Politics

By Pieter Cranenbroek Watching David Cameron in Europe is a bit like watching a kid make a stain on his shirt and rub it, making it bigger and bigger. The British prime minister has been rubbing his European leaders up the wrong way for a while, but his diplomacy has gone from bad to worse in recent weeks. His disillusioned performance in the Juncker episode means that Cameron has struck out in Europe. Less than a month ago, Cameron was...

By Indy Hack @IndyHack July 6th will mark the 79th birthday of the most iconic religious figure in current popular culture, a figure most often associated with peace, tolerance, non-violence and religious harmony, none other than Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama. Behind the carefully crafted and stage managed image of the world's most popular Buddhist monk lies a story of religious persecution and political oppression inflicted on the Tibetan people, not by the Chinese, but by the Dalai Lama...

  By Luca Foschi You do not fix history with a drone. What we are witnessing today in Iraq is the slow collapse of a century-long geopolitical partition drawn up in a secret document by United Kingdom and France, in one of their last acts as imperial powers. In May 1916 diplomats Mark Sykes and François Gorges Picot signed an agreement that reshaped the Near East, previously ruled by the Ottoman Empire who were siding with Austria-Hungary and Germany during the First...

By Guy Dorrell @GuyDorrellEsq In March this year, the nation lost an iconic figure from both parliament and the wider political and protest scene with the death of Tony Benn. Once billed as the most dangerous man in Britain, he would later be feted as a national treasure. The son of a Liberal MP and later hereditary peer, Anthony Wedgewood Benn would turn his back on the system that educated him and renounce the peerage that would eventually fall to...

By Rachel Wilson Political Reporter The current cuts to the public sector look set to impact on women the hardest. Women make up the majority of public sector workers and cuts to the sector has pushed women’s unemployment up over the past few years. Women make up 65% of the public sector workforce in the UK and the latest figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility estimate that 929,000 jobs will be lost in the public sector by 2018. Over...

By Valentina Magri The decision of the European Council to propose Jean-Claude Juncker as the next President of the European Commission was “one step closer to quitting Europe” for Britain. The move made David Cameron feel very angry. Indeed, the PM has promised a referendum in 2017 over EU membership if the Conservative party win the 2015 general election. Opinion polls show that Brits are split on the issue. But what would be the economic consequences of Brexit? The five economic consequences...

By Andy Irwin Last weekend’s anti-austerity march in central London organised by The People’s Assembly Against Austerity highlighted the anger of thousands and a lack of leadership on Britain’s disparate left wing. If you were one of the estimated 50,000 people who marched peacefully through London or simply attended the demonstration at Parliament Square last weekend you may be somewhat surprised to see the ensuing lack of coverage of the anti-austerity event organised by the relatively new pressure group ‘The...

By Deiniol Jones Russian Prime Minister Medvedev warned recently of the advent of a new Cold War. His boss, Vladimir Putin, contradicted him. It’s a confusing situation, and the confusion is only compounded when HRH Charles Prince of Wales pops up to make a revealing comment, comparing Vladimir Putin to Hitler. Does history repeat itself in precisely the same way? Is Putin a Hitler, a Stalin or just...well, just a Vladimir Putin? Is it possible to abandon historical analogies and...

By Guy Dorrell @GuyDorrellEsq Straight out of university, my first career move was to become an Army office. The year-long course at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst – where William and Harry attended – was designed to breed the future leaders of the British Army. My first close friend in my platoon was from an army family. He wanted to, and almost certainly would, follow his father’s footsteps and go into the same regiment, doing the same role. His father was...