Bangladesh: R&AW engineered attacks on the Buddhists

Posted on | oktober 1, 2012 | No Comments

According to different news reports mob had torched and vandalized the Buddhist village in one of the worst religious attacks in Bangladesh which appeared to have been triggered by a Facebook posting allegedly defaming the Quran.

According to bdnews24, on 30th September 2012, seven Buddhist Viharas, around 30 houses and shops were torched in the attacks that started at 11:30pm and lasted until around 4am on 1st of October. More than a hundred houses and shops were also reportedly attacked, vandalized and looted.

My sources inside Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) shared sensational inside story and background of the per-planned attack on the Buddhists in Cox’s Bazaar’s Ramu Upazila.
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Micro Credit, Macro Debt: The Industry of Poverty

Posted on | oktober 1, 2012 | No Comments

Introduction

The Industry of Poverty has many faces, as it manifests itself in every society on this globe, its effects are similarly devastating for the poor. What constitutes poverty? When is a person considered poor or low income? Is a person poor when he/she has to live off of less than one (1) USD a day? Is a person poor when she/he has only one meal per day? Is a person poor when she/he has no access to the internet, social media, newspapers and an occasional holiday? Or is a person poor because he cannot afford designer clothes?

Theory I: Poverty is in my opinion a state of being determined by objective criteria, more specific the Maslow Pyramid: food, shelter are among others, considered the most vital elements of survival. Higher up in the Maslow pyramid, the needs of the individual are apparently less physiological, more psychological and sociological, in other words less objectifiable, more part of the subjective, the self.
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Can We Measure Politics and Political Development?

Posted on | oktober 1, 2012 | No Comments

Political Development politics of developmentMeasuring how countries perform is all the rage. Everyone from the World Bank to Bertelsmann to Africa’s most famous entrepreneur does it, producing indices on things like how competitive economies are, how hungry populations are, how free the press is, how risky investments are, and how corrupt public sectors are.

Many of these indices are directly relevant for people working in development. They help countries determine how they compare with other states and where they ought to improve their performance. And they help aid agencies decide where and how to invest their resources.

Indicators tracking everything from GDP per capita to poverty to governance are ubiquitous across the field, especially among international professionals. Such numbers are used to determine need, priorities, and strategies (such as whether a government ought to be funded directly).
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The Riot of the Faithful

Posted on | oktober 1, 2012 | No Comments

The fall out from the Pussy Riot scandal continues unabated. But the activities are less from Riot’s supporters, and more from their detractors. Indeed, it seems that Pussy Riot’s “punk prayer” in Christ Our Savior Cathedral has stirred a hornet’s nest, and now all the little bees are angrily buzzing about, thrusting their tiny stingers into side of the so-called “enemies of the faith.” When I noted some of the activities of Orthodox activists in my last post, I assumed that their antics were more flashes in the pan. Now it’s clear that I grossly underestimated the fragility of the sensibilities of a minority of Orthodox followers. Perhaps it’s because I never thought that the religious fanaticism that I often witness in the US, let alone that among the ultra-Orthodox in Israel and elements in the Muslim world, would find expression in Russia.
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Neo-Nazism in Greece

Posted on | oktober 1, 2012 | No Comments

Flag of the Nazi PartyIS NEO-NAZISM ‘GANG ACTIVITY’ OR A POLITICAL MOVEMENT?

In a recent article, THE GUARDIAN noted that the Greek political party represented in parliament is more like a criminal organization than a party. This is the sort of hollow analysis that some writers engaged in about Italy’s Fascist Party and of Germany’s Nazi party before they took power, given that Nazis and Fascists had paramilitary operations that were the core of their political movement. The mere presence of paramilitary organization does not necessarily mean that the sponsoring political party is any less political.

Such analysis underestimates the mass appeal of neo-Fascism and neo-Nazism not just in Greece in 2012, but throughout the West. I have written as much in an article where I suggested that the return of Fascism/Nazism are possible against a global political economy that engenders capital concentration and downward social mobility, and against the background of a Western clash with Islam at a time that the world’s economic center will be shifting from West (EU and US) to East (China, India, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia). In short, the downward social mobility of the middle class make it feel suffocated and without any prospects for its own and their children’s future.
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