For the first time since September 2006, Mahmoud Abu Rahma, a leading figure in the Palestinian human rights group Al Mezan, has been granted permission to travel outside Gaza. More than 30 applications to travel had previously been turned down by the Israeli authorities, and it was not until German diplomats made appeals on his behalf that he was finally allowed to visit Europe.

Mahmoud Abu Rahma, Gazan human rights worker, has been calling on European Union diplomats to hold Israel accountable for its attacks on innocent Gazans during the war it waged in late 2008 and early 2009. Yet convincing the EU to take a more robust line against Israel...

Despite being nominally committed to defending human rights at all times, the Union has been prepared to sacrifice lofty principles when grubbier issues of geopolitics and economics are at stake. Kenneth Roth, New York-based director of Human Rights Watch expresses both hopes and fears about the direction in which the EU is heading.

Q: Is the EU paying sufficient heed to human rights in institutional reforms it is undertaking?

A: We have recognised and favoured the need for institutional change in that the EU was punching way below its weight. The reason for that really was two-fold. First, the requirement of ...

To halt the planet’s declining biodiversity and loss of critical natural resources, both the economy we live in and communication about science needs to be changed profoundly, says ecologist Louise Vet.

We presently live in a linear “take, make and waste” economy in which natural resources are running out and ecosystems are being destroyed, says Louise Vet, a professor of evolutionary ecology in The Netherlands.

But this clash between economic and ecological interests could be reconciled by implementing a so-called “circular economy”, she argues.

Increasingly many figures in Russia are now urging the Government to resort to tougher measures than those announced by Moscow in 2008 in response to Bush’s 2007 BMD plans in Europe, writes Vladimir Kozin.

At first Russia responded positively to United States President Barack Obama’s change of course in the Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) policy announced by him on 17 September 2009. The country even hinted at reconsidering its own military response measures that were articulated by President Dmitry Medvedev in November 2008. Moscow is worried that ...

As a son of Icelandic parents and someone who has always been identified with Iceland, I have followed its banking crisis with interest and concern, writes Donald K. Johnson.

The decision by the President of Iceland, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, not to counter-sign the Bill that was passed by Iceland’s Parliament has resulted in a referendum scheduled for 6 March. Icelanders will approve or reject the terms of the state guarantee on the 3.8-billion-euro loan (5.3 billion US dollars) to Iceland from the UK/Netherlands. If approved, each family in Iceland will be assuming 86,000 dollars of debt to the UK and

A steady stream of evidence shows that children are faring poorly in today’s world. Child welfare advocate Christina Ivazes considers the problems facing the young.

As American innovations spread across the globe, so do many of America’s challenges. In a free-market society, where health care is a profit-driven industry, services connected with this industry have problematic potential. Over several decades, and billions of marketing dollars later, an unregulated and lucratively symptomatic model has become so accepted and popularised by American society that...

A nation’s good international reputation benefits its ability to do business abroad as well as its ability to attract inward tourism and investment. Finland is uniquely placed to capitalise on its four Cs.

A prestigious work group under the chairmanship of Jorma Ollila has for about a year been working actively to brand Finland. The project has inspired curiosity as well as criticism. The critics often say that a polished image of our country does not help our cause and that marketing campaigns don’t matter for Finland.

Such statements are both true and false. By interpreting national brand to mean the same thing as national reputation, then the concept becomes a little clearer.

At both individual and collective levels, responding to the world’s severest problems without contributing to their escalation demands nothing less than cautious optimism, writes James O’Connor.

“The horror!” The horror!”, exclaimed Colonel Kurtz in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, and in the reworking of the novel as the film Apocalypse Now. There are plenty of horrors around, in real life as in fiction. The environmental horrors we have brought about, for example, demand radical action, something that might seem less likely now considering the outcome of the recent Copenhagen climate summit.

Media discussion of the Espoo shootings has not pursued the pertinent question raised on the day by Chief Inspector Tero Haapala of Finland’s National Bureau of Investigation: whether, in hindsight, a simple restraining order was ever the right response for a known criminal with convictions for illegal firearms possession making credible threats to kill against a former lover? Instead, the debate has strayed, unhelpfully, toward quite spurious questions over criminality and the deportation of non-Finnish citizens.

Yet to follow Haapala’s more constructive critical comment, one might also question that if a restraining order was the right response, how effectively was it being supervised by the police ...

Citizens,

The past year’s economic picture was bleak. We can look to the year that is just beginning with cautious hope, although the international economic situation is still marked by considerable uncertainty. Owing to the structure of Finland’s economy, recovery may take somewhat longer in our country. Continued joint action is therefore needed.

The current recession is also causing high unemployment, which is still rising. The number of people who are out of work may reach 300,000 this year, and even more seasonally. Many companies have already laid off workers, and it depends on future development what will happen to these nearly 80,000 people and their jobs.