Category: Sweden

The Nordic countries in a world in crisis

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By Johan Galtung

Talk at the Nordic Peoples’ Parliament in Jondal, Norway

Let us start with the crisis.

It is not a world crisis but a Western crisis. The root is simple: the Rest is catching up, and partly overtaking the West; China is catching up, and partly overtaking the USA–recovering from the blow received around 1500 from the Portuguese and the English destroying 1,000 years of buddhist-muslim trade from East China to Somalia via the rest of Asia; ending in Macao-Hong Kong (there are no Chinese enclaves in Portugal-England).

The West is outcompeted. The crisis is partly economic and partly a desperate Western effort, indeed Obama’s effort, to cling to hegemony.Read More »

An innocent victim of our sanctions against Iran

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Or how “high” politics are connected to the lives of Iranians even abroad

By Jan Oberg

I’ve come to know a young Iranian student here in Sweden. Fortunately he came before the discriminatory law that forces students from outside EU to pay for their studies while those from inside the EU can study freely.

Kourosh – a name I use for the purpose of this article – is a very modest, diligent and polite young man. He has quickly learned to talk everyday Swedish. He sees his life in Sweden as a great privilege and an opportunity to go back to his native Iran and make it a better place. Since I have applied for a visa to go to Iran, I’ve been eager to meet with him and listen to what he can tell me about Iranian culture and about how life has been for his family. The father is a truck driver turned farmer; the family is not among the poorest but also not in the upper class. Read More »

Nya hot ökar risken för krig mot Iran

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Av Sören Sommelius

EU förbjuder all oljeimport från Iran, och Iran hotar med att som svar blockera all trafik av olja genom Hormuzsundet. Till TT uttrycker utrikesminister Carl Bildt viss skepsis inför beslutet, risken är att vi ”glider in i en konfrontation som ytterst kan sluta i krig – och dit vill ingen”.

På sin blogg Alla dessa dagar är Bildt ännu mera kritisk till sanktionerna, som han menar möjligen kan påverka Irans ekonomi men knappast landets politik.

Men varför deltar Sverige då i beslutet??Read More »