Fownhope’s Heart of Oak Society traces its roots to the age of friendly societies, when communities provided their own safety net. Its anniversary celebrations reveal a tradition still very much alive, says MARK SEDDON
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A worldwide prohibition could be on the cards
Despite the tensions, the majority of UN member states in the world are united against nuclear weapons, writes BILL KIDD
ANGUS REID explains the significance of Cuba’s egalitarian in letter and spirit Family Code and the pertinent lessons it holds for democracies anywhere in the world
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NICK WRIGHT considers how the isolation of Israel and a new film on the controversial Italian communist leader are creating new reference points for Italy’s left
CARLOS MARTINEZ says Cuba’s achievements in the face of a criminal blockade are startling, but the island’s future if the United States succeeds in crushing it looks bleak
AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN reports that far-right MPs who mobbed the event organised by Hadash may have helped raise awareness of the brutality of the Israeli right
I DON’T want to panic the imbibers among you, so I should explain straight away that the title of this article refers to the upcoming conclusion of the United Nations Conference on a treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons in July of this year.
To explain, the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is almost 50 years old now and many have felt that the nuclear-armed states have remained just too comfortable in keeping the quinquennial NPT cycles going without any definitive action on their part. Only lip service is paid to the limited, yet valid, objectives of the NPT.
So it should be no surprise that in reaction to this, a plethora of nonnuclear-armed states banded together with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to hold conferences on the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons.
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