Monday August 11, 2025 / 17 , Safar , 1447
Header Logo
Leading The Way
search-icon
Footer Header
search-icon
SG
Saudi Arabia
Opinion
Discover Saudi
World
Sports
Business
Life
Advertisements
search-logo
  • Home
  • Opinion
  • Editorial
Opinion
311 - 320 from 772 . In "Opinion / Editorial"
The EU’s Iranian blunder
THE European Union’s insistence on standing by President Barack Obama’s utterly flawed 2015 nuclear accord is both purblind and cynical. The dim-wittedness arises from the agreement’s fundamental failure to impose genuine restraints, not simply on the ayatollahs’ nuclear armament ambitions but also on their sponsorship of terrorism and malign interference in the affairs of their Arab neighbors. US-led international sanctions had brought the Iranian economy to its knees and driven it to negotiate. There was a real opportunity to persuade Tehran to change its aggressive ways and rejoin the company of moderate nations. Unfortunately the Iranian negotiators over some 20 months played a blinder in terms of negotiating, advancing and then retreating from points of agreement and finding...
October 05, 2018

The EU’s Iranian blunder

Time to do better, on an international scale
THERE was a telling piece of news amid media reports of the destruction of the Indonesian coastal town of Palu six days ago. A powerful earthquake combined with a devastating tsunami turned earth to liquid under people’s feet before the inundation struck, killing upwards of 1,500 people and affecting the lives of at least 1.6 million others.Journalists who watched the police and security forces patrolling the ruins of this once vibrant and populous town saw desperate citizens who had lost everything picking through the ruins of shops and homes taking food and water and anything that could sustain them. And while they did so, the police and soldiers turned a blind eye. Their vigilance was reserved for criminal looters who were stealing cash, valuables or equipment.The tragedy is that...
October 04, 2018

Time to do better, on an international scale

The Macedonian name game
Macedonians on both sides of the argument have made a mess of their debate over the country’s name change. Prime Minister Zoran Zaev held a nonbinding referendum at the weekend in which the question was whether or not the country should alter its name to “North Macedonia”. More than 90 percent of those who voted backed the idea. However, only a third of eligible voters took part in the referendum, which, it is being said, renders the result invalid.The reason for the low turnout appeared to be a call for a boycott from opposition parties. However, if those against that name change have now done their math, even allowing for the indifference of a section of the electorate, they may be concluding that had they campaigned for a “No” vote, the abstentions and the minority of those...
October 03, 2018

The Macedonian name game

Libya: The perils of ambiguity
It was hugely illustrative of the madness currently gripping Libya that a passing reference by the country’s foreign minister Mohamed Siala in a speech to the UN General Assembly should have been taken as a request for the UN to put peace-keeping boots on the ground.What Siala actually said was that he wanted an expanded role for the local UN body, the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL). But because he did not spell out what he meant, commentators in Libya immediately concluded he was calling for UN troops. Despite his reported denial 24 hours later, Siala’s comments have stirred up something of a hornet’s nest. The ambiguity of his statement has unleashed typical local suspicions. Libyans no longer take any information at face value. They generally assume there is some...
October 02, 2018

Libya: The perils of ambiguity

India should talk to Pakistan
If everything had gone smoothly, foreign ministers of India and Pakistan would have held discussions in New York last week on the sidelines of the current session of the UN General Assembly. But the course of true diplomacy never runs smoothly, especially in South Asia and the hopes of a meeting that would have been the first between the two foreign ministers in three years collapsed as abruptly as the offer of talks from Pakistan’s new Prime Minister Imran Khan. But this time the reasons cited by one party, India, for cancelling the meeting on Sept. 21, a day after it formally accepted the invitation, looked as silly as they were unconvincing.True, a government reserves the right to change its decision factoring in the latest developments. But the developments India cited were anything...
October 01, 2018

India should talk to Pakistan

Corbyn goes after Israel
ThatJeremy Corbyn’s Labor Party, which may soon govern the UK, says it will recognize a Palestinian state as soon as it takes office, shows there are British politicians who are not afraid of talking about Palestine and Palestinian rights.In his keynote speech at Labor’s annual party conference, Corbyn lambasted Israel, saying that “the continuing occupation, the expansion of illegal settlements and the imprisonment of Palestinian children are an outrage”. He also called Israel’s recently approved Nation-State Law “discriminatory” and had strong words for Palestinian casualties at the Gaza border.Following Corbyn’s speech, the conference adopted a motion by an overwhelming majority to call for an arms embargo against Israel due to Israel’s response to border protests. The...
September 30, 2018

Corbyn goes after Israel

Trump brings back the two states
ISRAELI Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must have been taken aback when US President Donald Trump said he wanted a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the first time as president he has supported such an outcome. Not only is Netanyahu a sworn enemy of two states but since taking office in 2017, Trump has not offered to give the Palestinians the time of day, let alone a state. He declared Jerusalem the capital of Israel; moved the US embassy to Jerusalem; canceled the hereditary right of return for Palestinian refugees; cut all aid to the UN agency on Palestinian refugees, accusing it of “anti-Israel bias” as well as direct aid to the West Bank and Gaza, including suspending $25 million in aid for hospitals that serve Palestinians in East Jerusalem; withdrew from...
September 29, 2018

Trump brings back the two states

Hunting the judge
THE sexual misconduct allegations against Judge Brett Kavanaugh, President Trump’s pick for the key vacant seat on the US Supreme Court, are extremely serious. But the very manner in which these accusations have surfaced must fuel the suspicion that the US political establishment has opened up a new line of attack against an elected president whom they loathe. In a telephone interview on Tuesday in which members of the Senate Judiciary Committee questioned Kavanaugh, the judge denied all the allegations, one of which dates back to when he was a teenager in high school. He described them as “absurd”, “ridiculous” and coming from a “twilight zone”. He refused to speculate on why his accusers should have made their allegations. But he described what was happening as “smear...
September 28, 2018

Hunting the judge

A jumbo gaffe
There are two problems about Qatar’s gift of a $500 million luxury Boeing 747 to Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The first problem is that the emirate should have thought it was a sensible gift at this time. The second difficulty is that the Turkish leader should have seen fit to accept it.Every sovereign state has the right to dispose of its largesse as it thinks fit, providing this generosity is not actually directed toward the support of international terrorists and other criminals. Qatar has a sad record of sustaining the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) throughout the Islamic world. It has argued unsuccessfully that the Brotherhood is a moderate political movement seeking change through the ballot box. Yet the record shows that behind the polite and smiling MB politicians there hides...
September 27, 2018

A jumbo gaffe

The Kremlin takes over
The downing last week by Basher Assad’s forces of a Russian spy plane has clearly infuriated the Kremlin. The Syrian army used a Russian-supplied missile to shoot down the Russian Ilyushin Il-20 electronic intelligence-gathering aircraft. The destruction of this plane appears to have been a clever sting operation by the Israelis who had mounted an airstrike on Latakia at precisely the time the spy plane had been in the same airspace.The upshot is that the Russians have taken over control of Syria’s air defenses. It is hard to believe Moscow would announce the long-delayed supply of four batteries of S-300 surface-to-air missiles without ensuring that they alone would be responsible for their operation. Indeed this is borne out by Russian plans to upgrade Syrian air defense command...
September 26, 2018

The Kremlin takes over

< Previous Next >
footer logo
COPYRIGHT © 2025 WWW.SAUDIGAZETTE.COM.SA - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Powered by NewsPress
NEWS CATEGORY
saudi arabia world opinion business sports esports life
COMPANY
advertisements about us Epaper contact us Archive privacy policy