domain | Wikipedia.
24 December 2018 (openDemocrcay)* — At the end of 2003 the United States-led war in Iraq was going badly wrong. It had started so well from the Pentagon’s perspective, as American troops entered Baghdad within weeks of launching the invasion in late March.
Donald Trump announced a war crazed, hypersonic-weapon-fascinated businessman as the acting Defense Secretary to replace Jim Mattis.
Trump announced Patrick Shanahan as the new acting Defense Secretary of the United States. | Photo: Reuters | Photo fromteleSur.
23 December 2018 (teleSur)* — The United States President Donald Trump Sunday said he was replacing Defense Secretary Jim Mattis on Jan. 1 with Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan in an acting capacity after Mattis resigned over policy differences, and offered to stay in his post for two more months.
21 December 2018 (UNHCR)* — They are dressed in extra-large white shirts, black leggings and a rainbow of scarfs. Some of the girls cover their heads with veils, others wear beads, braids or colourful nails. Coming from 19 different countries as refugees or immigrants, the girls and young women who form Pihcintu choir may look very different from each other, but when they sing, they do it in one voice.
“When we sing together, we sing as a family,” says Sara Ali, 16, from Sudan.
After the Nicaraguan Government announced that it has asked two key human rights institutions to leave the country, the UN human rights chief, Michelle Bachelet, said on 21 December 2018 that she was “extremely alarmed” by a decision that means, in effect, there will be “no functioning independent human rights bodies left in Nicaragua”.
Artículo 66 | Students protest in the Nicaraguan capital, Managua. (file July 2018)
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According to High Commissioner Bachelet, the two non-profit human rights organisations were set up by the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights (IACHR), “in full cooperation with the Government after the violence and unrest earlier this year”.
A group of migrant boats stranded at sea, were rescued off the Spanish coast on Thursday [20 December 2018], and at least 25 people are believed to be dead or missing, including a pregnant woman, the UN Refugee Agency, UNCHR, has reported.
Briefing reporters in Geneva on Friday [21 December 2018], UNHCR spokesperson, Elizabeth Throssell, said that colleagues in the field had reported that bodies had been found on two of the boats: “You can imagine how traumatizing that was for the people who were rescued,” she said.
Cox’s Bazar, 21 December 2018 (IOM)* —Work has begun on one of the largest bamboo treatment plants ever installed in an emergency response, as IOM experts tackle a tiny insect that is devastating structures in the world’s biggest refugee settlement.
Bamboo becomes insect-resistant when soaked in a chemical solution for 12 -14 days. Photo: IOM/Abdullah Mashrif
An infestation of “boring beetles” means the bamboo in almost every shelter in the Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar – home to around 240,000 families – needs to be replaced.
Efforts to address the multiple challenges facing Africa’s Sahel region should be driven by local, regional and national leadership, with the support of international partners as required, the United Nations Special Adviser for the region on 20 December 2018 said.
MINUSMA/Harandane Dicko | The G5 Sahel HQ destroyed by a terrorist attack on 29 June 2018 in Mopti, Mali.
Briefing the Security Council, Ibrahim Thiaw, Special Adviser to the Secretary-General for the Sahel, said that the region’s stability and development was important not only for Africans, but also for Europe and beyond.
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The year 1989 had brought great hopes and expectations. That was the year when millions protested against the Soviet and Chinese totalitarian leviathans and when West and East Germany unified.
UNITED NATIONS, 19 December 2018 (IPS) – The UN’s major donors – led by the United States – have long been accused of influence-peddling and misusing their financial clout not only to grab some of the high ranking jobs in the world body but also threaten funding cuts to push their own domestic agendas.
The Trump administration’s plan to reduce its 22% assessed contributions to the world body –- mandatory payments to the UN’s regular budget– has helped resurrect a 1985 suggestion by the late Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme who proposed a new system of financing the UN.
The Palme proposal did not renounce the existing “capacity to pay” formula, but suggested there should be a cap of 10 percent maximum for any one country.
Migrants and refugees are being subjected to “unimaginable horrors” from the moment they enter Libya, throughout their stay in the country and – if they make it that far – during their attempts to cross the Mediterranean, according to a report released on 20 December 2018 by the United Nations political mission in Libya (UNSMIL) and the UN human rights office (OHCHR).
UNICEF/UN052822/Romenzi | A migrant sits in a patch of light entering through one of only two windows as he tries to warm himself up at a detention centre, located in Libya, 1 February 2017. At the time of UNICEF’s visit, 160 men were being detained there.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 
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