World News Insights: Opinion Articles

As a dual citizen who hangs out with polyglots carrying several passports each, I can attest that identity is a complicated thing. It’ll never be captured adequately by lists of checkboxes — from age and sex to race, religion, profession or indeed citizenship. Just glance across Europe right now. …

Emmanuel Macron is within striking distance of a historic re-election as French president after clinching a first-round lead against his far-right nemesis Marine Le Pen. Investors should be relieved, but not complacent. Round two on April 24 will be a close-run affair. Early results show France…

Well that was weird. On Tuesday I wrote a column saying it was unlikely that Elon Musk will buy Twitter Inc. On Wednesday I left on a family vacation. On Thursday, for my sins, Elon Musk announced an offer to buy Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash. 420 is a weed joke. I suppose this increased…

The Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s discussion with The Atlantic continues to stimulate reflections on the renewal and invigoration of a new religious discourse. What the Crown Prince has been calling for is a new approach to addressing religious matters and their functions and concerns. A…

Sri Lanka’s President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has a fetish for fiasco. The Indian Ocean island is a basket case for several reasons. Covid-19 decimated dollar earnings from tourism; the resulting increase in social spending ballooned public debt. Then came the war in Ukraine, worsening shortages of food…

America is following an “arsenal of democracy” strategy in Ukraine: It has avoided direct intervention against the Russian invaders, while working with allies and partners to provide the Kyiv government with money and guns. That strategy, reminiscent of US support for Britain in 1940-41, has…

Four years ago when Imran Khan emerged as prime minister of Pakistan many saw him as a breath of fresh air in a political system marked by the stink of corruption and ineptitude. In many ways Imran was an outsider. First, unlike his predecessors he was neither a Sindhi nor a Punjabi but a Pathan…

Elon Musk wants to buy Twitter Inc. for $43 billion — but he has only about $3 billion in cash on hand. Most of the fortune of the world’s richest man, which adds up to some $259 billion, is tied up in Tesla Inc. and other nifty things. So if he’s serious about a takeover — and there is ample…

On Tuesday, news broke that inflation continued to worsen in March, as consumer prices rose by 8.5 percent from a year earlier, the sharpest increase since 1981. While so-called core inflation — which strips out the volatile prices of fuel and food, both of which have surged because of Russia’s…

Almost a month before 15th of May, the day parliamentary elections will be held, Lebanon appears to face its most dangerous juncture. These elections will either take the country towards consolidating the Iranian mullah regime’s hegemony or, despite difficulties, it will put the country on a path…

For a few days late last month, “a cocktail of high atmospheric pressure, little wind and peak farming season emissions” left London with more-polluted air than Beijing, Bloomberg News reported. These worse-than-Beijing episodes are likely to occur more and more frequently — not because London’s…

There’s a trite expression that perfectly encapsulates how corporate leaders should now be viewing their intense dependence on Chinese production: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. After Covid-19 first struck in China, shuttering factories there before disruptions spread…