Daily Archives: March 19, 2012
#AQIM kidnap, hostage swap, but where is #Mauritania gendarme Ely?
The story of gendarme Ely Ould Mokhtar has been full of holes and contradictions from the outset. For Al-Qaeda to take a soldier hostage is unusual enough. For it to happen in Mauritania, where Aziz has claimed to have eradicated the AQIM threat was unremarkable, knowing his passion for the politically fantastic, but as the […]
French working class rally for their presidential hopeful
Thousands of people have turned out to rally in support France’s far-left presidential candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon. Some 30,000 people joined in a march at Paris’ Place de la Nation. Melenchon – who’s a staunch anti-capitalist -has verbally attacked France’s political elite, a move analysts say is helping him shake up the campaign. Opinion polls show […]
Slavery in Mauritania is NOT an invitation for US-backed intervention
Excellent to see CNN publish this detailed and in-depth report on modern-day slavery in Mauritania, researched covertly during a visit there in December 2011. But the extract below, from the end of the report invites a dangerous assumption: it could be interpreted as an excuse to intervene in the affairs of a sovereign nation. I believe this is […]
