Author Archives: DemDigest

Burma’s Rohingya crisis – what you need to know

     

Officially, Myanmar’s government does not recognize the Rohingya as lawful citizens, National Geographic reports: The government claims they were brought to Rakhine from Bangladesh during the time when Myanmar was… Read more »

Is Western democracy ‘threatening suicide’?

     

  The decline of Europe’s center-left has allowed populists to make inroads, which is a problem for democracy, argues Sheri Berman, a professor of political science at Barnard College and… Read more »

Disinformation vs. democracy: how to ‘Shatter The House Of Mirrors’

     

Vladimir Putin’s Russia is engaged in a well-financed and determined campaign to undermine democratic political and social institutions as well as international alliances, and to remove resistance to Russia’s foreign… Read more »

Time for the West to ‘get real’ about Ukraine

     

Officials in the central Ukrainian city of Cherkasy say a municipal councilor has been shot dead just hours after the broadcast of a television interview he gave about corruption within… Read more »

Burma’s Rohingya refugee crisis fits pattern of faltering reforms, weak leadership

     

Myanmar’s unwillingness to deal with the Rohingya refugee crisis fits a broader pattern of faltering reforms and indecisive leadership, the FT’s John Reed writes: The most serious crisis since Myanmar… Read more »

Navalny arrested: ‘Russians are ready for freedom’

     

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who aims to unseat Vladimir Putin in presidential elections next year, was arrested ahead of a rally on Friday, raising the possibility of a month… Read more »

Hong Kong activists demand full democracy on Occupy anniversary

     

Hundreds of protesters in Hong Kong on Thursday demanded full democracy outside government headquarters, speaking out against China’s suppression of civil liberties on the third anniversary of a major pro-democracy… Read more »

Venezuela: the right way to do regime change

     

Given the U.S. administration’s strong rhetoric against Nicolas Maduro’s Venezuelan dictatorship, it seems odd that the U.S. has not yet used many of the non-military arrows in its policy quiver,… Read more »

Liberia’s elections signal ‘irreversible’ democratic course

     

Liberia’s upcoming presidential and legislative elections will mark the first peaceful, democratic handover of a head of state to a successor since 1944, said President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, signaling an irreversible… Read more »