At 92, it’s clear that Mugabe’s time as president is limited even as no one knows exactly when it will end. There is no indication that he will step down even as his advanced age starts to show more readily. That has left his ZANU-PF party to work out succession itself, which might just tear the party – and country – apart.
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Photo Credit: Isaac Kasamani/AFP/Getty Images
Uganda's Elections Show Democratic Gains Are Slowing in Much of Africa
Ugandans voted last week in national elections for president, parliament and local government positions. But adding to concerns of voting irregularities and a climate of intimidation leading up to the election, the re-election of Uganda’s longtime president also highlights fears of a region backslide in democracy.
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Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
125 Million Reasons to Solve the Humanitarian Financing Gap
It is clear that the status quo on humanitarian funding is no longer feasible. While gaps in what was needed have always existed, the current “megacrises” have created a system where what is lacking almost matches what is being given.
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Why the US is Working with the UN to Resettle Central American Refugees
After a quiet year in 2015, migrants fleeing violence in Central America are crossing the US border in numbers rivaling the massive influx that occurred in 2014. But in a significant policy shift, the US announced last week it would formally open its refugee resettlement program to those fleeing violence in Central America, marking a significant change in how these children and families are treated.
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Students in Burundi try to take refuge at US Embassy | Photo credit: AFP/Marco Longari
Could Trouble in Burundi Take Down the Entire Region?
Nine months after President Pierre Nkurunziza upended Burundi’s fragile post-conflict peace by announcing he would stand for a third term in office, all indications are the crisis is getting worse rather than better. New evidence of sexual assault by security forces and growing allegations of mass killings coupled with the staunch unwillingness by Nkurunziza’s government to participate in regional talks aimed at resolving the crisis are leaving many to wonder how bad things will get.
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Aleppo under siege, 2013 | Photo credit: Basma
Starving in Syria
A sliver of good news came out of Syria yesterday with the announcement that the Syrian government would allow aid into the besieged city of Madaya. Located on the border with Lebanon, reports of starvation emerged earlier this week, highlighting once again the dire situation facing many inside Syria. However hundreds of thousands of others remain out of reach of aid agencies, lacking basic means of survival in a war where starvation has become a weapon wielded by all sides.
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Refugees fleeing Kosovo in 1999 | Photo credit: UN Photo/R. LeMoyne
A Refugee Convention for the 21st Century
The decades old system of international laws and agreements intended to facilitate the safe and dignified processing of refugees is now clearly broken. Unless the international community substantially updates these policies to reflect the realities of the 21st century, the old system is bound to fold under the pressure.
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Photo Credit: Gert Kamphuis
Stuck in the Calais Jungle
With all the focus on the current refugee crisis in Europe, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that refugees have been coming to Europe from Africa and the Middle East for years. The experience of those refugees and migrants are instructive to understanding the current crisis, and how far Europe needs to go in creating humane policies that uphold the rights of refugees.
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The SDG Challenge: Q&A with Graca Machel
One of the exciting things about the opening of the UN General Assembly in the wide variety of politicians, activists and civil society organizations it brings to New York every year. This year, one of those activists was Graça Machel, an international activist for women and children rights as well as the former first lady of Mozambique and South Africa. In a briefing following her appearance at the Social Good Summit, she talked about the launch of the SDGs and the challenges that lay ahead.
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Photo credit: Heidi Soeters/CDC
Reflecting on Lessons Learned from Ebola Outbreak
As the UN celebrates the official launch of the post-2015 agenda with the Sustainable Development Goals and world leaders start laying out their views in the UN General Debate, much of this week in New York is about looking forward. But on the sidelines of the main events focused on the SDGs, peacekeeping, violent extremism and the Syrian crisis, many are using this week as an opportunity to look back at the past year. Namely, a year after the West African Ebola outbreak reached its peak, many are discussing what went wrong and how to better prepare for the next epidemic.
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