New Internationalist

Poverty is a downer, no two ways about it. It refuses to be made history, though, mercy knows, it should have been consigned to it long ago. And it resists jollying up – narratives of the ‘we were poor, but we were happy’ type notwithstanding. Sure,

The Contents page of NI 523 stated that Alex Sager’s article ‘imagines a world where borders have finally been banished’. But that’s not really what it did, as it referred to a system of open borders and free movement, which assumes that the borders

Polish border guards are refusing entry to Chechen asylum-seekers, many of whom have faced persecution and torture. According to multiple reports, Chechens who apply for asylum are routinely mocked and humiliated, before being herded onto trains to t

These days the victory of a centre-left politician anywhere in Eastern Europe is somewhat anomalous. The scene is dominated by either traditional conservative nationalists or fire-breathing rightwing populists. But on 22 December, when Croatian voter

Women’s rights advocates have won a landmark ruling in the Abuja Federal High Court. Last December, a judge declared that sex work is not a criminal offence in a case brought by 16 women detained and allegedly tortured after being arrested for prosti

After six years in solitary confinement in Multan, Pakistan, Junaid Hafeez – a 33-year-old Fulbright scholar and lecturer – was handed a death sentence in December 2019 for allegedly ‘defiling’ the name of Prophet Muhammad. Junaid’s father, Hafeez-ul

Behemoth financier Goldman Sachs finally bowed to pressure from a coalition of over 100 environmental and indigenous rights groups in January. The bank has agreed to end all financing for drilling and oil exploration in the Arctic following a campaig

It is axiomatic locally that, while most countries have an army, in Pakistan the army has a country. Since it secured independence from British rule following the Partition of India in 1947, Pakistan has effectively been in the grip of martial law, s

The top 10% of the population earn 27.6% and the bottom 10% just 4.1%. However, Pakistan’s GINI coefficient is, at 30.7, relatively low – lower than that in the UK (34.1) and India (35.7) – indicating generally lower levels of inequality. 58%, though

KELSEY: Prison abolition is the radical goal that envisions a world without cages, using the principles of transformative justice to work towards a society built on care, mutual aid and community accountability. Since prisons were first introduced, t

In my view, Extinction Rebellion (XR) is a worthy successor to Climate Camp and has been willing to learn from the latter’s experience. Ten years ago, Marc Hudson was quoted in Red Pepper magazine saying that Climate Camp did not have local avenues f

by Ananda Devi, translated by Jeffrey Zuckerman (Les Fugitives, ISBN 9781999331849) lesfugitives.com Poor, old, lonely and living in a dilapidated house on London’s Portobello Road, Mary has little to look forward to until she chances upon Cub, a Bri

The rickshaw driver deftly negotiated the narrow alleyways of Varanasi, teeming with other rickshaws and motorcycles, tourists, pilgrims, priests, school-going children, masticating cows and the occasional heavily loaded mule. The rusty rickshaw clat

At the moment, my career as a political analyst involves a lot of travel to conferences and speaking engagements around the world, amounting to hundreds of thousands of miles in planes, trains and automobiles. I am probably burning several times more

‘I’m multitasking here!’ How often have you heard it – or even said it yourself? The phrase is often accompanied with a little smile of pride. A touch of: ‘Aren’t I a clever/busy/important person? Look how much I can do at once!’ Brain science has a