Mike Moore, who died on 2 February 2020 aged 71, was a former NZ Prime Minister (although that was short-lived at 59 days) and a former director general of the WTO. He was charming, witting and engaging and an excellent person to interview. I interviewed him in 2007 when he was in Dubai and I was at Khaleej Times. Here is what he said. FTAs pr...
New Zealand PM bows out
Here's an article from The Economist which, while talking about John Key's resignation, states that NZ is "one of the most successful countries in the world. While this is debatable, there is no doubt that Key has had successes- namely international recognition- along with failures, housing, immigration and the environment. We have yet to see whether the new Prime Minister, John English, will have the same success.
The much-heralded Middle East Peace Plan from the US will be released today (Tuesday 28 January). Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's beleaguered Prime Minister is at the White House for the announcement. No one from the Palestinians have been invited to the White House and no one from the Palestinians was involved in putting it together. This, despite th...
I wrote this for Behavioural Shift (www.behaviouralshift.com) What can the "darling doyens" – (well, post 50) expect from the coming year? What does Behavioral Shift predict? (1) Employment: We are likely to see a greater number of older people in the work force over the next decade, starting from this year, in the most developed societies. More pe...
I often get asked about Iran and the US and if the two will engage in war. Yes, is the answer, over time. The shooting down of a Ukrainian aircraft carrying many Iranians, many of whom lived in Canada, has merely delayed the inevitable. A US war with Iran. After living in the Middle East for some years and writing about the politics of the region, ...
Lebanon has a new government, finally. This was announced only a few hours ago. But have the protestors, who wanted an end to corruption and nepotism, really won? Is the new government significantly different from the old one? Al Jazeera reported the new government like this. Lebanon has formed a new government, its presidency announced after Hezbo...
Lebanon is in political and economic turmoil. The protests against corrupt governments continue and have turned violent. Poverty is a way of life in Lebanon now and cash can now be withdrawn up to USD 300 a month, not enough for businesses, and many individuals, to survive. Many Lebanese live abroad, in the UAE, the US and the UK in particular. How...
The threat of war in the Middle East is closer than ever, mainly because tensions between Iran and the US are rising. Nobody ever wants war; nobody will benefit; all sides will lose. And it will be a cost to all countries involved. Is it worth it? I read this today about the cost of war to the US. Here are eight principles that the US should rememb...
The death of Oman's 50-year ruler Sultan Qaboos raises many questions, the most important of which is: "Will his successor, Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said, continue Sultan Qaboos' work?" This entails taking not only an impartial approach to politics but being a negotiator and mediator. This balancing act is described well in the following article...
The death of Oman's Sultan Qaboos bin said bin Taimur al Said on 10 January 2020 is not only a blow to Oman but to the entire Gulf region. He ruled the small Sultanate of Oman, which has about 4.5 million people, for five decades and transformed the Oman from being a backwater in the Arabian Gulf to a thriving community with oil and the country wit...
There is confusion about what will happen in the Middle East, as tension between the US and Iran escalates. In response to the killing of the head of the Quds Defence Force, Qasem Soleimani, Iran has attacked an US-led coalition airbase in Iraq. It appears no one was killed, and President Trump is expected to make a statement soon. What a mess! Wha...
The US and Iran conflict continues. The fallout from the killing of Qasem Soleimani in Iraq last week is likely to continue for weeks, months and even years. What it means for the Middle East is unknown but it is likely that armed conflict within the region will follow. There is no doubt that Iran will avenge the killing in some war, although outri...
Following the killing of Iran's rockstar commander, Qasem Soleimani, the second most important person in Iran, by the US, war in the Middle East is that much more likely. Which country will side with whom? Even though the UAE and Saudi Arabia are allies of the US when it comes to the possible destruction of the Middle East, their alignments may wel...
The UK election result has many people considering the future of democracy in the country. How is the democratic will best represented? Is it by the older or the younger generation? Is it by the urban or rural populace? Or is it by the Northerners or Southerners? In this column, I will focus on the first of these: how age determined the outcome of ...
One issue that caught my attention over the last few weeks is that of Saudi women no longer being segregated in restaurants. Women and families no longer have separate entrances from men, nor do they have to sit behind partitions. Sounds great? In practice, at certain restaurants and hotels the unwillingness to implement a segregation policy has be...
The protests in Lebanon are ongoing, although we hear less about them. The protestors are not only railing against their poor standard of living, with the price of goods becoming more expensive, but also against corrupt politicians. When I was there, I was told by numerous people, who were supporters of all sides, that the politicians accepted loan...
Although I've just arrived back from Vietnam, I've been following what is going on in the Middle East. Most of Asia is deeply unstable. You just don't hear about it in the same way that you do the Middle East. I presume it's because this region is more important geo-politically than Asia to the rest of the world, particularly with its abundance of ...
The issue of refugees has been an ongoing problem since the war in Syria began eight and a half years ago. There are Syrian refugees, and others, heading to Europe as well as many making Lebanon and Turkey their home. Now there are Kurdish refugees who are victims of Turkey's ongoing onslaught in Northern Syria, about 10,000 and half of them childr...
Living in Vietnam has interesting cross-cultural insights. I've also lived in Dubai, London, New Zealand, and, for a shorter time in the US. The approach to age is different in all these places. In Vietnam, it seems that anybody over 30 years (and Westerners look older than Vietnamese) is considered "old" and you are expected to retire by 50. Famil...
Do you have to conform to survive in the Middle East? By conform I mean abiding by the religious norms and to the dress code. The answer is a resounding "yes" but is that not true of most societies? This is what I wrote on conforming for Behavioural Shift. Unwilling to conform? That's what happens as you age Is the "younger generation" confo...
We can read about the complexities of Yemen and it sounds such a scary place. It isn't. I spent three weeks there in 1998, and some of our travelling companions were kidnapped and killed in the process of being freed. That rarely happened in Yemen as those who were kidnapped were usually released after the kidnapping ransom- usually in the form of ...